The Navy has begun releasing documents from the investigation into the 1963 sinking of the USS Thresher, the deadliest submarine disaster in U.S. history.

The first of the documents released were 300 pages from the official inquiry, and reveal that the sub was in 'dangerous condition' if it flooded with salt water in deep depths prior to the disaster on April 10, 1963.

The loss of the nuclear-powered submarine and all 129 men aboard during a test dive in the Atlantic Ocean delivered a blow to national pride during the Cold War and became the impetus for safety improvements.

'The loss of Thresher was a defining event for the submarine service,' said Rear Adm. William Houston, director of the undersea warfare division in the office of the chief of naval operations at the Pentagon.

The Navy released documents on Wednesday detailing the sinking of the USS Thresher on April 10, 1963

The Thresher story was already well known. It had undergone sea trials and was back in the ocean for deep-dive testing about 220 miles off Massachusetts' Cape Cod.

The first sign of trouble was a garbled message about a 'minor difficulty' after the 279-foot (85-meter) submarine descended to more than 800 feet.

The crew indicated it was attempting to empty ballast tanks in an effort to surface. Sailors on an accompanying rescue ship heard something about the 'test depth.'

Then the sailors listened as the sub disintegrated under the crushing pressure of the sea.

'The loss of Thresher was a defining event for the submarine service,' said Rear Adm. William Houston, director of the undersea warfare division in the office of the chief of naval operations at the Pentagon

The Navy inquiry found weaknesses in the design and construction of the first-in-class nuclear-powered submarine, which had been built at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine, and based in Groton, Connecticut.

The documents released Wednesday included the timeline of the sinking, evidence lists, reports, testimony and correspondence. But there were some redactions.

Even more than 50 years later, technical details including the test depth were redacted.

In the documents, the Navy said it believes an interior pipe burst and caused electrical problems that caused an emergency shutdown of the nuclear reactor.

The documents noted that the commanding officer's evaluation of the first year of operations - before additional work was conducted at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard -- included praise for the submarine.

But he also said the submarine was overly complex in many areas and he noted a vulnerability of the auxiliary salt water system.

'He stated, 'In my opinion, the most dangerous condition that exists in Thresher is the danger of salt water flooding while at or near test depth,' the report said.

The brazed joints in pipes were a special concern, and many electrical panels were not adequately protected from sea water in the event of a leak, the report said.

The Navy inquiry found weaknesses in the design and construction of the first-in-class nuclear-powered submarine, which had been built at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine, and based in Groton, Connecticut

Even more than 50 years later, technical details including the test depth were redacted in the documents

Resting on the ocean floor at a depth of 8,500 feet, the Thresher looks as though it went through a 'shredding machine' and is spread out over a mile, University of Rhode Island oceanographer Robert Ballard told The Associated Press in 2013. Ballard used his 1985 discovery of the RMS Titanic as a Cold War cover for surveying the Thresher.

Not everyone was satisfied with the Navy's conclusions.

Retired Capt. James Bryant, commander of a Thresher-class submarine, requested the documents under the federal Freedom of Information Act and ultimately went to court to demand the documents release. He thinks theres more to be learned from the documents, most of them classified.

Michael Shafer, whose father and uncle both died on the Thresher, said some of the families need to review the documents to see for themselves and fully understand what happened. His suspicion is that the Navy was pushing the limits and placing personnel at risk during the Cold War.

Emblem adopted in 1960 for the USS Thresher

'I want to know the truth, the whole truth. Not some smoke screen from the Navy,' he said Wednesday from St. Petersburg, Florida.

A judge in February ordered the Navy to release the documents. The coronavirus pandemic delayed the review of the documents. Eventually, more than 1,000 pages of documents will be released.

If there was a silver lining, it was that the tragedy so shook the Navy that it accelerated safety improvements and created a program called SUBSAFE, an extensive series of design modifications, training and other improvements.

One submarine has sunk since then, the USS Scorpion in 1968, and it was not SUBSAFE-certified, the Navy said.

Nuclear-powered submarine the 'USS Thresher' steers through the sea, early 1960s, during a test

Some of the improvements included better welding techniques, and the main ballast tank blow system that helps a submarine reach the surface was made more effective.

Joy MacMillan, one of four siblings who lost their father, the submarines chief radioman, said its helpful to know the tragedy spurred safety improvements. But its still important for the families to have the documents, and some closure.

'After being 57 years in the dark, its time for the families to know any and all information so that we can put it away. We can say, `Mistakes were made. Lets move on,' MacMillan, of Brentwood, New Hampshire, said Wednesday.

The sinking was the first of a string of calamities in 1963.

The March on Washington was a turning point in the Civil Rights movement, but the Vietnam conflict grew, white supremacists bombed the 16th Street Baptist Church in Alabama and President John F. Kennedy was assassinated.
https://www.aish.com/jw/s/Alaska-Airlines-and-the-Jews-of-Yemen.html

Despite enormous danger, 28 Alaska Airlines pilots made some 380 flights and airlifted 48,818 refugees to Israel.

The story of the modern exodus of Beta Israel the Jews of Ethiopia during Operations Moses and Solomon, which together airlifted some 22,000 Ethiopian Jews to Israel, is well known. Less well known is the dramatic exodus of over 48,000 Jews from Yemen. Almost unknown is the role played by Alaska Airlines.

No one knows for certain when the first Jews came to Yemen. Local legend has them being sent as traders by King Solomon. In any event, Jews have lived in Yemen for many centuries. In that poverty-stricken country, the Jews were the poorest and lowest of citizens living in contempt and on sufferance as dhimmis. However, in their synagogues and schools, they taught their children to learn and write Hebrew. They never forgot their faith, protected the traditions, observed the Sabbath and passed the Torah and Talmud to each succeeding generation.

For the Jews life in Yemen became intolerable.

Following World War I, when Yemen became independent, life in that Muslim country for the Jews became intolerable. Anti-Semitic laws were revived; Jews were not permitted to walk on pavements; in court a Jews evidence was not accepted against a Muslims; Jewish orphans had to be converted to Islam. Some Jews were able to escape to Palestine but most were trapped.

From Despair to Danger

In 1947, following the United Nations vote to partition Palestine, the situation of the Jews in Yemen turned from despair to physical danger. Arab rioters in the adjacent port of Aden, then a British Crown colony and now part of Yemen, killed 82 Jews and torched the Jewish quarter. The establishment of the State of Israel on May 14, 1948 and Israels War of Independence increasingly endangered the Yemeni Jews as it did in all Arab countries. It was not, however, until May 1949, when the Imam of Yemen unexpectedly agreed to permit all Jews to leave his country that they were able to flee. They longed to return to Zion if only they had the means. At that time, slightly over 49,000 Jews lived in Yemen.

As the War of Independence ended in early 1949, Israel was devastated and virtually bankrupt. Notwithstanding, David Ben-Gurion, Israels first Prime Minister, defying logic and the advice of his economic advisors, ordered the immediate and rapid Ingathering of the Exiles. Where would Israel get the money? Go to the Jews in the Diaspora and ask them for the money, Ben-Gurion answered the skeptics.

Airplanes Needed

Egypt had closed the Suez Canal to the Jews of Yemen; they would have to be transported by air to Israel. The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC), the international Jewish humanitarian aid organization, agreed to fund the Yemenite exodus and organize the airlift, but they needed aircraft.

Photo: Al Taylor/ Courtesy of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee

Alaska Airlines was founded in 1932 when Mac McGee purchased a used three passenger Stinson and started an air charter business in Alaska. With the arrival of James Wooten as president in 1947, the airline began to purchase surplus planes from the U.S. Government and within a year became the worlds largest charter airline.

It would take at least $50,000 to set up the charter, cash that the Airline did not have.

The JDC approached Wooten and asked if Alaska Airlines would agree to accept the Yemen airlift. Wooten wanted Alaska Air to take on the mission of mercy but Ray Marshall, Chairman of the Board, was cool. Marshall felt the deal was a waste of the Airlines time and money. It would take at least $50,000 to set up the charter, cash that the Airline did not have. Marshall insisted that Wooten front the funds himself.

Wooten raised the $50,000 by borrowing it from a travel agency associated with the JDC. The contract was signed and Operation On Wings of Eagles, more popularly known by its nickname, Operation Magic Carpet commenced.

On the Wings of Eagles

As Yemen would not permit the Jewish refugees to be flown out of their country, Britain had agreed to the establishment of a transit camp in the adjoining Crown Colony of Aden from which the airlift could commence. Alaska Airlines set up its base in Asmara, Eritrea with their ground crew, pilots and aircraft,  DC-4s and C-46s. The arrangement was to fly from their base in Asmara to Aden each morning, pick up their passengers in Aden and refuel. Thence fly up the Red Sea and Gulf of Aqaba to the airport in Tel Aviv, unload the refugees, fly to the safety of Cyprus for the night and return to their base in Asmara at dawn, before starting all over again. The round trip would take about 20 hours.

Yeminite Jews returning to Israel as part of Operation Magic Carpet in 1949

The aircraft as configured could not carry enough passengers or sufficient fuel. So the planes were modified by replacing the regular airline seats with rows of benches and fitting extra fuel tanks down the length of the fuselages between the benches. Aircraft intended to carry 50 passengers could now carry 120 and fuel would last a skinny extra one hour.

Meanwhile the transit camp in Aden, called Camp Geula (Redemption) was organized by the JDC and staffed by Israeli doctors and social workers under the directorship of Max Lapides, an American Jew. Also headquartered at the camp were emissaries responsible for paying various Yemeni tribal chiefs a head tax which would permit the Jewish refugees to pass through their territory

Like the biblical exodus they walked out of slavery into freedom.

As news of the evacuation reached the Jews of Yemen, they left their few possessions behind (except their prayer books and Torahs) and like the biblical exodus began to walk out of slavery into freedom. They traveled in family groups, some hundreds of miles, through wind and sandstorm, vulnerable to robbers and a hostile local population, until half-starved and destitute they reached the border with Aden where Israeli aid workers met them and transported them to the transit camp. There they encountered electricity, medicines, running water, toilets and personal hygiene for the first time. During the entire operation, the Jews of Yemen arrived at Camp Geula in a steady stream, newer ones arriving as an earlier group was airlifted out.

Photo: Courtesy of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee

Getting the Yemenite Jews to Aden was one problem, getting them on the aircraft was another. Nomads who had never seen an airplane before and never lived anywhere but in a tent, many of the immigrants were frightened and refused to board. Once reminded that their deliverance to Israel by air was prophesized in the Book of Isaiah, They shall mount up with wings like eagles, reinforced by the painting of an eagle with outstretched wings over the door of each aircraft, induced them to board the planes. Once inside many preferred sitting on the floor to unaccustomed soft seats. Keeping them from lighting fires to cook their food was a task. During the flight, about half would get sick vomiting over the extra inside fuel tanks. Notwithstanding, the Yemenites upon landing in Israel chanted blessings and burst into song.

The Irish Moses

To start up Operation Magic Carpet, Alaska Airlines sent Portland native Bob Maguire, a pilot with management experience, to the Middle East. Maguire flew between 270 and 300 hours a month. Had he been in the U.S., the limit under its aviation rules was 90 hours. Ben-Gurion called Maguire the Irish Moses. The work cost Maguire his career. He contracted a parasite that affected his heart and as a result lost his commercial pilots license in the early 1950s. Another pilot was Warren Metzger, born in Lethbridge who found time between flights to marry his flight attendant. At least one pilot, Stanley Epstein, was Jewish.

The work was dangerous. Many airplanes were shot at.

The airlift that began in June 1948 was hard on the pilots who were flying 16-hour days and hard on the planes that flew well beyond their scheduled service intervals. Fuel was difficult to come by, the desert sand wreaked havoc on the engines and flying was seat-of-the-pants with navigation by dead reckoning and eyesight.

The work was dangerous. Many airplanes were shot at. One pilot, getting a little close to Arab territory while approaching Israel, watched tracer bullets arching up towards his airplane. Another plane had a tire blown out during a bombing raid in Tel Aviv. On one occasion, Maguire was forced to land his aircraft in Egypt when it ran out of gas. The Israelis had warned all pilots that if they had to land in Arab territory, the Jewish refugees and perhaps even the crew would likely be shot. The quick-witted Maguire told airport officials he needed ambulances to take his passengers to hospital. When they asked why, he replied that his passengers had smallpox. The frightened Egyptians wanted him out of there right away. Maguire received his fuel and flew on to Tel Aviv.

Part way through the operation, the U.S. Civil Aeronautics Board forced Alaska Airlines to shut down its international charter business and a company called Near East Air Transport, whose president was James Wooten and whose pilots, and aircraft were all Alaska Airs, completed the Operation Magic Carpet airlift. Near East Air Transport was just Alaska Airlines operating under another name.

By the time Operation Magic Carpet ended in September 1950, 28 Alaska Airlines pilots had made some 380 flights and airlifted 48,818 refugees, almost Yemens entire Jewish population, to Israel. Miraculously not one death or injury occurred.

Operation Magic Carpet was kept secret for reasons of security and to prevent sabotage. It would be many months later before the public or the press would become aware of the remarkable operation.

Today, Alaska Airlines is an international carrier serving 60 cities and 3 countries. Passengers flying Alaska Airlines do not realize that they are flying with the airline that saved the Jews of Yemen.

Photo-top: Courtesy of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee
(Bloomberg Opinion) -- Nvidia Corp. wants it all. And if the Silicon Valley-based semiconductor giant is able to pull off its blockbuster acquisition of premier chip designer Arm Ltd., the deal may be the final piece it needs to dominate the industry for a generation.

Late Sunday, Nvidia and Arms parent SoftBank Group Corp. announced they reached an agreement under which the U.S.-based company will acquire Arm for about $40 billion in stock and cash. The components of the transaction include $21.5 billion in Nvidia shares, $12 billion in cash, an up to $5 billion earn-out payment for SoftBank subject to financial performance targets and $1.5 billion in equity for Arm employees. The news follows a number of media reports over the weekend that said the two parties were near a deal, and it comes after Bloomberg News reported back in July that Nvidia and SoftBank were in exclusive discussions over Arm. The companies said the board of directors of all three companies have approved the deal and expect it to close in about 18 months.

Why would Nvidia want to pay tens of billions for Arm in the biggest chip deal in history and why now? First, Nvidia has attained substantially more financial firepower, which gives it the resources to do so. It has thrived this year as demand for its products that serve the data-center and video-gaming markets have soared amid the pandemic. As a result, the companys share price has more than doubled, making it 2020s second-best performing stock in the entire S&P 500 Index after Carrier Global Corp. With Nvidias market value now at about $300 billion  roughly 50% more than the previous semiconductor king Intel Corp.  the stock part of any transaction is more palatable.

Nvidia also may be trying to take advantage of SoftBanks string of turmoil and strategy changes, which has included a large-scale disposal of assets amid pressure from investors as well as controversy over its recent aggressive derivative bets in the public markets. And now, the Japan-based conglomerates very structure may be in a state of flux as well. This weekend, the Financial Times reported SoftBanks executives have revived discussions about taking the company private, following frustration over the discount in its market value versus the aggregate value of its holdings.

Story continues

As to the rationale of the deal, an Nvidia-Arm combination has the potential to remake the entire semiconductor industry over the next decade. Nvidia has always pitched itself as a chip company built for the big ideas of the future, a provider of the key components required for all the large high-growth opportunities such as cloud-computing, artificial intelligence, robotic automation, mobile computing and internet of things  a vast array of millions of internet-connected sensors and devices.

While Nvidias graphics chips are deemed essential for a large swath of those applications, the company has a huge hole in its lineup. The company lacks a general-purpose processor chip, or central processing unit (CPU), that serves at the main conductor in all computing devices. Every time it sells a graphics processor chip, its customers need to use another companys CPU. To illustrate, earlier this year when Nvidia launched its latest artificial intelligence computer system, it was forced to use the server chip made by rival Advanced Micro Devices Inc. because it didnt have a competitive offering.

With the Arm acquisition, which provides chip designs and technologies for general processors, Nvidia would gain the ability to own the whole chip stack, across mobile phones, computers and cloud-computing data centers. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has already hinted at Arms potential. He swooned over Arms chip architecture prospects, saying it was incredibly energy efficient and has the headwind to scale into very high performance levels over time during an investor conference call last month.

The acquisition will also help Nvidia extend its technologies into new markets. Sure, the company could have just licensed an Arm chip design like everyone else, but by owning the asset it can shape its future. For example, it can leverage Arms dominant position in the smartphone market and nascent Arm-based server processors by incorporating the use of its own software and programming interfaces into Arms designs, increasing the likelihood other vendors will standardize on Nvidias chips and technologies.

An Nvidia-Arm combination is not a foregone conclusion. Because of its large size, it will require regulatory approvals from the European Union, the U.S., United Kingdom and China. While the U.S. will probably be fine with the transaction as it puts a critical chip asset under an American banner, a sign-off by China is far from certain given the recent rise in tensions between the two economic superpowers. Further, while there is little significant share overlap between Nvidias current main graphics chip businesses and those of Arms big customers such as Apple Inc., Qualcomm Inc. and Samsung Electronics Co., expect a flurry of complaints from them anyway as they will question Nvidias neutrality and the prospect of the company adding its technologies into Arm designs.

Early this month, I wrote about how Nvidia deserved the title of Americas chip leader with the impressive innovation and performance gains behind its latest chips, likely presaging many quarters of strong results ahead. But on top of the short-term bright outlook, the prospective acquisition of Arm signals Nvidia has grander designs for its future. If successful, it could mean Nvidia will remain on top for a much longer time.

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

Tae Kim is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering technology. He previously covered technology for Barron's, following an earlier career as an equity analyst.

For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion

Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.

2020 Bloomberg L.P.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 21:05:27|Editor: huaxia

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Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, attends the third central symposium on work related to Xinjiang, in Beijing, capital of China. The symposium was held on Friday and Saturday in Beijing. (Xinhua/Ju Peng)

BEIJING, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- President Xi Jinping has called for efforts to build Xinjiang featuring socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era.

Xi, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, made the remarks at the third central symposium on work related to Xinjiang, which was held on Friday and Saturday in Beijing.

Xi underlined the need to fully and faithfully implement the CPC's policies on governing Xinjiang for the new era.

Xi demanded law-based governance and long-term efforts to develop Xinjiang into a region that is united, harmonious, prosperous, and culturally advanced, with healthy ecosystems and people living and working in contentment.

Thanks to strenuous efforts from all sides since the second symposium in 2014, major progress has been achieved in the work related to Xinjiang, Xi said, citing a series of markedly improving key indicators from 2014 to 2019, such as a sound economic momentum with an average annual GDP growth rate of 7.2 percent, people's living standards being significantly improved with an average annual 9.1 percent growth in residential per capita disposable income, and more than 2.92 million out of 3.09 million people being lifted out of poverty.

Such a sound situation where people live and work in contentment has laid a solid foundation for long-term peace and stability in Xinjiang, Xi said.

"Facts have fully proved that China's work on ethnic affairs has been successful," he said, noting the achievements are the result of the strong leadership of the CPC Central Committee, along with the concerted efforts of the whole Party and all the Chinese people including more than 25 million people from different ethnic groups in Xinjiang. Enditem
Add another case to the litany of court appearances for the D. B. Coopers Mansion owners as Harris County attorneys seek an injunction from a judge to force them to clean up the premises which officials say has become a public nuisance.

In 2011, the former commercial building that housed a gentlemens club was gutted by a massive fire that left the structure partially burned and open to the elements.

Cypress Creek Flooding Series: State Rep. joins Harris County Flood Control, Task Force in support of funds for flood mitigation

According to Harris County Fire Marshals Office records, there have been at least six fires at the property since 2011 consisting of both outside brush fires and dumpster fires in the partially burned structure. Large openings in the building allow trespassers access to the building.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Second Servings expands program to feed more people in need in Houston

The business, located at 22565 North Freeway in Spring, is owned by the Sannauru Family Limited Partnership and investigators have tried numerous times to serve its registered agent, Sandee Patel from Cypress, but to no avail.

The Harris County Attorneys Office received permission from the court to pin the notice to his door.

Our investigator had been to the home six times and he would speak to people at the residence who told him that he was out of town, said Bethany Dwyer, assistant county attorney.

The investigator, she said, would see cars parked in the driveway and people walking past the windows, but no one would answer the door.

It was clear he was just trying to avoid service, she said. Thats when she went back to the judge and he ordered them to post the service on the door.

He has received it now, the assistant county attorney said.

The petition outlines notice from the Harris County Fire Marshals Office beginning on Sept. 4, 2019 informing the defendant that the property constituted a nuisance and was ordered to clean up the refuse, debris, charred, and partially burned lumber within 10 days.

They were also put on notice if the structure was beyond repair, it should be razed within 30 days after the notice from the Fire Marshal.

Patel notified the Fire Marshals office on Sept. 24, 2019 that he would comply with the order and place traffic barriers at the front driveway to keep anyone from entering the property, remove the exterior skin of the building leaving only the steel frame or skeleton of the building, and put up cameras to try and capture the identity of people entering the property.

On Oct. 4, 2019, the Fire Marshals Office returned to the property and found the structure was still standing and there were no signs of demolition work underway.

A second visit on Oct. 25, 2019 found similar conditions.

On April 2, 2020, the Spring Fire Department responded to a call of a brush or grass fire on the property. When they arrived, they found a small fire and were quickly able to extinguish it.

Just 18 days later, they responded to another call of a fire on the same property where they found several trash fires inside the partially burned structure.

We understand that business owners dont have a lot of money to make the repairs right away, and were willing to work with them. But here we are nine years later, she said.

Dwyer pointed out it costs taxpayers every time the fire department has to respond to fires or law enforcement must contend with criminal activity on the property.

Stolen cars dumped there, runaways have been found living there, its not just a fire hazard, Dwyer said, and all of that costs the taxpayers money.

Dwyer said she hoped to get before a judge within the next 30 days.

If he doesnt answer and nothing happens, well seek a default judgement and ask the court to order the defendant to tear the building down and the other measures weve asked for in the petition, she said.

If the defendant doesnt follow through with those orders, Dwyer said they would file a contempt and ask the judge to either fine him or send him to jail until he complies, or both.

Im hoping well see some actual progress now that hes been served and has retained an attorney, she said.

She said she hoped he would also post signage that the premises is under surveillance so that it discourages any further activity on the abandoned property.

It also goes to help stop illegal dumping if they know theyre being videoed, she said.

Dwyer will ask the judge to make sure he has a trespass affidavit on file with local law enforcement if he doesnt already have it.

If anyone is on the property, they will be arrested for trespassing, she said.

The property doesnt appear to be up for sale and it appears hes still paying taxes on it.

We have concerns that the structure is sound and could collapse. If theres people in there it could trap people, she said.

The surrounding area is replete with tinder brush, is highly combustible, and could cause a massive fire.

That would require a big response from firefighters, and you run the risk of putting more people in danger, she said.

Trash litters the area and has become a location for illegal dumping. Old television sets, trash, and even a boat was found on the property.

Kevin Madden, the attorney for the owners, said he had just received the lawsuit and is working on a response to the petition which should be ready sometime within the next week.

Were not in agreement with the allegations in the petition necessarily, he said.

We are working with the county to resolve the issues. My client isnt trying to shirk any responsibilities, but we are working with the county to reach some form of resolution, he said.

The club was shut down in 2009 after failing to obtain a sexually oriented business (SOB) license.

dtaylor@hcnonline.com
Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 26/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A sketch of Andrew Wilkinson, leader of British Columbia's Liberal party:

Age: 63.

Family: Married to Barbara Grantham. They have three grown children in their 20s.

Education: Holds degrees from the University of Alberta, Dalhousie University and Oxford University, where he attended as a Rhodes Scholar.

Career: He previously served as attorney general, justice minister, minister of advanced education, minister of technology, innovation and citizens' services. He also served as deputy minister of the British Columbia Ministry of Economic Development, and as deputy minister for intergovernmental relations in the premier's office for two years. Outside of politics, he has worked as a lawyer in Vancouver and was educated and licensed as a physician, working as a doctor in Campbell River, Lillooet and Dease Lake. Riding: Vancouver-Quilchena.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 26, 2020.
A couple of weeks ago, two high school students came to my door and wanted me to sign a petition for them requesting the high school initiate a course in teaching about our past history of culture, thought, politics and differences. As you would know, it was an opportunity for me to discuss history with these bright students, and I proceeded with a short sermonette for laying out possibilities. I would like to think I gave these two young women something to think about, and Im glad they listened politely.

One thing Ive learned in life is that there are always at least two sides, or viewpoints, to any story. I told them to talk to many people, especially their parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, and others to gain as much insight to the question and understand all factors. They could also gain perspective from our town, county, state and national representatives. All of our municipal historians are apolitical in their jobs and are an especially great source of information to present the facts and let you decide.

I know that children today have a lot of history to learn, and much of it is glossed over. When I talk to my 14-year-old granddaughter about the old days," which is the 60s for her, she always wants to know the why of what happened. I was pleasantly surprised to know of her interest in many things, not just dance and soccer.

When I started writing for The Citizen 15 years ago, I examined the many books, diaries and family histories at the Victory Village History Center. I found a family reunion picture of generations of my ancestors in Wayne and Cayuga counties from the early 1920s showing love, happiness, hard workers, poor people, plain dress and perseverance. It was humbling when you think of the excess we think we need today. They had the necessities of life, and that was all that was important.

I grew up in the town of Victory and witnessed my family, neighbors and town folk worshiping and organizing dinners at the churches, watching the drama club perform plays in the Grange, putting on oyster dinners at election time in the old Victory Town Hall (old Baptist church), attending Christmas parties at the American Legion hall in Red Creek, cheering at ball games in Fair Haven, attending field days and picnics behind the Victory Federated Church, dancing at a lot of barn dances, and participating in activities at the Victory Fire Department.

The Knights of the Maccabees, who had meetings in the present history center, provided a charitable service to widows and orphans in the late 1800s and from World War I on, the town provided a position of overseer of the poor to help the needy. People knew everyone and donated to all who were in need in this small town. Many of the town forefathers provided service around the country and the world.

Silas Hamilton was a Revolutionary War doctor who came to Victory with a land grant for his services in that war. Many in Victory are his relatives, as he had two wives and 12 children. His grandson, Hamilton Wetherby, joined the Civil War in 1862 as a drummer boy at the age of 15. Many other Civil War veterans are listed on the D.H. Becker Post 251 Grand Army of the Republic Charter in Red Creek.

In 1935, Donald Isaac Coleman (my uncle) served at Howland Island, Port Byron, with the Civilian Conservation Corps under President Franklin D. Roosevelt working to build parks, nature centers and learning conservation practices.

Fay C. Smith, born and raised in Victory, found himself with the Army Corps of Engineers in Iran in 1944 building a hospital. He with other engineers built a filtration plant for water use from a river year-round, as there is no rain in Iran from April to October. A new electric plant at his base generated power with diesel engines made at the American Locomotive plant in Auburn.

The town of Victory always held a huge Labor Day celebration honoring its workers. On Labor Day, Sept. 4, 1945, a huge field day was held to raise money to help the people of the Philippine Islands recover from World War II. This event was held as a lasting memorial to Lt. Winfield Hall, a lifetime resident of Victory, who was killed at the age of 22 in an airplane crash in northern Africa, and honored on the Wall of Remembrance in Anzio, Italy. His name is also on the World War II monument dedicated May 4, 2004, in Auburn.

Recently, a group of local pilots, led by decorated Vietnam veteran Lauren Dates, of Victory, provided a special service for fellow veterans. They do special flyovers on Memorial Day, Veterans Day, Vietnam tribute ride day in July, and fellow veterans funerals. This is all donated at their own time and expense. At the dedication of the Cayuga County Vietnam Veterans Memorial Monument in Weedsport on Sept. 19, a contingent of seven planes flown by Lauren with fellow veterans and patriots performed several beautiful flyover formations during the service. The picture with this column is from the dedication service.

Beverly Coleman Sayles is the Victory town historian and a New York state registered historian, and can be reached at (315) 730-3183 or beverlycs65@gmail.com.

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Vineet Upadhyay By

Express News Service

DEHRADUN: Uttarakhand unit of Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) on Saturday issued show-cause notice to its Lohaghat MLA Puran Singh Fartyal for breach of discipline.

He rose issue of corruption in recently concluded state legislative assembly under Rule-58 for discussion.

Kuldeep Kumar, general secretary, state BJP said, "The MLA's recent conduct for sometime now falls into the category of indiscipline. A notice has been served to him."

The MLA had raised the issue stating that officers of Champawat district are indulged in corruption and even after complaining to the Chief Minister, no action has been initiated. The MLA has to file reply within 7-days.

Fartyal, in the assembly session on September 23 had alleged that he is not succumb under pressure. He also added that he is bein g pressurized by his own government and will be raising the issue before party's national chief JP Nadda.

Earlier, this month, the MLA had expressed his dissent against own government's decision to get the Tanakpur-Jauljibi road constructed by a contractor who has been involve din corrupt practices.

The MLA had said that his own government has joined hands with the corrupt contractor in a tender case worth Rs 123 crore.

He had further alleged that in year 2017, a case was registered against the contractor.

He had also written letters in this regard to JP Nadda and CM Trivendra Singh Rawat. Later, he met BJP's state chief Bansidhar Bhagat to discuss the issue.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 16:43:30|Editor: huaxia

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Six years after breaking ground, the Colombo Port City, the largest foreign direct investment in Sri Lanka, is reshaping the local economy, generating new opportunities for regional development, and emerging as generator for the future economic development. Launched in 2014, the project was jointly developed by the Sri Lankan government and China's CHEC Port City Colombo (Pvt) Ltd. It reclaims 269 hectares from the sea to function as a brand new Central Business District (CBD) for Sri Lanka's capital Colombo. On Sept. 17, Sri Lankan Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa inspected the Colombo Port City construction site to mark the sixth anniversary since the project. The prime minister said he hoped that the project would be completed soon, so that it would be a major economic boost for the island country.
India, Japan begins 3-day naval exercise JIMEX today in Arabian sea

India

oi-Ajay Joseph Raj P

New Delhi, Sep 26: The Indian and Japanese navies is all set to begin their three-day-long maritime military exercise from Saturday. The naval exercise will take place in the North Arabian Sea. It can be seen that this is the fourth edition of Japan Maritime bilateral exercise (JIMEX).

According to reports, the naval exercise will continue till September 28 and it is is being conducted in a 'non-contact at-sea-only format', in view of COVID-19 restrictions.

Maldives backs India again: Thwarts attempt to hold SAARC summit in Pakistan

It can be seen that the exercise is taking place in the backdrop of growing concerns over China's military activity in the Indian Ocean Region as well as in the Indo-Pacific.

According to officials, the fourth edition of the India-Japan maritime exercise JIMEX will feature a multitude of advanced exercises across the spectrum of maritime operations, in reflection of high degree of inter-operability and joint operational skills.

COVID-19 cases in India now over 59 lakh, deaths cross 93,000

The officials also said that JIMEX-20 will see some advanced level of operations and exercises which is indicative of the continued upswing in Indo-Japanese defence relations and continued efforts by both governments to work closely for a more secure, open and inclusive global commons.

Also, this would be the first military exercise after the two countries signed a landmark agreement on September 9 that will allow their militaries to access each other's bases for logistics support.

The JIMEX is a series of exercises commenced in January 2012 with a special focus on maritime security cooperation. The last edition of JIMEX was conducted in October 2018 off Visakhapatnam coast.

We will discuss A to Z, not just south bank of Pangong Tso: India tells China

Deepika Padukone questioned in drug probe | India tears into Pakistan | Oneindia News

JIMEX will showcase a high degree of inter-operability and joint operational skills through the conduct of a multitude of advanced exercises, across the spectrum of maritime operations.

Multi-faceted tactical exercises involving weapon firings, cross deck helicopter operations and complex surface, anti-submarine and air warfare drills will consolidate coordination developed by the two navies.

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Story first published: Saturday, September 26, 2020, 12:51 [IST]
"The first people to have priority in emergency use are the vaccine researchers and the vaccine manufacturers because when the pandemic comes, if these people are infected then theres no way to produce the vaccine," Yin said. Now, large Chinese firms including telecom giant Huawei and broadcaster Phoenix TV have announced theyre working with Sinopharm to get the vaccine for their employees. Several people who say they work in "front-line" organisations have said on social media that their workplaces have offered vaccinations for about 1000 yuan ($209). They declined to comment, saying they would need permission from their organisation. 'If its in the US where the virus is still raging thats a bit different, but in a country like China it doesnt seem to make sense to me.' Dr Diego Silva, University of Sydney In an established but limited practice, experimental medications have been approved historically for use when they are still in the third and last phase of human trials. Chinese companies have four vaccines in phase 3  two from Sinopharm and one each from Sinovac and CanSino.

The Chinese government referenced the World Health Organization's emergency-use principles to create its own through a strict process, National Health Commission official Zheng Zhongwei said at a news conference on Friday. He said there have been no serious side effects in the clinical trials. "Weve made it very clear that the COVID-19 vaccine we put into emergency use are safe," Zheng said. "Their safety can be ensured but their efficacy is yet to be determined." Yin Weidong, CEO of SinoVac, points to projection of COVID-19 infections and vaccinations at a briefing to journalists. Credit:AP Under the emergency rule, high-risk personnel such as medical and customs workers and those who have to work overseas are given priority access, he said. He declined to provide exact numbers. "In China's case, the pressure in preventing imported infections and domestic resurgence is still huge," Zheng said.

But Diego Silva, a lecturer in Bioethics at the University of Sydney, said that giving vaccines to hundreds of thousands outside of clinical trials doesnt have "scientific merit" in China, where there are currently very few locally transmitted cases, and incoming arrivals are quarantined centrally. "If its in the US where the virus is still raging thats a bit different, but in a country like China it doesnt seem to make sense to me," he said. "Because theres not enough of the virus in China locally to deduce anything, youre introducing a whole host of others factors" by injecting people outside of trials. Zheng said that all those injected under emergency use are being closely tracked for any adverse health effects. 'Im willing to be a little white mouse' Kan Chai, the columnist, wrote in an article posted online in September that despite initial hesitation, he decided to sign up after he heard a state-owned company was looking for volunteers.

He didn't say whether his was an emergency-use case, but the timing of his vaccination suggests it was. He took the first dose in late July, when the emergency inoculations were getting started and the trials were all but over. "Im willing to be a little white mouse, and the biggest reason is because I have trust in our countrys vaccination technology," he said. His real name is Li Yong, but his 1.65 million followers on the Twitter-like social platform Weibo know him better by his pen name, which means "10 years of chopping wood." He declined an interview request. He described taking the vaccine in a public webinar hosted by 8am HealthInsight, a popular health media outlet. It's unclear why he qualified to receive it. Scant information is publicly available about the programs scope, size, and scientific merit. CNBG and parent Sinopharm declined to comment. Zheng, the National Health Commission official, did not know about the Kan Chai case.

While emergency use may be the right path, Chinese companies are not being transparent about issues such as informed consent, said Joy Zhang, a professor who researches the ethical governance of emerging science at University of Kent in the UK. Zhang said that she could not find any relevant information on the Sinopharm website, and aside from reports published in international medical journals, there is little else made public. She said relatively more information is publicly available about other trials such as one run by Oxford University and AstraZeneca. The trial was halted after a participant developed severe neurological side effects, and only resumed after clinical data was submitted to an independent review board. History of vaccine scandals China has a troubled past with vaccines, with various scandals over the past two decades.

The most recent case was in 2018, when Changsheng Biotechnology came under investigation for falsifying records and making ineffective rabies vaccines for children. In 2017, Wuhan Institute of Biological Products, a CNBG subsidiary behind one of the vaccines in phase 3 trials, was found to have made defective diphtheria vaccines that were ineffective. Loading Public anger over the case prompted an overhaul of a vaccine punishment law in 2019. The country tightened supervision over the vaccine development and distribution process, and increased penalties for fabricating data. Those concerns seem to be of the past. Guizhen Wu, the chief biosafety expert for Chinas Centre for Disease Control, said a vaccine could be ready for the general public in China as early as November. She said she took an experimental vaccine back in April.
The young man is sitting on a Line 2 TTC subway car. He is not wearing a mask, nor is one hanging from his ear or in his lap or within reach. Masked people move to the ends of the car to avoid him.

The woman is wandering around Shoppers Drug Mart as she waits for a prescription. Her mask is pulled down so that it only covers her mouth. No one on staff asks her to pull it up over her nose.

The owner of a hair salon walks freely on every floor without a mask, talking on the phone, on a day when only one customer is booked at a time. The customer is masked. The stylist is double-masked.

Repairmen working hard outdoors cluster on a sidewalk, unmasked, without distancing from people passing by. Pedestrians edge away.

This is just an average day in Toronto in September 2020, seven months after COVID-19 fear became widespread. It is still impossible to go out without encountering people who have consciously decided not to mask. Why has no level of government made mask-wearing mandatory?

The best strategy for anyone worried about illness and death is to never take the TTC  passengers report on social media that they frequently see people, including staff, without masks  only order goods online for home delivery, give up on their hair, and walk out into a street shared with cars.

Some of these decisions are not affordable for some. Others are unsafe. They impose medical risk even on people who have not entered a restaurant or a mall since March. What astonishes me is that wearing a mask is cheap and easy. It is the minimum asked of anyone who leaves their home, and yet some people will not do it  passive aggression at its most manifest.

Others wont do it even when asked. This doesnt happen at the LCBO, at least not when I go in to pick up an online order, or even at the much more casual Wine Rack. The nature of the business means that staffers are accustomed to telling drunk or badly behaved customers to leave. I have developed a backbone, the brisk young male cashier explains to me when I thank him. I just tell them they have to wear a mask or they wont be served. And they obey, he says.

It would be pleasant to conclude that Canadian courtesy means that generally, people are reluctant to ask others to mask. I dont ask because its physically dangerous for a woman to make a polite request, though not necessarily more dangerous than being in a closed space with an unmasked person.

What a slap to perfect strangers who have done you no harm. It is rude to put people in a position where they have to ask you to do the easiest thing you could possibly do as COVID-19 cases rise steeply in this gentle, rational, consensus-building nation.

Even Mayor John Tory, who invariably sees us at our best, has successfully begged Premier Doug Ford to close bars and restaurants earlier, given that one drink makes most people imperturbable. (Last call is now 11 p.m. Strip clubs, which apparently still exist, have been closed completely.) Tory quotes his father, who used to say, Nothing good ever happens after midnight.

I have thought about this at length for days. Torys dad might just have been doing some teenage goading, unless his son was already 42 at the time, but he was right.

Generally speaking, risky decisions have already been made before midnight; everything else is just follow-through. People who were jerks before midnight will work on their jerkdom with passionate intensity in the small hours of the morning. But Im talking about sober, blinding-light-of-day Toronto, when we knuckle down and get really polite.

Provincially speaking  and I do mean that  Canada is not even at the point of making it mandatory for people to download the official COVID Alert tracking app, partly because some people dont own cellphones, or carry them everywhere, or have a cellphone that accepts the app. Its excusable. But a face mask?

Children wear masks in kindergarten. They dont like it, but they do it. Its a basic.

Lifes basics are few. They range widely but begin with the specific and obvious. First comes the morning shower, eating with utensils, keeping a minimal distance in crowds (unmeasured but learned) and saying, Fine, thanks, how are you? Up next are laundry particulars, showing up on time, and offering elders your seat. It ends with household dusting standards and car insurance.

Wearing a face mask in public during a pandemic comes before all these stages. It is a lowest common denominator. It is food and shelter, given that shelter means protection from the elements. That means the rougher elements and that means you.

Just put it on. Up a bit. There you are. Was that so hard?
The 22nd Ukraine-EU summit was initially scheduled for October 1.

The Ukraine-EU summit has been postponed to October 6.

That's according to the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, who made a tweet following a phone conversation with the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky.

"In my call with President @ZelenskyyUa and I agreed to meet, together with President @vonderleyen, in Brussels on 6 October for the 22nd EU-Ukraine summit. Looking forward to our discussion on this important partnership shortly after the special #EUCO of 1 and 2 October," the official tweeted.

In my call with President @ZelenskyyUa and I agreed to meet, together with President @vonderleyen , in Brussels on 6 October for the 22nd EU-Ukraine summit.



Looking forward to our discussion on this important partnership shortly after the special #EUCO of 1 and 2 October.  Charles Michel (@eucopresident) September 26, 2020

In a separate tweet, Michel offered "heartfelt condolences to all the families and friends who lost a loved one in the plane crash in Ukraine and to president @ZelenskyyUa."

EU summit with Ukraine: Background
OTTAWAAll three branches of the Canadian Armed Forces are attempting to crack down on hatred and extremism within their ranks with new orders prohibiting participation in hate groups.

The Canadian Army issued orders signed by Lt.-Gen. Wayne Eyre earlier this week, warning hatred and discrimination within the ranks amounts to a direct threat to our ability to fulfil our security and defence missions.

Both the Royal Canadian Navy and Royal Canadian Air Force are working on similar directives to their members, the Star has learned.

Racism exists in our ranks, in our practices and in our biases  Within the Army, this reality has the potential to tear at our very fabric because it undermines (army) morale, discipline and cohesion, which ultimately affects our operational readiness, Eyre wrote in the directive, first reported by the CBC and published Friday.

The orders forbid any regular or reservist member from being a member of a hate group, endorsing a hate group or committing acts of violence or intimidation motivated by discrimination.

If a member violates those prohibitions, they could face disciplinary action, be relieved from duty or  for the most serious cases, including hate crimes, violence and terrorism  face criminal charges. The orders also commit the army to concerted education and training to prevent hatred and extremism within the ranks.

Both the Royal Canadian Navy and the Royal Canadian Air Force have plans to issue similar command-specific direction in order to ensure all members are fully aware of their duties and obligations, wrote Daniel Le Bouthillier, a spokesperson for the Department of Defence, in a statement Friday.

As a defence team, the foundation of our purpose is rooted in service to our country and to all Canadians. We strongly oppose all forms of racial discrimination, xenophobia and intolerance.

The effort comes as Canadian Armed Forces grapple with recent high-profile cases involving extremism and white supremacists.

Patrik Matthews, a former combat engineer, disappeared from Beausejour, Manitoba in 2019 after the Winnipeg Free Press revealed he was a recruiter for The Base, a fascist white supremacist group. Matthews was arrested in January in the United States on weapons charges by the FBI.

Matthewss case is not isolated. Global News reported in 2019 that an internal Armed Forces investigation found at least 16 members had links to six different hate groups since 2013 including La Meute, the Soldiers of Odin, and Atomwaffen Division  a neo-Nazi terrorist group linked to attempted bombings, hate crimes and at least one murder in the United States.

Gen. Jonathan Vance, the outgoing chief of defence staff, told the Star in 2018 that the CAF knew it had extremists within its ranks  but did not know the scale of the problem. Since then, the CAF has been working on an internal system to monitor, track and assess hate-motivated incidents.

Bernie Farber, the head of the Canadian Anti-Hate Network, said he was quite impressed with the armys new directive.

But Farber, who recently met with Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan on the issue of extremism within the ranks, said that while the substance of the orders is solid, much will depend on how its implemented.

We have to see how these words will actually translate into action, Farber said in an interview, because thats really where the rubber hits the road. But the words are there.

Correction  Sept. 26, 2020: This article was updated from a previous version that misspelled Lt.-Gen. Wayne Eyres surname.

Correction  Sept. 28, 2020: This article was edited to correct Lt.-Gen. Wayne Eyres rank. As well, Patrik Matthews went missing in 2019, not 2018.
Seoul, Sep 26 : South Korea censored over 200,000 pieces of online data in 2019, a new report haa revealed, marking a slight decline from the previous year.

The Korea Communications Standards Commission (KCSC), the country's censorship body, took action against 206,759 pieces of online data last year, such as blocking public access or deleting them, down from 238,246 in 2018, according to an annual report from the Clinical Legal Education Center under the Korea University's School of Law.

The Korea Internet Transparency Report, funded by Google and the country's top portal operator Naver Corp., is released annually by Open Net Korea, a local internet privacy advocacy group, reports Yonhap news agency.

The report showed that 160,803 pieces of online information, or 78 percent of the total, were blocked from public access last year, while 34,995 were deleted.

It said pornographic or prostitution information consisted of 25.4 percent of the censored data, while gambling information took up 24.2 percent, followed by illegal food and drug data with 20.8 percent.

The report expressed concerns over the extent of censorship in the country.

"It is difficult for the KCSC to escape criticism, considering the vast amount of data blocked or deleted," Oh Kyoung-mi, a researcher at Open Net, said in a briefing.

The report also showed that the country's top two portal operators -- Naver and Kakao Corp., allowed state authorities to look into 3.1 million online accounts last year.

While the number marks a drop from 8.3 million in the previous year, the report noted that last year's figure is still high compared with 722,876 accounts probed in 2016.
BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept. 26

By Klavdiya Romakayeva - Trend:

In 2020 the export of potash fertilizers from Uzbekistan to Indonesia will amount to 130,000 tons (an increase of 1.5 times), Trend reports with reference to Dunyo information agency.

Indonesia is one of the world leaders in the production of a large range of agricultural products. At the same time, Indonesia does not have its own sufficient reserves of raw materials and capacities for the production of potash fertilizers. The annual import of potassium chloride in Indonesia is about four million tons, worth over $865 million.

If at the end of 2019, some 84,000 tons were exported from Uzbekistan to Indonesia, then over the past less than nine months of this year, 75,000 tons have already been shipped and taking into account the already signed contracts for 2020, the export of potash fertilizers from Uzbekistan to Indonesia will amount to 130,000 tons with an increase of 1.5 times.

Today, 70 percent of potash fertilizers shipped from Uzbekistan fall on Indonesia.

Earlier supplies were carried out through international trading companies, but in 2020 direct contracts were signed for an additional 40,000 tons with the five largest consumers in Indonesia.

This year, Uzkhimprom JSC chemical industry for the first time took part in a state tender for the supply of potash fertilizers in 2020 to Pupuk Indonesia state joint stock company, which holds international tenders twice a year for the purchase of 750,000 tons and is the largest consumer and processor of chemical fertilizers in the South-East Asia region.

Based on the results of this tender, Uzkhimprom JSC received the right to supply along with such major market players as the Canadian Canpotex International, the Russian Uralkali, and the Chinese Sino Agri International Potash Co., LTD. As a result, supplies from Uzbekistan with the implementation of this contract (50,000 tons) will increase by another 24 percent.

In order to increase the competitiveness of supplies from Uzbekistan, constant work is being carried out to reduce transport costs. As a result, transportation costs on the route Tashkent - Vladivostok - Surabaya (Indonesia) and Tashkent-Qingdao (China) - Surabaya (Indonesia) were reduced from $145 per ton to $85-90 per ton or 1.7 times.

Today, out of 40 containers daily shipped by the Dekhkanabad Potash Fertilizer Plant for export, 25 containers are shipped to Indonesia.

---

Follow the author on Twitter: @romakayeva
SAD seeks probe into use of ambulance by Mukthar Ansari

SAD to observe Sep 17 as 'black day' to protest against enactment of central farm laws

Shiromani Akali Dal pulls out of NDA over farm bills

India

oi-Deepika S

New Delhi, Sep 26: Shiromani Akali Dal on Saturday pulled out of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led NDA alliance days after Harsimrat Kaur resigned from the Union cabinet over contentious farm bills.

The decision to leave the NDA was taken at the party's high-level meeting presided over by party president Sukhbir Singh Badal.

According to a party statement issued here, the decision to quit the NDA was taken "because of the Centre''s stubborn refusal to give statutory legislative guarantees to protect assured marketing of farmers crops on MSP and its continued insensitivity to Punjabi and Sikh issues like excluding Punjabi language as official language in Jammu and Kashmir."

The SAD becomes the third major NDA ally to pull out of the grouping after the Shiv Sena and the TDP.

Badal said the SAD will continue to stand by its core principles of peace, communal harmony and guard the interest of Punjab and Punjabi in general, and Sikhs and farmers in particular.

Security beefed up at Delhi borders amid protests against farm bills

He said the decision has been taken in consultation with the people of Punjab, especially party workers and farmers.

Badal said the Bills on agricultural marketing brought by the BJP-led government are "lethal and disastrous" for the already beleaguered farmers.

He said the SAD was the oldest ally of the BJP, but the government did not listen to it in honouring the sentiments of farmers.

The Modi Government has maintained that the MSP system will stay and has accused the opposition of misleading farmers on the issue.

"If pain and protests of three crore Punjabis fail to melt the rigid stance of the Centre, it is no longer the NDA envisioned by Vajpayee ji and Badal sahab," Harsimrat tweeted.

The Farmers' Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill seeks to give freedom to farmers to sell their produce outside the notified APMC market yards (mandis).

This, the government says, is aimed at facilitating remunerative prices through competitive alternative trading channels.

The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020 seeks to give farmers the right to enter into a contract with agribusiness firms, processors, wholesalers, exporters, or large retailers for the sale of future farming produce at a pre-agreed price.

The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill seeks to remove commodities like cereals, pulses, oilseeds, onion, and potato from the list of essential commodities and will do away with the imposition of stock holding limits.
Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain Saturday said the surge in COVID-19 cases recorded in September seems to have plateaued" and should show a rapid fall". Interacting with reporters, he also said, the next sero-prevalence survey, slated to be conducted from October 1, is likely to be delayed as the report of the September survey is to be put before the Delhi High Court by this month-end.

The overall case fatality rate on Friday was 1.95 per cent, so less than 2 per cent. It used to be 3.5 per cent and above earlier. Also, cases which were coming in excess of over 4,000 per day have come down over the past few days. So, the surge we saw in September seems to have plateaued, and it should see a rapid fall," he said. Asked if the testing will now be scaled down, the minister said, no, it will remain the same. Even, cases which were reported on Friday were from the over 59,000 tests done the previous day, he said.

The next round of sero-prevalence survey is slated to begin from October 1. The previous exercise was held in the first week of September and its results have not been shared by the Delhi government. The results of the last sero-survey are to be put first before the High Court, so, it seems there will be a delay in starting the next round, as it takes time to do preparations, so October 1 starting date it seems highly unlikely," Jain told reporters.

Asked if a mayor and a minister contracting COVID-19 sends out a signal that perhaps COVID-19 norms are not being followed properly, Jain countered saying, They are public representatives, and if they contract COVID-19, it does not mean that they violated norms". Even healthcare workers who wear full PPE kits, contracted it. So this virus does not discriminate between a minister and the common man. Its behaviour is unpredictable," he added.

On chances of double infection of COVID-19 and dengue, he said, it is too early" to comment on this matter. Asked if symptomatic people who tested negative in a rapid antigen test are to take RT-PCR test, he said, there are strict orders" mandating that such people have to undergo the more reliable RT-PCR test.

On supply of oxygen through equipment, he reiterated , there is stock for 6-7 days. COVID-19 cases have shown a surge since the beginning of this month with 4,473 infections reported on September 16, the highest single-day spike here till date. The daily cases in Delhi had breached the 4000-mark for the first time on September 9 when the death count was 20 (overall 4,638 fatalities) and the caseload had crossed the 2 lakh-mark. From September 9-19, fresh cases have been recorded in excess of 4,000 per day except on September 14 when the figure stood at 3,229 with 26 deaths being recorded that day, taking the toll to 4,770, according to official data.

The Delhi government has significantly ramped up testing over the past few days. The number of tests conducted and corresponding fresh cases reported, ranged from 24,198 (2,312) on September 1 to 61,973 (4071) on September 19.

Since September 20, cases have remained below the 4,000-mark. Delhi recorded 3,827 COVID-19 cases on Friday, as the tally in the city mounted to over 2.64 lakh, while the death toll climbed to 5147.
Denver Mayor Michael Hancock poses for a photo with Dejon Lewis, a fourth-grade student at McGlone Academy, who said he benefits from after-school programming. The two spoke at a Feb. 20 press conference, during which the mayor announced new funding to reduce youth violence in Denver.
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and his Iraqi counterpart Fuad Hussein discussed regional developments here in Tehran on Saturday, Trend reports citing IRNA.

Both sides are also to review mutual cooperation.

Fuad Hussein is to confer with Iranian officials over agreements recently reached during Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi's visit to Tehran.

Iraqi foreign minister is also supposed to hold talks with other Iranian officials.

Earlier, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani in a phone call with Al-Kadhimi said connecting the Iran-Iraq railway creates new and serious momentum for developing bilateral interactions, adding that deep relations between the two countries guarantee the implementation of agreements.

Thanks to the strong willingness and serious determination of Iranian and Iraqi officials, both sides will be able to solve all difficulties and problems blocking the broadening of bilateral relations.

"In addition to his talks with me and first vice president, you (Prime Minister Al-Kadhimi) had successful meetings with Iranian ministers," Rouhani added.

Iran hails Iraqs significant role in the sensitive regional situation, the Iranian president said, adding that Iran is determined to establish complete stability in the region and is complying with its commitments in this regard.
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In early March, Susham Rita Singh, then 65, took time off from selling appliances at the Galleria-area Home Depot. Her husband and her daughter  a doctor  yelled at her, warning her against flying to India for her annual visit with her mom. This new coronavirus was wreaking havoc in other countries, and airports and international flights seemed a bad idea.

But Ritas mom was 90, and really, how dangerous could the trip be?

Rita flew back to Houston on March 21. On one of her flights, someone coughed a lot.

Home Depot required her to quarantine after the international trip. She did it reluctantly: She loved her job, loved the stores hubbub, loved talking to people.

More from Lisa Gray Hotez: Scientists divided on what recent COVID decline means

On March 24, she felt nausea and stomach pain. She thought her acid reflux was acting up: no big deal.

As she grew sicker, her doctor daughter grew more alarmed. Silky Singh Pahlajani, a neurologist, lives in New York City, where COVID-19 was overwhelming hospitals. Silky, 38, didnt feel sure that her moms problem was COVID-19  gastrointestinal distress was only beginning to be recognized as a symptom  but whatever it was, Silky felt sure it was serious. On the phone, she urged her mom to see a doctor.

Rita resisted. This was one of her regular tiffs with Silky: Other than basics such as annual checkups, the doctors mother avoided doctors. She preferred home remedies. And so far, that had worked fine: Rita was healthy and full of energy. In the 30-plus years shed lived in the U.S., shed never been hospitalized.

She made it clear to her family that she didnt intend to change, either. If she were ever severely ill, shed told them, she didnt want extreme measures taken to save her life. She thinks shes immortal, Silky grumbled.

But this time, Ritas home remedies werent enough. After a few days she was so fatigued that she couldnt stand. She submitted to a virtual doctors visit, and was commanded to go to an ER immediately for hydration.

TRACKING CORONAVIRUS: Interactive maps, charts show spread of COVID-19 across Houston, rest of Texas

She was rolled into a small west Houston hospital in a wheelchair. Then she blacked out.

Silky went into hyperdrive, constantly trying to talk with the doctors treating her mom. Furious that the small hospital was waiting for test results before treating her mom for COVID-19, Silky insisted Rita be transferred by ambulance to Houston Methodist in the Texas Medical Center. Being at the bigger hospital, Silky thinks, saved her mothers life.

Ritas lungs were failing fast. A pulmonologist told Silky hed never before seen a chest X-ray go completely white in 48 hours.

Silky knew that a ventilator was precisely the kind of extreme measure that her mother wouldnt want. And as a doctor, she knew why ventilators are any doctors last resort. They leave a patient vulnerable to infection, lung damage and delirium. Many patients put on ventilators dont survive, and the longer theyre on ventilators, the worse their chances. As a neurologist, Silky had seen the brain damage and strokes that a ventilator can cause  exactly the kind of impairment that her strong-willed mother would hate most.

But Silky couldnt let her mother die. Roughly 24 hours after Rita blacked out, she was intubated for a ventilator.

The family, not allowed to visit Rita in the COVID ICU, talked to her unconscious body via an iPad. They hoped she heard them somehow.

The weeks crawled by. Ritas lungs improved, but COVID-19, Silky says, is like a hurricane that blows through your body. Complication after complication arose. Ritas blood pressure dropped. Her liver was damaged. Her kidneys began failing, and she needed dialysis.

Silky consulted frequently with Ritas medical team, which she considered top-notch. And as different problems arose, Silky called almost every specialist she knew  friends from residency, from her various trainings, anyone she could think of  to pick their brains.

FROM THE EDITOR: New investigative series 'Exposed' reveals government failures in COVID preparation

At one point, during the weeks when Rita should have regained consciousness but didnt, it seemed that she might have had a massive stroke  the kind of problem that Silky herself treats. But an MRI showed no blood clot.

Still, as the days ground on, Ritas prospects grew dimmer. By April, the family was bracing themselves: There was an 80 to 90 percent chance that Rita would die.

Encephalopathy is doctor-speak for some kind of problem with the brain. To treat it, Ritas medical team tried steroids.

After the first dose, she opened her eyes. She wasnt responsive, but the family was thrilled. Well take it! Silky said.

Rita improved. And at the end of April, she woke up.

She remembers opening her eyes, not knowing where she was, and hearing a doctor shed never seen before tell her that she was at Methodist Hospital. She didnt understand what had happened. Her body was stuck full of tubes. She was in pain and confused.

She planned to escape when the nurses werent in the room. From her bed, she considered various routes: the window, the hallway. But when she at last got her chance, she found that she couldnt move her hand to rip out the tubes. In fact, she couldnt move at all. She couldnt even call for help: Her voice was gone.

Where, she wondered, was her family?

Slowly she began to understand the nightmare shed woken into. And at last her family members, thrilled, began to appear to her on the iPad. Rita beamed at her husband. And she beamed, too, at Silkys sister, now seven weeks more pregnant than shed been when Rita blacked out.

But Rita glared at her doctor daughter. It was Silkys fault, she thought, that she was here in this condition. Silky knew that shed have preferred to die.

But there she was, alive. In their video visits, to keep her spirits up, the family dangled the prospect of her first grandchilds birth. She wanted to see that, didnt she?

Courtesy Silky Singh Pahlajani

On June 17, after an awful seven weeks on a ventilator, Rita was at last able to leave the hospital. The sunlight was beautiful. In the car she opened the window to feel the wind, to hear the birds.

The next day Silkys sister gave birth to a girl. In a photo taken a few weeks later, on the first day that Rita was strong enough to hold the baby, the new grandmother is beaming.

With therapy shes getting stronger, Rita says now. Shes anxious to return to work.

And she has forgiven Silky for keeping her alive. In fact, shes now grateful for the extreme measures. She tells Silky, You are my angel.

And she warns her doctor daughter, sternly, to be careful not to catch COVID.

lisa.gray@chron.com, twitter.com/LisaGray_HouTX
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- A New York Supreme Court judge ordered a summary inquiry" into Eric Garners case on Thursday, about a year after his family had filed a petition to bring Mayor Bill de Blasio, former NYPD Commissioner James ONeill and FDNY Commissioner Daniel Nigro in front of a judge to answer questions on unresolved factual issues regarding the Staten Island mans death.

The petition was filed last year under New York City Charter Section 1109, which allows at least five citizens who are taxpayers in New York to file a request to bring any city employee before a judge to answer allegations of misconduct.

Although the arrest and death of Eric Garner has received considerable attention in the press over the past six years, many facts relating to his arrest and death, and the investigations and any disciplinary actions taken in response to his death, have not been disclosed to the public or the family of Mr. Garner, Judge Joan Madden wrote in the opinion. In this regard, the court notes that the purpose of section 1109 is to bring transparency to the actions of public officials."

In her decision, Madden allowed the lawyers representing Garners family to question officials on several points, including the unauthorized release of the Staten Island mans arrest records, an alleged lack of medical aid to Garner by NYPD officers and the release of the autopsy information.

The summary inquiry will allow the lawyers representing Garners family to conceivably bring de Blasio and ONeill in front of a judge, though those details will be discussed further on Oct. 6, the next conference call for the case.

Madden, however, did not grant the option to have Nigro testify.

The decision is a very good step in the direction of transparency, said Alvin Bragg, co-director of the Racial Justice Project at New York Law School and one of the lawyers on the case. The judge granted us the right to have an inquiry and is directing the city to do what it should have done voluntarily -- which is to lay bare the facts of the day of Mr. Garners killing and to lay bare what the city did and did not do.

CITY ASKED FOR DISMISSAL

In August, city attorneys had asked the judge to dismiss the petition, the Advance/SILIve.com previously reported.

There is no allegation that any named respondent unlawfully stopped Mr. Garner; used excessive force upon him; failed to intervene and stop the use of excessive force; made false statements on arrest reports; or failed to provide Mr. Garner with adequate medical treatment, nor could there be. They were not present, Law Department attorney Stephen Kitzinger wrote in a petition asking Madden to toss the case in its entirety.

Additionally, Kitzinger argued that the imposition of discipline is discretionary and that the petition needs to be supported by affidavits setting forth a factual basis for the claim.

2014 DEATH

Garner, 43, died in 2014 while in police custody when Daniel Pantaleo, an officer with the 120th Precinct, was shown on video wrestling him to the ground during an arrest at Victory Boulevard and Bay Street in Tompkinsville.

Garner was unarmed and allegedly selling loose cigarettes.

A state grand jury declined to indict Pantaleo in December 2014.

A still from a YouTube video shows Eric Garner being taken to the ground by Police Officer Daniel Pantaleo.

In May 2019, four years after Garners death, the NYPD started a disciplinary hearing

The hearing ended after 24 days, on June 6.

On July 16 of that year, U.S. Attorney General William Barr decided that the Department of Justice would not press civil rights charges against Pantaleo.

Barrs decision sparked outrage among Garners supporters, who started an 11-day-long protest city wide.

In August 2019 NYPD Deputy Commissioner of Trials Rosemarie Maldonado ruled that Pantaleo used a prohibited chokehold.

Former NYPD Commissioner ONeill eventually decided to fire Pantaleo.
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Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 18:19:34|Editor: huaxia

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WASHINGTON, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President Donald Trump praised Judge Amy Coney Barrett on Friday but refused to confirm that she will be his Supreme Court nominee.

"She's outstanding," Trump told reporters at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland upon returning from two campaign stops in Georgia and Florida when pressed to confirm media reports that he will nominate Barrett for the country's highest court.

"Well, I haven't said it was her," the president responded, only acknowledging that he has made the decision in his mind.

A conservative judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit, Barrett is among five female jurists that Trump have been considering to fill the seat left open by the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the Supreme Court's leading liberal voice.

"They're all very outstanding people -- top of line academically and every way possible," Trump said on Friday. "They are all great. It could be any one of them. It could be, actually, anyone on the list."

Trump, who has reportedly told U.S. lawmakers that he will select Barrett to replace Ginsburg, will make the announcement at the White House on Saturday afternoon.

Barrett was nominated by Trump for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit in 2017 and was later confirmed by the Senate with a 55-43 bipartisan vote.

The judge was a member of faculty of the Notre Dame Law School, teaching constitutional law, civil procedure and statutory interpretation. Before that, she clerked for Judge Laurence Silberman of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit and for Justice Antonin Scalia of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Trump successfully appointed two conservatives on the Supreme Court's nine-justice bench, Neil Gorsuch in 2017 and Brett Kavanaugh in 2018, tilting the institution to the right with 5-4 majority. At 48, Barrett would be the youngest member of the high court and cement a 6-3 advantage for the conservative wing.

U.S. Supreme Court justices, who have life tenure and can serve until they die, resign, retire, or are impeached and removed from office, play an enormous role in shaping the country's legislation and policies on issues such as abortion, LGBT rights, gun rights, climate change, and presidential powers.

Any Supreme Court nominee needs to be confirmed by the Senate with a simple majority vote. Republicans, who have a 53-47 advantage in the chamber, appear to have enough votes to confirm Trump's third pick. Only two Republican senators have said they would not support taking up a nominee prior to the November election.

Democrats oppose moving forward with a vote on Ginsburg's replacement before Election Day, pointing to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's decision in 2016 to block former President Barack Obama's Supreme Court nominee because it was an election year, all but ensuring a fierce confirmation battle on Capitol Hill.

McConnell and Senate Republicans have argued that this time is different because the Senate and the White House are held by the same party.

The revelation of Trump's reported intention to nominate Barrett for the Supreme Court came just hours after Ginsburg laid in state at the U.S. Capitol, becoming the first woman in the country's history to receive the posthumous honor.

A renowned champion of women's rights, Ginsburg died last week at the age of 87 due to complications related to metastatic pancreas cancer. She was appointed to the Supreme Court by then-President Bill Clinton in 1993, becoming the second woman appointed to the highest court in the United States.

"My most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed," Ginsburg reportedly dictated to her granddaughter Clara Spera a few days before her death.

Trump recently suggested that it was Democratic politicians who wrote Ginsburg's dying wish, a claim that critics have called baseless. The president and the justice had traded barbs since mid-2016, when he was the presumptive Republican presidential nominee.

The role of the Supreme Court is likely to be more important this year, as Trump has repeatedly tried to cast doubt on the November election while refusing to commit to a peaceful transition of power should he lose. He's trailing 2020 Democratic presidential nominee and former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden in national and swing states polls.

Trump has said he believes the Supreme Court would have to weigh in on the election and that he wants a full bench of nine justices for disputes.

In 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court decided in a disputed recount of votes in Florida with a 5-4 ruling, effectively handing that year's presidential election to the Republican presidential candidate and then-governor of Texas George W. Bush, who won 271 electoral votes, one more than a majority. However, Bush lost the popular vote to Democrat Al Gore.

Any election disputes would have to go through lower courts and may not even reach the high court, according to U.S. election and legal experts. Enditem
WESTLAKE, Ohio 

Drug trafficking: Crocker Road

An officer at 1:37 p.m. Sept. 11 stopped a rental vehicle for a traffic violation and became suspicious of the occupants, who were from Idaho, after they claimed to be in Cleveland to take pictures.

A police K-9 arrived alerted to the presence of narcotics in the vehicle, and officers recovered about 2 kilograms of suspected cocaine.

Officers took the four occupants of the vehicle to the Westlake Police Department. They charged a 53-year-old man from Idaho Falls, Idaho, with trafficking in drugs and are recommending a Cuyahoga County grand jury consider an additional charge of endangering a child since his 14-year-old son was in the vehicle. County Children and Family Services took custody of the child until a family member could pick him up.

A 32-year-old San Fernando, Calif., resident, and a 41-year-old Mexican national also are charged with drug trafficking. The adults were transferred to the Cuyahoga County Jail.

Chase ends with arrest and suspected marijuana recovered: Crocker Road

An officer at 9 a.m. Sept. 19 tried to stop a vehicle on Crocker at Detroit roads for equipment violations, but the driver sped away from the officer.

The chase proceeded westbound on Detroit and then northbound on Cedarwood Drive before the 32-year-old Westlake man driving the car stopped on Cedarwood near Bradley Road.

Officers suspect the man threw away an extended and loaded semi-automatic handgun magazine from the car during the pursuit. They recovered suspected marijuana and paraphernalia from the vehicle. Police charged the man with failure to comply and are recommending a county grand jury consider bringing additional charges of obstruction and drug possession.

Officers noted they stopped the same man on April 23 on Crocker Road, at which time he had a loaded handgun and was in the company of two juvenile girls. That case is still waiting to be presented to a county grand jury, which will consider whether to issue indictments on concealed weapon and weapons under disability charges.

Vehicles stolen: Regency Circle

Officers at 11 a.m. Sept. 21 responded to a residence for a report of two vehicles missing from the driveway.

The resident reported accidentally leaving both SUVs unlocked with the keys inside while parked in the driveway overnight.

Burglary: Meadow Lane

Officers at 6:45 a.m. Sept. 22 responded to a burglary complaint at a residence on Meadow Lane.

The residents awoke to find that one of the first-floor windows and screens were open and a purse was missing from inside the home, and a gray Honda Accord was missing from the driveway.

There were no signs of forced entry. Detectives later learned that paperwork belonging to the homeowner was scattered in the yard of a house on Scioto Avenue in East Cleveland, and they found the stolen Honda occupied on the street.

Westlake and East Cleveland police arrested a 19-year-old East Cleveland woman for receiving stolen property. She was arraigned Sept. 23 in Rocky River Municipal Court and her case was bound over to a Cuyahoga County grand jury. Investigators are working to identify others involved.

Read more news from the West Shore Sun.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 17:53:07|Editor: huaxia

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Lebanon's Prime Minister-designate Mustapha Adib speaks during a press conference in Beirut, Lebanon, Sept. 26, 2020. Adib declared on Saturday his failure to form a new cabinet given his inability to overcome obstacles hindering the mission, al-Jadeed local TV channel reported. (Dalati & Nohra/Handout via Xinhua)

BEIRUT, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Lebanon's Prime Minister-designate Mustapha Adib declared on Saturday his failure to form a new cabinet given his inability to overcome obstacles hindering the mission, al-Jadeed local TV channel reported.

Adib apologized to the Lebanese people, stressing that "the initiative of French President Emmanuel Macron must continue because it expresses the sincere intention of France."

"It has become clear for me that the consensus no longer exists noting that the efforts have reached their final stages," he said in Baabda Palace at his meeting with President Michel Aoun.

Adib was appointed on Aug. 31 to form a new cabinet following the resignation of Hassan Diab's cabinet after the blasts that rocked Beirut on Aug. 4.

However, Adib's efforts faced several obstacles including the insistence by Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri to hold on to the Finance Ministry by appointing a Shiite finance minister in addition to naming potential Shiite ministers in the new cabinet.

Moreover, Adib was pushing for the adoption of a rotation system among Lebanon's political parties for the four sovereign ministries, namely the finance, defense, interior and foreign affairs portfolios.

Berri's approach to dealing with government formation came following the United States' move earlier this month that slapped sanctions against former finance minister Ali Hassan Khalil who is Berri's top aid.

French President Emmanuel Macron, who has been pushing for the formation of a cabinet capable of implementing serious reforms in Lebanon, came in contact with Berri in an attempt to facilitate government formation but his initiative failed to change Berri's insistence that the finance ministry be retained by Shiite sect.

Adib had hoped to be able to form a cabinet of specialists who are independent of the main political parties. Enditem
Jailed Iranian human rights advocate Nasrin Sotoudeh has ended her hunger strike due to deteriorating health, her husband Reza Khandan said on social media on September 26.

Sotoudeh had been on a hunger strike in Tehrans Evin prison since August 11 to protest the risk that political prisoners in Iran face amid the coronavirus pandemic.

On September 19, she was taken to hospital for a serious heart condition. But four days later, she was taken back to Evin prison, triggering disbelief from UN independent experts among others.

It is unfathomable that the Iranian authorities would return Ms. Sotoudeh to prison where she is at heightened risk to COVID-19, as well as with her serious heart condition, the experts said.

We urge the authorities to immediately reverse this decision, accept her requests to recuperate at home before undergoing a heart procedure, and allow her to freely choose her own medical treatment, they added in a statement.

The experts echoed Sotoudehs call for the Iranian authorities to grant temporary release to human rights defenders, lawyers, dual and foreign nationals, prisoners of conscience, political prisoners, and all other individuals detained without sufficient legal basis during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The pandemic in Iran has infected nearly 440,000 and killed some 25,200, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

Sotoudeh, cowinner of the European Parliament's 2012 Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought, has been surviving on water, tea, sugar, and salt, amid concerns over her health, her husband has said.

Sotoudeh was arrested at her home in Tehran in June 2018.

She was sentenced to a total of 38 1/2 years in prison and 148 lashes over her defense of political prisoners, including women protesting the compulsory hijab law.

She must serve 12 years of her sentence to become eligible for parole.

The widely respected lawyer was also jailed from 2010 to 2013 over her defense of sensitive political cases. In 2015, she protested for several weeks to be allowed to continue practicing law.

Despite her imprisonment, Sotoudeh has remained outspoken. She also went on a hunger strike in March to protest prison conditions.
In looking back at the Access Hollywood episode, I came across an academic study published this year by scholars from the University of Massachusetts and Brandeis University that cuts against conventional wisdom. Entitling their paper Just Locker Room Talk?, the political scientists concluded that the revelations did make a difference, finding consistent evidence that the release of the tape modestly, though significantly, reduced support for Donald Trump during the 2016 campaign. These effects were similar among men and women, but noticeably larger among Republicans compared with Democrats.
The US has recorded the highest number of new coronavirus cases in a single day since August, after several states saw record daily spikes and the national total topped 7million.

There were 55,054 new COVID-19 cases reported by health authorities across the United States on Friday, a Johns Hopkins University tally shows.

It's the highest figure since August 14, when 64,350 new cases were recorded following a peak in infections in the summer.

The record uptick comes as the US surpassed the grim milestone of over 7million total infections on Friday, just three days after virus deaths topped 200,000.

The nation currently makes up more than 20 percent of the world's total cases and has the highest virus death toll than any country.

The alarming figures appear to be a result of a surge in cases in the country's midwest where four states reported record one-day increases on Friday.

More than 1,000 New Yorkers tested positive for COVID-19 in a single day Friday, marking the first time since June 5 the state has seen a daily number that high

On Friday, the US topped more than 7 million coronavirus cases, making up 20% of the world's total. Pictured: Bismarck-Burleigh Public Health nurses Crys Kuntz (left)and Sara Nelson confer inside the Bismarck Event Center in Bismarck, North Dakota, September 8

The US has recorded the highest number of new coronavirus cases in a single day since August

New York, once the epicenter of the deadly virus, is also experiencing an uptick with more than 1,000 residents testing positive on Friday - marking the first time since June 5 the state has seen a daily number that high.

The number of positive tests reported daily in the state has been steadily inching up in recent weeks, a trend possibly related to increasing numbers of businesses reopening, college campuses reopening and children returning to school.

Governor Andrew Cuomo announced Saturday there were 1,005 positive cases tallied on the previous day out of 99,953 tests, for a 1 per cent positive rate.

From late July through the start of September the state was seeing an average of around 660 people test positive per day. In the seven-day period that ended Friday, the state had averaged 817 positive tests per day.

However, that number of daily positive tests in a state of more than 19million people still puts New York in a much better position than many other states.

The US surpassed the grim milestone of over 7million cases on Friday as infections continue to trend upward

There were 55,054 new COVID-19 cases reported across the US on Friday - the highest figure since August 14, according to a Johns Hopkins University tally

New York had been the worst hit state at the peak of the pandemic in March and April before infections rates finally dipped after the state imposed strict health restrictions.

The virus then struck the Sun Belt at the start of the summer and now, the it is devastating communities in America's heartland that have been slower to implement restrictions or mandate masks.

Wisconsin, one of the states where cases are rising the fastest, reported 2,629 new infections, surpassing its previous record set last Friday, according to the tally.

Minnesota, Oregon and Utah also reported record increases in cases on Friday.

Every Midwestern state, except Ohio, reported more cases over the past four weeks compared with the prior four weeks, led by South Dakota and North Dakota.

South Dakota had the biggest percentage increase at 166 percent with 8,129 new cases over the last month compared to nearly 4,900 cases from the month prior.

According to the Rapid City Journal, the state set new records on cases, current hospitalizations and deaths on Thursday.

The state's Department of Health reported 463 new cases and a new high of 194 current COVID-19 hospitalizations.

On average, the nation is reporting 44,000 new cases a day and about 700 deaths, according to a Reuters tally

Earlier this week, the national death toll topped 200,000

Eight deaths were reported on Thursday, which has only occurred on one other occasion, about 10 days ago.

South Dakota health secretary Kim Malsam-Rysdon said it is too soon to know if the state has reached its peak.

Meanwhile Gov Kristi Noem tweeted on Tuesday that South Dakota is 'in good shape' with only five percent of ICU beds occupied by COVID-19 patients.

Meanwhile North Dakota's new cases doubled to 8,752 as compared to 4,243 during the same time in August.

The Bismarck Tribune reported that active cases in the state have risen to an all-time high during the pandemic.

On Thursday, the state's Department of Health reported 471 cases of COVID-19, bringing the states's active case total to 3,483.

Currently, 26 patients are in ICU beds, making up almost 10 percent of North Dakota's ICU capacity.

Meanwhile one-third of all North Dakota's counties are classified as 'moderate-risk' with some 'approaching high-risk.'

Despite the record, interim State Health Officer Paul Mariani broke with Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidelines and rescinded an order requiring close contacts of known COVID-19 patients to quarantine for 14 days.

Hospitalizations of COVID-19 patients also set records this week in Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming.

COVID-19 infections in the United States are trending upwards and the average number of cases in the last seven days is up 10 per cent from the prior week, according to a Reuters analysis.

On average, the nation is reporting 44,000 new cases a day and about 700 deaths.

Despite cases still rising in Florida, Governor Ron DeSantis on Friday lifted all COVID-19 restrictions on businesses, including restaurants and bars, saying the threat of the coronavirus pandemic had eased sufficiently to allow the state to enter the final phase of its reopening.
National PSU Award 2020

Chandigarh: For first of its kind endeavour to launch and successful operation of in-house video conferencing mobile app QVIC, the Punjab Mandi Board has been awarded with National PSU Award 2020 by the Elets Technomedia, the premier technology and media research organisation of Asia, during a National PSU Summit held at New Delhi.

This unique initiative of Punjab Mandi Board has been recognized in the summit for creating a new platform for conducting video conferences regarding various activities of Mandi Board with its senior officers and field staff especially amid Covid-19 pandemic to ensure smooth operation of procurement.

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QVICDisclosing this here today a Spokesperson of the Board said that QVIC had been recognized in the said summit as a unique digital initiative during Covid-19 and the Punjab Mandi Board was chosen for National PSU Award 2020, where the former Union Minister and Member Parliament Suresh Prabhu was the chief guest. The team of Punjab Mandi Board received this award during the webinar, he added.

The spokesperson further pointed out that the Board had launched this Quick Video Calling mobile app, where an audio and video call could be made with just a single click, which was being seamlessly utilised by the senior officers of the State Government during paddy procurement-2020 along with the officers of Punjab Mandi Board and its field officers.

Elets global conferences have invariably created knowledge sharing platforms of top-notch thinkers, and industry leaders linked to various sectors and these conferences were fascinated with various policymakers, experts, thought leaders and industry leaders from IT and eGovernance, Health, Education, and Urban Development sectors.

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Laal Singh

The Chairman Mandi Board Laal Singh lauded the tireless efforts of the team Mandi Board for adopting and executing such latest technologies, which were need of the hour especially in this era of information technology.

He congratulated the team for this award as Punjab Mandi Board had developed this unique solution, which was not developed by any of Government Departments.

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Meanwhile, the Additional Chief Secretary (Development) Anirudh Tewari also congratulated team Mandi Board for this rare achievement. He added that team Punjab Mandi Board has always focused on e-Governance for Punjab Mandi Board and its field offices.

Since his joining, he keenly focused on implementing such project by reviewing it on a weekly basis. He has given his massive input by in-corporating various technology-driven measures.

Punjab Mandi BoardSecretary Mandi Board Ravi Bhagat added that this app is a novel initiative, which would ensure greater security in its communication, transparency, and speedy disposal of the official work.

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The main features of this mobile app are: one click Video and Audio Calls, Creating group for Group calls, Browser based video calls, Screen Sharing, User friendly UI design and Security.

Pertinently, since its inception, Punjab State Agricultural Marketing Board (PSAMB) has always worked for societys benefit, including farmers and the general public in agriculture.

For this purpose, Punjab Mandi Board has consistently taken various initiatives set up by the Government of Punjab (GOP) and Government of India (GOI). Significant decisions were taken up by Punjab Mandi Board management in establishing a robust mandi system within the State of Punjab.

Other Indian states have always taken up Punjab State as an example state in agriculture, especially Punjab Mandi Board department. In continuation of this, Punjab Mandi Board had also taken up initiatives in Information Technology to reach the farmer community and the general public.
The Illinois Environmental Protection Agency and Department of Public Health are warning residents that water conditions remain ideal for blue-green algae blooms in Illinois waterways.

While most are harmless, some blue-green algae can produce toxins that may cause sickness or other health effects in people or pets. Blue-green algae blooms can form into late fall months.
The May 31, 1962, front page of the San Antonio Express was chock-full of news.

John Connally and Don Yarborough, locked in a heated Democratic gubernatorial runoff, were both in town.

Santa Rosa hospital was planning a $5 million expansion. The Cold War was raging, and the State Department had failed to get Russia to negotiate on a Berlin access agreement.

But the biggest local news was a public health campaign to get everyone to eat a sugar cube containing a poliovirus vaccine  every man, woman and child. It was free.

The story was joined by a front-page editorial, Join the attack, which lamented the many persons who have declined for one reason or another to get vaccinated.

It urged San Antonians to cooperate, assuring them the vaccine was safe, sure and easy to take.

Forty locations were set up, including Alamo Heights, Edison and Lanier high schools, Freeman Coliseum, Municipal Auditorium and San Pedro Park. Five military bases joined the effort.

San Antonio was a polio hot spot, and this community-wide effort helped end its crippling spread. Getting the same level of cooperation when a coronavirus vaccine becomes available may prove harder.

National surveys conducted by the Pew Research Center show a country as divided on this issue as it is on so many others.

From May to September, the percentage of those whod get a COVID-19 vaccine if it were available dropped significantly.

In May, 72 percent of all adults said theyd take it. In September, that percentage dropped to 51, not enough to develop a herd immunity to a disease that has killed more than 200,000 people in the United States, more than any other country in the world.

Republican respondents showed more reluctance: 65 percent said theyd get the vaccine in May. Four months later, that dropped to 44 percent. For Democrats, 79 percent gave way to 58 percent in the same period.

Side effect concerns and questions about effectiveness were the top reasons for those not planning to get a COVID-19 vaccine. Others said they didnt think they needed a vaccine, or that it would cost too much.

Overall, more men than women would take the vaccine. Older respondents would be more likely to take a vaccine, as would the more educated.

More Asian Americans would take the vaccine than Latino, white and Black respondents, with African Americans showing the least confidence.

John Watson, 83, a retired attorney in Johnson City, didnt recall such a lack of confidence in the polio vaccine in 1962. He had just moved to San Antonio that spring and was among hundreds who went to San Pedro Park.

I trusted the government, he said. I was a child when Pearl Harbor broke out, and I trusted the government to win the war. I did metal drives, collected newspapers and saved nickels and dimes to buy war bonds.

That was before Watergate, the Vietnam War and more recently, a president who openly lies day after day and who may push the nation into a constitutional crisis if he doesnt win a second term.

This week President Donald Trump wouldnt commit to a peaceful transition of power, an unimaginable level of disregard for democracy.

Watson was saddened by the eroding trust in governmental institutions shown in polls. Yet hes also not sure hell line up for a vaccine.

Ill have to see what the approval process looks like, he said. If its politically rammed through, Ill have some reluctance. The head of the FDA (Dr. Stephen M. Hahn) was the head of MD Anderson, so I hope he has the scientific integrity not to let Trump push him around.

Watson said hell look to trustworthy officials like Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

Theres good reason Pews survey reflects a lack of trust in whatever vaccines are developed against the coronavirus.

The White House hasnt just sowed distrust, but confusion. The president has contradicted his own health officials and agencies, effectively corrupting confidence in them. He has created disruption and politicized public health.

These are the tools of dictatorship, not democracy.

When a vaccine or vaccines are cleared and deemed effective, the United States will need at least 328 million doses. The world will need 7.6 billion.

More sobering is that coronavirus vaccines may not be as effective as those that stopped polio. More likely theyll be like flu vaccines.

People still die of influenza. People will still die of COVID-19. Whats still needed is a coordinated effort against the coronavirus and a president who can guide a nation through it.

Elaine Ayala is a columnist covering San Antonio and Bexar County. To read more from Elaine, become a subscriber. eayala@express-news.net | Twitter: @ElaineAyala
How far will the new farm reform laws help farmers get better returns for their produce? Global history shows that farmers will respond to those crops where their share of the take is higher, says T N Ninan. The hope for the success of the freeing up of agri-markets, he writes here, lies in getting farmer producer organisations off the ground and focusing on productivity.

Other views focus on Modis role as a reformer, what the automobile industry signals for the Indian economy and the risks of the government spending more, immediately, to combat the recession. Kanika Datta ...
A recently published research has found that a massive explosion had hit the earth millions of years ago, triggering the rise of dinosaurs on planet earth. It was found that huge volcanic eruptions triggered another level of mass extinction of tetrapods and herbivores. The eruptions, known as Carnian Pluvian Episode happened 233 million years ago and pumped carbon dioxide, methane, and water vapours which eventually heated the planet to unbearable levels.

The research which was published in the Science Magazine revealed that it was this mass extinction event that killed many tetrapods and heralded the dawn of dinosaurs on the planet. The CPE killed as many species as the giant asteroid did many years ago.

Read: New Species Of Dinosaur Related To Tyrannosaurus Rex Discovered On The Isle Of Wight

Read: Armoured Dinosaur 'Scelidosaurus' Finally Gets Recognised And A Place On 'family Tree'

Gave foothold to modern Tetrapods

According to the study, ecosystems were destroyed and oceans and the planet got warmer and drier. Annihilation of plants and herbivores, and declining numbers of plant-eating tetrapods triggered the age of dinosaurs, which stretched for 165 million years. In addition, to dinosaurs, the event also gives a foothold of modern tetrapod groups, such as turtles, lizards, crocodiles and mammals date back to this newly discovered time of revolution.

Read: Armoured Dinosaur 'Scelidosaurus' Finally Gets Recognised And A Place On 'family Tree'

Read: Evidence: Species That Roamed With Dinosaur Survived Mass Extinction Due To 'hibernation'

Meanwhile, a separate study found that the Lystrosaurus species that roamed with dinosaurs went into hibernation and survived Earths largest mass extinction that wiped out 70 per cent of species on Earth. According to a study published in the journal Nature, scientists at the University of Washington found that Lystrosaurus somehow survived for another 5 million years into subsequent Triassic Period on the continent, Pangea, present day Antarctica. The four-legged foragers helped scientists understand the phenomenon and history of hibernation of species in polar regions that get through tough conditions like food scarcity, temperatures fall, and dark environment and still survive.

Representative Image, credits: Pixabey
The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and Sterling Exploration and Energy Production Company (SEEPCO) have signed an agreement for the development and commercialisation of gas from the Oil Mining Lease (OML) 143.

The corporation said this in a statement signed by NNPC spokesman, Kennie Obateru, in Abuja on Saturday.

The agreement will help to reduce gas flaring in the country, the NNPC said.

The Group Managing Director of NNPC, Mele Kyari, was quoted as saying that the execution of the deal was a great milestone and a testament to NNPCs commitment to facilitating the nations transformation into a gas-powered economy.

The deal will not only help reduce gas flaring and its environmental hazards, but will also promote gas production and utilisation in the domestic market, it said.

He commended SEEPCO for its unwavering commitment to gas development and commercialisation in the country.

He said that this had led to the establishment of a Special Purpose Vehicle that would help expand gas utilisation in the country as a cleaner, cheaper and more reliable alternative form of energy.

Responding, SEEPCO Chairman, Tony Chukwueke, described the deal as an essential partnership that would help the company fulfill the pledge it made to support the efforts of the Nigerian government to eliminate gas flaring by monetising it.

ALSO READ: NNPC chief advocates capacity upgrade for indigenous oil firms

He commended NNPC and the GMD for ensuring the execution of the agreement.

He described it as central to the achievement of the companys cardinal objective of boosting the production of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), condensate and dry gas for the Nigerian market.

He said that the company had invested about 600 million dollars for that purpose. (NAN)
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SAN DIEGO  Ive written about the Latino vote for 30 years, and Ive been a Latino voter for longer than that.

So lately Ive been asked why Joe Biden has such a big problema with Latino voters, as well as why President Donald Trump is poised to do well with people that he often mistakes for pinatas.

Both trends make sense to me, even as a Latino Never Trumper. In fact  although many commentators have recently noted that Bidens Latino support is falling, while Trumps stock with Latinos is on an uptick  I saw this hurricane coming a few months ago. Back in May, I wrote about how many Latinos dont like the former vice president or consider him their amigo.

Latinos are all about relationships. Biden doesnt have one with us, and he never has. Even with his half century in elective office, its difficult to name a single piece of legislation that Biden has authored that specifically benefited Latinos.

Latinos apathy toward Biden has been hard to miss  even before they were largely left off the agenda last month at the virtual Democratic National Convention.

In November 2019, during the primary, Biden was confronted over his record with Latinos at a town hall in South Carolina. Carlos Rojas, a Latino immigrant advocate, grilled Biden about the reprehensible actions of President Barack Obama. Biden served at Obamas side for eight years with nary a peep publicly about Obamas assault on immigrants and refugeesrecord deportations, separation of families, kids in cages, etc. An impatient Biden snapped at Rojas: You should vote for Trump!

As you wish. Now many Latinos appear ready to take Bidens advice and vote for his opponent.

Polls show Trump performing well in Arizona, Texas and Floridawith 50%, 37% and 29% of the Latino vote, respectively.

For a Republican, anything north of 30% of the Latino vote is a decent showing, and getting more than 35% all but ensures that the Democrat doesnt stand a chance of winning.

As the liberal East Coast media  whose ignorance about all things Latino remains profound  whistle past the graveyard by claiming that Trumps Latino support is limited to anti-socialist factions, the wound is deeper than that. Biden is bleeding support from the Latino communitys quintessential swing votersMexicans and Mexican Americans in the Southwest.

It is counterintuitive that a group of voters that supported the Democratic nominee in the last 15 presidential elections dating back to 1960 would desert the current Democratic nominee. Even more so that a healthy slice of these voters would back the most anti-Latino president since, well, the last president.

Then again, much of politics is counterintuitive. Catholic voters back Democratic politicians who support abortion rights and then demagogue Catholic judicial nominees as religious zealots. Meanwhile, Evangelical Christians who preach morality and propriety have no qualms about supporting a Republican president who isnt even remotely acquainted with either concept.

This should have been the Latino election. Latinos are poised to surpass African Americans for the first time and become the largest group of non-white eligible voters in the United States. Both political parties should pay closer attention to the estimated 15 million Latino voters expected to cast ballots on Nov. 3  including the sizable number who live in four crucial battleground states (Colorado, Nevada, Arizona and Florida).

Keep a few things in mind:

- There is no Latino bloc, but there is a Latino vote. Just as there is a Jewish vote, or an African American vote, or a working-class White vote. Its not that millions of people get together and decide beforehand who theyll support. But it is fair and helpful to track how certain candidates do with specific groups.

- Republicans do well with Latinos who are conservativeCubans, Venezuelans and Colombians. Democrats tend to have a lock on the liberalsPuerto Ricans, Dominicans, and Central Americans. Mexicans and Mexican Americans are up for grabs as registered Democrats who will support moderate Republicans.

- And, while immigrant bashing has been shown to get our dander up, our top issues are jobs, the economy, education and health care. Though it is also fair to describe us as single-issue voters. That issue is respect. Along with family and an incredible work ethic, its everything to us. Ignore that fact at your peril.

And what about when Latinos have to choose between two candidates  each of whom has, at different times and in different ways, disrespected them? That prospect is dark and depressing.

Welcome to Election 2020.

Ruben Navarrette is a nationally syndicated columnist who appears in The Washington Post.

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A n issue preventing users of the NHS Covid-19 app in England logging a positive test result has now been resolved.

However, people who book a test outside the app still cannot log negative results.

Concerns were expressed when it emerged people tested in NHS hospitals or Public Health England (PHE) labs or those taking part in the Office for National Statistics infection survey could not enter their results on the newly-launched app.

The app has been available for download across England and Wales since Thursday, but the problem existed only in England.

Its launch has been hailed by Health Secretary Matt Hancock as an important step forward in the fight against the virus.

A tweet from the official app account on Friday confirmed that certain test results could not be recorded, after a user tweeted to say he was being asked for a code  which he did not have  in order to enter his result.

The new coronavirus contact tracing app on an iPhone, which was launched across England and Wales on Thursday morning. / PA

A day later, the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) confirmed it was urgently working to resolve the issue.

On Saturday evening, a spokeswoman said: Everyone who receives a positive test result can log their result on the app.

A minority of people, such as hospital patients, who were unable to log their positive result can now request a code when contacted by NHS Test and Trace to input on their app.

The new coronavirus contact tracing app on an iPhone / PA

But users who report symptoms through the app and then book a test outside the app are still unable to log a negative result, the spokeswoman confirmed.

She said they are looking into providing that option after feedback from users.

When the issue emerged, the Welsh Government tweeted to confirm that while the app is used across both countries, there was no problem in Wales.

Coronavirus hits the UK - In pictures 1 /81 Coronavirus hits the UK - In pictures A deserted Westminster Bridge PA A man wearing a face mask or covering due to the COVID-19 pandemic, walks past customers sat outside a restaurant AFP via Getty Images Boris Johnson addresses the nation on the Coronavirus lockdown Andrew Parsons Runners pass cardboard cutouts of Britain's Queen Elizabeth II and Prince William during the London Marathon in London AP An empty escalator at Charing Coss London Underground tube station Jeremy Selwyn Electronic bilboards displays a message warning people to stay home in Sheffield PA A sign is displayed in the window of a student accommodation building following the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Mancheste Reuters People take part in a 'We Do Not Consent' rally at Trafalgar Square, organised by Stop New Normal, to protest against coronavirus restrictions, in Londo AP People sing and dance in Leicester Square on the eve on the 10PM curfew Reuters Hearts painted by a team of artists from Upfest are seen in the grass at Queen Square, following the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Bristol Reuters Graffiti reads 'good luck and stay safe', as the number of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) cases grow around the world, under a bridge in London Reuters A sign is pictured in Soho, amid the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in London Reuters Prime Minister Boris Johnson gestures, during a coronavirus briefing in Downing Street, London AP A person runs past posters with a message of hope, as the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues in Manchester REUTERS Riot police face protesters who took part in a 'We Do Not Consent' rally at Trafalgar Square, organised by Stop New Normal, to protest against coronavirus restrictions in London AP An image of The Queen eith quotes from her broadcast to the UK and the Commonwealth in relation to the Coronavirus epidemic are displayed on lights in London's Piccadilly Circus PA Military vehicles cross Westminster Bridge after members of the 101 Logistic Brigade delivered a consignment of medical masks to St Thomas' hospital Getty Images Durdle Door in Dorset Reuters Captain Tom Moore via Reuters Mia, aged 8, and Jack, aged 5, take part in "PE with Joe" a daily live workout with Joe Wicks on Youtube to help kids stay fit who have to stay indoors due to the Coronavirus outbreak PA An NHS worker reacts at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital during the Clap for our Carers campaign in support of the NHS Reuters Goats which have taken over the deserted streets of Llandudno @AndrewStuart via PA Tobias Weller PA Novikov restaurant in London with its shutters pulled down while the restaurant is closed London Landscapes: Hyde Park and the Serpentine, central London. Matt Writtle A newspaper vendor in Manchester city centre giving away free toilet rolls with every paper bought as shops run low on supplies due to fears over the spread of the coronavirus PA Theo Clay looks out of his window next to his hand-drawn picture of a rainbow in Liverpool, as the spread of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continue Reuters A young man cuts another man's hair on top of a closed hairdresser in Oxford Reuters General view of the new NHS Nightingale Hospital, built to fight against the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in London via Reuters Jason Baird is seen dressed as Spiderman during his daily exercise to cheer up local children in Stockport, as the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues Reuters A woman wearing a face mask walks past Buckingham Palace Getty Images A man holds mobile phone displaying a text message alert sent by the government warning that new rules are in force across the UK and people must stay at home PA Medical staff on the Covid-19 ward at the Neath Port Talbot Hospital, in Wales, as the health services continue their response to the coronavirus outbreak. PA Prime Minister Boris Johnson taking part in a virtual Cabinet meeting with his top team of ministers PA A shopper walks past empty shelves in a Lidl store on in Wallington. After spates of "panic buying" cleared supermarket shelves of items like toilet paper and cleaning products, stores across the UK have introduced limits on purchases during the COVID-19 pandemic. Some have also created special time slots for the elderly and other shoppers vulnerable to the new coronavirus. Getty Images People on a busy tube train in London at rush hour PA Mia, aged 8 and her brother Jack, aged 5 from Essex, continue their school work at home, after being sent home due to the coronavirus PA Children are painting 'Chase the rainbows' artwork and springing up in windows across the country Reuters Social distancing in Primrose Hill Jeremy Selwyn A general view of a locked gate at Anfield, Liverpool as The Premier League has been suspended PA Homeless people in London AFP via Getty Images A piece of art by the artist, known as the Rebel Bear has appeared on a wall on Bank Street in Glasgow. The new addition to Glasgow's street art is capturing the global Coronavirus crisis. The piece features a woman and a man pulling back to give each other a kiss PA The Queen leaves Buckingham Palace, London, for Windsor Castle to socially distance herself amid the coronavirus pandemic PA A general view on Grey street, Newcastle as coronavirus cases grow around the world Reuters Matt Raw, a British national who returned from the coronavirus-hit city of Wuhan in China, leaves quaratine at Arrowe Park Hospital on Merseyside PA Britain's Chief Medical Officer Professor Chris Whitty (L) and Chief Scientific Adviser Patrick Vallance look on as British Prime Minister Boris Johnson gestures as he speaks during a coronavirus disease (COVID-19) news conference inside 10 Downing Street Reuters The ticket-validation terminals at the tram stop on Edinburgh's Princes Street are cleaned following the coronavirus outbreak. PA Locked school gates at Rockcliffe First School in Whitley Bay, Tyne and Wear PA A sign at a Sainsbury's supermarket informs customers that limits have been set on a small number of products as the number of coronavirus (COVID-19) cases grow around the world Reuters Jawad Javed delivers coronavirus protection kits that he and his wife have put together to the vulnerable people of their community of Stenhousemuir, between Glasgow and Edinburgh AFP via Getty Images A sign advertising a book titled "How Will We Survive On Earth?" Getty Images A man who appears to be homeless sleeping wearing a mask today in Victoria Jeremy Selwyn A pedestrian walks past graffiti that reads "Diseases are in the City" in Edinburgh AFP via Getty Images Staff from The Lyric Theatre, London inform patrons, as it shuts its doors PA A quiet looking George IV Bridge in Edinburgh PA A quieter than usual British Museum Getty Images A racegoer attends Cheltenham in a fashionable face mask SplashNews.com A commuter wears a face mask at London Bridge Station Jeremy Selwyn A empty restaurant in the Bull Ring Shopping Centre Getty Images A deserted Trafalgar Square in London PA Passengers determined to avoid the coronavirus before leaving the UK arrive at Gatwick Airport Getty Images

They said: This issue doesnt apply to Wales. We took the decision to link our all-Wales laboratory testing systems with the NHS Covid-19 app.

Here youll get a code in your test result notifications to enter into the app, whether your result is positive or negative.

DHSC confirmed that as of Saturday evening in England if someone books a test through the official testing website, they will be provided with a code to log a positive result.

People who have tests done in an NHS hospital, through a PHE lab  which carry out tests for NHS hospitals  or in a surveillance study, can request a code from NHS Test and Trace to log a positive result.

Tests booked through the app have the results, whether positive or negative, logged automatically.

The latest Government data shows 61,481 test results  either positive or negative  were reported on Friday from tests carried out in PHE labs and NHS hospitals.

Meanwhile, the ONS infection survey showed that in the latest six-week period there were a total of 282 positive tests, in 226 people from 188 households.
- An EC official has reportedly died in a motorbike accident on Friday, September 25

- The deceased, a temporal staff for the EC, died after falling off the bike

- The incident happened in the Amansie South district of the Ashanti region

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An official of the Electoral Commission (EC) has reportedly died in a motorbike accident in the Amansie South District of the Ashanti region.

The deceased, identified as Sylvia, had been temporarily contracted by the EC for the voter exhibition exercise which is going on across the country.

A report YEN.com.gh has sighted on Ghanaweb.com indicates that Sylvia died on Friday, September 25, 2020.

The deceased Photo source: Ghanaweb.com

Source: UGC

READ ALSO: Kwame Sefa Kayi speaks amid viral reports of him resigning from Peace FM over Fadda Dickson's letter to NDC

The deceased was reportedly returning home after doing her duties as an EC official at the All Days (Nnyanyinase) Electoral Area.

After closing from her duty post, Sylvia is reported to have picked a commercial motorbike, which is popularly known as okada.

At a point in their journey, the bike rider or 'okada man' as commercial motor riders are now known tried to overtake a Sprinter bus.

But in the okada man's attempt, Sylvia is reported to have fallen off the motorbike leading to her untimely death.

It is not known why Sylvia chose to pick a motorbike while going home but YEN.com.gh understands the area she was working in has a poor road network leaving many of the residents to rely on bikes for everyday commuting.

Sylvia is said to have been a teacher at the Manso Adubia District Assembly (D/A) Junior High School.

The unfortunate accident of Sylvia comes at a time when there is a massive debate about the legalisation of okada business.

The debate about okada has been sparked by the promise of former president and flagbearer of the NDC, John Mahama, to legalise their activities when he wins the 2020 elections.

While the okada is very popular in many parts of Ghana and has high patronage, the business is still illegal.

And the former president has promised to put the necessary structures in place and regularise their activities once he comes back into power.

Mahama's promise has led to divided opinions among Ghanaians; while some have seen it as a means for job creation for the youth and commended Mahama, others described it as very risky.

Meanwhile, two people on an okada recently lost their lives after meeting an accident at Mallam Junction in Accra.

As earlier reported, the motorbike carrying the two fell off the Mallam junction overhead bridge, crashing into the ground.

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People sitting this year's national civil servant Level 7 qualification test walk toward a test center at a high school Attached to Chunag-Ang University College of Education in Seoul's Gangnam District, Saturday. Yonhap





New COVID-19 cases fell below 100 for the first time in four days here Saturday, as the country is struggling with sporadic infection clusters in the greater Seoul area and persisting untraceable cases ahead of a major holiday.



The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) reported 61 new infections, including 49 local ones, bringing South Korea's total to 23,516 as of midnight Friday.



The number marked the first fall below 100 after three consecutive days of triple-digit new daily infections  the KCDA reported 114 new cases Friday.



The country had seen daily new cases in the triple-digit range for more than a month since mid-August due mainly to a surge in infections tied to a church in northern Seoul and an anti-government rally, with the figure soaring to a five-month high of 441, Aug. 27.



But the figure fell to double digits Sunday and skidded to as low as 61 Tuesday.



The number of local infections is the lowest since Aug. 13 when the figure stood at 47, according to the health authorities.



Imported cases stood at 12 as of midnight, bringing the total cases from overseas to 3,161, according to the KDCA.



Of the newly confirmed cases from overseas, three came from Uzbekistan, followed by two each from the Philippines, Indonesia and India, it added.






Though Amy Coney Barrett is the expected replacement for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, she is more aptly described as heir to another departed Supreme Court justice: conservative hero Antonin Scalia.

Like Scalia, for whom she once clerked, she is a committed Catholic as well as a firm devotee of his favored interpretation of the Constitution known as originalism. Those qualifications delight many on the right but dismay liberals and others who fear her votes could result in chipping away of some laws, especially the Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion.

President Donald Trump is planning to announce his choice of the 48-year-old Indiana judge at a Saturday afternoon press conference, setting Barrett on the path to help conservatives hold sway over the court for decades to come.

Her selection is as sure to energize the presidents political base as to galvanize his foes with only weeks left to Election Day. Republican leaders in the Senate have already said they have the votes to confirm her nomination this year, likely before the election.

But beyond the 2020 election, the Barrett elevation could bring a national reckoning over abortion, an issue that has divided many Americans bitterly for almost half a century. The idea of overturning or gutting Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 decision, has been an animating political issue exploited by both sides.

Liberals say they fear Barrett's religious views coupled with her devotion to a Scalia-favored interpretation of the Constitution known as originalism could result in a constant chipping away of Roe and other landmark abortion cases.

Her legal writings and speeches show a commitment to originalism, a concept that involves justices endeavoring to decipher original meanings of texts in assessing whether someones rights have been violated. Many liberals say that approach is too rigid and doesnt allow the Constitution's consequences to adjust to vastly changing times.

On abortion, questions have arisen about Barrett's involvement in organizations that vigorously oppose it. But she has not said publicly she would, if given the chance, seek to scale back rights affirmed by the high court.

Barrett has been a federal judge just since l2017, when Trump nominated her to the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. But as a long-time University of Notre Dame law professor she had already establish herself as a reliable conservative in the mold of Scalia.

She gained a reputation as a Scalia clerk in the late 1990s as bright and adept at picking apart poorly reasoned arguments. Ara Lovitt, who clerked with her at the time, recalls that at her investiture ceremony for the 7th Circuit, Scalia had high praise for her.

Isnt Amy great, Lovitt remembers Scalia saying.

Before becoming a judge, she discussed how court precedents provide welcome stability in the law. But she also seemed to leave the door open to the possibility of reversing ones about which there remained sharp disagreement.

"Once a precedent is deeply rooted," a 2017 article in the University of Pennsylvania Journal of Constitutional Law, which Barrett co-wrote, said, "the Court is no longer required to deal with the question of the precedents correctness. But it added: None of this is to say that a Justice cannot attempt to overturn long-established precedent. While institutional features may hinder that effort, a Justice is free to try.

Barrett and her husband, Jesse Barrett, a former federal prosecutor, both graduated from Notre Dame Law School. They have seven children, including two adopted from Haiti and one with special needs.

She would be the only justice on the current court not to have received her law degree from an Ivy League school. The eight current justices all attended either Harvard or Yale.

How her religious beliefs might guide her legal views became a focus for some Democrats during bruising confirmation hearings after Barrett's nomination for the 7th Circuit. That prompted Republicans to accuse Democrats of seeking to impose a religious test on Barrett's fitness for the job.

At Notre Dame, where Barrett began teaching at 30, she often invoked God in articles and speeches. In a 2006 address, she encouraged graduating law students to see their careers as a means to building the kingdom of God.

She was considered a finalist in 2018 for the high court before Trump nominated Brett Kavanaugh for the seat that opened when Justice Anthony Kennedy retired. Even some conservatives worried her sparse judicial record made it too hard to predict how she might rule, concerned she could end up like other seemingly conservatives who wound up more moderate.

Three years on, her record now includes around 100 opinions and dissents, in which she often illustrated Scalias influence by delving deep into historical minutiae to glean the meaning of original texts.

A 2019 dissent in a gun-rights case argued a person convicted of a nonviolent felony shouldnt be automatically barred from owning a gun. All but a few pages of her 37-page dissent were devoted to the history of gun rules for convicted criminals in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Barrett has twice joined dissenting opinions asking for abortion-related decisions to be thrown out and reheard by the full appeals court. Last year, after a three-judge panel blocked an Indiana law that would make it harder for a minor to have an abortion without her parents being notified, Barrett voted to have the case reheard by the full court.

She wrote a unanimous three-judge panel decision in 2019 making it easier for men alleged to have committed sexual assaults on campus to challenge the proceedings against them. And she was in dissent in June when her two colleagues on a 7th Circuit panel put on hold, just in Chicago, the Trump administration policy that could jeopardize permanent resident status for immigrants who use food stamps, Medicaid and housing vouchers.

Barrett would assume the court seat with already substantial wealth, and her financial disclosures show close ties to a number of conservative groups. Barrett and her husband have investments worth between $845,000 and $2.8 million, according to her 2019 financial disclosure report. Judges report the value of their investments in ranges. Their money is invested mostly in mutual funds, some of which are for retirement and their childrens education.

When she was nominated to the appeals court in 2017, Barrett reported assets of just over $2 million, including her home in Indiana worth nearly $425,000, and a mortgage on the property with a balance of $175,000.

In the two previous years, Barrett received $4,200 in two equal payments from Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative Christian law firm, her financial report shows. In 2018 and 2019, she participated in 10 events sponsored by the Federalist Society, which paid for her transportation, meals and lodging in New York, New Orleans, Washington and other cities. Several events took place at leading law schools.

Barrett was raised in New Orleans and was the eldest child of a lawyer for Shell Oil Co. She earned her undergraduate degree in English literature in 1994 at Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee.

She also served as a law clerk for Laurence Silberman for a year at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Between clerkships and entering academia, she worked from 1999 to 2001 at a law firm in Washington, Miller, Cassidy, Larroca & Lewin.

___

Associated Press Writers Mark Sherman in Washington and Ryan J. Foley in Iowa City, Iowa contributed to this report.
FILE PHOTO: Employees pass by Fira de Barcelona after the Mobile World Congress (MWC) was cancelled in Barcelona

By Joan Faus and Douglas Busvine

BARCELONA/BERLIN (Reuters) - The organisers of the Mobile World Congress, the telecoms industry's biggest annual gathering, said on Wednesday they were postponing next year's event to late June to make it possible to convene safely despite the coronavirus pandemic.

MWC 2021, originally scheduled for early March, will now be held in Barcelona, Spain, from June 28 to July 1. This year's congress was cancelled at the last minute as the virus spread around the world.

The event, which combines a glitzy trade show with a frenzy of executive networking, will be face to face but attendance will be down from the 110,000 who traditionally converge in the Catalan capital as winter turns to spring.

"It's going to be physical. It's going to be face to face. But it's going to have a bigger virtual component," said Mats Granryd, director general of the GSMA, the industry association that hosts the congress.

"Having 110,000-plus events is less interesting - getting the right people is more interesting," he told Reuters in an interview.

The congress has previously given a $500 million lift to the local economy - a boost sorely needed as rates of infection soar. The blow to travel and tourism from the pandemic has been devastating, with only three in 10 hotels now open in Barcelona.

MOMENTUM, INTEREST

The GSMA, which counts 750 operators and 400 more companies in the wider industry as members, scratched this year's event after an exodus by exhibitors. Travel, auto and technology shows quickly followed, forcing organisers to adapt to online formats.

Despite initial criticism, the lobby group assuaged its critics by offering refunds and credits towards future shows. It has committed to keeping the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona at least until 2024.

Seventy-eight of the top-100 exhibitors had already signed up for next year, the GSMA's Granryd said, a number that could reach the eighties after the event got pushed back to the Mediterranean summer.

Story continues

The delay seeks to buy time to strengthen hygiene measures around a "touchless" event that, in one social distancing feature, will replace tickets with admission using facial recognition technology.

Granryd expressed hope that, by next summer, it will be possible for delegates to take quick COVID-19 tests at their hotel before heading to the event. He also expressed confidence that telecoms bosses would have access to vaccines, now under development, once they become available.

The GSMA said it would also move up the Chinese edition of next year's Mobile World Congress, held in Shanghai, to Feb. 23-25 in what amounts to a calendar swap with the main event in Barcelona.

(Additional reporting by Inti Landauro; Writing by Douglas Busvine; editing by Jason Neely, Kirsten Donovan and Tomasz Janowski)
Lindy Chamberlain has opened up about her time in jail after she was wrongly locked up over the death of her baby Azaria, who was taken by a dingo.

Ms Chamberlain lost her nine-week-old daughter when she was dragged from a tent by the wild animal near Uluru, in the Northern Territory, on August 17, 1980.

The disappearance led to a series of court cases and inquests that saw Ms Chamberlain, 72, jailed for life - before she was eventually cleared.

An upcoming documentary 'Lindy Chamberlain: The True Story' will reveal new details of the family's experience and home movies of Azaria.

It will also shed light on Azaria's homemade black dress which bizarrely convinced some Australians that her mother was involved with witchcraft and had somehow been responsible for her daughter's death, The Sunday Telegraph reported.

Lindy Chamberlain on famously lost her nine-week-old daughter Azaria (pictured together) to a dingo in Uluru, in the Northern Territory, on August 17, 1980

Chamberlain (pictured in 2012) was wrongfully sentenced to life imprisonment for murder in 1982 and said her time in jail taught her to develop patience

Chamberlain also said a 'black baby dress' (pictured above) convinced Australians she was a witch and was responsible for her daughter's death. She made the dress for her son

Narrated by Sam Neill, the Network Ten doumentary draws on interviews with eyewitnesses, high profile media identities, high court judges and family friends.

It will also show the impact of the case on Ms Chamberlain's other children, Aidan, 46, Reagan, 44, and Kahlia, 37.

Chamberlain famously screamed 'a dingo's got my baby!' to her fellow campers after Azaria was dragged from the tent.

Previously unheard recordings will show Chamberlain discussing the black baby dress decorated with red ribbons with her mother.

'In this tape, recorded years before Azaria was born, I talk about how I'd made the black dress for Reagan and how much I liked it and how much Michael hated it,' she said.

Chamberlain was wrongly jailed for murder and her ex-husband Michael was sentenced as an accessory in 1982.

She was released in 1986 upon the sensational discovery of the baby's yellow matinee jacket at the base of Uluru.

Chamberlain's ex-husband Michael Chamberlain (pictured together) was also sentenced as an accessory to murder after Azaria's infamous disappearance

Lindy Chamberlain was a 32-year-old mother of three (she is pictured with husband Michael and sons Reagan and Aidan) when she returned to the family tent to find an empty bassinet

A royal commission exonerated her of murder in 1988. Lindy Chamberlain is pictured during the late 1980s with her eldest son Aiden, second son Reagan, daughter Kahlia who was born as her mother served a life sentence and husband Michael

Chamberlain also reflected on her time in prison and said it taught her to be patient.

'In the early days they tried to break me by giving me extra nasty jobs, but I would whip through anything and they soon realised it wasn't working.'

She said her biggest regret was not the three years she spent in prison but the way her case affected others who were involved.

Some witnesses were not believed by the police force and legal system and felt traumatised by the process.

'It makes me sad that they feel responsible that I went into prison,' she said.

The family were acquitted responsibility after a fourth coroner's inquest in 2012 which found that Azaria died 'as a result of being attacked and taken by a dingo'.
GODFREY  The road to success doesnt always follow a typical path.

Jarrius Burton is one example of how education and leadership skills can be achieved through non-traditional means.

Although the public school system wasnt a good fit for Burton, 18, of Alton, he knew he wanted to continue his education. So he joined L&Cs YouthBuild program where hes working to complete his GED/High School Equivalency.

High school wasnt the best option for me because I didnt feel like I was working toward a goal I wanted to achieve, Burton said. I wasnt motivated to get up every morning to go. I would miss school a lot because I hated going.

The YouthBuild program, a part of L&Cs Adult Education division and an Americorps affiliate, helped him discover all the opportunities available to him.

The best part about YouthBuild is all the amazing people and the opportunities that have opened because of it, he said. I love that theyve helped me become a leader and taught me things along my journey. The program works for people who want to feel theyre a priority. You can learn at your own pace and be rewarded for learning and staying motivated.

Burton looks to complete his GED soon and has already enrolled in a college-level course at Lewis and Clark. Hes on track to complete the YouthBuild program by the end of 2020.

His success in the Adult Ed program and his natural enthusiasm made him an excellent candidate to become a student ambassador.

Pathway Advocate Kavon Lacey describes Burton as an outgoing student who always wants to know what he can do to help.

Jarrius has a team-first mentality, Lacey said. We are very proud to have him with us as part of our student ambassador team. Hes a great role model for students entering our program.

The Adult Ed student ambassador group is a newly formed outreach program. Active students, like Burton, work to help others in the community who want to further their education or need help with job training.

In a student like Jarrius, you can see his passion and motivation, Lacey said. As an ambassador, he can channel that energy and get the word out to people the Adult Ed program can help the most. People can relate to him.

Burtons goal is to become an entrepreneur. I want to start my own business and support my family by doing something I love, he said.

His role as a student ambassador will help Burton acquire qualities hell need on his path to entrepreneurship. Ambassadors develop self-confidence and skills such as public speaking and networking.

The programs in the Adult Ed department are free of charge.

Sept. 20-26 was National Adult Education and Family Literacy Week.
After Ronald Reagan romped to a surprisingly easy victory over Jimmy Carter in 1980, a media narrative quickly formed.

We were told that the presidential race had been up for grabs until the two candidates met for a debate in Cleveland a week before the election.

The story goes that Reagans confident debate performance and Carters stiff, wonky delivery created a massive last-minute swing for Reagan and essentially ended Carters hopes for a second term.

Vince Breglio, a pollster for the Reagan campaign, didnt buy it.

Our surveys, Breglio said at the time, showed that the main reason Carter lost the election was that people just had a belly full of him.

Sometimes its just that simple.

Over the past few months, national and state polls consistently have indicated that a majority of American voters have had a belly full of President Donald Trump.

This phenomenon isnt new: After all, Trump is the only president in the 85-year history of the Gallup Poll never to enjoy a single day in which his Gallup approval rating reached at least 50 percent.

But the loss of more than 200,000 Americans to the COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting collapse of the U.S. economy have shattered a persistent pro-Trump narrative: that the president may be coarse, but hes a commanding leader who knows how to gets things done.

Youd have to go back to 1968 (when a then-current vice president, Hubert Humphrey, ran against a former vice president, Richard Nixon) to find a presidential race in which the voters were as familiar with the two major-party candidates as they are this year.

This year, weve got Trump, a sitting Republican president who has been a celebrity for more than three decades, against Joe Biden, a Democrat who spent eight years as vice president, ran for president twice before that and served 36 years in the U.S. Senate.

Thats why, in a way, the stakes seem unusually low for Tuesday nights first debate between Trump and Biden, which, like the 1980 Reagan-Carter clash, will be set in Cleveland.

Public opinion on these two men congealed long ago.

There is no factual error or outright lie that Trump could tell on the debate stage Tuesday night that would drive away the loyalists who stand in line to attend his rallies.

There is no verbal gaffe that Biden could produce that would shake his supporters sense that he is a decent, pragmatic antidote to four years of shoot-from-the-hip belligerence from Trump.

It would seem that any voter whos still persuadable at this point either has minimal interest in politics or is the kind of person who can stare at a one-page menu for two hours without settling on an entree.

Nonetheless, the Trump-Biden debates do matter, at least partly because this is a COVID-19 campaign in which the opportunities for traditional voter outreach events are limited.

On Tuesday night, Trump and Biden will have an hour and a half to speak to 80 million Americans. They will get the chance to confront each other and get fact-checked in real time by moderator Chris Wallace.

For 2020 Trump, like 1980 Carter, the messaging options are narrow. Four years ago, he could make the ABBA take a chance on me argument. This year, hes boxed in by his own record. Thats why, like Carter, hes basing his campaign on scaring the public away from his challenger.

Hes claiming that Biden is a senile Trojan horse for extremists in the Democratic Party who want to strip away individual liberties, confiscate guns, dismantle law enforcement and let the cities of America burn.

Before they do that, Trump insists, theyll try to steal the November election by papering the counties of this country with fraudulent mail ballots.

For Biden, like Reagan, there will be plenty of opportunities to prosecute the case against the incumbent and argue for change.

In 1980, Reagan faced an electorate that had wearied of four years of struggle under Carter. They just needed convincing that Reagan could be trusted with the nuclear button.

The first question of the 1980 debate, from Marvin Stone, the editor of U.S. News & World Report, went to Reagan. What, Stone asked, were the differences in the two candidates positions on the use of American military power?

I believe, with all my heart, Reagan said, that our first priority must be world peace, and that use of force is always and only a last resort, when everything else has failed.

Mission accomplished.

Biden faces an electorate that is exhausted by the rancor and unrest of the Trump years. After enduring months of Trump questioning his cognitive abilities, Bidens challenge is to show voters that at 77 he possesses the mental and physical energy required by the job.

A majority of voters want Biden to convince them that hes the answer. Tuesday night might be his best chance to seal the deal.

Gilbert Garcia is a columnist covering the San Antonio and Bexar County area. To read more from Gilbert, become a subscriber. ggarcia@express-news.net | Twitter: @gilgamesh470
Sequent Scientific has completed the sale of investments held by the company in Strides Pharma Science to Pronomz Ventures LLP on 25 September 2020.

The proceeds of the sale (net of taxes) will be predominantly utilised to consolidate the Company's shareholding in Provet Veteriner Urunleri San. Ve Tic.

A. S., Turkey (Provet) by acquiring 40% stake held by Dr. Husein Aydin in Provet, with the balance to be used to pare the outstanding debt of the Company.

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 07:03:29|Editor: huaxia

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QUITO, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- Ecuadorian President Lenin Moreno announced on Friday that he has signed an executive decree to offer extra nutritional support to the most vulnerable sectors of the population affected by the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

"Our priority is to take care of the most vulnerable! We are ensuring their (access to) food," the president wrote on Twitter.

The decree stated that among those that will benefit from this program are children and pregnant women in extreme poverty, impoverished citizens living in provinces with a high level of COVID-19 cases, as well as households whose economic situation has worsened due to the pandemic.

According to the decree, the 240-U.S. dollar aid will be distributed to around 950,000 families.

In March, the Ecuadorian government created the aid program Family Protection Bonus, and this along with other support programs from the Ministry of Economic and Social Inclusion, currently benefits around 2 million Ecuadorians during the pandemic.

As of Friday, the country has registered 132,475 cases and 7,436 deaths from COVID-19.

Another 3,800 deaths are considered to have been caused by COVID-19, but have not been verified, the health ministry said. Enditem
Icons for the smartphone apps TikTok and WeChat are seen on a smartphone screen in Beijing, Friday, Aug. 7, 2020. President Donald Trump has ordered a sweeping but unspecified ban on dealings with the Chinese owners of the consumer apps TikTok and WeChat, although it remains unclear if he has the legal authority to actually ban the apps from the U.S. Read more

A federal judge scheduled a rare Sunday morning hearing to decide whether the U.S. can go through with its ban on the popular video-sharing app TikTok.

ByteDance Ltd., TikTok's Chinese owner, has asked the court to block the ban, set to begin on Sunday night, even as it pursues approvals from the government for the sale of a stake in its U.S. operations to Oracle Corp. and Walmart Inc. under pressure from President Donald Trump. It argued in court filings Friday that the ban would trample constitutional free-speech protections.

Trump cited national security risks in August, when he announced a ban on the widely-used network from U.S. app stores. The president, who's also barred WeChat, owned by China's Tencent Holdings Ltd., has told ByteDance its only alternative is to sell its American TikTok business. The U.S. Justice Department argues the apps potentially give the China's government access to millions of Americans' personal data.

The government emphasized those concerns in a filing on Friday, urging U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols not to grant the temporary block. U.S. lawyers cited FBI Director Christopher Wray's assessment that China poses the "greatest long-term threat to our nation's information and intellectual property" as a reason for the ban.

"One of the tools that the PRC uses to further its goals is bulk data collection," the U.S. government said, referring to the People's Republic of China.

ByteDance, founded in 2012 by Zhang Yiming, has close ties to the Chinese Communist Party and must abide by laws that require it to cooperate with China's government, the U.S. said.

"In April 2018, the CCP forced ByteDance to shutdown one of its other platforms, and Mr. Yiming issued a public apology in which he pledged to cooperate with and elevate official CCP media," the U.S. said. "Following this public atonement, ByteDance underwent organizational restructuring with CCP infrastructure now built into it."

The ban, announced in an Aug. 6 executive order, is part of a wider effort by the administration to take a hard line against Beijing, which Trump bets will help him win re-election. Starting at 11:59 p.m. on Sept. 27, it would remove TikTok from the app stores run by Apple and Google's Android, the most widely used marketplaces for downloadable apps. People who don't yet have the app wouldn't be able to get it, and those who already have it wouldn't have access to updates needed to ensure its safe and smooth operation. TikTok is used regularly by 19 million Americans.

Ahead of the looming deadline, ByteDance had argued for an expedited schedule in the case. The U.S. pushed back at a hearing on Thursday, saying ByteDance had filed a separate suit more than a month ago and was late in requesting the injunction in this one. In defense of the ban, the government again cited security concerns.

"TikTok is allowed to continue operating with respect to existing users but cannot add users, and the reason for that is that there are significant national security risks," Assistant U.S. Attorney Daniel Schwei told the judge.

TikTok said that the ban was already undermining its business model by scaring users away, and that it had sought relief as soon as it was allowed to under the law. It said the government would have argued its request was premature if filed earlier.

"The urgency of this is created by the Sunday night ban," attorney John Hall said. "That part of it makes absolutely no sense to us."

Hall added the ban would increase risks to existing users by preventing them from getting regular security updates. The deadline also was affecting the company's reputation with users, who are considering moving to less attractive platforms, the attorney noted.

In the social media industry, Hall said, "users retained is absolutely the lifeblood of their business."

In Friday's filing, TikTok's lawyers argued that Trump is exceeding his authority with the proposed ban and acting in an "unreasonable and capricious manner" by seeking to cut off all transactions on the service.

The law being invoked "states the President's authority does not extend to the direct or indirect regulation or prohibition of 'personal communication' and the international flow of 'information or informational materials,' such as film, photographs, and artwork, regardless of the 'format or medium of transmission,"' the Chinese company's lawyers argued.

Such a ban also would trample free-speech rights of U.S. users of the Chinese company's platform, TikTok's lawyers added. Millions of Americans "engage in core protected speech on TikTok in pursuit of a wide variety of political, social, and cultural ends," according to the brief. "The Prohibitions unlawfully restrict this speech in violation of the First Amendment."

The case is TikTok Inc. v. Trump, 20-cv-2658, U.S. District Court, District of Columbia (Washington).
I dont know when it first hit me that the world had gone nuts, writes Piers Morgan

I dont know when it first hit me that the world had gone nuts.

It might have been when an American white woman named Rachel Dolezal self-identified as black on national television despite both her parents being white. That was nuts.

Or perhaps it was when Altrincham Grammar School for Girls in Manchester asked staff to refrain from calling female students girls because it might offend transgender students  yet didnt change the gender-specific name of the school. That was nuts.

Maybe it was when there were strident calls from radical feminists  who, like all radicals, destroy support for their cause by taking everything to absurd extremes  for James Bond to be female. That was nuts.

Or was it when students at Oxford University banned clapping at Student Union events in case it triggered anxiety? That was nuts.

Ultimately, I think the final straw came when Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called for the word mankind to be outlawed because it was sexist.

There, right there, was the purest, maddest example of the world going completely stark raving bonkers, and it came from one of the most powerful men  sorry, persons  on Planet Earth.

So yes, the world had gone nuts. It had become a place where common sense was ignored, weakness celebrated, strength denigrated, failure replaced by participation prizes, accountability abandoned in the rush to blame others, dissenting views instantly crushed by a howling, self-righteous mob and signalling ones dubious virtue was absolutely paramount.

Why had the world gone this way? Who was causing this nonsense?

I dont know when it first hit me that the world had gone nuts. It might have been when an American white woman named Rachel Dolezal self-identified as black on national television despite both her parents being white. That was nuts

The answer is a shocking one. For its us liberals who are responsible.

By us, I mean that I consider myself a liberal and its my fellow liberals who have been driving this frantically illiberal assault on the very things were supposed to stand for: freedom and tolerance.

Liberals believe that society should change gradually so that money, property and power are shared more equally. Above all, liberals are supposed to be tolerant.

Yet here they are, screaming, shrieking, hollering and hectoring us all into a world of staggering intolerance, and attempting to inhibit or silence our freedom of speech, particularly on our most pertinent societal issues.

HOW has this happened?

WHY has this happened?

WHAT will stop it?

When I began writing my latest book in late 2019, I assumed it would lead to me being publicly cancelled the moment it was published. Id be shamed, vilified, mocked, abused, bullied and no-platformed.

My book signings would be met with protests, possibly even threats of violence, and my media appearances to promote the book would be weirdly contentious.

This, after all, had been happening to anyone who dared to challenge the woke world view.

Woke is a word that modern liberals proudly use to justify their illiberalism  only they are awake enough to see how the world should be, while the rest of us imbeciles are too sleepily stupid to understand.

My criticism of Meghan has nothing to with her gender or skin colour. Nor is it bullying to hold people to account if theyre on the public purse. As for the obsessed charge, its true that Ive written and said a lot of stuff about Meghan and Harry, but thats because theyre huge global celebrities who keep doing things that dominate the news cycle, and every time I write about them, the columns get massive traction, suggesting enormous public interest

As with so many things, the term woke has been hijacked and abused by modern illiberal society. The term was first used during the 1860 US presidential election with the Wide Awakes movement spawned by young Republicans to oppose the spread of slavery.

Being woke burst into modern popular culture in an essay in 1962 and was supposed to indicate someone having a sharp political awareness of systemic social and racial injustices  which is an entirely admirable trait.

But in recent years, being woke has come to mean having an intransigent intolerance of myriad, often very trivial and pointless things, and the broadness of the woke charge sheet is growing absurdly long and is often utterly ridiculous.

Ive spent years in the eye of this illiberal liberal storm. Ive loudly supported womens rights, as well as civil rights, gay rights and transgender rights (apart from the absurd new trend of limitless gender self-identification), and I dont have a prejudiced bone in my body.

Yet that hasnt stopped the woke crowd regularly and furiously branding me racist, sexist, homophobic and transphobic. Theres no room for logic or reason in the world of illiberal liberalism.

Its not what you believe that matters so much as how you express your beliefs, the precise language you use and a total unquestioning compliance with the way they say you should behave.

Emboldened by social media echo chambers where they only expose themselves to thought processes they already agree with, these illiberal liberals have become modern-day fascists, demanding we all lead our lives in a way that conforms strictly to their narrow world view.

I have strong opinions about almost everything, and I actively dislike a lot of things that many might think are trivial and inconsequential, from papooses to vegan sausage rolls.

But I dont want them banned, or to stop people being free to eat them. I just want to exercise my freedom of speech to say I think they are abhorrent stains on society. And I should be allowed to say so without the entire world collapsing in a fit of collective hysterical pique.

I wouldnt mind the woke crowd so much if they were prepared to engage me in proper civilised debate  but theyre not. They dont see any need to debate anything because theyre so utterly convinced that they are 100 per cent right about everything and hypocritically refuse to acknowledge the importance of discourse in a liberal society. If we all follow this path, democracy will surely die.

Politics is now so horribly toxic and divisive, it doesnt leave room for anyone not on the extremities, and least of all old-fashioned liberals who believe in free speech.

Stephen Fry, speaking at the Festival For Dangerous Ideas in Sydney in 2018, said the same. A grand canyon has opened up in our world, he said, and the cracks grow wider every day. As it widens, the armies on each side shriek more and more incontinently at their perceived enemies across the divide, their gestures and insults ever huger, cruder and louder.

And he concluded: If someone is behaving like an arsehole, it isnt cancelled out by you behaving like an arsehole. Be better. Not better than they are. But better than you are. The shouting, the kicking, the name calling, spitting hatred, the dogmatic distrust, all have to stop.

Of course, hes right. And Ive been as guilty of this as anyone, frequently losing my rag on Twitter about everything from my beloved Arsenal to Americas inexplicable love affair with guns. But one thing Ive learned, the hard way, is the more you scream down those with whom you disagree, the less chance you have of winning an argument.

This is not a lesson most people even want to hear, let alone heed.

Since Fry made his speech, things have got immeasurably worse. People are more entrenched, more hysterical, more abusive than ever before  and the worst offenders, by far, are the wokies and their intransigent illiberal liberalism.

They scream and shout about the intolerance of others, the infringing of their rights, the excruciating difficulties of their day-to-day existence. They are constantly triggered by things that offend and upset them.

So, I began 2020 by constructing a book based around a burning desire to try to persuade my fellow liberals to stop behaving like arseholes, even if they think everyone else is, and start behaving like liberals again. To relearn the importance of freedom, particularly in relation to free speech. To regain a proper perspective on life.

Then came coronavirus  and everything changed. Locked down in our homes and unable to enjoy our normal freedoms, we re-established connections with family, friends, local communities and nature.

Celebrity culture was shunned for a new appreciation of more deserving, non-famous stars  health and care workers. And wokery was temporarily banished because nobody had the energy for it when really serious s*** was going down.

Then, to my horror, it slowly came creeping back and eventually exploded in a summer of madness after the despicable killing of George Floyd in America, at the knee of a cop.

The world took all leave of its senses, and illiberal liberalism rose up with even greater zealousness and ferocity than before the pandemic, tearing down  literally, in the case of statues  the very culture and history of great nations. It was as if wed learned absolutely nothing from such a life-changing event.

Ive changed during this crisis, as I think we all have  for good and bad. Its made me re-evaluate a lot of things I thought, how I view the issues that had been sending everyone nuts, and how my own behaviour may have contributed to the problem.

And, ironically, the same people who had spent the past few years lambasting me began to laud me, and those who had cheered me from the Twitter rooftops began to castigate me.

As someone who has been a diarist for 25 years, I concluded that the best way to explain that change was in real time, as it happened.

This, then, is an account of how, thanks to a devastating pandemic, weve been given the wake-up moment of our lives, and why we cannot, must not, go back to sleep.

Wednesday, January 1, 2020

The world seems relatively quiet this morning, though theres a disconcerting story coming out of China, where health authorities say theyre investigating 27 cases of a new strain of viral pneumonia in the city of Wuhan.

Friday, January 3

It hasnt taken long for 2020 to live down to 2019s often bafflingly insane standards of woke absurdity.

A judge today ruled that ethical veganism qualifies as a philosophical belief protected under UK law, worthy of the same legal rights and protections as, say, religion or other protected characteristics, like race, sex, pregnancy, maternity and sexuality.

Of course, the news was greeted with raucous celebration by the more radical and preachy members of the vegan community, which has spent the past two days haranguing people like me into giving up meat for the dreaded Veganuary.

Finally, theyve got what they want: legal validation for their war on carnivores. Kale-munching is no longer a lifestyle choice, its a right.

Inevitably, crafty commercial minds have realised there is money to be made from all this nonsense.

A year ago this week, Greggs, the high-street bakery chain, announced on Twitter: The wait is over #vegansausageroll. I was incredulous. Who the hell had been waiting for a vegan sausage roll? And how can a sausage be vegan anyway? Sausages are meat products.

I tweeted back at Greggs: Nobody was waiting for a vegan bloody sausage, you PC-ravaged clowns.

Oh, hello Piers, weve been expecting you, they instantly replied. Of course, all hell broke loose as the worlds vegans rushed to abuse and shame me, playing right into Greggs greedy little hands.

Saturday, January 4

President Trump has taken out the second most powerful man in Iran, its military leader General Qasem Soleimani, whose convoy was blown up by a US drone strike.

This stunning move follows a series of recent Iran-inspired rocket attacks on US bases in Iraq. Ive been friends with Trump for 13 years, since I competed in, and won, his inaugural season of Celebrity Apprentice USA.

Four sitting presidents  one in 12 of the 45 men who have held the office  have actually been murdered. I remain very concerned that Trump may become the fifth, such is the viciously violent vitriol aimed his way by those who should know better. It was Madonna who started this disturbing trend by screaming at the Womens March the day after Trumps inauguration in January 2017 that she thought of blowing up the White House, although she quickly backtracked, claiming her remark had been taken out of context and that she had spoken in metaphor

Its not easy being friends with the President of the United States when hes as divisive as Trump. Ive been pilloried in the media for it, abused mercilessly on Twitter, and even been subjected to verbal tirades in the street.

But Ive stayed friends with him because I like him, and hes been good to me. And contrary to popular myth, Ive never let it stop me criticising him in print or on air when I feel the need to.

I see both good and bad in Trump, and right and wrong. In some ways he is one of the least Right-wing Republican presidents ever. For example, he was the first one to reference the LGBT community in his inauguration speech.

Hes presided over a very successful economy, achieved record low unemployment levels and launched what many see as an entirely justified trade war with China  a country that has been economically ransacking America for several decades.

And yet a minute cannot pass without the woke community being mortally offended by Trump. He seems to turn many liberals into permanent gibbering wrecks of blazing fury.

Ill never forget a video that went viral the week after Trumps stunning election victory.

It lasted about 15 seconds and consisted of Yoko Ono emitting a long, strangled, mournful, high-pitched scream like a malfunctioning kettle exploding. Her agonised reaction perfectly epitomised the ludicrously over-the-top global meltdown by the planets celebrities to the result of a fair, open and democratic election.

Four sitting presidents  one in 12 of the 45 men who have held the office  have actually been murdered. I remain very concerned that Trump may become the fifth, such is the viciously violent vitriol aimed his way by those who should know better.

It was Madonna who started this disturbing trend by screaming at the Womens March the day after Trumps inauguration in January 2017 that she thought of blowing up the White House, although she quickly backtracked, claiming her remark had been taken out of context and that she had spoken in metaphor.

The way for liberals to beat Donald Trump is not by wishing him dead or screaming about him 24/7.

It is by using everything in the American democratic system to defeat him by fair means not foul. That means at the ballot box.

Thursday, January 9

In a statement released on their glitzy new website, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex revealed theyre relinquishing life as senior Royals with all the tedious duty that entails, and instead want to be a progressive force within this institution.

In other words, they want to be super-woke Royals (with all the do as we say not as we do hectoring hypocrisy theyve already brought to that status) who get to keep all the trappings of Royal life without any of the hard, boring bits.

Ive seen some disgraceful Royal antics in my time, but for pure arrogance, entitlement, greed, and wilful disrespect, nothing has quite matched this nonsense.

If I were the Queen, I would unceremoniously strip these deluded clowns of all their titles with immediate effect and despatch them back into civilian life.

Friday, January 10

I posted a MailOnline column attacking Harry and Meghans statement, and it was met with people either furiously agreeing with me, or furiously disagreeing and accusing me of being obsessed with Meghan because shed ghosted me, persecuting her, damaging her mental health and claiming, most absurdly, that I was only attacking her because shes black.

My criticism of Meghan has nothing to with her gender or skin colour. Nor is it bullying to hold people to account if theyre on the public purse.

As for the obsessed charge, its true that Ive written and said a lot of stuff about Meghan and Harry, but thats because theyre huge global celebrities who keep doing things that dominate the news cycle, and every time I write about them, the columns get massive traction, suggesting enormous public interest.

At the same time, I cant pretend the way she personally treated me hasnt informed my view of her now.

I was dropped like a stone the moment she met Harry, after 18 months of friendly communication originated by her, and a very cordial meeting, at her request, in my local pub when she pumped me for advice on how to handle the media.

It would surely influence anyones thinking if someone they considered a friend suddenly ghosted them without explanation.

Monday, January 13

The fallout from Harry and Meghans Royal resignation has grown unbelievably toxic. Like everything else these days, you must either love them or hate them, there can be no middle ground.

And social media has turned into a vicious battlefield with me at the centre of much of it. The narrative has firmly positioned Meghan and Harry as victims, and people like me as the heartless tormentors.

Im particularly enraged by the specific growing narrative that the only reason Meghans been so harshly criticised by the media is because were all a bunch of racists living in a racist country. I just wont accept that.

From the moment Meghan came on the Royal scene, and it was revealed she was from a mixed-race background, she was welcomed with warm, open, tolerant arms by a wonderfully multi-cultural and diverse modern Britain that was thrilled to finally see a non-white member of the Royal Family. She was showered with almost universal praise, especially when the engagement was announced.

I havent seen a press so united in joy for anything Royal since Diana became Charless girlfriend.

As I wrote in The Mail on Sunday the day after the wedding: Its hard to overstate the significance of this ceremony, beamed live around the world, to black people everywhere. To borrow the words of Martin Luther King, this was a day when little black girls could watch TV and genuinely share little white girls long-held dreams of one day marrying a Prince.

These words, I would politely suggest, do not indicate the thoughts of a racist. Yet that is what I, and others working in the media, have now been shamefully branded for daring to criticise Meghan for her  and Harrys  erratic and spectacularly ill-advised behaviour since the wedding.

My criticisms have been centred around their hypocrisy: Meghan having a $500,000 celebrity-fuelled baby-shower party in New York, including a lift on Georges Clooney jet, on the same day she and Harry tweeted a plea for people to think of the poor; the ridiculous lengths they went to hide basic details of their baby Archies birth from the public that pays for much of their lavish lives; and the way they used Sir Elton Johns private jet like a taxi service after repeatedly lecturing us all about the importance of watching our carbon footprint.

None of this was racist, either overtly or subliminally. The reality is that Meghan and Harry have brought this ugly situation entirely on themselves and should somehow find the strength in their faux-victim-ravaged, virtue-signalling, self-obsessed souls to admit it has nothing to do with racism and everything to do with their fragile egos and a simmering feud with the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, who will always be more important in the Royal Family as they will one day be King and Queen.

Tuesday, January 14

Today, Good Morning Britains excellent meteorologist Laura Tobin wore a very striking pair of skin-tight red trousers, so I jokingly complimented her for parading around in hot-pants.

We get on well and often exchange such light-hearted banter.

I was immediately accused of being sexist by several viewers on Twitter, so I read out their criticism and said: When a female presenter parades herself in skin-tight leather trousers to do the weather, you are going to get people going wow.

But some viewers were having none of it.

Piers Morgan showing that making women feel uncomfortable in the workplace for how they dress is still with us in 2020!

Another seethed: Piers just went into creepy perv mode over Lauras trousers. Very disturbing viewing. Various online newspaper stories erupted about me humiliating Laura, until she eventually addressed them on Twitter, saying: Lots of reaction to my trousers today, Im not humiliated by Piers Morgan.

Theyre just a pair of trousers! I thought I was being stylish!

All of this just left me exhausted.

One of the problems with the feminism debate these days is that some women want to have their hypocritical, sexist objectification cake and eat it, too.

When each new series of Poldark comes out, the amount of drool spewed by women over lead actor Aidan Turner could fill an ocean, and his half-naked body fills the front pages.

No man I know gives a damn about the way Aidans objectified, and I bet he doesnt either, but if we did the same to a female TV star now, radical feminists would rip us to shreds.

Thursday, January 16

James Bond will remain a man. This shouldnt be a sentence I ever have to write, but sadly I do.

The news was revealed by Barbara Broccoli, who has run the 007 movie franchise since the death of father Cubby, in an interview with Variety.

James Bond can be of any colour, she said, but he is male. Im not particularly interested in taking a male character and having a woman play it.

Get out of the way, guys! demanded Pierce Brosnan, who played 007 four times, and put a woman up there! I think it would be exhilarating, it would be exciting! Curiously, I dont remember Mr Brosnan suggesting this when he was 007.

I think women are far more interesting than that. Thank God for that.

Broccoli spoke after suggestions that the latest Bond movie, No Time To Die, began with James now retired and temporarily replaced as 007 by a black woman, played by Lashana Lynch, and that Bond would not have to navigate the #MeToo movement, which apparently involves him becoming a hyper-sensitive, emotionally aware wokie who cries in front of women rather than beds them.

The campaign to neuter the most masculine icon in movie history reached an entirely predictable nadir with a call for him to become female.

Get out of the way, guys! demanded Pierce Brosnan, who played 007 four times, and put a woman up there! I think it would be exhilarating, it would be exciting! Curiously, I dont remember Mr Brosnan suggesting this when he was 007.

If Pierce Brosnan needs someone other than me to explain why this is a dumb idea, then he should ask Rosamund Pike, who co-starred with him in Die Another Day.

James Bond is a character that Ian Fleming created, she said, and the character is a man. Its a very masculine creation. Why should a woman get, sort of, sloppy seconds? Why should she have been a man and now it has to be played by a woman?

Why not be a kick-ass female agent in her own right?

Exactly. By all means create your own super-spies, ladies, but for Christs sake, leave our guy alone.

Friday, January 17

The actor Laurence Fox is at the centre of a firestorm after appearing on BBC1s Question Time panel and getting into a fierce debate with a mixed-race audience member who called press coverage of Meghan Markle racist.

Its not racism, replied Fox. Were the most tolerant, lovely country in Europe. Its so easy to throw the charge of racism at everybody and its really starting to get boring now.

What worries me about your comment is you are a white privileged male, said Rachel Boyle, a comment that prompted widespread groans and boos from other audience members.

Oh God, sighed Fox. I cant help what I am, I was born like this, its an immutable characteristic. So, to call me a white privileged male is to be racist. Youre being racist.

Fox has been hounded mercilessly ever since, in the most disgusting and vicious way. All because he refused to accept the media coverage of Meghan Markle has been racist. He may not have personally experienced the kind of racism a black person endures, but that surely doesnt disqualify him from discussing it.

Even more worryingly, there have been calls to cancel Foxs acting career. And incredibly, theyve come loudest from minority representatives of the actors union Equity, which fired off a series of accusations on Twitter.

Cancel culture, as its become known, is one of the worst things about modern society, and its driven by the same woke liberals who profess to stand for tolerance.

They would do well to listen to Barack Obama, who is celebrated by liberals but finds cancel culture ridiculous and harmful.

He warned: This idea of purity and that youre never compromised and youre always politically woke  you should get over that quickly. The world is messy.

There are ambiguities. People who do really good stuff have flaws. People who you are fighting might love their kids.

One danger I see with young people, particularly on college campuses there is this sense sometimes of the way of me making change is to be as judgmental as possible about other people and thats enough.

Like, if I tweet or hashtag about how you didnt do something right, or used the wrong verb, then I can sit back and feel pretty good about myself. Thats not activism. Thats not bringing about change. If all youre doing is casting stones, youre probably not going to get that far.

Thursday January 30

The World Health Organisation declares Covid-19 a global public health emergency.

An hour later, my youngest son, Bertie, posted a photo to our father and sons WhatsApp group of a man in a full white hazmat suit walking outside his halls at Bristol University.

One of the students had gone down with flu-like symptoms and been taken to hospital.

Friday, January 31

Today heralded the denouement of perhaps the most seismic and contentious story of all, with Britains formal withdrawal from the EU. As someone who voted Remain but believed passionately that once my side lost the vote we had to accept the result, Ive been dismayed to watch fellow Remainers spend the past three-and-a-half years shrieking in fury and refusing to admit defeat.

Its been an unedifying, ugly, visceral spectacle, and whats made it particularly distasteful is that so many of these Remoaners, as theyve been dubbed, identify themselves as liberals.

Today, as Brexit becomes a legal reality, the cacophony of incessant liberal whining fills the air like a toxic stench. Its been an issue thats ripped Britain in two, dividing families and friends, turning mainstream and social media into seething cesspits, and leaving everyone drained, fractious and indignant.

As with those other extraordinarily polarising subjects, Donald Trump and Meghan/Harry, Brexit is not something youre allowed to be neutral about. Its imperative to take an unyielding position and stick to it, even if facts emerge that contradict things you believed.

Yet on Brexit and Trump, Ive found myself in a curiously middle-of-the-road place  voting against the former but wanting it delivered to safeguard democracy, and being a good personal friend of the latter who wouldnt vote for him but wants to cover his presidency in a fair, non-partisan, critical-where-he-deserves-it manner.

None of this has gone down well with the Brexit or Trump tribes. Nuance or impartiality just doesnt cut it any more in political debate.

As for Meghan and Harry, I admit to viewing the pair of them as disingenuous, virtue-signalling, hypocritical, selfish, narcissistic brats.

Has some of my criticism of them been too aggressive? Probably.

Has it been unfair? On occasion, perhaps. So, am I part of the tribal problem?

Yes, I guess I am. I have a dog-with-a-bone personality that can be a force for good, or perhaps not so good, depending on what bone I am gnawing on  from campaigning against the Iraq War when I was editor of the Daily Mirror and waging a lengthy battle for better gun control in America when I worked at CNN, to trying to oust Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger, or just feeling very irritated by vegan sausage rolls.

The only common denominator is that once the bones in my mouth, I find it very hard to stop gnawing, sometimes to my own detriment.

But at 11pm tonight, as Brexit became official, I felt nothing but a weary sense of relief and hope, perhaps forlornly, that we could all finally stop shouting at each other and find some common purpose.

 Piers Morgan, 2020.

Abridged extract from Wake Up, by Piers Morgan, published by HarperCollins on October 15 at 20. To order a copy for 17, with free delivery, go to mailshop.co.uk/books or call 020 3308 9193 before October 11.
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Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, September 26, 2020 07:30 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c475704a 1 National COVID-19,COVID-19-in-Indonesia,expert,death,epidemiologist,WHO,death-toll,angka-kematian-COVID-19,pakar-epidemiologi Free

The actual COVID-19 death toll in Indonesia could be three times the reported figure, which reached 10,105 on Thursday.

Dicky Budiman, an epidemiologist at Griffith University Australia, said that Indonesia had the highest number of COVID-19 deaths of any ASEAN country and that that the nation placed third in COVID-19 deaths among Asian countries.

According to Dicky, the death toll is a valid indicator of COVID-19 management in certain countries and regions.

But he said Indonesias actual death toll could be three times the reported number.

Read also: 160 deaths in one day: Indonesia sets bleak virus record

Indonesia should refer to the WHO [World Health Organization] definition of a COVID-19 death and should implement it in the country for our own sake, Dicky said, as quoted by kompas.com on Friday.

According to the WHO, a COVID-19 death is defined for monitoring purposes as a death resulting from a clinically compatible illness in a probable or confirmed COVID-19 case unless there is a clear alternative cause of death that cannot be related to COVID-19, for example, trauma. There should be no period of complete recovery from COVID-19 between the illness and death. A death due to COVID-19 may not be attributed to another disease, such as cancer, and should be counted independently of preexisting conditions that are suspected of triggering a severe course of COVID-19.

Dicky said Indonesias more than 10,000 deaths were ones those that were confirmed.

Meanwhile, we do not count [the deaths of people with] probable or suspected statuses. If we count them all, we might see three times as many, he added. (dpk)
He said no evidence to suggest murder and their bodies would have been found

Crime podcaster Adam Shand said he wasn't convinced the couple were dead

Local authorities found their campsite burned out and they haven't been located

They were in a secret relationship and didn't tell anyone where they were going

Russell Hill, 74, and Carol Clay, 73, went missing during a camping trip in March

A crime expert has revealed why he believes secret lovers who vanished on a remote camping trip may not have been murdered.

Russell Hill, 74, and Carol Clay, 73, went missing on March 19 in the Wonnangatta Valley in Victoria's East Gippsland region.

Their disappearance baffled authorities, who found their campsite burned to the ground and Mr Hill's car slightly damaged by fire two days later.

Crime editor at PodcastOne Australia, Adam Shand, said he was 'not convinced' the couple are dead.

'We don't know what we don't know in this case. We don't even know that they're dead,' he told A Current Affair.

Russell Hill (pictured left), 74, and his lover Carol Clay (right), 73, went missing during a camping trip on March 19 in the Wonnangatta Valley in Victoria's East Gippsland region

Crime podcaster Andrew Shand said it was assumed that the couple were murdered but he was 'not convinced' they were dead. He said authorities would have found their bodies

Mr Shand said many believed murder was the 'strongest theory' but there was no lead that suggested any foul play.

MISSING CAMPERS - UNANSWERED QUESTIONS What were the campers doing in the Wonnangatta Valley? Why did Mr Hill not tell his wife he was going? Why did Mr Hill take his drone? Advertisement

'Today we're still scratching, at least in a public sense, for a motive if there has been a killing.'

Mr Shand also said the couple's bodies would have been discovered if they had been killed.

'You've got crows and other carrion eaters circling over those corpses. That often leads police in searches to bodies,' he explained.

Mr Shand said there were plenty of unanswered questions relating to the couple's disappearance.

'There are so many questions. Why were they there? Why was Russell there? Why did he not tell his wife? Why was he there with the drone? What was he doing?' he said.

Detectives have been consulting with interstate and global police about the investigation.

Police have also asked interstate travellers who were visiting the area at the time to come forward.

Last month police revealed they were exploring a theory that the couple were attacked in their sleep.

Detectives believe the potential attackers may have torched their campsite to destroy forensic evidence of a crime.

Mr Hill's white Toyota Landcruiser was found with minor fire damage at their burnt campsite (pictured) near Dry River Creek Track in the valley on March 21

The search for Mr Hill and Ms Clay has gone international, as detectives turn to overseas and interstate experts for assistance

Mr Hill and Ms Clay were in a secret relationship and didn't tell anyone where they were going.

Ms Clay just told friends she would be gone for a few days.

In June, investigators said three theories about Mr Hill and Ms Clay's disappearance were being probed.

Foul play is strongly suspected on the balance of probabilities, but there is no evidence and no suspects.

Another possibility is that the couple were flying Mr Hill's $2,000 drone and died of exposure after getting lost off the path looking for it.

The third is that they died lost in the bush for any reason, but have not been found because wild dogs ate their remains.

Police are confident the pair did not fake their own deaths and do not believe it's case of murder-suicide.

The pair went missing in the Wonnangatta Valley, more than 200km north east of Melbourne

Russell Hill hangs onto a drone that he had with him when he went missing. The drone has not been found despite an extensive search of the area

The key to unlocking the case may have gone up in flames in a fire that destroyed their campsite.

Mr Hill's Toyota four-wheel-drive had been found by local police next to his burnt-out tent, but the pair were gone without a trace.

The vehicle itself had also sustained damage in the fire, but was still able to be driven away from the scene.

At the time, police had believed the fire was probably started by a dodgy phone charger or campfire spark and the couple had simply been lost in the forest.

But the fire could also have been lit by a thief rummaging around in the tent - or by a murderer trying to cover their tracks.

A spare set of keys was found hidden on the car, but it is believed Mr Hill took the main set with him.

Personal belongings (circled) were left in Russell Hill's vehicle, which sustained fire damage when his tent went up in flames

Carol Clay, 73, who was once the President of the Country Women's Association of Victoria, had been in a relationship with Russell Hill for many years in the lead up to their disappearance

Mr Hill's white Toyota Landcruiser was found with minor fire damage at their burnt campsite near Dry River Creek Track in the valley on March 21

That the car was locked likely indicated the pair left the campsite voluntarily, probably to go for a walk or fly the drone.

The drone remains missing despite an extensive search that ended on April 6 without anyone finding a trace of them.

Mr Hill had been a keen amateur radio enthusiast and made his last broadcast from the bush on March 20.

Police are now certain the couple died within 18 hours after Mr Hill's last message, as a passing hiker saw the burned-out campsite about 2pm the next day.

Because the couple weren't due back until up to a week later, the alarm wasn't raised for days and precious time was lost.

When questioned about the couple's relationship in April, Victoria Police Missing Persons Squad Detective Inspector Andrew Stamper skirted around the question.

'It is delicate and we are being very respectful of both families wishes and concerns here,' he said at the time.

Anyone with information is urged to contact CrimeStoppers on 1800 333 00

Victoria Police Missing Persons Squad Detective Inspector Andrew Stamper is leading the investigation into the mystery
When Gov. Greg Abbott recently announced eased rules for family visits to nursing homes and other long-term care facilities, those who run such places found themselves scrambling to prepare for the changes.

The new rules, which became effective Thursday, allow residents in long-term care to designate up to two essential family caregivers, who could visit  one at a time  in the residents room without physical distancing.

In other words, they can touch them. Hug them.

But heres the linchpin: The caregivers must test negative for the coronavirus within 14 days of the scheduled visit.

Before the expanded visitation, family members were allowed only outdoor visits at nursing homes and outdoor or indoor visits at assisted living facilities, with plexiglass separating people. Family members had to maintain physical distancing of at least 6 feet.

On ExpressNews.com: Texas to allow essential visitors inside long-term care facilities

For some, getting the required test for the new, up-close visit with a loved one is going to cost some bucks.

Currently, the tests provided free in San Antonio are only for those with COVID-19 symptoms, said Dr. Anita Kurian, assistant director of the San Antonio Metropolitan Health District.

The city is working to expand free testing to the asymptomatic population, she said.

Until then, people without symptoms who want to be tested  so they can visit their grandmother, say  must avail themselves of other facilities, such as CentroMed, Texas MedClinic, University Health System clinics and hospital systems, Kurian said.

But tests at private clinics can be costly, more than $100 for those without insurance. And caregivers who want to visit loved ones in long-term care more than once likely will need multiple COVID-19 tests to cover each 14-day period.

Federal law now requires private insurers, Medicare and Medicaid to fully cover most COVID-19 tests, although there are exceptions. And whether insurers will cover multiple tests for family visits  a new idea in Texas  is a gray area.

Just how this all plays out is anyones guess, at this point.

The rules state the caregiver must have a negative COVID-19 test no more than 14 days before the visit, unless the facility chooses to perform a rapid test prior to entry, said a spokeswoman with the Texas Health and Human Services Commission. The rules do not mandate a specific frequency for the testing strategy for essential caregivers. Each facility has to develop its own policy and adhere to that policy.

On ExpressNews.com: Visit to mom triggers memories of a big, big life

Dion Munoz, assisted living manager at Kaulbach Assisted Living, part of Morningside Ministries at the Meadows, said his nonprofit is working on a policy that addresses the new visitation rules and will have something in place in a week or 10 days.

But the new rules pose some challenges, he said, for facilities and family members. Essential family caregivers are allowed to spend up to two hours in a residents room. How will facility staff know for sure that a family member will keep their mask on the entire time, since the visits are unsupervised?

And how will families of limited means or no insurance be able to afford multiple COVID tests if they want to visit more than once?

This may create hurdles for some families, he said.

Under the new rules, an essential caregiver can be a family member, friend or other individual.

While caregivers are not required to maintain physical distancing, only one person can visit at a time. Essential family caregivers must be trained on the proper use of protective gear and other infection control practices, according to state rules.

Facilities must not have had any positive cases among residents or staff for 14 days to be able to participate in the visits.

Nonessential visitors still are allowed inside facilities but will not be allowed to touch residents and must remain behind plexiglass barriers in an area of the home free from the coronavirus.

At Saint Francis Nursing Home at 630 W. Woodlawn, essential family caregiver visits will take place in a private meeting area, not residents rooms, because such rooms are semiprivate.

We dont want roommates possibly being exposed, said Sister Sameula Komperda, head administrator at Saint Francis.

In addition to providing a negative COVID-19 test, the designated caregiver has to go through screenings, such as a temperature check.

It is our understanding that family members have to be retested multiple times for additional visits, Komperda said. Unfortunately, we cannot offer testing at our facility.

As at other long-term care facilities, there are other options for visits at Saint Francis  outdoors, through open windows  so those who cant afford viral testing still can see their loved ones, she said.

So far, she said, there hasnt been a big demand for the essential caregiver visits.

Weve only had two or three people even inquire, she said. The tests are expensive, and theyre not fun.

Alfredo Chavarria, executive director at the Etta at Shavano Park, an upscale assisted living and memory care facility, said his staff also is busily crafting the logistics for the upcoming indoor visits.

Were going to give everyone a clean surgical mask when they arrive, and we will escort family members to and from their loved ones room, he said.

His facility also will require that essential caregivers have up-to-date tests each time they want to visit. Etta will not be providing tests.

We hope to have this going by next week, he said. Many of our families are very eager for this.

Melissa Fletcher Stoeltje is a general assignment reporter covering breaking news, cultural trends and interesting people and goings-on around San Antonio and Bexar County, as well as all across South Texas. To read more from Melissa , become a subscriber. mstoeltje@express-news.net | Twitter: @mstoeltje
The Delhi police have arrested a man from Jharkhand through technical surveillance on charges of rape and criminal intimidation after he allegedly abandoned a 20-year-old woman in the ninth month of her pregnancy after trafficking her.

Deputy police commissioner Atul Kumar Thakur said they were informed about the matter on September 1 after the alleged trafficker abandoned the woman in a rented room and fled. He added the womans neighbours informed the police about the matter after finding her in pain as her condition deteriorated. Thakur said the woman was alone and had nobody to take care of her.

The woman was rushed to the All India Institute of Medical Sciences after her condition worsened and doctors said she urgently needed blood.

Also Read: Four Delhi cops suspended for selling 159kg of seized marijuana

Instantly, blood was donated to the pregnant woman by constables Yogesh, Rahul, and Sandeep voluntarily. She delivered a healthy baby girl on September 19 and has now been discharged. The condition of both the woman and her child is fine, said Thakur.

The rape and criminal intimidation case was registered on the womans complaint and the man was arrested on September 7.

The man had lured the woman to Delhi on the pretext of marriage and providing her a job. He kept her in a rented room and introduced her to neighbours as his wife, a police officer probing the case said requesting anonymity. The man allegedly raped the woman for nearly eight months.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison warned Australians of a tough 2020/21 budget

He says Australians will need to do some 'heavy lifting' at a 'significant cost'

The Australian leader was in Adelaide on Saturday for the Liberal Party's AGM

The federal budget will be a 'titanic effort' to pull Australia out of its COVID-19 economic crisis, Prime Minister Scott Morrison says, as his government is accused of stripping millions from the economy through cuts to unemployment payments.

The 2020/21 budget, to be delivered on October 6, will be the 'most unprecedented investment in Australia's future', according to the prime minister.

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'It will be a titanic effort that we're involved in to ensure that this country can get back on the growth path that we want to be on,' he said in Adelaide on Saturday.

The federal budget will be a 'titanic effort' to pull Australia out of its COVID-19 economic crisis, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said at the Liberal Party AGM in Adelaide on Saturday (pictured)

'That means we're going to have to do some very heavy lifting in this budget and that comes at a significant cost.'

Those out of work were hit with a cut to their dole on Friday as the JobSeeker supplement was reduced from $550 a fortnight to $250.

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From Monday, the JobKeeper rate will also decrease and be split into two tiers for full-time and part-time workers.

The full rate will go from $1500 to $1200 a fortnight, while people who worked less than 20 hours a week pre-pandemic will receive just $750.

Shadow treasurer Jim Chalmers said the cuts would strip $680 million a fortnight out of the economy just when it is needed.

Mr Morrison is pictured during a tour of the Osborne Naval Shipyard in Adelaide on September 26

The Australian leader is pictured speaking with apprentice welders during at the Osborne Naval Shipyard on September 26 in Adelaide

'It makes absolutely no sense for the government to be cutting support to workers, communities, businesses and local economies when the economy is still as weak as it is today,' he said.

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg again hinted on Friday the government was looking at some form of extra support for the unemployed, above that which applied before the pandemic struck.

However, the decision would not be made until later in the year.

National economic recovery relies heavily on Victoria continuing to squash the virus.

The state recorded 12 new cases on Saturday as well as one death, pushing the national toll to 870.

The enormous deficit set to be announced by Josh Frydenberg comes despite him promising last year that by 2020 Australia would be 'back in black'

Those out of work were hit with a cut to their dole on Friday as the JobSeeker supplement was reduced from $550 a fortnight to $250 (pictured: Job seekers queue up outside a Centrelink office in Melbourne on April 20)

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has teased that restrictions may be eased earlier than planned next month with infection rates tracking ahead of schedule but there's not expected to be wholesale changes on Sunday when some freedoms will be restored.

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Victoria's Health Minister Jenny Mikakos has quit her portfolio, a day after Premier Daniel Andrews partially blamed her for hotel quarantine failures at an inquiry into the bungled scheme.

The state's second wave has been traced to two Melbourne hotels, with the outbreaks linked to more than 750 deaths and triggering economically destructive lockdowns.

NSW also recorded one new case on Saturday, while Queensland recorded three new cases from international arrivals.
In the fourth episode of the short web series Next Stop, three Torontonians pile into the back seat of a car pool, and gripe about the challenges finding success as a Black content creator in Canada.

That plot point is also in part how the series came to be.

The creators of the show are Toronto filmmakers, Jabbari Weekes, Tichaona Tapambwa and Phil Witmer.

Tapambwa, who wrote, produced and directed for the series, says they were each looking for a way to break into Canadas film and television industry and decided to self-fund a project.

To their surprise, a year after they started releasing episodes on YouTube, the series has been picked up for streaming on CBC Gem.

While workshopping ideas for the show, Tapambwa said We tried a lot of ideas. And a lot of them did not stick. But they soon decided on making a series about Black Torontonians that balances comedy and drama in a way they hadnt seen in many Canadian shows, and landed on Next Stop.

What is that bittersweetness of being a Black Torontonian? Tapambwa said.

To answer that question, the team gathered what equipment they could and cast some first-time actors with captivating personalities, including Vanessa Adams and Jordan Hayles, and started shooting.

Episodes are built on joking conversations between friends, peppered with references and slang that Black and racialized Torontonians would be familiar with, like the long-standing debate over which subway station has the best patties. And chances are, viewers will read the name of the series in their heads, and hear the familiar cadence of a TTC stop announcement.

Next stop  Bloor-Yonge Station.

But along with the humour, each episode is also nestled with a more serious plight, such as Torontos climbing rent prices or battling with depression.

Tapambwa said they drew inspiration from FXs Atlanta created by Donald Glover and Netflixs Easy, shows that are both comedic and dramatic. They also noted Ackee & Saltfish, a popular web series by British director Cecile Emeke, as another muse.

Over the course of 2019, from February to November, they released four short episodes of Next Stop on YouTube, and gained an enthusiastic local following.

Amar Wala, owner of Scarborough Pictures, which signed on as executive producer of the series, says that after 10 years in the film industry, he has noticed a clear lack of diversity.

Frankly, as Ive gotten a little bit more successful and a little bit more stability, the less the industry started to look like [me] and what my kind of social circles look like, Wala said.

That realization has prompted Wala to advocate for more racialized voices in the industry.

Refinery 29 Canada writer Kathleen Newman-Bremang wrote a piece at the beginning of the year about how overwhelmingly white Canadian television content is. The piece quotes Jennifer Holness, a producer and founder of Hungry Eyes Media, who said, Its very difficult for diverse filmmakers [and TV creators] to get a first chance, let alone a second chance in this country. Highlighting that there can be disproportionate pressure on works made by and about racialized people to get time to grow an audience.

This month, Schitts Creek swept all seven comedy series awards at the Emmys for its final season after a six-season run. The Canadian comedy from the CBC created by father and son Eugene and Dan Levy gained a wide following outside of the country after being released on Netflix.

As the actors and producers collected award after award, Canadians watching the ceremony urged fans to check out more Canadian content, like Kims Convenience. And others also spoke about the need for Canada to cast a broader net in the diversity of shows and talent it green lights.

CBC executive director Given Lindo who is in charge of streaming, including CBC Gem where Next Stop will be offered, said that there is always more that can be done when it comes to commissioning and acquiring content that is representative and is showcasing as many communities as possible.

He said its a lot about numbers: the more creators [they] support, the more chances there are for breakout hits that will penetrate and resonate.

We think that the role we play, specifically with CBC Gem is being that platform where we can take chances and support creators who may not have the longest CV, but we can take chances on really talented people who have a unique point of view, he said. We have a lot of freedom and latitude, to really go niche and to find authentic creators.

With the support from CBC Gem and Scarborough Pictures, Tapambwa said they plan to work on new episodes to pick up where they left off.

The current season of Next Stop is now streaming for free on CBC Gem.

Angelyn Francis is a Toronto-based reporter for the Star covering inequity and inequality. Her reporting is funded by the Canadian government through its Local Journalism Initiative. Reach her via email: afrancis@thestar.ca
Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry asserted on Saturday Egypts support for efforts exerted to boost South-South cooperation, foreign ministry spokesman Ahmed Hafez said in a statement.

Addressing a virtual high-level meeting discussing South-South cooperation and the eradication of poverty, the minister asserted Egypts commitment to efforts to establish a new partnership to foster South-South cooperation to implement the UN 2030 and AU 2063 agendas.

The meeting was held on the sidelines of the 75th session of the United National General Assembly.

Shoukry also highlighted the role of the Egyptian Agency of Partnership for Development (EAPD) in boosting South-South cooperation, noting that Egypt supports all national, regional and international efforts to eradicate poverty.

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Tony Estrela and his cousin Daniel Vieira were having lunch at Yonge and Eglinton, watching as two window washers struggled to scale up the building on their swing stage.

All of a sudden, two cables snapped, sending their stage plummeting to the ground nearly 20 floors below.

Miraculously, nobody was walking along that portion of Yonge Street at the time so there were no injuries at ground level  but the terrified window washers were left dangling and clinging to their ropes.

First thing I did was turn around to my cousin and said, Call 911!, Estrela said.

What followed was an incredible tale of how five Good Samaritans sprang into action to rescue two window washers in midtown Toronto, during the noonhour Thursday.

A group of five Priestly Demolition workers, including Estrela and Vieira, were on a lunch break on the eighth floor at a construction site at 2161 Yonge Street when the dramatic scene unfolded across the street at the TVO building.

Estrela saw one of the window washers struggling with a tangled rope, which was caught on a ledge of the building.

The window washer was trying to fix the rope from where he was positioned below on the swing stage, Estrela said. The other washer was positioned further above him. He then tried to scale up the building, to continue to see if he could untangle the rope.

Thats when the cables snapped.

The Priestly Demolition workers rushed downstairs, dashed across the street and quickly found the building security guard to explain the situation.

My cousin and I, right away turned around to where the security guard is, and said Can you let us on the roof? Estrela told the Star in an interview the next day.

Vieira recalls taking an elevator to the 18th floor and running up another three flights of stairs to get to the roof. As they arrived, Vieira said the window washer working further above had managed to pull himself onto the ledge of one of the windows.

But the other man working below was still dangling, hanging on to his rope, fittingly called a lifeline.

The other gentleman was lower, thats why he did not have enough time (to do the same), Vieira said.

Vieira and the others noticed the window washers lifeline was pulled taut against a concrete ledge. They were afraid of just pulling on that rope as it could cause it to fray and snap against the concrete.

Vieira planned to grab the rope to make sure it wouldnt fray against the concrete. Then, the others would pull the window washer using the rope to help hoist him up to the window ledge.

Vieira and the four men went to the edge of the roof and explained the plan to the dangling window washer.

He looked like he was scared for his life. He just said, Please help me, Estrela said.

Vieira estimates that it took about two minutes to hoist the man to the ledge.

They estimated the man was in his 20s or 30s and about 180 to 185 pounds.

Video from CP24 showed fire crews bringing the men inside off the ledge after emergency rescue workers had smashed the glass.

The two window washers were back at the site the next day to talk to the Ministry of Labour.

The man who had been dangling from the rope came over to the Priestly work site to thank the group for helping save his life.

Mike Glavin, one of the five rescuers, recounted part of that conversation.

I told him, I didnt save your life, your rope did. All we did was make you more comfortable, Glavin said.

In a public Facebook post later that day, Koteles Andras, one of the rescued workers, documented the heroic rescue mission, blaming faulty suspension cables as the cause of the incident.

Andras declined to speak to the Star, saying the accident is still under investigation by the Ministry of Labour.

Vieira said he has never witnessed anything similar in his life.

I helped him, because if I was in that situation, I would want someone to try to help me, Vieira said.

With files from Ann Marie Elpa

Breanna Xavier-Carter is a breaking news reporter, working out of the Stars radio room in Toronto. Reach her via email: bxavier@thestar.ca

Zena Salem is a breaking news reporter, working out of the Stars radio room in Toronto. Reach her via email: zsalem@thestar.ca
If you really want to honour him, implement his inclusive ideology: SC Bose's grandnephew

At DMs meets, PM calls for direct, emotional connect between administration and public for good governance

PM Modi lauds CISR on foundation day

India

oi-Vicky Nanjappa

New Delhi, Sep 26: Prime Minister Narendra Modi lauded the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) on its foundation day on Saturday, saying it has been at the forefront of furthering scientific research and innovation in India.

In a tweet, Modi added the organisation has also been playing a valuable role in fighting COVID-19.

CSIR-CMERI, Durgapur unveil COVID-19 protection system for workplace

Deepika Padukone questioned in drug probe | India tears into Pakistan | Oneindia News

"Greetings to all those associated with CSIR on its Foundation Day. CSIR is at the forefront of furthering scientific research and innovation in India. They have also been playing a valuable role in fighting COVID-19. Best wishes to CSIR for its future endeavours," he said.
"The Comey Rule" is a cautionary tale about what happens when we put all of our faith in the system, and it fails - or perhaps it's about what happens when we lose all faith in the system after it fails us. There's a lesson in here somewhere, if only we were far enough along to see the answers.
While addressing the virtual 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly, Bhutan Prime Minister Lotay Tshering on September 25 said that Bhutan has always supported the G4 countries' aspirations to serve as permanent members of the United Nations Security Council. The G4 countriesIndia, Japan, Germany and Brazilare a group of countries that have been calling for reforms at the UNSC. During his address, Tshering also called for reform in the UN, saying the world body should evolve and cater to the changing realities.

Bhutan extends support to G4 nations

As quoted by ANI, Tshering said, At the same time, the UN must also evolve and match the changing realities, in particular, the existing structure and composition of the UN Security Council to not reflect the current realities and circumstances of the world. Bhutan has also long supported the aspirations of the G4 countries to serve as permanent members to an expanded Security Council. Of course, Africa also appropriately represented."

Read: G4 Amps Up Pressure On UNSC; Warns 'Urgent Reform Needed To Stop UN Becoming Obsolete'

Apart from this, the foreign ministers of the G4 countries held a virtual meeting that happened simultaneously with the UNGA. India, Brazil, Japan and Germany demanded urgency in the long-overdue reforms of the UN Security Council. Foreign Ministers of the G4 highlighted the urgency of reforming the United Nations and updating its main decision-making bodies, in order to better address the realities of modern times. A joint press statement was issued after the discussion by the G4 ministers stating that reforms are necessary to prevent the UNSC from becoming obsolete. The statement released by the external affairs ministry said, The world of today is very different from what it was when the United Nations was created 75 years ago. There are more countries, more people, more challenges but also more solutions. Our working methods need to keep pace and adapt. (...) We reiterate our call for reforms of three of the principal organs of the United Nations. We commit to instilling new life in the discussions on the reform of the Security Council.

Read: Nepal PM Oli Pushes India-proposed Convention On International Terrorism (CCIT) At UNGA

The Bhutan PM also spoke about COVID-19 as he said that the virus knows no border. He also urged the international community to share all important resources with developing countries in order to help in the fight against the virus. He asked, "Like climate change, COVID-19 also knows no border and similarly affects developing countries disproportionately. We do not know what is coming next and we do not know SARS COVID III will hit us. In that sense are we not interconnected. Is there a second option to multilateralism?". He further added, Peaceful co-existence among ourselves and with the nature around us is the best vaccine for humanity to thrive on this planet In a small and intricate world while fighting a highly infectious disease, it will be a big blunder if you do not help the developing world to have access to the all the resources including a vaccine.

Read: PM Modi Thanks Prime Ministers Of Nepal And Bhutan For 'warm Birthday Wishes'

Also Read: PM Modi Holds Telephonic Talks With Bhutan's King, Lankan President, Prime Minister

(Image Credits: AP)
The volume that includes Shakespeare's play likely escaped falling into the hands of the Spanish Inquisition

It was hidden away for centuries in the archives of a seminary in Spain, a rare edition of a Shakespeare play experts believe may be the earliest copy of his work to reach the country.

Published in 1634, "The Two Noble Kinsmen" is a tragicomedy about love, enmity and madness written by Shakespeare in collaboration with Jacobean playwright John Fletcher.

"It's likely the play reached Spain between 1635 and 1640," said John Stone, a lecturer in English studies at Barcelona University who discovered it at the Royal Scots College, a seminary in the northwestern town of Salamanca founded after the Catholic Church was outlawed in Scotland.

Collections of English works were rare in Spain and plays were exceptional in the 17th and 18th centuries, with all books subjected to inspection at the frontier by the Spanish Inquisition, particularly those from a heretical Protestant state like England.

The tragicomedy was part of a single volume of eight English plays printed from 1630 to 1635 that was likely brought over by a traveller and managed to escape falling into the hands of the Inquisition.

"I was going through the section on political economy and on the last shelf, I saw a book that was distinct in its binding from pretty-well anything else," Stone told AFP.

Having written his dissertation on Shakespeare in Spain, he realised its importance immediately.

"I knew the moment I saw it that it was the oldest copy of Shakespeare in Spain," said the Canadian researcher.

"The question was whether it had been the first Shakespearean text to reach Spain."

- Under nose of Inquisition -

Until now, the earliest known work of Shakespeare in Spain was a compilation of plays found at the Jesuit English College in Valladolid that likely arrived in the late 1640s or early 1650s.

It was sold in the 1920s to Henry Clay Folger, a wealthy American industrialist who went on to found the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington DC.

Story continues

Clues as to when "The Two Noble Kinsmen" arrived lay in the margin notes made by Hugh Semple, a politically-ambitious Scottish Jesuit who was rector of the Royal Scots College.

"The handwriting tells us it arrived in Semple's lifetime and he died in the early 1650s," Stone said of this "highly-networked individual" who was friends with Spanish playwright Lope de Vega and known for being able to bring in English books.

His international ties were "very active" in the mid-1630s when he "would have had a great opportunity to import the book," Stone said, suggesting it may have been brought over by a London-based Scottish aristocrat who was liaising between the English and Spanish monarchs.

Although the Royal Scots College was located in central Madrid at the time, right under the nose of the Inquisition, there was no sign its "eclectic mix of English books" was ever noticed by the Holy Office.

It is unclear whether the Shakespeare play was ever performed or used as part of the college's curriculum although Stone said theatre was often used as part of Jesuit teaching.

Stone is now working with a book historian to see if the binding or stitching of the volume could offer further definitive clues as to when it arrived.

hmw/mg/mbx
Gunmen suspected to be Fulani herdsmen struck again on Thursday, killing five persons in Jos South Local Government Area of Plateau State.

Last Monday, gunmen invaded the Foron District of Barakin-Ladi Local Government Area of the state, killing the District Head, Da Bulus Chuwang Jang. Also the rampaging gunmen on Tuesday attacked a mining site in the Riyom Council area and injured nine miners.

City Round gathered that the gunmen numbering about 20 stormed a drinking joint on Thursday at about 10:45 pm at Gwol village in K/Vom, Jos South Local Government Area of Plateau State and shot five people dead while one person sustained injuries.

An eyewitness said the attack caused pandemonium in the area as residents fled their homes and fled into the bush for safety, adding that the attackers also damaged property and destroyed farms before leaving.

Reacting to the incident, women and youths took to the streets to protest against the killings.

The Co-ordinator, Emancipation Centre for Crisis Victims in Nigeria, Barrister Dalyop Solomon, condemned the frequent attacks in the state and called on the state government and security agencies to check the act.

He said, It is unfortunate that we are experiencing this kind of attack after months of respite. The government and the security agencies need to wade in on time before it degenerates to full scale violence. Theres the need for a thorough investigation, arrest and prosecution of those behind this deadly attack.

The state Police Public Relations Officer, ASP Gabriel Ubah, who confirmed the killings of five persons in the community, said the command had commenced full investigation into the incident.

He added that the state Commissioner of Police, Edward Egbuka, along with other operational personnel of the command had visited the scene of the incident.

According to him, normalcy has been restored to the affected community and more security men drafted to the area to maintain law and order.

Follow Us on Facebook  @LadunLiadi; Instagram  @LadunLiadi; Twitter  @LadunLiadi; Youtube  @LadunLiadiTV for updates
KYODO NEWS - Sep 26, 2020 - 21:07 | All, World, Japan

Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and Russian President Vladimir Putin are planning to hold their first talks on Tuesday after the premier took office last week to succeed Shinzo Abe, a Japanese government source said Saturday.

During the talks by phone, the two leaders are expected to reaffirm their countries' commitment to continuing bilateral negotiations toward signing a postwar peace treaty and the necessity for economic cooperation.

Japan and Russia have struggled to resolve a long-standing territorial dispute regarding Russian-held isles off Hokkaido, called the Northern Territories in Japan and the Southern Kurils in Russia, and it has prevented them from signing a peace treaty.

The Soviet Union seized the islands following Japan's surrender in World War II in 1945. Moscow says it acquired them as a legitimate outcome of the war, while Tokyo argues their seizure was illegal.

The two countries have agreed to carry out joint economic projects on the islands as a trust-building exercise while they work toward a mutually acceptable resolution.

After announcing in late August his decision to resign due to health problems, then Prime Minister Shinzo Abe spoke with Putin in a teleconference and the two emphasized the need to resolve the issue.

Since he was elected as prime minister on Sept. 16, Suga has been holding phone talks with various global leaders, including from the United States, China, South Korea and India.

He has raised the issue of North Korea's abductions of Japanese nationals in the 1970s and 1980s during each phone conversation and requested cooperation in resolving it, Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu Kato said during a press conference Thursday.

Suga is also planning on holding talks with French President Emmanuel Macron, according to government sources.

Suga may meet with U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo when he visits Tokyo for a gathering of foreign ministers of Japan, Australia and India that is now being arranged for October.

Related coverage:

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Suga, Trump to hold 1st phone conversation on Sunday: sources

Japan's Suga, India's Modi agree to boost ties in 1st phone talks
The Enforcement Directorate is learnt to be collecting details of assets of Kerala CPM state secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan's son Bineesh Kodiyeri.

Bineesh was earlier quizzed by the agency in connection with a case registered against the accused in the Kerala gold smuggling case. He was also found to have links with Anoop Mohammed, a Kerala man held by the NCB from Bengaluru. Bineesh also said that Mohammed borrowed Rs 6 lakh from him for the latter's hotel business.

According to sources, as part of the investigation, the ED has sought the details of Bineesh's immovable assets. A letter in this regard was also learnt to have been written to the state registration department. A decision on implicating Bineesh in the case would be taken only after verifying the details.

Meanwhile, the CPM leadership in Kerala alleged that the CBI case into a housing scheme with the UAE agency's financial support was politically motivated.

Read: CBI to probe Kerala govt's deal with UAE agency

The CBI was acting as per the interest of the BJP. The agency did not follow the due process while registering this case based on an MLA's petition, the party maintained.

After a meeting of the CPM leadership on Saturday, Balakrishnan said that the CPM would politically face such moves by the BJP and the Congress that were aimed at sabotaging the Left Front government.

He also accused the Congress, which earlier accused the BJP of misusing central agencies, of not opposing the misuse of the agencies in Kerala.

The CBI, which registered a case on Friday in connection with alleged irregularities in Rs 20 crore housing scheme funded by Emirates Red Crescent, already conducted searches at a couple of locations in connection with the investigation.

There were reports that the state vigilance took files on the controversial housing scheme from the state secretariat on Friday as the state government ordered a vigilance inquiry into the matter.

The Opposition parties earlier alleged that the vigilance probe was an attempt by the government to scuttle a fair probe.
Mumbai, Sep 26 : Hours after Bollywood actor Deepika Padukone appeared before the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) in a drugs case, Shraddha Kapoor and Sara Ali Khan also arrived at the office of the drug law enforcement agency for questioning here, on Saturday.

Shraddha arrived at the NCB office here around 11.45 a.m. while Sara came at 12.15 p.m. at the NCB office in Ballard Pier area here.

Deepika's former manager Karishma Prakash also joined the probe at the NCB guest house in Colaba area here for the second day.

Shraddha, daughter of Bollywood veteran actor Shakti Kapoor has been summoned for questioning after her alleged chats with Sushant's former manager Jaya Saha came to the fore during the NCB probe.

According to NCB sources, Shraddha is likely to be quizzed if she allegedly procured drugs from Saha or some other sources.

The NCB will also ask for whom she procured the CBD oil and who the 'SLB' in her alleged chat was.

Shraddha, who starred in "Chichhore" with Sushant may also be queried on how long she knew the late actor and whether they reportedly joined any party or gatherings where drugs were consumed.

She may be asked to throw light on whether she ever went to the Pawna Resort where the alleged parties were said to be hosted by Sushant.

Besides, the NCB had last Wednesday also sent summons to Sara for questioning.

Sara is the daughter of Bollywood actor Saif Ali Khan and Amrita Singh, and she had starred with Sushant in "Kedarnath".

The NCB sources said that Sara will be asked about the drug consumption by her, where and how she allegedly procured it, etc.

During a television interview Sushant's girlfriend Rhea Chakraborty had claimed that the late actor started smoking marijuana during the shooting of the blockbuster film "Kedarnath".

Earlier this morning, Deepika Pahukone arrived at the NCB guest house for questioning after she was summoned for questioning on Wednesday.

Deepika is the daughter of badminton icon Prakash Padukone and is married to actor Ranveer Singh.

She has been asked to join the probe as her alleged chats with her former manager Karishma Prakash discussing drugs came to the fore.

Deepika will be quizzed why she asked Karishma to bring drugs at the Koko Club in October 2017 and for how long she was consuming the drugs.

The NCB will also ask her if she sought the drugs for her own consumption or for someone else, who paid for it, how, etc.

After Rhea, these three actresses are the biggest ones to have come under the NCB radar, which is attempting to unravel the alleged drug nexus in Bollywood since the past nearly two months.

The NCB has also questioned Bollywood actor Rakul Preet Singh on Friday for over four hours after her name came to the fore in the alleged chats.

The NCB has registered a case after the Enforcement Directorate (ED) registered a case of money laundering into the death of Sushant and then found the alleged chats of drugs on the phones of Rhea, her brother Showik and Sushant's house manager Samuel Miranda.

The ED wrote to NCB to probe the drug case. After registering the case, the NCB questioned several people and arrested Rhea, Showik, Miranda, Sushant's personal staff Dipesh Sawant and 16 others.

The NCB has also questioned Sushant's former manager Shruti Modi, Dharma Productions former executive producer Kshitij Prasad Ravi, Kwan Talent Management Agency CEO Dhruv Chitgopekar, noted producer Madhu Mantena Varma and several others in the case so far.

Besides the NCB, the CBI and the ED are probing the separate cases into the death of Sushant. Sushant was found dead on June 14 in his Bandra's Mont Blanc Apartment.

Latest updates on Sushant Singh Rajput Death Mystery

-- Except for the title, this story has not been edited by Prokerala team and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed
Christians Are Most Under Threat Minorities in the Middle East

Democrat Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen was among a handful of lawmakers who spoke out against Christian persecution on Wednesday night, saying that Christian communities are the most under threat minorities in the Middle East.

Van Hollen was among several members of Congress who provided video messages played at an online global summit hosted by the prominent Washington-based human rights advocacy organization In Defense of Christians.

While the conference is traditionally held in person, this year it was moved online due to COVID-19 lockdowns.

"I'm proud to represent the great state of Maryland in the U.S. Senate. Maryland was originally founded by colonists who hoped to establish a safe haven for Roman Catholics who were fleeing religious persecution at that time in England," Van Hollen, 61, said.

"I am pleased today, we are home to a diverse group of faiths who are free to practice their religions. We need to make sure those same rights extend to people around the world. In the Middle East, the minority religions that are most under threat and pressure are Christian communities."

As many advocates across the globe have voiced concerns about the mass displacement of Christians in Iraq after the invasion of the Islamic State terrorist group in 2014, Van Hollen said the world needs to "make sure that those Christian communities have the rights that we have in the United States under the First Amendment of our Constitution and the rights set forth in the Declaration of Human Rights from 1948."

"I am proud to work with you on a bipartisan basis to do that," Van Hollen said.

"Let's continue to work together to make sure that we protect the right of religious freedom around the world. In the Middle East, that means coming together to make sure that we protect minority faith groups. And none is at greater risk and under greater pressure than Christian communities throughout the Middle East."

Van Hollen, in the past, has supported efforts advocated for by In Defense of Christians, which engages in grassroots political advocacy campaigns that lobby for the protection of persecuted ancient Christian communities in the Middle East. Among the efforts, Van Hollen and IDC have supported the Global Fragility Act of 2019 and Armenian Genocide Recognition.

More recently, Van Hollen teamed up with Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., to send a letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom Sam Brownback asking the State Department to seriously consider recommendations made by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom.

The conservative and progressive lawmakers urged the State Department to consider designating certain countries where Christians and other minorities are persecuted as "countries of particular concern," a designation that carries with it the possibility of sanctions.

Such countries included in the letter are Syria, Russia, India and Vietnam.

Earlier in Wednesday's program, Lankford praised the Trump administration for its "active engagement around the world" on the religious freedom front.

However, Lankford warned that the U.S. should speak out against the 84 countries that have blasphemy laws on the books, specifically calling out Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Russia.

"Those 84 countries, a full one-third of the countries have everything from fines to the death penalty for simply not agreeing with the faith of whoever the leader is of that country," Lankford said. "That is a very significant thing for us and it is one of the areas that we should try to speak out on."

As countries like Pakistan have blasphemy laws that are often abused to mistreat Christians and other religious minorities, Lankford said that he has tried to push the issue of religious liberty "for a long time" when it comes to trade negotiations.

"We have to deal with the issue of religious liberty and also to be able to speak out against things like anti-Semitism, ways that other nations are isolating individuals," Lankford said. "We saw as recently as this past July when an American citizen was standing in court in Pakistan being tried for blasphemy and a Pakistani citizen walked into the court and shot him dead in the middle of the court. We saw just days ago a Pakistani citizen put on trial for blasphemy and convicted for blasphemy and taken away from his wife and children because he didn't convert to Islam after he was demanded to at his workplace."

In the U.S. House of Representatives, a bipartisan effort has been ongoing for years to help support the needs of persecuted Christians in the Middle East.

Rep. Anna Eshoo, a California Democrat and the only Assyrian American member of Congress, has teamed up with Nebraska Republican Jeff Fortenberry to co-chair the Religious Minorities in the Middle East Caucus. Eshoo co-founded the caucus along with former Congressman Frank Wolf of Virginia.

In 2015, Eshoo and Fortenberry introduced a successful resolution to define the persecution of Christians, Yazidis, and other ethnic and religious minorities in Iraq and Syria as genocide.

"I couldn't have a better partner in Congressman Fortenberry. We are colleagues ... but it is our faith that has really cemented our relationship," Eshoo said. "There is still much work to be done in different parts of the world, most especially in the Middle East to protect the Christians. So many have fled. Many have been left behind."

Fortenberry stressed that over the last few years, the U.S. has "worked very hard to continue to supply aid to the beleaguered communities of northern Iraq."

"We have also worked hard on a resolution that would look at integrating religious minorities into security forces of Iraq," the congressman explained. "Those dialogues continue with the State Department as well as the Defense Department. The prime minister of Iraq has made encouraging statements toward the religious minority population. I'd like to think that thanks to Anna's longsuffering in this space and our work together, perhaps we're seeing a bit of fruit of the work there in that regard."

John Barsa, the acting administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, said during the event that over the last several years, the U.S. has "spent over $450 million to help with the restoration of schools, infrastructure, roads and hospitals" in beleaguered northern Iraq.

"We've also funded psychosocial support, capacity building for organizations, mobilization of the private sector to invest in northern Iraq and much, much more," Barsa said. "These efforts are essential to support these communities and their ability to recover, return and thrive in their ancient homelands once again. USAID is committed to this important work."
Centre should not give too positive a spin on COVID-19 vaccine

India

oi-Briti Roy Barman

New Delhi, Sep 26: The central government has been accused by The Lancet medical journal of putting a "too positive spin" on the Covid-19 situation in India.

The journal has warned India as this representation can hamper public health initiatives.

The Lancet also asked Indian leaders to respect "scientific evidence...and not provide false optimism."

It added, "Failing to honestly report negative news creates uncertainty among the public and health-care professionals."

The medical journal also has slammed ICMR saying, "The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has been singled out by experts for straying from scientific evidence, appearing at worst politically motivated and at best overly optimistic."

It said that perpetuating unrealistic claims or failing to honestly report negative news creates uncertainty among the public and healthcare professionals, discouraging people from taking preventive action or taking public health messages seriously.

"... Presenting the current situation in India with a too positive spin not only clouds reality but also hampers vital public health initiatives. Perpetuating unrealistic claims or failing to honestly report negative news creates uncertainty among the public and healthcare professionals, discouraging people from taking preventive action or taking public health messages seriously," the editorial says.

"India has the expertise in medicine, public health, research, and manufacturing to lead the nation through the Covid-19 pandemic. To capitalise on these attributes, the country's leaders must respect scientific evidence, expert commentary, and academic freedom, and not provide false optimism," it adds.

It has also pointed towards issues with Covid numbers. "Transparency of the data on Covid-19 cases and deaths, especially those underpinning the case fatality rate, has also been questioned, as detailed in a recent World Report. The Indian Government reports a case fatality rate of 1.8%, much lower than the reported rate in other countries, but it is difficult to know if the numbers are comparable," said Lancet.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Saturday, September 26, 2020, 15:24 [IST]
3 1 of 3 John Kovach / Hearst Connecticut Media Show More Show Less 2 of 3 Show More Show Less 3 of 3





NEW CANAAN  Town officials reported two new coronavirus infections Friday but neither person currently resides in the state.

One of the people who caught the virus is a student living out of state at college, the other is a middle-aged person living at a second home, First Selectman Kevin Moynihan said in a prerecorded message to residents.
A federal judge scheduled a rare Sunday morning hearing to decide whether the U.S. can go through with its ban on the popular video-sharing app TikTok.

ByteDance Ltd., TikTok's Chinese owner, has asked the court to block the ban, set to begin on Sunday night, even as it pursues approvals from the government for the sale of a stake in its U.S. operations to Oracle Corp. and Walmart Inc. under pressure from President Donald Trump. It argued in court filings Friday that the ban would trample constitutional free-speech protections.

Trump cited national security risks in August, when he announced a ban on the widely-used network from U.S. app stores. The president, who's also barred WeChat, owned by China's Tencent Holdings Ltd., has told ByteDance its only alternative is to sell its American TikTok business. The U.S. Justice Department argues the apps potentially give the China's government access to millions of Americans' personal data.

WELCOME INVITATION: George sends letter to TikTok CEO touting Fort Bend County

The government emphasized those concerns in a filing on Friday, urging U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols not to grant the temporary block. U.S. lawyers cited FBI Director Christopher Wray's assessment that China poses the "greatest long-term threat to our nation's information and intellectual property" as a reason for the ban.

"One of the tools that the PRC uses to further its goals is bulk data collection," the U.S. government said, referring to the People's Republic of China.

ByteDance, founded in 2012 by Zhang Yiming, has close ties to the Chinese Communist Party and must abide by laws that require it to cooperate with China's government, the U.S. said.

"In April 2018, the CCP forced ByteDance to shutdown one of its other platforms, and Mr. Yiming issued a public apology in which he pledged to cooperate with and elevate official CCP media," the U.S. said. "Following this public atonement, ByteDance underwent organizational restructuring with CCP infrastructure now built into it."

The ban, announced in an Aug. 6 executive order, is part of a wider effort by the administration to take a hard line against Beijing, which Trump bets will help him win re-election. Starting at 11:59 p.m. on Sept. 27, it would remove TikTok from the app stores run by Apple and Google's Android, the most widely used marketplaces for downloadable apps. People who don't yet have the app wouldn't be able to get it, and those who already have it wouldn't have access to updates needed to ensure its safe and smooth operation. TikTok is used regularly by 19 million Americans.

CONSIDER THIS: Should you delete TikTok? Why some experts think the app is a privacy threat

Ahead of the looming deadline, ByteDance had argued for an expedited schedule in the case. The U.S. pushed back at a hearing on Thursday, saying ByteDance had filed a separate suit more than a month ago and was late in requesting the injunction in this one. In defense of the ban, the government again cited security concerns.

"TikTok is allowed to continue operating with respect to existing users but cannot add users, and the reason for that is that there are significant national security risks," Assistant U.S. Attorney Daniel Schwei told the judge.

TikTok said that the ban was already undermining its business model by scaring users away, and that it had sought relief as soon as it was allowed to under the law. It said the government would have argued its request was premature if filed earlier.

"The urgency of this is created by the Sunday night ban," attorney John Hall said. "That part of it makes absolutely no sense to us."

Hall added the ban would increase risks to existing users by preventing them from getting regular security updates. The deadline also was affecting the company's reputation with users, who are considering moving to less attractive platforms, the attorney noted.

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In the social media industry, Hall said, "users retained is absolutely the lifeblood of their business."

In Friday's filing, TikTok's lawyers argued that Trump is exceeding his authority with the proposed ban and acting in an "unreasonable and capricious manner" by seeking to cut off all transactions on the service.

The law being invoked "states the President's authority does not extend to the direct or indirect regulation or prohibition of 'personal communication' and the international flow of 'information or informational materials,' such as film, photographs, and artwork, regardless of the 'format or medium of transmission,"' the Chinese company's lawyers argued.

Such a ban also would trample free-speech rights of U.S. users of the Chinese company's platform, TikTok's lawyers added. Millions of Americans "engage in core protected speech on TikTok in pursuit of a wide variety of political, social, and cultural ends," according to the brief. "The Prohibitions unlawfully restrict this speech in violation of the First Amendment."
MAIDUGURI, Nigeria: Suspected Islamist militants killed at least 11 people in northeastern Nigeria in an attack on a security convoy that was taking people displaced by an insurgency back to their homes, police and security sources said on Saturday.

Islamic State, to whom a breakaway faction of Nigerian militant group Boko Haram pledged allegiance in 2016, said on its Amaq news agency that 30 police officers and soldiers were killed in the attack on Friday on a road leading to the strategic fishing town of Baga in Borno state.

In a statement on Saturday, Borno state police said eight police officers and three members of a government-approved militia were killed, and 13 people were wounded in the attack around noon (1100 GMT) on Friday.

Two soldiers, a police officer and a member of the government-approved militia - all speaking anonymously because they were not authorised to speak to journalists - told Reuters at least four soldiers were also killed.

Two Nigerian military spokesmen did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Islamist militants have forced more than 2 million people to flee their homes since 2009 when Boko Haram began an insurgency aimed at creating a state adhering to a strict interpretation of sharia law. Some 30,000 people have been killed in the conflict.

The convoy was taking people back to Baga at the start of an initiative by authorities in Borno to relocate displaced persons to their homes. Borno is the insurgencys birthplace and the state worst hit by the conflict.

Islamic States West Africa Province (ISWAP) has become a dominant force in the region in recent years, targeting attacks on security forces. Boko Haram has carried out suicide bomb attacks and shooting raids on local residents.

Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor
The heady delight of ubriaco, the drunken cheese An Italian cheese imbued with wine and other stories from the cheeseboard

It was at an open-air market stall early one morning in Venice that I first discovered ubriaco or drunken cheese. I fell in love with the notion even before tasting it.

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DRUNKEN CHEESE, said the sign in English pinned to a hard, white cheese with a deep burgundy-coloured rind and veins. It immediately piqued my interest. The vendor told me, Ubriaco means drunk-a in Italian, before handing me a small, crumbly wedge to try. It was soft and fresh, and tasted sublime, with a hint of red wine in the thunderbolt-shaped lines on the inside.

The story of the cheese gushed forth like the Arno river from the arches of the Ponte Vecchio bridge steps away. In the War, the first World War, he said, soldiers from Austria and Hungary raided farms in the Treviso area not far from here. They were hungry, and they took everything they could carry awayloaves of bread, bottles of wine, chunks of cheese, fruits, vegetables, anything. One day, a cheese maker heard them coming and slipped a wheel of cows cheese into an open barrel of red wine to hide it. It sank to the bottom and the soldiers missed it. The next day, when the farmer pulled it out, the dark wine had covered it and slipped into the cracks. He tasted it. It was wonderful. Allora! Our ubriaco cheese came to be!

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A charming backstory to go with a winning combination of flavours, I thought. I indicated a point, he cut a wedge, and I walked away with a revelation wrapped in parchment paper and string.

Continuing on my long walk, I began to reminisce about other chance encounters with cheese. Once, in the rugged and remote heart of the Italian island Sardinia, I came across a white cheese called casu marzu in a village market. The recipe turned out to be ancient and outlandishshepherds leave the goats cheese outdoors, so flies can invade and feast on it. They lay their eggs in it, and the cheese is considered a ready-to-eat-delicacy when the larvae hatch and turn into squirming, pooping maggots. I have yet to taste it.

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Kurut, salty and chalky yogurt balls, are popular in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan. (Photo: iStock)





The food markets of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan showcase mounds of hardened, salty and chalky yogurt balls called kurut. They are an acquired taste but immensely popular with the locals, and they make a pragmatic, dry and long-lasting snack for schoolchildren and anyone on the go.

While staying in ager (a traditional Mongolian tent) with a family of nomadic herders, I had squares of soft, tart airag cheese made from fermented mares milk.

Then there was the time I was kicked by a fluffy white llama as I tried to pet it. I was with a farmer family, 14,000ft above sea level, by Lake Titicaca in Peru. They served fresh and delicious cheese empanadas. When I asked what cheese it was, he waved his head at the glowering creature.

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As I mulled these encounters, the heady delight of discovering ubriaco took hold. Back in London, I discovered it was available at a handful of cheese shops, such as La Fromagerie off Marylebone High Street and the Drunk Cheese stall in Borough Market. The latter is dedicated to ubriacatura, or cheeses soaked in all manner of alcoholic drinks. There, I tried blue cheese imbued in Amarone (red wine), pecorino lashed with beer, stretched cows milk refined with sparkling white wine, and orange liqueur infused in a blend called Fiore d Avancia. The impressive array of cheeses make for a fetching display, with varied shapes and rinds of purple grape, beige seeds and green herbs. Their site, www.drunkcheese.co.uk, is replete with images of inventive combinations.

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Marrying wine and cheese, two popular ingredients that have been paired for centuries, was an idea waiting to happen, and its success has caught on. But we cannot let cheese makers have all the fun.

So go ahead and devise new pairings in your own kitchens. You no longer need to wonder what to do with small quantities of wine and other types of left-over alcohol. Invoke the mantra of the three Rsreduce, reuse, recycle. Red wine, when cooked, turns a deep purply brown, with the flavour intensified. I found a host of ideas on the net and stirred up a jug of sangria. A champagne vinaigrette salad dressing followed. White wine with grated cheese combined beautifully as a sauce for angel hair pasta as well as a fish marinade. Then came desserts such as wine-soaked peaches and wine ice cream.

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I soak hand-torn chunks of parmigiana cheese in left-over wine. In just a few hours the rough edges are covered in a maroon tint, and the delicate flavour from the wine gets absorbed. I leave them to air-dry for a couple of hours, and serve them as home-made ubriaco.

Luis Fernando Olaverri, the famous vintner, said, Wine is the only artwork you can drink. Well, given all the recipes you can dream up, you can have your wine and eat it too!
BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept. 26

Trend

President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev has sent a congratulatory letter to Xi Jinping, Chairman of the Peoples Republic of China.

"Dear Mr. Chairman,

It is on the occasion of your countrys national holiday  Establishment Day of the Peoples Republic of China that on my own behalf and on behalf of the people of Azerbaijan I extend my most cordial congratulations to you and your friendly people.

We are delighted to witness success and achievements of the Peoples Republic of China, your country becoming one of the leading nations of the world and day by day growth of its prestige in the international arena.

We attach utmost importance to the comprehensive development of Azerbaijan-China relations that have ancient history. The traditional ties of friendship and cooperation that bind our countries and peoples are enriched today by new substance of cooperation in the political, economic and humanitarian spheres. This cooperation will certainly continue to develop successfully also within the "Belt and Road" project that you have initiated.

The solidarity and mutual support demonstrated by our countries since the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic that humanity faces have once again proven that our bilateral relations were built on solid foundation. I seize this opportunity to express my gratitude to you for assistance of the Peoples Republic of China in our country in the fight against the coronavirus disease.

I am confident that the ties of friendship and mutually beneficial cooperation between Azerbaijan and China that are based on good traditions will continue to develop and strengthen through our joint efforts for the sake of prosperity of our peoples.

On this notable day, I wish strong health and success to you and everlasting peace and prosperity to the friendly people of China," the letter said.
The Union government had temporarily retained 47,272 crore excess Goods and Services Tax (GST) compensation cess in the Consolidated Fund of India (CFI) pending reconciliation, which cannot be construed as a diversion as the money was fully utilised in providing compensation to states, two officials said.

The amount collected as GST compensation cess has not been used for any other purpose, the officials working in the finance ministry said requesting anonymity.

They were commenting on observations of a recent report prepared by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) that pointed out short crediting of 47,272 crore cess in the non-lapsable GST Compensation Cess Fund. The amount was collected for 2017-18 and 2018-19.

Also Read: Farmers have lost all faith in PM Modi-led govt: Rahul Gandhi

The short-crediting was a violation of the GST Compensation Cess Act, 2017. The amount by which the cess was short credited was also retained in the CFI and became available for use for purposes other than what was provided in the act, said the CAG report on Accounts of the Union Government, which was tabled in the Parliament on September 23.

The finance ministry accepted the audit observation and told CAG in February this year that the proceeds of cess collected and not transferred to the Public Account would be transferred in the subsequent year, the report said.

Explaining the technical nuances of short crediting, the report said: Short crediting of cess collected during the year led to overstatement of revenue receipts and understatement of fiscal deficit for the year. Further, any transfer in the subsequent year would become an appropriation from the resources of that year and would require Parliamentary authorisation.

One of the officials mentioned above said, In all earnest, there has been no diversion of funds, whatsoever as to the compensation due to the states for the year 2017-18 and 2018-19 were fully paid and the time taken in the reconciliation of compensation receipts cant be termed as diversion of GST Cess Fund when the dues to states were fully released by the Centre.

Also Read: Most states choose 97k crore borrowing to plug GST deficit

The CAG, in its report, has not said that the cess was diverted, he said. The amount collected under-compensation cess fund has been regularly and fully distributed to states as per their dues and budgetary provisions and by the end of July 2020 everything has been accounted for and released, he added.

The Union government had released the entire 1,65,302 crore as GST compensation for 2019-20 to states by July this year even as the actual collection in the fiscal year was only 95,444 crore.

To release the compensation for 2019-20, the balance cess amount collected during 2017-18 and 2018-19 was also utilised. In addition, the Centre had transferred some amount from CFI to meet the requirement, a second official said.

At the time of introducing the new indirect tax regime, the GST law assured state governments a 14% increase in their annual revenue for five years and the Centre committed to meet any shortfall in revenue through the cess levied on luxury goods and sin products such as liquor, cigarettes, aerated water, automobiles, coal and other tobacco commodities.

The officials said the government makes all efforts to transfer all amounts collected by the end of every financial year into designated funds by making necessary budget provisions.

The amount of cess collected first gets collected in CGI since Article 266 requires that all amounts collected by the Centre should get credited to the CGI. It is further transferred to the Compensation Cess Fund through a budget head. However, since the final accounts of amounts collected are known only after the end of the financial year, normally by the end of June next year after necessary reconciliation, any amount collected over and above the estimate, will remain in CFI temporarily, the first official said.
The death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg has clarified what is at stake in the 2020 election. It is not, as some believe, democracy itself. Nor is it, as others assume, our continued existence as a nation. Democracy will survive Donald Trump, and the United States of America will outlast Joe Biden. The question that 2020 will help to answer is what sort of democracy, and what sort of nation, America will be as it prepares to enter the second quarter of the 21st century.

The reaction to Ginsburgs death, and to Republican plans to fill her seat on the Supreme Court, underscores the choice before the electorate: Does it prefer to live in a democratic republic ordered toward the principles of the Founders and the constitutional structure they designed to protect individual liberty? Or would it rather dwell in a plebiscitary democracy where the original meaning of the Constitution, when it is not explicitly repudiated, is politely overlooked in order to satisfy ever more radical egalitarian demands?

Needless to say, the answer is up in the air, and has been for some time. But we may be nearing a settlement, one way or another. The civil unrest of the past several months has made unignorable the existence of a large body of opinion that holds something is terribly wrong with America as founded, something that cannot be redeemed, and that American history and American institutions must be drastically revised to atone for the injustices committed against racial minorities. President Trump, in his inimitable way, has made the opposite argument, and called for a renewed appreciation of the American story and a resurgence of national pride.

Ginsburgs passing heightened the tension. Suddenly an abstract cultural debate was transformed into a concrete political-legal struggle, and the prospect of lasting victory for one team (Trump and Mitch McConnells) looked real. The fight over the Supreme Court vacancy Ginsburg left behind also illuminated the lengths to which some progressives are prepared to go to make real their vision of the future. And it is in their openness to institutional upheaval that the real import of this election may be found. If enacted, the measures these Democrats propose would warp our constitutional system. They would turn the American government into a creature far different from the one the Founders made. This would be the upshot of the structural reform that, until the last week, lived mainly on Twitter and in the heads of policy wonks.

Story continues

These Democrats say that, if President Trumps nominee to replace Ginsburg is confirmed, and next year brings a Democratic president and a Democratic Senate, then the first order of business for the new government, in the middle of a pandemic and a troubled economy, will be abolishing the legislative filibuster and packing the Supreme Court by adding anywhere from two to four justices. Such a move, which even the greatest president of the 20th century was unable to achieve, would polarize this country even more than it already is, and delegitimize the Court in the eyes of millions. But it is just the start of what some on the Democratic left would like to accomplish.

The Electoral College has been on the chopping block since 2000. If it goes the way of the dodo, presidential campaigns thereafter will be determined by who has the greatest allegiance in the biggest cities of the largest states. To override the supposed Republican advantage in the Senate, where every state enjoys equal representation, some progressives would grant statehood to Washington, D.C., and to Puerto Rico, and maybe Guam and American Samoa while theyre at it. These changes would make it much easier for Congress to eliminate private health insurance, enact universal vote by mail, decarbonize the economy, grant citizenship to illegal immigrants and voting rights to noncitizens, suppress political speech, resume taxpayer funding of abortion, and cross out the Second Amendment. The sheer number of bad ideas in play would be overwhelming.

Now it is true that at least the first item on this agenda would be debated according to the present rules. And the multiple veto points within the American kludgeocracy would no doubt interfere with, and sometimes upend, the boldest plans of the progressive Democrats. It is also the case that incorporating new states gives rise to challenges both constitutional (are we really willing to grant the remaining residents of the federal District of Columbia  the first family  three electoral votes?) as well as political (does Puerto Rico even want to be a state?). But the very fact that we are having this conversation at all  and that Biden, at this writing, has neither ruled out the court-packing scheme nor said whom he would nominate to the Court  ought seriously to worry defenders of the Founders Constitution.

In 1963, in the first chapter of The Conservative Affirmation, Willmoore Kendall offered his definition of American conservatism. Conservatives, Kendall wrote, oppose the Liberal Revolution that would replace representative government with majoritarian democracy:

Put an end, the Liberals insist, to rural overrepresentation in the lower house of Congress and in the state legislatures  bringing them in line with the principle one-man one-equal-vote. And that principle, once adopted (it is French political philosophy, not American), must call finally for abolition even of the U.S. Senate as a check on majorities, and would in any case make the House the creature of numerical majorities at the polls. Abolish the electoral college, the Liberals insist further, and so make the President also the direct agent of the popular majority. Reform the party system, the liberals insist still further, so that each of our parties shall be programmatic, ideological  like those of the real democracies in Europe  and that the two parties together shall submit, at election time, a genuine choice to the electorate. Abolish the filibuster  so runs the next point in the program  because it frustrates, serves no other function except to frustrate, the will of the majority. Rescind the seniority-principle in congressional committees, the program continues; it also obstructs the will of the majority. Now give the Liberal attackers their way on all these points, and the form of government explicated in The Federalist Papers will be no more.

That is what 2020 is about.

This essay was originally published in the Washington Free Beacon.

More from National Review
Trump has told people around him that he plans to name Barrett, a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit, as his nominee at a White House ceremony on Saturday. Administration officials and campaign advisers were preparing for a Barrett announcement, and some remarks for the president disclosing her as his choice have already been written, according to officials familiar with the matter.
Ottawa:

Canada will offer temporary residence permits to people stranded in the country as a result of US President Donald Trumps travel ban, the immigration ministry has said.Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if needed as we have done in the past, Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said at a news conference.



Hussen did not indicate how many people could be concerned by this measure, but he said that as of early Sunday afternoon, the Canadian authorities were unaware of anyone stranded in the country by the US order.



Trump on Friday suspended the arrival of all refugees to the US for at least 120 days and barred entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iraq, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.



Hussen, who is of Somali origin, said the Trump administration had assured Ottawa that Canadians holding dual nationality with those countries would not be affected by the US ban.



He said that people from those seven countries who have a valid Canadian permanent residency card can still enter the United States. However, under the US order, the ban will apply to people from the targeted countries who are passing through Canada.More than 35,000 Canadians with dual citizenship have citizenship with one of the seven countries, he added.



Hussen also stressed that Canada would continue to pursue an immigration policy based on compassion while at the same time protecting the security of its citizens.On Saturday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau welcomed immigrants to Canada, striking a sharp contrast with Trumps sweeping executive order restricting immigration the previous day.



To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada, Trudeau posted on Twitter.



According to the latest Canadian census, from 2011, one out of five people in the country are foreign-born.



Canada has welcomed more than 39,670 Syrian refugees between November 2015 and the beginning of this January, according to government figures.

For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has proposed Friday a pact with American officials that guaranteed neither nation would interfere in the other's elections and domestic affairs just weeks before the November 3 presidential election in the United States.

Russia's non-interference proposal

According to a report by the VOA News, the Russian government released a statement where Putin underscored the "risk of large-scale confrontation in the digital sphere" and called for possible measures to enable both countries to "reboot the relations" in the field of information and communication security.

Putin's proposal comes amid reports from the U.S. intelligence that found Russian has been taking actions to influence the November elections. Cyber experts concluded in an earlier report that Moscow also interfered in the 2016 U.S. elections.

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov read out the Russian president's statement in a video released by the ministry. He is currently visiting military drills involving China and Iran in an area in southern Russia.

Western countries have previously accused Russia of hacking and hiring internet trolls to influence the upcoming elections.

Earlier this month, Microsoft Corp's intelligence unit accused Moscow of hiring hackers to target at least 200 different organizations with ties to the 2020 U.S. election, including political parties and consultants working for Republicans and Democrats.

In August, the American intelligence community accused Russia of undertaking a broad effort to disparage the former Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden's bid for the presidency, through various disinformation campaigns.

"We assess that Russia is using a range of measures to primarily denigrate former Vice President Biden and what it sees as an anti-Russia 'establishment," William Evanina, director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center, told lawmakers on August 7.

Also Read: 'Discarded' Mail-In Voting Ballots Support Trump's Claims of Election Fraud as Investigation Continues

Election interference

Evanina added there are a few Kremlin-linked parties who are supporting Trump's campaign by advertising on social media platforms and Russia state television, as reported by the Wall Street Journal.

Microsoft's threat intelligence team reported earlier this month that several Russian government hackers attacked more than 200 U.S. organizations that are linked to the November election. Some of the agencies hit include national and state political parties and consultants for Republicans and Democrats.

Some U.S. intelligence officials have stated that Moscow has actively been conducting interference activities to sow chaos during the 2020 presidential election. They have also noted that Russian-linked individuals are supporting Trump's campaign and candidacy.

According to The Moscow Times, Putin's statement called for cooperation between the United States and Russia by exchanging guarantees that neither will conduct interference schemes against the other's domestic affairs, including elections. The Russian president's proposal noted the particular use of information and communication technologies.

In his statement, Putin noted that one of the world's most significant challenges is the threat of a large-scale digital confrontation. He added that prevention lies in several critical players that must ensure international information security.

Putin's reason for proposing the agreement is to prevent cyberspace crimes. He compared the deal to the 1972 Soviet-American agreement that aimed to reduce the chances of an incident occurring.

Related Article: Donald Trump Touts Israel Agreement to Gain Support For Reelection Campaign

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People watch a screen showing a file image of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un during a news program at the Seoul Railway Station in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Sept. 25, 2020. AP



North Korea's apology over its recent fatal shooting of a South Korean government official is a "helpful step," the U.S. State Department said Friday, while reaffirming its support for Seoul's condemnation and demand for a full explanation.



The reaction came shortly after North Korean leader Kim Jong-un said he felt "very sorry" in a message sent to the South.



"We understand that the DPRK has conveyed an explanation and apology to the ROK. This is a helpful step," a spokesman from the U.S. Department of State told Yonhap News Agency, while speaking on condition of anonymity.



DPRK stands for North Korea's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.



The apology over the incident by the North's highest leadership is exceedingly rare,



Previously a North Korean soldier shot and killed a female South Korean tourist at the Mount Kumgang Resort in the North in 2008, but it has yet to offer any apology.



In the message, sent Friday (KST), the North Korean leader said this week's shooting incident near the de facto inter-Korean maritime border should not have occurred and that he was sorry to have "disappointed" the South Korean president and the people of South Korea.



He also offered an account of the incident that took place Tuesday when North Korean coastal guards shot and killed a 47-year-old South Korean, affiliated with the maritime ministry, who was drifting in the North's waters, according to the National Intelligence Service here.




GUILFORD  The towns school district learned this week that a Guilford High School student had tested positive for COVID-19, Superintendent of Schools Paul Freeman told community members in an email.

The infection marks the first confirmed coronavirus infection reported in the towns school system since it resumed in-person classes as part of a hybrid model on Sept. 10.

The student was last in school on Friday, Freeman said in his announcement.

After the district learned of the infection, officials conducted contact tracing to determine who had been in close contact with the student, said Sonia Marino, who took over as Guilfords health director this week after long-time health director Dennis Johnson retired.

Through contact tracing, officials identified a small number of people who were asked to self-quarantine until two weeks had passed since their last interaction with the infected person, she said.

This student has no siblings in other schools, did not ride a bus and did not participate in any after-school activities, Freeman said in his email, adding that because of the limited number of people with which the student had close contact, Guilford would continue with its hybrid learning model.

Officials instructed the infected student to stay at home and in isolation for the next 10 days, according to Freemans email.

Guilford First Selectman Matthew Hoey complimented the district and the health department on their handling of the case.

This particular incident was handled in, I thought, a very efficient and effective way, he said. I think itsa perfect example of the way the health (department) and the school admin are working together to protect the students and staff.

As soon as officials heard there was a possible case, they got to work on contact tracing, according to Hoey, who said the superintendent and the health director coordinated the decision to keep schools open.

I dont think this changes the risk level to the community, the first selectman said.

Meanwhile, a North Branford High School student also tested positive for COVID-19, Michael Pascucilla, director of the East Shore District Health Department, confirmed Thursday night.

meghan.friedmann@hearstmediact.com
As part of the provinces goal to attract $1 billion in new investment in plant protein processing and another $500 million in new animal protein production there is now funding available for the development of a protein research strategy.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 26/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

As part of the provinces goal to attract $1 billion in new investment in plant protein processing and another $500 million in new animal protein production there is now funding available for the development of a protein research strategy.

In partnership with the federal government, it has made $100,000 available for the development of the strategy and the establishment of a research chair at the University of Manitoba that will help bridge the gap between Manitobas research and protein processing sectors.

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James House, head of the department of food and human nutritional sciences at the University of Manitoba, will lead the project.

The province is well on its way on the plant protein processing investment side of things. There is close to $600 million already committed by the French company Roquette and the home-grown Merit Functional Foods who are building two pea protein processing plants in the province. (The Merit plant will also process canola protein.)

On the animal protein side, Manitoba is already the largest producer of hogs and is the third largest beef-producing province in Canada.

"Global demand for plant and animal protein continues to increase, providing economic opportunities for Manitobas farmers, processors and communities," said Blaine Pedersen, Manitobas minister of agriculture and resource development. "The new research strategy and the work being undertaken by Dr. House will help industry identify those opportunities, further supporting the Manitoba Protein Advantage strategy."

In January, the Manitoba government created the Manitoba Protein Consortium to provide leadership and encourage stakeholders to become engaged in the Manitoba Protein Advantage.

The province has also benefitted from several million dollars of investment from Protein Industries Canada, a federally funded innovation supercluster based out of Saskatchewan.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 19:51:31|Editor: huaxia

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Zambian Minister of Health Chitalu Chilufya (R) and Chinese Ambassador to Zambia Li Jie (L) attend a donation ceremony of COVID-19 preventative materials in Lusaka, capital of Zambia, on Sept. 25, 2020. (Photo by Martin Mbangweta/Xinhua)

China has delivered more COVID-19 preventative materials to Zambia.

LUSAKA, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- China has delivered more COVID-19 preventative materials to Zambia.

Li Jie, Chinese Ambassador to Zambia, said on Friday the international community still needs to support Zambia as the country has continued to see a rise in both new cases and deaths.

He said the two countries have been all-weather friends for a long time and that the two sides have been united in fighting the pandemic since it broke out in the southern African nation.

"These supplies have just arrived in Zambia by air. I am handing over them to the Ministry of Health. I believe they will play a positive role in the treatment of critically ill patients and the protection of medical staff," he said.

The Chinese envoy noted that despite the difficulties in face-to-face communication caused by the pandemic, the China-Zambia cooperation has been advancing.

He pledged that China was ready to support Zambia and other African countries as soon as the COVID-19 vaccine was put into use.

On his part, Minister of Health Chitalu Chilufya said China was taking the lead in supporting Zambia not only in the fight against the pandemic but in the health sector in general.

Zambia, he said, will remain indebted to the support rendered by China not only in the provision of health materials but infrastructure in the health sector.

He noted that the donation will change the landscape in the way Zambia was managing COVID-19 cases.

Meanwhile, the country recorded 24 new COVID-19 cases in the last 24 hours out of 1,737 tests done. This brings the cumulative cases to 14,515 while deaths stand at 332.
State officials on Friday warned of rising coronavirus cases in five N.J. counties.

Ocean County -- and Lakewood in particular -- has become a new hotspot. The county saw 439 new cases since Monday, or 100 to 150 per day, and half of them have come from Lakewood, state Health Commissioner Judith Persichilli said.

There have also been upticks in Bergen, Gloucester, Middlesex, and Monmouth counties.

Statewide, officials announced 612 news cases and seven more deaths from the coronavirus on Friday. Those newly reported deaths occurred between Sept. 14 and Sept 23.

Friday marked the 10th time in the past 11 days that the number of new cases exceeded 400 and the second time in eight days it was above 600  though new deaths and hospitalizations have remained relatively stable in recent weeks.

New Jerseys rate of transmission was 1.15 for the third straight day  the highest its been in more than a month and above the key benchmark of 1, which shows the outbreak is growing.

Officials have said recent increases are due in part to the states vast testing capacity, some is because of community spread of the virus, and the rising cases among younger residents.

Overall, New Jersey has seen 202,100 COVID-19 cases out of more than 3.47 million tests and 16,097 deaths related to the virus  14,306 lab-confirmed and 1,791 considered probable since the outbreak began March 4.

Heres a roundup of coronavirus news:

Murphy extends N.J.'s coronavirus public-health emergency another 30 days. State of emergency stays in effect. This is the seventh time Murphy has extended the emergency, which gives him the power to take executive action to combat COVID-19s spread. The emergency declaration expires after 30 days if the governor doesnt extend it.

When will N.J. expand indoor dining capacity? Murphy hopes sooner than later. As cooler temperatures arrive and places like neighboring Connecticut take more reopening steps from coronavirus restrictions, Gov. Phil Murphy said Friday morning he believes New Jersey will be safe to increase indoor dining capacity sooner than later  though hes still not sure when.

Bill to increase N.J. nursing home staffing passes after a 5-year battle. Its now up to Murphy. It took five years and a worldwide pandemic to make it happen, but state lawmakers Thursday approved a bill that would require a minimum number of frontline nursing home workers on every shift.

N.J. father of 6 finally meets doctors who saved him during COVID-19 coma (VIDEO). When Kevin Jackson was admitted to Jefferson Washington Township Hospital in April with sudden symptoms of COVID-19, the father of six slipped into unconsciousness and was on a ventilator within days. While he slept in a medically-induced coma, he was surrounded by doctors and nurses  faces he never knew as they worked to keep him alive.

Murphy says hell sign N.J. budget with $700M in tax hikes and $4.5B in borrowing as is next week. A day after the New Jersey Legislature passed a new state budget that raises about $700 million in taxes and calls for borrowing $4.5 billion to help make up for revenue losses in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, Gov. Phil Murphy said Friday he plans to sign the plan into law early next week without vetoing any of it.

Queen Latifah hosts benefit for COVID-19 relief with Whoopi Goldberg, Jimmy Fallon, Laura Dern. Queen Latifah is hosting a livestreamed celebrity benefit for the American Lung Association this weekend. Called #Act4Impact, the fundraiser, set for Saturday, Sept. 26, will raise money for the associations COVID-19 Action Initiative.

These N.J. schools stopped in-person instruction because of COVID-19 cases. Heres the latest list.About two dozen schools across the state have paused in-person classes three weeks into the school year because students and teachers have tested positive for the coronavirus.

NJ Advance Media Staff Writers Brent Johnson, Susan K. Livio, Rebecca Everett, Samantha Marcus and Amy Kuperinsky contributed to this report.

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Allison Pries may be reached at apries@njadvancemedia.com. Have a news tip or a story idea about New Jersey schools? Send it here.
Sunitha Natti By

Seventy five years is a time to unapologetically revel in accomplishments. But a post-independent India, just shy of its 75th birthday, must begin at the beginning, correcting the foundational principles starting with individual rights, argue Harsh Madhusudhan and Rajeev Mantri in their book A New Idea of India: Individual Rights In A Civilizational State.

The authors place immense belief in equality aiding economic growth, and how the lack of it kept the country impoverished for decades. They give us an essential reminder that India is a civilisational State and not just a post-colonial entity, whose journey is traced highlighting all that has been wrong with secularism, socialism, welfarism and liberalism that we practice today, and what it actually should be. And because almost every debate invariably gets a caste and religion tint, the authors drive home a fundamental fact that the opposite of secularism is not communalism, but theocracy.

Take secularism. All individuals are equals, but the State has been discriminating citizens based on religion, caste, class and language clearly to consolidate minority votes, they argue. This has seen need-based welfare ceding way to identity-based socialism, but in the end as we see it now, the so-called Nehruvian form of governance running almost uninterrupted since independence has failed to deliver prosperity.

The issue of whether groups should supersede individual rights is as old as the hills, so that's not the baffling part. What's more concerning is that, even today, there's hardly any intellectual and constructive dialogue on the outcome of pseudo-secular and socialist economics exacerbating social divisions. In contrast, one is branded communal if one doesn't support State welfare based on religion, the authors note.



The duo also channel much energy into the unsettling and illiberal double standards, while making the case for something as basic as why the role of shaping the society shouldn't be in the hands of the State. For long, there have been fundamental flaws deliberately subjecting one group to reforms, and hypocritically leaving out minorities. In essence, such a divisive construct threatens to wither individual identities. Just consider how and why polygamy is deemed socially harmful for the majority community but not for minorities and why State control over Hindu places of ownership alone isn't a violation of the very principles of secularism.

At the heart of the book lies a dispassionate attempt to distinguish nation-State, State-society, and Hindutva-Hinduism. This is important as India is at a turning point and post-Covid starting 2021 could be its make-or-break time to reposition itself in the geopolitical order. The book thus is timely with its thought-provoking question: What is the idea of India? Should religious groups have special rights over and above individual rights that all citizens enjoy in a free, democratic India?

As LK Advani once noted, a Hindu rashtra and a secular state are virtually synonymous and playing by the ear, the authors argue that the Hindutva movement should desire an end of religion and caste-based personal laws. That's because, in a market system, discrimination hurts all, often unequally.

The book neatly sliced into five chapters offers a view on most hot-button issues from Uniform Civil Code to abrogation of Article 370. While championing an overhaul of the judiciary, downsizing of ministries, administrative reforms, it also has policy prescriptions and makes the case for genuine liberalism including rule of law, open markets, and separation of religion and State.



It's reference-rich citing multiple authors old and new, though one would have liked the level of discussion seen in the first two chapters maintained throughout. The flow is simple, which means you can finish it in a sitting or two, but commands complete attention.

As for the ending, there simply isn't one. Perhaps the authors hope for a stimulating discourse to begin as soon as readers leave the book.
WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump has chosen Judge Amy Coney Barrett to replace the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg, sending the nomination to the Senate with hopes of a quick confirmation fewer than 40 days before the presidential election.

Republicans are eyeing a vote in late October, though Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell hasnt yet said for certain whether a final vote will come before or after the Nov. 3 election.

A confirmation vote so close to a presidential election would be unprecedented, creating significant political risk and uncertainty for both parties. Early voting is underway in some states in the races for the White House and control of Congress.

A look at the confirmation process and what we know and dont know about whats to come:

WHO IS AMY CONEY BARRETT?

Barrett has been a federal judge in Indiana since 2017, when Trump nominated her to the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. She was previously a longtime University of Notre Dame law professor and clerked for the late Justice Antonin Scalia, whom she called her mentor as she accepted Trumps nomination on Saturday. At age 48, she would be the youngest justice on the current court if confirmed.

Barretts three-year judicial record shows a clear and consistent conservative bent. She is a committed Roman Catholic as well as a firm devotee of Scalias favoured interpretation of the Constitution known as originalism.

Republicans have widely praised her, while Democrats worry her votes could chip away at the Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion and erode health care protections. They argue that her philosophy is too conservative and rigid.

WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Lindsey Graham says his panel will hold four days of confirmation hearings the week of Oct. 12.

Once the committee approves the nomination, it goes to the Senate floor for a final vote. This could all happen by Nov. 3 if the process goes smoothly. Graham said he hopes the committee can move the nomination to the Senate floor by the week of Oct. 26 for a confirmation vote.

Barrett is expected to make her first appearance on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, meeting with McConnell, Graham and other members.

WILL THERE BE A VOTE BEFORE THE ELECTION?

Republicans are privately aiming to hold the final vote the last week of October, but acknowledge the tight timeline and say they will need to see how the hearings go. McConnell has been careful not to say when he believes the final confirmation vote will happen, other than this year.

Senate Republicans are mindful of their last confirmation fight in 2018, when Christine Blasey Fords allegations of a teenage sexual assault almost derailed Brett Kavanaughs nomination. The process took longer than expected after Republicans agreed to allow Ford to testify. Kavanaugh, who denied the allegations, was eventually confirmed in a 50-48 vote.

DOES THE SENATE HAVE ENOUGH VOTES TO MOVE FORWARD AND CONFIRM?

McConnell does appear to have the votes, for now. Republicans control the Senate by a 53-47 margin, meaning he could lose up to three Republican votes and still confirm a justice, if Vice-President Mike Pence were to break a 50-50 tie.

At this point, McConnell seems to have lost the support of two Republicans  Maine Sen. Susan Collins and Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, both of whom have said they dont think the Senate should take up the nomination before the election. Collins has said the next president should fill the court seat, and she will vote no on Trumps nominee on principle.

CAN THE DEMOCRATS STOP THE VOTE?

There isnt much they can do. Republicans are in charge and make the rules, and they appear to have the votes for Trumps nominee, at least for now. Democrats have vowed to oppose the nomination, and they are likely to use an assortment of delaying tactics. None of those efforts can stop the nomination, however.

But Democrats will also make the case against the nomination to voters as the confirmation battle stretches into the final weeks  and maybe even the final days  of the election season. They say health care protections and abortion rights are on the line, and argue the Republicans vow to move forward is hypocrisy after McConnell refused to consider President Barack Obamas nominee, Judge Merrick Garland, several months before the 2016 election.

HOW DOES THE CAMPAIGN FACTOR IN?

Republicans are defending 25 of the 38 Senate seats that are on the ballot this year, and many of their vulnerable members were eager to end the fall session and return home to campaign. The Senate was originally scheduled to recess in mid-October, when the hearings are now expected to begin.

While some senators up for reelection, like Collins, have opposed an immediate vote, others are using it to bolster their standing with conservatives. Several GOP senators in competitive races this year  including Cory Gardner in Colorado, Martha McSally in Arizona, Kelly Loeffler in Georgia and Thom Tillis in North Carolina  quickly rallied to Trump, calling for swift voting.

HOW LONG DOES IT USUALLY TAKE TO CONFIRM A SUPREME COURT JUSTICE?

Supreme Court nominations have taken around 70 days to move through the Senate, though the last, of Kavanaugh, took longer, and others have taken less time. The election is fewer than 40 days away.

COULD THE SENATE FILL THE VACANCY AFTER THE ELECTION?

Yes. Republicans could still vote on Trumps nominee in whats known as the lame-duck session that takes place after the November election and before the next Congress takes office on Jan. 3. No matter what happens in this years election, Republicans are still expected to be in charge of the Senate during that period.

The Senate would have until Jan. 20, the date of the presidential inauguration, to act on Trumps nominee. If Trump were reelected and Barrett had not been confirmed by the inauguration, he could renominate her as soon as his second term began.

DIDNT MCCONNELL SAY IN 2016 THAT THE SENATE SHOULDNT HOLD SUPREME COURT VOTES IN A PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION YEAR?

He did. McConnell stunned Washington in the hours after the death of Justice Antonin Scalia in February 2016 when he announced the Senate would not vote on Obamas potential nominee because the voters should have their say by electing the next president.

McConnells strategy paid off, royally, for his party. Obama nominated Garland to fill the seat, but he never received a hearing or a vote. Soon after his inauguration, Trump nominated Neil Gorsuch to fill Scalias seat.

SO WHAT HAS CHANGED SINCE 2016?

McConnell says its different this time because the Senate and the presidency are held by the same party, which was not the case when a vacancy opened under Obama in 2016. It was a rationale McConnell laid out during the 2016 fight, and other Republican senators have invoked it this year when supporting a vote on Trumps nominee.

Democrats say this reasoning is laughable and the vacancy should be kept open until after the inauguration.
The halls of the Hackensack Meridian Health Palisades Medical Center in North Bergen, New Jersey, do not sound the same without Nancy Martells voice echoing down the corridor  a morning staple there for 18 years.

There is now a huge void left at the hospital since Martell, a respected patient care technician, died on on July 12 after a three-month battle with Covid-19.

Nancy Martell (Courtesy Chris Martell)

She would have turned 59 on Thursday.

"Every day I go to work I'm expecting for her to come walking down the hall, said Fran Ulloa, a registered nurse who worked alongside Martell in the ICU Unit for most of those 18 years. You could hear her from the time she would get out of the elevator, so I when I knew she was there, it kind of put my smile on my face. 'Oh good, Nancy's working today.'

She would come in saying, Im here now, we can get started.'"

Martell, then Nancy Corales, got started on her journey toward that calling during her childhood in Lima, Peru.

As a young girl, according to family lore, she came upon a badly injured chicken and tried desperately, but unsuccessfully, to save it.

My grandpa told me that he told my mom that it couldnt be saved, so I guess from that point on she said she wanted to help make people better, said her son, Chris, 24, an only child.

She never took no for an answer. She was always very persistent," he said.

In Peru, Corales made good on her childhood vow, studying to become a nurse, serving as one in the Peruvian Navy, her son said. Later, she continued her studies and became an obstetrician, then wedded her husband, Jorge Martell  a marriage that lasted 24 years.

After her parents and three brothers moved to the United States in search of a better life, Martell and her own family, which now included 11-month-old Chris, followed to New Jersey in 1997. Settling in North Bergen and getting certified as a nurse's assistant, Martell started working at the hospital, then called Palisades Hospital, five years later.

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"She didn't want to do the whole process (of getting another medical degree) again from scratch," said her son. "You always have your education, but I guess the education didn't carry over to the U.S."

Martell worked long hours, sometimes arriving late to pick up her son after school, but Chris said he forgot his annoyance as soon as she arrived. "I was always proud of seeing my mother in her uniform," he said.

The work didn't stop at the hospital entrance: Martell also served as a vice president in her union, HPAE local 5030.

"Nancy was very kind. She was always looking out for everyone," said Jolee Matone, another nurse who worked alongside Martell in the ICU Unit. "She was the kind of person if you called her for a helping hand, she would be there if she knew you well or not."

"She was always smiling, always very talkative," added Matone. "She loved her son and was proud of him and always talked about him."

In December, Nancy and Jorge moved to a new home in Teaneck. And Chris, whom co-workers say she always gushed about, graduated from Montclair State University last year.

Martell also moved to the emergency room, where patient care technicians with her experience were in high demand.

Then in March, the first Covid-19 cases hit the hospital. She confided to her son that she was scared over potential exposure, but not enough to stop taking care of her patients. She caught the coronavirus herself sometime at the end of that month, her son said.

Jorge Martell also got sick helping take care of his wife, and for two weeks they were hospitalized together until he recovered. But Nancy, who had struggled with respiratory issues, just wasn't getting better. She was transferred to Hackensack University Medical Center, where she died weeks later.

Chris Martell still gets emotional over the last conversation he had with his mother, shortly before she was placed on a ventilator. He was hungry and called to ask the proper way to make pancakes. His mom, taking care of family until the end, explained when to flip them the right way.

"I told her thanks and I love you," recalls Chris, "and she said, 'I won't be able to talk for awhile because I'll be on a ventilator.'"

"In the last three weeks before her passing she wasn't getting better, she was just getting worse and worse," he added. "So, I guess I already had it my head as a logical person that she was not going to get better.

"But I guess I wasn't prepared for her to pass."

Martell's colleagues weren't either.

"Every day I'm expecting her to come through the door," said Ulloa, "then I have to remind myself she's not coming through the door."
From the moment Premier Daniel Andrews told the hotel quarantine inquiry on Friday that his health minister, Jenny Mikakos, was accountable for what had gone wrong in this botched program, her resignation was inevitable.

Andrews did not even try to defend the way it had been run or the ministers entrusted with doing so. He agreed that decision-making had been slip-shod, "disappointing" and that there had been a collective failure to take responsibility.

Health Minister Jenny Mikakos has resigned. Credit:James Ross

He also said that, even though Mikakos and her department had been in charge since shortly after the program began in March, there had been far too much concentration on its logistical aspects  security, the provision of food and rooms  and far too little on its potentially devastating health consequences.

Relatively junior health officials wrote warning after warning about this  the first on April 9, within a fortnight of the program beginning  but it was not until June, when COVID-19 had broken out of the hotels and into the suburbs, that anybody started paying attention.
A top Government adviser on Covid tests is a shareholder in the Swiss drugs firm that sold the UK millions of pointless antibody screening kits, a Mail on Sunday investigation has found.

Sir John Bell, regius professor of medicine at the University of Oxford, holds more than 773,000 worth of shares in Roche, the pharmaceutical company that made the kits.

He was also on the companys board as a non-executive director, but stood down in March.

In early May, the Government agreed to buy 13.5 million of Roches antibody tests, which the firm said were 100 per cent accurate. Sir John states he played no role in the decision.

Sir John Bell, pictured, regius professor of medicine at the University of Oxford, holds more than 773,000 worth of shares in Roche, the pharmaceutical company that made the kits. He states he had no role in the decision for Roche to purchase the antibody kits

There are two types of Covid test. Diagnostic tests tell patients if they currently have the virus, while antibody tests  like the Roche one  reveal if a person has antibody cells in their immune system that prove they had it in the past.

Following the deal, Sir John appeared on Channel 4 News and Radio 4s Today programme calling the tests a major step forward  but did not mention his links to the firm.

However, studies revealed that antibodies for Covid-19 quickly wane, and so testing for them reveals little. At the time of the Roche deal, Sir John said: If you test positive with this test, you can say for certain you have had the infection so you will have had Covid-19.

The news comes days after it emerged the UKs Chief Scientific Adviser, Sir Patrick Vallance, a former president of British drugs giant GlaxoSmithKline, still has a 600,000 shareholding in the firm which is currently involved in developing Covid vaccines. Health Secretary Matt Hancock told LBC radio that Sir Patrick, who also chairs the Governments expert panel on vaccines, abided by the rules.

After the Roche contract was signed, a Public Health England (PHE) evaluation found the tests may not be reliable, so plans to make them available to NHS and care workers were dropped.

Jon Deeks, professor of biostatistics at Birmingham University, called the tests pointless.

In early May, the Government agreed to buy 13.5 million of Roches antibody tests, which the firm said were 100 per cent accurate (pictured: file photo)

Sir John told The Mail on Sunday he disagreed with the PHE evaluation but admitted the Government has no real use for antibody tests right now. Asked if hed declared his interests in Roche to the Government, Sir John said: Of course they knew  the Department of Health has a long list of my interests.

He said that he did not sit on the advisory body involved in the decision to purchase the Roche antibody tests, adding: I did not know about the Roche contract until it was signed. I advised on [diagnostic] home-testing kits, not these ones.

While on the board of Roche, he received a salary of 260,000. He announced his decision to step down in December, but held on to his shares in the company, worth 773,000.

It emerged that the UKs Chief Scientific Adviser, Sir Patrick Vallance (pictured) a former president of British drugs giant GlaxoSmithKline, still has a 600,000 shareholding in the firm which is currently involved in developing Covid vaccines

The Oxford professor has worked as an adviser to the Department of Health and Social Care since 2017 in a variety of roles.

Under former Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt he helped explore ways the Government could work with drugs companies such as GlaxoSmithKline.

Among his numerous high profile appointments, he also sits on the board of Genomics England, a Government-funded company set up and funded by the Department of Health and Social Care to sequence 100,000 genomes from NHS patients.

Since March he has been chairman of the Governments New Test Approvals Group, which assesses virus diagnostic tests.

New coronavirus cases are hitting fewer than one in 400 people in any of the UK's top 10 virus 'hotspots', figures reveal

Experts have urged people living in virus 'hotspots' not to over-react

In Bolton, with a population of 287,000, new infections represent one in 413

The same pattern is clear in other hotspots in both the North West or North East

By Nick Craven for the Mail on Sunday

New cases of Covid-19 are hitting fewer than one in 400 people in any of the countrys top ten virus hotspots, figures reveal.

As experts urged those in virus hotspots not to over-react, the most recently available weekly figures for Bolton  which has been topping the list  show that there were 696 new cases reported.

But as the town has a population of 287,000, the new infections represent less than a quarter of one per cent  or one person in 413.

Mortality figures for Bolton in the same period  the week up to last Tuesday  show that two people died as a result of Covid, compared with 37 people from other causes.

The same pattern is clear in the other hotspots, all of them in the North West or North East, with only fourth-placed Liverpool and tenth-placed Pendle recording any Covid-related deaths, at one each. In Liverpool, 61 people died from other causes.

Liverpool also had the highest figure for new Covid cases (1,132) in the hotspot top ten, but given its much larger population, that represented only 0.227 per cent of its residents, or one in 440.

Cancer specialist Professor Karol Sikora said it was important that the public, including those living in hotspots, did not over-react.

People gather near an information board that reads 'Don't mix with other households' in Bolton town centre following the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) September 22, 2020

In Spain, currently the worst-affected country in Europe where the infection rate is higher than these hotspots in the UK, the rate is about 320 people per 100,000, which is less than a third of one per cent  a very small number.

And then of course the number of those infected who are likely to die is far smaller again, so you have to keep things in perspective.

With cancer and heart and circulatory diseases accounting for more than 335,000 deaths a year, Prof Sikora added: There are much bigger killers out there than Covid-19. If we had figures for cancer and heart disease deaths being shown on the news every day, people might see this all a little more clearly.

Those conditions need to be treated when they occur and thats really a problem, so patients will suffer more because of the delays in access to treatment which are building up because of the pandemic.

Prof Sikora argued that the return to some kind of lockdown risked losing public support for the Government policy, which he said was already faltering,

All the time I see people getting more and more fed up with the restrictions, and I imagine thats even more the case in these hotspot areas.

He added: If I were in charge of this, Id be much more liberal  Id shield those who are known to be vulnerable: the elderly and those with other underlying health problems.

Then, for the vast majority, we need to slowly liberate people, not enforce a tighter lockdown.
Rebel Wilson, 40, flaunted her incredible 18kg weight loss in a short Boomerang clip via Instagram on Sunday.

After attending an art exhibit at the Villa Paloma Monaco in Monte-Carlo with her new boyfriend Jacob Busch, 29, the Australian comedian took to Instagram with a video of herself twirling on the balcony.

Flaunting her recently slimmed-down physique, the blonde played up to the camera a form-fitting fuchsia frock with a flirty V neckline.

Looking good! Rebel Wilson, 40, flaunted her incredible 18kg weight loss in a short Boomerang clip shared to her Instagram on Sunday

With her locks styled in a bouffant bun and a sultry coat of make-up, Rebel looked every inch the Hollywood bombshell.

Rebel has been on a health and fitness journey this year, losing at least 18kg (40lbs or 2.8 stone).

Elsewhere at the art exhibition on Sunday, Rebel and Jacob met with Prince Albert of Monaco.

What a transformation! The Australian comedian offered her followers a glimpse of her stunning form-fitting V-neck fuchsia pink dress. Pictured left on Sunday, right in December 2014

Rebel posed up a storm with the 62-year-old royal when appearing at the art event for renowned Spanish painter Joan Miro.

The beauty made her red carpet debut with Jacob at a gala in Monaco this week.

While the Isn't It Romantic star and the beer heir held back on any public displays of affection, they are reportedly 'officially boyfriend and girlfriend.'

Earlier, Rebel had attended an art exhibit at the Villa Paloma Monaco in Monte-Carlo with her 29-year-old beau Jacob Busch (right)

'He's a gentleman, has very old school manners and treats her well,' a source told People of their relationship dynamics.

'He is also very health conscious and they've been motivating each other with their health journeys,' they added.

Businessman Jacob is readying the launch of his premium ice cream company called Napps.

The LA-based company has developed a dairy-free ice cream made from organic coconut cream, honey and other fine ingredients from all over the world.

Jacob's family founded the Anheuser-Busch brewery, which produces America's most popular beer, Budweiser.

Billionaire family: Jacob's family founded the Anheuser-Busch brewery, which produces America's most popular beer, Budweiser. While it's unclear how much of that will be inherited by Jabob [left], his current personal net worth has been estimated at US$100million

In 2016, Forbes listed the Busch family as the 16th richest in America, with a fortune of US$13.4billion.

While it's unclear how much of that will be inherited by Jabob, his current personal net worth has been estimated at US$100million.

At one point, the family even owned their own elephant named Budweiser.

In 2017, the young entrepreneur launched his own beer called Sons Beer with best friends Carlo Mondavi and Elliott Taylor.

Despite branching out on his own, Jacob is still very much involved with his family's charity, the Busch Family Foundation, which benefits the Busch Wildlife Sanctuary, the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation and The Boys and Girls Club.

Jacob and Rebel's 11-year age gap shouldn't be a problem for the 29-year-old, who previously dated Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star Adrienne Maloof, 59.
" " Anti-coup protesters hold banners and raise three-fingered salutes April 3, 2021, in Yangon, Myanmar. Myanmar's military junta continued its brutal crackdown on a nationwide civil disobedience movement. Local media and monitoring organizations estimate that more than 600 people have been killed since the coup began in February. Getty Images/Getty Images

On Feb. 1, 2021, the Myanmar military seized control of the country's government, ousting democratically elected civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi. The event sparked widespread resistance from the pro-democracy electorate, many of whom took to the streets to march in peaceful protest. They were met with violence from the military regime. To date, more than 600 people  including women and children  have been killed.

Political turmoil like what's happening in Myanmar is not new. But what occurred at a QAnon-affiliated event May 31, 2021  Memorial Day  was. At the For God & Country Patriot Roundup conference in Dallas, former national security adviser Michael Flynn suggested a coup "should happen" in the U.S. when responding to a question from an audience member who asked "why what happened in Myanmar can't happen here."

A former U.S. national security adviser implying the U.S. military should overthrow the government shocked and concerned many, including Republican Representative Liz Cheney who condemned Flynn's comments on Twitter.

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A Blow to the State

The French phrase "coup d'etat" literally translates to "blow of state" in English, likening forced political seizure to a physical strike against the government. It didn't enter the English lexicon until the late 1700s, coinciding with several major political upheavals in France.

Coups d'etat differ from other forms of civil unrest  like war, rioting and revolution  in several ways. "Unlike civil wars, coups usually take place on one day," Brian Klaas, an associate professor of global politics at University College London and host of the Power Corrupts podcast, says in an email exchange.

He also points out that unlike revolutions, which tend to have broad majority support, coups are usually spearheaded by a small group seeking political power. Finally, they also tend to focus on an executive power, such as a president or a prime minister, rather than the entire governmental apparatus.

When most people think of a coup d'etat they picture a violent military uprising: something like Chile's bloody overthrow of President Salvador Allende in 1973 or the 2012 revolt that cost an untold number of lives in Mali. And although the majority of these events do skew toward violence, not all coups involve bloodshed. Napoleon's 1799 capture of Paris, for instance, reportedly went off without a single death.

Let's examine some of the conditions under which coups d'etat occur.

" " Armed guards watch out for attackers as Chilean President Salvador Allende leaves the Moneda Presidential Palace during the military coup in which he was eventually overthrown and killed in 1973. Photo by Luis Orlando Lagos Vazquez/Keystone/Getty Images

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What Brews a Coup?

So what leads to a coup? "If I'm being honest, it's very idiosyncratic from country to country," says Scott Anderson, a senior fellow with the National Security Law Program at Columbia Law School.

Klaas agrees. "The drivers of a coup in a place like Madagascar are very different from those in Thailand, for example," he says, even though both countries are coup hotspots. But, he says, the general rule of thumb is that "political chaos and dysfunction make coups more likely."

The best coup predictor for any given country is whether that country has a history of them.

After gaining independence from Britain, Myanmar enjoyed 14 years of democracy before its first military coup in 1962. A procession of military juntas followed until 2011, when the country transitioned back to a representative quasi-democracy. However, the military, evidently dissatisfied with the most recent election results, snatched power back earlier this year.

Another predictor is a country's economic status. Generally, poorer countries tend to have more political unrest, which can lead a small, radicalized group to seek power. Four of the current top five most impoverished countries in the world by gross domestic product (Burundi, South Sudan, the Central African Republic and Malawi) have all experienced coup d'etat attempts in the last decade.

But it would be erroneous to assume that only poor nations are susceptible. After all, one of history's most famous attempted coups, the assassination of Julius Caesar, occurred near the height of the Roman Empire's power.

Deep political polarization can also precipitate a coup, especially if one group feels that their interests are being excluded in the election process.

" " One way experts say the U.S. is designed to be "coup-proof" is because of the military chain of command. There are checks in place if corruption enters the hierarchy. U.S. Department of Defense

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Divided We Fall

So, with that in mind, could a coup d'etat happen in the U.S.? Experts say it's improbable, though not impossible.

Coups rarely happen in what political scientists have termed "consolidated democracies," where democratic institutions are deeply and firmly entrenched. "The United States is a consolidated, albeit severely flawed, democracy," Klaas says.

Anderson says three major factors contribute to the United States' "coup-proofing." The first is an independent court system. By and large, U.S. courts are non-partisan and beholden to judge, jury and legal precedent rather than a particular political party. This holds true even for Supreme Court justices, who may be appointed directly by a sitting president.

Second is military chain of command. The president holds the highest rank in the military; as Commander in Chief, every general answers to them. And as an institution, respect for authority in the military runs deep.

But if corruption enters the hierarchy, there are still checks in place. Soldiers have the right to refuse orders that strike them as "palpably illegal." Furthermore, U.S. military personnel are not a completely homogenized group.

As of 2021, people of any gender, racial background, sexual orientation or political persuasion can  and are encouraged to  serve. Together, these (theoretically) ensure that one political actor or party does not achieve an unbreakable stranglehold over military power.

Finally, there's the sheer byzantine sprawl of the United States government. "We have a highly decentralized system," Anderson says, "it's actually fairly difficult to hijack the system, because you would need to hijack lots and lots of parts."

Some political scholars have argued that the 25th Amendment, which allows a sitting vice president to take over for a president who is deemed "unfit for office," could amount to a non-military coup under the right circumstances. Other individuals have argued on Facebook that the Insurrection Act of 1807 somehow provides a legal loophole that would authorize the former president to command the military  a claim that Anderson calls "complete nonsense."

But democracy needs to stay vigilant. Once the idea is in the air, a coup becomes marginally more possible, feeding the fears and false beliefs of a small group of extremists. That's why, as Klaas says, "Flynn's statement was extraordinarily dangerous."

Now That's Wild In November 1987, a "medical coup d'etat" was carried out in Tunisia by seven doctors who snuck into 84-year-old president Habib Bourguiba's room in the dead of night to declare him incapacitated.

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Originally Published: Sep 21, 2006
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TROY  It is often a mistake to assess a verdict from a distance. If you're not sitting in the courtroom for the day-by-day of a trial, it is difficult to evaluate whether the evidence warranted a conviction.

So I'll resist the temptation to decry the acquittal of former Rensselaer County District Attorney Joel Abelove on perjury and official misconduct charges related to the police shooting of Edson Thevenin four years ago. I didn't attend the trial. I didn't hear what the judge who exonerated Abelove heard.

But I'll note that most everything about the handling of the shooting stinks to high heaven. It is evidence not only of a broken system, but of widespread rot.

It stinks, for example, that Abelove rushed the case to a grand jury just FIVE DAYS after the killing and granted the patrol sergeant who shot the Black DWI suspect immunity for his testimony. The decision meant Abelove couldn't have prosecuted Sgt. Randall French no matter what the grand jury decided.

It stinks that the grand jury was not shown photos of the bullet holes in Thevenin's windshield, which revealed the central claim of the shooting false. If French's life was endangered because Thevenin had pinned him with the car, as Troy police contended, the entry points of the gunshots could not have varied so widely. A forensic analysis would later show French was in motion.

It likewise stinks that, as a detailed report from former Attorney General Eric Schneiderman later found, officers on the scene ignored evidence and "grossly mishandled" witnesses who contradicted what quickly became the official narrative. "Get the f*** out of here," witnesses were told.

It stinks that Abelove was acquitted by the very judge, Jonathan Nichols of Columbia County, who dismissed the same charges two years ago because he believed the attorney general's office was overstepping its jurisdiction  a decision unanimously reversed on appeal, allowing the case against Abelove to continue.

If you were a defendant, wouldn't it be nice to know your judge viewed the charges against you so skeptically? Wouldn't that lead you to conclude, as Abelove did, that you'd be better off putting the judge in charge of the verdict instead of a jury?

It stinks that Mayor Patrick Madden participated in this dishonesty from the start. Even now, Madden refuses to release findings by an outside investigator apparently hired by the city to contradict Schneiderman's report and the police department's own internal investigation, which was damning.

It stinks that voters ignored Madden's disqualifying conduct and reelected the Democrat anyway.

And yes, it is beyond inexcusable that Thevenin fled a traffic stop at 3 a.m. on a Sunday morning, leading officers on a chase that ended in a crash. That decision put this whole sordid mess into motion.

We can believe Thevenin didn't deserve to die for that decision. But we can't really know whether French feared for his life when he fired eight times at the DWI suspect. While most of us slept in comfort that April morning, Thevenin forced the officer into making an impossibly difficult split-second decision.

Maybe Abelove was right to believe the patrol sergeant deserved the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he was right that the evidence didn't support criminal charges against French, who recently died of COVID-19. On that point, the Schneiderman report later concurred.

Special Investigation 147 NY dams are 'unsound,' potentially dangerous Thousands of dams have not been inspected in over 20 years.

But Abelove should have been presented his decision to the public after a thorough investigation and with a full and honest accounting of the facts. We deserved that. The truth is what the public always deserves.

Instead, we were fed a rushed investigation and a hurried exoneration based on an obvious falsehood that nobody contradicted  not former Chief James Tedesco, who immediately and forcefully declared the shooting warranted; not Madden, who bathes his cowardice in legalese; and certainly not Abelove, who wants us to believe he's been victimized.

"This was a political hit job from the start," the Republican Abelove, in private practice since losing a 2018 reelection bid, said Friday on WGDJ radio. "When they saw an opportunity to try to take me out, they took it."

I've used this space to call out bald political bias in the attorney general's office, including Letitia James' attempt to shutter the NRA. But Abelove's self-important grandiosity strikes me as laughable.

We're to believe Schneiderman and James care so much about the DA's office in a small, upstate county that they lusted to take down the mighty Abelove? With all due respect, he was never that important.

The trial is over now. Abelove's acquittal means he can move on with his life. I wish him no ill will.

But this isn't over for Troy, which faces a civil lawsuit filed by Thevenin's family. This ugly tragedy waits for a resolution. The stench lingers.

cchurchill@timesunion.com  518-454-5442  @chris_churchill
Oh, the hoopla when Democrat presidential Joe Biden chose Kamala Harris to be his running mate. The identity crowd swooned over Joe's perfect trifecta: black, Asian, and female. But wait: there's an authenticity problem lurking here.

When one thinks of a victimized black American, one thinks of slavery, chains, lynchings, segregation, "Deep South," ghettos, gangs, drugs, and generations on welfare in dangerous inner-city ghettos, without a hand up or a way out.

Elvis captures the bleak picture of the stereotypical black victim well. If it fits, the Democrats did it. They did it with a welfare system that broke up the theretofore strong black nuclear home. Instead of a chicken in every pot, perhaps, there was a black loving husband and dad in 70% of intact family homes. They did it with a system of welfare that paid more for every child born, as long as there was no man in the household. And they did it with a conglomeration of welfare benefits that gave the broken home the equivalent of more tax-free dollars in assistance than any recipient could dream of earning with attendant tax and Social Security deductions.

Only a short time ago, the city of Philadelphia admitted just this fact. The average welfare recipient with kids, and no attendant dad, receives from the city the equivalent of $60,000.00 free, and tax-free!

Kamala's father simply doesn't fit Joe's black American stereotype, simply because he is black. He is an educated man from the island of Jamaica, who immigrated to the United States for doctoral studies in economics and taught at the University of Chicago, Northwestern, and Stanford. Not too shabby, and definitely not a poster boy for black victimhood.

As for the Asian half of the pedigree, what's the issue? Kamala's mother is equally well educated. She immigrated to the United States, from India, member of an esteemed caste, with a BS she earned at the age of nineteen and a subsequent doctorate earned in California. She is known for her cancer research. Moreover, Indians, from India, are the most successful immigrant group in the United States.

Admittedly, Kamala's parents broke up in her childhood, but with her mom's pedigree and education, hers was not a deprived upbringing.

Regarding Kamala being a female, ho-hum. That battle has been waged and won.

More interesting and novel to the political scene is the box Kamala and Joe have deliberately left unchecked. That box is Kamala's Jewish husband and his Jewish kids from a prior marriage. Yes, Jews refuse to play the victim, though through their agonizing history of persecution, ridicule, banning, and decimation, they would certainly be entitled to their own branch of the victim bush. Still, they refuse to accept a victim status.

But, heretofore, politicos have proudly proclaimed Jewish blood, tenuous though it might have been, akin to Elizabeth Warren's indigenous blood ties.

But decidedly not now. The Democrat party has eschewed all things sniffing of religion, especially all things Jewish. Sarah Stern, Founder of EMET (and a contributor to American Thinker), has just published an in-depth results of a survey that proves the lamentable results of our anti-Semitic educational system: "Systemic Anti-Semitism Taking Root in Our Students' Minds," September 24, 2020.

To this day, the boxes Joe and Kamala have checked are bogus, and the only true one remains unchecked.

Image: Gage Skidmore via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0.
Kolkata, Sep 26 : On the 200th birth anniversary of late Bengali educationist and social reformer Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Saturday recalled the incident when his bust was desecrated during a political rally by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in 2019.

"His bust was unfortunately desecrated in 2019 by certain outsiders, which only shows their disregard for Bengal's legacy," the CM tweeted.

Banerjee said that Vidyasagar truly represented the pride of Bengal and serves as an inspiration for the people of Bengal till now. "His teachings are deeply inculcated in our values... He was a pioneer for Bangla language and drafted primer Barnaparichay. Also known as 'Dayar Sagar', he fought for widow remarriage, banning child marriage & polygamy," she said.

Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar's bust was desecrated in a college during BJP president Amit Shah's mega rally in Kolkata on May 15 last year. The state's ruling Trinamool Congress and BJP activists indulged in a pitched battle in Bidhan Sarani vandalising the bust and the property of the century-old Vidyasagar hostel on College Street.

Videos released by the Trinamool Congress after the incident had shown a group of men purportedly trying to break down the gate of the Vidyasagar College and enter the campus by jumping over its walls.

Meanwhile, West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar also paid tribute to the legendary philanthropist on his 200th birth anniversary.

"He was one of the greatest reformers of all times. His contributions to the upliftment and betterment of the society is immense," Dhankhar said.
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Linkedin Simon Johnson (Reuters) Stockholm  Sat, September 26, 2020 18:31 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c476fb9f 2 Art & Culture Nobel-Prize Free

The winners of this year's Nobel Prizes will miss out on a swanky gala in Stockholm surrounded by royalty and Sweden's glitterati, but 2020 will at least not be added to the war years when no awards were given.

Yet as the coronavirus pandemic rapidly enveloped much of the world earlier this year, that was far from certain.

"When we were thinking about this in March and April this year, we were worried that it wouldn't be possible to award any prizes at all," Lars Heikensten, head of the Nobel Foundation that administers the prizes founded by dynamite inventor Alfred Nobel, told Reuters.

While Sweden has not imposed a rigid lockdown like many European countries, Heikensten said the committees that decide the various prizes had to switch to working digitally to make the selection process work.

But the foundation was determined that the awards - worth 10 million Swedish crowns ($1.1 million) this year - go ahead.

"We thought it was particularly important in a year like this, when the importance of science is so obvious," Heikensten said.

The awards were cancelled during parts of World War One and World War Two. Some prizes have not been given in individual years, with the most recent example being the postponement of the Literature prize in 2018 over a sex scandal.

The awards attract huge attention every year, shining a light, if only briefly, on scientists who work mostly in academic obscurity, while burnishing the reputations of often better-known authors who receive the Literature award.

But the COVID-19 pandemic, which has claimed almost a million lives globally, has meant that the Nobels will have a lower profile this year with many of the traditional celebrations postponed or re-jigged as digital events.

The foundation has cancelled the banquet, highlight of the celebrations that takes place every December, and the traditional prize-giving ceremony in Stockholm's Concert Hall will be replaced by a televised event where winners receive their prizes in their home nations.

Read also: Nobel winners to get $110,000 raise as prize money increased

This year's first prize - for Physiology or Medicine - will be announced on Oct. 5. Heikensten said if restrictions allowed by the end of next year, the 2020 winners would be invited to celebrate alongside the 2021 laureates.

"The traditional celebrations are important and part of what we are, but they are not the most important thing, which is the prize winners and what they embody," he said.
The Mumbai Police on Saturday warned media vehicles against pursuing vehicles of celebs who are being summoned for the drugs probe by the Narcotics Control Bureau. In a stern statement, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Zone I) Sangram Singh Nishandar said that today (Sep. 26), the police observed several media vehicles chasing" people called for the NCB inquiry.

This afternoon, we saw some mediapersons chasing the vehicles from the rear, front, sides, getting off their vehicles, posing great risk to themselves, the people in the vehicles and also the common persons. We will not tolerate this anymore," said Nishandar.

Today we have observed a lot of media vehicles chasing people who were called for the inquiry. The vehicles will be seized because they are endangering their lives as well as lives of whoever was called & common people: Sangram Singh Nishandar, DCP Zone 1, Mumbai Police. pic.twitter.com/1q69kPrrgc ANI (@ANI) September 26, 2020

He warned the media against chasing any vehicles henceforth but if anyone was found violating it, he threatened to seize the vehicles and take action against the drivers of those vehicles.

In the past couple of months, since the probe into the death case of the Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput, there have been many such road chases by some media-vehicles.

They included celebs like Rhea Chakraborty, Deepika Padukone, Sara Ali Khan, Shraddha Kapoor and several others called in connection with the drug angle probe into the Sushant case.

Hot-tempered arguments and even scuffles have been witnessed among the media fraternity as all vie to get their bytes, shots or videos of the celebs, often their family members or even lawyers.
Mr. Trump and his Senate allies argue for extreme haste to ensure that a possible election loss does not affect their project to force a new ideological balance on the court. But its worse than that. The president himself has said he is counting on Judge Barretts hurried confirmation so that she can rule on what he appears to believe are the inevitable election disputes he will bring before the court. He has spoken in recent days about getting rid of the ballots and enlisting the court in stopping the Democrats voting scam, arguing that he needs a ninth justice of his choosing to ensure the court rules his way. Imagine the turmoil that would cause: A court hastily stacked with Trump nominees hands reelection to the president, based to a degree on his view that some Americans ballots should not count.
By Trend

As many as 3,204 people have been infected with the coronavirus (COVID-19) in the past 24 hours in Iran, said Sima Sadat Lari, spokesperson for Iran's Ministry of Health and Medical Education, Trend reports citing the ministry.

According to Sadat Lari, 172 more people have died from the coronavirus over the past day.

Sadat Lari added that the condition of 4,041 people is critical.

The official said that Iran's Tehran, Isfahan, Qom, East Azerbaijan, South Khorasan, Semnan, Qazvin, Lorestan, Ardabil, Khuzestan, Kermanshah, Gilan, Bushehr, Zanjan, Ilam, Razavi Khorasan, Mazandaran, Alborz, West Azerbaijan, Markazi, Kerman, North Khorasan, Hamadan, and Yazd provinces are considered 'red' zones.

So far, more than 3.9 million tests have been conducted in Iran for the diagnosis of coronavirus.

Iran continues to monitor the coronavirus situation in the country. According to recent reports from the Iranian officials, over 443,000 people have been infected, and 25,394 people have already died. Meanwhile, over 372,000 have reportedly recovered from the disease.

The country continues to apply strict measures to contain further spread. Reportedly, the disease was brought to Iran by a businessman from Iran's Qom city, who went on a business trip to China, despite official warnings. The man died later from the disease.

The Islamic Republic only announced its first infections and deaths from the coronavirus on Feb. 19.

The outbreak in the Chinese city of Wuhan - which is an international transport hub - began at a fish market in late December 2019.

The World Health Organization (WHO) on March 11 declared COVID-19 a pandemic. Some sources claim the coronavirus outbreak started as early as November 2019.

---

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
A progressive evangelical group on Saturday called on evangelicals and white Catholics to square their faith at the ballot box and vote against President Donald Trump.

Many have been told that if they are Christian, they have to vote for Republicans but we know that their faith calls them to something more than that, said Doug Pagitt, executive director of Vote Common Good. We say to faith, hope and love, and in this election for many that means they cant support this president any longer. That they have to vote for someone different. For a lot of them it means voting for Joe Biden and for some it will mean that they just cant vote for this president like they did in 2016.

The group held a rally on the Capitol steps just hours before the president was due to appear at a campaign rally at Harrisburg International Airport. The group is holding several rallies across Pennsylvania this weekend as part of a broader push to urge voters of faith in key swing states to abandon support for Trump.

Vote Common Good recently commissioned a poll, which found that Trumps perceived lack of kindness is driving faith voters away. National polls have shown that while the evangelical support for Trump has slipped just slightly, the overwhelming majority of evangelicals continue to support the president.

Several other progressive groups also staged anti-Trump rallies in Harrisburg ahead of Trumps visit.

Hal Ginsberg, of the progressive group Our Revolution, said midday shoppers at Broad Street Market showed support for the groups message. About 15 members gathered outside the market, with posters and placards, drawing waves and honks from passersby.

People seem to respond in Pennsylvania to the message that Trump has lied to workers, Ginsberg said. He made promises that he would bring jobs back and he would bring more jobs from off shore. Weve seen just the opposite.

Calling himself an unapologetic follower of Jesus, Drew Hart, a professor of theology at Messiah College, said truth and justice had been severely eroded over the past four years among people of faith.

Jesuss name has been deeply vandalized in the public square, he said. Hart said he loved Jesus too much to turn him over to people who had co-opted him for their own power and domination.

State Senate candidate George Scott, a Lutheran minister, also addressed the small crowd on the steps of the Capitol on Saturday.

Scott, the Democratic challenger in the race for the 15th Senatorial District, invoked the words of the late Congressman John Lewis, affirming that his politics are 100% an extension of his faith.

What my faith teaches me is to love God and my neighbor, he said. We are not doing a good job on that second part.

More from PennLive

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Joe Biden faults President Trumps coronavirus response ahead of HIA rally

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Rio Rancho Public Schools sent out a notice Tuesday that an employee or a child at Sandia Vista Elementary School tested positive for COVID-19.

RRPS properly notified the New Mexico Public Education Department and New Mexicos Department of Health because of the positive test, which came in the districts second week with hybrid students back in the classrooms, after zero positive tests in the first week.

Fourteen students from the fourth-grade classroom affected, plus four SVE staff members, were quarantined.

The next day, Sept. 23, a third-grader at Puesta del Sol Elementary tested positive, resulting in 14 third-graders and two staff members being quarantined.

Superintendent Sue Cleveland sent out an email early last week, noting about the SVE case: Per guidance from both NMPED and NMDOH, we are required to investigate to see who had close contact with the staff member or student who tested positive for COVID-19. A close contact is defined as being closer than 6 feet for more than three minutes to a person who is positive for COVID-19, and all staff and students who were in the same classroom as the infected individual.

According to NMPED and NMDOH, all staff who were in close contact with the infected individual must be tested seven to 10 days after close contact exposure to the positive COVID-19 individual. All students who were close contacts are strongly encouraged to be tested. Both staff and student close contacts must self-quarantine at home for 14 days, regardless of the test result.

Those deemed to be a close contact were notified via telephone of their status and provided with instructions. Areas of the school, plus buses, in which the COVID-19 positive individual spent time will be disinfected.

Parents were urged to keep an eye on their students.

If you or your child begin to develop symptoms of COVID-19, which are fever, chills, cough, shortness of breath or difficulty breathing, fatigue, muscle or body aches, headache, new loss of smell or taste, sore throat, congestion or runny nose, nausea or vomiting, diarrhea, call the COVID-19 Hotline at 1-855-600-3453, then press 8, the letter said. Should you experience symptoms of COVID-19, it is important that you call the New Mexico Department of Health facility in Sandoval County to schedule an appointment for testing at 867-2291.

In addition, we ask that you notify your childs school.

RRPS is only sending notification of a positive COVID-19 case to parents, guardians and staff at the impacted school.

For the districts Cases & Quarantines Status Updates, visit rrps.net/schoolreentryupdates/c_o_v_i_d_Case_Status.
(Natural News) There has never been an administration that has taken such an aggressive stand against Democrat-run cities that are lawless cauldrons and incubators of violence like the Trump administration, as his Justice Department proved once again this week.

In a move that infuriated leftist mayors, Attorney General William Barr and the DoJ singled out three cities  New York City, Portland, Ore., and Seattle, Wash.  as anarchist jurisdictions, warning that the leaders of those cities are putting their citizens lives in danger on a daily basis.

He also threatened, no doubt at President Donald Trumps direction, the cities with a loss of federal tax dollars because the administration does not want to spend money in cities where leaders refuse to provide citizens with the protection they deserve.

When state and local leaders impede their own law enforcement officers and agencies from doing their jobs, it endangers innocent citizens who deserve to be protected, including those who are trying to peacefully assemble and protest, Barr said in the release. We cannot allow federal tax dollars to be wasted when the safety of the citizenry hangs in the balance.

It is my hope that the cities identified by the Department of Justice today will reverse course and become serious about performing the basic function of government and start protecting their own citizens, Barr continued, according to a report that was leaked to the New York Post.

In a five-page memo sent to various federal agencies Sept. 2, President Trump instructed Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought to issue guidance within a month to the heads of agencies on restricting the eligibility of or otherwise disfavoring, to the maximum extent permitted by law, anarchist jurisdictions in the receipt of federal grants.

The same day, Trump tweeted his Administration will do everything in its power to prevent weak mayors and lawless cities from taking Federal dollars while they let anarchists harm people, burn buildings, and ruin lives and businesses.

My Administration will do everything in its power to prevent weak mayors and lawless cities from taking Federal dollars while they let anarchists harm people, burn buildings, and ruin lives and businesses. Were putting them on notice today. @RussVought45  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 3, 2020

Vought told the Post earlier in September American taxpayers who fund the great programs that our cities rely on deserve to be protected by their local city officials. He noted further that the administration was exploring all options to ensure federal resources flowing to lawless cities arent being squandered.

The lack of law and order surrounding these riots, and response from local leadership, is a dereliction of duty. Our men and women in blue cannot be handcuffed by local leadership in their efforts to respond to riots and protect their fellow citizens, he said.

The Marxists and enablers of BLM violence were furious.

The President is playing cheap political games with Congressionally directed funds, Mayors Bill de Blasio of New York, Ted Wheeler of Portland, and Jenny Durkan of Seattle wrote in a joint statement. Our cities are bringing communities together; our cities are pushing forward after fighting back a pandemic and facing the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, all despite recklessness and partisanship from the White House. (Related: Seditious AOC tells Americans to take to the streets, radicalize and fight as Trump, GOP Senate consider Ginsburgs successor.)

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo claimed that the administration lacks the legal and constitutional authority to make good on its threat (as though no one in the White House researched this ahead of time).

Is it going to happen? No, because its illegal and its unconstitutional, he complained (while never once pushing back against Barack Obamas highly unconstitutional Obamacare mandate and his DACA program). If they actually do this, we will challenge it legally, and he will lose again.

NYC law department chief Jim Johnson claimed as well: The president does not have the authority to change the will of Congress.

Right. Tell that to Obama.

Meantime, the president is telling voters in as strong terms as possible ahead of the Nov. 3 election that he is the law and order president, not Joe Bidens Marxist Party.

Sources include:

ZeroHedge.com

NYPost.com

NaturalNews.com
Several men, including the boat operator, went over the side, hoping to swim for help. The boat operator has not been seen since, and it remains unclear whether he was aware of the smugglers plans. Lisheen swam and floated for days, stung by jellyfish, bitten by unknown sea creatures. On two occasions, he said, he tried to let himself sink to oblivion, only to find himself floating again.
WASHINGTON - Attorney General William Barr personally told President Donald Trump this week about an investigation into nine discarded mail ballots in northeastern Pennsylvania that the president later touted as evidence of widespread election fraud, according to a person familiar with the conversation, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe internal administration discussions.

The conversation came as Trump has fixated on the subject of voter fraud with aides, administration officials said, asking for information on the topic and updates from his campaign advisers and legal team about voting lawsuits. He has repeatedly lambasted voting by mail as susceptible to widespread fraud, despite evidence to the contrary.

The Justice Department made a public announcement about the Pennsylvania case Thursday after the president discussed it in a radio interview. The statement drew sharp criticism from voting-law experts, who questioned the timing and the details released, such as the fact that most of the ballots were cast for Trump.

Barr himself has echoed the president's attacks on mail voting and leveled unsubstantiated assertions about the risks of mail ballots. He has suggested without evidence that foreign governments could easily inject counterfeit ballots into the system or that postal workers delivering ballots are susceptible to bribery.

Since the Watergate era, attorneys general have notified presidents about criminal cases of national importance, while trying to avoid discussions that would involve the administration in specific investigations, particularly those involving political figures. ABC first reported Barr's conversation with Trump about the Pennsylvania case.

A Justice Department spokeswoman declined to comment. A senior White House official said Trump was not "briefed" on the Pennsylvania case, but did not respond to a request for comment on whether the subject came up in a discussion with Barr.

At issue are nine ballots that officials said were found in an election office trash can on Sept. 16 in Luzerne County, Pa., in the northeastern corner of the state. Luzerne County Manager David Pedri said in an interview Friday that the ballots were discarded by an independent contractor who has since been fired. All nine were military ballots mailed in from overseas, he said.

Pedri said the county elections director discovered the ballots in an office trash can and "immediately began an internal inquiry."

Pedri also said he and other local officials were not aware that seven of the nine ballots had been cast for Trump until the statement Thursday by the U.S. attorney's office released that information.

Trump's touting of the case and his request that aides inform him of potential irregularities alarmed election lawyers and voting-rights advocates, who emphasized that small mistakes happen every election year and do not prove the existence of widespread fraud.

"There's a big difference between what happened in Luzerne County and systemic fraud that says you can't trust the result of the election," said Ben Ginsberg, a longtime election lawyer for Republicans.

Ginsberg said the Luzerne irregularities "absolutely" warrant investigation, but he also said officials need to distinguish between willful fraud and a simple mistake.

Trump first made an allusion to the Pennsylvania investigation Thursday in an appearance on Fox News Radio's "The Brian Kilmeade Show" when asked about his refusal to commit to a peaceful transfer of power if he loses the election.

"I think we have a long way before we get there," the president responded. "These ballots are a horror show. They found six ballots in an office yesterday in a garbage can. They were Trump ballots - eight ballots in an office yesterday in - but in a certain state and they were - they had Trump written on it, and they were thrown in a garbage can."

White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany then told reporters that there would be an announcement about the case. "I can confirm for you that Trump ballots, ballots for the president, were found in Pennsylvania and I believe you should be getting more information on that shortly," she said.

David Freed, the U.S. attorney in the Middle District of Pennsylvania, subsequently released a statement saying his office was investigating the discarded ballots, initially saying that all nine had been cast for Trump. He later clarified that seven of the ballots had been cast for the president and two were found sealed.

A spokesperson for the U.S. attorney declined to comment beyond Freed's written statement or explain why he revealed for whom the votes had been cast.

Trump's campaign pounced on the announcement. "Democrats are trying to steal the election," one campaign spokesman wrote in a tweet, which went viral before he later deleted it.

The president also cited the case again in comments to reporters at the White House, saying, "We want to make sure that the election is honest, and I'm not sure that it can be."

Two White House officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe internal discussions said the White House decided to announce the investigation after Trump mentioned on the air and reporters began making inquiries.

Clifford Levine, a Democratic election lawyer from Pittsburgh, noted that Luzerne County voted for Trump by a 20-point margin in 2016, and county government is controlled by Republicans.

"It is the position of the Democratic Party that every legitimate vote should count, and we would not be satisfied if in fact a couple of votes were somehow inadvertently set aside. That would be inappropriate," he said. "But there is no evidence of fraud or conspiracy."

In a statement, Luzerne County said the contractor began work at the elections bureau on Sept. 14 and was assigned to sort mail. The discarded ballots were discovered two days later by the elections bureau director and the contractor was removed, the county said.

"While the actions of this individual has cast a concern, the above statement shows that the system of checks and balances set forth in Pennsylvania elections works," the statement said. "An error was made, a public servant discovered it and reported it to law enforcement."

Pedri, the Luzerne County manager, said the matter was referred to the local prosecutor, who in turn called in the U.S. attorney. The FBI, state police and local prosecutors inspected all trash from the elections office for the three days the contractor was on the job.

Pedri declined to say why the contractor discarded the ballots or whether any further irregularities had been discovered beyond the nine ballots.

In a letter to the Luzerne County election office released Thursday night, Freed also said investigators recovered four "official, bar-coded, absentee ballot envelopes that were empty." Those materials were discovered in an outside dumpster, he said.

"It was explained to investigators the envelopes used for official overseas, military, absentee and mail-in ballot requests are so similar, that the staff believed that adhering to the protocol of preserving envelopes unopened would cause them to miss such ballot requests," Freed wrote. "Our interviews further revealed that this issue was a problem in the primary election - therefore a known issue - and that the problem has not been corrected."

Asked if he was surprised that the investigation drew national attention, Pedri, the county manager, said: "Nothing surprises me anymore."

"Obviously the investigation will uncover if there is any sort of a larger problem, and we're happy to assist," he said. "We are cooperating with that investigation. We are the ones who initiated it."

Completed absentee ballots have only just begun to trickle into Pennsylvania counties; according to data provided by the Department of State, fewer than 900 mailed ballots have been returned out of nearly 2 million requests processed so far.

- - -

The Washington Post's Alice Crites contributed to this report.
BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept.26

By Nargiz Sadikhova - Trend:

The value of trade turnover between Kazakhstan and Greece amounted to $865.08 million over the first seven months of 2020, compared to $822.09 million during the same period of 2019, Trend reports with reference to Kazakhstans Statistics Committee.

The share of Greece in the total value of Kazakhstans trade turnover stood at 1.8 percent during the reporting period compared to 1.5 percent during the same period of 2019.

Kazakhstans export to Greece amounted to $853.09 million over the period from January through July 2020, compared to $812.1 million during the same period of 2019

Greeces share in the total volume of Kazakhstans export amounted to 3 percent during the reporting period of 2020 compared to 2.5 percent during the same period of 2019.

In turn, Kazakhstans imports from Greece amounted to nearly $11.9 million over the reporting period, compared to $9.8 million during the same period of 2019.

Greeces share in the total volume of Kazakhstans import amounted to 0.1 percent during the reporting period of 2020 compared to 0.04 percent during the same period of 2019.

The total volume of Kazakhstans trade turnover amounted to $48.7 billion over the period from Jan. through July 2020 which indicates a decrease from $54.5 billion during the same period of 2019.

Kazakhstans export amounted to $28.6 billion during the reporting period of 2020 ($33.03 billion in the same period of 2019), whereas imports amounted to $20.1 billion ($21.5 billion in 2019).

During the reporting period, main articles of Kazakhstan and Greece trade turnover were food products, agricultural products, as well as products of the chemical industry.

---

Follow the author on twitter: @nargiz_sadikh
Did NCP chief Sharad Pawar had secret meeting with Amit Shah, Fadnavis? Here's the truth

Mamata, Pawar want to keep Congress at bay: Devendra Fadnavis

Fadnavis, Sanjay Raut meet at luxury hotel; not political, says BJP

India

oi-Deepika S

Mumbai, Sep 26: Former Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis and Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut met here on Saturday, prompting speculation in political circles, while the BJP denied their discussion had any political aspect.

Raut, whose strident anti-BJP posture over power sharing formula after last year''s state Assembly polls was daily fodder for TV channels, met Fadnavis at a luxury hotel in the western suburbs.

Maharashtra BJP chief spokesperson Keshav Upadhye said there was no political angle to the meeting.

"Raut wanted to interview Fadnavis for (the Sena mouthpiece) Saamana and this meeting was to discuss how to go about it," he tweeted.

"Fadnavis informed Raut that he would grant him the interview after returning from the Bihar poll campaign," Upadhye said.

Thackeray slams, Fadnavis defends as political war breaks out over Kangana Ranaut

He said there are no "political connotations" to the meeting between Fadnavis, now the Opposition leader in the Assembly, and Raut, who is the editorial mainstay of Saamana.

Raut said, "Is it a crime to meet Fadnavis, who is a former chief minister and now the Opposition leader in the state Assembly?

"When I interviewed Sharad Pawar, I had announced that I have planned interviews with Fadnavis, Rahul Gandhi and Amit Shah," Raut told PTI, adding meeting leaders from other parties is not a crime in politics.

Shiv Sena and BJP, which contested the 2019 state Assembly elections as allies, fell out over power sharing formula, with the Uddhav Thackeray-led party said it was not ready to accept "less than what was agreed" with the BJP.

The Sena formed the government in November last year with the NCP and Congress as the new alliance partners.

The two-hour-long meeting between Fadnavis and Raut was the first one between leaders of both the parties after the acrimonious post-poll break-up after last year.

Leader of Opposition in the Legislative Council Pravin Darekarsaid Fadnavis and Raut met to discuss the interview.

"Raut had sought Fadnavis'' appointment for an interview for Saamana. Fadnavis wanted the interview to be published unedited and both met to discuss the framework," he said.

Raut has interviewed NCP chief Sharad Pawar for Saamana, besides Bal Thackeray and Uddhav Thackeray.

Darekar also told a TV channel that "anything can happen in politics", while Union minister Raosaheb Danve said such meetings were expected in future too.

Former state BJP minister Sudhir Mungantiwar said BJP and Sena have drifted apart and no politics should be seen in Saturday''s meeting.

Danve said, "BJP is currently playing a strong role as opposition in the state. We are not trying to break any party in the state to form government in Maharashtra."

Mungantiwar said, "Any such decision of government formation has not been discussed in the state core committee, hence the possibility of joining hands with Shiv Sena to form a government in Maharashtra is out of question."

He referred to Fadnavis forming a government by joining hands with NCP leader Ajit Pawar in November last year, where the BJP leader had to resign in three days as Ajit Pawar could not garner necessary number of MLAs.

"BJP workers strongly objected to that attempt and have maintained that party leaders should be taken into confidence henceforth ahead of any such political moves," Mungantiwar said.

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Story first published: Saturday, September 26, 2020, 21:09 [IST]
By PTI

JAIPUR: A student was shot dead by a man near her college in Rajapark area of the city on Saturday when she had gone to appear for her graduation final year examination, police said.

"She had come from Jhunjhunu to write the exam, scheduled from 7 am to 10 am. The accused attacked her with a knife and then opened fire around 10. 30 am near her college," DCP Rahul Jain told PTI.

She was immediately rushed to SMS government hospital where she succumbed to the injuries, Jain said.

The accused, Vishnu Chaudhary who hails from Dholpur and is preparing for a competitive exam in Jaipur, was caught soon after the incident, the DCP said.

The reason behind the murder is not immediately clear and the matter is being investigated further, he said.
Bihar Assembly Elections 2020: 30.9 per cent prefer Nitish as CM

India

oi-Vicky Nanjappa

New Delhi, Sep 26: The Election Commission of India on Friday announced the poll dates for the crucial Bihar Assembly Elections 2020. A survey has said that nearly 31 per cent prefer Nitish Kumar as the Chief Minister of the state.

An IANS C-Voter survey said that 30.9 per cent of the people are still backing Nitish Kumar as the most preferable CM again. Kumar is followed by Rashtriya Janata Dal leader, Tejashwi Yadav at 15.4 per cent and BJP leader, Sushil Modi at 9.2 per cent. RJD supremo who is barred from contesting the elections due to his conviction is preferred by 8.3 per cent to be CM. Ram Vilas Paswan on the other hand has the support of 6.5 per cent.

Bihar Assembly Election 2020: Our fight is against BJP, not JDU, says Tejashwi Yadav

Congress leader Tariq Anwar has received 2.1 per cent approval. The sample size of the survey is 25,728 and the same was conducted between September 1 and September 25.

The margin error of the survey is +/- 3 per cent at the state level and at the regional level it is +/-5 per cent.

The Bihar Elections 2020 will begin on October 28. The Election Commission of India said that the polls will be conducted in three phases. The counting of votes will take place on November 10. With this the model code and conduct has come into force with immediate effect.

Deepika Padukone questioned in drug probe | India tears into Pakistan | Oneindia News

The ECI said that the first phase will cover 71 constituencies, including the Left Wing Extremism hit ones in 16 districts. The second phase will cover 94 in 17 districts. The third and final phase will cover 78 assembly seats in 15 districts the CEC also said.

The first date of nomination is October 1 and the last date would be October 8, the CEC said.

Bihar Polls 2020: How EC plans to conduct free and fair elections amid coronavirus pandemic

Bihar will vote in three phases- October 28, November 3 and 7, the ECI also said. The counting of votes will take place on November 10, the ECI also said.

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The ECI said that the number of voters per polling station has been cut to 1,000 to facilitate social distancing. This will raise the number of polling stations of over 1 lakh in 2020 from 65,337 in the 2015 polls the ECI also said.
The lawyer alleged NCB is conducting a 'fashion parade' of Bollywood stars to divert media attention from the probe into Sushant Singh Rajput's death

The pace of CBI probe into Sushant Singh Rajput's death has suddenly slowed down and all attention is being diverted to drugs-related issues with the NCB conducting a "fashion parade" of Bollywood stars, the actor's family lawyer Vikas Singh alleged on Friday.

"Today, we are helpless as we don't know which direction the case is going in. Normally a press briefing is done by CBI. But in this case, till today, CBI has not done a press briefing on what they have found out. This is a very serious issue," Singh alleged at a press conference.

As far as the narcotics angle is concerned, the senior advocate further claimed that such a case can be made only if a certain quantity of drugs is seized from someone.

Singh further alleged that Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) is conducting a "fashion parade" of Bollywood stars to divert media attention.

"An offense can not be proved until some quantity of contraband is recovered. The only case made out is that of casual consumer and proving anyone guilty is almost impossible," he told reporters.

Singh had earlier in the day taken to Twitter saying he was getting "frustrated" by the delay in CBI taking a decision in the case.

"Getting frustrated by the delay in CBI taking a decision to convert abetment to suicide to Murder of SSR (Sushant Singh Rajput).

Rajput, 34, was found hanging in his apartment in suburban Bandra on 14 June following which the Mumbai Police had lodged an Accidental Death Report (ADR).

On 25 July, Rajput's father KK Singh lodged a complaint in the matter with Patna police against Sushant's actor-friend Rhea Chakraborty, her parents Indrajit and Sandhya, her brother Showik, the late actor's then-manager Shruti Modi and his house manager Samuel Miranda.

He accused them of cheating and abetting his son's suicide. He also claimed that the accused persons had siphoned off Rs 15 crore from his son's bank accounts.

Based on this allegation, the Enforcement Directorate is probing money laundering charges.

The FIR lodged by Patna police was later transferred to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), while the NCB is probing drugs angle in the case.
The leader made the request at an inauguration ceremony of 1,000 remote health facilities, which gathered more than 5,000 doctors and nurses across the country, along with those from Laos and Cambodia.

After more than two months of implementing the project on distance health check-up and treatment for the 2020-2025 period, the Ministry of Health in collaboration with the Ministry of Information and Communications, the Ministry of Defence and Viettel Military Industry and Telecoms Group has connected more than 1,000 medical sites with nearly 30 central and municipal hospitals in Hanoi and HCM City. A number of Lao and Cambodian hospitals have also joined the network.

This is a major stride of the medical sector, especially amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, PM Phuc said, stressing that digital health care has played a significant part in the fight against the epidemic in Vietnam.

Highlighting advantages of the model, the leader said remote health care has not only helped to improve the medical quality but also created a digital foundation for the sector.

The network should be expanded to more than 14,000 medical facilities nationwide, he requested.

Major Vietnamese hospitals should partner with their counterparts in foreign countries with advanced medicine, the leader continued.

He asked the health ministry and other relevant ministries and localities to complete a legal framework for remote health care, while joining with IT units to develop platforms and apps for the services.

PM Phuc urged the comprehensive application of digital technologies at health centres and more efforts in the communication work in order to spread the model.

The leader expressed his hope that the health ministry will become one of the ministries and agencies that have taken the lead in materialising the national digital transformation programme.
WASHINGTON, D.C.Two years ago, AVN Hall of Famer Stormy Daniels became a national, even international celebrity when her story of having sex with Donald Trump led to a highly publicized lawsuit, and even to a series of court cases that appear headed to the Supreme Court.

But Daniels story was only the latest in a long line of extramarital sexual episodes involving United States presidents, dating back to the earliest days of the country.

Those tales, including the Daniels-Trump affair, are detailed in a new book, Sex With Presidents: The Ins and Outs of Love and Lust in the White House released this week by Harper Collins publishers. The author, Eleanor Herman, specializes in this sort of thing. Her previous books include Sex With Kings, Sex With the Queen, and Mistress of the Vatican.

Technically, Daniels did not actually have sex with a president, because her encounter with Trump took place in 2006, more than a decade before he assumed the nations highest office. But Herman is not hesitant to include other instances of non-presidential sexcapades. Colorado Senator Gary Harts sexual adventures get the Herman treatmentas do the affairs of Alexander Hamilton, who served as the countrys first Treasury Secretary, but never as president. (He did, however, get a hit Broadway musical dedicated to his life story.)

But the book sticks primarily to sex with the Commander-in-Chief. Such as:

 Franklin Delano Roosevelt. In between running for president and winning four times, leading the country out of the Great Depression and through World War II, Rooseveltwho was confined to a wheelchair due to poliosomehow found time for affairs with at least two summer wives. That is, mistresses with whom he had relationships when his actual wife, First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, would leave the sweltering heat of Washington D.C. for cooler climates in the summer months.

 John F. Kennedy. Still the youngest president ever to take office, at age 43, to say JFK was both sexually restless and reckless would be an understatement. His seemingly countless affairs are detailed in Hermans book, though his presidency was cut short after less than three years by an assassins bullet. Even with his death, the White House remained oversexed, thanks to Kennedys successor, who was...

 Lyndon Johnson, who was another president of great achievements, including the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts, the creation of Medicare, and numerous Great Society programs designed to help pull underprivileged Americans out of povertythough his legacy was badly damaged by his commitment to the Vietnam War. Obviously a man of considerable energy, Johnson frequently snuck women into the Oval Office, where they had sex. After his wife, Lady Bird, walked in on him in the act with a White House secretary, Johnsonrather than attempt to repair his marriagehad a buzzer system installed to warn him when Lady Bird was on her way.

Hermans book even answers the question that would likely be on every readers mindwhich U.S. president possessed the largest penis. Her source material for answering that question may be a bit murky. But her answer: the sexually prolific LBJ.

Photo By flipchip / Wikimedia Commons
(sorry Couldn't resist the title. )

I am seriously considering a few weeks to a few months (if possible) at a cheaper resort.

I don't drink. It's not a personal problem - I might have one beer on a hot day, or a glass of wine once a month. But basically I don't drink. And I got nothing against people drinking.

BUT are all the other tourists going to be hammered all the time?

I've never been to a resort, but I met a lot AI-ers while in Gurdalavaca for 2 months. Some would come off the resort to eat lunch in the town, and be stinkin drunk when they arrived, and would then drink in the plaza for about 4 hours, and then stagger back to their resort. Loud drunk duh...

I did meet a lot of other resort people in those 2 months - but mostly on the beach, and not so drunk.

Ferociously rude Russians one day. Then a family of the most gracious, charming and pleasant Russians the next day. Dozens of very nice, but shy at first. Quebecois. Wow, the Quebecois I met did not speak any English at all. Made me embarassed - Je m'excuse.

Some Slovenians, Italians, Brits, lots of nice people..

But the various tourists that came to town drunk and drunker where invariably Canadians!

Seeing that Cayo Coco will be 100% Canadian for a while.... Is everybody going to be pissed all the time?

Just askin! Gotta know what to expect
They only pretend to feel connected. "This is because most people want emotional bond and understanding which is not something a psychopath would naturally have unless they could pretend for a specific goal  like being charming enough to get your bank details or convince someone to change their dying parent's will to benefit them," the professor said. "The lack of emotion is really part of why some psychopaths can sit emotionless through watching highly graphic violence  especially when they have no real idea of what they should be feigning. "If anything, the response is arousal or excitement, which is something more than just the emotional void that they find is their baseline." American serial killer Ted Bundy appeared charming. Credit:

Psychopaths, especially the serial killer types, learn how to fake emotion in order to get what they want. They simply don't feel remorse the way other people do. For years the people of Perth wondered why the Claremont killer had stopped killing. Could a murderer who took the lives of young women really just stop? There were theories. Was he dead? In jail? Had he moved away? It turns out he had just met someone, got married, and assumed the role of suburban step-dad.

Many organised serial killers manage to keep up the appearance of being just like everyone else. Associate Professor Dellar said the ability to seem harmless or even charming, like Ted Bundy, could "make it difficult to spot the shark amongst the fish". They could blend in, and appear to be a nice bloke while keeping their violent fantasies secretly to themselves. Could he stop? Its not uncommon for psychopaths to stop murdering when they get a wife, or partner.

Criminologist Aaron Sell says sometimes it just becomes logistically impossible to continue killing and getting away with it while living with someone. Loading In one famous case, a prolific serial killer committed his crimes only when his wife took their children on regular holidays without him. Alaskan killer Robert Hansen might be the best example of a serial killer who could stop, but only while his wife was around, Professor Sell said. While she was home he acted normally, she knew he was a little off but did not suspect he was capable of the horrific cruelty he was convicted of.

He would kidnap and torture women, then turn them loose in the woods and hunt them down like wild animals when his wife took their children to visit her family. He stopped hunting when his wife was in town, he would only hunt when his wife would take their kids on vacation and then he would go out and kidnap people and bring them back to his house, have sex with them, sometimes torture them and let them go and then kill them, Professor Sell said. Professor Dellar said many serial killers stopped killing as they grew older. "The main pattern [is often] serial killers tend to act out when their own lives are most unstable  marriage breakup, partner infidelity, losing a job," he said. "As they grow older, there are greater chances for stability through relationships, grandchildren, and stable incomes. This seems to impact the extreme violent acts, but not necessarily the fantasy, which may live on in their reading material, pornographic movies with violent elements etc."
Macra na Feirme has laid out their priorities for Budget 2021 which will lead directly to a stronger more progressive agricultural sector and a more resilient rural environment for young people to live and work.

The focus is on both taxation and funding measures that will yield the greatest returns for both young farmer income, rural job opportunities and the environment.

The Government needs to step up and show their support for young people in rural Ireland.

Young farmers need the opportunity to establish themselves without large debt and young people need to be able to work and contribute to the local economy President Thomas Duffy said at the launch.

The proposals include both important changes to existing measures such as changes to tax exemption on the leasing of farmland to family members under the age of 30 along with a continuation of consanguinity relief to 2025.

New measures include a dedicated debt mediation service for farmers and VAT exemptions on safety equipment and sexed semen to stimulate practice change.

Farming is at a difficult time, there are a lot of big asks on us as farmers.

We need to see creative ideas used to achieve those asks.

Between Brexit and greater environmental business, its now we need to see real investment in the future of farming Agricultural Affairs Chair Shane Fitzgerald said.

Proposals around rural transport and infrastructure are front and centre in Macras proposal to revitalise rural Ireland and its economy.

Investments for those working from home including an increase in the Work from Home allowance, a microgrant scheme for investments for those unable to access broadband through fibre and investment in increasing the availability of apprenticeships are some of the proposals included.

Macra has called on the government to make free travel available for under 25s to reduce financial pressure of car ownership on rural young people and to address Irelands transport emissions.

"Rural young people are being left behind in the move to work from home and when they need to access public transport services, they simply arent available.

These issues are widening the rural/urban divide and the government need to address this in Budget 2021" said Shane Quigley, Macras Rural Youth Committee Chairperson.

On social aspects Macra have also highlighted the lack of provision of services in mental health care and in addressing the rural drugs crisis.

The success of the Make the Moove Programme in Tipperary is a model Macra is calling on the government to fund especially considering the rise in suicides amongst rural young people.

Covid has taught us many lessons, not least that the impossible is very possible. Funds have appeared that can now be better used to make real change and provide a future for rural Ireland but only if the government acts now President Duffy stated.

Meanwhile, Macra met recently with the Ministerial team in the Department of Agriculture to highlight issues of importance to young farmers.

Speaking after the meeting, Macra na Feirme President, Thomas Duffy said, Macra na Feirme were delighted to meet with the new Agriculture Minister, Charlie McConalogue, T.D and Ministers for State Hackett and Heydon to outline our budget priorities, CAP concerns and Brexit issues.

The Government recently announced a 15m fund to bridge the digital divide amongst 3rd level students during COVID. Unfortunately, agricultural students and colleges have been excluded from this programme. Recently, the government announced that some of this 15m fund had been used to mass purchase 17,000 laptops for students in universities and institutes of technology.

President Duffy continued saying Macra na Feirme highlighted the lack of fairness and equality that is facing students entering and returning to Irelands Agricultural colleges. Macra na Feirme highlighted the unfairness and discrimination that this exclusion puts on Agricultural college students.

Macra na Feirme have called upon Minister McConalogue and the Department to make the necessary funds available to support agricultural students in equal measure to other students across the 3rd level network.

For new entrants to farming, the Macra na Feirme President said that we highlighted the need to ensure that a National Reserve for Young Farmers is created for the coming year. Every year, having a National Reserve Scheme for young farmers is an encouragement for new entrants to farming. It is crucial that the Department open the scheme for 2021.
A current federal prosecutor has spoken up publicly against Attorney General Bill Barr, saying he has brought shame on the Department of Justice. James Herbert, an assistant U.S. attorney for the District of Massachusetts wrote a letter published in the Boston Globe saying he wanted to speak out against the unprecedented politicization of the office of the attorney general. ABC News confirmed the authenticity of the letter.

The letter is significant because even though several former officials have spoken up against Barr, it is highly unusual for a current federal prosecutor to criticize the attorney general publicly. In the letter, Herbert made sure to emphasize he was only speaking for himself. While I am a federal prosecutor, I am writing to express my own views, clearly not those of the department, on a matter that should concern all citizens: the unprecedented politicization of the office of the attorney general, Herbert said. The attorney general acts as though his job is to serve only the political interests of Donald J. Trump. This is a dangerous abuse of power.

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NEW: Sources familiar confirm to @ABC the authenticity of this letter from current AUSA James Herbert publicly speaking out against AG Barr. "The current attorney general has brought shame on the department he purports to lead." w/ @AaronKatersky pic.twitter.com/4jzDtk7Q0r  Alex Mallin (@alex_mallin) September 25, 2020

In the letter, Herbert suggests the final straw that led him to break protocol and speak out publicly was Barrs speech at Hillsdale College earlier this month. During the speech, Barr harshly criticized his own Justice Department and its workers, claiming they were often motivated by politics and went headhunting for high-profile targets. While speaking at the conservative-leaning school, Barr dismissed those who say he is too personally involved in cases involving Trump. What exactly am I interfering with? he asked. Under the law, all prosecutorial power is invested in the attorney general.

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Herbert cited several instances in which Barr has shown he is more interested in making the president happy than seeking justice. From his misleading summary of the Mueller Report, to his selective intervention in cases against political allies of the president, to his accusation that victims such as George Floyd are being used as mere props by those calling for racial justice, to his baseless claims about mail-in ballots, William Barr has done the presidents bidding at every turn, Herbert wrote. For 30 years I have been proud to say I work for the Department of Justice, but the current attorney general has brought shame on the department he purports to lead.
DIVIDED WE FALL

Americas Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation

By David French

The 2016 election unleashed a flood of books warning that the duly elected president of the United States would transform the country into a dictatorship. This has proved to be a dubious proposition, and not just because Donald Trump lacks the discipline necessary for such a gargantuanly complex undertaking. The enormous popularity of these jeremiads, even more than their profusion, would appear to contradict their alarmist thesis. It seems odd somehow to speak of impending authoritarianism when its opponents see their books shoot to the top of the best-seller lists.

The more plausible future dystopia is related to the nature of America as a geographically large, culturally heterogeneous and politically decentralized country. Instead of a fascist power grab, we seem more likely to witness an escalating series of disputes between state and federal authorities, and among the states themselves, leading to the possibility of division and secession. We see the seeds of this disintegrative future, for example, in the raft of progressive municipalities that have exempted themselves from federal immigration law, the conservative state legislatures that have effectively banned abortion and on the streets of Portland, where officers from an alphabet soup of federal agencies were recently deployed to protect a United States courthouse from protesters.

According to David French, there is not a single important cultural, religious, political or social force that is pulling Americans together more than it is pushing us apart. In his admirably measured book Divided We Fall: Americas Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation, French convincingly argues that polarization is putting America on a perilous path to disunion.

A conservative evangelical Christian who has lived and worked among secular liberals, French understands better than most that coexistence with people of radically different backgrounds and beliefs is not only possible but necessary, and that it requires a basic respect for pluralism that fewer and fewer Americans seem willing to show. Last year, French earned a measure of notoriety when he was unwittingly catapulted into that rarefied and motley group  Karl Marx, Joe McCarthy, Charles de Gaulle and Margaret Thatcher among them  after whom a political ideology or style is named. In a widely discussed essay for the Catholic journal First Things, the writer Sohrab Ahmari defiantly proclaimed himself Against David French-ism, which he defined as a conservative persuasion marked by a cowardly refusal to accept politics as war and enmity; a guileless respect for civility and decency at the expense of defeating the left; and an aversion to using state power to impose a public square reordered to the common good and ultimately the Highest Good.
A federal judge has blocked the Trump administrations plan to end the 2020 census count a month early and said administration officials knew, but failed to disclose, that the speedup would lead to an inaccurate population count.

U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh of San Jose issued a nationwide injunction Thursday night requiring the Census Bureau to return to its previous schedule of contacting households and counting residents through Oct. 31. The bureau had announced Aug. 3 that it would end census-taking on Sept. 30 so that it could deliver the results to President Trump by the legal deadline of Dec. 31.

The once-per-decade population count determines each states number of seats in the House of Representatives and is used by federal officials to apportion $1.5 trillion in funds per year.

In the Aug. 3 announcement, the Census Bureau said the shortened schedule would not affect the accuracy of the count. But less than two weeks earlier, Koh said, a bureau official issued a memo saying the speedup would lead to a census of unacceptable quality. And the Census Bureaus associate director for field operations wrote that anyone who thought the results could be delivered by Dec. 31 has either a mental deficiency or a political motivation.

While the Census Bureau was publicly declaring that it would meet the deadline by hiring additional staff and increasing training, Koh said, the bureaus own reports showed it had only 38% of the census-takers it needed.

In ordering the speedup, Koh said, administration officials violated their constitutional and statutory obligations to produce an accurate census and offered an explanation that runs counter to the evidence.

She said the evidence showed that the Census Bureau had received pressure from the Commerce Department to shorten its schedule. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross was appointed by Trump.

The Trump administration said Friday it will ask the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco to overturn Kohs ruling.

Acting in a lawsuit by civil rights groups and local governments, Koh had issued a restraining order Sept. 6 requiring the Census Bureau to maintain full-scale operations while she considered whether to extend the census through October. She acted in response to a Justice Department court filing that said the bureau has already begun taking steps to conclude field operations in areas with high response rates.

Trump is also seeking to exclude undocumented immigrants from the census count, an action that could strip House seats from California and other states with large immigrant populations. A federal court in New York has ruled against the presidents proposal, but the administration has appealed to the Supreme Court.

Derrick Johnson, chief executive of the NAACP, a plaintiff in the suit over the census schedule, said, The decision to continue the census will ensure proper attention is given to overlooked and unreported areas that need to be counted the most.

Virginia Kase, chief executive of the League of Women Voters, another plaintiff, called the ruling a victory for democracy.

Koh was appointed to the court by President Barack Obama in 2010 and nominated by Obama to the Ninth Circuit in February 2016. With Republicans in the majority, her nomination won approval from the Senate Judiciary Committee but never received a confirmation vote on the Senate floor.

Bob Egelko is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: begelko@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @BobEgelko
YPSILANTI TOWNSHIP, MI -- Three brothers who took over a Mexican restaurant in 2017 named it after their mother to praise her hard work.

Fernando, Rudy and Rodolfo Gonzalez operate Minys Mexican Restaurant at 2866 Washtenaw Ave. in Ypsilanti Township, where their mother Minerva, who goes by Miny, runs the kitchen.
"We've seen the same pattern with suicide," he said. In older teen girls it's up 70 per cent compared with the first decade of this century and "in pre-teen girls, who had very low rates [previously] it's up 151 per cent and that pattern points to social media." Watching the documentary, Catherine Manning, who runs self-esteem workshops for young people, said the revelations about the methods used by social media platforms to get into people's minds and the statistics around the resulting self harm left her "in tears". Catherine Manning, a self-esteem educator, was "in tears" watching the Netflix documentary in which social media's creators outline its harms to young people. Her daughter, Lucinda, has changed her ideas about the platforms after watching it. Credit:Jason South "I was just thinking about how abducted our kids have been and how much it [social media] is already causing them so much pain and anxiety. But at the same time, it is such a great tool for our socialisation," said Ms Manning, CEO of SEED workshops. "The statistics presented about the rise in self-harming behaviours and suicide among young people certainly correlate with those around the increase in things like body dysmorphia [a mental health condition in which physical defects are imagined] across the board," she said.

"The powerful thing for kids to identify is that something they care about so much has no care for them other than as revenue ... there is nothing new in this, but it makes it a whole lot more personal." Teens including Neisha Biviano, her friend Mia Quinn, also 15, and Ms Manning's daughter Lucinda, 18, are saying the documentary's revelations have been so affecting it will influence their real-world relationships with social media. I was just thinking about how abducted our kids have been and how much it [social media] is already causing them so much pain and anxiety. Catherine Manning, CEO SEED workshops Mia Quinn, an aspiring visual artist and photographer, said despite the value platforms such as Instagram offer, especially showing her other young people's art, after watching The Social Dilemma she immediately told her friendship circle she wanted to delete the app. "I had just watched The Social Dilemma and said [to my friends] guys let's all delete Insta and Snapchat, I said 'Insta isn't working for me I don't want to be here anymore, this isn't right'.

"Then again, I don't want to leave it and move to a different platform without my friends [who did not want to abandon it entirely]." She unfollowed large numbers of people, including all "influencers", and stuck only with those offering creativity. She said this "confused the algorithm" on Instagram - which guesses what individual users might like and curates personalised streams and targeted ads - and "it now only shows me new people to follow that are mainly art students, and that's really good". "I think the best thing you can do is buy books, unfollow influencers who make their money from social media - they bring more harm than good to everyone - turn your notifications off ... and follow more of your hobbies and interests rather than people."

Ms Biviano says despite the instinct to disconnect, the fact many positive things come into her world via social media means it is worth continuing with. "It has two possibilities: there is a really amazing virtual place that's filled with acceptance and it can be a lovely creative outlet and inspiring. "But the other is this breeding zone full of self-destructive energy and hate and this increasing amount of political, polarising views getting thrown up, and also an increasing amount of negative and really toxic, unreachable standards that have been created." Julie Inman Gant, eSafety Commissioner, has "lived" The Social Dilemma and believes the will by giant platforms to lead the creation of a safe social medial culture is not there. Credit:Janie Barrett The national eSafety Commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, has insider experience of tech corporation culture and says the will to create a safe environment is not there. I worked in the tech industry for more than 20 years and actually lived the Social Dilemma," she said, "I tried to serve as a constructive safety antagonist from within the industry, but it only got me so far because the corporate will and leadership was not there."

The film particularly illustrates the influence of social media on children who may not yet have developed sufficient critical reasoning skills to stay safe online and combat fake news, she said. If the tech giants are building the digital roads they must also be installing the virtual seatbelts and stop signs and policing theses roads to keep users safe. Given Facebook has 2.5 billion users and YouTube has 1.5 billion, and algorithms create and recommend content, "the frightening reality is that they [users] could spend this critical early part of their lives only hearing one viewpoint". Loading Melbourne University senior social sciences lecturer Dr Lauren Rosewarne has written two books on social media and says revelations about activities of big tech companies shock users but they generally do not cause widespread user-behavior change.

The impression given in The Social Dilemma that developers were "babes in the woods" who had no idea features they built could become harmful or addictive were "laughable", but members of the generation that has known no life before social media are equipped with more media literacy than older peers. "What we need to do culturally is think about how do we become more savvy users and how do we control the tech we use rather than letting it control us," she said. Lucinda Manning, 18, said though parents may believe kids did not question the dark arts of social media platforms competing in what the film dubs the "attention extraction" industry, they do and will be even more selective now. Friends have deleted apps like Facebook and Instagram as theyre very aware of the negative impacts it has on their mental health. Lucinda Manning, 18 "I do believe my generation is becoming very aware of the impacts social media has on them. I think many parents think young people dont care and arent paying attention but the reality is we are, and we really do care.
Re-branding Sri Lanka View(s):

There will be no other time better than this to re-brand Sri Lanka. Though we as a nation used to say Ayubowan (May you have a longer life) in greeting visitors, there was in inferiority complex in the minds of Sri Lankans hence, everyone wanted to stick to the British code of greeting

However, Starting from Prince Charles to all the world leaders started greeting without shaking hands after the pandemic. Hence, Ayubowan has become the new trend in meeting and greeting people. There are many other similar and valuable elements in our culture and our national heritage which could be utilised in positioning Sri Lanka as a tourist destination. Becoming a safe destination to travel post-pandemic is a feather on the hat for Sri Lankans who are known for their innate traits of hospitality and care.

Its also important to look at how Sri Lanka has been positioned over the last few decades

Land like No other  This was the longest lasting positioning statement or the USP of Sri Lanka as a destination. However, was it the right way to position a country? In my opinion its not. The moment it says; Land Like no other  it is an incomplete sentence which doesnt say What Sri Lanka stand for instead it states what Sri Lanka is not Its not a recommended approach in branding.

Small Miracle  big or small miracles be miracles Size does not matter for a miracle. Hence, the association of the word Small seems to be a mistake in positioning Sri Lanka again.

So Sri Lanka  This raised the question; So what? May be it could have been So Sri Lankan instead So Sri Lanka. However it wasnt supposed to be best campaign either.

Sri Lanka Tourism is at crossroads again with COVID -19 and a ban on arrival of flights. In a more strategic sense this time should be considered as the time given to get ready with a solid campaign for Sri Lanka Tourism. Sri Lankan government is ready to support Tourism in all possible ways. Its the Strategic thinking and insight driven marketing which needs to take the lead now.

What strategic insights to be taken in to consideration in positioning Sri Lanka?

Authenticity  Sri Lanka is a country second to none in terms of her authenticity. In this day and age tourists are looking not for star grade and star class experience, instead they are looking for more and more authentic experience. We are endowed with natural resources, wildlife, golden coast line and beautiful beaches, 2500 years of a written history and its ruins and monuments, local food cult and many more. But the issue is that we still believe in making only star class experiences and offering them inside a concrete jungle. True its needed in Colombo but not in out of Colombo. Focusing on authentic experience will also allow us to attract a quality crowd who would truly value whats offered and would pay the due price.

What stops us in offering authenticity 

Sticking to the thought of putting up structures and more structures and buildings and providing the luxury inside the hotel premises (Red carpet treatment) and the notion of providing Red Carpet Treatment is the best way of promoting Sri Lanka is the biggest obstacle that should be overcome in positioning Sri Lanka. Tourists today value peace of mind, serene, silence and nature more than anything else. What should be promoted to them are: organic food, healing, therapy, real experience in Sri Lankan culture, opportunity to be a part of the real rural life of Sri Lanka is whats valued today than ever. Therefore its high time we as a nation realising the shift taking place in thinking and expectation of tourists.

What do we lack?

Whats stopping a tourists enjoying the in-built beauty of Sri Lanka is what needs to be looked at if we are to find solutions to the problem.

One of the main issues in Sri Lanka is privacy. One of the main complaints against Sri Lanka is how they get harassed during their stay which prevents them from enjoying the authentic feeling of what they experience. Therefore, Sri Lanka Tourisms needs to find immediate solutions in assuring security and safety of tourists who come down to Sri Lanka. Failing to address these issues will create a negative brand equity which will tarnish the reputation we can build as a great tourist destination. We also need to believe in the fact that what we have to offer here is something unique and something second to none. Hence what needs to be done is to look at ways of enhancing the natural appeal of our culture, heritage and rural life of typical Sri Lankans.

Education system of Sri Lanka should inculcate the future generation how to respect the freedom and privacy of tourists. Tourism should be included in the school curriculum if we are serious about being a exemplary destination in the world.

Conclusion 

Lets redesign our tourism sector, based on our core competencies which cant be matched by any other destination. We have once been the best destination to travel and then became the safest destination to travel. Lets not forget; Sri Lanka is the pearl of the Indian Ocean. This land is a pearl if we can understand the value of and live up to it. This land is tiny yet its elegant. Sri Lanka  Tiny yet Elegant and authentic destination of the Indian Ocean.
Seventy RLD workers and leaders, including its district president, were booked for holding a protest against new farm bills without permission from the administration, police said on Saturday.

RLDs district president Ajit Rathi, party spokesman Abhishek Choudhry and former MLC Choudhry Mushtaq are among the 70 people who have been booked under Section 188 of the IPC, SHO DK Tyagi said.

A case was registered against them on Friday for holding a protest outside the district magistrates office against the Centres farm bills without permission from the administration, he said.
Egyptians understood the 'wicked' conspiracy to dismantle the country and realised they are on the right path to development and they will overcome the difficulties to attain prosperity

It was bound to happen. People will always stand to be victorious and support the right side of the equation. No one can ignore the fact that we have been through very difficult times that have serious consequences. But we were not alone in this crisis because the whole world, the rich and the poor, have been through the most difficult phase of this century that targeted the most valuable, which is the peoples health.

When countries had to enforce a complete, or even partial, lockdown to curb the spread of COVID-19, the impact was horrendous, both economically and financially. The most powerful and rich countries currently suffer from budget deficits. They have postponed major projects, altered their economic plans, taxed their citizens heavily, and enforced laws that oblige businessmen to shoulder part of the burden.

In the US, the GDP dropped from $20 trillion to less than $16 trillion. Unemployment doubled, affecting 50 million Americans. Companies either went broke or laid off a number of its employees to cope with the crisis.

There are seven million infected Americans, and a bigger number is expected to be ill with the virus. Even countries that managed to control the spread of the virus, like China, Japan, Korea and Germany, could not evade the negative economic impact of the virus because of the economic slowdown that hit other consuming economies. The majority of countries are either suffering an economic downturn or the hefty burden of loans.

Anger was seen from the US, Japan, China, the EU and Korea, to the poorest and most vulnerable states worldwide, and scenes of the most violent demonstrations took place in South America. The virus has effectively put the world economy into a standstill. Meanwhile, the expenses of health services ate up a great portion of government budgets.

When economic downturn is coupled with high spending, as was the case during the lockdown, political and social unrest are expected.

In Egypt, the government took several measures to ensure concerted efforts in dealing with the crisis on the social, economic and health levels. Panic on the part of the government would have led to an economic catastrophe, as has been the case in other countries that were rigged by rumours.

The government, under the leadership of President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi, rapidly formed a crisis management committee to mitigate the impact of the pandemic. The government managed to strike a balance between the need to battle against the virus and mitigate its economic impact due to the lockdown.

The crisis management team managed, in collaboration with the World Health Organisation and scientists from around the world, to avoid the state of panic. They worked on curbing the negative impact of the virus on people's health, made medication available, and helped people stay safe through awareness campaigns.

On the economic level, several sectors came to a standstill, especially the services sector, and to some extent the production sector. Meanwhile, remittances dropped, as Egyptian expats were either brought back home because they had lost their jobs or became infected.

Tourism was hard hit, as were airlines. But Egypt was not alone. The government, the Armed Forces, and medical teams worked side by side to help the people overcome the pandemic crisis.

Thus Egyptians pursued a relatively calm life, but the government was caught between a rock and a hard place. At the time when Ethiopia was trying to deprive Egypt of Nile water, threatening Egyptians' supply of water and food, Egypt had to find a way to support the economy to avoid the negative impact of the lockdown.

The government had to ignore the traditional norms of raising prices of food and medication. Raising taxes on industrialists was not also an option because they might lay off workers or close down their companies. The government stirred through the crisis carefully as it was running out of good options.

However, a "wicked" group manipulated the government's move against building violations into a campaign of foul play that depicted the government as if it were destroying the entire country. The group, along with its funders and supporters, called on Egyptians to go out on the streets to unseat the government.

However, despite the difficult times and the harsh repercussions of the pandemic, Egyptians understood the "wicked" conspiracy to dismantle the country and realised they are on the right path to development and they will overcome the difficulties to attain prosperity.

*Alaa Thabet is the editor-in-chief of Al-Ahram daily

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In the interaction with his Sri Lankan Lankan counterpart, Modi referred to his government's neighbourhood-first policy as well as SAGAR and said India gives priority to its relations with Sri Lanka

New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday held wide-ranging talks with his Sri Lankan counterpart Mahinda Rajapaksa, covering the entire expanse of bilateral ties and with a focus on further expanding cooperation in key areas.

In his opening remarks at a virtual bilateral summit, Modi said he was confident that the massive electoral victory of the ruling party in Sri Lanka backed by the Rajapaksa government's policies will facilitate deeper cooperation between the two countries.

"An opportunity has come to begin a new chapter in India-Sri Lanka ties after your party's electoral victory. People from both the countries are looking at us with new hope and expectations," Modi said.

Rajapaksa was sworn in as Sri Lankan prime minister for a fresh term on 9 August after his party, the Sri Lanka People's Front, secured a two-third majority in the parliamentary polls.

Modi said India gives priority to its relations with Sri Lanka as he mentioned his government's neighbourhood-first policy as well as SAGAR (Security and Growth for All in the Region) doctrine.

It was Modi's first such virtual bilateral engagement with a leader of a neighbouring country. For Rajapaksa, it was the first diplomatic engagement with a leader of a foreign country after he was sworn in as prime minister.

It was learnt that the two leaders deliberated on a host of issues like ways to further deepen overall defence and trade ties as well as expansion of existing cooperation in several key areas.
Friday scoreboard: See how teams fared around the state

Take a look at the state-wide scoreboard for Friday night.
According to informed sources, Trump will make the official announcement in the White House Rose Garden on Saturday evening, The Hill news website reported.

Washington, Sep 26 (IANS) US President Donald Trump was likely to nominate Judge Amy Coney Barrett, who has served on the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit since 2017, to the Supreme Court as the replacement for late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, according to media reports.

A Politico news report citing sources said tha Barrett, 48, is expected to appear alongside the President during the announcment.

If confirmed, she will join Trump's two other appointments, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, to form a 6-3 conservative majority.

She was previously considered as a potential nominee to replace Anthony Kennedy in 2018, but Trump ultimately chose to nominate Kavanaugh to fill that vacancy.

As he returned to Washington on Friday night, Trump told reporters that he had made decision.

"In my own mind, yes," Politico quoted te President as saying.

But when asked about Barrett, he added: "I haven't said it was her but she is outstanding."

The Hill news report said that Trump was very pleased with Barrett's performance during a meeting at the White House on Monday.

The report said that she was the favourite choice of conservative Christians who hope to overturn the landmark decision in Roe v. Wade establishing a woman's right to an abortion.

He had also considered former Florida Supreme Court Justice Barbara Lagoa, a Cuban-American judge now on the 11h Circuit Court of Appeals.

Meanwhile, the White House has already started to reach out to Ssenators to set up meetings with the nominee, Politico reported.

The Senate Judiciary Committee expects to hold confirmation hearings the week of October 12.

Both Trump and some Republican senators have said the Supreme Court needs to have all nine justices ahead of the election, in case the court needs to step in to decide the result.

The Democrats have still maintained that a nominee should be tapped by the next President following the November 3 election.

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden said the move to pick a new Justice before the election was an "abuse of power".

Two Republican Senators, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine, have also opposed voting on a nominee before the election.

--IANS

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British Prime Minister Boris Johnson wants to appoint two Brexit-backing critics of the BBC to key roles in the media, including one as chairman of the publicly owned broadcaster itself, the Times reported on Saturday.

The newspaper said Johnson wanted to appoint Paul Dacre, the former editor of the Daily Mail, as chairman of media regulator Ofcom, and he has asked Charles Moore, the former editor of the Daily Telegraph, to become the chairman of the BBC.
(Newser)  President Trump took aim at Black voters Friday by offering a new multi-billion-dollar plan and taking a jab at his Democratic rival, CNN reports. "No one in politics today has done more to hurt the Black community than Joe Biden," Trump said at a campaign event in Atlanta. "Joe Biden should not be demanding your support; he should be begging for your forgiveness." Trump's campaign said his so-called "platinum plan" would funnel up to $40 billion in government fundingand perhaps hundreds of billions more from the private sectorfor Black business loans, per NPR. White House advisor Ja-Ron Smith called it "historic" for a GOP president to focus "on the economic empowerment of the Black community."

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Trump's plan is packed with other planks, like designating Antifa and the KKK as "terrorist organizations" and making Juneteenth a national holiday, Fox News reports. It would also aim to improve healthcare for Black communities; allow Black churches to vie for federal resources; install "diversity training" in law enforcement; and boost Black educational opportunities by closing "failing schools" in favor of "full school choice and education opportunity." The rollout comes amid gloomy polling numbers for Trump among Black voters, who prefer Biden by roughly a 75-point margin. Forbes, meanwhile, runs through Trump's plan and says "it's not clear" where much of the funding will come from. (Trump sparked controversy by planning a rally on Juneteenth.)
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We also endorse Marcus Goodwin, who impressed us two years ago when he first ran for the council. A real estate developer who started his career working for the D.C. Council and in the mayors office, Mr. Goodwin understands government but would also bring a needed business perspective to the council on issues such as workforce development, affordable housing and the needs of small businesses. He is thoughtful about racial inequalities in law enforcement and would be a constructive voice in the debate over reshaping police and public safety. There are other strong candidates  notably Monica Palacio, former head of the citys Office of Human Rights  but Ms. Henderson and Mr. Goodwin stand out. We endorse them over the incumbent because, while we admire Mr. Whites advocacy for returning citizens, his stances on education would undermine the important reforms that have occurred under mayoral control.
Security forces in Minsk detained more than 100 protesters on September 26 during a womens march against Alyaksandr Lukashenka, who claimed victory in the country's presidential election more than a month ago amid reports of widespread fraud.

Riot police in balaclavas rounded up demonstrators and packed them into minibuses and police vans, according to RFE/RL's Belarus Service. A number of journalists were among them.

The detentions began soon after the women, many dressed in white and carrying red and white flowers and waving red-and-white opposition flags, gathered to march through the capital.

The march, which Minsk residents called the "people's inauguration" of Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya, lasted about 2 and 1/2 hours.

The march took place three days after Lukashenka held a secretive inauguration in Minsk amid a police lockdown in the city and Internet blackout.

Lukashenka has directed a brutal postelection crackdown in response to protests, including thousands of arrests, beatings, and other mistreatment of peaceful protesters, and the expulsions of foreign journalists. He has denied accusations that the presidential election on August 9 was rigged.

Rallies were reported elsewhere in Belarus, including Hrodna. People were detained in Brest, Homel, and Zaslavl, the Vyasna rights group said.

Vyasna published a list of 106 people it said had been detained in Minsk during the march. Late in the day, a group of street musicians was detained after drawing a crowd while playing Soviet-era rock star Viktor Tsoi's "We Want Changes" in an underground passage, Vyasna said.

Among the women taken into custody was 73-year-old Nina Bahinskaya, a frail but resolute figure who has been a regular participant of the anti-Lukashenka protests.

A security officer in a balaclava grabbed the red-and-white flag from Bahinskayas hands before dragging her into a minibus. She was later released, but the flag was not returned.

WATCH: Dozens Arrested In Minsk

A group of women chanted "Our president is Sveta!" -- referring to opposition politician Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who they say won the vote -- before riot police dragged many of them into vans.

Tsikhanouskaya, who appeared as a guest on the BBC radio program Global Questions on September 26, spoke about the role women have played in the demonstrations.

Im really proud of all the Belarusian people who are in the demonstrations now but am extremely proud of the women, she said.

They have no other choice than to participate in the demonstrations because they know that they are fighting for the future of their children, she said.

They dont want our children to be the slaves of this system, to be the slaves of this regime.

Tsikhanouskaya, now in Lithuania, also commented on the secret inauguration, saying it revealed Lukashenka's weakness.

"He behaves as if he is afraid of his people, but if he is sure that he has won this election he wouldnt be afraid of his nation," she said, adding that the inauguration doesnt mean anything.

Crisis In Belarus Read our ongoing coverage as Belarusian strongman Alyaksandr Lukashenka continues his brutal crackdown on NGOs, activists, and independent media following the August 2020 presidential election, widely seen as fraudulent.

Lukashenka was "illegitimate in the eyes of the Belarusian people and he didnt become legitimate because of his inauguration -- absolutely not," she said on the BBC radio program.

Tsikhanouskaya called for Belarusians to demonstrate on September 27 for the goal of new, honest elections and, as a result, an official, lawful inauguration.

Tsikhanouskaya, who joined the presidential race at the last moment after her husbands own bid was ended after he was jailed, said she won the August 9 poll with 60 to 70 percent of the vote.

The EU and United States have increased contacts with Tsikhanouskaya, a former English teacher and translator. Asked about the support the opposition has received from Western countries thus far, Tsikhanouskaya said she was not disappointed because she believes other countries are doing what they can, but she added: "Maybe they can be more brave in their decisions. They can be more pushy."
About 9:15 a.m., the victim was approached by a robber in the 3100 block of West Cermak Road. The robber pulled out a handgun and announced a robbery, and a fight ensued, police said. The offender fired one shot, striking the victim in the left hip. The robber then fled south on Albany Avenue, police said.
Religion is under siege, Bill Barr tells Catholics as he accepts award for service in the Lords vineyard

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Calling it the foundation of free society, Attorney General Bill Barr said religion in America is under siege and urged an audience at the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast Wednesday to continue to advocate for religious liberty as he accepted an award from the group for his service in the Lords vineyard.

Barr, who is described as a culture warrior Catholic by the National Catholic Reporter, was the second recipient of the annual Christifideles Laici Award created by the NCPB in 2019. The award highlights the work of the lay faithful who serve the church by spreading the Gospel in ways that are new in ardor, methods and expression in line with Pope Saint John Paul IIs exhortation of the New Evangelization. The award reads: "In honor and gratitude for the Fidelity to the Church, Exemplary Selfless and Steadfast Service in the Lord's Vineyard."

Explaining that he was a little sheepish in accepting it because no one is really worthy of an award like this, Barr said he was honored to receive it because he admires the organizers of the annual event and those who are associated with it.

He noted that the event, which had to be online this year because of the pandemic, served as a living testament to the vital role of the Church and its principles in American public life. Pointing out what he said the founders of the nation understood as the crucial link between religion and liberty, Barr said this understanding has been under threat from secularists over the last five decades.

Unfortunately, in the last half-century, that foundation of our free society has increasingly been under siege. Traditional morality has eroded, and secularists have often succeeded not only in eliminating religion from schools and the public square, but in replacing it with a new orthodoxy that is actively hostile to religion, Barr said.

The consequences of this hollowing out of religion have been predictably dire. Over the past 50 years, we have seen striking increases in urban violence, drug abuse, and broken families. Problems like these have fed the rise of an ever more powerful central government, one that increasingly saps individual initiative, coopts civil society, crowds out religious institutions, and ultimately reduces citizens to wards of the State, he added.

While efforts are being taken to push back the efforts of secularists, Barr urged the faithful not to become complacent.

As patriotic Americans and people of faith, we cannot be complacent about these trends. Yet nor should we give in to despair. More recently, thanks in part to organizations like this one, we have seen some small but significant steps toward the restoration of religion to its rightful place in American public life, he said.

Barr then pointed to victories for religious liberty in the legal arena, citing three cases from the recent term of the Supreme Court in which the Department of Justice filed supporting briefs.

In one case, the court reaffirmed the principle that the government cannot discriminate against religion in general funding programs, and struck down a provision of the Montana Constitution that had been interpreted to exclude religious schools from a scholarship program for underprivileged students. In another case, the court held that the First Amendment prohibits courts from intervening in employment disputes involving teachers at religious schools who are entrusted with the responsibility of instructing their students in the faith, Barr said. In the third case, the court considered a regulatory mandate requiring employers to provide contraceptive coverage to their employees, and upheld the administrations rules exempting the nuns of the Little Sisters of the Poor and other employers with moral and religious objections, he added.

Barr argued that the disputes in each case should not have even occurred because in each case, the religious litigants were not asking for anything more than the basic freedom to exercise their faith and be treated the same as others.

Advocating for religious liberty is just one way that lay Catholics and others can answer the call to serve. In his exhortation Christifideles Laici, for which the award I have the honor of accepting today is named, Saint John Paul II noted that the lay faithful are never to relinquish their participation in public life. At the same time, he emphasized that faith is first and foremost about how we live our daily lives, for the daily life itself of a truly Christian family makes up the first experience of Church, Barr said. Whatever our vocation in life, it is never too late to work in the Lords vineyard. Our spiritual renewal, and the renewal of our national character, depend on it. Thank you, and God Bless America.
According to a post published on September 15, 2020, by French blog Blablachars, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), users of the Leclerc Main Battle Tank (MBT) for more than 20 years, have decided to donate 80 of these tanks to Jordan. In 1993, the UAE has signed a contract with the French Company Giat Industries (now Nexter Systems) for the purchase of 436 combat vehicles, including 388 Leclerc MBTs, two driver training tanks, and 48 armored recovery tanks based on the Leclerc MBT chassis.

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UAE Leclerc MBTs during a dynamic combat demonstration. (Picture source: Army Recognition)

This number should allow Jordan to equip two of the four tank battalions belonging to its 3rd Armored Division. This large unit is in fact made up of two brigades: the first one  the 40th Armored Brigade (King Hussein)  comprises the 2nd Tank Battalion (Royal Tank Battalion) and the 4th Tank Battalion (Prince Ali Bin Al Hussein); the second brigade  the 60th Armored Brigade (Prince Hassan)  comprises the 3rd Royal Tank Battalion and the 5th Royal Tank Battalion. These two brigades were transferred to the Jordanian central command in 2018, Blablachars recalls. All these units are equipped with older tanks such as the Tariq (Centurion), the M60 A1, the Al Khalid (Chieftain), or the Al Hussein (Challenger1).

This transfer from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to Jordan could allow the creation of new synergies around the upgrading of the Leclerc MBT in the three user countries, which are now the United Arab Emirates with a little over 300 units, Jordan with these 80 tanks, and of course France with 200 tanks, Blablachars concludes.



The Leclerc MBT is the backbone of the UAE armed forces which is in service since 1994. In 2003, France's Giat Industries signed a contract to upgrade hundreds of Leclerc tanks it has supplied to the UAE within a $4 billion deal signed 10 years ago. In early 2011, French Company Nexter signed an agreement with the International Golden Group from UAE to supply Azur up-armour kits for the Leclerc MBTs of the UAE Armed Forces. The AZUR kit consists of additional protection in the form of side skirts of composite material, bar armor on the rear of the hull and turret to protect against rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs), and extra protection for the engine.



Leclerc main battle tanks of the United Arab Emirates were deployed in combat operations in Yemen (near Aden) as part of the Saudi-led coalition. It is estimated that 70 Leclerc MBTs were deployed by the UAE in Yemen, 15 of them equipped with the AZUR package.



French-made Leclerc is one of the most modern main battle tanks in the world. The tank is armed with a GIAT (Nexter) CN120-26 120mm smoothbore cannon which has a chamber the same size as that of the 120 mm smoothbore gun fitted to the Leopard 2, M1A1 and M1A2. The turret is equipped with an automatic loader that contains 22 rounds of ready-use ammunition normally loaded from outside through a small hatch in the back of the turret bustle. With this system, the tank can fire at a rate of 10 to 12 rds./min.



The Leclerc MBT has a crew of three including a driver, commander, and gunner. The hull and turret of the Leclerc MBT are of welded steel construction to which the composite armor is added; this provides a very high degree of protection against both KE and CE attack. The armor package of the tank is of modular design so that it can be easily replaced or upgraded with the latest generation of new armor.



The Leclerc MBT is powered by a SACM V8X-1500 Hyperbar diesel developing 1,500 hp coupled to a SESM ESM 500 fully automatic transmission with five forward and two reverse gears and hydrostatic transmission. It can run at a maximum speed of 72 Km/h with a maximum cruising range of 450 km with internal fuel that can be extended to 550 km with external fuel tanks.
Salah argues that sooner or later Erdogan will have to backtrack on the majority of his foreign policy choices  including those on Egypt

This week has been seeing growing signs that the threats of military resolve that Turkey has been projecting around the Eastern Mediterranean are receding in favour of a dialogue-oriented discourse.

In two consecutive statements during the course of the week, high ranking officials from Turkey, Greece and Cyprus spoke of chances for dialogue to resolve problems, essentially between Turkey and Greece over the exclusive economic zones in the Eastern Mediterranean and on the division of Cyprus.

According to Abdel-Rahman Salah, Egypts last ambassador in Ankara, who was dispatched in 2011 and recalled back in the tumultuous summer of 2013 when Turkey openly opposed the political transition in Egypt, there would have to be a way for Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to end the rough and aggressive foreign policy choices he has been adopting for over seven years so that he can make a U-turn to the soft power choices that pursue joint interests and zero problems with the neighbours of Turkey as has been the case with his foreign policy parameters during his first 10 years at the helm.

The current rough policies, Salah argued in an interview with Ahram Online, are proving not just useless to serve Erdogans interests but also counterproductive, having caused the regional isolation of Turkey and put the Turkish economy at a very challenging point.

Erdogans real claim to fame is with the economic success story that he made. He also managed to give Turkey a considerable regional presence that was expanding upon the pursuit of common interests for Turkey and its neighbours. With the aggressive choices he has been making, Erdogan is simply not just losing regional allies and internal loyalists but he is also losing his own claim to fame, Salah argued.

It is only very conspicuous that at the internal level Erdogan is coming under growing criticism, not just from the ultra-secular camp, but also, and a lot more significantly, from politicians who had been his closest advisors, Salah added.

Like all those with an insight into Turkish affairs, Salah is not at all overlooking the fact that both Ali Babajan and Ahmet Davutoglu have now become firm political adversaries to Erdogan  essentially on the account of the foreign policy choices of the president of Turkey and the impact thereof on the economic situation in the country.

Of course there are old and established political foes who subscribe to alternative and contrasting political agendas but I am here talking about two leading architects of Erdogans political and economic choices during the time his rule was considered by many as a success story: Ali Babajan and Ahmet Davutoglu, he said.

During the past few weeks, Salah noted, both Babajan and Davutoglu had showered criticism on Erdogans political choices.

Erdogan's policy on Egypt, he added, was one of the main things that both Babajan and Davutoglou have sharply criticised.

According to Salah, it is becoming very evident now to all shades of Turkish opposition that Erdogan has decided to compromise his relations with Egypt, a leading regional power in favour of a delusional aspiration to expand Turkish regional presence through association with political Islamic groups that have been losing credit in the region.

Salah is willing to argue that Erdogans bit on political Islam is the root of the problem he is now facing.

In 2012, Erdogan saw that political Islam was finding its way up in Arab Spring countries; he saw it happening, in different ways, in Egypt and Tunisia; he thought it would happen also in Syria, Libya and Yemen, he said. Accordingly, he decided to play the Islamist card out of an assumption that he would be leading the entire Middle East through the rise of political Islam to power in several Arab states, he added.

For Salah, this Islamism was not at all something that Erdogan was so overplaying before the phase of the Arab Spring. And, he added, while Erdogans Islamist line was clear, the president of Turkey was always careful not to step over the line of secularism that Turkey has been embracing for almost a century when he came to power.

When Erdogan visited Egypt in 2011 he publicly stated he is committed to his countrys secular affiliation, which did not please the Muslim Brotherhood at the time, Salah recalled.

He added, Erdogan had been so observing of the requirement of secularism to the extent that back in 2007 when the liberal opposition wanted to sue him for having crossed the lines of secularism it was impossible for a court of law to find anything in his speeches or interviews that indicated any contempt of secularism.

According to Salah, Erdogan would not agree for his party members to publicly share the fact that he leads them at prayers. He thought this would conflict with his image as the leader of a secular country, Salah said.

And, he added, until 2012 Erdogan had openly and publicly declined all appeals made by radical Islamists to turn the museum of Hagia Sofia, which was built in the sixth century as a church before it was converted into a mosque in the 15th century and then into a museum in the 20th century, into a mosque again.

He used to openly and publicly say that there are so many mosques around Hagia Sofia and they are never full of worshippers and that there is no logic to reconvert the museum into a mosque, Salah recalled.

It was towards the end of 2012, Salah said, that Erdogan opted for an extra Islamist dose, which inevitably ended into reconverting Hagia Sofia into a mosque earlier this year.

Erdogan had just found it purposeful to subscribe to Islamism and he has gone the extra mile there, but today or maybe tomorrow he would find a way to climb down  and in both cases he is acting strictly out of political opportunism, for he is really a political pragmatist, Salah said.

In 2010, Erdogan was getting into a confrontation with Israel over the Gaza flotilla but it did not take him long to drop the confrontation; this is the way he does politics: he would push the line but he would make a U-turn when necessary, Salah said.

The same happened a few years later when he quit a panel at the Davos conference with former Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Perez but he later asked the foreign minister of Turkey to privately pass his apologies to Perez  and it was Ahmed Davutoglou, the former foreign minister of Turkey who revealed this, he added.

Today, Salah argued, Erdogan needs to rethink his choices on many fronts. One of the things that Erdogan would need to think about sooner rather than later is his illusion of sharing the Muslim world with Iran  with him leading the Sunni world and Iran leading the Shias.

This was a total illusion right from the start; he miscalculated the situation when he saw Egypt being consumed with its internal political developments and Saudi Arabia getting into some internal political debates; he saw a vacuum and he thought he could fill it -- but it was just a big miscalculation, Salah said.

As an essential part of readdressing his choices on this front, Salah said, Erdogan would have to find a way to make peace with Egypt.

Egyptian demands [to make peace with Turkey] are perfectly clear and perfectly legitimate: Erdogan needs to pull out the jihadists he is moving around the Middle East, especially those in Libya our next door neighbour that has been so badly influenced by the presence of militias; then he needs to stop the propaganda and political activism designed against Cairo from Turkey; and he needs to stop causing instability around the Mediterranean, he stated.

If Erdogan was to do this, Salah said, then it is my assessment that Egypt would reciprocate.

Egypt, in Salah's opinion, is not at a die-hard quarrel with Turkey. On the contrary, he said, Egypt had been willing to build bridges and work with Turkey as indicated by the 2010 agreements between the two countries. After the January Revolution, he added, there was a moment when Cairo and Ankara got particularly close with the rule of Mohamed Morsi in 2012 and then they got particularly at odds with the ouster of Morsi.

According to Salah, the sooner Erdogan comes to terms with the fact that he stands no chance of helping the Muslim Brotherhood back in power in Egypt, the easiest he would make it for himself to mend fences with Egypt.

Salah admits that this optimism about a U-turn in Erdogans foreign policy and about a possible Egyptian-Turkish rapprochement is not something that many informed diplomats and analysts would share with him. However, he still thinks there is a possiblity for improvement out of his own judgement on Erdogans political pragmatism.

Moreover, according to Salah, it is totally wrong for anyone to think that if Erdogan was to accommodate Egypt's demands, in relation to political intervention in Egyptian affairs and military intervention in Libyan and also in Syrian affairs, that Egypt would hesitate to reciprocate in view of its close alliance with the UAE that is perceived by many political commentators as jockeying to compete with Turkey over Sunni leadership  albeit in a soft style that is inspired by aide, both financial and political.

This is nonsense; Egypt is no proxy for anyone; Egypt is a leading country in this region and I am sure that Erdogan and all politicians in Turkey, be they his supporters or opponents, know very well that when all is said and done Egypt is the big prize, he argued.

On the European front, he added, Erdogan who projected a wish to join the EU in order to apply the Copenhagen criteria that helped him put the military power under the executive power turned around to the point that he openly and repeatedly threatened the European governments with sending waves of Syrian refugees that had found their way in Turkey.

If Erdogan managed to improve his foreign relations and seize his support of the militant Islamist groups that he is in direct cooperation with, then there is a possibility for him to work a way out of the current economic crisis that cannot be resolved by just depending on Qatar and some mega Islamist businessmen.

Moreover, Salah added, by U-turning on foreign policy and giving a positive push to the economy, Erdogan could well overcome his internal political dilemma that had forced him to get into an electoral bargain with the ultra-nationalists in the 2018 parliamentary elections and had cost his party in 2019 the seat of the mayor of Istanbul, despite all the political tricks.

I think it was very significant that Erdogans party lost Istanbul, not just for Erdogan whose success story started when he was mayor of Istanbul, but also for the Justice and Development Party whose leaders know very well the political significance of the seat of the mayor of Istanbul, he argued.

Salah is convinced that Erdogan must be aware of the fact that the scope of apprehension over his regional policies is widening to include countries like Algeria and Morocco, who have traditionally had no quarrel with him over his assumed Islamism. He must also be aware that he had to make more compromises than he wished in Libya upon the intervention of Russia and the US, who clearly told him to pull back his forces upon the Egyptian announcement that Cairo would not tolerate the presence of militias in Libya starting the Sirte-Juffra line, some 1,000 kilometres to the west of Egypt. And he must be aware that his military presence in Syria and Iraq is not sustainable.

So it is clear that he needs to make a U-turn; I think he will, but I am not sure exactly when or how, Salah concluded.

Last year, Salah released a book on his mission in Turkey. Kont Safiran Lada Al-Sultan (I was an Ambassador to the Sultan) was published by Nahdet Misr, in Cairo.

In around 300 pages, with endless detailed accounts and anecdotes, Salah shared his memories as the ambassador of Egypt in Turkey during the high and low moments of cooperation  with a particular emphasis on the Morsi presidency.

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United Nations, Sep 26 : Presenting India as a global power for universal good, Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched his 'pharmadiplomacy', promising the world on Saturday that the nation's vaccine manufacturing capability will "help all humanity" in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic while assuring global leaders whose worries about its availability has been a dominant concern at the UN General Assembly.

"As the largest vaccine producing country of the world ... India's vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis," Modi said in his pre-recorded speech to the high-level meeting of the UN General Assembly.

"India will also help all the countries in enhancing their cold chain and storage capacities for the delivery of the vaccines," he added offering help with a crucial aspect of its delivery around the developing countries.

As the world's pharmacy with a huge manufacturing capacity, India has a special role in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic even though it is not at the forefront of developing an indigenous vaccine.

It has supplied hydroxychloroquine to countries around the world, including the United States.

Vaccine manufacturers like Serum Institute of India are manufacturing millions of doses of vaccines ahead of the completion of trials and approval process to be ready to ship at the green signal taking a huge financial risk.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said at the opening of the high-level session, "Some countries are reportedly making side deals exclusively for their own populations. Such 'vaccinationalism' is not only unfair, it is self-defeating." The availability of a vaccine has been worrying developing and developed countries alike. Several countries said they were concerned with vaccine hoarding and profiteering.

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrision said on Friday, "Whoever finds the vaccine must share it. This is a global responsibility and it's a moral responsibility for a vaccine to be shared far and wide." Mauritius Prime Minister Pravind Kumar Jugnauth, who followed Modi, also agreed. Modi's message is to reassure everyone that vaccines will be available to them.

India has a record of pharmadiplomacy as it has almost single-handedly helped African countries combat AIDS with affordable medication.

More than two-thirds of medications to treat HIV are supplied by India.

(Arul Louis can be reached at arul.l@ians.in and followed on Twitter at @arulouis)
The Gujarat government- organised Navratri festival will not be celebrated this year in view of the COVID-19 pandemic, Chief Minister Vijay Rupanisaid on Saturday. However, the government has not yet clarified its stand on whether Navratri celebrations, marked by 'garba'dance, will be allowed to be organised by individuals.

"The nine-day traditional state-level Navratri festival, organised by the state government every year will not be celebrated in the larger public interest due to the prevailing COVID-19 pandemic situation this year," a release quoted Chief Minister Vijay Rupani as saying. The festival was supposed to be held between October17 and October 25.

The government's decision comes at a time when the state has reported over 1.3 lakh confirmed coronavirus cases and more than 3,400 deaths. The state-level garba function, held at GMDC Ground in Ahmedabad every year, was started by Prime Minister Narendra Modi when he was chief minister of Gujarat.

The PM had participated in the festival last year and performed 'aarti' at the GMDC ground.
Parents of stillborn babies will have access to new bereavement payments under changes to support for families dealing with the personal, social and financial impacts after the loss of a child.

The Morrison government will commit $7.6 million in next week's federal budget to ensure that all families who experience a stillbirth or the death of a child under 12 months of age receive $3606 in support payments.

Parents of stillborn babies will soon be given expanded leave entitlements. Credit:

The payments, designed to help parents cope with the costs of a stillborn child such as funerals and burials, has attracted growing criticism because of the inconsistent way it was applied depending on the circumstances of a baby's death.

The change will introduce a single payment rate to parents who were previously only eligible for a bereavement payment if a baby's heart beat after birth. The rate of the Stillborn Baby Payment was also lower for a second or subsequent stillbirth.
Walking the talk on mental health By ParamieJayakody View(s): View(s):

Pedestrians across Colombo were recently treated to a rare sight of over a hundred people walking and talking, bearing signs and banners encouraging more people to TALK and Walk.

Walking all the way from Galle Face to Independence Square, the walk met up with a host of riders as they reached the square, tired, spent, but content with their efforts for a noble cause.

The Courage Compassion Commitment foundation, founded in 2003 by Jetha Devapura is a registered Non Profit Charitable organization run by volunteers based in Sri Lanka and Australia to provide services in the areas of mental wellbeing and cancer care.

They are the team behind the CCC line, 1333, Sri Lankas only toll free crisis hotline that operates 24/7 in all three languages. We believe that empowering people to step Out of the Shadows and talk about their problems is fundamental in reducing the stigma associated with social and mental health issues, says Mr. Ranil Thilakarathne, Manager of the CCCline.

1333 is a volunteer run operation, and answers more than 25000 calls a year. They also have an annual bikeathon where bikers cycle across Sri Lanka, travelling 1333km in thirteen days with the aim of spreading awareness and reaching out.

This year, their route began with them journeying to Chilaw and ending at Colombo Independence Square on September 10, commemorating the end of their journey on World Suicide Prevention Day.

Joining them at their concluding ceremony were the participants of Lets TALK and Walk the newest initiative of the team where they recognize that mental and physical health go hand in hand, and invites everyone to walk and talk about their problems. Lets Talk & Walk was held by the CCC foundation and CCC line in collaboration with lifeline international and the international association for suicide prevention. Joining them in their efforts for raising awareness were various Rotary Clubs, Rotaract Clubs, Interact Clubs, and Leo Clubs, all united in their passion for making a better future.

Their efforts concluded with a ceremony at Independence Square, where the bikeathon riders were presented with certificates and their efforts acknowledged. It was also attended by special invitees Ashanthi De Alwis and Randhir Withana, who joined the walk in support as well. The evening ended with a candlelight vigil.

Pix courtesy 1333 team
resident Vladimir Putin of Russia on Friday proposed a truce with the United States in cyberspace, without acknowledging that his country has repeatedly used cybertechniques to attack elections from the Ukraine to the United States, stolen emails from the Defense Department to the White House, and developed some of the worlds most sophisticated disinformation efforts.

Putin issued an unusual written statement outlining a four-point plan for what he called a reboot in the relationship between the United States and Russia in the field of information security. Moscow and Washington, he wrote, should issue guarantees of nonintervention into the internal affairs of each other, including into electoral processes.

He urged a bilateral agreement on preventing incidents in the information space, modeled on Cold War-era arms control treaties.

But beyond the conciliatory language, Putins statement offered no hint that Moscow was prepared to make any specific concessions on its greatly accelerated use of cyberweapons over the past decade  sometimes directly, sometimes through proxies. Russia continues to deny interfering in American politics, while insisting that the United States meddles in Russian politics by backing opponents of Putin.

As we have said more than once, there is no basis for claims that Russia has meddled in American elections, Russias foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, said in his own statement on Friday. We are in favor of a professional and constructive discussion of all existing problems and claims at the negotiating table.

President Donald Trump has said repeatedly that he is tempted to believe Putins insistence that Russia had no role in the 2016 election, although the spokesman for the National Security Council, John Ullyot, dismissed Putins offer on Friday.

It is hard to take such statements seriously when Russia, China, Iran and others have sought to undermine our election process, Ullyot said, following Trump in suggesting the problem goes beyond Russia.

It is possible that this offer is a further effort by Russia to create divisions in the United States, he said.

Russia has floated similar proposals before, including when Putin met with Trump in Helsinki, Finland, in 2018. Trump warmed to them at first, saying he would work with Russia to create an impenetrable cybersecurity unit designed to assure that election hacking, and many other negative things, will be guarded and safe.

But Trumps declaration was mocked by many, including some members of the presidents own staff, who asked how the United States would jointly patrol cyberspace with one of the worlds leaders in cyberespionage. Around the same time, the United States was placing malware inside Russias electric grid and making no effort to hide it, in hopes of deterring Moscow from attacking the American grid.

It was not clear if Putin was calling for the reset because of the intense focus on Russian activity around the 2020 election, or because firms like Microsoft have identified continued Russian attacks, some from groups linked to the military and Russian intelligence agencies.

This time, Putin is calling for a reset less than six weeks before an American presidential election that could put an outspoken critic of the Kremlin  former Vice President Joe Biden  in the White House. The move appeared at least in part to be an attempt to present a friendlier face in response to American officials recent statements that Russia had mounted clandestine efforts to weaken Biden in the presidential race.

Christopher Wray, the director of the FBI, warned last week that Russia was actively pursuing a disinformation campaign against Biden. That led to a rebuke of Wray from Trump. And a recent CIA analysis concluded that it was likely Putin was continuing to approve and direct interference operations aimed at raising Trumps reelection chances.

Its possible that in the Kremlin they understand that Biden is likely to win, said Andrei Kortunov, director general of the Russian International Affairs Council, a research organization close to the Russian government. They are preparing for a Democratic administration that could be even tougher toward Russia than a Republican one.

Both Russia and China have periodically proposed cybersecurity treaties, including requirements that everyone logging into the internet be required to use their true identity. While such proposals might limit illicit activity  if they could be enforced  they would also make it easier for the worlds autocrats to hunt down dissidents.

Two Russian political analysts with ties to the Kremlin said in interviews Friday that even if Putins proposal was a genuine attempt at improving the relationship with Washington, they did not expect it to go anywhere. Kortunov said Putin had not signaled that he was ready to give any substantial ground in the dispute over election interference.

Its obvious that the Kremlin would, of course, prefer not to quarrel with Washington, no matter the election result, Kortunov said, noting the risk of a President Biden seeking to impose new sanctions on Russia. But they would like to avoid these challenges without paying a serious price.

Fyodor Lukyanov, a Moscow foreign-policy analyst who advises the Kremlin, said Fridays cybersecurity proposal underscored that Putin is now in a far more conciliatory mood than he was at the height of the Ukraine crisis five years ago. But he said American distrust of Russia was so deep that he did not expect Putins proposal to be taken seriously in Washington  and that relations could take another step downward if Biden wins the presidency.
Fujifilm Holdings Corp said Monday it has completed delayed clinical tests of Avigan, a potential treatment for COVID-19, paving the way for the application of sales and production of the antivirus drug.

Fujifilm Toyama Chemical Co, a subsidiary of Fujifilm Holdings, is conducting analysis of data from the tests to confirm the safety and efficacy of Avigan, which could be the third drug for the treatment of novel coronavirus patients if approved by the government.

In Japan, the antiviral drug remdesivir developed by U.S. firm Gilead Sciences Inc was given the green light in May, followed by the steroid drug dexamethasone.

Fujifilm Toyama began clinical tests in March to see if Avigan was effective in treating patients with the respiratory disease caused by the virus and they were initially expected to end by June. But it was delayed as a downtrend in the number of new infection cases in the country made it difficult to gather enough patient data, targeted at 96.
The National Democratic Party (NDP) is set to outdoor a running mate for the party's flagbearer Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings, tomorrow, Saturday, September 26.

The General Secretary of the Party, Alhaji Mohammed Frimpong, hinted that the outdooring of the running mate will be followed by a seminar that will have the participation of the party's delegates from across the country.

Tomorrow we will be outdooring our running mate to the flagbearer and that will also organise a seminar that our delegate will be attending from the region.

He added that As part of our strategies, we will have our select group of delegates comprising parliamentary candidates and communication officers converging at this venue. It will be a ceremony preceding the seminar.

About NDP

The National Democratic Party is a political party founded in October 2012 by Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings, wife of former President Jerry John Rawlings.

She was formerly a high ranking member of the National Democratic Congress before breaking away.

Mrs. Rawlings was acclaimed as flagbearer of the NDP at the Party's third National Delegates Conference in Accra where she received an overwhelming endorsement.

Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings charged members of the party to work hard to secure parliamentary seats for the party in the upcoming polls.

She added that the partys target is to win 15 out of the 47 parliamentary seats in the Ashanti Region in the 2020 general elections.

In 2012, the Electoral Commission disqualified her and 11 other presidential candidates for failing to meet requirements before the September 30 deadline to file nomination documents.

She contested again in 2016 on the ticket of the NDP.

This makes it the second time she is running for the presidency as flagbearer of the party.

---citinewsroom
Thirty-one years after Bill and Ted first went on their Excellent Adventure, and 29 years after that Bogus Journey, the OG slacker dudes are back in a third instalment, Bill and Ted Face the Music (released in August). The bandmates (Keanu Reeves, Alex Winter) have travelled through time, performed on Mars, and vibed over 80s counterculture. Theyve peaced out with the Grim Reaper too. And yet, Face the Music has new adventures. The two men are still best buds but theyre now middle-aged, the bands struggling, their marriages are unravelling. This time, their daughters help them unite the world. Its just one of the ways in which the buddy movie has changed. Take a look

High-school chumaraderie

Last years surprise hit, Booksmart, dropped cliche campus concerns like getting laid (and getting competitive about it). Instead the geeky girls decide to break all the rules and party on the last night before graduation. Here, the friendship between Molly and Amy is the real love story. The girls are each others cheerleaders, telling each other, You take my breath away or You have no right to be so beautiful.

Jackson Healy (Russell Crowe), and a down-on-his-luck private eye, Holland March (Ryan Gosling) start out as foes, then team up to solve a mystery in The Nice Guys.

Buddies, a dad and a daughter

The Nice Guys was filmed in 2016 but has a 70s feel. Our bumbling buddies are goon Jackson Healy (Russell Crowe), and a down-on-his-luck private eye, Holland March (Ryan Gosling), investigating the suspicious suicide of a porn star. They start out as foes, then team up to solve the mystery. But not before they deliver the laughs. Gosling, a single dad, is a weeper and worrier. Unusually for a crime caper, his teen daughter Holly also gets roped into the adventure  doing her best to save daddy from the bad guys.

Losers take it all

In The Other Guys (2010), disgraced detectives Allen Gamble (Will Ferell) and Terry Hoitz (Mark Wahlberg) stumble upon a financial scam  a rare chance to abandon desk duty and become top dogs. Both buddies are uncool. Ever wondered what life is like for the cops always clapping in the background? Well, now you can take a look.

In The Heat, when law enforcers Sarah Ashburn (Sandra Bullock) and Shannon Mullins (Melissa McCarthy) first meet, they do not take to each other, but move on to grudging respect and, eventually, friendship.

Women cops get a piece of the action

Action comedy The Heat (2013) features Sandra Bullock as an uptight Fed raised in foster homes and Melissa McCarthy as a tough-talking Boston cop. Naturally they grudgingly join forces to try to bring down a mobster. This is a buddy film that segues into a sisterhood film. Sparks fly, so do savage putdowns, before they move on to a grudging respect for each other and, eventually, friendship. The film ends with McCarthy having signed the back of Bullocks yearbook, Foster kid, now you have a sister.

Frenemies go back to school

21 Jump Street, the 2012 film based on the popular 1987 series that launched Johnny Depp, gets Morton Schmidt (Jonah Hill) and Greg Jenko (Channing Tatum) to go undercover as high-school students to investigate a campus drug ring. But the two cops werent friends in school. Worse, one has all the smarts and failed the physical at the police academy, the other is all brawn and little brain. The two renegotiate their own relationship as they uncover whos cooking up a crazy new pill.

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Andre Calantzopoulos, CEO of Philip Morris International (PMI) (NYSE: PM), today delivered high-level remarks at the 2020 Concordia Annual Summit. Calantzopoulos discussed the impact that uncertainty, polarization, hyperpartisanship, and ideology are having on international efforts to overcome pressing global issues. He called for science to be protected from politicization and highlighted the importance of developing open dialogues based on factual scientific objectivity. Calantzopoulos shared PMIs belief that with the right regulatory encouragement and support from civil society, cigarette sales can end within 10 to 15 years in many countries.

The Concordia Annual Summit, which coincides with the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) meeting, convenes the worlds most prominent business, government, and nonprofit leaders to foster dialogue and enable effective partnerships for positive social impact.

Excerpts of the remarks by Andre Calantzopoulos follow:

Reflecting on the state of our world today and the challenges ahead, four words come to mind: Uncertainty. Polarization. Hyperpartisanship. Ideology.

These words are not new, but with the COVID crisis, they have gained prominence, moving beyond traditionally contentious sectors such as ours and into the mainstream.

The lockdowns that sent us into our homes earlier this year, the continued uncertainty we all feel, and the immense socioeconomic pressure caused by the pandemic have increased tensions and reinforced the polarization of both private views and the public discourse.

And while these past months have revealed how much can be accomplished when people work together, the tendency of individuals to put their self-centered impulses ahead of community wellness remains on display.

Divisivenessa binary choosing of sidesnot only hinders progress but threatens to thwart it.

Maybe there is no silver-bullet solutionbut to focus on respect for and adherence to facts, dialogue, inclusion, and science could help immensely. It is not enough, however, to simply say follow the facts and the science and expect progress to unfold. COVID-19 is just the latest example that proves a tragic truth: Science can be, and is being, weaponized to suit narrow agendas. Science and facts are being held hostageand distortedby politics, and people are suffering as a result.

As a society, we are experiencing a confluence of global existential threats. These threats require collective, multilateral discussions and cooperationand that can only be achieved through a commitment to open dialogue.

Absent a commitment to factual scientific objectivityfree of agenda-driven politicswe risk the very real and terrifying prospect of vaccine nationalism, an inability to tackle climate change at scale, and a narrowed chance of delivering solutions that create a fairer and more equitable world.

In a global world, in a global economic and human system, whether we like it or not, there is no solution in isolation. Individual governments or companies alone cannot bring the necessary change. If we want to make the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals a reality, if we want to protect our populations from the pandemic, including implementing a viable vaccine, we must work together. And most important, we must involve the 7.8 billion people on this planet. How do we do this? We tell them what the real problems areoffering the full facts; we propose solutions they can adopt or adapt; and we incentivize them to act in accordance with this new knowledge. We wont succeed by keeping them in the dark, by confusing them, or by misleading them.

Being at the helm of the largest multinational tobacco company as it transforms to deliver a smoke-free future, I experience firsthand how detrimental polarization is to making real progressin this case, progress in eradicating smoking. And, as a reminder, this concerns more than 1 billion men and women who smoke around the world.

Today, science-based, innovative products that do not involve combustion offer a better alternative for those men and women who would otherwise continue to smoke. To be clear: These products are not risk-free. And the best choice is never to start smoking or to quit tobacco and nicotine altogether. But for those adults who would otherwise continue to smoke, scientifically validated smoke-free products are a much better choice than cigarettes.

A future in which cigarettes are obsolete is within reach. In fact, with the right regulatory encouragement and support from civil society, we believe cigarette sales can end within 10 to 15 years in many countries. Yes, thats right: an end to cigarettes within 10 to 15 years in many countries.

Unfortunately, political agendas and ideology are slowing progress and keeping millions of people uninformed. Rather than holding an evidence-based conversation on how best to regulate these innovative products to help adult smokers leave cigarettes behind, we are often faced with an ideologically driven resistance from some public health organizations and some NGOs. These organizations allow disinformation to appear as legitimate science. They put dogma before data, and they expend more energy on attacking a company than on helping the human beings who should be at the center of the debate.

Poorly executed scientific studies, skewed results shaped by bias, and misleading media headlines are now the norm.

What is the result? Many adults who smoke are confused about these better alternatives and so continue to use cigarettesthe most harmful way of consuming nicotine. This is inexcusable. We must ask: Who will take responsibility for denying these adults access to and accurate information about science-backed innovations? Who will be held responsible for the real-world consequences of dogmatic thinking?

The issues created by uncertainty, polarization, hyperpartisanship, and ideology are not unique to the tobacco sector. From climate change to food security, we need fact-based conversations and a collaborative, multinational, multi-stakeholder approach to deliver real change. The public has a right to decision-making and information based in science. We cannot allow politically driven, well-funded individuals to prevent the worlds citizens from learning about and accessing smart solutions. Whether we are talking about vaccines, carbon emissions, or tobacco harm reduction, we need science, not rhetoric, to inform policies and regulations.

Science unites. It has the power to open borders and minds and bring progress. It can propel innovation.

For Philip Morris International, science has changed our company and is transforming our industry. I am proud to come before you today to say that, already, more than 11.2 million people have switched to our main smoke-free product and stopped smoking. Many more have switched to other smoke-free alternatives that are better than continued smoking. This is a profound public health achievement.

Governments across the worldin Greece, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and beyondare beginning to validate the role better alternatives to continued smoking can play. Earlier this year, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration authorized our electronically heated tobacco system, IQOS, as a modified risk tobacco product. In doing so, the agency found that an exposure modification order is appropriate to promote the public health.

But a smoke-free future is not yet guaranteed. Ridding the world of cigarettes will require adherence to science, objectivity, collaboration, and a commitment to accelerate information to the people most directly concerned.

Many years ago, our industry was challenged to create a better alternative to cigarettes. PMI answered that call. We have transformed our entire company to devise and produce scientifically substantiated better products with the aim of delivering a smoke-free future. Science, data, and fact have led us here.

People who smoke are responding to our efforts. With the right regulations and related information, they could switch out of cigarettes much faster. Lets put these peoplenot politicsat the center of policymaking.

Science secures progress. It secures solutions. It brings hope at a time when global challenges are so great they threaten to overwhelm. We should not allow science to be politicized and polarized.

Philip Morris International: Delivering a Smoke-Free Future

Philip Morris International (PMI) is leading a transformation in the tobacco industry to create a smoke-free future and ultimately replace cigarettes with smoke-free products to the benefit of adults who would otherwise continue to smoke, society, the company, and its shareholders. PMI is a leading international tobacco company engaged in the manufacture and sale of cigarettes, as well as smoke-free products and associated electronic devices and accessories, and other nicotine-containing products in markets outside the United States. In addition, PMI ships a version of its IQOS Platform 1 device and its consumables authorized by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to Altria Group, Inc. for sale in the U.S. under license. PMI is building a future on a new category of smoke-free products that, while not risk-free, are a much better choice than continuing to smoke. Through multidisciplinary capabilities in product development, state-of-the-art facilities, and scientific substantiation, PMI aims to ensure that its smoke-free products meet adult consumer preferences and rigorous regulatory requirements. PMIs smoke-free IQOS product portfolio includes heat-not-burn and nicotine-containing vapor products. As of June 30, 2020, PMI estimates that approximately 11.2 million adult smokers around the world have already stopped smoking and switched to PMIs heat-not-burn product, available for sale in 57 markets in key cities or nationwide under the IQOS brand. For more information, please visit www.pmi.com and www.pmiscience.com.

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(Newser)  Searchers combing the area where a Ukrainian military aircraft crashed found two more bodies Saturday, bringing the death toll to 26. The plane, a twin-turboprop Antonov AN-26 belonging to the Ukrainian air force, was carrying a crew of seven and 20 cadets from a military aviation school when it crashed and burst into flames Friday night while coming in for a landing at the airport in Chuhuiv, about 250 miles east of the capital Kyiv, per the AP. Two people initially survived the crash, but one later died in a hospital. No cause for the crash has been determined. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky declared Saturday to be a day of mourning for the crash victims and ordered that flights of AN-26 planes be halted pending an investigation into the cause of the crash. Zelensky also called for a full assessment of the condition of the country's military equipment.

story continues below

The AN-26 is a transport plane used by both military and civilian operators. Nearly 1,400 of the planes were manufactured from 1969 to 1986, according to the company's website. Defense Minister Andrei Taran said the plane that crashed was built in 1977. Prime Minister Denis Shygal called for an official report on the crash by Oct. 25. "Yesterday we lost young cadets and experienced military men, who had their whole lives and, I am sure, more than one military feat ahead of them," Zelensky said in a statement released by his office. "The whole country will mourn today with their families." Deputy Defense Minister Igor Starobinsky said the families of the dead would each be paid a compensation of about $55,000.

(Read more Ukraine stories.)
By Express News Service

BHOPAL: A racket, that brought minor and young girls from Bangladesh, Bihar, West Bengal, and Maharashtra and then allegedly pushed them into prostitution, was busted in Indore on Saturday.

As many as 13 young girls, including at least nine Bangladeshi nationals, were freed from a locked room of a hotel in the posh Vijay Nagar area of Indore.

Ten accused including two women have been arrested for operating the sex racket.

As per Indore police sources, two young aspiring female models from Mumbai and West Bengal had recently reported to the Vijay Nagar police in Indore, about having been brought to Indore by a woman event manager under the guise of modeling assignments.

Once in Indore, the two models were physically tortured and forced into the sex racket. A case of rape, kidnapping, and extortion was registered in that matter. During the investigations, a much larger sex racket came to the fore following which a hotel in Vijay Nagar area was raided, and 13 girls aged between 16 to 30 years were freed, DIG-Indore Harinarayanchari Mishra told The New Indian Express on Saturday.

The subsequent probe has revealed that at least nine of the rescued girls and women were Bangladeshi nationals, who were illegally brought to India for jobs, but were later pushed into prostitution.

A case of human trafficking has been registered at the citys Lasudiya police station and 10 persons, including two women, have been arrested. The arrested persons are natives of Indore and adjoining districts who operated the sex racket with the help of social media platforms and apps, the Indore DIG added.
It's a busy Saturday in Kansas City but tense exchange of bullets is a good place to start worrying about the fate of this cowtown as violence and civil unrest escalate.



Checkit:



KCTV5: Authorities investigating officer-involved shooting near 63rd, Swope

KMBC: KCPD investigating officer involved shooting

KSHB:KCPD officer shoots person near Swope Parkway

Deets:



"Saturday afternoon near E. 63rd Street and Swope Parkway . . . Police say both the suspect and the officer fired shots. The suspect was left with non-life-threatening injuries. The officer was not injured in this incident."

Developing . . .
Tributes have been paid this week to Edgeworthstown community employment worker Seamus Gilchrist on foot of his retirement after more than three decades of unwavering local service.

The much admired and well respected community activist stepped down from his role as activities co-ordinator at the mid Longford town's hugely popular civic amenity, 'The Green'.

Having started out as a Community Employment employee in the late 1980s, for the past 20 years Seamus has occupied the role of activities co-ordinator, a post and sense of responsibility which local Heritage Hero Matt Farrell attested to during a presentation earlier this week.

Today we are celebrating the retirement of Seamus Glchrist," said Mr Farrell. "Although many people played their part over the years Seamus has remained with us for over thirty years, firstly as a worker in the Fas Community Employment Scheme and for the last twenty years as activities co-ordinator.

"During this period, he has approached his task with a positive attitude to improve the quality of life of the mostly young people who viewed the Green as a place to meet and generally have some fun. Seamus has seen many young people grow up and pass through.

"We have no doubt that all owe a debt of gratitude to him for the way he managed the facility.

"He used his unique qualities to guide these young people in the right path. Indeed, one of these, a very successful young man in Australia recently got in touch to acknowledge the benefits he received from his time spent during his summers on the Green.

"Seamus also had the unique ability to defuse any situation that might arise without causing a big fuss."
New Delhi, Sep 26 : In a big change in its business strategy, the country's largest coal-fired power producer NTPC proposes to completely stop land acquisition for green field thermal projects and rather look for reducing its carbon footprint through aggressive renewable energy push.

"We have taken the decision not to acquire any further land for green field thermal projects in near future and the focus will be on reducing the carbon foot print," NTPC chairman Gurdeep Singh said in a statement to the shareholders at a recently concluded AGM.

As part of its initiative to transform itself into a renewable player, NTPC has also decided to set up a separate green focused subsidiary.

By 2032, state-owned NTPC plans to add 32 GW of renewable generation capacity to its portfolio through organic and inorganic routes. Non-fossil fuel-based generation capacity will make up nearly 30 per cent of its portfolio, which, at present, is less than 10 per cent. Short term target is to reach 10 GW of renewable capacity up to 2022.

"In order to get access to large tracts of land for RE projects, discussions are in progress with state governments of Gujarat, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh for allocation of land parcels for setting up of renewable projects. These would be developed under Ultra Mega Renewable Energy Power Parks scheme of the government of India," the company chairman informed the shareholders.

NTPC plans to become a 130 GW power producing company by 2032 investing over Rs 1 lakh crore ($14 billion) by 2024.

The capacity will have a diversified fuel mix of 65.4 per cent coal, 4.6 per cent gas, 1.5 per cent nuclear, and 28.5 per cent renewable energy, including hydel generation capacity. The firms' total thermal generation capacity is around 57 GW, and the shift in focus is to ensure long-term sustainability.

Recently, it issued a tender to enlist engineering, procurement, and construction vendors for floating and ground-mounted solar projects in the country. It also floated a request for proposal to acquire 1 GW of operational solar projects across India.

The company has also invited interested entities to invest in setting up manufacturing parks in surplus land with it a operational power projects.
Judge Amy Coney Barrett (pictured) is said to be President Trump's presumptive nominee for Supreme Court justice

Democrats are being warned against using presumptive US Supreme Court nominee Judge Amy Coney Barrett's Catholic faith against her if questioning her during confirmation hearings.

Reports have indicated that Barrett, 48, is Trump's pick to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died September 18.

Barrett was Trump's nominee for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in Chicago, a position she has held since 2017.

She's also a mother of seven - to five biological and two adopted children - and a devout Roman Catholic, a fact that her detractors have used against her because they believe that she won't be able to keep her religious views separate from her judicial opinions.

Former Sen. Joe Lieberman said Friday that it would be a mistake for Democrats to focus too hard on Barrett's Catholicism during potential confirmation hearings because it would 'hurt her opponents.'

Lieberman told Fox News that, 'You can disagree with somebody based on whether they're pro-life or pro-choice, but when you start to say that you're against them because their religion, in this case their Roman Catholicism, determines their point of view, you're doing something really abhorrent that I think is bigoted, is un-American, and incidentally, is unconstitutional.'

Liberman also said that, 'In America, we don't question anybody who's seeking an office of public trust based on their religion - that's what America's all about.'

Former Sen. Joe Lieberman said in a new interview that focusing too hard on Barrett's Catholic faith during her potential confirmation hearings would be damaging for Democrats

In 2017, during Barrett's confirmation hearing for her Court of Appeals seat, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat (pictured), told the judge that 'the dogma lives loudly within you'

During the interview, Lieberman, a former Democrat-turned-Independent, noted that Article VI of the US Constitution states that 'you can't apply a religious test for any office of public trust in America. That's how wise and fair the people who wrote the Constitution were.'

When it was pointed out that Democrats had rallied around Catholic John F. Kennedy when he was running for president, Liberman said that 'JFK was a great hero and inspiration for my generation to get into public service.'

He added that 'we really broke a barrier that I'd hate to see us come back and see someone like Judge Barrett, if she's nominated tomorrow, face again.'

Part of the attention on whether Barrett's Catholicism will be a factor during potential confirmation hearings can be traced back to her 2017 hearing for her Court of Appeals seat.

During one exchange, California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat, questioned whether Barrett would be able to keep her faith separate from her legal opinions.

'The conclusion one draws is that the dogma lives loudly within you,' Feinstein said, adding 'that's of concern when you come to big issues that large numbers of people have fought for years in this country.'

Critics are concerned that Barrett (in an undated photo), a devout Catholic, will not be able to separate her faith from her judicial opinions and may attempt to roll back abortionrights

One issue in particular that progressives at the time were worried about was whether Barrett would attempt to roll back abortion rights.

Lieberman said that, 'I thought Sen. Feinstein's question in that case was really improper, and was biased really.'

He added that, 'Everybody brings to the Senate, to the Congress, to [the] Supreme Court experiences and beliefs that they have.'

Following word that Barrett appeared to be Trump's presumptive Supreme Court pick, CNN asked Feinstein if she would question Barrett on her Catholicism again, but Feinstein declined to answer, responding instead, 'I'm not going to go there.'

Sen. Mazie Hirono, a Democrat from Hawaii, who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee told the news organization Tuesday that Barrett's religious views shouldn't be off-limits.

But, Hirono also said that, in 2017, it wasn't specifically Barrett's religious views that was the issue, it's 'anybody's views that they bring to their decision making.'

'So they keep telling us that none of the things they wrote or said yesterday should infringe on their decision, but how can we be assured that they can be objective?' Hirono asked.

'Why should we say you get a lifetime appointment so that you can reflect your ideological agenda in your decision making?'

Another Judicial Committee member, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, Democrat from Rhode Island, also said Tuesday that 'a person's religious views or background should not make any difference so long as it's clear that they can leave that personal background at the robing room door, and give impartial justice to whomever is before them irrespective of whether the personal religious views might dictate something different than the law.'

Durbin told CNN that should Barrett come before them for a confirmation hearing, 'Democrats needed to 'take care that we respect the Constitution, that we ask her probative questions, respectful questions and make certain the American people understand where any nominee stands.'

Lieberman told Fox News that: 'If Judge Barrett is nominated by the president, I hope and pray - I literally mean in this case pray - that senators who question her are not at all affected by her devotion to her Roman Catholic faith.'

The self-described 'religiously observant Jew' said that he respected Barrett for her devotion and that the senators 'ought to judge her on her judicial opinions and her legal testimony before the Judiciary Committee.'

Earlier in the week, Sen. Joe Manchin, a Democrat from West Virginia, had said that he intended to vote 'no' for Barrett if she was nominated - not because of her potential religious and judicial conflict, but because of concerns about Republicans trying to cram in a confirmation so close to the 2020 Presidential Election.

When asked by CNN about the 2017 Feinstein 'dogma' remark, Manchin pointed out that he's Catholic.

'Religion should not play a part,' he said. 'I don't know why that was ever brought up. And she's, she believes what she believes; I believe what I believe.'

Feinstein declined to elaborate on what the Democrats' plan would be if Barrett should get Trump's nomination. Instead, she said, 'Let's wait till she's nominated.'

Advocacy group leaders Friday have already made their stances on Barrett known, issuing statements condemning her as the potential choice for a new Supreme Court justice.

'If confirmed, Judge Amy Coney Barrett will unleash a Supreme Court majority that is hostile to all of our basic civil rights, and the impact will be felt for decades,' LAMBDA Legal group head Kevin Jennings told Reuters.

'Judge Barrett's personal belief that marriage is between a man and a woman, coupled with her unwillingness to affirm that the Supreme Court's decision making marriage equality the law of the land is settled law, should sound the alarm for anyone who cares about LGBTQ people and their families.'

LGBT rights group president Alphonso David said that if Barrett 'is nominated and confirmed, Coney Barrett would work to dismantle all that Ruth Bader Ginsburg fought for during her extraordinary career.'

Meanwhle, Brett Hartl, the government affairs director for the Center for Biological Diversity called Barrett 'an ideological fanatic who lacks the temperament to rule fairly in the interests of all Americans.'

Hartl also noted that Barrett's 'slim judicial record shows that she's hostile to the environment and will slam shut the courthouse doors to public interest advocates, to the delight of corporate polluters. Environmental justice, our climate and wildlife on the brink of extinction will all suffer if Barrett is confirmed.'
There is no doubt that both Max Verstappen and Adrian Newey will still be at Red Bull in 2021.

That was the claim of team boss Christian Horner at Sochi, as he fended off rumours that Red Bull could be about to lose two of its biggest assets.

There have been rumours that Lawrence Stroll and Toto Wolff may be successfully convincing top F1 designer Newey to join Sebastian Vettel in switching camps to Aston Martin.

"The situation with Adrian is that he's been with us for 14 years and is very happy within the team," Horner insisted.

"He enjoys working in our environment, he's obviously taken more of a step back in more recent years but he's still motivated. He will absolutely be with the team next year - without any doubt," the Briton added.

Stability on the driver front also appears likely, with Red Bull having staunchly supported its under-fire second driver Alex Albon so far this season.

Horner said it is Red Bull's "intention" to keep the British-born Thai: "He just needs to build on the kind of performances he put in in Mugello."

As for Verstappen, there have been rumours that despite his contract through 2023, the Dutchman has various one-sided exit clauses that allow him to escape.

"Obviously the contract between the driver and the team is always going to be confidential," Horner said when asked about that.

"There will always be speculation regarding that but I'm 100 percent certain Max will be in a Red Bull Racing car next year."

(GMM)
Continued from Part I

With the onset of the new millennium, epidemics in Nepal saw a range of new diseases and their outbreaks. Some were highly communicable whereas many were non-communicable diseases. Some of the newer epidemics reported in Nepal are as follows:

1. TYPHOID

Photo: Medicinenet

Typhoid fever is a life-threatening infection that can lead to high fever, constipation or diarrhoea, nausea, abdominal pain, and vomiting. It is caused by the bacterium called Salmonella Typhi. The infection is spread through contaminated food and drinking water with the faeces of an infected person which enters into the gastrointestinal tract and begins to multiply showing different symptoms as mentioned earlier.

It was in 2002 when the typhoid fever first saw the outbreak in Nepal with over 6,000 cases recorded in Bharatpur in a span of seven weeks. After this, additional 112 cases of typhoid fever were reported in Dhulikhel Hospital the same year. Later in 2014, an outbreak of the disease was reported in Bajura district with over 50 daily cases.

The Nepal government has introduced two types of vaccines for the treatment of typhoid: the inactivated injectable vaccine (lasting two to three years), and the live attenuated oral vaccine (lasting five to seven years). Although these vaccines do not provide 100% protection, they will reduce the severity of the illness.

2. DENGUE

Dengue is a mosquito-borne single-stranded RNA virus infection that is caused by the four well-established serotypes of viruses (DENV 1-4) belonging to the Flaviviridae family. This disease emerges in the form of dengue fever (DF), dengue hemorrhagic fever (DHF), and dengue shock syndrome (DSS). The infection is transmitted through the bite of infected Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus or female mosquitoes that feed during the daytime. These mosquitoes are generally sourced around stagnant water bodies.

Dengue was reported in October 2004 for the first time in a Japanese traveller who had travelled to Nepal. In 2006, all the four serotypes of dengue virus were reported. But a major outbreak came only in 2016, where a total of 1,473 cases were reported from Chitwan, Jhapa, Rupandehi, and Makawanpur. Another large dengue outbreak was in 2019 with 14,442 cases from Kathmandu, Chitwan, Kaski, Rupandehi, and Makawanpur. Dengue also lacks a proper vaccine to date, but proper sanitation and vector control to curb breeding of mosquitoes are advised.

3. BIRD FLU

Photo: Wikimedia

Bird flu, also known as avian influenza, is an infectious disease caused by any of the influenza type A viruses that normally infect birds. Altogether, 16 different types of bird flu have been identified including H5N1, H7N9, and H1N1. This disease affects several types of birds, wild animals, and farmed poultry. This flu is spread to humans through saliva, nasal secretions, faeces, and feed of birds causing severe respiratory-related problems.

In January 2009, the bird flu (H5N1) virus outbreak was seen in the backyard of a poultry farm in a village of Jhapa. And, the first outbreak was confirmed in Kakarbhitta where 28,000 chickens in the area were killed to control the virus. Also, the first case of bird flu death in Nepal was on April 8, 2009, where a 21-year-old youth of Kavre died of bird flu. However, the highest number of outbreaks, 201 cases, was reported in the year 2013.

The best way to prevent bird flu is to avoid exposure to birds and their faeces whenever possible. For treatment, antiviral drugs such as oseltamivir (Tamiflu), and zanamivir (Relenza) are recommended for bird flu (type A).

4. HEPATITIS

Photo: News Medical

Hepatitis is inflammation of the liver tissues. It is caused by viruses such as hepatitis A, B, C, D, and E, whereas other causes include heavy alcohol use, certain medications, toxins, other infections, autoimmune diseases, and non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH). Hepatitis A and E are spread by contaminated food and water. Hepatitis B is sexually transmitted; hepatitis C spreads through infected blood; and lastly, hepatitis D is spread to the patients of hepatitis B.

In April 2014, an outbreak of hepatitis E first started in Biratnagar with 11 cases who visited hospitals with acute jaundice. In the next seven weeks, additional 1,861 patients reached the hospital complaining of acute jaundice, where 123 patients were admitted to the hospitals. Between April-May in 2014, HEV infected more than 6,000 individuals with 11 deaths in Biratnagar.

This disease is mainly associated with faecal contamination of drinking water.

The Nepal government with the aid of GAVI has introduced phase-wise Hepatitis B vaccine programmes from 2002 to 2004. It is currently administered as a pentavalent vaccine along with Hemophilus influenza B (HIB) and Diphtheria Pertussis and Tetanus (DPT) vaccines at six, 10, and 14 weeks of age.

5. SCRUB TYPHUS

Photo: University of California

Scrub typhus is a mite-borne disease which is caused by orientia tsutsugamushi which carries mites in their larval stage when they are chiggers that feed on forest and rural rodents including rats, voles, and field mice. The mites are both the vector and the natural reservoir for O.tsutsugamushi. Symptoms of this disease start suddenly after the incubation period of six to 21 days that include fever, chills, headache, and generalised lymphadenopathy.

Some reports claim the presence of scrub typhus in 1981, 2004, and 2007 in Nepal. However, the first outbreak of scrub typhus was officially reported only in 2015 when 101 cases were reported from 16 districts, with eight deaths. Again, in 2016, there was an outbreak where 18 deaths were reported with more than 800 cases in 47 districts.

As per now, there is no vaccine or preventive measures for scrub typhus in Nepal. However, doctors use antibiotic doxycycline to treat this disease. For fast recovery, these antibiotics are given soon after symptoms begin.

6. CHICKENPOX

Photo: Clinical Advisor

Chickenpox is a very contagious infection which is caused by the varicella-zoster virus. It causes an itchy rash with small, fluid-filled blisters. Blisters pop and start to leak over 10 to 21 days and after that, the crust and scab appear before healing which might take five to 10 days. Usually, chickenpox is milder, but in some cases, blisters can spread to the nose, mouth, eyes, and even genitals. Apart from children, chickenpox is highly contagious to people who have not had the disease or been vaccinated against it.

The first outbreak of chickenpox in Nepal was reported in 2015 in Baidauli VDC of Nawalparasi, where 55 cases from 27 households were affected by chickenpox. This outbreak continued for 45 days. The number of cases rapidly rose after the detection of the primary case. The chickenpox vaccine is called the varicella vaccine made from a live but weakened virus.
Im not the sort of person who has encounters with the police. In fact, its only happened once. I was 21, an undergraduate at Cambridge, and clearly in the wrong. Its the contrast between how the British police treated me on that occasion and the behaviour of the Delhi police today that I want to point out.

With a group of friends, I was returning from Benazir Bhuttos presidential debate at the Oxford Union. We decided to take the village route which was lonely and dark. In high spirits, dishevelled dinner jackets and singing loudly we were tearing down hoping to get back before 2 am. Suddenly a police car appeared flashing: Stop immediately.

All four of us tumbled out, apologising profusely. Not only were we guilty of speeding, we were also visibly over the limit. Our appearance made denial impossible. I was convinced we were for the slammer. The policeman, however, was generous and understanding.

Well, gentlemen, youve clearly had a good evening. Why spoil it by doing something stupid? Drive slowly and go home to bed. You look as if you could do with a good nights sleep.

The policeman could see we were young, exuberant, foolish and clearly in the wrong. But in his eyes a telling-off was more in order than punishment. Such behaviour is typical of many British policemen. Thats why theyre affectionately called Bobbies.

Now consider the Delhi police who are investigating the February riots. Senior officers have cautioned the constabulary not to offend Hindu youth but no such concern is shown for young Muslims. Although 38 of the 53 people killed in the riots were Muslims, 13 of the 15 charge-sheeted are also of the same faith. While students protesting against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act and the National Register of Citizens are accused of conspiracy, members of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), who clearly provoked hatred if not violence, are unscathed. Prominent Opposition leaders like Sitaram Yechury are alleged to have provoked and mobilised the crowd on the grounds one of the accused has said so. But the so-called deposition is unsigned and in garbled English.

So deep runs our dismay with the Delhi police one of their most highly-regarded former commissioners has forcefully and publicly criticised them. Before I remind you of what he said, remember Ajay Raj Sharma was appointed by AB Vajpayee.

In an interview to me for The Wire on February 28, Sharma said he was worried the police have become communal. Videos of their behaviour during the riots clearly suggest this. Equally worryingly, the police seem scared of the BJP and intimidated by the government. Lack of professionalism is the main problem here, he honestly admitted. Their leadership, he added, lacks spine and moral character.

I asked Sharma what he would have done about Anurag Thakur, Parvesh Verma and Kapil Mishra if he had been police commissioner. His answer was as explicit as it was short: I would have arrested them. I asked how he would have handled Ved Prakash Surya, the deputy commissioner who was standing beside Mishra when the latter threatened the crowd. He said he would have immediately demanded an explanation and, if it wasnt satisfactory, suspended him forthwith.

Interestingly, it was Sharma who compared Indian policemen with their British counterparts. I smiled when he said British policemen are called Bobbies because people trust them. Indian policemen evoke suspicion and fear.

For us in India, its hard to believe policemen can be liked. Our experience makes that impossible to accept. Yet with a little conscious effort things can change. Sharma told me the first step is to isolate the police from political interference. But thats not all. The constables who man local police stations and are, therefore, the first point of contact of the people with the police must be taught to be friendly, effective and polite.

Now is anyone in the Delhi police  or the government  willing to listen to Mr Sharma?

Karan Thapar is the author of Devils Advocate: The Untold Story

The views expressed are personal

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Chancellor Rishi Sunak announced an extension of four coronavirus loan schemes for firms, VAT cuts for the hospitality sector, and more time for firms and individuals to pay taxes. Photo: JOHN SIBLEY / POOL / AFP via Getty

Its been another wild week for the economy, as governments continue to grapple with the fallout from the coronavirus.

On Monday and Tuesday respectively, there were dispatches from the UKs chief medical officer Chris Whitty, warning that Brits need to continue following guidelines to avoid a punishing second wave of the virus, and new restrictions were outlined by Boris Johnson.

New rules announced included a 10pm curfew for hospitality in England which those working in the sector have warned will be a threat to business, and has since seen crowds gather in the street at closing time for pubs.

Rishi Sunak also outlined the Winter Economy Plan on Thursday, calling the new policies a radical intervention in the labour market and said saving jobs was his number one priority in a statement to MPs in the Commons.

Sunak announced an extension of four coronavirus loan schemes for firms, VAT cuts for the hospitality sector, and more time for firms and individuals to pay taxes.

He also extended grants for the self-employed for six months, though only covering 20% of average monthly profits.

The centre-piece of the announcement on Thursday was a job support scheme, drawn up as a successor to the furlough scheme which has kept millions of workers employed.

It essentially tapers off the work the job support scheme has already done and is designed to prevent redundancies by topping-up the wages of workers who work and are paid for at least a third of their typical hours.

The Treasury said employees working a third of their usual hours would receive 77% of their normal pay.

The chancellor said the job support scheme could cost about 300m ($382m) a month if employers sought funds to keep on a million workers. But he said it was very tricky to be precise about total costs given uncertainty over many of the assumptions behind any such calculations.

Analysis by Capital Economics estimated the total cost at 3bn, with another 2bn for the other new measures.

Story continues

Despite the measures he has set out for companies and employees, Sunak has admitted unemployment will continue to rise.

Firms had cautiously welcomed the measures but warned that they did not go far enough to prevent lay-offs.

In spite of this, a bright spot for jobs, new figures showed the number of new job adverts posted online last week hit its highest weekly total since early March before the coronavirus lockdown.

A survey by the Recruitment & Employment Confederation (REC) found almost 129,000 vacancies had been advertised between 14 and 20 September. It marked a 3% increase on the previous week, and the total number of postings is now up by a quarter on levels seen at the start of June.

The data will boost hopes of at least a partial recovery in the UK jobs market, despite rising unemployment that UK chancellor Rishi Sunak admitted on Thursday would continue to grow still further.

Employers have slashed hundreds of thousands of jobs in recent months, but hiring has also picked up. Major supermarkets and logistics firms like Tesco (TSCO.L) and Amazon (AMZN) are among those to have announced recent hiring sprees, but the latest data suggests hiring in education sector has also picked up as the new school year gets underway.

While the government attempts to insure the jobs market for the next few months, borrowing has hit its highest level in decades.

The cash required to keep the economy afloat has pushed borrowing to 173.7bn between April and August. New official figures show its 146.9bn higher than a year earlier.

It marked the highest since the Office for National Statistics began compiling the data in 1993.

Total government debt stood at 2tn at the end of August, 1.9% bigger than the size of the entire UK economy's output and 249.5bn more than a year earlier. It marks the highest debt ratio since 1961, as GDP has also plummeted, shrinking at its steepest quarterly rate since records began earlier this year.
An Armenian court late on September 25 put the leader of the countrys main opposition party in two months of pretrial detention as part of a vote-buying case he calls politically motivated.



Gagik Tsarukian, a wealthy businessman and leader of the Prosperous Armenia Party (BHK), has been accused of electoral bribery during the 2017 parliamentary elections.



Tsarukian, who didnt attend the court hearing and waited for his arrest outside the National Security Service (NSS) building, condemned the detention order as politically motivated.



His lawyers said they would appeal what they described as an illegal and unfounded ruling ordered by the government.



The oligarch was taken into custody just over three months after the parliament dominated by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinians allies stripped him of his parliamentary immunity and allowed prosecutors to launch a criminal investigation against him.



Pashinian, a reformist pressing an anti-corruption campaign, came to power in 2018 in the wake of mass popular protests.



The NSS claims Tsarukian created and led an organized group that bought more than 17,000 votes for BHK during parliamentary elections held in 2017.

The electoral fraud probe has led to the indictment of 14 individuals, among them two former BHK parliamentarians, and the questioning of 162 other people.



Tsarukian and his party maintain that Pashinian ordered the criminal proceedings in response to the BHK leaders calls for the governments resignation. Pashinian denies that the case is politically motivated.



In June, a Yerevan court refused to allow Tsarukians pretrial arrest. But that decision was overturned weeks later in July by Armenias Court of Appeals, which ordered a lower court to hold another hearing.



Tsarukians allies have linked the governments continued attempts to arrest him to an anti-government rally, which will be held by the BHK and two other opposition parties in Yerevan on October 8.



Defense lawyers claimed prosecutors kept pushing for Tsarukians arrest despite producing no proof that their client has pressured witnesses or obstructed the NSS investigation over the past three months.



Representatives of the BHK, the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun), and the Hayrenik party said this week that the planned rally will go ahead even if Tsarukian were taken into custody. They said they will demand the holding of snap parliamentary elections.



The BHK was part of Pashinians first cabinet formed following anti-government protests that led to the peaceful fall of longtime President Serzh Sarkisian in April 2018.



Pashinian fired BHK-affiliated ministers in October 2018, accusing Tsarukian of secretly collaborating with the countrys former leadership.
61-year-old P Jeyaraj and his son Emmanuel Bennix (31) were tortured by police personnel at the Sathankulam Police Station in Tamil Nadu on June 19 and June 20 leading to their deaths a few days later, an investigation by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has found.

CBI has filed a charge sheet naming nine policemen, including the then inspector of the police station, for arresting the father-son duo under a false charge and torturing them. A case was filed against 10 policemen, but one sub-inspector died during the investigation after being infected with Covid-19.

Bennix and Jeyaraj were arrested on June 19 for allegedly obstructing the police from doing their work but they died on June 22 and June 23 respectively due to injuries inflicted upon them during the police custody. The custodial deaths led to a national outrage prompting the Tamil Nadu government to order a CBI inquiry  the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court had ordered the CB-CID wing to take over the investigation till the time CBI began its work.

Inspector and SHO S Sridhar, Sub Inspectors K. Balakrishnan, P Raghuganesh, Head Constables S Murugan, A Samadurai, and Constables M Muthuraja, S Chelladurai, X Thomas Francis and, S Veilumuthu who were working in the police station at Sathankulam, 635 km from here, in Thoothukudi district have been named in the charge sheet.

CBI Investigation revealed that the father-son duo were arrested in the evening of 19.06.2020 and allegedly tortured at the Sathankulam Police Station by the accused in the evening as well as in the intervening night, consequent to which both of them succumbed to the injuries and died in the intervening night of 22.06.2020 and 23.06.2020, a statement from CBI said.

The statement said further investigation is continuing to look into the role of other persons in the case.
New Delhi, Sep 26 : No further relaxation is likely in terms of e-invoicing as the Centre is set to go ahead with the decision to make GST e-invoicing mandatory for companies with annual turnover of over Rs 500 crore for their business-to-business transactions starting October 1.

Industry representatives, however, have urged the government to not make it mandatory and rather allow voluntary compliance.

The relief, however, would be there for relatively smaller businesses, as the threshold for mandatory e-invoicing, a step to improve tax compliance, was earlier planned to be kept at Rs 100 crore, is set to be raised to Rs 500 crore on the recommendations of an empowered panel of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council.

The initial date for its roll out was April 1, 2020, but the Centre notified October 1, 2020, as revised date for implementation of e-invoicing.

As per the website of the Good and Service Network 'e-invoicing' has many advantages for businesses such as standardisation, interoperability, auto-population of invoice details into GST return and other forms (like e-way bill), reduction in processing costs, reduction in disputes, improvement in payment cycles and thereby improving overall business efficiency.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
President Donald Trump announces his U.S. Supreme Court nominee, Judge Amy Coney Barrett (R), in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, on Sept. 26, 2020. (Olivier Douliery/AFP via Getty Images)

Trump Nominates Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court

WASHINGTONPresident Donald Trump on Sept. 26 nominated Judge Amy Coney Barrett to fill the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburgs seat on the U.S. Supreme Court, setting the stage for a heated nomination battle in Congress ahead of the November election.

Trump announced his choice at the White House, where Barrett accepted the nomination.

I looked and I studied, and you are very eminently qualified for this job, Trump told Barrett at the White House, describing her as one of the nations most brilliant and gifted legal minds.

Trump has praised Barrett multiple times in recent days. News of the presidents choice broke a day prior to the ceremony.

Trump had whittled down his list of 45 to five women, opting to replace Ginsburg, the senior liberal judge on the court, with another woman. The only other woman he had named as being on the shortlist was Barbara Lagoa, who serves on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11 Circuit, but the president appeared not to meet with her while in Florida this week.

Theyre all very outstanding peopletop of line academically and every way possible, Trump told reporters in Maryland on Sept. 25.

The confirmation hearings for Barrett will begin on Oct. 12 and last three or four days.

Barretts husband and seven children attended the ceremony and sat beside First Lady Melania Trump.

I love the United States, and I love the United States Constitution. Im truly humbled by the prospect of serving on the Supreme Court, Barrett said. Should I be confirmed, I will be mindful of who came before me. The flag of the United States is still flying at half-staff in memory of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg to mark the end of a great American life.

(LR) President Donald Trump, Judge Amy Coney Barrett, First Lady Melania Trump, and Barretts family walk to the Rose Garden at the White House on Sept. 26, 2020. (Carlos Barria/Reuters)

Seventh U.S. Circuit Court Judge Amy Coney Barretts family and First Lady Melania Trump watch during Barretts Supreme Court nomination ceremony, at the White House on Sept. 26, 2020. (Olivier Douliery/AFP via Getty Images)

Brilliant Woman

Carrie Severino, president of the Judicial Crisis Network, a group that works outside the government to help select conservative judges, told The Epoch Times that Barrett is an incredibly brilliant woman who has shown her commitment to the Constitution and the rule of law as both a scholar and judge.

Severino added that Barretts record of facing attacks on her faith during her confirmation hearing several years ago could serve to calm those who are anxious about Republican-appointed justices veering to the left down the road, pointing to Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts.

Shes someone who has demonstrated courage in her life up to this point. Its her record of courage that would alleviate peoples concerns in that area, she said.

Trumps announcement came a little more than a week after Ginsburgs death from pancreatic cancer at the age of 87.

If confirmed, Barrett would further tilt the Supreme Court in favor of conservatives, giving them a 63 advantage on the nine-member court. The confirmation could have far-reaching implications on issues such as abortion, Obamacare, gun rights, and challenges to the result of the 2020 election.

Barrett, a Roman Catholic and mother of seven, has the backing of many conservative groups, in part for her perceived hostility to Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court ruling that struck down state-level restrictions on abortion.

Barrett, 48, earned her juris doctorate at Notre Dame Law School in 1997. She served as a law clerk to Judge Laurence Silberman of the District of Columbia Circuit and then-Justice Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court.

She returned to Notre Dame in 2002 to teach in the areas of federal courts, constitutional law, and statutory interpretation and became a professor in 2010.

In 2017, Barrett was confirmed in a 5543 vote by the U.S. Senate to serve on the 7th Circuit. At the time, every full-time member of Notre Dame Law Schools faculty signed a letter of support for her nomination, as did lawyers who clerked at the Supreme Court the same year as Barrett.

She conducted herself with professionalism, grace, and integrity, her colleagues stated in a letter. But perhaps as importantly, she treated with courtesy everyone who worked at the Court and she was able to work collaboratively with her colleagues (even those with whom she disagreed) on challenging legal questions.

Seventh U.S. Circuit Court Judge Amy Coney Barrett speaks after being nominated to the Supreme Court, at the White House on Sept. 26, 2020. (Olivier Douliery/AFP via Getty Images)

Judge Amy Coney Barrett applauds as President Donald Trump announces her as his nominee to the Supreme Court, in the Rose Garden at the White House on Sept. 26, 2020. (Alex Brandon/AP Photo)

Textualist-Originalist

When Justice Anthony Kennedy retired in 2018, Barrett was among the top contenders for the Supreme Court seat vacancy, which was ultimately filled by Justice Brett Kavanaugh, Trumps second nomination.

Her husband, Jesse Barrett, serves as an assistant U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Indiana. Two of their children are adopted from Haiti.

She is a textualist-originalist, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) told The Epoch Times American Thought Leaders.

She views her role as a judge as involving the interpretation of the law based on what it says, based on what words are used, and how those words were understood publicly at the time of their adoption either into the Constitution or into whatever statutes being interpreted. Its exactly the kind of justice President Trump wants, and that the country needs right now.

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) wrote on Twitter that Barrett throughout her career has maintained the importance of an independent judiciary that interprets the law & Constitution as-written, operating free from political pressure.

Judge Barrett has impressed the brightest judicial and legal minds with her profound understanding of the law. I look forward to meeting with her in the coming days as the Judiciary Committee prepares for her confirmation hearing, he said, urging Democrats to refrain from character attacks, which they resorted to during the Kavanaugh confirmation battle.

Trump on Sept. 26 said Barrett will decide cases based on the text of the Constitution as written.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) speaks to reporters after the Senate Republican luncheon on Capitol Hill in Washington on Sept. 9, 2020. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)

Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) at the CPAC convention in National Harbor, Md., on Feb. 28, 2019. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)

Upcoming Battle

Republicans will try to fast-track the nomination, with just over a month left before the Nov. 3 election.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has said Trumps nominee will get a vote on the Senate floor this year, though he hasnt committed to a vote before the election.

Both sides view the upcoming battle as positive for their reelection chances. Democrats want to hold onto the House of Representatives and flip the Senate while unseating Trump; Republicans hope to continue to hold the Senate, keep the presidency, and take back the House.

Top Democrats including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) have said theyll go to great lengths to try to block the nomination.

Everything is on the table, Schumer told reporters this week.

Barretts previous vetting for her appeals court position gives Republicans something to point to in propelling the nomination forward.

There was a pretty comprehensive background check done on Judge Barrett, Lee said, which he said could help speed up the approval process.

During the judiciary hearing, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), ranking member of the committee, and other lawmakers grilled Barrett over how her faith would inform her rulings.

The dogma lives loudly within you, and thats of concern, the senator told Barrett, a comment that prompted accusations of religious bigotry.

But Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) also wondered how Barretts faith would guide her work as a judge, who pointed to an article she wrote that appeared to direct Catholic judges to recuse themselves from cases concerning the death penalty.

Barrett said she wrote the article 20 years prior, adding, Its never appropriate for a judge to impose that judges personal convictions, whether they derive from faith or anywhere else, on the law.

Democrats want to stall the nomination and eventually stymie it, but theres solid support across the aisle for Barrett aside from Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska). Murkowski said she couldnt rule out voting no for Trumps nominee, while Collins has said she will vote no if the confirmation vote is before election.

Republicans hold a 5347 majority in the upper congressional body. Vice President Mike Pence can break ties. A simple majority vote is needed to advance the nominee from the Judiciary Committee, and again in a full Senate vote.

Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) has said the GOP has enough votes.

Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is seen in her chambers in at the Supreme Court in Washington on July 31, 2014. (Cliff Owen/AP Photo)

People pay respects as Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg lies in repose under the Portico at the top of the front steps of the Supreme Court building in Washington on Sept. 23, 2020. (J. Scott Applewhite/AP Photo)

Dying Wish

Ginsburg, who wanted Republicans to consider then-President Barack Obamas nominee in 2016, reportedly told a family member on her deathbed that she wants a new president to replace her, an apparent reference to Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.

That was Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburgs dying wish, her most fervent wish, that she should not be replaced until a new president is installed, Schumer said on the Senate floor on Sept. 21, calling for Republicans to adhere to the wish.

But Republicans say that the wish, if true, illustrates Ginsburgs entry into politics. The justice came out against Trump during the 2016 election before later apologizing.

Republicans also point to the precedent of confirming justices in election years and the importance of having nine judges on the court for decisions before the New Year.

Youre going to need nine justices up there, Trump said on Sept. 22 outside the White House. I think its going to be very important. Because what theyre doing is a hoax with the ballots.

Theyre sending out tens of millions of ballots, unsolicitednot where theyre being asked, but unsolicited. And thats a hoax, and youre going to need to have nine justices.

Conservative and liberal groups are gearing up for what is expected to be another battle, with early predictions pointing to attacks on Barretts adopted children.

Matthew Vadum and Mimi Nguyen Ly contributed to this report.

Emel Akan reporter Follow Emel Akan is White House economic policy reporter in Washington, D.C. Previously she worked in the financial sector as an investment banker at JPMorgan and as a consultant at PwC. She graduated with a masters degree in business administration from Georgetown University.
Netflix responded to Republican US senators' letter urging the streaming platform to reconsider adapting Liu Cixins book into a TV series, following the author's support of the Chinese government's treatment of Uighur Muslims.

Netflix on Friday said it will maintain its decision to adapt Chinese author Liu Cixins book The Three-Body Problem as it judges the individual projects on their merit. The streaming platform was responding to the letter of five Republican US senators who have urged Netflix Inc to reconsider its plan to adapt the book into a television series.

According to a report by Bloomberg, Netflix said that Liu is the author of the book but is not the creator of the show. We do not agree with his comments, which are entirely unrelated to his book or this Netflix show, the OTT platform said.

Reuters reported that the author has defended the Chinese government's clampdown on ethnic Uighurs and other Muslims residing in the Xinjiang region.

In a letter to Netflix, the senators, led by Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, said the decision of the streaming platform to adapt Liu's work amounted to the normalisation of the Chinese government's crimes. They asked Netflix to seriously reconsider the implications of providing a platform to Liu.

Earlier this month, Netflix said that co-creators of Game of Thrones David Benioff and DB Weiss will be adapting The Three-Body Problem and its sequels, along with TV writer Alexander Woo.

A report by The Guardian quoted Benioff and Weiss saying that the books were the most ambitious science-fiction series that they have read. Woo called the books an elegant and deeply human allegory. Liu is a consulting producer for the series.

Liu in 2019 told the New Yorker magazine, "If anything, the government is helping their economy and trying to lift them out of poverty. If you were to loosen up the country a bit, the consequences would be terrifying."

Walt Disney Co was also recently criticized by US lawmakers for filming parts of Mulan in Xinjiang.

Netflix streaming services can be accessed in more than 190 countries in the world, however, it does bit operate in China.
The 2020 version of Rosh Hashanah, the start of the Jewish High Holy Days that culminates with Yom Kippur on Monday, could be a sign of what upcoming holidays will look like.

Rosh Hashanah, which normally involves celebratory meals with friends and family and time to reflect at the synagogue, this year instead involved small dinners and lots of connecting via Zoom.

The coronavirus pandemics restrictions on socializing and the difficulties of traveling to see relatives means the holiday season is going to be very different this year. Its a situation many Bay Area families are wondering about, as Chuseok, Dia de los Muertos, Thanksgiving, Kwanzaa, Diwali, Christmas and other holidays approach.

When it comes to Dia de los Muertos, the Mexican holiday starting Oct. 31 that honors the dead, for example, the Centers for Disease Control suggests delivering traditional dishes to friends and neighbors in lieu of hosting a party. The federal agency also recommends that people avoid traveling for the holidays this year, advising, for instance, holding small family Thanksgiving dinners indoors or outdoor gatherings with a restricted number of guests.

Local Jewish families got a taste of what those kinds of restrictions mean with Rosh Hashanah. In many cases, though, they engaged in more traditions than usual  even if it meant ordering holiday foods from restaurants  as people hunted for meaning and connection during a challenging year.

Lawyer Debra Rubenstein, who moved to San Francisco from New Jersey four years ago, ate a Rosh Hashanah feast packaged for one from a local pop-up while joining her temples service on one phone as her mom and sister watched the same service from New Jersey on Rubensteins second phone.

It was nice to be together, even if just electronically, as normally Rubenstein wouldnt experience the same service as her family.

Yalonda M. James / The Chronicle

Looking ahead, Rubenstein says she is disappointed she likely wont be able to fly home: New Jersey has a 14-day quarantine period for residents of many states, though California was recently taken off the frequently changing list. She hopes there might be opportunities for an outdoor Thanksgiving with friends.

San Rafaels Andy Naja-Riese, who leads an agricultural nonprofit, also doesnt live close enough to family to see them. In past years, hed get together with a group of 10 friends for Rosh Hashanah, but with some of those people being at high risk of getting sick from the coronavirus, the gathering didnt happen.

He still felt like it was worth putting in the effort for a spectacular meal, though  even if it was just for him and his husband. He incorporated customs from his East Coast family, making this Rosh Hashanah one of his most traditional ever. The star of the feast was his moms coffee-infused magic brisket, which he had never made for a Jewish holiday before.

I was sad we couldnt enjoy it together, but at least I was able to send her photos and talk about the recipe, he said. I was able to honor her love and care.

For those living alone and far from family, restaurants provided a much-needed taste of tradition. Karen Adelman, co-owner of Berkeleys venerable Jewish deli, Sauls Restaurant & Delicatessen, said this was the busiest year by far for takeout Rosh Hashanah meals. Demand was so high that the restaurant stopped taking orders several days in advance.

Even if you have them by yourself or join your family by Zoom, the food is obviously a way of having continuity, she said. Certain foods just signify whats supposed to happen when everything else is a little uncertain.

Local grocers say they have already begun surveying their customers to help figure out how they should approach the coming holidays. Emily Lubomirsky of Lukes Local determined the Cole Valley market should offer its annual prepared Thanksgiving feast in a smaller format. So, in addition to its usual meal that serves six to eight people, there will be another option suitable for groups of three to five. The store also plans to offer individually sized a la carte options for the first time, such as a smoked turkey shepherds pie and Delicata squash stuffed with quinoa and pomegranate.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

Similarly, online grocer Good Eggs is trying to source smaller turkeys after an informal poll of customers showed that 97% planned to celebrate Thanksgiving with a small group. Turkey feels like a comforting tradition people will want to have, but they might need a 15-pound bird for their group of four, said Jane Stecyk of Good Eggs.

Stecyk was shocked to see that 60% of customers in the poll said they were excited to cook for Thanksgiving this year. She expects that means people with more time on their hands will put in the effort to make something more ambitious than usual.

That was the case for Novato author Gabi Moskowitz for Rosh Hashanah. In a normal year, shed bounce between several events over the course of the holiday weekend, but safety restrictions meant she hosted just one meal for family members in her social bubble. To make it still feel like an important evening, she spent three days preparing a true feast: tomato-tinged brisket braised for six hours, roasted baby potatoes, kale salad with fresh figs, round challah and honey cake with sunken figs.

Moskowitz anticipates her annual Hanukkah party with friends and neighbors wont happen this December, but she plans to apply lessons learned from Rosh Hashanah for the eight-day event, as well as for Thanksgiving and other holidays.

I found that looking for places to make meaning and looking for adaptations to long-standing rituals was the key to not getting lost in a sea of despair, she said. Even on a tiny scale, I can try to find ways to make it as special as possible.

Janelle Bitker is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: janelle.bitker@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @janellebitker
Dayasiri insists batik import ban should continue By Sandun Jayawardana Says it was lifted without his knowledge View(s): View(s):

Batik, Handloom and Local Apparel Products State Minister Dayasiri Jayasekara has insisted on the continuation of a ban on the import of batik, handloom and powerloom textiles. He alleges the ban was lifted by certain officials without his knowledge.

Minister Jayasekara stated that the ban, which had been imposed in June, had been lifted by the Finance Ministry recently without his consent.

I made my feelings known on this at the Government Parliamentary Group meeting this week and then again at the Export Development Council (EDC) meeting convened by the President and the Prime Minister after a lapse of 28 years. I even said I was prepared to resign if it was not reimposed, he told the Sunday Times.

He added that Sri Lanka had become a dumping ground for cheap garments and further import restrictions were necessary to uplift local production.

For example, handloom sarees imported from India sell for Rs. 1200 while a local handloom saree is selling for Rs. 3000. Our manufacturers cannot compete with these cheap imports, and this is why the ban is so necessary.

There were several highly reputed local brands which were exporting their apparel products, Mr. Jayasekara noted, adding that his plan was to encourage them to both export and market their brands in Sri Lanka.

He revealed that the Government intended to increase the tax on fabric imports by Rs. 30 a kilo.
The 360 shows you diverse perspectives on the days top stories and debates.

Whats happening

Donald Trump and Joe Biden are scheduled to spar in the first of three presidential debates on Tuesday in Cleveland. The debate will be moderated by Fox News anchor Chris Wallace and cover a broad range of topics, including the coronavirus pandemic, race and violence in cities, election integrity and the economy.

The face-to-face meeting comes at a time when Biden holds a consistent lead in both national and swing-state polls. Barring any unexpected changes in the state of the pandemic or the economy, the debates likely represent President Trumps best chance to shift the race, election experts say.

The candidates have chosen characteristically distinct methods to prepare for the first debate. Biden has been drilling on the issues and ways to critique Trumps leadership for weeks. Biden told reporters that he will do several days of intense practice before the event. Trump, for his part, has reportedly eschewed traditional prep altogether, as he did ahead of his debates against Hillary Clinton in 2016.

Why theres debate

The debate offers Trump a chance to close the gap less 40 days before the election, some pundits say. One of Trumps main lines of attack against Biden throughout the campaign has been questions about his mental fitness. The groundwork laid out over the past several months could pay off if Biden stumbles over his speech or gives a meandering answer that plays into voters fears about his psychological state. Though most analysts believed Clinton won all three debates in 2016, Trump landed some signature moments that became some of the most enduring exchanges of the race. The upcoming debates provide the same opportunity, Trump advisers say.

Trumps confrontational debate style could also present challenges to Biden, who said he wants to avoid getting baited into a brawl and losing focus on the issues. The presidents tendency to rely on inaccurate spin, and at times outright lies, could also push Biden into a disadvantageous position of trying to fact-check Trumps statements, rather than getting his own message across.

Story continues

Others say Trump has made a major tactical error by lowering expectations for Biden. Even a mediocre performance would be enough to clear the incredibly low bar Trump has set for him, they argue. Trump also runs the risk of combusting in an unfavorable debate setting, where his preferred press conference tactics of calling on sympathetic reporters or simply walking away arent available to him, critics say.

The state of the race also plays into Bidens hands. All he needs to do is avoid a complete collapse to hold onto his sizable lead, election experts say. Trump, on the other hand, needs a decisive win to gain ground, which might set him up to take ill-advised risks that could hurt more than help, some argue.

Whats next

After Tuesday, the next scheduled event is the vice presidential debate between Mike Pence and Kamala Harris on Oct. 7. Trump and Biden are slated to debate two more times in October. Election Day is Nov. 3.

Perspectives

Biden has a chance to easily dispel Trumps main line of attack

After weeks of ham-handed attempts at convincing the electorate that Joe Biden is a doddering fool, Trump has put himself in an impossible situation. He has committed the amateurish political mistake of lowering the bar on his opponent's performance to floor level.  Juliana Silva and Bill McGowan, CNN

As the lesser-known candidate, the debate presents opportunity but also risk for Biden

COVID-19 has denied us the months of appearances and news conferences that reveal the candidates personalities, values and abilities. For good or ill, voters know Mr. Trump; they dont possess anywhere near the same information about Mr. Biden. That leaves him with more to gain and more to lose in Cleveland.  Former senior presidential adviser Karl Rove, Wall Street Journal

The debates likely wont make much of a difference in the race

Most attentive voters are partisans, and have already decided to support their partys candidate. The smaller number of attentive voters who have decided to defect have generally done so by now. And the even smaller group who really have no party preference? They, too, may well have decided by this point. Most of the undecided voters by now are those who dont typically pay much attention to politics, and hardly any of them will watch the debates.  Jonathan Bernstein, Bloomberg

Trump has shown hes not ready to face tough questions

Trump will continue to face adversarial questions and fact checks from moderators and perhaps from Biden in the debates. ...Trump doesnt seem prepared for it.  Amber Phillips, Washington Post

The Supreme Court vacancy gives Trump a chance to debate an issue hes comfortable with

Theres 90 minutes to debate and they have a whole host of issues to cover but all of a sudden the Supreme Court fight is going to be front and center. [Its] going to mean that Donald Trumps talking about an issue thats on home turf, if you will, as opposed to spending more time on areas where he has less of a compelling effort to run on.  Republican strategist Colin Reed to Fox News

A major gaffe could be a huge blow to Bidens campaign

Almost every Democratic operative Ive spoken with in the past few weeks remains petrified that Biden is going to bungle the debates in a way that costs him the election  perhaps by looking old or confused, confirming the worst paranoia and conspiracy theories about him being unfit for the job. They see the debates as Bidens best chance to blow an election that, based on the current polls, seems like his to lose.  Edward-Isaac Dover, Atlantic

Biden faces the daunting challenge of keeping up with Trumps falsehoods

Fact-checking Trump live is a challenge for anyone, even when youre not on stage in a make-or-break debate for the presidency. There is a palpable fear among some Democrats about whether Biden is up for the challenge and whether being too aggressive could backfire.  Amie Parnes, The Hill

The lack of an audience could throw Trump off of his game

Mr. Biden will have another advantage during the debate: President Trump will not have a live audience to excite him and satisfy his insatiable need for approval and attention, which means he will be even more vulnerable to a takedown.  Richard A. Friedman, New York Times

Is there a topic youd like to see covered in The 360? Send your suggestions to the360@yahoonews.com.

Read more 360s

Photo illustration: Yahoo News; photos: Getty Images (4)
VANCOUVER - The addition of a new male calf to a critically endangered pod of southern resident killer whales has left experts happy yet disappointed because it won't further the population of the orcas.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 25/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

VANCOUVER - The addition of a new male calf to a critically endangered pod of southern resident killer whales has left experts happy yet disappointed because it won't further the population of the orcas.

The Center for Whale Research in Friday Harbor, Wash., said scientists snapped a photo confirming the sex as the roughly three-week-old mammal rolled and played in West Coast waters just south of the Canadian border while swimming beside its mother, J35.

The feisty boy appeared robust and healthy, it said in a news release. The calf pushes the number of southern resident orcas to just over 70.

Andrew Trites, director of the Marine Mammal Research Unit at the University of British Columbia, said the only down side about a male is that it won't bear more calfs.

"I mean I'm so happy to know that he's alive and he's surviving and seems to be doing well," he said.

"But my fingers were crossed that they were going to give birth to a female. Their future is tied to having more females born. They need more females."

One of the biggest problems facing southern resident killer whales is that they have a higher number of male births and survivals than females, he said.

Of about 40 calves born since 2000, 26 are males while 13 are females. The sex of one is still undetermined.

The skewed sex ratio in such a small population does not bode well for the future, Trites said, adding just one male is needed for numerous females.

"Every female is golden. Every female is one step closer to securing their survival."

The Center for Whale Research said in a news release Friday that a second calf was recently born to J41.

The gender of the newest calf hasn't yet been determined. The centre said it would wait to give the calf a numeric designation.

Approximately 40 per cent of newborn calves do not survive their neonatal first few weeks.

The centre will await the whales' return to evaluate the calf's condition, it said.

Three separate pods make up the endangered southern residents: K, J and L.

Trites said L pod has a gender ratio of about 50-50, which is what is expected from mammal populations.

But the other two pods have about three males for every female.

Joe Gaydos, a wildlife veterinarian, said the skewed sex ratio could simply be a "probability thing" but some scientists believe pollution and lack of nutrition could play a role.

One of the questions asked by researchers is whether there is a higher likelihood of males being born when the female is stressed or carries a large amount of contaminants, said Gaydos, the science director for the SeaDoc Society based at the University of California, Davis.

"More and more work has been done with people looking at nutritional conditions and contaminants. But these animals have had contaminants for a long time, so you know I'm kind of leaning against that," said Gaydos.

"With such a small population it is hard to really know."

Male orcas are not known to share food as much as females although they can dive deeper and perhaps access fish that the others cannot, he said.

They probably play "a lot of important roles" that are not well understood such as protection of the pod so both sexes are important, but a female has greater potential to add to the population over her lifetime, Gaydos said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 25, 2020.
People gather at Jefferson Square in Louisville, Ky., on Sept. 23, for word on whether the police officers involved in the shooting death of Breonna Taylor would be charged. (Associated Press)

To the editor: I am not an attorney, a police officer or anyone with real expertise on the criminal justice system. I am simply a random citizen and reader of the Los Angeles Times. The police killing of Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Ky., in March and the aftermath compelled me to write because, like many, I am appalled and outraged.

Taylor's senseless death, in my opinion, is such a colossal systemic failure that it somehow reminds me of the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger in 1986. The combination of misinformation, incompetence and poor oversight is beyond my feeble comprehension. It seems obvious that if people were to break down your door in the middle of the night, as the Louisville police did with Taylor and her boyfriend, you would treat them as mortal threats and defend yourself.

As much as I would love to see the police officers do a perp walk and have their mug shots taken, I understand why this will not happen. There is no jury that would find an officer guilty of murder or manslaughter when he can reasonably claim that he was acting in self-defense. If those officers are arrested and prosecuted, it would be the Rodney King trial all over again. The officers would be acquitted, and there would be rioting.

In fact, sending these officers to prison wouldn't be enough. We as a society must prevent this from ever happening again. That means ending "no knock" raids. It means ending the war on drugs. Sending police to prison may feel like justice in this moment, but doing the hard work of reforming our society in tribute to Taylor and her family is simply what she, and all innocent bystanders in an endless drug war, deserve.

Mark Rogers, South El Monte

..

To the editor: The decision on whether to indict the officers was made by the Kentucky attorney general, not the grand jurors, who were spoon-fed less than all the important and contradictory facts. The prosecution controlled what evidence they did and did not get.

Story continues

The officers' fusillade that killed Taylor was done recklessly, consisting of shots fired at no one in particular and clearly not at the boyfriend, who fired in lawful self-defense at the intruders.

The officers' claim they announced their presence was refuted by several neighbors, according to a lawsuit by Taylor's boyfriend, but the attorney general offered the testimony of only one person who claimed to have heard an announcement but earlier contradicted himself on that point.

The proper decision would have been to let the "announcement" defense be weighed by a jury and not the attorney general alone. That's how it works for everyone except law enforcement shooters.

Thomas E. Beck, Rossmoor

The writer is an attorney specializing in police misconduct cases.

..

To the editor: After two Louisville police officers were shot, Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf was quick to tweet, "Violence against law enforcement is NEVER acceptable in a civil society."

But law enforcement violence against civilians is also never acceptable in a civil society.

Police officers stormed into an apartment and killed an unarmed person. Apparently that isn't a crime. The crime that the state says was committed was that the police shooting was reckless and a neighbor could have been shot.

The decision not to charge the officers for the killing is foul and unjust.

Note I omitted any mention of race, class or gender in my retelling. It adds salt to the wound. A Black woman was killed, and her death was in vain. There is no justice.

Northern abolitionists were incorrect when they said the Civil War would cleanse the nation's soul and end slavery. Children taken from their parents, systemic oppression, the killing of Black people, racist remarks against Asians for COVID-19, a crippling economic depression that affects mostly people of color, a bellicose president who has used law enforcement against the American people  these are the signs and symptoms of a nation on the brink of war and civil unrest.

Jose Rodriguez, Los Angeles

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
As part of a $5 million promise, Discover is granting Black-owned restaurants across the country financial assistance to help them rebound from the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In July, the credit card company kicked off its Eat it Forward program, a three-month long series of awards for 200 restaurants around the country.

To launch the program, Discover granted three Black-owned restaurants $25,000 each, including Post Office Pies in Birmingham, Rodney Scotts BBQ -- which has locations in both Birmingham and Charleston, S.C. -- and Back in the Day Bakery in Savannah, Ga.

Since then, Eat it Forward has awarded grants to three more Birmingham-area restaurants: CakeEffect in Hoover, along with Refined ToGo and Brown Sugar Desserts by Renea in Helena.

There are six entry periods left in the Eat it Forward program (the current entry period ends Sept. 27) before it officially comes to a close on Oct. 31.

Until the end of October, consumers can go to Discovers Facebook, Twitter and Instagram pages to nominate Black-owned restaurants. The nominees will be randomly selected to receive $25,000:

Heres how it works:

Twitter: Tweet and mention the restaurants name and @Discover, #EatItForward and #Sweepstakes.

Facebook: Nominate a restaurant by tagging them in the comments section of a post where Discover is asking for nominations related to the $5 million commitment to Black-owned restaurants.

Instagram: Upload a photo taken by a user that is related to the nominated restaurant and tag @Discover, #EatItForward, #Sweepstakes and mention the restaurants Instagram account or restaurant name in the photo caption.

COVID-19 has wreaked havoc on businesses across the United States, and we want to help effect positive change by offering financial support to Black-owned restaurants, a segment of the economy that has been disproportionately impacted during this pandemic, said Julie Loeger, Discover Executive Vice President and President of U.S. Cards, in a press release. Through this campaign, people across the country can support their favorite Black-owned restaurants. By sharing the names of these establishments on social media, it not only helps promote these businesses, but it also nominates them for a chance to receive $25,000.

According to research from the Brookings Institute, women and minority-owned businesses may feel the heaviest impact from the COVID-19 recession. A June report by the National Bureau of Economic Research estimated that 41 percent of Black-owned businesses have closed during COVID-19, more than double the percentage of businesses that are white-owned.

Related:
Senator Bernie Sanders claimed there were "a number of plans" Democrats are considering for removing Donald Trump if he were to lose the election but refuse to leave office.

Mr Sanders made the comments while appearing on Bill Maher's show on Friday night.

He said that while the Democrats' primary goal is to urge voters to overwhelmingly support Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden and make a challenge to the results of the 2020 US election moot, there are plans in place should Mr Trump lose but refuse to leave the White House.

The bottom line is, there are things that we have to do now to make sure that Biden wins. And if Trump attempts to stay in office after losing, there will be a number of plans out there to make sure that he is evicted from office," Mr Sanders said. "But right now, in the next five weeks, our job is to defeat him and defeat him badly."

Democrats have been sounding the alarm since a number of reports emerged earlier this week in which officials in the Trump administration warned that the president was examining a number of ways to stay in office in the event of an election loss.

The president himself has done little to dismiss the reports, as he has refused to commit to accept the election results on numerous occasions when pressed by reporters.

Were going to have to see what happens, you know, but Ive been complaining very strongly about the ballots. The ballots are a disaster, Mr Trump told reporters at a White House briefing Wednesday.

He went on to insinuate that he wanted to discount numerous ballots that have already been cast through early voting.

Get rid of the ballots and youll have a very peaceful  there won't be a transfer, frankly. There will be a continuation, Mr Trump said. The ballots are out of control. You know it, and you know who knows it better than anyone else? The Democrats know it better than anyone else.

Mr Sanders' statement Friday was not the first time he's called on Democrats to take Mr Trump's apparent threat not to adhere to the election results seriously.

"Listen to what Trump is saying," he said. "Don't brush it off."

On Thursday, Mr Sanders livestreamed a speech in which he called for all Democrats to vote for Mr Biden in massive number to defeat Mr Trump in a landslide. He said that by defeating Mr Trump with overwhelming numbers, it would make it "virtually impossible" for Mr Trump to justify staying in power.

Never in a million years did I ever think that I would have to give a speech about what do we do if a president refuses to leave office if he loses. I never, ever thought that I would have to give that speech, or anyone else. But that is where we are today, Mr Sanders said during his appearance on Mr Maher's show.
Ryan Jenkins, a 13-year-old student from Soddy Daisy, announced a new project he has been working on called VOTE Tennessee.

Mr. Jenkins, who believes all voters should be informed, created this project to do that exact thing.

The mission of VOTE Tennessee is to inform voters of the candidates running for specific offices in the state of Tennessee and help voters become familiar with what these candidates believe by sending a questionnaire to candidates from all across the state. VOTE Tennessee also plans to host virtual candidate discussions since not as much in=person campaigning can go on due to Covid-19.

Right now VOTE Tennessee is active on Facebook, where they post all candidate responses and videos.

VOTE Tennessee can be reached via email at tnvotes20@gmail.com. VOTE Tennessee is also looking for additional volunteers. "If you would like to help, please reach out," officials said.

VOTE Tennessee's goal is to reach out to every state house and state senate candidate across the state.
The Pennsylvania Board of Game Commissioners approved the use of night-vision and infrared-thermal scopes and other optics, both handheld and mounted to firearms, in hunting furbearers at a brief online meeting Saturday.

Following unanimous approval of the proposal, Commissioner Brian Hoover noted that the push for the change came from hunters.

The commission has listened to the hunter, the public, he said.

Furbearers that may be hunted in Pennsylvania are coyote, fox, raccoon, bobcat, opossum, skunk, weasel and porcupine.

Commissioners also gave preliminary approval to an expansion of the emergency powers of the executive director of the commission in dealing with wildlife diseases.

Existing regulations are written specifically for chronic wasting disease in deer and related species, but many other diseases may be on the horizon.

Commission staff noted that rabbit hemorrhagic disease, which is spreading through the American southwest, is among the most immediate concerns, although there are many wildlife diseases that could require emergency actions.

In other action, commissioners voted to accept a donation of 2.67 acres of land in South Lebanon Township, Lebanon County, from the estate of Daniel Blouch. The parcel is adjacent to existing State Game Land 156.

Under state guidelines to minimize the effects of coronavirus, the meeting was held online.

Contact Marcus Schneck at mschneck@pennlive.com.
As millions of students start the school year remotely, many of them have never met their teachers in person.

Yet strong student-teacher relationships are linked to both short-term and long-term improvements on multiple measures: higher student academic engagement, better attendance, better grades, fewer disruptive behaviors and suspensions, and lower school dropout rates. These effects hold true regardless of students individual, family, and school backgrounds. And experts say strong relationships will be even more important this year , as many students grapple with trauma brought on by the pandemic, the economic downturn, and recent high-profile police killings of Black people.

See also: How to Build Relationships With Students During COVID-19

That means teachers need to find ways to form connections with their students via computer screen.

I was convinced it was going to be awful because I love building relationships with kids, and I was like, How am I going to have those conversations and those little inside jokes and stuff if theyre not here? said Jennifer Atkins, a 7th grade English/language arts and reading teacher at Howell Middle School in Victoria, Texas. For the first three weeks of her school year, students were completely remote. Now, her district has moved to a hybrid approach to instruction in which some students are coming into school a few days a week. But some of her students have opted to remain virtual, and she still hasnt met those kids face-to-face.

Even so, Atkins and other teachers say, theyve still managed to form solid relationships with their students this year.

I almost feel like I know them better than classes previously, even my in-person, because I have taken more intentional time to get to know them, said Caila Smith, a middle school English/language arts teacher in Illinois. This is one of the things I wont go back to doing, quote, the normal way.

Here are some tips from Smith and other teachers who are figuring out how to make this work:

1. Relationships come before content.

At the beginning, I felt a lot of pressure to jump right into curriculum to make up for a disrupted spring semester, Smith said. But she quickly realized that I have to spend more time than I normally would building relationships with these kids. In some ways, its more important than content.

After all, teachers said, students will be more engaged in class when they feel a camaraderie with their teacher. Thats especially important this year, as students grapple with the adjustment to remote or hybrid instruction and the consequences of the coronavirus pandemic. A recent nationally representative survey from Education Week found that 56 percent of teachers, principals, and administrators said student morale is lower now than it was before the pandemic.

If you dont have a relationship with that kid, theres no learning thats going to happen, Atkins said. If they think you dont like them, theyre done, and they shut down. They work for the teachers they respect.

2. Get to know students interests outside of academics.

Making time to get to know students on a personal level is important every year, but especially this one, said Tony Gentile, a 5th grade teacher in the Papillion La Vista Community school district near Omaha, Neb. His district has resumed in-person instruction, but hes teaching the students who opted to stay entirely online.

At first, Gentile said, he missed the little unstructured moments to chat with students in the hallway, at lunch or recess, and both before or after school. Hes tried to replicate that over video callshe uses the moments as students are logging into class as opportunities for small talk. And he gave his students a presentation about his own interests, hobbies, and family.

And of course, pets are a great way to bond. Gentile shares pictures and videos of his yellow lab and golden retriever with his students, and theyll hold up their own pets to the camera. Students siblings might also pop up on their webcam, and students can easily share their favorite things from their rooms during show-and-tell.

I have found that I know more about my students personal lives now than I did [when we were] in the classroom, he said.

3. Give personal feedback and notes.

Teachers say its especially important this year to give students one-on-one attention. For example, Atkins asked her students to share what they liked the most and the least about her English/language arts and reading class. (Most students said their least favorite part was poetry.) She responded to every student individually.

Megan Taylor, a 7th grade social studies and language arts teacher in North Carolina, has been sending a handwritten letter home to every student since she started teaching. Its an extra personal touch, she said. You took the time to sit down and write a letter saying youre proud of something theyve done in class, or its great to have you in classjust a little bit more personal relationship building.

This year, she thinks the letter will be especially important in building community, since students are completely remote until at least the end of October. "[Im] making sure theyre all feeling welcome and comfortable and making sure theyre just feeling like theyre being noticed right now, she said.

4. Inject some fun into class time.

Atkins said she tries to use her Bitmoji avatar as much as possible to give students a sense of her personality. She also has built four Bitmoji classrooms, which are colorful repositories of links and information that teachers say let them create a sense of familiarity and connection with their students from afar .

One of Atkins Bitmoji classrooms is Harry Potter themed, to go with her class reward system. Every year, including this year, students are sorted into the four Hogwarts houses featured in the series. Students can score house points for going above and beyond in their work or just making a witty comment that makes Atkins laugh. The competition has made students more likely to participate in class discussions online, she said.

Also, Atkins has assigned her students who are still entirely online the responsibility of coming up with a daily fun fact to share with the students who are doing hybrid instruction. That way, they are building community with their peers even when they havent met each other.

Thats important, said Gentile, the 5th grade Nebraska teacher, because students dont have the same opportunities to chat with their peers online as they would in person. Find every opportunity that you can to have the students share about themselves and then talk with each other, he said.

Image via Getty
Nearly 100 people gathered in downtown Saturday to demand justice for Breonna Taylor, marking the second Houston protest this week after a Kentucky grand jury decided officers involved in the botched raid that led to her death would not be charged.

Taylor was a 26-year-old emergency medical technician who was killed by police gunfire in her own home in March.
Boys Basketball: Watertown wins over Rapid City Stevens

Reese Stark and Drew Norberg combined for 41 points to propel Watertown to a 61-51 high school boys basketball win over Rapid City Stevens.
Workers place a metal collar on the joint on Thursday night to bring the two pieces together and plug the leak. River Street was opened up on Wednesday and crews woredk until late into the night unsuccessfully trying to fix the late. Uncovering the pipe again on Thursday. Old maps were pulled out to try to track down the gate system and divert water. PreviousNext

North Adams Lifts Boil Water Notice



Crews spent long hours digging, filling and chasing down gates, leavened with a little levity. Update on Saturday Sept. 26, 1 p.m.: The state Department of Environmental Protection has lifted the boil water order issued Friday for residents affected by the water main break on River Street. It is no longer necessary to use boiled water or bottled water for drinking, making ice, brushing teeth, washing dishes and preparing food. The City of North Adams apologizes for any inconvenience and thanks you for your patience. The areas specifically identified as potentially affected were: River Street, Yale Street, Upper Meadow Street, Williams Street, North Street, Cady Street, Pitt Street, Chesbro Avenue, Chase Avenue, North Holden Street, Dover Street, Miner Street, Wal-Mart, and McCann Technical School. The city has it has taken the following actions to confirm the status of the water system: The water main has been repaired and the water mains were disinfected with chlorine.

A chlorine residual has been maintained throughout the water system.

Friday, Sept. 25, multiple water system samples were collected from the affected area and elsewhere in the city. All results were absent for total coliform bacteria and showed adequate chlorine residuals.

Pressures have been determined to be adequate in the at-risk areas. _____________________________________________________________________________________ NORTH ADAMS, Mass.  The city released a boil water notice for all residences and business that lost water service or experienced discolored water or lower pressure in connection to the River Street water main break.

The Department of Public Services released a statement at 2:30 p.m. on Friday urging residents and businesses whose water was affected to boil water before consumption.

The statement reads:

"Due to the water main break on River Street, and as a precaution, all residences and business which lost water service, or experienced discolored water or lower pressure (below 35 psi at the water main/hydrant), advised to boil water for one minute prior to use for human consumption."

The Public Works and Water departments spent two days trying to isolate the leak in order to repair it. The 24-inch main separated at a joint that was probably caused by expansions and contractions from changing temperatures.

The leak was reported at about 7 p.m. on Tuesday and crews dug out the area on Wednesday. However, crews struggled to track down and turn the appropriate gates -- shutoffs that allow water to be diverted or shut off to certain sections of the system. Many of the 400-odd gates in the city are obsolete and some have trouble functioning.

There's also been issues with the mapping system for the gates and the departments have been depending on old maps because the digital ones created in the 1990s are "muddled" said Public Services Commissioner Timothy Lescarbeau.

In this case, it turned out the culprit was a line long that removed when the flood control system was installed along River Street. A check on the other side of Marshall Street some years ago related to Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art found concrete in the line. However, there was a section on the east side of the bridge that was still active.

During this time, a number or residences lost water or experienced low water pressure. Although the main ran down River Street, it also affected McCann Technical School and the City Yard on Hodges Cross Road and, to some extent, Walmart. McCann was closed and students at Colegrove Park Elementary reverted to remote education as a precaution.

Crews were able to find that old gate and shut off the water. A pressure collar with a rubber gasket was placed on the 140-year-old pipe late Thursday night that successfully closed the leak.

The city also released a fact sheet that stated n o water samples have confirmed the presence of bacteria, and the notice is being issued as a precaution . o water samples have confirmed the presence of bacteria, and the notice is being issued as a precaution

The sheet included:

Massachusetts drinking water standards required public water systems to maintain 20 pounds per square inch (psi) of pressure at each service connection to ensure safe water to our customers. These circumstances warranted advising those customers with discolored water, those who lost service and those whose pressures dropped to below 20 psi to boil their water upon resumption of water service. We determine pressure loss through hydrant pressures at less than 35 psi to have occurred in the following areas: River St., Yale St., Upper Meadow St., Williams St., North St., Cady St., Pitt St., Chesbro Ave., Chase Ave., North Holden St., Dover St., Miner St. WalMart, and McCann Tech.

Loss of pressure can result in backflow of water through and into the distribution system and may result in bacterial contamination. As a result, we advised customers in the affected area to boil their water and MassDEP is requiring the issuance of this public notice as a precautionary measure. The fact sheet also stated : We made repairs in the area and restored water pressure where pressure drops were identified. We maintained chlorine disinfection throughout our distribution system to kill bacteria and viruses that may be present. We will verify adequate pressure and will collect bacteria samples to confirm water quality within the area of concern and elsewhere in our distribution system. We will verify protection of the water system from backflow risks. We will let you know you are no longer advised to boil water due to this incident.

A public notice with more detail is available and is being distributed to affected areas. Further notice will be provided when the boil order is lifted.

For more information: please contact Public Services dispatch at 413-664-3047.

The full notice can be found here
A woman has been rushed to hospital after she bit into a strawberry which allegedly contained a needle - marking the second reported sabotage case in a week.

Erin Gelken was forced to go for tetanus injections and blood tests after she pricked her tongue on a strawberry she bought at Aldi in Port Pirie, South Australia.

Ms Gelken and her partner Mitchell Thomas were 'shaken up' following the alleged contamination, Nine News reported.

South Australian couple Erin Gelken and Mitchell Thomas were 'shaken up' following the alleged strawberry contamination

This is the second time South Australian shoppers have allegedly found needles in their strawberries this week.

Mr Thomas said Ms Gelken bit the first one and was 'fine' but was pierced after she attempted to eat a second strawberry.

'It's absolutely abhorrent, it's not good for the industry, these are industry killers,' Mr Thomas said.

The couple said they have reported the incident to Queensland Health and the police, with the latter seizing the strawberries and needle as evidence.

They bought the strawberries on Tuesday.

The other alleged case of sabotage occurred after Anne Lentakis purchased a punnet of Berry Indulgence from a Foodland in Stirling, Adelaide Hills, on Thursday.

Ms Gelken was forced to go for tetanus injections and blood tests after she pricked her tongue on a strawberry she bought at Aldi in Port Pirie, South Australia

Mr Thomas said Ms Gelken bit the first one and was 'fine' but was pierced after she attempted to eat a second strawberry. 'It's absolutely abhorrent, it's not good for the industry, these are industry killers,' Mr Thomas said

Ms Lentakis told ABC Radio she and her 11-year-old son had been cutting the fruit for an afternoon snack when they came across the contaminated strawberry.

'He cut one strawberry and found a pin deep inside the strawberry,' she said.

'He said to me, "Mum, I think there's a pin in my strawberry".'

The distraught mother said her eight-year-old son later found another needle planted in a different strawberry.

Ms Lentakis has since notified the fruit and vegetable store of the find and it has pulled the Berry Indulgence brand from its shelves.

'I think there have been things put in place since this happened before with metal scanning, so that was a bit confusing to wonder how and why this could happen but [he was] very appreciative that I had called him,' she said.

'He had jumped on the phone and activated their procedures.'

South Australia police are reportedly investigating the incident.

Ms Lentakis told ABC Radio she and her 11-year-old son had been cutting the fruit for an afternoon snack when they came across the contaminated strawberry

A national health crisis was sparked in September 2018 when sewing needles were discovered inside strawberries on sale at major supermarkets.

The contamination scare saw supermarkets pull punnets from their shelves and farmers dump the fruit by the truckload.

Some consumers were reluctant to purchase strawberries and the decline in demand had a significant impact on producers.

The estimated farm gate value of Queensland strawberries had declined by 8 per cent for 2018 to 2019, worth around $12million.
Actor Poonam Pandey has claimed that she recently suffered a brain haemorrhage after being beaten by husband Sam Bombay. The actor has revealed that she was in the hospital around a week ago and was discharged recently. I got beaten up very badly this time, it was a half murder. I dont know for how many days I was in the hospital, she said.

Poonam has now hinted that she may take the police complaint back which she had filed against Sam in Goa during their honeymoon, accusing him of molesting, threatening and assaulting her in their hotel room.

Because he is just crying in front of me and I really dont know what to do? Every time he just beat me up and later starts crying saying sorry. This time also he did the same and promised it will not happen again and I will treat you good. But this is something he keeps doing always. Because of him I got a brain haemorrhage, she told Spotboye in an interview.

Turning down accusations of marrying Sam for his money, Poonam said, This man has deleted all my pictures from his handle whereas I have not deleted anything, thinking that everything will be sorted even now. He does this everytime and removes them. And I feel I am a fool after reading articles against me that I am making money out of him. Whereas the fact is he is making money out of me by selling my videos.

Also read: Shraddha Kapoor, Sara Ali Khan deny consuming drugs, Bollywood actors statements to be reviewed by NCB: report

A Goa court had granted conditional bail to film producer Sam Bombay, who was arrested for allegedly molesting, threatening and assaulting his actor wife Poonam Pandey, police said on Wednesday. Sam has been asked to report to Canacona police station for four days starting Wednesday and also not to interfere with witnesses.

Poonam had filed a police complaint late on Monday night claiming that her husband had molested her and threatened her with dire consequences after assaulting her, he said. The couple are in Canacona village of South Goa for a film shoot.

The couple had tied the knot earlier this month and had shared pictures from the wedding on Instagram. While Sam has deleted the wedding pictures, Poonams account still holds few of them.

(With PTI inputs)

Follow @htshowbiz for more
Amid the ongoing ban on TikTok and Helo, Bytedance has issued cash bonuses up to Rs 4 lakh to employees in India. The company had earlier this month announced via an internal memo that it will be issuing a cash bonus to all eligible employees to help them overcome the "challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic and the changing macro environment."

All full-time employees who have worked for 26 or more working days between July to August are being given a bonus worth half their August base salary.

Bonuses for some mid-senior and senior employees ranged from Rs 1-4 lakh, the Economic Times reported, quoting people familiar with the matter.

ByteDance, which owns TikTok and Helo, has come under global scrutiny owing to its link with China and concerns about the collection of users' personal data.

The government on June 29 banned 59 Chinese apps, including TikTok and Helo from ByteDance. On September 2, the Centre banned additional 118 Chinese mobile applications, including PUBG. It said that these apps are engaged in activities that are "prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, the security of the state and public order".

ByteDance recently applied for a tech-export licence in China in line with the country's requirements, as it strives to seal a deal with Oracle Corp and Walmart Inc for TikTok's US operations.

China in August revised a list of technologies that are banned or restricted for export for the first time in 12 years. Experts believe that it is aimed at giving Beijing a say over any TikTok deal.

ByteDance has said that its deal with Oracle and Walmart, which will see the creation of a standalone U.S. company, needs approval from both the United States and China.

US President Donald Trump had ordered ByteDance to divest TikTok amid concerns that the personal data of as many as 100 million Americans who use the app could be passed on to China's Communist Party government.
Northern Ireland is at a crossroads.

Currently 46 people are in hospital being treated for Covid-19, with five patients critically ill in intensive care.

Read More

Meanwhile, the Department of Health revealed on Friday that a further 273 people have tested positive with the virus. This means there have been 1,236 confirmed cases here in the last seven days. Of these, 160 are older than 60 and the bleak reality of these statistics is that more people will become seriously ill with Covid-19 and die in the coming weeks.

However, as we saw earlier this year, it is possible to flatten the curve by adhering to the public health guidance.

Now, more than ever, it is vital that our government advisers and Executive respond quickly and deliver straightforward policies, backed up with scientific evidence - something that is lacking at the moment.

For example, we are told the majority of infections are happening in domestic settings - hence the need to stop household visits - but what is the actual figure and how is this information being gathered when we know the test and trace system is not working as it should?

Consider also the rules around pubs and restaurants - while household visits were banned, six people from any number of households were allowed to sit together at a table at a pub or restaurant.

The politicians and officials argued that measures, such as hand sanitising stations, were in place in pubs and restaurants, which help to mitigate the dangers posed by the virus.

But it does not take a genius to work out that it doesn't matter how clean your hands are if you are breathing infected droplets over the person sitting next to you - so it was little wonder the public was left confused.

Then, on Thursday night, the Executive performed a quiet U-turn, publishing updated guidance stating that the six people at a restaurant or pub table can only live in two households. It seems a sensible approach, but it is unclear why it was not implemented at the same time as the restrictions on domestic visits.

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And now it seems that they are dragging their feet on the matter of a proposed curfew for licensed premises. The measure has been put into place in England, Scotland and Wales, with Prime Minister Boris Johnson stating that "we must stop the virus being transmitted in bars and restaurants". But here in Northern Ireland, the Executive is yet to reveal its decision.

Worse still, it has transpired that ministers have agreed on the best course of action but they will not announce the decision until next week.

This coming at a time that the message from the Executive is that we are heading towards a crisis and it is vital that everyone adheres to the public health messages to prevent further tragedy, a decimated economy and a shattered NHS.

Moreover, the experts are clear - the time to act is now.

As it stands, Covid-19 is going to remain a considerable threat for some time and the battle to keep it under control is clearly going to involve further significant sacrifice.

This will require a public that trusts those making the decisions - but with all the questions and confusion over the handling of the pandemic, the Executive may find winning that trust is the biggest battle of all.
Trump to Announce Supreme Court Nomination

President Donald Trump on Saturday will announce his next Supreme Court nominee, the third in his first term.

The Republican is widely expected to choose Amy Coney Barrett, a federal judge in Indiana, to fill the vacancy that opened with the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Barrett is exactly the kind of justice President Trump wants, and that the country needs right now, so I think it will be her and that it should be, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) told The Epoch Times.

Ginsburg, a Clinton nominee, died at age 87 on Sept. 18 from cancer complications.

Trumps first nominee, Neil Gorsuch, was confirmed 54-45 by the Senate in April 2017.

Gorsuch filled the seat left open a year prior by the sudden death of Justice Antonin Scalia, a Reagan nominee.

In 2018, Justice Anthony Kennedy, another Reagan nominee, opted to retire, giving Trump his second nomination.

(Front L-R) Supreme Court justices Stephen Breyer, Clarence Thomas, John Roberts, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Samuel Alito, (Back L-R) Neil Gorsuch, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Brett Kavanaugh at the Supreme Court building on Nov. 30, 2018. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Brett Kavanaugh was confirmed in a narrow 50-48 vote after weeks of tense deliberations that included the promotion by Democrats of unsubstantiated sexual assault allegations, several of which were later retracted.

Trump plans to announce his new nominee on Saturday at 5 p.m. at the White House in Washington. He has said he will choose a woman.

Shortly before Ginsburgs death, the president expanded the list of judges and others he promised to draw from if another Supreme Court vacancy opened up while he was still in office.

The original list of 25 was expanded to 45.

Barrett, who serves on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit, was on the old list. Supporters say her well-developed record as a judge and scholar makes her a great choice, as does her adherence to the Constitution and sharp intellect.

Time and time again, you hear people saying shes the smartest person in the room, Carrie Severino, president of the Judicial Crisis Network, told The Epoch Times.

Barretts Catholic faith came under attack by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), the ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, during a 2017 hearing before her confirmation to the federal court.

Why is it that so many of us on this side have this very uncomfortable feeling that dogma and law are two different things. I think whatever a religion is, it has its own dogma. The law is totally different. And I think, in your case, professor, when you read your speeches, the conclusion one draws is that the dogma lives loudly within you, Feinstein told Barrett. And thats of concern.

Amy Coney Barrett during Senate confirmation hearing to be U.S. circuit judge on Aug. 4, 2017. (Screenshot via Senate TV)

The senator said she was worried Barrett and Joan Larsen, another judicial candidate at the hearing, would vote to overturn Roe v. Wade, which ruled that abortion is a constitutional right. Both Larsen and Barrett responded that they would not be in a position on lower federal courts to rule on Roe v. Wade and would follow precedent established by the Supreme Court.

You really saw the grace under pressure when Senator Feinstein attacked her for her religious faith. She did not waver. She was very confident but kind, respectful, and firm in her response, Severino said.

Earlier in the hearing, Barrett faced questioning from Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who asked her about her writing that Catholic judges should recuse themselves from cases concerning the death penalty.

Barrett said she wrote the article 20 years prior, adding: Its never appropriate for a judge to impose that judges personal convictions, whether they derive from faith or anywhere else, on the law.

She also said: Im a product of 19 years of Catholic education. And every once in a while, Holy Mother the Church has not agreed with a vote of mine. And has let me know.

A Supreme Court Honor Guard salutes before moving the flag-draped casket of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg back into the court as Ginsburg lies in repose under the Portico at the top of the front steps of the Supreme Court building in Washington on Sept. 24, 2020. (Andrew Harnik/Pool via Reuters)

Lee told The Epoch Times that the recent reporting on Barretts faith signaled religious bigotry.

Barrett facing harsh scrutiny already from the Senate means shes a known quantity that could potentially be approved quickly, before the Nov. 3 election.

Barrett and Barbara Lagoa, a federal judge in Florida, are the only women Trump has confirmed hes considering. The president had narrowed down his choices to five.

Lagoas parents left Cuba to give their children a better future. Her background makes her an attractive choice for some, who say it would help bolster Trumps reelection chances by garnering votes among Hispanics and in Florida.

Whoever Trump picks will be grilled by Judiciary Democrats as the presidents opposition seeks ways to derail his nominee.

Democrat congressional leaders have urged the Senate not to consider Trumps nominee, arguing its too close to the election and expressing frustration with how the GOP-controlled upper chamber blocked President Barack Obamas nominee in 2016.

But the bulk of Republican senators say theres plenty of precedent for election-year nominations and that the same party controls the Senate and presidency this time around, making the situation much different than 4 years ago.

President Trumps nominee will receive a vote on the floor of the United States Senate, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said last week, hours after Ginsburg died.

Jan Jekielek contributed to this report.
By PTI

UNITED NATIONS: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday raised questions on the response of the United Nations in combating the COVID-19 pandemic, and assured the global community that India will use its production and delivery capacity to help all humanity in fighting the deadly disease.

"Over the last 8 to 9 months, the whole world has been battling the pandemic of the coronavirus. Where is the United Nations in this joint fight against the pandemic? Where is its effective response?" Modi said as he asserted that reform in the responses, in the processes, and in the very character of the United Nations is the need of the hour.

In his pre-recorded video statement to the landmark General Debate of the 75th session of the UN General Assembly, Prime Minister Modi said that even during these very difficult times of the raging pandemic, India's pharmaceutical industry has sent essential medicines to over 150 countries.

ALSO READ | India's gesture of friendship towards one country is not directed against third country: PM Modi

"As the largest vaccine producing country of the world, I want to give one more assurance to the global community today. India's vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis," Modi said in a strong assurance to the international community that is battling the devastating coronavirus pandemic.

The COVID-19 pandemic has so far infected over 32 million people and more than 993,500 people have died across the world.

In India, the deadly virus has infected nearly 6 million people and killed more than 93,000.

The prime minister's remarks questioning the UN's effectiveness in combating the pandemic came amidst the strident criticism of the role played by the World Health Organisation (WHO) by US President Donald Trump, who this week alleged that the top world health body was virtually controlled by China.

Trump has repeatedly blamed China for the coronavirus pandemic which originated in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in December last year and accused Beijing of suppressing the details of the deadly contagion.

Modi told the 193-member UN General Assembly that in India and the neighbourhood, "we are moving ahead with phase 3 clinical trials in India."

He further assured that India will also help all the countries in enhancing their cold chain and storage capacities for the delivery of the vaccines.

ALSO READ | Self-reliant India will be force multiplier for global economy: PM Modi tells UNGA

This year's high-level UN General Assembly is being held in a largely virtual format as world leaders did not travel to New York for the annual gathering due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Heads of State and Government and Ministers sent in pre-recorded video statements for the high-level week, including the special commemoration of the UN's 75 years and the General Debate.
Lord Justice Leveson missed a trick by not asking Sir Tom Stoppard to be one of his six assessors, called to aid the distinguished judge in his inquiry into the British press.

I say this not only because Britains greatest living playwright would have been a wonderful extra pair of eyes to make sure that the report, vast as it threatens to be, will also be a literary pleasure to read when it emerges in two days time. The real point is that Sir Tom, who started his writing career as a 17-year-old trainee on the Western Daily Press in 1954, has for all those intervening years been thinking about the rights and wrongs of the British press.

In his 1978 play Night and Day, Stoppard examined and satirised our trade with beautiful precision. As in this exchange: Milne: No matter how imperfect things are, if youve got a free press everything is correctable, and without it everything is concealable. Ruth: Im with you on the free press. Its the newspapers I cant stand. Ruth speaks for all those who feel the tabloid press have abused a great privilege.

This point was expressed last week by the American political scientist, Frank Luntz, addressing the Policy Exchange think-tank. Luntz, precisely because he admires Britain, said in some exasperation: I do not understand how a national newspaper in this country can put nude women on page 3. Duly behaving like a character from a Stoppard play, I put my hand up and asked Luntz: So what page do you think they should be on?

Despair

This, of course, did not address the Americans point. The correct response to that sort of objection was put by the character Milne, who one suspects spoke for the playwrights own view: Junk journalism is the evidence of a society that has got one thing right, that there should be nobody with the power to dictate where responsible journalism begins. That does seem right, though junk journalism can at times make some of us at the posher end of the trade feel embarrassed or even tainted by association.

Five years ago, on these pages, I wrote an article of despair at the way some papers in this country had treated Kate McCann, whose child Madeleine had been abducted while on a holiday in Portugal, and who at least one British newspaper had all but declared guilty of murder. I described it as a tsunami of prejudice masquerading as detection; the Daily Express, in particular, had treated the McCanns with disgusting cruelty. One should not lose sight of the fact, however, that a year later the McCanns were awarded 550,000 in libel damages; and the Express titles were forced to accompany that payout with front-page apologies to the parents they had so grievously wronged.

Similarly, Christopher Jefferies  who was subjected to character assassination by tabloid after he had been erroneously arrested on suspicion of murdering 25-year-old Joanna Yates three years ago  has received considerable financial compensation for the defamatory attacks he suffered. This doesnt make the papers behaviour any more acceptable; but it does show there is already a regulatory framework governing newspapers.

It is known as the law: and the same law  in this case criminal rather than merely civil  is now bringing prosecutions against newspaper executives in connection with the illegal interception of communications, or, in the vernacular, phone hacking. Indeed, no fewer than 185 police officers are involved in this case, making it, by one account, the biggest investigation in British criminal history.

In fact, it is the man who put Brian Levesons name forward for his unenviable task, the Lord Chief Justice Igor Judge, who has best made the argument against new laws specifically to govern the press. In the 13th Annual Justice Lecture, the most senior member of the judiciary declared a year ago: An independent press will, from time to time, behave appallingly or employ individuals who in order to pursue a story will commit criminal offences. No editors, I think, have ever advocated that they are entitled to some special journalistic privilege if they do so, immunising them or their employees from criminal prosecution. So that is not the issue... We do not say that the General Medical Council and self-regulation have failed when, as sometimes happens, a doctor sexually molests one or more of his patients, or like Dr Shipman murders them.

It is understandable that many MPs, who can never forgive the press for its expose of the abuse of the parliamentary expenses system, and who now have to submit those expenses to an independent scrutineer, should be rubbing their hands at the prospect of the press itself coming under statutory oversight. Yet it should occur to these politicians that there is a special reason why their financial dealings have been exposed to the rigours of quasi-legal external invigilation: the money they receive is taken directly from the public, without the latter having any discretion in the matter. In that sense, they are much closer to the BBC, which is paid for out of a poll-tax.

Feral

This is why the former Director-General of the BBC, Mark Thompson, argued last year: It is not obvious to me that newspapers that people can choose to buy or ignore should be held to the same level of continuous supervision and accountability as broadcasters who reach out into every household in the land. To which one can add that it is advertisers as well as readers who hold commercial newspapers to account. One reason why there is no equivalent to the page 3 nude in the US press is that advertisers wouldnt want to be associated with such journalism; and it was an advertisers strike which was the proximate cause of the closure of the News of the World, and the loss of over 300 journalists jobs.

It is true that the British press is, to quote Tony Blair, feral; or certainly more so than its equivalents in the USA or Europe. If you are a Prime Minister, it might well be a source of deep irritation that you should be lampooned and hounded in a way which your European counterparts would not have to endure. By the same token, we journalists in this country are envied by our European colleagues.

This was made clear in a speech last week by Jurgen Kronig, the head of the Foreign Press Association in London: We foreign journalists coming to London are swiftly confronted with this deep cultural commitment to press freedom  no register of journalists, no legal requirement even to have a Press Card. Britain has in my view the freest, probably the best press in the world. At the same time it can be the most irresponsible press. Two sides of one and the same coin.

Devalued as it may have been, it is a coin worth keeping.

d.lawson@independent.co.uk
Srinagar, Sep 26 : An earthquake measuring 4.8 on the Richter scale jolted Jammu and Kashmir on Saturday even though the impact was felt only in Srinagar city and adjoining areas.

Met department officials said the quake struck at 12.02 p.m., and its epicentre was in Jammu and Kashmir region, 120 km inside the Earth's crust.

"Its coordinates are latitude 34.86 degrees north and longitude 74.06 degrees east", an official of the Met department said.

On Friday, an earthquake measuring 5.4 on the Richter scale occurred in Jammu and Kashmir with its epicentre in Ladakh-Tibet border.

Seismologically, Kashmir is situated in a highly earthquake prone region.

Earthquakes have wrought havoc in Kashmir in the past.

In October 2005, an earthquake measuring 7.6 on the Richter scale killed over 50,000 people in Indian and Pakistan controlled parts of J&K.
(Natural News) U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo blasted the atheist communist party in China during the virtual Values Voter Summit 2020 on Tuesday for persecuting Christians and trying to rewrite the Bible to adapt the Christian doctrine to Chinese society.

(Article by Edwin Mora republished from Breitbart.com)

We watch today the challenge that Christians and Catholics have to practice their faith inside of China, Pompeo proclaimed at the virtual conference, echoing annual International Religious Freedom Reports issued by the State Department.

The Chinese Communist Party is trying to rewrite the Bible itself to sinicize the Christian doctrine, he added, consistent with independent assessments. Thats unacceptable. That will diminish the Chinese people. We want good things for them.

Chinese dictator Xi Jinping has made it clear that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) wants to sinicize all religions  ensure that they assimilate into traditions and doctrine that better conform with Chinese society and CCP objectives.

Referring to sinicization, the Diplomat reported in June 2018:

This has been a primary focus of Xis religious policies since his April 2016 speech at the National Religious Work Conference, in which he asserted that in order to actively guide the adaptation of religions to socialist society, an important task is supporting Chinas religions persistence in the direction of sinicization.

During the virtual conference, Pompeo stressed that authoritarianism thrives in the absence of religious freedom.

I believe, President Trump believes, that absent religious freedom, the lives of people around the world are very difficult, he noted. Authoritarianism almost always follows the oppression of religion. Pushing religion out of the public square drives oppression, drives authoritarianism,

That is why the Trump administration has made it a top priority to promote religious freedom across the world, Pompeo said.

He also lambasted China for trying to eliminate anyone who is not Han Chinese in Muslim-majority Xinjiang province.

In Xinjiang, the communist party is imprisoning Muslims in concentration camps, dubbed vocational centers by Beijing.

The U.S. State Department has acknowledged that China is subjecting Christians, Muslims, and other religious groups to transformation through re-education at the camps.

China forces the camp prisoners to listen to propaganda and subjects them to intensive monitoring outside the facilities, all intended to ensure the worshippers remain loyal to the Communist Party.

According to Pompeo, the United States must ensure that China does not trample on religious freedom and human rights.

He said:

The Chinese Communist Party is seeking hegemony across the world, and we have an obligation to do our best to make sure that the freedoms that we value and the capacity to exercise our human rights arent trampled upon by whether thats their predatory economic activity or their military might or their misinformation campaigns here in the U.S.

We work hard to make sure that we maximize religious freedom for every human being all across the world, he added.

Read more at: Breitbart.com
Every five years when controversy around building a new road to bypass Bridgenorths core business section comes up the issues get a little more complex.

The anniversary of what is mostly a fight between village business owners and traffic planners is linked to updates of Peterborough Countys overall roads plan.

A bypass looping around the east side of the village was added to the plan in 2004. Ever since the Bridgenorth business community has lobbied to have it removed, never successfully.

From a traffic control point of view this is all about reducing backups.

Chemong Road from Peterborough north to Bridgenorth carries roughly 15,000 vehicles a day, the busiest road in the county.

Most flow into Bridgenorth. At the north end of the village they hit stoplights and either go left across the Chemong Causeway or continue north. Both routes lead to cottage country.

Back in 2004 traffic was not so heavy. Traffic snarls generally happened on Friday and Sunday when cottagers were arriving or leaving.

From the outset businesses have been concerned a bypass would induce cottagers not to stop in for groceries or other supplies.

But the bypass wasnt an imminent threat. The transportation planned talked about it being needed in 2031, a longer time frame than most people can get worked up about.

The arguments were common to what had been hashed out in other rural communities. Protection of village identity and preservation of small businesses versus ease of travel, particularly for cottage outsiders.

Sixteen years later the issues are not as simple.

There is more permanent housing in and around the village, so more people who visit daily. An aging, affluent cottage population is more likely to have sold their homes and converted their lakeside properties to permanent homes  even more regular village users.

The current pandemic has now accelerated shifts away from Toronto and the GTA to smaller communities.

If that acceleration continues to add to a growth trend that already existed there will be more traffic in Bridgenorth, more of it people coming to use village services rather than driving through to another destination.

Still, a business spokesperson this week told county councillors they only have to look at how bypasses in other communities have killed local business.

Two examples would be Bewdley, bypassed by Highway 28 in the early 1970s, and Orono, bypassed by the Highway 115.

But those were different times and situations. Neither had large business sections to begin with or much of a population to support them.

Bridgenorth today is in a better position to deal with a bypass. One traffic consultant has said bypass could make the core business section stronger by reducing congestion and making daily shopping easier for residents and cottagers.

Cost is another concern. The bypass is budgeted at $53 million. In 2014 it was estimated that Ward Street, the village main street, could be widened to three lanes for $2 million.

Thats a big difference, and not worth the added investment just to make it easier for cottagers to get where they are going.

But the day will likely arrive when there is too much cottage traffic for Ward Street to handle, and enough local shoppers to keep businesses thriving.

With that in mind, the county would best to leave a bypass on the books.
Donald Trump's former press secretary has attacked Democrats for criticising the president's reported favourite Supreme Court replacement, Amy Coney Barett, suggesting they should instead praise the pro-life lawyer for "empowering women".

"If liberals actually cared about empowering women, theyd be applauding Judge Amy Coney Barrett - a working mom with impeccable legal credentials - not denigrating her with bigoted attacks on her Christian faith," Sarah Huckabee Sanders said in a tweet, following reports Ms Barrett is set to replace Ginsburg.

Senior Republicans on Friday night told CNN the president intends to choose Ms Barrett, a 48-year-old conservative judge on Chicagos 7th US Circuit Court of Appeals, to replace Ginsburg, who died last Friday aged 87.

Democrats have criticised the move, suggesting that Ms Barrett's strong Roman Catholic faith could influence her decisions in the Supreme Court, with its rulings crucial to some of the most important and fiercely contested issues in US law, including reproductive rights. Some Democrats have branded Ms Barrett an "extremist".

Quoting multiple GOP sources with knowledge of the Supreme Court replacement process, the CNN report stated the White House is indicating to allies on Capitol Hill that Ms Barretts intended selection will be announced on Saturday.

The machinery is in motion, one of the sources told the outlet, while cautioning that, until Ms Barrett is announced, the president could always make a last-minute change.

Mr Trump told supporters at a campaign rally on Friday that he was moving forward with a SCOTUS announcement tomorrow. The Democrats dont think we should do it," he said. "Put them in our shoes  They would be working over the weekend. They have been not good to deal with.

Despite the reports, Mr Trump has remained tight-lipped on who he will nomiate to replace Ginsburg, a liberal icon and staunch defender of women's rights. "Is that what they're telling you?" he told reporters Friday night.

"You'll find out tomorrow," he added. "Look, they're all great. It could be any one of them. It could be actually anyone on the list".

Other names in the hat to replace Ginsburg had included attorneys Barbara Lagoa (Atlanta), and Kate Comerford Todd (deputy White House counsel).

A Catholic mother-of seven, Ms Barrett is a former professor at the Notre Dame Law School. She was a finalist to replace retired Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy in 2018, a spot that ultimately went to Brett Kavanaugh.

At her confirmation hearing to the appellate court, Dianne Feinstein said that her Catholic dogma lives loudly within her. And thats of concern when you come to big issues that people have fought for for years in this country, Ms Feinstein said.

Ex-senator Joe Lieberman on Friday night broke ranks with his former colleagues, warning that repeated attacks on Ms Barrett's faith could end up hurting the party in the long-run.

"You can disagree with somebody based on whether they're pro-life or pro-choice," Mr Lieberman, the 2000 Democratic vice presidential nominee, told Fox News.

"But when you start to say that you're against them because their religion, in this case, their Roman Catholicism determines their point of view," he added, "you're doing something really abhorrent that I think is bigoted, is un-American, and incidentally, is unconstitutional."
Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal wrote to Union environment minister Prakash Javadekar on Saturday, and asked him for an in-person meeting to discuss the crop stubble burning issue in northwest India.

In his letter (in Hindi), Kejriwal suggested a move away from the Centres scheme of subsidising straw management machinery, which he said hasnt solved the farm fires problem, which plagues the region from October every year.

He wrote that he didnt meet Javadekar earlier because the Delhi government had meetings with scientists at the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI) who had found a simpler technology to deal with crop stubble residue. The scientists have suggested that the stubble can be converted to manure using a chemical which may also improve soil fertility in the long run.

I understand that the Centre and the various state governments are taking various measures as per their capacities. But the focus now for all state governments is on machines that can help cut stubble. Despite the central subsidy for these machines, farmers also have to pay a hefty amount to get them. Then they also spend money on getting the stubble cut with machines. This is one of the main reasons why many farmers are weary of procuring the machines, he wrote.

Responding to an Aam Aadmi Party tweet on Saturday citing Kejriwals letter, Javadekar tweeted that they had already spoken over the phone. Arvind Kejriwalji we have aleady spoken over the phone. Centre has already taken successful steps to curb air pollution in Delhi and we have seen results. I have also informed you that we had called meetings with all states involved in the matter, Javadekar tweeted.

Crop stubble fires have started in Punjab earlier than expected, which could mean in combination with adverse meteorological conditions like low winds, air pollution could spike gradually in Delhi in the coming days.

But while the Centre is working on a scheme of subsidising straw management machinery, the Delhi government is suggesting the use of newer technologies in the field.

The IARI technology can address these problems. We are going to try the technology in Delhi this year and ensure no stubble is burnt. Even though there is less time I hope the IARI technology is popularised in neighbouring states to reduce stubble burning. I can meet you when you call me, Kejriwal wrote.

Last year an analysis of satellite data by Hiren Jethva, Research Scientist with, Universities Space Research Association at, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center had suggested there was virtually no decline in the number of crop stubble fires in 2018 compared to 2017, even as the Centre implemented a new policy for in-situ management of crop residue.

The Centre had launched a 1,150-crore scheme in 2018 to subsidise farm straw-management machinery in the northwestern states where rampant paddy-straw burning contributes to air pollution in Delhi every year.

The Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) had said last year that there was a 50% reduction in the agricultural area where crop residue burning takes place every October in Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Delhi based on satellite data collected by them.

ICAR director general, Trilochan Mohapatra did not answer HTs calls on Saturday. On September 6, he had told HT, We have disbursed the money this year also to states to ensure farmers get subsidised straw management machinery. By October 15, those machines should be in place. We are expecting a reduction in stubble burning cases. Already over 50% reduction in areas with crop stubble burning has been recorded.

According to Harinder Singh Lakhowal, Bharatiya Kisan Union, general secretary (Punjab), People have only started harvesting their crop now. Some people may have burnt stubble also. A large number of farmers have not received subsidies to buy straw management machinery this year so obviously they will burn stubble. Farmers are extremely disturbed about the farm bills also. Its a crisis.

Farmers can hire Happy-Seeder or other machinery at 1,200 to 1,500 per acre and will get a 50% subsidy if they choose to buy the machine. Farmers spend about 2,000 per acre on diesel etc to run residue-management machinery according to Lakhowal.

According to a study published in the Science Magazine journal last year, use of the Happy Seeder technology can potentially generate 6,000-11,500 more profit per hectare for farmers through reduced fertilizer and labour costs. The use of Happy Seeders can also reduce greenhouse gas emissions per hectare by more than 78%, the study had found.
As of August 26th, 2021 Yahoo India will no longer be publishing content. Your Yahoo Account Mail and Search experiences will not be affected in any way and will operate as usual. We thank you for your support and readership. For more information on Yahoo India, please visit the FAQ
(Natural News) To no ones surprise, the top morning and evening broadcast network newscasts have yet to utter a word about either of the weeks two major bombshells in how the FBI went about its spying of the Trump campaign and Operation Crossfire Hurricane. With one pertaining to text messages from FBI agents and the other about a key Steele dossier source having been investigated as a possible Russian spy, the wheels have come off and flown over the edge.

(Article by Curtis Houck republished from NewsBusters.org)

Thursday afternoon, The Federalists Sean Davis and Mollie Hemingway reported on a new federal court disclosure from Michael Flynn attorney Sidney Powell that FBI agents tasked with tak[ing] down Donald Trump during and after the 2016 election were so concerned about the agencys potentially illegal behavior that they purchased liability insurance to protect themselves less than two weeks before Trump was inaugurated president.

Davis and Hemingway make clear that the senders of the texts were redacting, but the filing nonetheless consisted of handwritten notes and texts from Peter Strzok, Andrew McCabe, Lisa Page, and FBI analysts who worked on the FBIs investigation of Flynn.

Here was a sampling of texts from Davis and Hemingway (click expand):

[W]e all went and purchased professional liability insurance, one agent texted on Jan. 10, 2017, the same day CNN leaked details that then-President-elect Trump had been briefed by Comey about the bogus Christopher Steele dossier. That briefing of Trump was used as a pretext to legitimize the debunked dossier, which was funded by the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign and compiled by a foreign intelligence officer who was working for a sanctioned Russian oligarch. Holy crap, an agent responded. All the analysts too? Yep, the first agent said. All the folks at the Agency as well. [C]an I ask who are the most likely litigators? an agent responded. [A]s far as potentially suing yall[?] [H]aha, who knows.I think [t]he concern when we got it was that there was a big leak at DOJ and the NYT among others was going to do a piece, the first agent said. (.) [T]he new AG might have some questions.then yada yada yadawe all get screwed, one agent wrote. The FBI agents also discussed how the investigations leadership was consumed with conspiracy theories rather than evidence. Im tellying [sic] man, if this thing ever gets FOIAd, there are going to be some tough questions asked, one agent wrote. [A]nd a great deal of those will be related to Brian having a scope way outside the boundaries of logic[.] (.) Several texts show that the order to close the criminal investigation against Flynn came as early as Nov. 8, 2016, the same day as the 2016 presidential election. It was later re-opened in early January of 2017. (.) The explosive new text messages also show agents believed the investigation was being run by FBI officials who were in the tank for Hillary Clinton. [D]oing all this election research  I think some of these guys want a [C]linton presidency, one agent wrote on Aug. 11, shortly after the FBI opened the Crossfire Hurricane investigation against Trump. In one series of texts sent the same day as the infamous Jan. 5 Oval Office meeting between Obama, Biden, Comey, Sally Yates, and Susan Rice, one agent admits that Trump was right when he tweeted that the FBI was delaying his briefings as incoming president so they could cook up evidence against him.

So the previous administration closed then reopened the probe into the incoming national security adviser after it had spied on the campaign of the opposing party? That seems like something journalists should be covering!

Of course, ABC, CBS, and NBC newscasts dont actually care about any of this.

Speaking about the texts on Fridays Fox & Friends, Hemingway called them stunning revelations and agents that the leaks, the criminal leaks about the Mike Flynn phone calls with Ambassador Kislyak were done by high levels at the White House and Trump was right to call into question the probe in January 2017.

The Hills Joe Concha noted such stories are either getting buried or not even spoken about at all, which is utterly remarkable while the people that should be called out on the carpet are instead rewarded with book deals and lucrative contributor deals with CNN or MSNBC.

So, the more you do bad things, apparently in Washington, the more you get rewarded on the other end instead of being ostracized or even, I dont know, charged with doing something. Its utterly remarkable, he added, citing Comey, McCabe, Page, and Strzok.

Thursdays second bombshell came a few hours later when the Senate Judiciary Committee released an FBI memo declassified that revealed a key Steele dossier source was investigated by the FBI (with a FISA warrant) in 2010 for ties to key Russian intelligence officials.

And as CBSs Catherine Herridge tweeted when the letter was released, the Crossfire Hurricane team knew this was the case in December 2016. Herridges network didnt care about either of these developments and kept them off of CBS This Morning and CBS Evening News.

Knowing that, the Daily Callers Chuck Ross astutely pointed out that this has created only more concerns that Russian disinformation was fed to Steele.

For a news media so concerned about Russia around every corner and under every nook and cranny, they seemed to have fallen victim to doing Russias bidding. Who knew?!

For a liberal media that spent years touting the dossier and continues to level charges of being a Russian spy and Russian collusion against their political opponents, its worth calling attention to how the salacious document theyve loved since first hearing about it in 2016 was a total lie.

Fox Business Network host Maria Bartiromo sounded off on this Friday during her show Mornings with Maria (click expand):
Democratic presidential nominee and former Vice President Joe Biden holds up a copy of his daily schedule in Tampa, Fla., on Sept. 15, 2020. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Biden Called Troops Stupid [Expletives], Campaign Confirms

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden called members of the military stupid [expletives] during a trip to the United Arab Emirates in 2016, his campaign confirmed.

Video footage of Bidens statement circulated widely on social media on Friday.

Andrew Bates, a spokesman for Biden, said in a statement to the Daily Beast that Biden was jokingly encouraging the audience to clap for an airwoman on the stage, and a number of service members can be seen laughing and smiling at the comment.

Seconds before, he praised them for the incredible sacrifices [they] make for our country, Bates said, adding, He thanked them for their patriotism and courage throughout, and closed his remarks by saying, youre the finest generation of warriors the world has ever, ever knownreceiving an enthusiastic ovation.

The video clip circulating on TikTok, Twitter, and other social media websites showed Biden telling troops: I have incredibly good judgment. One, I married Jill, and two, I appointed Johnson to the academy. And I just want you to know that. Clap for that, you stupid [expletives].

People present were clapping when Biden made the off-color remark.

President Donald Trump speaks to the press as he departs from the South Lawn of the White House in Washington on Sept. 18, 2020. (Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images)

Come on, man. Man, you are a dull bunch. Must be slow here, man. I dont know, Biden added.

Biden in recent weeks has hammered President Donald Trump over alleged remarks Trump made about troops while in France several years ago.

The Atlantic, citing anonymous sources, claimed Trump made disparaging remarks about troop, but the reporting was challenged by a number of on-the-record sources who were present during the trip.

If the reporting is true, its disgusting, Biden told a crowd in early September. It affirms what most of us believe to be true, that Donald Trump is not fit to do the job of president, to be the commander in chief.

Trumps campaign on Friday called for Biden to apologize over his remarks to troops in Abu Dhabi.

Biden and Trump are slated to face off in their first debate on Sept. 29 in Ohio.
The Government has played its hand, for the time being at least. After weeks of confusing and contradictory edicts, growing public disquiet and rising Covid-19 cases, they've revealed their grand plan: suppress the virus 'as much as possible' to 'save lives' until there is a vaccine.

As we all know, corona cases are spiralling. And we, the British public, are to blame, according to the PM. There had been 'too many breaches' of the rules, he said in his address last week.

So at the moment we're in a sort of limbo  told to work from home 'if we can', facing curfews, and, in Scotland, more severe restrictions on visiting each other's homes.

ADVERTISEMENT

And, of course, if people 'don't follow the rules... then we reserve the right to go further', Boris Johnson said.

I am sure I'm not alone in feeling an unsettling sense of deja vu. Are we on the verge of another full lockdown? It's unbearable to contemplate. Health Secretary Matt Hancock seemed to think it was all quite straightforward  the vaccine, it's been widely reported, is already in production. He thinks it'll be ready 'early next year', or maybe even this year, depending on who he's been talking to.

Then, and only then, can we all breathe a sigh of relief. The perpetual cycle they're planning of regulations, confinement and closures  and ever more draconian ways of enforcing these measures, the fines and snooping  can come to an end. We will be saved, a fairytale end to the pandemic.

The proverbial carrot dangling on a stick. Almost, but not quite, within reach.

Every Friday I take a Covid swab at home and post it off, writes DR ELLIE CANNON

Except that there is a huge snag in this strategy. Ask any scientist who knows what they're talking about and they'll tell you the vaccine just isn't going to provide this kind of resolution.

Of course, I understand why people cling to this dream  the Hollywood ending to the pandemic. I say this both as a GP and as an ordinary person whose life, like everyone else's, has been turned upside down this year. I'm deeply invested  a fully signed-up guinea pig on the vaccine trial myself. I dearly wish it were true. But I feel, as a doctor, it's my duty to be honest: the jab, when it finally arrives, won't be the miracle cure or silver bullet these Ministers are making it out to be.

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To claim otherwise is at best misguided, which, given the retinue of science advisers at their disposal, seems unlikely. At worst, it is deeply disingenuous. Mr Hancock and Mr Johnson could have done well to tune in to an interview with Oxford's star vaccine scientist Professor Sarah Gilbert earlier this month, in which she urged people to 'temper their expectations' about immunisation. She added: 'It's not going to be as it is in the movies, where there is some breakthrough and suddenly the world is protected.'

And I couldn't agree more. Vaccines are not a panacea. For a start, some people just won't opt to have the jab. At the moment, large numbers of people seem nervous.

A recent survey suggested 15 per cent of Britons would say no to the jab, up from five per cent in March. In America, as many as 40 per cent claim they'd turn it down.

Others simply won't get round to it. Most vaccines have to be given in two doses, which makes it even more likely people will forget, not get round to it, or put it off.

Others may not be suitable  for instance, people with immune system conditions, and those with certain types of cancer.

Covid fact Trials in humans are under way for 42 possible Covid-19 vaccines.

In these patients, vaccinations aren't recommended because they can interfere with treatments.

And there has to be the capacity and infrastructure to quickly vaccinate a lot of people  and as we've seen, those put in charge of these kinds of things can often be 'surprised' by surges in demand.

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Professor Stephen Evans, 77, who is an expert in pharmaceuticals at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and a participant, like me, in the Oxford vaccine trial, added: 'There must be good systems able to track who has been vaccinated and who hasn't and the data on this must be able to get back to GP records.

'It is not clear that the planning for this massive data-processing task has been done, but it's crucial to ensure that the vaccine is really effective in actual use, rather than just in the trials.'

We know from the trials that the Oxford vaccine is safe. In some people, it causes mild, transient side effects  a headache and generally feeling below par are most common. I didn't have any side effects. And we know it does cause a strong immune response in adults aged 18 to 55, which means scientists are optimistic that it will provide protection against Covid-19. But it'll take time to find out just how much.

More than 35,000 volunteers are on the trial, spread across a number of countries. Some of us have had the real jab, others a placebo, or dummy version. The researchers now have to watch and wait, to see how many in each group catch Covid-19.

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Every Friday I take a Covid swab at home and post it off. I get my result back in about 48 hours. So far, I've been all clear. But it's important to understand: no vaccine is 100 per cent effective. Take the UK flu vaccination programme, which is considered a success. On a good year, it prevents just over 50 per cent of cases. But in the winter of 2017, it protected just 15 per cent of those who had it overall (there were more than 25,000 deaths).

This was partly because the jab that year didn't protect against what turned out to be the most prevalent strain of flu going about (there are more than 60 strains currently identified).

Professor Sarah Gilbert, pictured, has urged people to 'temper their expectations' about immunisation

But as we age, the immune system weakens and responds less 'enthusiastically' to vaccination. Since the 2017 disaster, older adults have a new, souped-up version of the flu vaccine, and over the past couple of years, deaths from the virus have been remarkably low. But it takes time and a great deal of research to get these things right.

Aware of this phenomenon, the Oxford trial has specifically recruited people who are aged over 70 for its latest phase.

Hopefully we'll soon know more about how well it works in older adults  who we know are most vulnerable to the virus. But many experts, including Prof Gilbert, have pointed out that it may take a fair bit of refinement before we find a version that works best for this age group.

Then there is the question of how long immunity lasts. Recent studies suggest antibodies in those who've had Covid-19 wane after as little as three months. Could it be the same with the vaccine? We don't know, and may not know for years.

As Dr Charlie Weller, head of the vaccines programme at medical research body Wellcome, says: 'If we're lucky enough to get one or two [Covid] vaccines which are both safe and effective, they're still likely to not provide full immunity or be effective in every age group or person.'

And even if everything goes well, it's widely agreed that it won't be possible to produce, package and provide enough doses for everyone in the first year. Those in greatest need will be at the front of the queue, such as those in high-risk groups along with healthcare and other frontline workers.

Whichever way you cut this cake, the fact remains: a vaccine alone won't be a way out of all this.

Covid fact More than a quarter of Britons are living under tighter Covid-19 restrictions.

While Mr Hancock and Mr Johnson were talking suppression, Shadow Health Secretary Jonathan Ashworth was making another pie-in-the-sky proclamation: that 'no level of deaths from Covid were acceptable'.

The old Zero-Covid plan  complete elimination of virus. Sadly, this too is flawed.

As we have seen, zero cases can be achieved in island countries such as New Zealand, which have locked their borders. They have 35 reported cases at present, presumably safely isolated. But with the virus endemic across the world, they'll have a tough time keeping it up, should they ever start allowing people to travel in and out again.

My good friend Dr Elisabetta Groppelli, a virologist at St George's Hospital, London, worked in Sierra Leone during the ebola outbreak of 2015.

However, a Get To Zero strategy not only failed, but probably did more harm than good. It was discovered that the virus lay dormant in patients' bodies, leading to recurrence and further transmission.

As Dr Groppelli explained: 'The biggest problem with that strategy was that, as public health officials, we had to change the message half-way through.

'This led to confusion, distrust and a sense of helplessness. One patient said to me, 'You told us we would be ebola-free. If we got to zero, we would be fine. But the virus is still here in our bodies.' '

Dr Groppelli believes there is a broader lesson. 'Getting to zero was a good slogan,' she said. 'But as every slogan is one that hides important details, it is inherently prone to misinterpretation and dangerously invites mental shortcuts and unrealistic positivity.'

She concludes that zero is simply not an honest approach, adding: 'Let's be realistic and honest with each other. We must find a way of co-existing with the virus, which means limiting its spread as much as possible and, most importantly of all, protecting the most vulnerable.'

Ultimately, Mr Ashworth, and everyone else who finds the idea of any Covid deaths unpalatable, needs to steel themselves.

Because even when we do have a vaccine, people will die from it. Possibly hundreds every day, as with flu.

Last week, Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty, and Chief Scientific Officer Sir Patrick Vallance warned that without action we could see as many as 200 virus deaths a day by mid-autumn.

Every death is someone's tragedy. But, just as people are born, we also die. And this is why it's vital to look at fatalities due to Covid in perspective.

According to the Office for National Statistics, in August alone there were 34,750 deaths, of all causes, in England  2,060 fewer than the five-year average.

Vaccines are not a panacea. For a start, some people just won't opt to have the jab. At the moment, large numbers of people seem nervous

One in ten of these, roughly 3,897, died from dementia or Alzheimer's disease  that's 130 every day.

A further 130 a day (on average) died from heart disease.

Covid-19 did not even feature in the top ten leading causes of death in August in England or Wales  with 482 fatalities, it came 24th, after lung cancer, colorectal cancers, prostate cancer, liver disease and even flu.

Over a year, cancer  of all kinds  kills some 165,000 people, which would be an average of 450 people per day.

Accidents at home, often while doing DIY, are often fatal. Roughly 6,000 people die this way each year  that's about 16 people every day.

Five people die every day in road accidents across the UK, while 69 are seriously injured.

Infections  including C.diff and stomach bugs  kill 5,937 a year, or about 16 people a day.

Last year, there were 5,691 suicides, 1,413 of them in the last three months. Nearly three-quarters were male, making suicide the biggest killer of men under the age of 45.

No one, least of all me, wants to ever again see the torrent of deaths that happened due to Covid-19 in the early part of this year. But I'd argue that if we see winter out with just a few hundred a day succumbing to it, we'd be getting off fairly lightly.

Please don't see this as callous. How would I feel if it were one of my own family? Devastated, of course.

But I am also, as a doctor, deeply concerned by the death, disease and misery that would undoubtedly result from a perpetual cycle of lockdowns and restrictions.

Are deaths from missed cancer screenings, unreported heart problems or from avoiding a GP not as important as Covid deaths? Were the thousands of excess dementia deaths not worth preventing?

The reason we shut down the country in spring was to prevent a healthcare catastrophe from hundreds of thousands of incredibly sick people flooding woefully unprepared hospitals. And the plan worked, just.

But these kinds of measures will never provide a solution, nor are they sustainable. They simply delay the inevitable. Ease up, numbers rise and people start to die. And not even a vaccine, as wonderful as it may be, can entirely prevent that.

Yes, we should socially distance, wear masks and wash our hands a lot. More people working from home keeps transport networks less busy for those who can't.

For the time being it is a sensible approach. We should aim to keep Covid-19 levels manageable, and find ways to protect the vulnerable. But we should also not become swept up in the terror caused by claims we're in 'a second wave', when rising numbers of deaths are, on balance, to be expected.

Suppression or lockdown should be used wisely to get answers and make plans: secure the economy, optimise testing and increase hospital capacity. If we have to lock down again, it means we've not done what we knew we should.

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As virologist Dr Simon Clarke told me, it will prove one thing: the Government, which until now I have backed to the hilt, has failed.
President Donald Trump is holding a campaign rally at Harrisburg International Airport Saturday evening, but people were lined up hours before.

The rally will be held at a hangar near the main terminal of the Lower Swatara Township airport. Doors open at 4 p.m., and the president is slated to arrive at 7 p.m.

People were standing in long lines Saturday morning.

The event will be held at a hanger owned by AvFlight Corp. The private company services general aviation such as corporate aircraft and private charters flying in and out of the airport.

Tickets are given out on a first-come, first-served basis with an allotment of two tickets per mobile number. Ticket reservations can be made at events.donaldjtrump.com.

HIA is coordinating parking for the rally and opened its long term parking lot at 7 a.m. Buses are transporting people from the lot to the hangar area.

Attendees will be required to pass through a security check point and a temperature check. In addition, the campaign is providing hand sanitizer and masks.

More: Joe Biden faults President Trumps coronavirus response ahead of HIA rally

Trump is expected to announce his Supreme Court pick before the rally. He hopes to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg before the election.

Hours ahead of President Donald Trump's rally at Harrisburg International Airport, supporters were lining up to get inside. Trump is speaking Saturday night, Sept. 26. | Photo: Janet Pickel of PennLive

Its the second time in a week the president has campaigned in the Keystone State.

With 20 electoral votes, Pennsylvania could be the state that determines who wins the presidential election, several analysts have said. Trump won Pennsylvania by less than a percentage point in 2016, but his victory here helped propel him to the White House.

With Pennsylvania, I dont have to make a play, weve got Pennsylvania, Trump boasted at a rally Tuesday night just outside Pittsburgh.

That may be harder than Trump suggests.

Despite fervent Republican efforts, no GOP nominee since George H.W. Bush in 1988 had captured the state until Trump did four years ago, winning by just 44,000 votes out of nearly 5.9 million cast. And as someone born in Scranton, Joe Biden is also heavily focused on the state.

Biden has led Trump in polls in Pennsylvania, but some recent surveys have put the race within the margin of error. This state in many respects is up for grabs, G. Terry Madonna, a political analyst at Franklin & Marshall College, said earlier this week.

More:

Gov. Tom Wolf blasts President Trump for Saturdays Harrisburg airport rally

Could the Pa. GOP bypass the popular vote regardless of who wins? Heres what we know.
For the average landholder whose property is forcibly acquired by the government, a good outcome might be a reasonable payout and a stress-free relocation - with a bit of Darryl Kerrigan-esque grumbling thrown in along the way.

But the billionaire Perich family are not average landholders. Their $30 million windfall for land subsequently valued at just $3 million less than a year later has stumped the Auditor-General, stunned the public and renewed Labor's push for a federal anti-corruption commission.

However, insiders familiar with the family and the Commonwealth bureaucracy are not surprised. Indeed, this is at least the second time the Perich family have struck gold on land acquired by the federal government for Sydney's second airport.

Tony Perich, right, and his son Mark Perich at their dairy farm at Bringelly next to the site of the forthcoming airport. Credit:James Brickwood

In December 1999, Perich brothers Tony and Ron negotiated payment of $21.5 million, or $565,000 a hectare, for 38 hectares of their land, after an expensive seven-year court battle. Just two years earlier, the Commonwealth had sold a 344 hectare farm a few kilometres up the road for $3.5 million, or $10,000 a hectare, to a company owned by developers Ron and Roy Medich.
KYIV, Ukraine - Over 360 more people have been detained in Belarus during protests against the countrys authoritarian president, who was unexpectedly sworn in to his sixth term in office after an election the opposition says was rigged.

Thousands of Belarusians took to the streets of the capital of Minsk and other cities on Wednesday evening to protest President Alexander Lukashenkos morning inauguration, which took place without advance public notice.

Police fiercely dispersed the crowds of protesters; in Minsk, officers used truncheons and water cannons, leaving dozens injured. Belarus Interior Ministry said Thursday that 364 people were detained, including 252 in the capital. The vast majority remained in custody, awaiting court hearings.

Anti-government rallies continued Thursday morning despite the previous nights crackdown. Hundreds of people in Minsk formed human chains of solidarity in different parts of the city and obstructed vehicle traffic by driving slowly or stopping altogether, honking in protest.

Lukashenkos inauguration before an audience of government officials, lawmakers and other dignitaries hadnt been announced in advance and came as a surprise for many after nearly seven weeks of mass protests against his disputed reelection.

Many European officials refused to recognize Lukashenko as the countrys legitimate president. Opposition leaders dismissed the ceremony as a farce.

The oppositions Coordination Council, which several leading activists formed to push for a transition of power, said Thursday that the secret inauguration of Alexander Lukashenko brought thousands of peaceful citizens onto the streets of our countrys cities.

Lukashenko on Thursday argued that the inauguration wasnt prepared in secret and bristled at Western criticism.

You know, about 2,000 people, together with the military, were invited to the inauguration. It is practically impossible to keep it secret, he was quoted by the state news agency Belta as saying.

You know, we didnt ask anyone to recognize or not recognize our election, the legitimacy of the newly elected president ... the important thing is that its in accordance with the Constitution, Lukashenko said.

Lukashenko, a 66-year-old former state farm director, has run Belarus, an ex-Soviet nation of 9.5 million, with an iron fist for 26 years. Official results of the countrys Aug. 9 presidential election had given him 80% of the vote, with his strongest opponent, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, getting 10% support. But both opposition members and some poll workers say the vote was rigged.

Tsikhanouskaya has not accepted the outcome of the election as valid, and neither have the thousands of her supporters who have been demanding Lukashenkos resignation at daily rallies all over the country for nearly seven weeks in a row.

The United States and the European Union condemned the election as neither free nor fair and criticized the violent police crackdown on post-election protests in Belarus. The EU has been pondering sanctions against the Belarusian leadership, but failed to agree on imposing them this week.

U.K. Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said Thursday that Britain would prepare targeted sanctions against those responsible for human rights abuses in Belarus.

Anti-Lukashenko protests have rocked the country daily since the election, with the largest rallies in Minsk attracting up to 200,000 people. In the first days of protests, police used tear gas, truncheons and rubber bullets to disperse crowds. Several protesters died, many were injured and nearly 7,000 were detained.

Amid international outrage over the violent suppression of the protests, Belarusian authorities switched to prosecuting top activists. Many members of the Coordination Council have been arrested or forced to leave the country.

The response to street demonstrators intensified again this week, with police detaining hundreds and injuring many.

The countrys prosecutor general, Andrei Shved, threatened protesters Thursday with significant fines and said authorities were seeking to adopt stricter punishments for parents who are involving children in protest actions.

Prosecutors in Minsk have already handed 140 warnings to families that took children to anti-government rallies.

__

Daria Litvinova in Moscow contributed to this report.

___

Follow APs coverage of the anti-government protests in Belarus at https://apnews.com/hub/belarus

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There are two stories we like to tell about Ruth Bader Ginsburg; one is a story about anger and the other is a story about incremental conciliation. People wonder whether something happened in the mid-2000s to change the polite, cautious, and almost scarily emotionless Justice Ginsburg into the fierce and fiery feminist RBG. She contended that she didnt change at allinstead, she said, it was the court that changed around her. I have tended to think that while her writing certainly changed, her approach to the world, to her work, and even toward her ideological foes at the court remained largely the same. She saw anger as wasted energy. Some of the quotes she repeated most frequently locate her squarely in the Vulcan quadrant of the emotional spectrum.

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And so while the days pass and I find myself incandescently and elaborately furious at what is about to be done to her legacy, and how, I keep trying to remind myself that she found rage to be a wholly pointless emotion. She would say, Reacting in anger or annoyance will not advance ones ability to persuade. She would say, When a thoughtless or unkind word is spoken, best tune out. She would say, Fight for the things that you care about, but do it in a way that will lead others to join you. She would say, Dont be distracted by emotions like anger, envy, resentment. These just zap energy and waste time. She would say, You can disagree without being disagreeable. And she would cite an aphorism from Justice Benjamin Cardozo: Justice is not to be taken by storm. She is to be wooed by slow advances.

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As I turn over and over what to do with my fury right now, I wonder if even that interior debate would have bored her. Who has time to have strong emotions about your strong emotions? In any event, I cannot presently find space for persuasion and patience. All that good faith and institutionalism is irreparably shattered. Its also what got Democrats into this mess, which is perhaps why Im having a hard time caring much about the shattering. Maybe RBGs devotion to bipartisanship and rising above is all just quaint and old-fashioned now. Maybe amid everything else that is now broken, what is also lost and gone forever are the predicates for compromise and persuasion that were her stock in trade. When dealing with serial liars and hypocrites and those who operate in bad faith, the time for being agreeable and generous is over. We are not just mourning her, but also mourning the optimism found in her abiding belief that the best path forward would always be to tune out the ugliness and reach for broad agreement. We are mourning the possibility that any two people can disagree civilly, or respectfully, again.

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One of the things I have been reconsidering as I turn over RBGs legal legacy this week is not just the things she did to fight for equality but why she did them. We like to tell the tales of her early advocacy at the ACLUs Womens Rights Project as a kind of canny reverse psychology in which she helped dismantle gender stereotypes baked into the law by bringing cases about men. We say she did that to appeal to all-male judicial panels and because men couldnt conceive of laws that prevented women from having credit cards or being able to train in the military as laws that harmed women; men thought they were protecting women from the cruelty of the world by doing these things. But as I have gone back and thought about what she was really doing, it wasnt a party trickshe wasnt just bringing cases on behalf of men to advantage women in the end. She truly believed that she was helping men to live fuller and richer lives, too. She wasnt doing zero-sum equality. She was lifting everyone up.

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I now think we may disserve RBG when we paint her as someone who paved the way for our daughters to be equals because she was driven by anger and a loathing of injustice.

In a beautiful piece in Washington Post this week, professors Pam Karlan and Aziz Huq make exactly this point: She also championed male plaintiffs who demonstrated the burdens an ideology of gender-separate spheres imposed on allas when, in a 1975 case, she argued on behalf of Stephen Wiesenfeld that the denial of Social Security benefits to widowers but not widows amounted to an unjust replication of stereotypes. They go on to note that, faced with the claim that Wiesenfeld simply wanted to stay home and care for his young son, Robert Bork, who represented the U.S. government as solicitor general, scoffed at the very premise of the case: Wiesenfelds desire to be the caregiver for his child, said Bork incredulously, was an obvious fabrication. But Ginsburg knew that men suffered from these inflexible stereotypes about who was a breadwinner and who was the nurturer, just as women did. She wasnt using her legal strategy to push men down. She believed that the world would simply be better for all of us if women could be fighter pilots and men couldas her own husband didallow themselves to cook dinners and help with homework.

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In many ways, I now think we may disserve RBG when we paint her as someone who paved the way for our daughters to be equals because she was driven by anger and a loathing of injustice. I think she genuinely believed that true equality would benefit men as much as women, and I think her holistic thesis on gender and justice has proven true. The world she helped design with her polite, incremental acts of persuasion has enriched men and women alike, and the world she helped design for immigrants, voters, minorities, workers, the disabled, and the elderly was never intended to be zero-sum, either. The fact that wealthy white men in the GOP see more liberty, a broader franchise, more racial diversity, and better-paid workers as a threat to themselves doesnt mean the world she was creating was destructive. Her vision of America always demanded that benefits be shared more widely so that everyone could benefit from a more diverse and more accepting polity.

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Maybe that was always too romantic. Maybe we are simply at a place in which anyone elses victory means that we are diminished. But I continue to believe that nothing about this weeks winner-take-all law or politics would have been appealing to Ginsburg, just as nothing about eroding the integrity and reputation of the courts would have been attractive to her. Corny as it may sound, the justice really did see the law as a means of offering up Americas bounty to everyone. That work demanded patience and politeness and cooperation.

That millions of people stand to lose health care, and reproductive rights, and environmental protections, because of her replacement at the court is horrible. It is one cause of my rage, certainly. But it isnt the worst thing RBG could have imagined. The worst thing is the exultant ways in which those ensuring that so many will suffer so a few can call themselves the victors would have been anathema both under her view of the Constitution and under her polite and anachronistically charitable worldview. And it is, I think, worth being mad about. I have gradually come to think that while RBG didnt let herself be motivated by naked fury, she was propelled forward by injustice. And the injustice of having a seat filled by yet another president who lost the popular vote, and ratified by a Senate that subverts the minority vote, even as a majority of the country has no interest in rushing the vote? That injustice burns just as hot as any injustice RBG encountered, and perhaps even she would have given up on good-faith cooperation when good-faith cooperation took advantage of her.
Hunters are often great storytellers, recounting to anyone who will listen tales of the big one that got away and that once in a lifetime shot they made. Sometimes the stories get a little crazy and maybe a tad unbelievable. This is especially true with those of us that pursue Nebraska bucks.
Hong Kong: HK detainees' case probed

Police today said 12 Hong Kong residents were detained by the Yantian Branch of the Shenzhen Public Security Bureau for the offence of crossing the boundary illegally and the force is investigating the case in the direction of whether someone organised or committed cross-boundary crimes.

Police received a reply from the Guangdong Provincial Public Security Department yesterday stating that the Guangdong Coast Guard intercepted a boat suspected of crossing the boundary illegally inside boundary waters under their jurisdiction at around 9am on August 23.

Coast Guard officers discovered 12 Hong Kong residents on board and arrested them for the offence of crossing the boundary illegally.

After an initial investigation, the Yantian Branch detained the 12 suspects for further investigation.

Investigations revealed that the 12 people boarded a speedboat arranged by a smuggling syndicate in Po Toi O pier in Sai Kung, New Territories, Hong Kong at around 7am on August 23. The speedboat was driven by one of the suspects.

They planned to flee to Taiwan via Mainland marine waters to evade criminal responsibility in Hong Kong and had paid the syndicate a fee before boarding the speedboat in Hong Kong for the smuggling arrangements.

The Yantian Branch is still investigating and will submit the case to the Yantian People's Procuratorate in Shenzhen for arrest approval according to the Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China and Criminal Procedure Law of the People's Republic of China.

According to the information provided by the Guangdong Provincial Public Security Department, and after reviewing the Marine Departments Vessel Traffic Services System and the Marine Polices Digital Radar Security System, the force suspected that the speedboat departed from Po Toi O at around 7am on August 23, and entered Mainland waters through the southeastern side of the Hong Kong waters boundary at around 7.30am.

The speedboat later passed through the effective detection range of the systems. Its latest detectable time by the Marine Polices Digital Radar Security System was at around 8am on the same day and it was 10.9 nautical miles outside the boundary of Hong Kong waters and was steering towards the southeast direction.

The Guangdong Coast Guards announcement noted that at around 9am that day, a speedboat suspected of crossing the boundary illegally was intercepted in marine waters under its jurisdiction (2154'00''N11453'00'' E).

The location was approximately 26 nautical miles off the southeastern side of the boundary of Hong Kong waters.

This story has been published on: 2020-09-26. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
Bristol Institute inducts its sixth successful batch of MBA students View(s):

First started in January 2018 with its inaugural batch, the MBA programme at Bristol Institute of Business Management awarded by the University of the West of England (UWE), Bristol has been widely successful across the higher educational sphere of Sri Lanka.

Lauded for its strict quality in line with UWE Bristols standards, time-relevant syllabus, holistic skill development and effective assessment criteria, the MBA programme recently inducted its sixth successful batch of students  a commendable feat since its first intake just two years ago.

Spanning two years, the programme has created an accumulated student population of over 250 MBA students at Bristol Institute of Business Management. Chief Operating Officer M.J.M. Dilshad notes: We have found that our MBA is a widely sought after qualification , stemming from the fact that the fundamental core of the programme revolves around preparing future managers to successfully face the dynamism of the global market in the light of the many challenges of the contemporary business world.

Explaining further he affirmed the programme seamlessly integrates practical insights and theoretical viewpoints into key issues facing organisations, and encompasses investigative methodologies that are relevant and applicable to todays world. In addition we also encourage our students to think about management in a responsible way to achieve sustainable value for organisations and the society at large.

The business world is an ever changing one, more so today, and our MBA programme not only shapes students thinking to be versatile, but also practices what it preaches, states Dilshad explaining how the institute proactively overcame the challenges of Covid-19 by investing in sophisticated digital platforms to have a seamless shift from physical lectures to digital learning while keeping delivery quality intact. We offered a comprehensive digital platform that included webinars, online tutoring, student support and an all-inclusive virtual library, he says.

Structured to include a complementing mix of modules such as Customer and International Markets, Leadership, Complexity and Change, Managing People in a Global Context, Strategy and Implementation, Digital Business Information Systems, Financial Decision Making and Conducting Evidence Based Research to name a few, the programme also includes the completion of a comprehensive dissertation.

Delivered by a high powered lecture panel comprising PhD Holders, researchers, industry professionals and subject experts, the MBA programme at Bristol Institute of Business Management ensures that students receive a rounded experience combining theory, application and skills development. Its flexible approach to learning in tandem with the contemporary nature of business in todays world sets the Bristol MBA apart from the rest.
Washington County added to quarantine list for troublesome bug

The Maryland Department of Agriculture has added several areas, including Washington County, to its quarantine list regarding the spotted lanternfly.
Matt Zwick at his rowhome in West Philadelphia's Kingsessing section. With his companion unable to work amid the Covid-19 shutdowns, he applied for mortgage aid under a state program funded by the federal CARES Act, only to learn his bank, Wells Fargo, was dropping out of the program. Wells has since changed course. Read more

An underused $25 million program to bail out Pennsylvania homeowners who lost income due to coronavirus shutdowns got a shot in the arm Friday when Wells Fargo Bank reversed course and agreed to work with the program.

As of Sept. 18, only 2,000 Pennsylvanians had applied for $8.4 million, or one-third, of the money in the Pennsylvania Pandemic Mortgage Assistance Program, which was unveiled by state officials in July. Only $3.1 million has been paid.

The program offers up to $1,000 a month for six months to homeowners who need mortgage assistance due to coronavirus closures. But under a law passed by the General Assembly, homeowners have only until Wednesday, Sept. 30, to apply for the money at phfa.org/. (Another program at the site also helps renters.)

Several advocates said the program could be a godsend for those struggling to pay their bills, and requires little effort from banks. Several neighborhood and community banks have approved customers for the program, and PNC, the states largest bank, is participating, said PNC spokesperson Marcey Zwiebel.

But other major Philadelphia-area lenders, including Citizens, TD Bank, and WSFS, have not joined the program. Citizens and WSFS officials said those banks generally dont service mortgage loans, but typically sell them soon after they make them. So they are little affected by whether homeowners pay. Banks or other investors who buy the loans can accept the grants,

After taking applications for the program in August and earlier this month, Wells Fargo, which has the regions largest bank branch network, decided just last week not to take the money after all, telling applicants that the government program imposed too many conditions.

But after aggrieved borrowers posted protests on social media, on Friday afternoon spokesperson James Baum sent this statement: After a careful review of the Pennsylvania Pandemic Mortgage Assistance Program and conversations with the state Housing Finance Agency over the past week, we have determined that due to recent changes in the program, we will be able to make it available to some Wells Fargo mortgage customers and are hopeful that the issues preventing us from making it available for all qualified customers can be resolved.

Baum added that the program offers us another tool to assist customers in Pennsylvania in addition to late-payment (forbearance) programs adopted by many banks and credit unions.

At first, the program sounded like an easy fix: As part of Pennsylvanias share of the federal CARES Act, lawmakers in Harrisburg had approved $25 million to help pay home loans.

But in a statement Thursday, before its final reversal, Wells Fargo cited limits on eligibility, the time frame of the mortgage relief (March through November), and a lack of clarity in certain rules and processes. .

Officials of the Pennsylvania Housing Finance Agency, which administers the program under executive director Robin Wiessmann, a former state banking secretary, declined to comment.

Hard-pressed borrowers who signed up after the Wolf administration announced the program in July were dismayed when Wells Fargo said it was pulling out.

"We will survive, but others could lose their homes, worried Robyn Stephens, who helped her partner, Matt Zwick, a grocery store employee who has been home caring for her, to apply for aid paying the mortgage on his house in West Philadelphias Kingsessing section.

She cited six weeks of encouraging correspondence from bank officials  ending last week, when a Wells Fargo rep wrote tersely that the bank would not proceed. Stephens and Zwick took to social media to protest and network with other frustrated applicants.

Stephens expressed joy at the banks reversal, and asked: Did they cave because of folks complaining and you were about to expose them? Wells Fargo officials declined to comment.

Though banks and state and local forebearance programs have helped many borrowers, including Zwick, delay payments, the Pandemic Assistance Mortgage Program is the only one that offers direct grants, said James Jackson, mortgage advocate at the Philadelphia Unemployment Project, who had helped Zwick spread the word about the program and Wells Fargos reluctance.

If banks wont take the grant money, homeowners who qualify for federal aid are more likely to lose their homes or be forced to go without other basics, warned lawyer Irwin Trauss, head of the consumer lending program at Philadelphia Legal Assistance. He noted that Wells Fargo apologized earlier this year for moving some homeowners into forbearance programs without their approval.

I think Wells Fargo is trying to regroup, said Steve Gardner, head of Clarifi, the Philadelphia nonprofit credit-counseling service.

Trauss is concerned that the $1,000 a month limit on aid  and provisions preventing banks from accepting additional money for larger mortgages from other aid programs  made many who should benefit ineligible. The 2,018 initial applicants include 447 from Philadelphia (home to one in eight Pennsylvanians) and 373 from its four suburban counties.

According to Trauss, the General Assembly added the $1,000 limit and other restrictions to the mortgage aid program when legislators passed it this year. Also, Trauss said, PHFAs own rules made it tougher for people whose mortgages were already in default to get aid, though some of those rules have been eased.

He expressed frustration the programs bottlenecks werent cleared faster. It is free money, requiring almost nothing of the lender" but to agree to take the money, Trauss said.
With Madhya Pradesh heading for Legislative Assembly by-elections in September, Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan recently took to Twitter to take a dig at the Congress Party.

On Saturday, the veteran Bharatiya Janata Party leader took to Twitter to make a double meaning pun to haze the Congress Party.

Elections are going to be held in many places across the country including Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Karnataka. We have to take full care of the Election Commission guidelines in view of the Corona period," Chouhan wrote in Hindi. While the tweet seemed regular enough, the last line stole the show.

In keeping with Covid-19 regulations, Chouhan asked residents and voters in Madhya Pradesh to completely sanitise" the hand" and completely wash it off. Haath ko puri tarah sanitize kar dena hai," he wrote.

  ! , ,                                      Shivraj Singh Chouhan (@ChouhanShivraj) September 26, 2020

Didnt get it? Haath" or hand is also the party symbol of the Congress Party, which forms the BJPs main opposition in MP.

So while Chouhans double0-entendre served as a coronavirus advisory, it was also meant as a barb to the Opposition.

Chouhan wrested power from Congresss Kamal Nath who resigned as Chief Minister in March earlier in the year following a breakdown of the government ensuing from an internal rebellion.

A seasoned political veteran, this is Chouhans fourth term as MP CM. The Congress, however, is not taking the crucial by-election lightly. As per recent reports, Nath has roped in Rajasthans former rebel Congress leader Sachin Pilot to campaign for the party in the Chambal-Gwalior belt of MP, areas that are traditionally BJP strongholds.

Meanwhile, dates for the by-elections to 28 legislative seats are set to be announced on September 29.

The upcoming bypolls in Madhya Pradesh are not general elections, but they will determine the future of the state, Nath said earlier last month. In August, the senior Congress leader and Leader of Opposition in MP said he has been working to strengthen his party in the last four months and the fight was not with theBJPs achievements, but its organisation.
Rebel Wilson debuted her romance with new boyfriend Jacob Busch this week, with the pair attending a red carpet event together in Monaco.

And now the Hollywood couple are getting the royal treatment as they met with Prince Albert of Monaco while visiting an exhibit at Villa Paloma Monaco in Monte-Carlo.

The Australian actress, 40, posed up a storm with the 62-year-old royal when appearing at the event for renowned Spanish painter Joan Miro.

Looking effortlessly glamorous in a pink floor-length gown, Rebel sported a black face mask while chatting with Prince Albert, who appeared dapper in a blue suit and contrasting face covering.

Rebel looked loved-up with her new beau, the Anheuser-Busch brewery heir, 29, in the photographs, with the couple having made their official debut at Prince Albert's Planetary Health Gala on Thursday.

Australian actress Rebel Wilson, 40, posed up a storm with Prince Albert of Monaco, 62, when appearing at the event for renowned Spanish painter Joan Miro in Monte-Carlo. Pictured, Joan Punyet Miro, Isabelle Bscher, Prince Albert and Rebel Wilson

Looking effortlessly glamorous in a pink floor-length gown, Rebel sported a black face mask while chatting with Prince Albert, who appeared dapper in a blue suit and contrasting face covering

Rebel appeared glamorous in a form-fitting, V-neck gown, highlighting her incredible three stone weight loss.

Holding a statement black clutch bag, the Pitch Perfect actress stood next to the prince while taking photographs at the private event - with neither wearing face masks at this point.

Masks are mandatory in Monaco when on public transport, in indoor public spaces, queues and some outdoor areas.

In early March, Prince Albert became the first head of state to test positive for COVID-19. He told PEOPLE at the time that he experienced mild flu-like symptoms.

'I've a slight fever, not really that bad. A little bit of a cough. I'd a runny nose the first few days, that was the first sign. I've felt a little stuffed up but that's it,' he said. After he spent several weeks self-isolating in the palace, the royal returned to his family.

Rebel debuted her romance with new boyfriend Jacob Busch (pictured together) this week, with the pair attending a red carpet event together in Monaco

Meanwhile, Prince Albert looked sophisticated in a navy suit, teamed with a bright blue tie and white shirt for the occasion on Friday.

Rebel's boyfriend Jacob showed he was just as dapper in a black velvet tuxedo with a matching bow-tie.

Jacob's family founded the Anheuser-Busch brewery, which produces America's most popular beer, Budweiser.

In 2016, Forbes listed the Busch family as the 16th richest in America, with a fortune of US$13.4billion.

While it's unclear how much of that will be inherited by Jacob, his current personal net worth has been estimated at US$100million.

Rebel appeared glamorous in a form-fitting, V-neck gown, highlighting her incredible three stone weight loss

Rebel looked loved-up with her new beau, the Anheuser-Busch brewery heir, 29, in the photographs (above), with the couple having made their official debut at Prince Albert's Planetary Health Gala on Thursday

Rebel and Prince Albert also posed with Joan Punyet Miro, the grandson of the famous Spanish painter, as well as Swiss art gallerist Isabelle Bscher.

Earlier in the week, Rebel and Jacob attended Prince Albert's Planetary Health Gala in the city, which the royal attended with his glamorous wife Princess Charlene.

Looking effortlessly elegant, Charlene sported a floor-length silver gown to the occasion - which also included guests such as American actress Rebel Wilson and English film star Helen Mirren.

Hosted by the Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation, the annual event gathers leading philanthropists, talents and scientists to join forces and launch the charity's initiatives to bridge the widening gap between health and the environment.

The night is usually auction filled with many collectables, memorabilia and fine art from some of the most high-profile artists across the globe going on sale.

Proceeds will be used to help the Foundation's initiatives, which includes the development of marine protected areas, protection of threatened marine species, the mitigation of the impact of climate change and acidification on the ocean, as well as the fight against plastic pollution.
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y.-- Heres a look at the top criminal-justice headlines from around the borough this week:

Adam Kamagate, 34, of Concord, allegedly drank Champagne in front of police shortly before being arrested on Sept. 17, 2020. (Staten Island Advance/Tom Wrobleski)

NYPD: HE FLIPS CAR, SWIGS CHAMPAGNE IN FRONT OF COPS

A Staten Island man tried to flee a police officer while allegedly drunk behind the wheel, eventually overturning the vehicle he was driving and then drinking from a bottle of Champagne in front of the cops, according to police and the criminal complaint.

On Sept. 17, police observed a red 2015 Range Rover speeding at around 40 mph and running through a red light at Daniel Low Terrace and Fort Place in St. George, according to the complaint.

When officers approached the car, the driver fled, the complaint states.

Click here for the full story.

PD: SHOTS FIRED, DRUG-INFUSED CANDY RAID

Cops investigating an incident in which a gun was fired at a crowd in Granitville arrested two men on weapon charges, and a subsequent raid at one of their homes found a stash of drug-infused candies made to resemble popular childrens sweets, police allege.

The NYPD identified the suspects as Theodore Lettein and Anthony Lista, both 23.

Lettein fired multiple shots from a loaded gun while numerous people were present on a public street near his home on Woodcrest Road in Graniteville on Sept. 10 at about 5:10 p.m., according to police and the criminal complaint.

Click here for the full story.

HES CHARGED IN PORT RICHMOND SHOOTING

The NYPD responds to a report of shots fired on Heberton Avenue in Port Richmond Thursday, Sept. 17, 2020. (Staten Island Advance/Joseph Ostapiuk)

Authorities allege that a 21-year-old man shot and tried to kill a 25-year-old man in Port Richmond last week.

Freddy Espinal, of John Street, fired a gun multiple times at about 9:10 p.m. on Sept. 17 at the corner of Heberton Avenue and Albion Place, according to the criminal complaint and police.

The victim was struck in the leg and required medical attention because of injuries that included excessive bleeding and substantial pain, according to the complaint.

Click here for the story.

WOMAN, 21, ACCUSED OF STABBING TWO OTHER WOMEN

The attack occurred on June 23, 2020, on Jersey Street and Brighton Avenue, allege prosecutors. Tatianno Lindo's lawyer said she was defending herself.

A 21-year-old New Brighton resident has been indicted for first-degree assault for severely slashing two other women in her community three months ago, prosecutors allege.

Tatianna Lindo, of the 300 block of York Avenue, pleaded not guilty Wednesday at her arraignment in state Supreme Court, St. George.

A criminal complaint said the attack occurred at 1:30 p.m. on June 23 at Brighton Avenue and Jersey Street.

Click here for more details.

NYPD: HE SHOT GUN AT PERSON, WAS CAUGHT WITH DRUGS

A 42-year-old man from New Brighton faces a charge of attempted murder for allegedly shooting a gun last Tuesday on the street in Stapleton.

Andrew Lawrence of Prospect Avenue discharged a firearm multiple times on Sept. 15 at about 6:05 p.m. on Pleasant Valley Avenue, according to the criminal complaint and police.

Surveillance video was reviewed as part of the investigation into the gunplay, which occurred on a residential street where Lawrence attempted to cause the death of another person, the complaint states.

Click here for more details.

S.I. MAN ALLEGEDLY PUNCHED, KICKED COPS AT PROTEST

A Staten Island man who attended several protests in the city this summer is facing felony charges after he punched two police officers in the face and kicked one in Manhattan, police allege.

Police arrested Alvin Dan, 28, of South Gannon Avenue, while he was attending a Black Lives Matter protest in Washington Square Park on Sept. 18, an NYPD spokesman said.

As police were trying to arrest the Meiers Corners man, Dan kicked a lieutenant in the right thigh and then punched him in the right eye, police allege.

Click here for the full story.

RAID ON GRASMERE APARTMENT NETS GUNS, AMMO, COPS SAY

Cops found guns and ammunition inside the apartment of a Grasmere man the day after he threatened a woman over the phone, police allege.

Officers armed with a search warrant raided the sixth-floor apartment of Paul Hadzi, 62, on the 600 block of Hylan Boulevard near Narrows Road South on Saturday at about 2:20 p.m., according to the criminal complaint and police.

Inside Hadzis dwelling, cops recovered two firearms, an imitation pistol and ammunition, according to the complaint.

Click here for the story.
Fat Bear Week is an annual competition, held by Katmai National Park in Alaska, to crown the fattest bear of the state's Brook River. You can help pick the winner.
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Leo Schubert turned 103 years young on Sept. 25 at Eger Health Care and Rehabilitation Center, surrounded by staff members of Eger, the facility he has called home for approximately 10 years.

The last surviving sibling of seven children -- four brothers and three sisters -- Schubert recalls his growing-up years.
(Photo : Photo by Samuel Corum/Getty Images) A woman marks down her vote on a ballot for the Democratic presidential primary election at a polling place in Armstrong Elementary School on Super Tuesday, March 3, 2020 in Herndon, Virginia. 1,357 Democratic delegates are at stake as voters cast their ballots in 14 states and American Samoa on what is known as Super Tuesday. (Photo : Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images) Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump fields a question during the first Republican presidential debate hosted by Fox News and Facebook at the Quicken Loans Arena on August 6, 2015 in Cleveland, Ohio. The top ten GOP candidates were selected to participate in the debate based on their rank in an average of the five most recent political polls.

A week before U.S. Elections 2020 on Nov. 3, the survey says most Americans want a total 'social media blackout.' These are due to several cases of fake news and misinformation on most media platforms.

U.S. Elections 2020: What will happen to social media?

A new survey from GQR research shows 52% of American voters support shutting down most-used social media platforms all over the country, a week before the US Elections 2020 begins.

This includes Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and other platforms. The survey questioned at least 1,000 registered voters in September, including 54% Democrats and 51% Republicans.

As told by the survey, 62% are not confident that social media platforms can prevent misinformation. Meanwhile, 91% think social media companies should do more to prevent its spread.

"There's a pretty staggering level of concern for how ill-prepared social media platforms are for this election. I mean, a majority of voters effectively said, 'Screw it, shut it all down.' That's not to say we should do that, but it sends a clear message to Silicon Valley that they need to step up," Jesse Lehrich, founder of Accountable Tech, survey commissioner.

Other than the flagging techniques of platforms, 82% survey takers also support placing warning labels on accounts spreading false information about voting, and 85% support blocking posts calling for violence or spreading election misinformation altogether.

Facebook-- the most untrustworthy platform?

Interestingly, Facebook has the highest unfavorable views than other social media platforms, with a 52% rate. Most survey takers expressed dismay with the platform, saying that it is the least trusted news source out of them all.

A 2018 study also suggests Facebook was "among the three previous sites visited by respondents in the prior 30 seconds for 22.1% of the articles from fake news websites we observe in our web data." Only six percent of real news articles were seen on the platform.

In relation to prior Presidential Elections, The Guardian also written an article titled "Facebook's failure: Did fake news and polarized politics get Trump elected?" suggesting the platform's reach became Trump's secret weapon to win.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, however, only said that their company will do more adjustments in the future about the accusations.

Are you in favor of shutting down social media platforms?

ALSO READ: Google Search Blocks Autocomplete Functions Before Election Day 2020 to Prevent Misinformation

This article is owned by Tech Times

Written by Jamie Pancho

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
David Dimbleby has criticised Boris Johnson for his attacks on the BBC (Ian West/PA)

Broadcaster David Dimbleby has criticised Boris Johnsons attacks on the BBC, calling them dangerous.

The former Question Time host, 81, also said he disapproved of BBC presenters who get paid for outside appearances.

He told The Times: I am very dismayed by the Johnson attacks on the institution. I think they are crowd-pleasing. I think they are quite dangerous. I dont think they will work.

He added: Margaret Thatcher always had it in for the BBC but she wasnt trying to destroy it  A lot of people who support Johnson also quite like the BBC. I dont know what is going on in his mind. I think its quite frightening.

Expand Close Prime Minister Boris Johnson meets shoppers and shopkeepers during a visit to his constituency in Uxbridge, west London (Stefan Rousseau/PA) / Facebook

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Whatsapp Prime Minister Boris Johnson meets shoppers and shopkeepers during a visit to his constituency in Uxbridge, west London (Stefan Rousseau/PA)

On BBC presenters who get paid for appearances outside the corporation, he said: If you present the news you shouldnt go off and earn 20 grand for chairing a paint conference.

Dimbleby said the Question Time panels got less impressive as a lot of politicians  gradually refused to come on and think, Whats in it for me?'

But its their duty to explain what they are doing  To say when you get to the top, I am not going to be interviewed, like Boris Johnson did at the last election, is so arrogant  It doesnt make you a shrewd operator. It erodes the democratic process, Dimbleby said.

Expand Close Dominic Cummings (Yui Mok/PA) / Facebook

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Of Downing Street chief adviser Dominic Cummings, he added: Hes like a machine gun  Shrinking the BBC, getting rid of all the senior people in the civil service, attacking the judiciary  You dont achieve anything just by attacking them all.

Video of the Day

His comments follow reports that Downing Street wants to axe the TV licence fee and fund the BBC through viewer subscriptions.

The Sunday Times previously quoted a senior Downing Street source as saying: We are not bluffing on the licence fee  We will whack it.
Cementing its stature as an Employer of Choice, Sony Pictures Networks India (SPN) has been featured amongst the Top 50 in Indias Best Workplaces for Women 2020 by Great Place to Work Institute. This is the third accolade for the conglomerate; earlier in June 2020 they were honoured with Indias Best Companies to Work For 2020 and Indias Best Workplaces in Media 2020 lists by the Great Place to Work Institute.

Through its rigorous and objective methodology, the Great Place to Work Institute helps organisations identify, create, and sustain great workplaces worldwide through the development of high-trust cultures. In this years study spanning 800 organisations and 21 industries, SPN leads the way in ensuring gender parity and inclusion of women at work.

At SPN, people, passion, and purpose are aligned to enable employees to Tell stories Beyond the Ordinary. It is a strategic priority for the network to provide a conducive environment for its employees, especially the women workforce, to help them to excel in their personal and professional careers.

NP Singh, Managing Director and CEO, Sony Pictures Networks India (SPN), commented, Being featured amongst Indias Best Workplaces for Women 2020 is a milestone achievement that reflects our belief in the power of diversity. This accolade has strengthened SPNs stance as an inclusive industry leader and raised the benchmark criteria for an Employer of Choice. I dedicate this recognition to our passionate and committed workforce.

Manu Wadhwa, Chief Human Resource Officer, Sony Pictures Networks India, added here, At SPN, employee voice is of paramount importance.This recognition of being an equal workplace is a testament to our efforts towards building a culture of trust, connectedness and care with heightened zeal, empathy and passion. The consecutive wins empower us to continue accelerating our endeavours in this direction.
U.S. Congressman Alan Lowenthal announced on Friday that he has officially adopted Vietnamese journalist Nguyen Van Hoa, an RFA contributor jailed for seven years in Vietnam, as a prisoner of conscience under the Defending Freedoms Project, a project of the congressional Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission.



Under the project, U.S. lawmakers work to raise awareness of the cases of their adopted prisoners, advocating for their freedom or for a reduction in their sentences, and calling attention to the laws or state policies that led to their unjust imprisonment.



I am proud to adopt Nguyen Van Hoa as a prisoner of conscience, Lowenthal said in a Sept. 25 statement released by the California representatives office.



He is a man of conviction, who has been wrongly abused, detained, and imprisoned for trying to cover issues important to the Vietnamese people, but which are uncomfortable for the Vietnamese government to hear.



Nguyen Van Hoa, 25, was jailed by the Peoples Court of Ha Tinh in Nghe An province on Nov. 27, 2017 after filming protests outside the Taiwan-owned Formosa Plastics Group steel plant, whose spill in 2016 killed an estimated 115 tons of fish and left fishermen and tourism industry workers jobless in four central provinces.



Nguyen, who had blogged and produced videos for RFA, was arrested on Jan. 11, 2017 for abusing democratic freedoms to infringe upon the interests of the state under Article 258 of the Penal Code, but the charges against him were later upgraded to the more severe conducting propaganda against the state under Article 88.



Lowenthal had previously advocated for Nguyens release, writing letters to Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc calling for the blogger to be freed, and to U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, calling for U.S. government in the case.



Three other Vietnamese prisoners of conscienceNguyen Tien Trung, Nguyen Cong Chinh, and Nguyen Van Daihave already been freed, due in part to Lowenthals advocacy on their behalf, the congressmans office said.



Others also held



Two other contributors to RFA are also held in jail in Vietnam.



Nguyen Tuong Thuy, a blogger and vice president of the Independent Journalists Association of Vietnam, was arrested in May and charged with making, storing, and disseminating documents and materials for anti-state purposes. Still awaiting trial, he is now in custody at the Police Detention Camp on Phan Dang Luu Street in Ho Chi Minh City.



And in March 2019, RFA contributing blogger Truong Duy Nhat was sentenced to 10 years in prison, upheld in August on appeal, following his conviction in what authorities called a land-fraud case. He had been abducted in Bangkok in January 2019 and taken by force back to Vietnam after applying for asylum in Thailand.



Vietnam, with a population of 92 million people, has been consistently rated not free in the areas of internet and press freedom by Freedom House, a U.S.-based watchdog group.



Reporters Without Borders (RSF) ranked Vietnam 175 out of 180 in its 2020 World Press Freedom Index. About 25 journalists and bloggers are being held in Vietnams jails, where mistreatment is common, The Paris-based watchdog group said.



As Vietnams media all follow the Communist Partys orders, the only sources of independently-reported information are bloggers and independent journalists, who are being subjected to ever-harsher harsh forms of persecution, including plainclothes police violence, RSF said.



Vietnam has increasingly rounded up independent journalists, bloggers, and other dissident voices as authorities already intolerant of dissent seek to stifle critics in the run-up to the ruling Communist Party congress in January.



Reported by RFAs Vietnamese Service. Written in English by Richard Finney.
A teenager whose rare cancer came back after five years and started growing again during the coronavirus lockdown has told how 'there's no point being down about it' - despite her uncertain prognosis.

Rosie Rickards, 18, from Hampshire, was diagnosed with choroid plexus carcinoma, a rare form of brain tumour which left her almost totally blind, in 2013.

Aged 11, she had a ten-hour operation to remove the tumour before having chemotherapy and radiotherapy to give the best chance of the cancer not returning, but in 2018, just eight days before she was due to sit her GCSE exams, the cancer returned.

Further treatment kept the size of the tumour stable until May of this year, when it started growing once again.

Rosie has since had further radiotherapy but now faces an uncertain wait for an MRI scan to determine whether this has had any impact on the size of the tumour - which could leave her paralysed if it continues to grow.

Rosie Rickards (pictured), 18, from Hampshire, whose rare cancer came back after five years and then started growing again during the coronavirus lockdown, has remained relentlessly positive despite her uncertain prognosis

The teenagers diagnosed with Choroid plexus carcinoma, a rare form of brain tumour which left her almost totally blind, in 2013. Pictured, with her sister Ruby, 15

'There's no point being down about it because otherwise I would just be crying all day,' explained the teenager. 'I may as well be happy rather than be like "my life is so awful".

Rosie was first diagnosed after she started suffering with severe headaches, feeling sick and needing to sleep all day.

Her family also noticed she would be staring in the wrong place while talking and would speak nonsense and then not remember what she had said.

Rosie then visited her GP, only to be told several times that she was suffering from migraines or that the headaches were caused by hormones because she was 11 and going through puberty.

The doctor did refer Rosie to a specialist, but before her appointment she ended up in Accident and Emergency at Frimley Park hospital after her symptoms got dramatically worse.

'I was being sick and I was really tired, and I kept fainting so my dad took me to the A&E,' Rosie said. 'When he took me in I couldn't use my legs, he was dragging me along the floor.

Aged just 11, Rosie had a ten-hour operation to remove the tumour and then had chemotherapy and radiotherapy to give the best chance of the cancer not returning. Pictured, Rosie at a wedding shortly before her first diagnosis

The optimistic teenager (pictured) in hospital shortly after her surgery. Further treatment kept the size of the tumour stable until May of this year, when it started growing once again

Rosie was put into a wheelchair and then given a MRI scan, which revealed she was suffering from a tumour. She was then told she needed a ten-hour operation to remove the tumour from her brain.

Speaking of the shock of her diagnosis, Rosie said: 'I thought, "why can't it be someone else?" They just told me I had a lump in my head.

'Being eleven I didn't know what the word was so I thought it's alright, they'll take it out and I'll be fine.

WHAT IS A CHOROID PLEXUS CARCINOMA? * Choroid plexus carcinomas occur within the ventricles of the brain and can block the cerebro-spinal fluid from circulating and draining, causing pressure to build up in the skull. * Choroid plexus carcinoma's occur most often in one year olds, where the signs of the raised intracranial pressure may be vomiting and lethargy (drowsiness) or your child being unable to look upwards. Their head size may also grow quickly. * Choroid plexus carcinomas are a high grade (grade 3), fast growing tumour. There is an association with the genetic condition, Li-Fraumeni syndrome.They are different from choroid plexus papillomas. * The first symptoms of a choroid plexus carcinoma may, therefore, be pressure headaches, particularly in the mornings. * Treatment involves removing as much of the tumour as possible followed by chemotherapy and, sometimes, radiotherapy. This partly depends on the age of the child, as health professionals try not to give radiotherapy to children under 3 years. (Information from The Brain Tumour Charity) To find out more about CLIC Sargent, click here. Advertisement

'I think I was upset. I went from hanging out with my friends every day to being stuck in hospital all of a sudden I had to have this major surgery,' she added.

Her mother Claire, 43, who is separated from Rosie's father, said the hardest part of the ordeal for her was watching her daughter get wheeled down to the operating theatre for her operation.

'We didn't know if we would see her again,' she said.

Even though the operation was ultimately a success and the tumour was removed, it was not enough to save her sight.

Rosie is completely blind in her left eye and has some vision in her right eye, but not enough to 'drive or read a book'.

She and her mother said she went blind after the tumour prevented fluid from draining from her brain, which in turn damaged her optic nerve.

Choroid plexus carcinoma usually affects children under two and impacts the brain tissue which secretes cerebrospinal fluid.

As it grows, the tumour can block fluid passages, which leads to a build-up of liquid in the brain  known as hydrocephalus  which is what happened in Rosie's case.

The tumour can also cause irritability, nausea or vomiting and headaches, all of which Rosie had.

The teen said the first thing she asked after waking up from her operation was 'how am I going to go to school?' and was promptly told by her mother that she wouldn't be able to go.

After the operation, Rosie had intensive chemotherapy and radiotherapy to give the best chance of destroying all of the cancer cells.

Things were made harder by the fact that she was on a ward with very young children and did not have the company of anyone her own age.

With the support of a social worker from children and young people's cancer charity CLIC Sargent, Rosie did meet other young people who had had a similar experience, helping to boost her confidence.

However, the young woman said losing her sight was the hardest thing of all.

'People always say to me "you've been through so much treatment" but the thing that I've found hardest at the time when I was 11 was my eyesight because I was out with my friends all the time then all of a sudden I couldn't,' she explained.

She ended up missing nearly all of her first year of secondary school  year 7  and had to have home tutors.

Yet the treatment appeared to have been a success and so Rosie, who thought she had been cured, was able to continue her life and school career.

But five years later, in 2018 and just eight days before she was due to sit her GCSEs, Rosie began getting strange symptoms once more.

She said: 'I couldn't move fingers on my left hand. I couldn't walk without bumping into someone. We went to Winchester hospital, I remember this doctor saying to me "can you walk to that sofa" and I said I just can't.'

In 2018, just eight days before she was due to sit her GCSE exams, the cancer did come back and further treatment kept the size of the tumour stable until May of this year, when it started growing once more. Pictured, Rosie

Rosie has since had further radiotherapy but now faces an uncertain wait to find out with an MRI scan if this has had any impact on the size of the tumour  which could leave her paralysed if it continues to grow. Pictured, with her sister and mother, Claire, 47

The young woman went on to add she could not move her little finger when trying to touch type at school and members of staff were asking her 'what is wrong with your fingers?'

Her mother also said Rosie would be sitting on the sofa and her leg would suddenly rise. Claire added her daughter, who had had a clear brain scan just a couple of months previously, was at times 'walking like Bambi' with her legs splayed.

From observing her daughter's symptoms, the mother believed that she had a spinal tumour.

The mother recalled, 'I kept ringing the hospital and saying something's wrong but they said 'no it's fine because she'd had a brain scan that was clear.'

'As a mum, you just know. I kept on and on and on at them,' she added.

Finally, the mother's persistence paid off and Rosie was rushed to hospital as an inpatient, where a MRI scan revealed she had a spinal tumour, of the same type which she had had in her brain.

It is believed the cancer cells travelled from her brain via her spinal fluid.

Her mother said of the new diagnosis, 'I couldn't believe it was happening again. You never relax but I was just in shock. Also, I knew how hard it was the first time and it's stomach-churning to know you've got to go through that again.'

Rosie agreed that the second diagnosis was 'hard' and that she had been looking forward to going to college. But she added, 'I did think I had been through it before, I knew what to expect.'

Because of the return of her cancer, Rosie was unable to sit her GCSEs and so a mixture of her predicted grades and mock results were used instead.

Rosie said that whilst she got 'passes in most of them', she thinks she would have performed better if she had been able to sit them.

Remarkably, the teenager  who was also unable to take her GCSEs because of her disease  said there is 'no point being down' about her situation

Her further treatment involved more chemotherapy as well as the trial of a new drug called Aftatinib.

According to Cancer Research UK, the drug works by blocking signals coming from particular proteins which tell a cancer to divide and grow. The hope is that this will slow down or stop the cancer from growing.

However, whilst in Rosie's case the new drug and the renewed chemotherapy did shrink her tumour, her kidneys struggled with the new regime and so she lost an 'unreal' amount of weight and had to stop taking Aftatinib.

Fortunately, the treatment was enough to stabilise the tumour until May  when lockdown measures were in full force - when it started growing once again.

'I got offered a scan,' Rosie explained. 'I thought I'll take it and I had this feeling it had started growing back and then obviously the scan said it did.'

Claire said the further bad news was especially hard because much of hers' and Rosie's extended family  including her grandparents, aunties and cousins  live in Weymouth, which is around 75 miles from Andover.

'You just want a hug and you can't have one,' her mother said. 'It has been very isolating this time, even worse, because usually if you get bad news then people do turn up at your house and we haven't had that, we haven't had someone round for a cup of tea.'

In June, Rosie, who has a younger sister named Ruby, 15, had 15 days of radiotherapy to try to treat the tumour but is unsure how successful it has been.

She and her mother are still anxiously waiting to receive a date for an MRI scan because medics need to wait for swelling caused as a side effect of the radiotherapy to diminish.

The wait is made worse by the knowledge that if the tumour continues to grow it could leave Rosie paralysed. Her mother said she is 'on their case' to ensure the scan happens soon but Rosie remains characteristically optimistic.
The forests of Illinois have a new friend in the fight against invasive species.

The University of Illinois Extension forestry program has taken to the skies to see if drones can be used to survey for evidence of the invasive shrub amur bush honeysuckle.

This is an exciting time for technological advances in natural resource conservation, says Kevin Rohling, Illinois Extension forestry research technician. Drone technology is a game changer. It has the potential to drastically increase our ability to quickly detect and assess issues in Illinois forests without allocating a lot of resources.

Invasive insect, animal, plant and aquatic species threaten native populations, disrupt ecosystems, and cost the U.S. billions of dollars to manage. The most effective way to control invasive species is through a strategy of early detection and rapid response, says Nick Seaton, who collaborated with the drone research in his role as project coordinator for the River to River Cooperative Weed Management Area. But manual surveys to find plants are time consuming and expensive, and invasives move fast.

The forestry team is determining if images captured by drones can quickly identify invasive infested areas. Extension foresters can then deliver advice and training to private landowners, managers, businesses, and non-profits on how to treat and efficiently control further spread.

The research project took place in Southern Illinois, a unique and biodiverse area. The regions patchwork of protected state and federal natural areas is home to 107 state threatened and endangered species that are jeopardized by invasive species.

Invasive plants do not recognize political boundaries, Rohling says. So private areas near the Shawnee National Forest managed with the aid of this technology will reduce seed sources that would otherwise contribute to the spread of bush honeysuckle.

Starting in 2018, the team organized more than 40 flights during spring and fall when the forest canopy was clear of leaves, but when the greenery of bush honeysuckle was still visible in the understory.

The forestry team collaborated with the River to River Cooperative Weed Management Area on the research, and funding was provided by the USDA Forest Service Northeastern Area State and Private Forestry.

The forestry team identifies its target site and sets up automated flights to take high-resolution photos. The images are combined into a mosaic of the forest canopy that is loaded into the mapping program ESRI ArcGIS for analysis.

Early results show that the drone surveys provide access to remote areas while saving time and resources, but there are limitations. The foresters were able to identify mature plants, but small or fire-damaged plants escaped detection, Rohling says. Aerial surveys took less time than walking surveys, only two hours compared to more than 11; however, there is a narrow window of time to get photos.

Timing is absolutely critical, Rohling says. Were still working on improving that component.

Early fall flights photographed canopies still full of leaves, but invasive species had browned out in later flights. In the spring, early buds and leaves blocked the understory. And, the drones can only fly when the weather cooperates.

Looking ahead, the team expects they can use drones to survey for other invasive plant species, but the potential for maintaining forest health doesnt stop there. They plan to find blooming chestnut trees and propagate them in other areas for agroforestry purposes. A student is also using the aerial images to identify new habitats for rare plant species.

Were only now scratching the surface with drone technology, Rohling says. For example, future projects could include very targeted herbicide applications that would save money as well as reduce environmental impacts.
They were headed to a church that offered refuge to protesters, she said, but police blocked the route they were going to take so she said they parked and walked. As they walked up the ramp of a library near the church, police converged to make arrests before a curfew took effect, Scott said.
Mangaluru, Sep 26 : : The Central Crime Branch police on Saturday grilled noted Kannada television presenter Anushree for more than four hours for her alleged involvement in a drugs case involving actor-choreographer Kishore Aman Shetty.

Mangaluru police have been conducting a parallel probe into drug consumption and peddling cases involving famous TV personalities.

Anushree is the first TV personality, whom the Mangaluru police had summoned two days ago.

A coastal city in Karnataka 351 kilometre from state capital Bengaluru, Mangaluru is a tourist attraction besides being an IT and education hub.

The Mangaluru CCB police arrested Kishore Aman Shetty about a fortnight ago for allegedly possessing MDMA tablets.

Shetty is a noted celebrity who shot to fame for his dancing skills as well as acting in the popular Bollywood franchise, ABCD (Anybody Can Dance), directed by Prabhu Deva.

During the interrogation, Shetty allegedly spilled the beans about his choreographer friend Tarun Raj, who was arrested last week after the arrest of Shetty's alleged girlfriend Aska.

The police say Aska and Tarun Raj were said to have known Anushree.

Speaking to reporters after her interrogations were completed, Anushree said that she knew both Tarun as well as Kishore 12 years ago as they used to teach her dance for a show. "They had choreographed me. After this, somehow we lost connection and suddenly, now I have been summoned," she said.

She added she has always batted for a drug-free society. "Whatever they (police) asked me I have answered to the best of my knowledge. If the police call me again, I will come here and cooperate." Responding to another question Anushree asserted that she was never a party animal. "I have not partied as it is being portrayed by the media," she claimed.

On Friday Anushree had posted a statement on her Facebook timeline stating that the media should not write baseless stories against her or her family.

"I have been summoned by the police. I am going there to present myself. Let the inquiry be conducted. I will cooperate with them fully. But, the media should refrain from writing baseless stories against me. Just because, the police summoned me one does not become an accused or a culprit. The media should respect my personal dignity," said her statement on FB.
In this instance, though, I would like to restrict myself to India-Pakistan circumstances, as relations between these two neighbours are today at rock-bottom.

In Sri Lanka, the Tamil Tigers indulged in violent extremism for decades, which included the assassination of a former and would-be Indian Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi. I have experienced both situations first-hand; and do not for a moment underestimate their seriousness.

The 1971 Indo-Pak war was a watershed in ties between the two nations. On June 27, 1972, on the eve of his departure for Simla for talks with the Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, the Pakistani President Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in a broadcast on Radio Pakistan said: "The war we have lost was not of our making. I had warned against it but my warning fell on deaf ears of a power drunk Junta. They recklessly plunged our people into the war and involved us in an intolerable surrender which lost us half our country."

It took seven years and a coup d'etat for the Pakistani army to reassert itself; and with its recapture of power began a policy of trying to avenge 1971, not by war, but by chipping away at India with a proxy war.

In 1983, the National Conference party in Jammu and Kashmir won a second landslide victory in state elections. But their leader and chief minister, Dr Farooq Abdullah, fell out with Indira Gandhi, who used her constitutional levers to dismiss his government the following year.

When Dr Abdullah subsequently patched up with Indira Gandhi, many of his supporters disapproved of the reconciliation. Thus, when fresh elections took place in Jammu and Kashmir in 1987, a significant segment of the National Conference's traditional voters turned against them. The outcome, though, did not reflect this. In others words, it is widely believed the results were rigged. The parties that suffered went on to constitute the separatist All Party Hurriyat Conference.

In February 1989, Soviet troops withdrew from Afghanistan. People in Indian-controlled Kashmir were inflicted a view that if Pakistan could have defeated the Soviet Union, Indian soldiers would be no match for their Pakistani counterparts in the event of an invasion by the Pakistani army. Thus, even pro-India Kashmiris became nervous and felt it was better to be on the right side of such a war than the wrong one. It is in this fertile atmosphere of alienation and fear that an uprising occurred in August 1989 in Indian-controlled Kashmir.

During the 1988 to 1992 presidency of George Bush Senior, the United States administration placed Pakistan on a preliminary watch list of countries potentially sponsoring terrorism, without designating it as a state sponsor of terrorism as such. So, I asked a senior American diplomat posted in Islamabad what persuaded President Bush to issue such a caution. He replied, the President had "credible evidence" to do so. I probed the diplomat further. He revealed US satellites had picked up movement of Pakistani army trucks delivering weapons close to the Line of Control with India in Kashmir. The weapons had been supplied by western countries to Pakistan for distribution to the Afghan Mujahideen. Instead, they were diverted to Kashmir. That, I believe, was the genesis of a proxy war, which has included the audacious assault on Mumbai in November 2008. As recently as the killing of Indian para-military personnel in Pulwama in Kashmir in 2019, the Jaish-e-Mohammad released a video saying it carried out the attack.

It's possible that since 1989 Indian agencies have retaliated and therefore been behind incidents in Pakistan. I recall one in Karachi in the 1990s where I suspected this could be the case. But in 1997, Inder Gujral as the Indian External Affairs Minister announced his doctrine for cordial relations with India's neighbours. Together with this, came instructions to Indian espionage organisations to cut back on covert operations. Consequently, for a lengthy period thereafter India exercised considerable restraint.

Whether such activities have resumed under Narendra Modi, I can't certify one way or the other. The truth is I don't know. But what I am confident about is this: that Kulbhushan Jadhav, allegedly an Indian spy apprehended inside Pakistan, could not possibly have had the capability to single-handedly destabilise Balochistan.

During negotiations at the Simla summit, Bhutto floated the idea of the Line of Control in Kashmir being converted into a "Line of Peace". General Pervez Musharraf's formula in 2006 was broadly along similar lines. But Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's government ultimately found it difficult to trust a man who was instrumental for the Kargil intrusion in 1999. Basically, there's a trust deficit between the Indian establishment and the Pakistani military. Only by bridging this shortfall can there be any meaningful forward movement.

There's an appreciation among Pakistan-watchers in India that the main political parties in Pakistan are not disinclined towards peacefully resolving differences between the two nations. This is also true among progressive parties in India. It was also the outlook of the otherwise anti-Pakistan Bharatiya Janata Party under Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

It appears to be the belief in the power structure in Pakistan that militancy in Indian-controlled Kashmir is justified. I beg to differ. As the European Commission has echoed, where there's an opportunity to enter office through the ballot box, violence is unjustified.

The Election Commission of India has ensured free and fair elections in Jammu and Kashmir since the 1990s. In India's north-eastern states, separatist parties have fought elections and formed governments, like the Scottish National Party. Sinn Fein is a member of a ruling coalition in Northern Ireland. Therefore, the legitimacy of separatist forces in Jammu and Kashmir can best be established by proving they indeed enjoy majority support.

The one and only opinion survey carried out on both sides of the Line of Control in Kashmir -- by King's College London and Chatham House in 2010 -- 44 per cent of people in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir wanted independence as opposed to 43 per cent in Indian-controlled Jammu and Kashmir. Merely 2 per cent of people in Indian-controlled Jammu and Kashmir wanted to join Pakistan, compared to only 1 per cent of people in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir.

Such figures may have changed in recent years. But India and Pakistan are obliged to sorting out their disputes under the Simla Agreement, which states "the two countries are resolved to settle their differences by peaceful means through bilateral negotiations". This Agreement is registered as a Treaty with the United Nations under Article 102 of the UN Charter.

So, are terrorism and proxy wars a threat to peace and stability in South Asia? They certainly are. And the sooner they are dispensed with, the better it will be for the region.

(Ashis Ray is an author. This was his speech at a webinar organised by the London Institute of South Asia. The views expressed are personal)

--IANS

ray/am
A federal judge in Florida last week denied an insurers petition to dismiss a COVID-19 business-interruption lawsuit, while a federal magistrate judge in California threw out a similar claim.

Both lawsuits were filed by plaintiffs whose policies excluded coverage for any damage caused by virus. The California judge said arguments that the exclusion didnt apply were nonsense, while the Florida judge found similar arguments plausible.

The disparate opinions continue a split among state and federal judges across the nation as to whether business income lost because of COVID-19 closure orders is recoverable through all risk commercial property insurance policies. Federal courts in New York, Washington D.C., Texas and Michigan and a state court in Michigan have dismissed COVID-19 business-interruption lawsuits. A federal court in Kansas City, Mo., has allowed three such lawsuits to proceed, as has a state court judge in New Jersey.

The latest decision comes from a lawsuit filed by Urogynecology Specialist of Florida against Sentinel Insurance Co. for breach of contract after the carrier denied the medical clinics claim for lost income during a statewide closure order. Sentinel said the policy that excluded coverage for damage caused directly or indirectly by the presence, growth, proliferation, spread, or any activity of fungi, wet rot, dry rot, bacteria or virus.

U.S. District Judge Anne C. Conway, with the Middle District of Florida in Orlando, found two problems with the insurers argument. She said in an order issued Thursday that the section of the policy that referenced the virus exclusion stated that it modified certain coverage forms, but those forms werent provided to the court.

More importantly perhaps, Conway said the insurer did not prove that the virus exclusion was not unambiguous.

Denying coverage for losses stemming from COVID-19  does not logically align with the grouping of the virus exclusion with other pollutants such that the policy necessarily anticipated and intended to deny coverage for these kinds of business losses, her order states.

Federal Magistrate Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley, on the other hand, found no ambiguity in the insurance policy that the Hartford Financial Services Group had issued to the Franklin European Wax Center in Fresno, Calif. The policy excluded any damage caused by virus.

The wax center argued that it lost income because of the government closure orders, not because of the virus. Corleys order summed up her opinion about that in one word: Nonsense.

The magistrate judge noted that the plaintiffs complaint states, the coronavirus is proliferating onto virtually every surface and object in, on, and around commercial premises such as that belonging to EWC Fresno, and thereby causing direct physical damage.

Curiously, in another Northern California District case, a federal judge suggested that a pleading that claimed the novel coronavirus was physically on a property may have a better chance of getting a hearing.

U.S. District Court Judge Jon S. Tigar on Sept. 14 granted a motion by Travelers Casualty Insurance Co. of America to dismiss a business-interruption lawsuit filed by Mudpie, a childrens store in San Francisco. But Tigar dismissed the case without prejudice, meaning Mudpie can file again after amending its pleading.

Tigar wrote in his order that he was demising the lawsuit because Mudpie did not allege that any physical force had caused it to close the store and suffer a loss of income.

Tigar said it is doubtful that Mudpie will be able to establish a direct physical loss of property, but granted the plaintiff leave to amend its complaint anyway.

The court also recognizes, however, that the law concerning business interruption coverage linked to the COVID-19 pandemic is very much in development, the order states.

Instead of amending its complaint, Mudpie on Wednesday filed an appeal with the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Michael Levine, a policyholders attorney for Hunton Andrews Kurth in Washington D.C., said the state of play so far shows suggests that judges are looking for allegations that some tangible, physical change caused the business-income loss.

The one commonality that weve seen so far, the courts are looking for some physical manifestation, he said. They are saying the closure orders alone arent enough and they are saying they want to see some allegation that COVID-19 has at least affected the property.

Levine said those early dismissal orders, however, may be overturned on appeal.
DUP's Sammy Wilson has been branded a 'disgrace' after a photograph emerged of the MP not wearing a face mask on the London underground.

Fury erupted on social media after Mr Wilson was pictured reading a magazine without a face covering as he travelled from Westminster to Heathrow on Thursday.

A witness claimed the MP, 67, had not worn a mask for the entire duration of the trip, despite those who do not cover their faces on London transport risking 200 fines.

Critics took to social media to question the politician after the image emerged this week, with one branding Mr Wilson a 'disgrace' and asking: 'Rules not apply to MPs?'

He added: 'Sammy Wilson MP on tube in London this morning with no mask after a 200 fine announced earlier this week. Disgrace.'

Another condemned what he claimed was 'highly irresponsible behaviour' from the East Antrim MP, adding: 'I hope that he will reconsider his actions and show some respect for other people on the tube in the future.'

DUP's Sammy Wilson has been branded a 'disgrace' after a photograph emerged of the MP not wearing a face mask on the London underground

Fury erupted on social media after Mr Wilson was pictured reading a magazine without a face covering as he travelled from Westminster to Heathrow on Thursday

North Down MP Stephen Farry tweeted: 'Most NI MPs do acknowledge, understand and respect rules re facemasks' on public transport.

Mr Wilson has since accepted he 'should have' had a mask on, while complaining the UK has 'become like East Germany under the Stasi where members of the public think it is acceptable to act as snoops.'

The MP, who previously described face coverings as 'muzzles', went on to ask why the person who took the photograph had not approached him on the train.

He also claimed he had only taken the mask off briefly to make a call, the Belfast Telegraph reported.

'Whoever took the picture didn't approach me or say anything to me which I suppose would have been the proper way to behave,' he added.

It comes as new data revealed less than 0.1 per cent of people who are stopped by police for not wearing masks on trains have received a fine.

A witness claimed the MP, 67, had not worn a mask for the entire duration of the trip, despite those who do not cover their faces on London transport risking 200 fines

Speaking about the photograph of Mr Wilson at a Stormont Executive press conference, DUP leader Arlene Foster said everyone is 'equally subject to the law'

British Transport Police said it stopped 14,726 people from 15 July to 15 August for failing to comply, with 14 fixed penalty notices issued, the BBC reported.

From July 30 to September 8, authorities recorded 50,729 'interventions' with passengers not wearing masks. Some 3,545 were told to leave the train.

Rules introduced in June require anyone travelling on public transport to wear a face covering, but BTP said fines would only be issues as a 'last resort.'

Speaking about the photograph of Mr Wilson at a Stormont Executive press conference, DUP leader Arlene Foster said everyone is 'equally subject to the law'.

'I want to say this as clearly as I can, everyone is subject to the law, everyone is equally subject to the law and equal under the law,' she said.

'So it is important that we remember that, and that is the position of the DUP.'

She added on Thursday that she had not had the opportunity to speak to Mr Wilson about the matter yet.

'Everybody has to abide by the law and take the consequences as well as not abiding by those laws,' she said.

Those caught not wearing a mask on public transport in London can face a 200 fine, which doubles each time a person is caught, up to 6,400.

There are exemptions for the rule on the basis of age, health and disability reasons.

Earlier this week, Conservative MP Danny Kruger apologised after being spotted without a mask during a public transport journey in London.

Mr Kruger, David Cameron's former speechwriter, said in a statement: 'I boarded an almost empty carriage at Hungerford and quite simply forgot to put on my mask.

'When I got to Paddington I realised my mistake and covered up for the rest of my journey.

'If the person had reminded me rather than taking a photo and posting it on social media I would of course have put on my mask then and there.

'I do apologise for my mistake.'

Mr Wilson has previously been outspoken about the wearing of face coverings.

In July he tweeted a photograph of himself in an ice cream shop in Co Antrim not wearing a mask, with the message 'you can't eat ice cream when you're muzzled!'

Face coverings in indoor places became compulsory in Northern Ireland on August 10.
PORTLAND, ORE.  Hundreds of law enforcement agents swept across Portland on Saturday, making targeted arrests, shutting down intersections and seizing weapons in a largely successful effort to keep opposing political rallies across the city from erupting into violent conflict.

A rally organized by the Proud Boys  a far-right group notorious for engaging in brawls  had led Gov. Kate Brown to declare a state of emergency before the events, which also included rallies organized by local protest groups whose members had announced that the outside group was not welcome.

At the Proud Boys gathering, where some people wore tactical gear and carried weapons, there was some brief conflict when a handful of outsiders arrived and were quickly surrounded by a crowd. Video posted by a local journalist showed a man kicking someone who had been knocked to the ground. Police said they were investigating the assault.

About half a mile away, on the other side of Interstate 5, about 200 people gathered peacefully with Black Lives Matter flags and made presentations about the history of that corner of the city, where many Black families first established roots during World War II.

Dre Miller, an activist with one of the organizing groups, said the groups had been approached by city officials asking them not to go forward because of the possibility of conflict. But he said the group took precautions, including setting up a car caravan to minimize chances of conflict as ralliers departed. And by sticking to their goals of highlighting the history of racism in the neighbourhood where the Proud Boys had scheduled their rally, he said, the gathering was one of the most peaceful he had been to in recent weeks.

Our Black organizers are going to stick together and stick to the message, he told the crowd.

The Proud Boys chairman, Enrique Tarrio, said he was grateful that the police presence  estimated by the Oregon State Police at 500 officers  had kept the groups apart.

We got all of our speakers on stage, we got to say what we wanted to say, we did what we wanted to do, and now were out of town, Tarrio said Saturday afternoon.

Political and law enforcement officials had expressed fears that Saturdays competing events could become violent, as they have in weeks and years past, especially with gunshots fired recently by both sides on the streets of Portland and the tensions of a presidential campaign.

But what was setting up to be a violent showdown in the middle of downtown Portland began to change when the Proud Boys altered their plans, moving their rally to a relatively remote park on the northern edge of the city, while groups such as Rose City Antifa announced that they would gather at a different park miles away.

Downtown Portland has been rocked by protests since the summer, first over the police killings of Black people, and later over the Trump administrations move to send federal agents to the city in an attempt to quell the demonstrations.

They have escalated on recent weekends, when right-wing groups and racial justice protesters have engaged in the streets. In one case, authorities said, a right-wing activist in mid-August fired gunshots from a vehicle. At another, a right-wing activist brandished a gun. An antifa supporter shot and killed a far-right demonstrator during a clash on Aug. 29, police said.

Portland has not been the only scene of unrest across the country. Demonstrations across the country kicked up after a grand jury in Kentucky decided not to indict either of the Louisville police officers who shot Breonna Taylor, a Black emergency room technician, in her own apartment.

The protests continued Saturday in Louisville, though they were somewhat subdued. Shortly before the 9 p.m. curfew there, protesters cleared out of the downtown square that has been a central gathering point for demonstrations. Some went to a nearby church, where they ate dinner, listened to music and talked.

Police arrested a handful of protesters as they attempted to leave downtown, and were planning to march again later in the evening.

The Proud Boys had billed their gathering in Portland as an opportunity to counter the citys long-running racial justice protests, with Tarrio posting online that antifa is in for a bad time if law enforcement was not present.

Several hundred people gathered at Delta Park on the citys north edge, mingling, drinking and shouting. Some in the crowd broke into expletive-filled chants against antifa, the loose group of activists who sometimes use violence to stop people from promoting views they deem fascist or racist.

In addition to the assault reported by the police, there were several other confrontations when people suspected by members of the crowd of being antifa activists walked into the area.

A few Portland police officers, who had largely stayed away from the centre of the event, briefly entered the park and tried to defuse the skirmishes. A helicopter circled overhead as the proceedings began with the national anthem and the Pledge of Allegiance, and a host of speakers began condemning the racial justice protesters who have gone nightly into Portlands streets, as well as the citys leaders.

Along with the Black-led gathering nearby, hundreds of other local protesters gathered a few miles away at Peninsula Park for a day of crafts and other activities. A group of black-clad demonstrators loaded their own makeshift plastic shields from a bus on their way to the rally, while medical crews set up tents.

Doreen McGrath, a 63-year-old activist, said she had driven in with a group of about 25 people from Seattle. Their group stood on the outskirts of the gathering, chanting and waving signs. Hey there, Proud Boys, you better hide, they chanted. We can see your fascist side.

Authorities reported arresting three people, and officers also confiscated at least two hardened shields. We will seize weapons and shields as can be done safely and as resources allow, a spokesman said.

The scene was different at the Proud Boys venue, where a man told those who had come together in the early afternoon that he had 30 shields to give out. The man arrived at the gathering with vehicles emblazoned with the words American Wolf, seemingly referencing an armed civilian militialike group based in Washington state.

Later, the Portland Police pulled over a truck carrying Proud Boys supporters as they were leaving and seized guns, baseball bats and several shields.

The Proud Boys group has strongly criticized Mayor Ted Wheeler of Portland for not taking a stronger line against the protesters who clashed with agents outside of a federal courthouse downtown in nightly confrontations over several weeks. The Proud Boys welcomed Browns emergency order, which also allowed state and local police to use tear gas, which the mayor had banned city police officers from using.

In a statement last week, Wheeler, a Democrat, said he feared the arrival of Saturdays demonstrators more than the ongoing demonstrations against racial injustice in his city.

I categorically condemn violence of all kinds by all people, Wheeler said in a statement. But let me be clear, the alt-right and white supremacist groups organizing to come to Portland on Saturday present the greatest threat weve faced so far.

In Philadelphia on Saturday, dozens of Proud Boys marched through downtown city streets, followed by police officers on bikes. Some carried American flags and Trump 2020 flags while chanting derogatory comments about antifa, videos on social media showed. Some onlookers heckled them, mocking their appearance and clothing.

As the Proud Boys rally came to an end in Portland, police directed traffic out of the park, funneling motorists directly onto a freeway that would take them over the Columbia River  out of the city and out of the state.

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Save Log in , register or subscribe to save articles for later. Normal text size Larger text size Very large text size The reviewers havent been especially kind to Gregor Jordans adaptation of Tim Wintons novel Dirt Music since it debuted at the Toronto Film Festival last September, in that far-off time before COVID. The film about Georgie (Scottish actress Kelly Macdonald) and Lu (American Garrett Hedlund) and their illicit, guilt-ridden affair in remote coastal Western Australia "plays like Wake in Fright meets The Notebook" wrote the reviewer for rogerebert.com, and "shamelessly marinates" in "contrivances and coincidences" that "are preposterous". Variety dismissed it as "a fine-looking romance that never finds the right key", populated by characters "who act without much by the way of logic". Despite much early promise, the Chicago Tribune opined, the film "stalls out in a rotation of meaningful looks and tearful whispers and gazing at ocean vistas". Ouch. Director Gregor Jordan working behind the scenes on the film Dirt Music. The thing is, Jordan  who burst onto the scene with his brilliant crime caper Two Hands in 1999, and reteamed with star Heath Ledger for his take on Ned Kelly in 2003  kind of knows all this. He knows the story demands the viewer take some big leaps. He knows it probes a mysterious and not-immediately-filmable connection between people and land. He knows its not for everyone. But, honestly, he tried. "I did it as well as I could have," he says. "Whether it's good enough, I don't know. It works for me, and I know there are people who've seen the film and it works for them and they love it, and I know that there's other people it's not going to work for."

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Jordan shot the film in late 2018, and finished tinkering with it after its Toronto bow and some test screenings  "an interesting process," he says, "it's sometimes hard to gauge what's the best thing to do afterwards"  late last year. But hes been living with the story much longer than that. He was one of a group of filmmakers to whom the book was sent in proof form before it was published in 2001; David Wenham  who plays Georgies partner, crayfishing kingpin Jim Buckridge  was another. "He dug out his original unpublished copy and showed it to me." Jordan says the book, which won the Miles Franklin Award and was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize in 2002, blew him away. "But it also kind of overwhelmed me as well. I just really had no idea how you would turn something that expansive, with that number of abstract ideas, into a movie." So he passed, while Phillip Noyce (Rabbit Proof Fence, Patriot Games, Dead Calm) took it on, with Russell Crowe attached as Jim and Heath Ledger in mind for the role of Lu, a musician wrecked by grief over the death of his brother, sister-in-law and young niece in a car accident, and wracked with guilt for surviving it. Director Gregor Jordan with Kelly Macdonald. Credit:Universal But that too came to nothing, with Noyce saying in 2014, "I could never get a script that I thought captured the poetry of the novel, and theres the problem. A poetic novel is just difficult to translate into a movie." It was Sam Neill who brought the story back into Jordans life a few years ago, when he asked if he could bring producer Finola Dwyer, a fellow New Zealander, along to a dinner the director was hosting in Cape Town.

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"And we got talking, and she let me know she had optioned the book and had a script and would I be interested in reading it," Jordan recalls. "So it was sort of a weird piece of serendipity." The script was by Jack Thorne, the hugely successful English writer for screen (Skins, Shameless, His Dark Materials) and stage (Harry Potter and the Cursed Child), and Jordan was hooked. "There was just such beauty in his writing, what he'd taken from the book was so elegant and clever, and there was an element of invention, too. He made imperceptible changes that captured the spirit of the book so beautifully and presented it in a way that I could see could be makeable as a film. I mean, all those strange abstract ideas are still there, but I just thought 'this is doable'." Ah, those strange abstract ideas. This is, you suspect, where Jordan and the reviewers part company. In bare narrative terms, Dirt Music is relatively straightforward. Georgie has fallen out of love with Jim and is instantly attracted to Lu. They begin an affair. But the depressed Lu is also a poacher, nabbing crayfish that, by the terms of his monopoly licence, ought to belong to Jim. Trouble brews. Its the "abstract ideas"  of music as a conduit to memory and the emotions, of dirt as the site of rootedness and identity  that make Wintons book so complex and filming it so challenging.

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The movie asks us to take seriously, for example, the idea that Lu is so stricken with grief that his dead family literally haunts him. And it asks us to accept that Lu would deal with that grief by heading off to a remote chain of islands Georgie had once mentioned to him to hunt and fish and live and, in all likelihood, to die alone. Its picturesque as all get-out, and for Jordan, who has been known to sleep on a plank on a remote island in the Philippines just to chase the surf, it might even be plausible. But he readily admits its a big leap to ask of most audiences. "The idea that he would essentially live like a caveman in order to try and exorcise the demons that are haunting him  that's a pretty out-there concept," he says. The lead characters are deeply embedded in the landscape. Credit:Universal Jordan had trouble enough finding actors who would follow him on this journey "literally to the end of the world". Hes not joking about that. Base camp for the two weeks of shooting the final act, set in the fictional Coronation Gulf, was a compound of tents at the far end of the Dampier Peninsula. Getting there involved a three-and-a-half hour flight from Perth to Broome, followed by a three-and-a-half hour drive along dirt roads. Getting to set each day meant yet more trekking  a boat trip followed by wading through waist-deep water, with gear held overhead, to uninhabited islands accessible only with the permission of local Aboriginal people.

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"You've gotta be pretty gung-ho to go to that kind of place and shoot," he says. "It was really a question of finding the best actors who are really right for those roles, who are the right ages, who are available, who are happy to travel to far north-west Australia and live in tents and go through the hell we went through to shoot it." A rather self-limiting field, in other words. Lu (Garrett Hedlund) and Georgie enjoy a rare carefree moment in Dirt Music. Credit:Universal Pictures He didnt set out to cast non-Australians, he adds, though having stars with the cachet of Macdonald and Hedlund does make international sales easier. "But there were certain actresses, Australian or not, who were very interested, and then they just sort of went, 'Hang on, I've got to fly to where?' They just couldn't wrap their heads around it. Also a lot of actresses have young children, so they just can't take them to those kinds of places." Casting is always "a strange business" anyway, he says. "You're not completely in control. It's like the universe almost provides you with the actors that you need." And the ones it provided him are "fantastic", he adds. The real star of this film, though  indeed, of any adaptation of a Winton story  was always going to be the landscape. Thats the appeal for filmmakers, but its also a serious hurdle to overcome when youre ostensibly making a great sweeping love story with a couple of humans at its centre. "The connection Lu and Georgie have is quite primal and visceral in that they are people who are from the earth and from the sea," Jordan notes. "These big visceral elements are a part of their love story, which sounds weird, I know, but it is what Winton created brilliantly. Trying to communicate that visually and aurally via the film was an important part of the challenge.

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Mysore Narasimhachar Srinivas, popularly known as M N Srinivas, was a pioneering anthropologist and sociologist. Srinivas coined phrases like dominant caste, vote bank and Sanskritization, phrases that almost everyone knows and hears constantly during election season.

Fifty years ago, in April 1970, a fire tragedy took place at the Centre for Advanced Study in Behavioural Sciences (CASBS), Stanford University, USA. Anti-Vietnam war protesters set fire to CASBS buildings, partially destroying two buildings and the works of several scholars at the centre. One of them lost everything, it was none other than M N Srinivas. He was doing a one-year fellowship at the CASBS at the time. Srinivas was then working on his seminal work The Remembered Village, which delved into caste and the social system in India. All three copies he had of the draft monograph, including notes and other research materials that he had collected over a span of 18 years, were all destroyed in the fire. Books, charts, maps, photographs and correspondence relating to ethnography and 5,000 cards of handwritten, processed filed notes also perished. Srinivas recounts the story in the first pages of The Remembered Village. The book also contains an acknowledgment of the part played by the arsonists in the making of the book into a sort of memoir.

Srinivas was shattered upon finding his years of hardwork reduced to ashes. He contemplated dropping this work altogether. However, Sol Tax, an American anthropologist and a friend of Srinivas, motivated him to work on it again by suggesting that he recollect memories of his field work and interactions he had with people as a part of his extensive research. At first, it appeared to be a daunting task, indeed a terrifying prospect for a deeply devoted researcher like Srinivas, in the absence of the vast inputs and findings he had collected over the years. The only solace was that the raw field notes of his study were kept in Delhi. The Ford Foundation in Delhi microfilmed these raw field notes and airmailed the film rolls to CASBS. A grant from the Wenner-Gren Foundation to CASBS supported Srinivas.

However, the raw field notes were related to Srinivas first visit to Rampura and it did not contain corrections and addenda Srinivas had recorded on cards on subsequent visits there. Despite all the obstacles and uncertainties, Srinivas, like a phoenix rising from the ashes, recreated his work The Remembered Village, relying solely on his sharp memory and raw field notes. The title of the book also does justice in such a scenario. The book was first published in 1976 by University of California Press.

As a result, the book was not so much an academic book, and was rather written in the form of a novel. One can even see the influence of R K Narayan, the celebrated writer and literary figure, who was also a close friend of Srinivas. However, The Remembered Village is not just lucid English prose or a lucid account of a village field study, but a piece of ethnographic literature filled with an anthropologists point of view on caste and class. It also provides a portrait of the lives and practices in an Indian village in post-Independence India. The book showcases the complexities of inter- and intra-caste relations in the Rampura community. It also offers insight into the nature of ethnographic research.

The book is set in Rampura (now known as Kodagahalli), a village about 34 kilometres from Mysore (now Mysuru). Till 2007, many thought of Rampura as a mystical village. But studies and researches by anthropologists from Mysore University and the Anthropological Survey of India led to the finding that Kodagahalli was actually the Rampura of Srinivas.

The field study undertaken by Srinivas in 1948 is also worth remembering. He visited Rampura a few days after the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi. He went to the village to study the social structure and caste system of the village. The villagers, then mourning the death of Gandhi, asked him to return after the thirteenth day of mourning. Srinivas returned after the period, this time taking along with him a cook and 26 pieces of luggage and stayed in the village for 11 months to familiarise himself with the social set-up and culture and customs. He made frequent visits to the villages till 1970, after which he returned to CASBS at Stanford University to complete his work. The fire tragedy struck when he was all set to finalize his monograph. It took another six years for Srinivas to finish The Remembered Village, and when it was published in 1976, it went on to become an all-time classic in ethnographic studies. Through The Remembered Village, Srinivas highlighted the importance of caste loyalties in electoral politics, apart from the influence of dominant caste groups.

Srinivas laid the foundations of research into Indian village society in the postIndependence years. In 1972, Prof VKRV Rao and Srinivas co-founded the Institute of Social and Economic Change (ISEC) in Bengaluru. A Chair has been instituted at ISEC in the name of Prof M N Srinivas, who died in November 1999.

(The writer formerly held the Ramakrishna Hegde Chair on Decentralization and Development, Institute for Social and Economic Change, Bengaluru)
National Voter Registration Day, which was celebrated Sept. 22, was a great reminder for people to vote.

First observed in 2012, the nonpartisan civic holiday celebrating democracy quickly has gained momentum; it is celebrated the fourth Tuesday of September.

And some Lorain County organizations have prudently joined the cause to get residents registered to vote.

On Sept. 23, Lorain County commissioners, during their weekly meeting, encouraged voters to register in marking National Voter Registration Day.

The commissioners also welcomed Lili Sandler, of Lorain County Rising, an organization working to get as many people as possible to vote in November.

Sandler told the commissioners that Lorain County Rising set up 48 voter registration boxes across the county encouraging residents to register to vote and to request applications to cast ballots by mail.

The boxes contain self-addressed envelopes with ballot request forms inside.

Also, the boxes have signs attached to them with quick response codes, better known as QR codes, directing residents to online resources for more information.

The boxes were strategically placed at local library branches, recreation centers, churches, Oberlin College and Lorain County Urban League.

With the Oct. 5 voter registration deadline fast approaching, Sandler is hoping, as we are, that the boxes will encourage more people to vote on Election Day.

After the deadline, the boxes will contain information on candidates seeking office in Lorain County.

So, one can imagine the excitement Sandler has that these boxes are placed in high-traffic locations where people will see and interact with them.

Lorain County Risings initiative is in collaboration with the League of Women Voters, Lorain County Urban League, Coalition of Labor Union Women, and the Oberlin and Elyria branches of the NAACP.

Sandler and the organizations are hoping for an enormous turnout for November.

Commissioner Matt Lundy said during the meeting the Lorain County Board of Elections had received more than 42,000 absentee ballot requests, a much higher volume than 2016.

Ballots are set to be mailed out beginning Oct. 6.

Lundy encouraged voters to get registered while expressing full confidence in the Board of Elections because the staff runs a very tight ship and they go by the book.

And Lundy has a point that because there are representatives of both major political parties running the operation, the process will be very smooth.

Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose in a news release, that as of Sept. 18, nearly 1.8 million absentee ballot applications have been received.

One of the big reasons why Ohio is considered the national leader in absentee voting, LaRose said, is because the state has utilized the system for nearly two decades.

He said you get good at something when you practice, and Ohio has proven to be game-ready.

That confidence is needed, and Lorain County officials seem to be ready.

Tim Fergus, absentee coordinator at the Lorain County Board of Elections, said absentee ballots and voting by mail are receiving this attention because of the high expected voter turnout for the presidential election, along with health and safety concerns about public gatherings due to the novel coronavirus pandemic.

Lorain County Board of Elections deserves credit for having worked all year to prepare for any challenges in November.

Also, early voting starts Oct. 6 at the Board of Elections, 1985 North Ridge Road in Sheffield Township, so were urging residents to get a head start on casting ballots to hopefully avoid any perplexities.

Since National Voter Registration Day was started, nearly three million voters have registered to vote on the holiday to date.

The holiday has been endorsed by the National Association of Secretaries of State, the National Association of State Election Directors, the U.S. Election Assistance Commission and the National Association of Election Officials (The Election Center).

Partners in this effort include well known companies that most people have heard about such as eBay, Facebook, Twitter, Google, PayPal, YMCA, YWCA, United Way and Uber.

So, it has some support from some heavy hitters.

Although these organizations have decided to use their platforms about registering to vote, whether in-person or by mail, some citizens still should learn about the political process.

National Voter Registration Day leverages technology and the reach of its partners to educate Americans about how to register, sign up for election reminders, request mail-in ballots and learn about early voting options.

The organizers of National Voter Registration Day are adamant that it wants to unite Americans, which is desperately needed during these times and climate in the country.

They see this as an opportunity to set aside differences, enjoy the rights and opportunities all share as Americans, and celebrate this democracy.

We also see this as a time for citizens to exercise their civic duty to make their voices heard.
WASHINGTON  The Trump administration has placed new restrictions on exports to Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation, Chinas most advanced maker of computer chips, a measure that could deepen the technology conflict between China and the United States.

In a letter on Friday, the Department of Commerce told American companies in the chip industry that they must first acquire a license to sell technology to SMIC and its subsidiaries. The department said it was taking the action after a review in which it determined that the Chinese company may pose an unacceptable risk of diversion to a military end use in the Peoples Republic of China.

The measure, which could cut SMIC off from the American software and other technology it needs to make its products, comes as the Trump administration takes a harsher stance against Chinese technology companies that it has deemed a national security threat. The administration has clamped down on shipments to the Chinese tech giant Huawei, restricted exports to dozens of other Chinese companies by placing them on a blacklist this year and moved to ban the Chinese-owned social media services WeChat and TikTok.

A spokesperson for the Bureau of Industry and Security, a division of the Commerce Department, said the bureau could not comment on specific licensing issues, but that it was constantly monitoring and assessing any potential threats to U.S. national security and foreign policy interests and would take appropriate action as warranted.
NEWTOWN TOWNSHIP >> Newtown Township will be applying for federal funding to bolster its career firefighting force. And its crossing its fingers and hoping the third times a charm. At its Jan. 12 meeting, the board of supervisors voted unanimously to resubmit its SAFER (Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response) grant application to the Federal Emergency Management Agency to...
An image of the plane crashing (Emergency Situation Ministry/AP)

Searchers combing the area where a Ukrainian military aircraft crashed have found two more bodies, bringing the death toll to 26.

One person survived after the plane, a twin-turboprop Antonov-26 belonging to the Ukrainian air force which was carrying 20 military cadets and a crew of seven, crashed and burst into flames on Friday night.

The aircraft was coming in to land at the airport in Chuhuiv, about 250 miles east of the capital Kyiv, when the incident occurred.

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Two people initially survived the crash, but one later died in a hospital.

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy declared Saturday to be a day of mourning for the crash victims and ordered that flights of An-26 planes be halted pending an investigation into the cause of the crash.

Mr Zelenskiy, who visited the crash area Saturday, called for a full assessment of the condition of the countrys military equipment.

Prime minister Denis Shygal has called for an official report on the crash by October 25.

In a statement released by his office, Mr Zelenskiy said: Yesterday we lost young cadets and experienced military men, who had their whole lives and, I am sure, more than one military feat ahead of them.

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The whole country will mourn today with their families.

Deputy defence minister Igor Starobinksy said the families of the dead would each be paid compensation of about 1,500,000 hryvna (44,000).

The An-26 is a transport plane used by both military and civilian operators.

Nearly 1,400 of the planes were manufactured from 1969 to 1986, according to the companys website.

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Defence minister Andrei Taran said the plane that crashed was built in 1977.

An An-26 chartered by a contractor for the World Food Programme crashed on August 22 while taking off from Juba in South Sudan, killing seven people.

The crash was the second large air disaster to afflict Ukraine this year.

In January, a Boeing 737 belonging to Ukraine International Airlines was shot down shortly after take-off from the airport in Tehran, Iran, killing all 176 people aboard.

The plane was shot down by Irans Revolutionary Guards amid high tensions after the United States killed a top general in a drone strike.
The possibility of more campus closures has sparked a sudden interest in withdrawing from college before it's too late.

"All of us are counting down to the tuition deadline," said Carla Voight, 20, a junior at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, referring to the last day students are eligible for some reimbursement if they leave school.

She worries that after that point, her classmates will be hard-pressed to get any money back, even if the campus closes and they are sent home.

Depending on when a student withdraws during a semester, a school's refund policy may reimburse a significant amount  specifically, if it's within the first month or so of the semester, although it varies by school.

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However, refunds are typically offered on a sliding scale and most schools won't give any money back at all after the fifth week of classes. (At the University of Michigan, students can get half of their tuition refunded up until the sixth week of school.)

Because of the coronavirus outbreak, a number of colleges and universities have said they will offer refunds of fees and room and board if students are sent home, although the reimbursement policies vary from school to school  and nearly all of them have drawn the line at tuition.

Now, those policies are being put to the test with cases of Covid-19 spiking at campuses across the country. Many of the colleges and universities that had reopened are reverting to distance learning.

"There's no reason for schools to stay open other than student tuition," Voight said. "Once that's locked in, there is no reason to stay open."
The forum aimed to provide updated information on changes in trade and economic policies of the countries in the Americas while analysing the market situation and demand for Vietnam's export industries in this period.

It also identified opportunities and solutions to promote exports and attract investment from the Americas, especially in the context that a number of free trade agreements have come into force, the global supply chain has seen movement, and economic recovery after COVID-19 has begun.

Speaking at the forum, Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Do Thang Hai said that the economic - trade relationship between Vietnam and the Americas has been continuously expanding in recent years.

In particular, the Americas are the continent witnessing the highest growth in trade turnover among Vietnamese partners.

Despite the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the two-way trade revenue between Vietnam and the Americas still reached US$69.3 billion in the past eight months, up 11.8%, and Vietnam's exports to the Americas increased by 15.9% over the same period in 2019.

The minister said that the pandemic has created negative impacts on the global and Vietnamese economies, however, it also provides opportunity for enterprises who are adaptable along with the opportunity for Vietnam to be a new destination for American investors amid the trend of relocation of investment projects.

Delegates also shared lessons and business stories as well as making analysis, comments and solutions to Vietnamese and American enterprises to have strategies to approach each others markets in a more methodical manner amidst the fluctuations in the global supply chain.
'I don't run': Premier says he will not resign Mr Andrews emphatically said he would not resign as Premier over the hotel quarantine bungle. "I don't run from problems and challenges. I've got a very important job to do which is to continue to get these case numbers down and then to begin the biggest recovery project that our state has ever seen. I don't run from challenges," he said. "I have an enormous amount of work to get done, and I'm going to get it done. Because that's what I do ... I get on getting things done." The Premier said he was grateful for Ms Mikakos' contribution to the "Parliament and to the people of Victoria and to our party, and I wish her well for the future".

"I thank her for her dedicated service, for her hard work. She is a very, very hard-working person and I'm grateful to her for her efforts." Martin Foley appointed new Health Minister Current Mental Health Minister Martin Foley has been appointed Minister for Health, Minister for Ambulance Services and Minister for the Coordination of Health and Human Services COVID-19. Mr Foley congratulated Victorians on driving down COVID-19 infection rates and said he was looking forward to a "COVID-normal reopening of Victoria" and building "the kind of health system that we would expect Victorians want ... to keep those infection rates down".

Victoria's new Health Minister Martin Foley. Credit:Joe Armao He said he has "nothing but confidence" in Health Department Secretary Kym Peake, despite revelations she failed to brief Ms Mikakos on crucial elements of the quarantine program and key concerns raised by health experts. "I look forward to continuing a very productive relationship with them," Mr Foley said. Mr Andrews also said he had full confidence in Chris Eccles, the secretary of the Department of Premier and Cabinet, although Mr Eccles failed to pass on a crucial federal offer of Australian Defence Force support for the hotel quarantine scheme on April 8. The Andrews government has now lost four ministers in three months, including former Small Business Minister Adem Somyurek, Assistant Treasurer Robin Scott and Gambling and Liquor Licensing Minister Marlene Kairouz who resigned over a branch-stacking scandal.

Pressure had been mounting on Ms Mikakos over her handling of the coronavirus pandemic and the quarantine program, which led to Victoria's second coronavirus wave that has claimed the lives of more than 750 people, cost the economy $12 billion and forced Melburnians into the strictest lockdown in the country. I am deeply sorry for the situation that Victorians find themselves in. In good conscience, I do not believe that my actions led to them. Jenny Mikakos Ms Mikakos and Health Department Secretary Kym Peake consistently maintained the hotel quarantine program was a "multi-agency operation with shared accountability". Loading In her resignation statement, Ms Mikakos said: "I have never shirked my responsibility for my department, but it is not my responsibility alone."

But in an extraordinary testimony to the state's inquiry into the ill-fated program on Friday, Mr Andrews squarely held his Health Minister accountable. In his statement to the inquiry, the Premier said he regarded Ms Mikakos and Jobs Minister Martin Pakula as responsible for informing cabinet about "the initial overall service model and costings that had been determined for the program". Loading "I then regarded Minister Mikakos as accountable for the program," his statement says. Last month, in an exclusive interview with The Age, Ms Mikakos said she considered herself unlucky.

"Ive been unlucky enough to land a one-in-a-100 year global pandemic during my time as Health Minister," she said. "But I am a fighter. I never give up." The Victorian Liberal opposition has long been calling for her resignation over her role in managing the health crisis. Loading Ms Mikakos has been a member of the upper house since 1999, representing the Northern Metro region. Mikakos denies her actions led to Victoria's second COVID wave

Ms Mikakos said she could no longer remain in cabinet following the Premier's testimony to the inquiry, but denied her actions led to the catastrophic second wave. "I have always put everything into my ministerial responsibilities," Ms Mikakos said in her statement on Saturday. "I have never wanted to leave a job unfinished, but in light of the Premiers statements for the Board of Inquiry and the fact that there are elements in it that I strongly disagree with, I believe that I cannot continue to serve in his cabinet. "I am deeply sorry for the situation that Victorians find themselves in. In good conscience, I do not believe that my actions led to them." The Rydges on Swanston hotel in Carlton where a COVID-19 outbreak led to 90 per cent of Victoria's second wave cases. Credit:Penny Stephens

Although Ms Mikakos said that "with the benefit of hindsight", the heads of her department should have fully briefed her on the hotel quarantine program. "As I said to the Board of Inquiry, I take responsibility for my department, the buck stops with me ... "With the benefit of hindsight, there are clearly matters that my department should have briefed me on. Whether they would have changed the course of events, only the Board and history can determine." Neither the Premier nor any of his ministers or senior public servants were able to explain who made the decision to hire private security and knock back an offer of Australian Defence Force support to help with guarding returned travellers.

Genomic sequencing has revealed 99 per cent of coronavirus cases in Victoria's second wave were a result of the hotel quarantine program, after security guards contracted the virus from returned travellers and spread it throughout the community. Mikakos stands by her statement to hotel quarantine inquiry A day after testifying at the $3 million inquiry, evidence emerged throwing Ms Mikakos' sworn statement into doubt. Ms Mikakos told the inquiry on Thursday she did not learn until late May that private security was being used to guard return travellers, two months after the quarantine program had been established. But footage emerged of her standing beside Jobs Minister Martin Pakula on March 29 as he told media that private security had been deployed to quarantine hotels.

Briefings to Labor state MPs from April, seen by The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald, also mention that private guards had been hired. Private security guards were also mentioned in at least 13 emails sent to the partys caucus throughout April. And at a press conference on March 27  just hours after the national quarantine scheme was announced  the Premier said security guards would be used for the program, alongside Australian Defence Force personnel and Victoria Police. In an additional statement to the hotel quarantine inquiry on Friday afternoon, Ms Mikakos said she had no "individual recollection" of the press conference with Mr Pakula and private security was "not an issue that I specifically turned my mind to" prior to the COVID-19 outbreak at the Rydges on Swanston hotel in May. "Nor did I have reason to do so," she wrote.
President Trump announced Saturday that he is nominating Judge Amy Coney Barrett to fill the Supreme Court seat of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, kicking off what is expected to be a tempestuous Senate confirmation battle less than six weeks before the November presidential election.

Today it is my honor to nominate one of our nations most brilliant and gifted legal minds to the Supreme Court. She is a woman of unparalleled achievement, towering intellect, sterling credentials, and unyielding loyalty to the Constitution, Judge Amy Coney Barrett, Trump said at a press conference at the White House alongside Barrett.

Amy Coney Barrett will decide cases based on the text of the Constitution as written, Trump said. As Amy has said, being a judge takes courage. You are not there to decide cases as you may prefer. You are there to do your duty and to follow the law, wherever it may take you.

Barrett has served on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit since she was appointed by Trump in 2017. The 48-year-old Notre Dame law professor clerked for late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia and is a conservative Catholic mother of seven, including two adopted children from Haiti.

Thank you very much, Mr. President. I am deeply honored by the confidence that you have placed in me, Barrett said in her acceptance remarks. I love the United States, and I love the United States Constitution. I am truly humbled by the prospect of serving on the Supreme Court.

Barrett offered words of praise for her predecessor, Ginsburg, as well as Scalia, whom she called her mentor.

His judicial philosophy is mine too, she said of Scalia. A judge must apply the law as written. Judges are not policy-makers, and they must be resolute in setting aside any policy views they might hold.

When she was nominated to be a judge on the Seventh Circuit, three Democratic senators supported Barretts confirmation, Tim Kaine of Virginia, Joe Manchin of West Virginia, and former senator Joe Donnelly of Indiana. Over the past week, Senate Democrats have expressed vehement opposition to her nomination to the Supreme Court, arguing that Ginsburgs replacement should be chosen and confirmed by a new president and Senate after the general election.

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Barretts Catholic faith has come under particular scrutiny by her critics, some of whom worry that she would vote to overturn Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court case that legalized abortion nationwide. Barretts supporters have accused those who oppose her nomination of exhibiting anti-Catholic bias.

Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell has said that Trumps nominee will receive a vote in the Republican-controlled Senate.

Two of the Senates 53 Republican senators, Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, have come out in opposition to holding a vote on Barretts nomination. The Senate needs only 50 votes to confirm her, with the tie-breaking vote in favor of Barrett cast by Vice President Mike Pence.

Ginsburg died last Friday at 87 due to complications of metastatic pancreatic cancer. On Friday, she became the first woman in the history of the nation to lie in state in the Capitol.

Her death has upended the election cycle as Republicans work quickly to confirm a new justice and Democrats prepare to oppose Trumps nominee to fill the late justices seat.

On Friday, Trump said he had made his decision but declined to confirm whether the nominee would be Barrett.

I havent said it was her, but she is outstanding, Trump said at Joint Base Andrews Friday evening.

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SEC to push PPPs listings By Duruthu Edirimuni Chandrasekera View(s): View(s):

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) will submit a concept paper to the government on publicly listing Private Public Partnerships (PPPs).

Chinthaka Mendis, Director General SEC has said in his annual statement that PPPs combine the skills and resources of both the public and private sectors through sharing of risks and responsibilities, which in turn will enhance the competitive landscape and provide immense benefits to the country in many folds. In order to promote PPPs as a mode of infrastructure financing in the country, we have been formulating a viable model to list infrastructure PPPs at the CSE (Colombo Stock Exchange).

Upon enquiring on this, Viraj Dayaratne, Chairman SEC told the Business Times that the regulator has completed a concept paper on this. It was proposed in a bid to deepen the breadth of the market.

Generally, the PPPs that Sri Lanka is familiar with are where a private entity brings the money and the know-how whilst the government institution comes up with the project. This is a procurement method. In what we propose, the private entity comes in with the cash and ties up with the government which will provide land/infrastructure to form a Special Purpose Vehicle. Earlier too a special purpose vehicle can be formed but it didnt have a legal standing of its own. What we propose is that this vehicle can be listed on the stock market to raise more capital, Mr. Dayaratne explained. The SEC is looking at projects such as energy and power which yields a return on investment faster than infrastructure projects such as roads etc for PPPs.

Mr. Dayaratna said this move will need separate public listing requirements. It is imperative for the SEC to recalibrate its role with a view to provide impetus to capital formation while striking the right balance between market regulation and market development. The CSE has the market infrastructure to support the fund raising requirements of the government as well, especially in terms of tapping public markets for funding development projects and the private participation in initiatives of national significance. Very much like private entities, we expect that the government will also look at versatile and alternative sources of funding in marching forward, Mr. Mendis has said.

Mr. Dayaratne also said the All Or Nothing Board, a mechanism that is used on a buy or sell a (large) parcel in its entirety at an open auction, is also set to power PPPs listing. This board instructs a broker to execute the order or sell/buy the parcel only in full.
The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) said on Saturday it was exiting the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) coalition at the Centre after Parliaments approval of three contentious farm bills, days after the partys lone minister in the central government resigned from the Union Cabinet over what the party said were anti-farmer laws.

All leaders at the SADs emergency core committee meet late on Saturday were unanimous in deciding that the party can no longer be part of the NDA, its president Sukhbir Singh Badal said.

Parliament has passed the three bills that the Narendra Modi-led government says are aimed at unleashing reforms in agriculture. While some experts have hailed the move, farmer bodies and opposition parties allege that the laws will benefit only the corporate sector and traders.

While announcing the decision to snap its 24-year-long ties with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the SAD cited injustice to farmers, Sikhs, Punjab and the Punjabi language.

The core committee decided unanimously to pull out of the BJP-led NDA alliance because of the Centres stubborn refusal to give statutory legislative guarantees to protect assured marketing of farmers crops on MSP [Minimum Support Price] and its continued insensitivity to Punjabi and Sikh issues like excluding Punjabi language as official language in Jammu and Kashmir, said a statement issued by SAD spokesperson Harcharan Singh Bains after the three-hour-long meet.

The SAD, a long-time constituent of the NDA, and the BJP have been allies since 1996, when they forged a pre-poll alliance ahead of the 1997 Punjab assembly elections that brought them to power.

In a statement, Badal said that the SAD will continue to stand by its core principles of peace, communal harmony and guard the interests of Punjab, Punjabi in general and Sikhs and farmers in particular.

Last week, the SADs Harsimrat Kaur Badal resigned as the Union minister for food processing in protest against the three farm bills that were later passed in the monsoon session of Parliament.

The new laws aim to liberalise the agriculture sector by removing hurdles created by the Agriculture Marketing Produce Committee (AMPC) Act in direct procurement of agricultural produce by buyers and create a level-playing field for all, thereby allowing private players a bigger role in farm trade.

Farmer bodies and opposition parties say that these reform bills take away price protection provided through MSP, whereas the government maintains that MSP will remain in place and the bills will ensure higher remuneration for farmers.

Badal said the new laws on agricultural marketing are lethal and disastrous for the already beleaguered farmers. He said the SAD was the oldest ally of the BJP but the government did not listen to it on honouring the sentiments of farmers.

Responding to the developments, BJP national spokesperson Gopal Agarwal said: Farm bills are for the benefit of the farmers MSP was an administrative mechanism, which will continue to be operational as earlier. The Akali Dals apprehensions are uncalled for. Hope they will realise it and come back to the NDA fold. But our government will continue on the path of farmers welfare and take steps to increase agriculture sector income.
One man in his 20s and another in his 30s have been arrested in Balbriggan after they attempted to flee when stopped by gardai.

The men were captured and a search of their vehicle yielded a sawn-off Beretta shotgun and six shotgun cartridges yesterday evening.

The men reversed their vehicle at high speed in an attempt to get away from gardai when stopped in the Pinewood area of Balbriggan and subsequently abandoned the vehicle and fled on foot.

Both males were pursued on foot by gardai and arrested after being located in shrubbery near Castleland Park View, Balbriggan.

The vehicle was seized by gardai for technical examination and a sawn-off Beretta shotgun and six shotgun cartridges were recovered and seized.

These seized items will be sent to the Ballistics Unit for analysis.

The arrests are a result of an intelligence led operation carried out by the Balbriggan Detective Unit as part of Drogheda's Operation Stratus.

The two men are currently detained at Swords and Balbriggan Garda Stations under the provisions of Section 30 of the Offences Against the State Act, 1939.
by Kenneth Corbilla

In Metro Manila and throughout the country, cemeteries will be closed from October 29 to November 4, to avoid gatherings of large crowds. Msgr Broderick Pabillo, apostolic administrator of the archdiocese of Manila, has released a pastoral letter in which he asks the faithful to follow and abide by the rules set by the government. Faithful advised to offer a mass and pray as a family for the dead, sharing memories of the dearly departed. At present in the Philippines there are 299,361 Covid positive cases, with 5,196 deaths.

Manila (AsiaNews) - In the fight against Covid, the Philippine government has issued some guidelines that include a ban on visiting cemeteries on November 2, when the Catholic Church commemorates all the faithful departed. Msgr Broderick Pabillo, apostolic administrator of the archdiocese of Manila, has released a pastoral letter in which he asks the faithful to follow and abide by the rules set by the government.

Filipino culture gives great importance to the cult of the dead and the liturgical commemoration of the faithful departed brings millions of people to visit the graves and pray for the dead between 1 and 2 November.

A few weeks ago, the mayors of Metro Manila came out with a resolution to close the public cemeteries from October 31 to November 3 this year to avoid large crowds congregating and thus spread the Corona 19 virus. This was extended nation-wide by the IATF resolution 72 which came out on September 15. It states: All public and private cemeteries, and memorial parks, including columbariums and the like throughout the country shall be closed to visitors from October 29 to November 4, 2020. I enjoin everyone to cooperate, said Bishop Pabillo on his pastoral letter.

He points out that the Catholic Church wants to follow that resolution to help prevent the spread of the coronavirus pandemic in the country. At present in the Philippines there are 299,361 Covid positive cases, with 5,196 deaths.

Archbishop Pabillo suggests that for this year, to honor the dead, the Filipino faithful could instead offer a mass and find time to gather as a family and pray for them. Instead of going to the cemeteries on November 1 and 2, we can also set aside time together as a family in our homes and pray for those who have gone ahead of us. It is a good and holy thought to pray for the dead. It would also be good if we can share with the family members our recollections about our beloved dead so that their memory can bind us closer to each other.

The prelate expressed appreciation for the decision of Metro Manila's political leaders, saying it is a good thing to prevent the spread of the deadly disease.

He also reminded everyone that 1st and 2nd of November is not the only time to commemorate our departed loved-ones. That can have a solution by coming to the cemetery, not necessarily on November 1 and November 2 so maybe before or the whole month of November. Ang mahalaga maalala natin sila at ipagdadasal natin sila (Whats important is we remembered them and we will pray for them), said by Bishop Pabillo over an interview by the Church-run radio station Radio Veritas.

Last July, the bishop of Manila contracted the said disease but is asymptomatic. He was announced COVID-free during the first week of August after two-week quarantine.
The girl, who is out of danger but still in ICU, told the police on Tuesday that the four men raped her on 14 September when she had gone to collect fodder

A 19-year-old Dalit girl was gangraped allegedly by four upper caste men in Hathras district of Uttar Pradesh, reports said. The accused are said to have attempted to strangulate her and she is now admitted to a hospital in Aligarh after suffering serious injuries.

The girl, who is out of danger but still in the intensive care unit (ICU), told the police on Tuesday that the four men raped her on 14 September when she had gone to collect fodder for animals.

According to The Indian Express, the girl's tongue was cut off and she has sustained severe injuries on her spinal cord and her neck.

The initial medical report by the hospital has confirmed strangulation and assault. Doctors said further examination is being conducted to confirm rape.

Based on her brother's complaint, earlier the police had booked a man identified as Sandeep for attempt to murder and under the provisions of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.

The accused has been arrested and remanded to judicial custody, The Times of India reported.

Speaking to The Times of India, Hathras Superintendent of Police Vikrant Vir on Tuesday said that based on the girl's statement, gangrape charges were added to the FIR and three others were booked.

"One accused has been held and the others, too, will be soon arrested," said Vir.

One of the doctors treating her said, "Due to the damaged spinal cord, the victim has quadriplegia (paralysis in all four limbs) and is not able to breathe properly."

Meanwhile, Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee Vice President Deepak Kumar, after meeting the girl, alleged that the accused was threatening her and her family.

He further said a detailed report on the matter will be given to party General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi and State President Ajay Kumar Lallu.

According to Scroll, Congress leader Shyoraj Jivan Valmiki met the complainant's family members and demanded action against the police officers for the delay in recording her statement. He said that no injustice to members of the Dalit community would be tolerated.
Phone scammers posing as officials from across the border are escalating their tactics, issuing fake arrest warrants to mainland Chinese victims working and studying in Hong Kong, police revealed on Saturday in the wake of a HK$7.13 million (US$920,000) con.

A 27-year-old mainland victim began receiving phone calls in mid-August from fraudsters speaking in Mandarin, alleging he had committed money-laundering crimes back home. He then surrendered personal details including his address, identity card number and online bank account login and password after being told it was necessary to clear his name.

Phone scams that once focused primarily on Hong Kongs elderly residents are beginning to target mainland Chinese living in the city, police say. Photo: Shutterstock

Get the latest insights and analysis from our Global Impact newsletter on the big stories originating in China.

A few weeks later, in mid-September, a woman posing as a mainland law enforcement official visited his Jordan flat with a fake arrest warrant for money laundering. The victim later discovered HK$7.13 million had disappeared from his bank account and reported the case to police, who were able to recover some of the stolen money.

Subsequent investigation revealed the 20-year-old woman who had threatened the man with the phoney arrest warrant was herself a victim of the fraud ring.

Police said she had been coerced into staging the fake threat, but was not cheated out of any money.

Local authorities warned that scammers were shifting their focus from the elderly, previously their favoured targets, to mainlanders living in Hong Kong.

We noticed that phone scams involving fake mainland officials are on the rise. People who come to Hong Kong for work or their studies may not be aware of such scams, an officer said.

No arrests have been made in connection to the case so far, according to police.

Two weeks ago, an 18-year-old university student was arrested for her alleged involvement in phone scams that robbed Hongkongers out of more than HK$200 million. She was suspected of being a spy for con artists posing as law enforcement officers from the mainland.

Story continues

In late August, a 31-year-old woman was arrested for allegedly swindling nearly HK$4 million from an elderly woman. The perpetrator claimed to be a special agent from the mainland who accompanied the victim to a local bank branch and got her to open an online account.

In the first five months of the year, more than 500 people in the city were duped out of HK$185 million in similar scams.

This article Mainland man living in Hong Kong conned out of HK$7.13 million as fake arrest warrants added to scammer playbook first appeared on South China Morning Post

For the latest news from the South China Morning Post download our mobile app. Copyright 2020.
(Photo : (Photo by Bill Ingalls-NASA via Getty Images)) ZHEZJAZGAN, KAZAKHSTAN- OCTOBER 29: Expedition 49 NASA astronaut Kate Rubins talks to her family via satellite phone shortly after she Russian cosmonaut Anatoly Ivanishin of Roscosmos, and astronaut Takuya Onishi of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) landed in a remote area near the town of Zhezkazgan, Kazakhstan on Sunday, Oct. 30, 2016 (Kazakh time). Rubins, Ivanishin, and Onishi are returning after 115 days in space where they served as members of the Expedition 48 and 49 crews onboard the International Space Station. (Photo : NASA)

The National U.S. Presidential Elections is nearing its scheduled date on November 3, and different states are preparing to accommodate the surge of voters, whether by mail or through voting centers. However, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is also preparing on its own to accommodate its astronaut, Kate Rubins, to cast her vote directly from the cosmic heavens to her country. Rubins emphasize the importance of exercising the right to vote.

NASA's astronauts are known to be the top of their class and with a high value of degrees. The patriotic Kate Rubins is promising to exercise her voting rights and do her part as an American citizen given a chance to choose its leader. Despite not being in space yet, Rubins will fly to the International Space Station just weeks away from the November elections.

Kate Rubins is currently on Star City, Russia, and relayed her message via an Associated Press interview. The interview portrayed Rubins' intent and eagerness to participate in the upcoming elections despite the distance from her country. Through technology and a secure network, Rubins will vote for her elected officials.

NASA and Kate Rubins would launch by mid-October, headed for the International Space Station (ISS), where she'll perform her mission and cast her vote on the side. Rubins will cast her vote more than 200 miles above the planet and stay with the ISS for six months.

This mode and method of voting are possible in the state of Texas, where most astronauts live. The state's laws protect and allow the voters from space to cast one and forward it to the electoral committee. NASA will ensure the security of the vote that comes from its astronauts.

ALSO READ: The Space Competition Through China's Perspective and More Space News

Voting From Space: How Will it Be Done?

Like any other voting process, the voter will choose from the ballot and forward the results to a system, either automated, mail, or manual sorting. Kate Rubins' voting process would include several agencies from NASA to receive and relay the vote.

Most probably, NASA would have astronauts Kate Rubins to cast her vote the same time as the November 3 U.S. Elections happens on the planet. Rubins would choose her preferred candidates and forward the electronic ballot to NASA to give it to Mission Control.

Mission Control would then forward the e-ballot to the space station, who will relay the now vote to the county clerk responsible for gathering the tally. NASA promises this process to be secure and safe for its astronaut's vote to count and adequately add up to the database.

Kate Rubins: Voting is Critical

The 41-year old astronaut is known to be the 60th Woman to Fly in Space last 2016 in her mission with NASA aboard the Soyuz spacecraft bound for the ISS. NASA's Kate Rubins is the first person known to sequence DNA in space in Expedition 48/49.

Rubins' latest mission is a six-month venture to the ISS in the mission called 'Expedition 63/64' as a flight engineer scheduled to launch in October 2020. The astronaut will fill in her responsibilities as a NASA space engineer and as an American citizen in the upcoming U.S. Elections.

Rubins believe that taking part in the election is critical in practicing democracy and making it work. She added that if astronauts can do it from space, U.S. Citizens from the ground should also select the country's rightful leader.

ALSO READ: The US Military Releases Drone Missiles Called Ninja Bombs In Syria...Does It Mean No More Combatant Death?









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Written by Isaiah Alonzo

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
(Photo : (Photo by Bill Pugliano/Getty Images)) DETROIT, MI - JANUARY 13: Elon Musk, co-founder and CEO of Tesla Motors, speaks at the 2015 Automotive News World Congress January 13, 2015 in Detroit, Michigan. More than 5,000 journalists from around the world will see approximately 45 new vehicles unveiled during the 2015 NAIAS, which opens to the public January 17 and concludes January 25.

Tesla and Chief Executive Officer, Elon Musk, is not shy to collaborate and work with other companies to give the world new technology and innovations. However, a recent tweet about Sandy Munro asking the 'Tesla guys' to hear him out gets rejected by none other than big boss, Elon Musk, in 3-Wheel Vehicle development on Twitter. The Tesla CEO seems uninterested in the collaboration and even considers it unsafe, turning it down cold.

CEO Elon Musk and Tesla recently received a video greeting and invitation from Sandy Munro, a famed engineer known for his manufacturing consulting firm, that asks for a collaboration and business venture to develop a 3-Wheeled electric vehicle. However, Musk seems not to be interested in the craft.

Sandy Munro's video surfaced from a fan who then relayed it to Elon Musk, tagging him in a tweet that caught the CEO's attention. Despite the engaging and welcoming video that gives Tesla a new opportunity for a business venture, Elon Musk seems uninterested and doubts the vehicle's safety.

Elon Musk and Tesla have produced multiple vehicles and designs that all have four wheels, with the Tesla Semi to be the only exception as it will haul massive-loads of cargo. Tesla and Musk's company focuses on giving stability with the four-wheeled vehicles; that is why most of their vehicles are on the 'car' platform.

The eccentric CEO is known to reject the idea of an electric motorcycle manufactured by the clean energy company, Tesla, due to safety concerns. Top Speed's report on Elon Musk's e-motorcycle venture completely rules it out on Tesla's line-up.

ALSO READ: Elon Musk Calls Yahoo Finance 'Dumb' for Limited Research and Attacking Tesla; Twitter Fans Back Him Up

Elon Musk to Sandy Munro: 'Can't Support 3-Wheel'

A tweet by a user named 'ALEX' (@ajtourville) shows a clip of the famous Sandy Munro that asks Tesla to 'hear' him out regarding his electric vehicle innovation. However, the proposed vehicle has three-wheels and will be a single-seater ride. The Twitter user tagged Elon Musk by mentioning him in the tweet and speculating whether he's heard Munro's request.

Cant support 3 wheel vehicles. Not safe enough.  Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 26, 2020



Elon Musk (@elonmusk) noticed the tweet, and his response was not something expected of him. Musk, being Tesla's representative, rejected the idea of the three-wheeled vehicle, saying that the company does not support it. He also adds that those types of cars are not safe enough to ride and be made by Tesla.

Sandy Munro, who is he?

There are no responses yet from Sandy Munro's side and team. However, this means that the project would be scrapped, following the CEO's rejection. Sandy Munro is known to be a Tesla critic with several videos against the company's technologies and innovations.

Sandy Munro's YouTube Channel has 77 thousand subscribers with a massive 6 million views from the audience. The channel is called 'Munro Live' and claims that the host himself, Sandy Munro, is an expert in engineering and technology.

Munro's YouTube Channel has a wide variety of Tesla reviews and critics, including his recent study about Tesla's Battery Day presentation.



ALSO READ: Elon Musk Criticizes Microsoft's Acquisition of OpenAI Behind Much Touted Human-Like Text Generator- 'Executive License' Defeats AI Democracy

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Written by Isaiah Alonzo

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Women IT entrepreneurs for economic growth By Jayampathy Jayasinghe View(s): View(s):

The launch of the Women Technopreneurs Forum will have a positive change in the creation of the IT industry in Sri Lanka. In Norway women participation in the IT industry has contributed to a key growth in the economy, according to the Norwegian Ambassador to Sri Lanka Trine Joranli Eskedal.

She was speaking as the Guest of Honour at the launch of the Women Technopreneurs Forum held at the Shangri-la hotel in Colombo this week. Even in Norway the IT industry remains a male-dominated industry and the gap between male and female IT professionals was due to females at school level not being encouraged unlike the male counterparts to study IT technology. Referring to the spread of COVID-19, she said that people have to rely on IT industry for future endeavours.

She further said that technology is all about artificial intelligence, machine learning and robotics to make life simple and modern day technology is growing by leaps and bounds and is also changing fast. Diversity in terms of gender cultural background and education is central as to how one will be able to exploit and make use of this new technology.

Chairman- SLASSCOM, Channa Manoharan said when more women entrepreneurs are created the impact it would have on the GDP and the economy would be much more. Of the 60 per cent of women who graduate from universities, only 30 per cent enter companies or research institutions while others decide not to work at all. Meanwhile a survey conducted in the country has found that employers prefer to employ more women in their workplace as they are more receptive than men. But due to cultural patterns in country women participation at workplace or in entrepreneurship has dropped, he added. Director SLASSCOM, Shehani Seneviratne said although Sri Lanka has 52 per cent females how many start-ups are led by females? It may be less than 10 per cent. How many IT businesses are run by females? It is a sad situation where people have talented and educated females in the industry but few have ventured in launching start-ups. The objective of this launch is to get more women technopreneurs into the system who will contribute to the economy. SLASSCOM has a vision of achieving US$5 billion revenue by 2025, and creating 1000 start-ups by that period. There are many local and foreign funding agencies willing to help women entrepreneurs.

The keynote address was delivered by Melony Mahaaarachchi, Lead Mechanical Engineer Space Craft Design Engineer, NASA. Vice Chair SLASSCOM Sandra De Zoysa, Hira Fernando (Women Technopreneurs Forum) and Director SLASSCOM Anura De Alwis also spoke.
President-elect Ronald Reagan takes the oath of office during inauguration ceremonies in Washington, DC. His wife, Nancy, is holding the Bible and Chief Justice Warren Burger is administering the oath.

On January 20, 1981, Republican President Ronald Reagan started his first inaugural address with words that take on greater meaning after the past week, during which Republican President Donald Trump cast doubt twice on whether he would accept an outcome that went against him in an election that is now less than forty days off.

"To a few of us here today this is a solemn and most momentous occasion, and yet in the history of our nation it is a commonplace occurrence," said Reagan of the passing of the torch from President Carter to himself, even as 52 Americans being held hostage in Iran were being released. "The orderly transfer of authority as called for in the Constitution routinely takes place, as it has for almost two centuries, and few of us stop to think how unique we really are. In the eyes of many in the world, this every-4-year ceremony we accept as normal is nothing less than a miracle."

It's worth reflecting on Reagan's words, given President Trump's conviction that mail-in ballots could be widely fraudulent and thus color whether he should accept the electoral outcome. Fox News Sunday anchor Chris Wallace is likely to provide President Trump another shot at this question in the first presidential debate on Tuesday.

I retain my fundamental optimism in the power and remarkable resilience of US democratic institutions, which have survived wars, impeachments and assassinations. I badly also want to agree with the lead Wall Street Journal editorial Thursday that argued "the notion that Mr. Trump could stop a peaceful transition of power is preposterous."

After all, Republican Senate and House leaders have repudiated Trump's remarks, military leaders have said it won't be their soldiers' job to adjudicate elections, and if Congress hasn't certified a winner by the time Trump's term ends on Jan. 20, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi will step in as president.

So, we should all stop worrying, right? Perhaps not.

It's worth reading more deeply into The Wall Street Journal's reasoning that "the media and intelligentsia have worked themselves into a frenzy over imaginary fears that Mr. Trump will somehow remain in office by force if he loses the 2020 election."

Argues the lead editorial: "The rule of law is vital to free and fair elections, and Mr. Trump is right not to foreswear his legal options. Yet his reckless comments give credence to Democratic hysteria, and he should clarify his views if he doesn't want to lose more voters who think he lacks the temperament or self-control for the office."

Tuesday would be a good time for him to start.

Both candidates, Trump and Biden, should foreswear declaring themselves as the victor until all the votes are counted and the process itself has produced an outcome. In advance, both should appeal to their supporters to remain calm in the hours and perhaps days after Nov. 3. They shouldn't take the electoral contest into the streets  and they should foreswear violence in the strongest terms.

One can hardly imagine a more important year for the American democratic process to run smoothly, with China leading an authoritarian swing as its economy emerges first from Covid-19's economic and social hit. The unfolding contest of democratic and autocratic systems will be generational, but it will be a harder one to win if the United States is divided, distracted and unable to build on the inspiration it has provided democratic change since its revolution.

My non-American friends have long argued  and they are only half-joking  that they should be granted the right to vote in our elections because our choice touches everyone in the world.

This year their messages have been more laden with doubts about the durability of our democracy, which stood nearly alone at the end of the 18th century.

"In 1787 you created a wonderful constitution out of the ideas of the European enlightenment, with checks and balances, protection of minorities and inalienable rights," wrote Friedbert Pfluger, a close friend and former Christian Democratic Union member of the German Bundestag, in an email just a few days ago. "These convictions are the manifest destiny of the USA, and it is above all on them that its attractiveness and strength in the world is based."

"We watch in astonishment as your president breaks taboos one by one," wrote Friedbert. "Will Trump accept an electoral defeat, especially a narrow one? Are we heading for a coup d'etat and civil war? Is there a threat of a nationalistic autocratism in the center of the Western world?"

Such doubts are unsettling US allies, they are encouraging autocratic adversaries, and they are even beginning to unsettle capital markets that have taken for granted that the world's reserve currency is backed up by the world's most stable democracy that represents common values.

Speaking at the Atlantic Council this week, House Democratic Majority Whip Jim Clyburn, himself a survivor and product of U.S. civil rights upheavals, recalled that 19th Century historian Alexis de Tocqueville said that what made the United States great was not that it is "more enlightened than any other nation, but rather because we've always been able to repair our faults."

What's at stake, he said, is whether the United States once again can successfully engage in repair work and thus arrest an ongoing recession in democratic rights and countries globally since 2006.

Whoever wins the November elections should recall that his role is to continue the work that produced the American miracle and all its global good. "I also see problems here in Germany and Europe," wrote Friedbert. "We certainly have no reason for self-righteousness. But we need a well-meaning USA as a trustee and defender of the West."

In his inaugural, Reagan turned to President Carter and said, "Mr. President, I want our fellow citizens to know how much you did to carry on this tradition. By your gracious cooperation to the transition process, you have shown a watching world that we are a united people pledged to maintaining a political system which guarantees individual liberty to a greater degree than any other, and I thank you and your people for all your help in maintaining the continuity which is the bulwark of our Republic."

Frederick Kempe is a best-selling author, prize-winning journalist and president & CEO of the Atlantic Council, one of the United States' most influential think tanks on global affairs. He worked at The Wall Street Journal for more than 25 years as a foreign correspondent, assistant managing editor and as the longest-serving editor of the paper's European edition. His latest book  "Berlin 1961: Kennedy, Khrushchev, and the Most Dangerous Place on Earth"  was a New York Times best-seller and has been published in more than a dozen languages. Follow him on Twitter @FredKempe and subscribe here to Inflection Points, his look each Saturday at the past week's top stories and trends.

For more insight from CNBC contributors, follow @CNBCopinion on Twitter.
A fresh twist in the case of a carer charged with manslaughter over a disabled woman's death was a witness to her final will, it has been revealed.

Ann Marie Smith died in the Royal Adelaide Hospital on April 6 from septic shock, multiple organ failure, severe pressure sores and malnourishment.

The 54-year-old, who had cerebral palsy and relied on NDIS support, was allegedly left to rot in her own excrement by 69-year-old carer Rosemary Maione.

Maione was a key witness to Ms Smith's last will and testament which was also signed by a solicitor and dated December 18, 2013, The Advertiser reported.

Ann Marie Smith (pictured), 54, died at Royal Adelaide Hospital in April from septic shock, multiple organ failure, severe pressure sores and malnourishment

Carer Rosemary Maione (pictured), 69, was charged with manslaughter over Ms Smith's death. She was a key witness on the 54-year-old's last will and testament

Ms Smith (pictured) died after allegedly being left to rot in her own waste at at her home

Police have also alleged Ms Smith's jewellery was taken, her money was stolen and she was left in the same cane chair for 12 months.

Ms Smith's uncle, Glen Smith, said he was not aware of any earlier wills and spoke out about the lack of financial safeguards protecting society's vulnerable people.

'How can a carer be a witness to the will of the person they are taking care of?' he said.

Mr Smith explained his niece died with $150 in her bank account and had debts exceeding $80,000 despite a $325,000 inheritance from her father in 2009.

Ms Smith's final will left her entire estate to former carers and friends, but did not include Maione.

Two carers and a female friend were set to receive $2,000 and two male friends would be given Ms Smith's jewellery and pets.

One of the men, Ms Smith's former school friend aged in his 50s, was an executor to her will and initiated probate, seeking to distribute her estate, on July 8.

South Australian police have released photos from inside Ms Smith's home where she sat in her final days. The 54-year-old was allegedly left in the same chair for 12 months

Maione (left) will remain under home detention until she appears in court in April next year

He was set to receive the remainder of Ms Smith's estate, including her purpose-built Kensington Park house currently on the market for $929,000.

Mr Smith said the oversight made by Maione's employer Integrity Care SA as well as the NDIS and state and federal governments had been an 'astounding failure'.

'How can probate begin when all the investigations are continuing, including her finances? It's simply beggars belief,' he said.

Mr Smith said safeguards were needed around witnesses signing legal documents for disabled, elderly and vulnerable people.

A police spokesman said Ms Smith's will had been viewed by police and no further comment could be made with the case before the courts.

An investigation into Ms Smith's death and financial affairs is ongoing.

Maione was granted bail to remain under home detention and will appear in Adelaide Magistrates Court in April 2021.
The cash strapped local authority is set to pay Ward 11 councillor Albert Chirau and former councillor Moses Marecha US$25 000 for outstanding allowances for the time they were dismissed during their 2013-2018 term. In a deed of settlement, the local authority sought an out of court settlement with the two after months of legal battle.

Whereas the plaintiff and defendant have reached an out of court settlement and herein record their settlement terms and conditions. The defendant (Gweru City Council) agrees that they owe the plaintiffs (Chirau and Marecha) US$12 500 each in outstanding allowances and a commercial stand each as part of their exit package. The defendant undertakes to pay

US$12 500 to Albert Chirau first Plaintiff within 60 days of the granting of this order. The defendant undertakes to pay US$12 500 to Moses Marecha second Plaintiff within 60 days of the granting of this order, reads part of the deed of settlement.

Meanwhile, water problems in Gweru have resurfaced after the four pumps that were bought by Government and installed at Amapongokwe Dam to ease the citys water challenges all broke down.

The Government through the Ministry of Local Government and Public Works sourced the four water pumps for City of Gweru at a cost of US$440 000. Ironically the local authority had earlier indicated that it required US$6 million for the pumps raising suspicion of fraudulent machinations.

The purchase of the pumps by Government had brought the total number of pumps at the reserve water source to five and a combined pumping capacity of 80 mega litres of water daily. However, the four pumps are said to have broken down resulting in the resurfacing of water challenges in the city. The local authority has since introduced water rationing. Gweru Mayor Councillor Josiah Makombe confirmed the new development.

We have water supply challenges in the city. This is because the newly installed water pumps at the citys alternative water source, Amapongokwe all developed faults. The four water pumps that we received have broken down. The water pumps were procured from South Africa. We are hoping that they will be fixed soon so that we start supplying adequate water to the city, he said.

The local authority recently signed a debt cancellation agreement with Zimbabwe National Water Authority (Zinwa) over an outstanding $1,5 million for raw water from Gwenhoro Dam. On the other hand, Zinwa owed council $3,3million for clean water supplies to Whawha Prison, Fletcher High School and Midlands State University. Zinwa agreed to offset the $1,5 million debt with GCC receiving the difference of $1,8million. Sunday News
- Weekend Markets: The Pound to Euro exchange rate is 1.0959

- The Pound to Dollar exchange rate is $1.27466

There has been slightly more optimistic rhetoric from UK and EU officials ahead of a crucial round of negotiations next week. The pound Sterling has been unable to make headway, especially with coronavirus restrictions continuing to increase while London has been put on the watch list. The pound-dollar rate was trapped close to 1.2700 at the European close.

Image: GBP/USD exchange rate chart

Cautious optimism ahead of key UK/EU negotiating round

EU Chief Negotiator Barnier and UK counterpart Frost held informal talks in London on Thursday.

The Prime Minister's deputy official spokesman said: 'We've had useful exchanges with the EU over the past couple of weeks and progress has been made in certain areas.

He reiterated that the government stance; remains committed to striking a 'zero tariff, zero quota' trade deal with the bloc and 'avoiding tariffs is beneficial for both sides, particularly given our shared commitment to high standards.

One EU official was quoted as saying; it seems like the tide is turning.

An official spokesman still injected a note of caution; But we've always been clear that a number of challenging areas remain, which is why we continue to be committed to working hard to reach an agreement and we look forward to the next negotiating round in Brussels. He added that state aid and fisheries remain the main areas of contention.

According to JP Morgan; Overnight newswire reports continue to sound optimistic on Brexit negotiations and highlight the fact that they will be insulated from the recent IMB [Internal Market Bill] turmoil adding that the heat has been taken out of the situation, official talks restart in Brussels next week.

The Credit Suisse London Desk added; Many of the domestic indicators are greatly concerning but a Brexit deal (or not) is the key. The negotiation vibe seems a bit more cordial and I think Boris must be motivated to get something signed. For now I am trying to stay very flexible with a slight bias to buy GBP dips if appear overdone.

British Retail Consortium warns over higher food bills

The British Retail Consortium (BRC) said tariffs would add 3.1bn a year to the cost of importing food and drink if the UK and EU fail to strike a free trade agreement.

"If there is no deal before Christmas, the increase in tariffs will leave retailers with nowhere to go other than to raise the price of food.

The BRC noted that The EU is the UK's largest trading partner and the source of 80% of its imported food. It also claimed that the average tariff on food it imports would be over 20%. This could increase average household food bills by 112 over a year

The BRC also warned that increases in "physical checks, paperwork, and other non-tariff barriers" will further push up the cost for retailers.

Image: EUR/GBP exchange rate chart

ING remained notably cautious; Brexit-related sentiment does not appear to have progressed or regressed after a week of negotiations. Sterlings downside risk still looks quite material as chances of no-deal remain relatively high.

Credit Agricole looked at a slightly longer-term perspective; While we expect the UK and the EU to reach a Brexit trade deal by the end of this year, we believe that a lot of uncertainty will remain given the difficulty that Boris Johnsons government has securing deals outside of the EU. All this could fuel market expectations of further BoE easing and keep the headwinds for the GBP vs the EUR in place.

The Euro-pound rate edged lower to near 0.9140 on Friday, although this primarily reflected a weaker Euro. After a brief test of the 1.2800 level, the pound-to-dollar rate dipped to test the 1.2700 area.

Deutsche Bank noted; We maintain a slight bearish bias in GBP, but risk/reward is starting to be eroded as the Brexit risk/further lockdowns story looks increasingly priced and the plethora of support zones around 1.27 continue to hold.
LOBAMBA  Go lock him up!

Embattled General Transport Manager (GTM) of the Central Transport Administration (CTA) Washington Khumalo was temporarily locked up in Parliament yesterday.

Khumalo was escorted by Clerk to Parliament Ndvuna Dlamini to the Lobamba Police Station after the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) said that he was displaying insolence by refusing to respond to questions posed and, instead firing back a question to the PAC.

Of late, the GTM is currently a subject of scrutiny by his superiors following that he has been slapped with a charge of insubordination in the Ministry of Public Works and Transport.

CTA employees are also embroiled in a court dispute with government over the closure of a trading account for the government garage.

Even though the workers won the case in court, government is appealing the matter.

Showdown

In yesterdays showdown, Khumalo infuriated the PAC by failing to answer a question asked by the committee Chairperson, Phila Buthelezi, on his perception of the state of affairs at the CTA.

According to the way you see things at the CTA, is everything well there or what? the PAC Chairperson asked.

The background of the question was an observation by the chairperson that the country was grounded, without ambulances to rush patients to hospital, no police cars to attend to emergencies and acute shortage of fuel was crippling governments normal operations.

Khumalos initial reaction was to shrug off all blame for the current national state of affairs in as far as shortage of transportation and fuel was concerned.

I want this to get on the hansard that the fact that the country is grounded has absolutely nothing to do with me. I did not contribute to such state of affairs, he said.

Khumalo could not finish his statements, when the chairperson quickly put him back on the pedestal. All I am asking you to respond to is a question on your perception of the state of affairs at the CTA, Buthelezi said.

To this, the GTM elected to ask back: May I ask this committee a question, is it the first time that such a thing happened in office since I assumed the reigns there (sic)?

The GTMs question was the straw that broke the camels back, as the Chairperson immediately ordered that he be incarcerated for not respecting the PAC.

Mvaleleni sekake ayophompa, said the PAC Chairperson loosely translated to mean, Go lock him up so he can go and cool off.

Continued the chairperson: We have asked you a question and you ask us back, something that I have never seen in the history of this Parliament. You are disrespecting us, yet we represent the nation. Savimbi Mkhonta (sergeant at arms) must open up the cells of Parliament and lead you into it until you fully appreciate what is happening here.

Apologise

Members of Parliament Busisiwe Mavimbela and Gege MP Musa Kunene suggested that the GTM be made to apologise before going to the Parliament holding cell. He must humble himself because he also has children. This is a country and he must show respect, said MP Kunene.

MP Jomo Dlamini said Khumalo should have simply answered the question with a yes or no response, instead of complicating the situation.

Quickly thereafter, at about 12:15pm, the sergeant at arms Savimbi Mkhonta walked into the House and ushered Khumalo out. He led him to a police duty room where he was also met by Clerk to Parliament Ndvuna Dlamini. Soon thereafter, he was made to drive his car to the Lobamba Police Station, while the police followed from behind.

Meanwhile, Parliament continued with normal duties, dealing with audit queries of the Ministry of Public Works and Transport until about 1:50 pm, when MP Buthelezi ordered the sergeant at arms to fetch Khumalo so that he could continue with business.

After his release from the temporary detention, Khumalo was asked by the PAC to continue responding to more queries about the CTA. Nothing was said about his short stint at the police station.

It was gathered that the Clerk said Parliament was missing the keys to its holding cells, which was why it had been preferred that Khumalo be held at the police station.

Eswatini News gathered that Khumalo had already called his lawyer Noncedo Ndlangamandla to the police station.

Her mission was to establish if there were any charges levelled against him and what they entailed.

She found that there were no charges and she left, Khumalo explained in an interview, and further mentioned that when he got to the police station, officers asked the Clerk to Parliament if he was laying charges, but there was no clear answer.

He insisted that he had done nothing wrong because his question was meant to trigger a robust discussion on why there were problems at the CTA.






Centre says MSP procurement of kharif paddy begins immediately in Punjab, Haryana

India

oi-Ajay Joseph Raj P

New Delhi, Sep 26: The Centre on Saturday announced commencement of paddy procurement at the minimum support price (MSP) with immediate effect in Punjab and Haryana in the wake of early arrival of the kharif crop in these two states.

"Otherwise, paddy procurement for the 2020-21 kharif (summer) marketing season is scheduled to begin from October 1 in all the key growing states," it said.

India, Japan begins 3-day naval exercise JIMEX today in Arabian sea

"However, in view of early arrival of paddy in the 'mandies' of Haryana and Punjab, Government of India has approved the commencement of procurement operations for paddy /rice immediately in both these states from today i.e. with effect from September 26, 2020," the Union Food Ministry said in a statement.

This is to ensure that farmers are facilitated in selling their produce at the MSP expeditiously, it said. The orders for commencement of procurement operations for paddy /rice from September 26, in Haryana and Punjab, have been issued, it added.

Maldives backs India again: Thwarts attempt to hold SAARC summit in Pakistan

Deepika Padukone questioned in drug probe | India tears into Pakistan | Oneindia News

According to the ministry, state procuring agencies including Food Corporation of India (FCI) are in a state of readiness for smoothly undertaking procurement operations. The Centre has fixed MSP for 'common variety' paddy at Rs 1,868 per quintal and for 'A' grade variety at Rs 1,888 per quintal for the current year.

The government has kept a target to procure 113 lakh tonnes of rice from Punjab and 44 lakh tonnes from Haryana during the kharif marketing season. Otherwise, total rice procurement target is kept at 495.37 lakh tonnes for the entire country for the 2020-21 kharif season.

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Story first published: Saturday, September 26, 2020, 14:04 [IST]
Paddling around Moreton Island, north-east of Brisbane. Credit: Now its Franks turn  another Frank, this one my fellow desperado in lunatic escapades in Joh Bjelke-Petersens Queensland, when madness filled the air. My mind turns to the time in the mid-70s, Frank a 25-year-old, me 15 years older, when we spent 11 hours under the blazing sun, becalmed on the tramp of a tiny catamaran, with only a bag of dope and a bottle of Bundy rum between us and oblivion. Wed been warned about the folly of crossing the massive Moreton Bay in a surf cat; no one had mentioned the danger of total wind loss. Fools rush in, as we did later when liberating Bjelke-Petersens portable lectern, from which hed just launched a magazine we were editing. Anything for a dare in those days. Our heist led to a high-speed cab chase through the suburbs of Brisbane with a pesky public servant in pursuit. He reclaimed the lectern, removed us from our jobs. Frank is another putative brother. As a 50-something dad with baby Jess. Credit:Courtesy of Mick Barnes Jess visits me. Shes also a little on the tearful side. My daughter cant face the fact of my humanity; like all humans Ill die, and that time is on the horizon. I have a lot invested in Jess; a friend calls her my ultimate triumph. It doesnt matter how many plays you put on, what youve done in journalism, your Walkley win; Jess is your work of art, he says.

Hes giving me more credit than is due. Jess is a tender-hearted, vivacious, glowing woman, a 30-year-old magnet for other young people with her warmth, bubbling good humour and zest for life. Jessies mother and I split when Jess was seven, following which she handled shared parenting, fortnights around, then moved in with me full-time for several years. I taught Jess how to body-surf and bike-ride, took her camping and bushwalking; she taught me how to ice-skate, no mean feat given I was in my 60s. I wrote her nonsense poems for her birthdays, dressed up as the tooth fairy and crawled around the house providing elephant services to make her laugh. We were  are  a team. With granddaughter Veronica. Credit:Courtesy of Mick Barnes When I won my Walkley in 2019, at 83 becoming the oldest recipient of Australian journalisms highest honour, it was Jess who led me to the stage. Dad, Im so proud of you, she whispered in my ear, as the entire room got to their feet and clapped. Our closeness is both a blessing and a curse. I know Jess will be devastated when I die. She tells me she tries to put that future out of her mind. I tell her Ill always be with her, albeit disembodied. Its a spurious argument, even to me. But I dont want her lost in grief. I want her adding light to the world, as she has done all her life. I want her giving, and getting, joy with her daughter Veronica. Thinking of Jess brings the NDI to mind. The Non-Drinking Irishman is sentimental, passionate, big-hearted, distilled Tullamore Dew in every way except his drinking habits. Or absence of habit. The NDI has played court to Jess and me for most of our life. In his gentle Irish way, he will pluck out a memory: My favourite image is of you leaving the party, seven-year-old Jess on your shoulders as you skip across the road.

Circumstances have removed the NDI to Perth, although he returns by phone or in person, as he did for Jess and Jakes wedding three years ago. The coronavirus pandemic kept him from Veronicas first birthday party a couple of months ago. Ronnie will keep Jess and Jake on their toes. You can see in her eyes the mischievous wheels spinning in her head. She will be a handful, and a great source of pleasure. Jess needs to be living in the present, for her. I tell Jess to remember the enormous fun weve had together, from childhood and beyond. Have the same fun with Veronica, I say. But still I worry. Loading What sort of world will Veronica grow up in? Will it be one that shuns science, promotes totalitarian rulers, is controlled by big business? Snap out of it, Mick. Remember civilisation seemed almost finished in 1942, when Hitler was jackbooting across Europe. The Veronicas of the world will set about repairing what weve done. Ah, Meg. I was 14, she 15, when we met in Narrandera, the NSW Riverina town where we grew up. I thought of her as my girlfriend. Was she really? I dont know. Wed hold hands, go on picnics and to swimming parties, kiss tentatively, partner each other in tennis tournaments. Id walk the long way home from school past Megs place, just to be nearer to her.

I think of her as the girl I should have married, but didnt. I went off, pursuing a career in journalism. She married a lovely man and had a happy family life. But she remained anchored at the back of my mind, emerging from there by chance about two years ago, when a bloke from our home town spied a book Id published on the shelf of a coffee shop my daughter was running near my aged-care home. He asked if the author was the same Mick Barnes hed known as a child. It was. A day later came an email from Meg, now a widow, Narranderas busy bush telegraph having reached her in Melbourne, where she now lived. She will tell me she wants me to stick around. We have unfinished business. She plans to stick around for me. Me too. A month later, I flew to Melbourne to meet up with Meg again. It was like coming home. We were 82 and 83, but the same feelings stirred. I stayed for five days, and later, together, we visited Frank and Leisa in Queensland. Was it to be a fairy-tale ending? It seemed so. Meg flew up from Melbourne for the Walkley presentation last November. She looked stunning in her little black number. When Jess escorted me, clutching my Walkley, back to my seat, Meg watched as my old journo friends clustered around, full of good cheer and congratulations. I could see you are a much-loved person, so I think I will have to love you too, she told me later. It was a moment that transcended the award. But our plans didnt reckon on the coronavirus. Shes in lockdown in Melbourne; Im in lockdown of a different kind here in Sydney. We feel the distance personally. Were not alone in this. We know how much we mean to each other, we have so little time left to be together. If the world goes from bad to worse, it might be no time at all. On our nightly calls we promise each other well hang on until we can get together. Its not an empty promise. Ill do my best. As they say, this is bigger than both of us. How long is not long, anyway? Is my reflection talking weeks, months, years? I dont know and the mirror shuns the question when I ask it.

With childhood sweetheart Meg, 60 years on. Credit:Courtesy of Mick Barnes Fragments of life are exploding into my mind now. My dear sister Maureen, 85 and living with her 89-year-old husband John in an aged-care home in Sydneys Castle Hill. Maureen airbrushes dismal times with a rosy hue. She saw greatness in our older brother Brian, the missionary arch-bishop, now departed, where I saw mere achievement. Maureen recalls historic incidents in different timeframes and places, with different personnel, to me. Loading My younger brother Denis steps in for a cameo, a hearty bloke with a big laugh. Hes a climate change denier. We avoid dangerous territory. And another Peter, my son, a whiz photographer. Unlike Piaf, I have some regrets. Ive not been as good a grandfather to his sons as I might have been. Perhaps a case of Jessie distraction, the obsession of a solo father. Pete has kept the door open, shared good times with me whenever I could visit them in Brisbane; I love and admire him for that. The boys, both now in tertiary education, call me Granmick.
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Republican-led Senate is expected to move quickly toward a confirmation vote for President Donald Trump's nominee to replace the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg once he announces his choice on Saturday.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell hasn't yet said for certain whether a final vote will come before or after the Nov. 3 presidential election, just a little more than five weeks away, but Republicans are eyeing a vote in late October.

Ginsburg's Sept. 18 death put the Senate in uncharted political terrain. A confirmation vote so close to a presidential election would be unprecedented, creating significant political risk and uncertainty for both parties. Early voting is underway in some states in the races for the White House and control of Congress.

A look at the confirmation process and what we know and don't know about what's to come:
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Smoke rises after a mortar shell was fired by Pakistani Army near the Line of Control (LoC), in Balakot sector of Poonch district.  PTI photo

Two Pakistani soldiers were killed in renewed cross-LoC skirmishes in Jammu and Kashmirs Poonch area on Wednesday.

The Pakistani authorities said that two of its soldiers Noor-ul-Hassan and Waseem Ali were killed in intense exchange of fire in Dewa sector of the Line of Control (LoC)

The Indian Army officials in frontier Poonch town had earlier said that the Pakistan Army violated the November 2003 ceasefire understanding by resorting to heavy firing and mortar shelling in forward areas along LoC in three sectors of Poonch. They said that unprovoked firing and shelling from across the de facto border started at around 9 am and continued till reports last came in.

A defence spokesman in J&Ks winter capital Jammu while confirming it said, At about 9 am today, Pakistan Army initiated unprovoked ceasefire violation by firing with small arms and intense shelling with mortars along LoC in Kerni, Qasba and Shahpur sectors. He added that the Indian Army retaliated befittingly.

It was not immediately known if there were any casualties or damage on the Indian side.

According to the Indian authorities, the Pakistan Army has violated ceasefire along the LoC as many as 37 times, so far, this month alone. They said that last week an Army jawan was killed and two others, including an officer, were injured in Pakistani firing in LoCs Sunderbani sector of Rajouri district. Earlier on September 2, a Junior Commissioned Officer (JCO) was killed in a similar incident in Keri sector of the same district.

In Islamabad, Pakistans Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) in a statement said that two Pakistani Army soldiers Sepoys Noor-ul-Hassan (29) and Waseem Ali (25) were killed in intense exchange of fire between the facing troops following unprovoked ceasefire violation by the Indian Army along the LoC in Dewa sector. It added, Pakistan Army responded and targeted the (Indian) posts which initiated the fire. There are reports of substantial damage to Indian post(s) and men and material.

The ISPR alleged that there have been as many as 2,333 ceasefire violations by Indian troops in 2020.
New Delhi, Sep 26 : Facebook has patched a critical vulnerability in Instagram that could have given an attacker the ability to take over a victims Instagram account, and turn their phone into a spying tool, simply by sending them a malicious image file.

When the image is saved and opened in the Instagram app, the exploit would give the hacker full access to the victim's Instagram messages and images, allowing them to post or delete images at will, as well as giving access to the phone's contacts, camera and location data, according to cyber security researchers at Check Point.

An attack can be triggered once a malicious image is sent via email or WhatsApp and then saved on a victim's device.

The researchers revealed the critical vulnerability as remote code execution (RCE) that allows an attacker to take over a computer or a server by running arbitrary malicious software (malware).

"This vulnerability can allow an attacker to perform any action they wish in the Instagram app. Since the Instagram app has very extensive permissions, this may allow an attacker to instantly turn the targeted phone into a perfect spying tool - putting the privacy of millions of users at serious risk," the cyber security firm revealed in a blog post on Friday.

Instagram is one of the most popular social media platforms globally, with over 100 million photos uploaded every day, and nearly 1 billion monthly active users.

"The vulnerability we found was in the way that Instagram used Mozjpeg- an open source project used by Instagram as its JPEG format image decoder for images uploaded to the service," the researchers explained.

The company disclosed the findings to Facebook and the Instagram team.

Facebook described the vulnerability as an "Integer Overflow leading to Heap Buffer Overflow" and issued a patch to remediate the issue on the newer versions of the Instagram application on all platforms.

"The patch for this vulnerability has already been available for 6 months prior to this publication, giving time to the majority of users to update their Instagram applications, thus mitigating the risk of this vulnerability being exploited," the researchers informed.

"We strongly encourage all Instagram users to ensure they are using the latest Instagram app version and to update if any new version is available".
California could join France, Norway and the United Kingdom in banning cars with traditional combustion engines, after Gov. Gavin Newsom's executive order to end the sale of gas- and diesel-powered vehicles in the Golden State by 2035.

But there are plenty of obstacles, including the technical challenges of sourcing raw materials and producing enough batteries and fuel-cells, as well as the need to deliver vehicles consumers will want to buy.

If the government tells you that you cant build anything other than electric vehicles, consumers will have no other products to choose from, said Sam Abuelsamid, principal automotive analyst with Guidehouse Insights. New vehicle sales could drop precipitously, with many people choosing to just drive the the gas- and diesel-powered vehicles they have a lot longer, he added.

So far, battery cars have generated modest sales, barely hitting 2 percent of U.S. demand, according to industry data. Even in California, the epicenter of the American EV market, the figure is just 10 percent.

However, there is growing optimism that even without new mandates, sales will surge. At the launch on Wednesday of Volkswagen's ID.4, its first long-range electric car for the U.S., VW Group of America CEO Scott Keogh said he expects U.S. demand will reach 15 to 20 percent by 2025, and then "spike up from there."

Guidehouse forecasts sales of hybrids, plug-ins and BEVs will reach 1.13 million this year, 5 million by 2025, and 12.5 million in 2030.

The U.S. is far from the leader. China  which is also studying a ban on gas-powered vehicles  is now the worlds largest market for BEVs. From a percentage standpoint, however, demand in Norway has hit as high as 70 percent at times over the last several years.

The auto industry has long dragged its feet on the matter of electric vehicles, but now theres a massive shift under way  and not just from new entrants such as Tesla, Lucid and Rivian. GM CEO Mary Barra said General Motors is on a path to an all-electric future, with 20 or more BEVs planned by 2023. VW, meanwhile, targets 50 by 2025 through its various brands. Even niche players like Rolls-Royce are plugging in.

Story continues

Rolls will show off its first fully electric model before the end of the year, it confirmed this week, an inevitability if legislation forbids (owners) from driving a combustion-engined car into the center of a city like Paris, Los Angeles or London, some of the brands most important markets, a spokesman for the British marque told Automotive News.

The U.S. trade group Alliance for Automotive Innovation said on Thursday that neither mandates nor bans build successful markets, stressing It will take broad steps bringing together regulators, manufacturers, dealers, electric utilities and others to make a ban succeed.

But the good news is that things are moving in the right direction, said Stephanie Brinley, principal auto analyst with IHS Markit.

In the U.S. alone there will be over 100 BEVs by 2025. IHS, among others, say they expect costs to plunge as battery prices fall by as much as half from what automakers pay today. Tesla CEO Elon Musk said this week this will allow launching a new $25,000 model within three years, barely half the cost of todays Tesla Model Y.

In terms of charging up 10s or even 100s of millions of EVs, the U.S.  like many other countries  would fall short if everyone plugged in at public stations. But, today, 80 percent of EV owners use home chargers, mostly overnight, when utilities have plenty of excess capacity and many offer discount rates. That is likely to remain the norm going forward, said Pat Romano, CEO of ChargePoint, a major EV charging system provider, even as companies plan to add thousands of new charging stations.

Eventually, new capacity will be needed as more and more battery-cars take to the roads, said analyst Abuelsamid, but with 290 million vehicles in the U.S. fleet alone, the conversion process likely will take more than a decade.

The challenge will be to migrate to renewable sources, such as wind or solar, so that tailpipe emissions arent simply shifted to more smokestacks.
Retrofitted with pandemic era phrases, nips and tucks, Khan belted out what was effectively an abridged version of last year's gig, at half past noon on Friday.

United Nations, : If you blinked, you could have mistaken Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan's speech at the UN General Assembly (UNGA) as the one he delivered in 2019.

The layering of the two years' speeches seems like a Khan riff on a wild moment from recent US politics.

"Person, woman, man, camera, TV" was a phrase that US President Donald Trump used as an example of a question from a cognitive test he took. Trump explained that remembering the words in order got extra points.

Khan's speech was ordered almost no differently from last year: A wide swipe at the world, "corrupt elites", tree planting, Islamophobia, RSS, Modi, Kashmir and then more Kashmir.

The Prime Minister's address was rescheduled from a late afternoon EST slot to the 14th spot in the morning session, which aligned with traditional evening primetime hours in the Pakistan area.

Framed against a flag festooned backdrop and a painting of Muhammad Ali Jinnah on the wall behind him, Khan sat at a desk amidst a haze of green coloured props and rattled off a bucket list of macro-level grievances. This was the warm-up routine, quite in line with last year.

Khan's speech began at 12.31 p.m. local time. Ten minutes in came the big leap. At 12.42 p.m., his claims on carbon emissions and the promise to plant 10 billion trees came to a screeching halt so that some scraps of geopolitical red meat could be flung around.

A side by side reading of Khan's 2019 and 2020 speeches show up a fairly predictable pattern in the text flow. The new inserts were mostly about the coronavirus and some chunks from last year's 50 minute speech were cut out entirely.

This year, Khan made no mention of women and Hijab, unlike last time when he waded in. "A woman can take off her clothes in some countries but she cannot put more on? And why has this happened? Because certain western leaders equated Islam with terrorism," he said early in his 2019 speech.

Sample this excerpt from 2019: "...We planted a billion trees in five years. Now we are targeting 10 billion trees."

Khan's 2020 lines have minor edits, some adjectives tossed in: "We have launched an extremely ambitious program to plant 10 billion trees in the next three years as a contribution to mitigating the effects of climate change."

In 2019, he 'explained' to the UNGA the concept of the RSS: "I have to explain what the RSS is. Mr Modi is a 'life member' of RSS. An organisation inspired by Hitler and Mussolini. They believed in racial superiority the same way that the Nazi's believed in the supremacy of the Aryan race."

Here's how Khan took off on the RSS on Friday, in the context of "Islamophobia": "The reason behind this is the RSS ideology that unfortunately rules India today. This extremist ideology was founded in the 1920s, the RSS founding fathers were inspired by the Nazis and adopted their concepts of racial purity and supremacy."

Next on the Khan rundown: Kashmir. That stayed in the same slot, after climate change, RSS and Modi.

The 2019 readout: "Now I want to move on to talk about Kashmir. When we came into power; my first priority was that Pakistan would be that country that would try its best to bring peace" and "This is the time when you, the UN, must urge India to lift the curfew; to free the 13,000 Kashmiris who have disappeared meanwhile and this is the time when the UN must insist on Kashmir's right to self determination.

"Mr. President, For over 72 years, India has illegally occupied Jammu and Kashmir against the wishes of the Kashmiri people, and in blatant violation of the resolutions of the Security Council."

"India is playing a dangerous game of upping the ante against Pakistan in a nuclearised environment," he added.

In 2019, it was, "if a conventional war starts between two countries, nuclear countries...anything could happen".

India slammed Khan's 34-minute "litany of vicious falsehood, personal attacks, warmongering and obfuscation of Pakistan's persecution of its own minorities".

"The only crowning glory that this country has to show to the world for the last 70 years is terrorism, ethnic cleansing, majoritarian fundamentalism, and clandestine nuclear trade," India said in its right of reply late Friday.

The main resolution on Kashmir - No. 47 - demands that Pakistan withdraw its troops and personnel from Kashmir
PM Modi to address UN General Assembly today; To focus on global push for counter-terrorism

India

oi-Ajay Joseph Raj P

New Delhi, Sep 26: Prime Minister Narendra Modi will on Saturday address the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in the 75th session. He is scheduled as the first speaker.

In the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, the UNGA is being conducted virtually this year, PM Modi's statement will be a pre-recorded video message that will be played out in New York.

The theme of the 75th UNGA is "The future we want, the United Nations we need, reaffirming our collective commitment to multilateralism - confronting the COVID-19 through effective multilateral action".

Deepika Padukone questioned in drug probe | India tears into Pakistan | Oneindia News

The Prime Minister is expected to keep the focus on India's priorities, he is likely to address the issue of cross-border terrorism, and strengthening global action on counter-terrorism. India will push for more transparency in the process of listing and delisting of entities and individuals in sanction committees.

Being one of the largest Troop Contributing Country, India will also seek to engage intensively in finalising of mandates for UN peacekeeping mission. Continuing India's active engagement on issues relating to sustainable development and climate change.

During the session, PM Modi is also likely to highlight India's contribution to the global cooperation against COVID-19 pandemic by providing aid to more than 150 nations.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday addressed the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA)'s 75th session, which is being held online this year due to the coronavirus pandemic. Majority of world leaders, including PM Modi, are delivering pre-recorded speeches at the New York summit. This is PM Modi's third address at UNGA.

PM Modi questioned for how long India will be kept out of the decision-making structures of the United Nations (UN), asserting that reform in the responses, processes and the character of the global body is the "need of the hour."

PM Modi, in a pre-recorded video, said the stability in the UN and empowerment of the world body are essential for the welfare of the globe.

PM Modi's strong push for UN reforms and the much-delayed expansion of the powerful Security Council came as India will begin its two-year term as an elected non-permanent member of the 15-member Council from 1st January 2021.

Modi asked, "For how long will India be kept out of the decision-making structures of the United Nations? How long would a country have to wait particularly when the transformational changes happening in that country affect a large part of the world?"

Modi said that while it is a fact that the faith and respect that the United Nations enjoys among the 1.3 billion people in India is "unparalleled", it is also true that the people of India have been waiting for a long time for the process for the reforms of the United Nations to get completed.

"Today, people of India are concerned whether this reform-process will ever reach its logical conclusion," he said, adding that every Indian today, while seeing the contribution of India in the world organisation, aspires for India's expanded role in the United Nations.

"Reform in the responses, in the processes, and in the very character of the United Nations is the need of the hour," he emphasised.

India, the world's largest democracy and home to 1.3 billion people, has been spearheading decades-long efforts to reform the Security Council, saying a structure set up in 1945 does not reflect contemporary realities of the 21st Century and is ill-equipped to handle current challenges.

There is widespread support, including four out of the five permanent members of the Security Council - US, UK, France and Russia - for a permanent seat for India at the Council.

(With inputs from agencies)

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In hindsight many, if not all, would have handled the situation differently, but, unfortunately, hindsight was not available when decisions were made. Bruce MacKenzie, South Kingsville

It is quite sad for the nation, which is facing its most serious health issue of recent times, that there are many who are more interested in advancing their own and their party interests, rather than offering genuine and compassionate support to those who have the responsibility to fix the many unforeseen issues.

Hindsight is wonderful It seemed inevitable that someone in the cabinet had to pay the price for the hotel quarantine debacle and this may not be the end of the resignations once the inquiry hands down its findings. No one will come out of this mess with any credit, including the Leader of the Opposition, who from day one has offered nothing constructive and merely said that everything the government has been doing is wrong.

Thanks for your service

Thank you, Jenny Mikakos, for your service to Victoria prior to and at a time of an unprecedented, vicious disease. The need of people for a head is craven.

Sometimes bad things happen when the situation is just not initially controllable. Ask those who fouled up in NSW with the Ruby Princess.

Jenni King, Camberwell

Raising an old debate

When University of Melbourne vice-chancellor Duncan Maskell says Victoria must address the question What is our tolerance for death in this global pandemic (State faces life-and-death issue, The Sunday Age, 20/9), he raises a debate that goes back to Aristotle but is having a renaissance with some latter-day economists.

It raises the question: Is it morally right to damage the economy, which dramatically affects societys young, to protect the old and vulnerable? This takes us back to the idea of whether we view the individual as having intrinsic value. Some economists and philosophers would claim we do not, as individuals, have intrinsic value. The value we have is an extrinsic one gained by our productivity and value to the wider society and economy.

Thus it is a short step to say we should open the market up completely while doing what we can to reduce the impact of the virus to the elderly. The next step is to do a cost-benefit analysis and ask why we should expend costly resources on unproductive people in aged care. I am hoping for a few more productive years and am not ready for the state to hand me the cup of hemlock.

Lance Sterling, Burwood
A progressive group has purchased the domain name amyconeybarrett.com to protest her nomination to the US Supreme Court (AP)

A progressive activist group has purchased the internet domain name www.amyconeybarrett.com in an attempt to fight what they say is Donald Trump's takeover of the US judicial system.

The site features a large photo of Amy Coney Barrett, who Mr Trump is expected to name as his choice to replace former Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the US Supreme Court. Next to the photo is a warning that Ms Barrett must be stopped.

"Amy Coney Barrett would threaten your health care and your reproductive freedom. We have to stop her," the site reads.

At the top of the site, a bold, white header reads "Honor Ruth Bader Ginsburg," whose reported final wish was that her position not be filled until after the 2020 US election.

"We have to protect Ruth Bader Ginsburg's legacy. This vacancy should not be filled until after inauguration day," the site says.

Demand Justice claims that Ms Barrett is "exactly who Donald Trump said he would pick as a Supreme Court justice: someone who could be counted on to overturn Roe v. Wade and end the Affordable Care Act."

According to the group, Ms Barrett has "repeatedly indicated that she would strike down the Affordable Care Act" and that by doing so the Supreme Court would be "ending protections for people with preexisting conditions."

The group also warns that Ms Barrett would be an advocate for overturning Roe v. Wader, the Supreme Court decision that allows abortions to take place legally in the US.

"She is also one of the favorite judges of people who want to overturn Roe v. Wade, because they know she will be a reliable vote to roll back reproductive freedom."

The group calls on visitors to email their senators about the situation, to sign their petition, and to donate to the group's activist campaigns.

Mr Trump is expected to name Ms Barrtett as his choice to replace Justice Ginsburg on Saturday.

In a Washington Post editorial, O Carter Snead, a professor of law at the University of Notre Dame and a 15 year friend and colleague of Ms Barrett claimed that progressives and liberals should not fear her taking a seat on the Supreme Court.

Story continues

"There is no need to fear Barretts faith. To the contrary, her commitment to treating others with respect grows directly out of her religious convictions," the author wrote. "But Barretts love of neighbor goes beyond merely treating others with dignity. In all the time I have known her, I have never once seen Barrett place her needs above those of others."

Still, Democrats fear that a 6-3 conservative majority Supreme Court would spell the end of programs like the Affordable Care Act, the DACA immigrant work program, and an overturn of abortion laws.

In 2018, Demand Justice also opposed the confirmation of then-judge Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court.

Read more

Amy Coney Barrett: The most controversial decisions by Trump's Supreme Court frontrunner

Trump expected to announce conservative Barrett for court
Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) on Saturday said it has received Rs 7,500 crore from Silver Lake Partners, which had recently picked up 1.75 per cent stake in its retail arm. On September 9, Mukesh Ambani-led RIL had said that the US private equity firm would invest into Reliance Retail Ventures Ltd (RRVL).

The company has received "subscription amount of Rs 7,500 crore from SLP Rainbow Holdings Pte Ltd (Silver Lake)", RIL said in an exchange filing on Saturday. Following the allotment of equity stake, "SLP Rainbow Holdings holds 1.75 per cent of the fully diluted equity share capital" of RRVL, it said. This investment had valued RRVL at a pre-money equity value of Rs 4.21 lakh crore. It's the second billion-dollar investment by Silver Lake in a Reliance Industries subsidiary after the $1.35 billion investment in Jio Platforms announced earlier this year.

The other investments of Silver Lake include Airbnb, Alibaba, Alphabet's Verily and Waymo units, Dell Technologies, Twitter and numerous other global technology leaders. In August, Reliance acquired the retail and logistics businesses of Future Group for Rs 24,713 crore to boost its retail vertical.

Silver Lake was the first US private equity firm to invest in Jio after tech giant Facebook took a 9.99 per cent stake in the company for Rs 43,573.62 crore. Silver Lake bought 2.08 per cent in Jio in two tranches for a total of Rs 10,202.55 crore. KKR, Vista and General Atlantic followed Silver Lake to take stakes in Jio.

Also read: How big is Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Retail
Harvard associate professor Lorgia Garcia Penas fears came true on Tuesday night when her guest lecture about violence against women of color was Zoombombed. Garcia Pena and three organizing professors from the University of Georgia were called racial slurs, had death threats made against their families and repeatedly had their home addresses posted in the Zoom chat.
An eighth death has been linked to a coronavirus outbreak stemming from a wedding and reception in the northern part of Maine.

The man who died was in his 80s and from Somerset County, the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention said Saturday.

The wedding and reception in the Millinocket area on Aug. 7 is linked to more than 170 cases of COVID-19, including in an outbreak at a nursing home in Madison and a jail.

The Maine CDC said Saturday that the number of deaths related to an outbreak at the Maplecrest Rehabilitation and Living Center in Madison is now seven.

In other developments, the number of coronavirus cases at a Rumford paper mill has increased to 18, the company said Friday.

ND Paper mill has said it was testing the more than 600 workers.

In March, the company said it implemented stringent requirements for employees and added a mask mandate in May, WMTW-TV reported.

The head of the union that represents the workers has urged all community members to follow protocols to limit the spread of the virus.

Youre killing us. Youre putting me and everybody else out of work. Not just in the mill but in the community, and people are gonna die, Gary Hemingway said. Its not funny. You dont want to wear a mask, youre the idiot, but youre hurting us.
Prosecutors in Germany insist they do not need Madeline McCann's body in order to prosecute the man they believe killed the youngster.

Braunschweig-based Hans Christian Wolters claims the authorities simply need to be 'convinced' she is dead to be able to put a suspect on trial.

The statement will lead to increased speculation that prosecutors are moving closer to charging the prime suspect in the youngster's disappearance - Christian Brueckner.

The 43-year-old convicted paedophile and rapist is currently in jail in Germany. As yet no charges have been brought against him over the toddler's disappearance.

Toddler Madeline McCann who disappeared while on a family holiday to the Algarve

Mr Wolters has already indicated recently that they had 'material evidence' that Madeline was dead.

He told investigative reporter Sandra Felgueiras, on RTP show Sexta as 9, last night: 'To indict someone we don't need a body.

'A person can be convicted without a body being found but we have to be convinced a person is dead.'

He also appeared to hint that German authorities may have evidence placing paedophile Brueckner in the Praia da Luz holiday flat the British youngster vanished from on May 3, 2007.

Prime suspect in the Madeleine McCann disappearance - Christian Brueckner

When asked if he had any forensic evidence placing Brueckner inside the flat where Madeline was sleeping, Mr Wolters replied: 'I have an answer but we have decided not to divulge this information.

'I can't say 'yes' or 'no' as that would bring a thousand other questions and I cannot go into details.

'But you have to believe me when I say we have more evidence.

'Here in Germany our Public Ministry only divulges things when they are solid.'

Mr Wolters added, however, that prosecutors were no nearer to identifying the person who made a half hour phone call to Brueckner on his mobile while he was near the Ocean Club complex shortly after Madeline disappeared.

The call came from a Portuguese mobile which detectives have been unable to trace, despite a large police appeal.

Mr Wolters said: 'We have the number that called him but we haven't managed to attribute that number to anyone at the moment.

'We don't know what the conversation was about and we don't know the relationship between the people who spoke.

'We are searching for a witness to establish the content of the conversation which lasted nearly half an hour and so was quite a long conversation.

'We hope someone remembers that conversation. We don't have any reason to believe that person could be involved in what happened that night to Madeleine.'

He added that there was no smoking gun evidence to link Brueckner to the crime but insisted that there was many pieces of the Madeline puzzle pointing towards the suspect.

The solicitor also said that prosecutors are sure that the British youngster is dead despite British police treating the case as a missing person inquiry.

He said: 'Everything we have points to her being dead. We have no margin of manoeuvre.'

Mr Wolters also stressed that German police do not believe the chief Madeline McCann suspect had an accomplice and described his ex-girlfriend Nicole Fehlinger as a witness.

Madeline McCann's parents Kate and Gerry McCann appeal for help finding their daughter

Portuguese police search for the missing toddler shortly after her disappearance

Brueckner's lawyer Friedrich Fulscher has insisted his client, currently serving a 21-month drug sentence in prison in the German city of Kiel, has nothing to do with Madeleine's disappearance.

Brueckner is also being probed in Germany over a 2004 Algarve rape and a sex attack on a beach near Praia da Luz a month before Madeleine vanished.

In Portugal prosecutors have reopened their investigation into a sex crime in a playground he was arrested over in 2017.

He was held on suspicion of exposing himself to young children at a playground in Sao Bartolomeu de Messines a 40-minute drive from Praia de Luz.

Police discovered after his detention that he was wanted in Germany on an international arrest warrant for child sex abuse and possession of child pornography.

He was extradited to his homeland and was never prosecuted in Portugal following his Algarve arrest.

The criminal probe was mothballed despite protests from the youngsters' angry parents but reopened earlier this month.

On Thursday Brueckner was told he would remain in jail after losing a legal challenge against an earlier extradition from Italy to Germany which he insisted should lead to him being freed early.

The ruling means he will now stay in jail until 2024 at least.
Shimla To establish an institutional mechanism for interaction, the Himachal Pradesh Police and the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for research, analysis and technology programmes on Saturday.

Chief minister Jai Ram Thakur, who was present at the signing event, said the MoU will help police personnel update their knowledge about new technologies, geographical and temporal analysis of crime and public order, prediction of crime trends, traffic management, e-challaning, beat patrolling system, threat and security analysis, cybercrime, cyber forensics and cyber security.

He added that the collaboration would be based on research and development activities and capacity building which would involve police officers, IIT faculty, researchers and students. The CM added that under the agreement, IIT students will be taught about police functioning and will also be offered internships with state police units.

He said that this would also facilitate interaction of students with police officers and share knowledge about trends, detection, prediction, analytics and learning about technological matters. Investigation officers will also be able to access technological advancement and its applications in practical policing.

The collaboration will lead to improved police working, especially with respect to systems, protocols, technologies and training imparted at Police Training Centre, Daroh and other units in the state police, he added.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday held a virtual bilateral summit with Sri Lankan counterpart Mahinda Rajapaksa. During the summit, PM Modi upheld the relations with Sri Lanka and said that India has always given special priority to Sri Lanka considering the 'neighbourhood first policy' and Security and Growth for All in the Region (SAGAR) doctrine.

"The relations between India and Sri Lanka are thousands of years old. According to my government's neighbourhood first policy and SAGAR doctrine, we give special priority to relations between the two countries," PM Modi said.

"I thank you (Sri Lankan PM Mahinda Rajapaksa) for accepting my invitation for this virtual bilateral summit between India and Sri Lanka. I also congratulate you for being elected as Prime Minister and victory of your party in Parliamentary elections," he added.

READ | PM Modi And VP Venkaiah Naidu Congratulate CSIR On Its 79th Foundation Day

READ | PM Modi To Address UNGA; India's Global Anti-Covid Fight, Counter-terror, Climate On Cards

India's assistance to Sri Lanka

Rajapaksa expressed gratitude for Indias work for other countries during the Covid-19 pandemic. Rajapaksa's statement can also be deemed as gratitude for India's 10-tonne consignment of essential medicines including hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) and paracetamol to Sri Lanka to assist in the island nation's fight with COVID-19, besides other financial assistance.

Moreover, India also assisted the island nation in extinguishing the fire in MT Diamond ship, a Greek Oil tanker which caught fire in Sri Lankas eastern coast. The Indian Coast Guard (ICG) had deployed six ICG ships and two aircraft for fire fighting and pollution response to the MT Diamond ship fire.

The operation to douse off the fire on MT New Diamond ship provided an opportunity for greater cooperation between the two countries, Rajapaksa said.

This virtual summit is the first such virtual engagement by PM Modi with a neighbouring country and the third virtual summit amid COVID-19 crisis with the leaders of other countries, after the summit with Australian PM Scott Morrison and second meeting with the European Union leadership. It is also Rajapaksa's first diplomatic engagement with a leader of a foreign country after he took over as the prime minister of Sri Lanka on August 9.

Prior to this virtual summit, Rajapaksa had visited India in February 2020 preceded by Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa's visit in November 2019.

READ | PM Modi Greets Manmohan Singh On His Birthday

READ | For First Time In Decades Law Framed To Benefit Small, Marginal Farmers, Workers: PM Modi, Accuses Oppn Of 'using Farmers' Shoulders To Fire'
Not every path to higher education involves a four-year college degree.

Marvy Finger, president and CEO of the Finger Companies, one of Houstons leading independent developer of luxury multifamily properties, realized the value that CTE programs  career and technical education  could mean to Houston high school students. In 2013, he created the Marvy Finger Family Foundation Scholarship program, offering Houston ISD students fully funded, two-year vocational and technical education programs at Houston Community College, Lone Star College and San Jacinto College. Now in its seventh year, the foundation has awarded 284 scholarships, setting students on careers in fields such as welding, automotive repair, health science, construction management and maritime logistics.

The program has grown each year since 2013, when eight students were funded, to this years class of about 80 students entering technical education, learning skills from a two-year associate degrees or Level 2 certifications. The scholarships cover full tuition, textbooks, fees and tools, up to $20,000. This year, because much of college education is virtual learning, students also were given new laptops. Mentorships, career advice and job placement also are offered. In addition, all scholarship students can participate in Houston Food Banks Food for Change program, receiving 60 pounds of food twice a month.

Finger began the program because he saw a need to help students pursue potentially high-paying jobs through technical pathways; he also wanted students to enter the job market without the financial burden of college debt.

Scholarships To learn more about or apply for the Marvy Finger Family Foundation Scholarships, see mfffscholarship.com. See More Collapse

He wanted to lay the foundation for students who wouldnt have the opportunity to go to college to begin their own careers by pursuing technical fields, said Cruz Casiano, director of the scholarship program. Mr. Finger makes a lot of charitable contributions, but this program means a lot to him.

greg.morago@chron.com
The Alabama Department of Corrections said Friday that Christopher Nalls, 59, who died on Sept. 10, tested positive for COVID-19 on a post-mortem test.

Nalls suffered from multiple health conditions, according to the ADOC. He tested negative for COVID-19 after admission to a hospital on August 31 and was discharged September 4. But his condition worsened and he was readmitted to the hospital on September 10 and died later that day.

Nalls was serving a 15-year sentence for theft of property in a Fayette County case and was serving time at the Hamilton Community Work Center.

The ADOC says 23 inmates have died from COVID-19. The agency says 409 inmates have tested positive and 13 cases remain active, according to its dashboard on the coronavirus.

Related: Dont let me die: Inside the Alabama prison systems COVID-19 quarantine ward
Paris, Sep 26 : Seven people have been detained over an attack in Paris near the former headquarters of the satirical magazine, Charlie Hebdo, the site of the 2015 massacre, authorities said on Saturday.

According to the authorities, the 18-year-old suspect, identified as a Pakistani national, attacked and injured two people with a meat cleaver on Friday near Boulevard Richard-Lenoir, the BBC reported.

The suspect was arrested on the scene, while six others were being interrogated while in custody.

In a statement, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said the police had underestimated the threat level in the area, adding that it was "clearly an act of Islamist terrorism".

The identities of the suspect and the victims were yet to be made public.

Prime Minister Jean Castex told reporters that they were out of danger.

Friday's incident comes as a high-profile trail was underway of 14 people accused of helping two jihadis carry out the 2015 attack on Charlie Hebdo, in which 12 people were killed, including the magazine's editor at the time Stephane Charbonnier, the BBC reported.

Of the 14, three were being tried in absentia, the BBC reported.

The two gunmen were killed by security forces.

The trial had been delayed by almost four months due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

Following the attack, Charlie Hebdo is now run from a secret location.
BRANFORD  With patriotic music wafting through the air, some 500 rallied at Branford Point to show support for President Donald J. Trump ahead of the Nov. 3 election.

As nearly 150 power boats, yachts, day sailers, kayaks and dinghies boats, adorned with Blue Lives Matter, Trump 2020 and American flags, passed by the Branford Point fishing pier, supporters on land blew air horns, shouted support and waved their own flags.

It went very well, said Branford resident Todd Petrowski , organizer of the Boaters for Trump and Blue Lives Matter Boat Parade.

The parade came early in the day, before Trump nominated Amy Coney Barrett to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Petrowski, who is not a boat owner, participated on a friends vessel, a 27-foot fishing boat.

I think we had a very good showing and we had plenty of people on land for support, I think it was a very good turnout, he said.

Police estimate there were about 200 individuals on the pier, while another 250 participated in a car parade.

The reports that I got back was that it was without incident, Branford Police Chief John Mulhern. There were no issues.

Supporters of presidential candidate Joe Biden who arrived at the event with Biden for President signs were met with taunts  but political conversations also took place.

About half a dozen women from Guilford and Madison gathered on the pier, among the Trump supporters, carrying Connecticut loves Biden and Harris signs.

Madison resident Leah Snyder said vulgar comments were directed at her and other Biden supporters.

I honestly feel very disgusted by the amount of people that are supporting him and the policies that he supported so far and the people that are yelling at us for exercising our right to peacefully protest and them comparing us to other protesters, its completely incorrect, said Snyder.

.

Trump supporter Alice Palumbo said she was not upset about the half a dozen Biden supporters as they stood on the pier with their signs.

They have a right to do what they want to, but I have a right to say what I want to, also, she said.

She noted that she is surprised by the number of people who are supporting Trump in the state of Connecticut.

Its such a Democratic state, she said. I actually believe theres a lot of people for Trump, but because theres so many things that happen if you say that youre a Trump supporter...I love the police, myself.

Branford resident Tracey Hawkes was thinking the same thing as she joined the rally.

I think its really exciting, the 58-year-old Branford resident said. Traditionally, Connecticuts a very blue state and I think that to have people come out and support their candidate is really important.

There were cordial exchanges between Trump and Biden supporters; among topics they discussed were separation of church and state, climate change and positive discourse.

It was a peaceful conversation, said Barbara Chupp, of a conversation with a Trump supporter. He was very reasonable.

Of the handful of people that we met todaythere were two people who actually asked to engage us in conversation, said the 56-year-old Guilford resident. I feel like we really, really need more of that, she added.



David Cruz, who had patriotic music playing, including Whitney Houstons rendition of America the Beautiful, and Bruce Springsteens Born in the U.S.A, said he was there to support Trump, as well as Blue Lives Matter.

My brothers a cop, he said. I support all police officers and I think we need to do that.

Petrowski said this was an important message from the event.

We wanted to get the point across that the Branford police are a fantastic organization and so is East Haven, so we just wanted to show support for them, he said. I think thats the most important thingthey did a wonderful job.
EDITORS NOTE: NJ Cannabis Insider is hosting an online symposium on Tuesday, Sept. 29 at 1 p.m. The webinar, What Doctors Should Know About Cannabis, will address pressing questions healthcare professionals have about medical marijuana. Heres how to sign up.

Despite being signed into law in July 2019, many of the improvements touted by Jake Honigs Law, which expanded the states medical marijuana program, have yet to be implemented, frustrating physicians, healthcare professionals and attorneys operating in the healthcare space.

With more than 86,000 patients signed up for the medical marijuana program in New Jersey, and a ballot question asking voters to decide whether or not to legalize recreational cannabis, health care experts say many in their industry remain under informed about the medicinal value of cannabis and when or how to prescribe it.

Dr. David Nathan, founder and president of Doctors for Cannabis Regulation, said there were numerous issues the medical cannabis program still needed to address in order streamline the program including the sign-up process for patients and physicians, increasing the number of dispensaries, delivery, home cultivation and allowing nurse practitioners and physician assistants to recommend cannabis.

My feeling is that anybody who is eligible to prescribe medication in the state of New Jersey should be eligible to recommend cannabis, Nathan said.

Sheila Mints, a healthcare attorney with Capehart Scathard, said Jake Honigs Law authorized nurse practitioners and physicians assistants to register patients for the medical marijuana program but, in practice, that change has yet to take effect.

Even though legally they can still do it, the website hasnt been changed to allow them to register, Mints said. Its like a simple, stupid thing that you would think would not be that difficult to do. If you go on the MMP website, the only way that you can register is if youre a licensed physician, but if youre a nurse practitioner, you cant do that.

Moreover, while the patient population continues to rise, physicians participation in the program has remained relatively static, she said, potentially setting up a crunch for patients and physicians down the road.

Not enough physician input or education

Among the reasons for physicians' reticence to join the program, Mints said, are the lack of physician involvement in treatment and the lack of continuing medical education (CME).

They register the patient, but theyre not actively involved in what the patient gets, how much they take, and they dont understand enough to be able to say, Okay, this is a good you know, she said. They dont understand the drug interactions. They dont have clinical information provided in a way physicians are used to getting that information.

That lack of education, she noted, was an issue intended to be addressed through Jake Honigs Law but CMEs about medical cannabis have yet to materialize.

For Dr. Jordan Tishler, a Massachusetts-based physician who regularly recommends medical cannabis, the largest problem he faces as a cannabis specialist is the inability to write a true prescription  he can recommend cannabis to a patient but hes not able mandate the strain type, amount or frequency of use.

This leaves patients subject to the massive hype from the media and up-selling at the dispensary, Tishler said. Prior to COVID, I routinely saw patients buy hundreds of dollars of products that I had not recommended who then did not get the expected result, or worse, got sick.

Tishler will be part of a panel of experts to discuss what medical professionals need to know about cannabis at NJ Cannabis Insiders Sept. 29 webinar.

Since COVID, with online ordering, Ive seen an improvement in outcomes, which just shows how harmful all the advice from non-medical sources was, he said. A prescription would remove this interference and return the process of choosing and adjusting the medication to the patient and their knowledgeable and caring cannabis specialist.

Stigma still a factor

Stigma, Mints said, also impacts physician participation in the program.

When I talk to my clients, theyre concerned because theres a number of sort of high-profile practices that are kind of loosey goosey when it comes to abiding by some of the regulations related to doctors and the prescription of medical marijuana by registering people, she said.

Even still, she said, there are certainly a lot of doctors who have medical marijuana registration, as part of their practice, but they dont advertise it at all.

They dont try to encourage new patients to be involved, Mints said. If one of their existing patients comes to them and says, I want to do this, then theyll do it, but they want to keep it private.

A version of this story first appeared in NJ Cannabis Insider.

Justin Zaremba may be reached at jzaremba@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @JustinZarembaNJ.
Camper fire claims the life of two people in Marshall County
This year, Jewish communities in Montgomery County had to find new and creative ways of observing the High Holy Days of Rosh Hashanah, which started Sept. 18, and Yom Kippur on Sunday.

Congregations will find different accommodations based on denomination and the needs of their community.

In the Jewish religion, Rosh Hashanah is the Jewish New Year, and the beginning of a 10-day period of introspection and penitence that ends with Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. During Yom Kippur, observers will fast all day, and pray for forgiveness. It is the most important Jewish holiday.

Edwin Goldberg, rabbi of the Beth Shalom of The Woodlands, said typically around this time before Yom Kippur he would be spending most of his time preparing for an in-person service with his congregants and working on his sermon. This year, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there wont be an in-person service, and a lot of Goldbergs time has been spent setting up the necessary technology to stream the services over Facebook.

Beth Shalom of The Woodlands was not set up to consistently stream services before the pandemic, but by the time April rolled around it became a necessity. Rosh Hashanah services were streamed online and while it wasnt what the congregation was hoping for it did go over well.

Its not as if its going to feel like a regular service, just virtual, Goldberg said. One of the Aha moments was to say that I cannot say were going to do something and its going to be just like it was.

Instead of focusing on what wouldnt be able to happen this year, he decided instead to focus on what they could create, instead. For his congregants, this means creating a space at home to worship.

Its not just about coming to a building, its also about making your home a sacred place, he said.

Connecting through technology

Over the summer, Beth Shalom tested out various ways to stream services and connect the congregants with the synagogue through technology. Thankfully, the tests that failed happened back in July, not as they were preparing for Rosh Hashanah.

One of the adjustments that Goldberg has made under these new circumstances is shortening his sermons. Attention spans seem to be shorter while watching services on a screen than they were in the synagogue. Beth Shalom has been locked down since March and will continue virtual services for the time being. But to celebrate the Jewish New Year they did host a socially distanced gathering in Northshore Park.

Were trying to be safe but also recognize that people have spiritual needs and at the end of the day we have to figure out how to get together, Goldberg said.

Outdoor services

Its a sentiment that Mendel Blecher, rabbi of Chabad of The Woodlands, echoes. As an Orthodox Jewish community, technology like streaming services is not an option. For Yom Kippur, Chabad of The Woodlands will be holding services in a tent outside to allow for people to socially distance. Congregants encouraged him to hold outdoor services for Yom Kippur after outdoor services for Rosh Hashanah were well attended.

Were really just coming to pray, primarily, and come together as a community, Blecher said.

Like Goldberg, Blecher will be keeping his sermon short, but for slightly different reasons. It was only a few days ago that he decided to hold the service outside because it looks like the weather will be cooperating, but he doesnt want to keep people outside in the potential heat too long while they are fasting.

But for congregants who choose to observe at home, Blecher said Chabad of The Woodlands provided the items they need in High Holiday packages, including a collection of readings, prayers, and meditations, as well as a honey cake. As he was reminded by a member of the congregation, the same God that is in the synagogue is also at home.

Mercy and compassion

The thing about coming to the synagogue, theres that sense of community, togetherness, and synergy of everyone praying together, which creates a whole different atmosphere, Blecher said. But prayer can be done at home too, and should be done at home if a person cannot attend in person.

Both congregations have had positive reactions from their members to the different ways they have chosen to observe the High Holy Days. For Goldberg, working around the COVID-19 restrictions is about making the best of a bad situation. Yom Kippur is about praying for mercy and compassion, and he hopes his congregants remember to give those things to themselves.

We have choice, but were not in control, he said. The most important part of the High Holy Days, in general, is this idea that you cannot change your fate but you can temper it to the extent that we practice three things: we repent, we pray, and we do acts of charity and goodness and kindness for others.

As moral beings, he said, we dont have the freedom and liberty to do whatever we want, but we do have the freedom to do the right thing. This year, while observing Yom Kippur, the right thing means practicing faith while socially distanced.

jamie.swinnerton@chron.com
From: Larry Levine - Publisher of the Midnight Report New York , NY Saturday, September 26, 2020

Video Clip: Click to Watch Prison Consultant Larry Levine describes how Boston Gangster Whitey Bulger who was a fugitive from justice and on the FBI's most-wanted list for over a decade was violently Killed by a group of inmates at a Federal Prison in Hazelton West Virginia. Bulger was 89 years old, in a wheelchair, and generally believed to be a suspected FBI Informant. He had only been at USP Hazelton for a few hours when a group of inmates entered his cell and stabbed him several times, gouged out his eyes, and pulled his tongue out. 213-219-9033 llevine@wallstreetprisonconsultants.com


Former Queensland premier Peter Beattie says Daniel Andrews must be prepared to accept full responsibility and not "buck pass" to cabinet colleagues or public servants if he is to be forgiven by voters for the state's coronavirus disaster.

The Labor luminary, who made a reputation for issuing mea culpas during his nine years as premier, said while all long-serving leaders face a crisis of some kind, the circumstances surrounding COVID-19 was in "a class of its own".

Peter Beattie has some advice for Daniel Andrews on handling a crisis. Credit:Glenn Hunt

Mr Beattie said Australians were "fair minded" and it was too early to tell what the Victorian Premier's personal or his government's electoral fate would be.
Pop Smoke has achieved a posthumous No 1 album in the UK, becoming the first solo artist to achieve the feat.

The rapper, born Bashar Barakah Jackson, was killed in a suspected robbery in February this year, aged 20.

Shoot for the Stars, Aim for the Moon made it to the top spot 12 weeks after debuting on the UK albums chart at No 2.

Pop Smokes album is also the first debut of 2020 to reach the No 1 spot. 97 per cent of album sales were from streaming.

Jade Bradshaw, product manager at Pop Smokes UK label Polydor, said it was a bittersweet moment.

This No 1 cements Pop Smoke's legacy in the UK and the promise he had to be one of the greats, said she said.

This is a bittersweet moment but it is an honour to be part of this project with Steven, Shiv & our colleagues at Republic [Records].

In a four-star review of Shoot for the Stars, The Independent said Pop Smoke, who helped to pioneer New Yorks drill scene, had an ability to project emotion like few artists his age.

He thrived most when working on instinct, and possessed a voice that ran deep and guttural, often evoking the menace of a classic cinema villain, the review said.

Brilliant and bittersweet, Shoot For the Stars Aim For the Moon is the work of someone whose success should have been stratospheric.
Robert Cuellar Jr., LISD Child Nutrition Program Director, has been featured by a national campaign that focuses on ending childhood hunger as he works to provide meals to the students across Laredo during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The campaign focuses on rallying communities throughout the country to provide funds to the campaign in an effort to stop childhood hunger in America. According to No Kid Hungry and Cuellar, at least 1 in 4 kids may live with hunger as a result of the pandemic, a rise from the 1 in 7 prior to the crisis.

In a four-part miniseries that highlights the contributions of those in the frontlines who help feed the children, Cuellar is said to have treated the kids he fed as his very own.

Cuellar emphasizes that his department was able to feed 1.47 million meals to child since the closing of schools in March, but that number is a far cry from the 6 million meals that are served during a regular school year. He mentioned that LISD is currently providing meals for all children, regardless of school district, which has increased the number of meals provided a day by at least 900 to 1,000.

No Kids Hungry featured a photo of Cuellar dressed up as Captain America during a, what he said was a dynamic moment, curbside meal distribution and applauded the decision for the fun it brought to the situation. Cuellar added that some students still call him Captain America and he is still wowed by the experience.

I did that because one needs to enjoy the moment with the students, have a moment of excitement and be in their world and connect with them and this was one way of engaging, Cuellar said.

READ MORE: Laredo-based juice and smoothie bar expands to San Antonio

During the summer, helped manage the 27 LISD campuses provide meals to the students and children of Laredo. In May, school districts celebrated National School Lunch Hero day, which is when Cuellar dressed up as Captain America and thanked the entire staff for being true heroes of the pandemic.

(The children) cannot go out, but at least they can have a nice meal, Cuellar said.

According to Cuellar, LISD has a 94.8% free or reduced meal rate that the students and parents can use during prior years to have affordable meals during school. He added that No Kid Hungry awarded the district grant funding to purchase more Cambro carts for meal transportation, meal warmers and other needed supplies.

Since the start of the pandemic, No Kid Hungry stated that it has sent more than $27 million in emergency relief to more than a thousand schools and community groups across the country, Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia and Guam to help them serve approximately 10.8 million meals a day.

As of today, Cuellar continues to work daily to overlook the operation across LISD campuses, which he has done so for 16 years. He believes that a healthy nutrition and his high standards help improve a students behavior, attendance and academic performance.

My dad and my mom, had problems with diabetes and heart issues, so I was passionate about making sure that I do something in life and something worthwhile and I became a nutritionist. Cuellar said in the video. Now as director, I make sure that I assist in any endeavor I can so, I make sure that I want to have a healthy Laredo.

His late father and the health issues that plagued his parents are a driving force into his passion of nutrition, and he has made it a mission to continue to provide nutritional meals to the children of Laredo. He said that his goal is that no child is left without a meal and is humbled that he was recognized nationally. However, he added that he is just one of many child nutrition staff members who provide the balance and nutritious meals to students.

I dont see this as a job; I see this for me, as a mission, a journey, Cuellar said.

The campaign is currently promoting a fundraiser that runs up until October 16 that allows people who dine or shop at certain locations to donate to the organization. Cuellar said that currently, Popeyes, Dennys, Jack in the Box and Chrysler offer contribution opportunities.

cocampo@lmtonline.com
Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, and Prince Harrys decision to step away from royal life shocked the world. Many were confused and wondered what that meant for the royal family. The entire ordeal got dubbed Megxit, as a play on words.

The couple is taking steps to be financially independent, and they are now living in the United States. There were a few factors that lead to their choice to resign, but the queen made a certain decision that reportedly pushed them to leave.

Prince Harry and Meghan take their leave

Meghan Markle | Max Mumby/Indigo/Getty Images

RELATED: Meghan Markle and Prince Harry Sent a Subtle Message That They Dont Regret Royal Exit and California Move

As an American actress and woman of color, Meghans marriage into the royal family brought all kinds of excitement. Some felt that her arrival was a positive change. However, Insider reports that there was trouble even before the wedding.

After Prince Harry made their relationship official, he made a statement that addressed the harassment towards Meghan from the British press. He pointed out that some of the remarks were racist. For example, one comment had compared the couples newborn baby to a monkey.

Back in January, the couple announced that they were stepping back from their duties. In April, they stopped using their titles and officially resigned from the royal family. It was not an easy decision for anyone.

A friend of Prince Harry mentioned that the prince was suffering a lot. Prince Harry was struggling to protect his family from the press. Meghan, on the other hand, may have been suffocating in the royal family as a result of living in a different culture.

The queen did announce her support of the couples decision. However, her message hints that she is in control. It shows that there is no going halfway when someone is a working royal.

The 2019 Christmas speech

Queen Elizabeth II | Chris Jackson/Getty Images

RELATED: Meghan Markle and Prince Harry Leaving the Royal Family Was Inevitable

Every year, the queen gives a speech on Christmas day. However, some people wondered if Queen Elizabeth was going to cancel it for 2019 given all the scandals in the royal family. She decided to carry on with the speech instead.

During the speech, Queen Elizabeth talked about the good and the bad that happened during the year. She welcomed her new great-grandchild Archie. Her speech mentioned Prince of Wales visit to Cuba, which marked the first time in history a British royal officially traveled there.

Queen Elizabeth also commemorated the 75th anniversary of D-Day. She spoke about the importance of reconciliation. She stated: How small steps taken in faith and in hope can overcome long-held differences and deep-seated divisions to bring harmony and understanding.

Some internet users believe that Queen Elizabeths outfit was a small hint of her opinions concerning Brexit. Her blue dress, accompanied by a sapphire and diamond brooch, reminded many fans of the EU flag. However, this would not be the only possible subtle message that people noticed.

How did the Christmas speech encourage their decision?

When it came to Prince Harry and Meghans decision to leave, the 2019 Christmas speech played a crucial part. It was not so much of what Queen Elizabeth said but rather what she did not say. According to Marie Claire, there may have been subtle hints about her feelings on their exit.

In Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durands Sussex biography titled Finding Freedom, Prince Harry and Meghan got hurt when they noticed the Queens surroundings. On Queen Elizabeths desk, there were a few family photos. However, Prince Harry, Meghan, and their son were all missing from the pictures.

In addition to the photos, Queen Elizabeth did not mention either Prince Harry or Meghan in her speech. However, she did talk about the birth of their son. She and Prince Philip welcomed the newborn child into the family.

Prince Harry and Meghan were upset as a result of the Christmas speech. Scobie and Durand reported: Harry felt as though he and Meghan had long been sidelined by the institution and were not a fundamental part of its future.
Maharashtras COVID-19 tally rose to 13,21,176 on Saturday with the single-day addition of 20,419 fresh cases, state health department said. With 430 more patients succumbing to the infection, the cumulative toll in the state went up to 35,191, it said.

A total of 23,644 patients were discharged after treatment in the state in the day, taking the count of recoveries to 10,16,450, the department said. The state is now left with 2,69,119 active cases.

Mumbai city reported 2,282 new cases, taking its overall count to 1,96,585, while fatalities rose to 8,750 with44 more people succumbing to the infection.
A truck driver was arrested from Etah district of Uttar Pradesh on Friday evening for allegedly issuing a life threat to chief minister Yogi Adityanath while seeking the release of jailed Mafioso-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari, police officials said on Saturday. This development comes at a time when the state government is going tough on Ansari and his gang members.

The suspect sent multiple messages on the WhatsApp number of the state police integrated emergency service UP 112 three days ago, police officials said.

The officials said the sender threatened to remove the state government if Ansari was not released from jail within 24 hours. They said the messages were received on UP 112s WhatsApp number between 9.56 and 10.11 am on Wednesday.

The Lucknow police media cell said the accused was identified as Etah resident Amarpal, a truck driver by profession, and the threat messages were sent by him as a mischievous act. The suspect was initially traced in Delhi and was later arrested when he reached his house in Etah, they added.

Also read: BJP announces new central team; Raman Singh, Vasundhara Raje are among national vice presidents

They also said the police were further investigating the intentions behind the threat messages. They were also trying to ascertain whether anybody else was part of the crime.

The Lucknow police had registered an FIR at the Hazratganj police station against unidentified people on Wednesday for issuing the threat through anonymous communication, the police said.

Earlier, on June 12, two brothers from Gonda district had sent a message on the WhatsApp number of the Uttar Pradesh police, threatening to blow up the chief ministers residence and 50 other places in the state. The two brothers had secretly used a rivals phone to frame him to settle personal scores.

On May 21, a similar message to target the CM was sent on the WhatsApp number of UP 112. A Mumbai resident, Kamran Ameen Khan, was arrested in this connection on May 23. A day later, another Mumbai resident, Sayyed Wahab, was arrested when he threatened to carry out blasts if Ameen was not released from police custody.
Seventh U.S. Circuit Court Judge Amy Coney Barrett speaks after being introduced by President Donald Trump as his next Supreme Court nominee, at the White House on Sept. 26, 2020. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Where Amy Coney Barrett Stands on Gun Rights and Abortion

Amy Coney Barrett, who currently serves as a federal judge for the Chicago-based 7th Circuit Court of Appeals, has been nominated by President Donald Trump to fill the vacancy on the Supreme Court bench. Her record as a judge and legal scholar is being intensely scrutinized as predictions are made about what the bench will look like if Barrett replaces the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

As an appellate court judge, Barrett has weighed in on a number of hot-button issues since taking the bench in the 7th Circuit in 2017, such as abortion and gun rights. She is also a professor at Notre Dame Law School, where she taught in the areas of constitutional law, the federal courts, and statutory interpretation.

Barrett has already earned the backing of many conservative activists for her originalist approach to the law and her perceived hostility to Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court ruling that legalized abortion in 50 states.

Meanwhile, abortion rights, civil rights, and other progressive groups have expressed concerns over Barretts record.

The judge previously drew intense scrutiny for reviving a lawsuit from a male Purdue University student who had been found responsible for sexual assault by what critics described as the campuss kangaroo court.

Some are also worried that Barretts religious views would guide her in her legal analysis such as in abortion-related cases, as seen in 2017 when Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) tensely questioned the judge about her religious background. Barrett replied that judges shouldnt follow their personal convictions in the decision of a case, rather than what the law requires.

The judge has also indicated that she is supportive of expansive gun rights in a dissent she authored in 2019.

Here are some of her notable legal opinions on these issues.

Gun Rights

Barrett indicated her support for gun rights in her dissent in Kanter v. Barr, a 2019 case that challenged a federal law that took gun rights away from nonviolent felons. A businessman who had pleaded guilty to mail fraud argued that the law violated his Second Amendment right to bear arms.

The 21 majority, both appointed by Republican President Ronald Reagan, said the federal law and a similar Wisconsin one were constitutional.

In her dissent, Barrett said that since the countrys founding, legislatures have taken gun rights away from people who were considered dangerous.

History is consistent with common sense: it demonstrates that legislatures have the power to prohibit dangerous people from possessing guns, she wrote. But that power extends only to people who are dangerous.

She added that while the federal and state governments have a strong interest in protecting the public from gun violence, they had failed to show that the business owner owning a gun would pose a risk.

The Second Amendment confers an individual right, intimately connected with the natural right of self-defense, and not limited to civic participation, she said.

Abortion

Barrett has grappled with some abortion-related cases while on the 7th Circuit bench and cast votes that signaled opposition to rulings that struck down abortion-related restrictions.

In 2018, Barrett voted to rehear a case en bancto have the three-judge panel decision reviewed by the full courtinvolving an Indiana law that required fetal remains to be buried or cremated after an abortion. The trial and appeals court judges found that the law violated the Constitution. Ultimately, Barrett was outnumbered and the 7th Circuit ruled to deny the rehearing and reinstated an original opinion that blocked the law from being enforced.

At the time, she joined in a dissenting opinion authored by Judge Frank Easterbrook. The dissent addressed another portion of the law that had been struck down but was not at issue in the rehearing proceedings, which Easterbrook described as the the eugenics statute. That portion of the law bans abortions for sex, race, and disability reasons.

Easterbrook argued that the Supreme Court had never ruled on such a law and would be the only authority to rule on the issue.

Using abortion to promote eugenic goals is morally and prudentially debatable on grounds different from those that underlay the statutes [Planned Parenthood v.] Casey considered, the dissent reads (pdf). None of the Courts abortion decisions holds that states are powerless to prevent abortions designed to choose the sex, race, and other attributes of children.

The Supreme Court later reinstated the Indiana law on the disposal of fetal remains.

In 2019, Barrett voted to rehear a ruling by a three-judge 7th Circuit panel that upheld a challenge to another Indiana abortion law. The Indiana measure would require that parents be notified when a girl under 18 is seeking an abortion, even in situations in which she has asked a court to provide consent instead of her parents.

The 7th circuit eventually denied the hearing. Barrett joined a dissent for denying the rehearing authored by Judge Michael Kanne, who said, Preventing a state statute from taking effect is a judicial act of extraordinary gravity in our federal structure.

Also in 2019, Barrett joined an opinion on a First Amendment case involving a Chicago law that banned pro-life activists from approaching women entering an abortion clinic. The Chicago law was modeled after a Colorado law that was upheld by the Supreme Court in a case in 2000. Judge Diane Sykes wrote in the opinion that the appeals court had no choice but to follow the top courts precedent.

Thats a losing argument in the court of appeals. The Courts intervening decisions have eroded [Hill v. Colorado]s foundation, but the case still binds us; only the Supreme Court can say otherwise, she wrote.

Reuters contributed to this report.
Despite this illegal practice, BMW shares have gone down in value during this period. Adding insult to injury, the Bavarian manufacturer has raised $18 billion from investors from 2015 to 2019 by feeding them false information. BMW , therefore, misled the people who believe the most in the company about its "U.S. retail sales performance and customer demand in this market while raising capital in the United States. The Securities and Exchange Commission highlights significant cooperation during the investigation amid challenges posed by the health crisis, and this openness was taken into account in imposing a penalty according to the governmental agency.No fewer than three legal entities  BMW AG, BMW NA, and BMW US Capital  violated the antifraud provisions of the Securities Act of 1933. It should be highlighted that the penalty comes as a result of not admitting or denying the orders findings. In other words, no executive will be held accountable because the automaker will pony up $18 million.The Bavarians arent alone, though. Closer to home, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles paid $40 million to settle a similar problem. To make a long story short, FCA instructed dealers to report fake figures from 2012 to 2016, helping the companys capitalization on the stock market.So far this year, BMW of North America had it rough. The BMW and MINI brands reported decreases of 15.3 and 35.1 percent in Q1 of 2020 as opposed to the first quarter of 2019. The health crisis translated to even worse results in Q2, namely decreases of 39.3 and 41.5 percent.On a related note, did you know that the U.S. is a net exporter of BMWs? More Bimmers are exported from the United States than imported, which is hardly surprising if you remember that the X3, X4, X5, X6, and X7 utility vehicles are all made in this part of the world.
The young man's father, Ihor Skochkov, had served as an aviation squadron navigator with the Army's 25th Guards Military Transport Aviation Brigade.

The death of one of the Ukrainian Air Force University cadets who were killed in the An-26 crash in Kharkiv region Friday night, Oleksandr Skochkov, 20, is not the first tragedy in his family, it has turned out.

His father Ihor Skochkov, a military pilot, had died in the Donbas warzone near Luhansk when the enemy downed the Il-76 transport plane he was operating as a navigator on June 14, 2014, Hromadske reported.

Ihor Skochkov, had served as an aviation squadron navigator with the Army's 25th Guards Military Transport Aviation Brigade.

Skochkov Junior had also sought to become an air force navigator, just like his late father.

Read alsoDefense minister names probable cause of An-26 crashAn-26 accident in Chuhuiv: Background

The plane crashed on approach to the Chuhuiv military airfield by the highway on the night of September 25. Kharkiv's Air Force University's crew and cadets were on board  a total of 27 people.

Twenty-five people were killed in the tragic accident and two survived. Later, one of the survivors died in the intensive care unit of the Kharkiv hospital.

SBI investigators opened proceedings into possible "violation of flight rules and preparation, which led to a disaster and grave consequences" (Article 416 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine).

Flight recorders have already been retrieved from the crash site.

The SBU security service elaborated on the last moments of the tragic flight as per ground control data.

At 20:38 the captain reported left engine failure to the tower.

At 20:40, he requested an approach to land, and at 20:43 the plane passed the outer marker.

At 20:45, the plane crashed.

Deputy Interior Minister Anton Geraschehnko added that the pilot reported he would be landing the plane with one operating engine.

The An-26 that crashed on Friday was manufactured in 1977. It had been operated as a training aircraft for the Air Force.

Il-76 downing by Russian proxy forces in June 2014

The Il-76 military transport aircraft was shot down by Russia-led forces near the city of Luhansk in the early hours of June 14, 2014, as the plane was landing. At the time, paratroopers with Ukraine's 80th Separate Air Assault Brigade were holding defense at the airport of Luhansk, surrounded by enemy troops. The Il-76 was supposed to deliver ammunition, equipment, and personnel. Onboard the aircraft there were nine crew members and 40 paratroopers. They all died in the crash.

According to investigators, the aircraft was shot down by Russia-controlled terrorists Andrei Patrushev and Alexander Gureev on the orders of Igor Plotnitsky, ex-leader of the so-called "Luhansk People's Republic" ("LPR") terrorist organization. All three are accused of committing an act of terror under Part 3 of Article 258 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.
WASHINGTON  President Trump said Friday night that he would welcome a smooth, beautiful transition of power after the election in November but that he would lose only if Democrats cheated  and that were not going to stand for it if they did.

Mr. Trumps comments to cheering supporters at an outdoor rally in Newport News, Va., were his latest intimation that he might mount an unprecedented effort to stay in power after an electoral defeat and lead the nation into uncharted waters at a moment marked by civil strife.

I want a smooth, beautiful transition, the president said. But they dont add the other part: But its got to be an honest vote.

This is a disaster waiting to happen, he added.

The comments came after Mr. Trump had baselessly claimed that the widespread use of mail-in ballots was a formula for a fraud-ridden result. He also warned that some states might be unable to report a decisive outcome on election night because they would be awaiting mail-in ballots, which can arrive after Election Day, on Nov. 3, so long as they are postmarked no later than it.
Local American Red Cross volunteers are deploying physically to support Red Cross relief efforts in response to the Oregon wildfires and Hurricane Laura, and the Red Cross has a need for new volunteers to help, according to a statement.

American Red Cross volunteer Ezequiel Alejandro is deploying to Louisiana to support the Red Cross response to Hurricane Laura. American Red Cross volunteers Nicole Mercado and Karen Sears are physically deploying to Portland, Oregon to support Red Cross relief efforts in response to devastating wildfires. These local volunteers are three of more than 2,000 volunteers for the Red Cross in Connecticut and Rhode Island and hail from Manchester, Bristol and Niantic.

:In just the last month, a series of deadly hurricanes and wildfires have uprooted lives even as people have struggled with the ongoing impacts of the coronavirus pandemic. The Red Cross is on the ground working tirelessly to provide food, shelter, comfort and support to people in need. The Red Cross is coordinating closely with partners and local officials in the affected areas. Even as the Red Cross is responding to Hurricane Laura and the deadly western wildfires, the Red Cross is mobilizing supplies and volunteers in anticipation of Tropical Storm Sally. Our work is just beginning, as we will be providing support for weeks to come, members said in a statement.

Review the Red Cross most urgently needed volunteer positions at redcross.org/volunteertoday. There is a special need for volunteers to deploy out of state to support sheltering efforts.

If you are interested in helping the community should a disaster occur, go to redcross.org/volunteertoday or contact Sarah Scheel: sarah.scheel@redcross.org, 860-426-5795. Be sure to review the CDC guidance for people who are at higher risk for severe illness, consult your health care provider and follow local guidance. Our number one priority is the health and safety of our employees, volunteers and the people we serve, members said.

The Red Cross depends on financial donations to be able to provide disaster relief immediately. You can help people affected by disasters by making a gift to Red Cross Disaster Relief. Your gift enables the Red Cross to prepare for, respond to and help people recover from disasters big and small. Visit redcross.org, call 800-RED-CROSS, or text the word REDCROSS to 90999 to make a $10 donation.

Cromwell Troop 26s COVID-19 Summer

CROMWELL  During these unprecedented times and many cancellations, it was hard for BSA Troop 26 to have a normal summer. However, they were able to make the best of the circumstances and still accomplish things. Summer camp was cancelled, which a many of the boys use to help enrich their scouting skills and get new badges, members said in a statement.

Instead, the boys did Camp Kinda-Like-A, which is an online version of camp, where they were still able to earn Merit Badges and some scouting experience. The Cub Scout Crossover - where the Arrow of Light scouts crossover to join BSA Troop 26 - was also postponed, but those boys were finally able to have their crossover ceremony and start on their path in Scouts BSA, according to the statement.

During the summer, Troop 26 also did several service projects to give back to the Cromwell community. While things were different, like having to wear masks and social distancing, it was still a great way for the boys to better their community, members said. First, the boys attended an event at the Coles Road Firehouse, which included a food drive run by state Rep. Christie Carpino. Carpino set up a delivery of produce from Farmers to Families, and members of Troop 26 assisted buy moving the boxes and loading them to be transported to their destinations. The Farmers to Families effort has helped feed many families in need all across the region. For the second project, the boys hiked the trails behind Cromwell Middle school, picked up trash and refurbished the trail after the hurricane that left trees on the trail.

Middlesex Habitat holding ;Military Build

CROMWELL  Middlesex Habitat for Humanity to hold a military build - home applicant meeting, 6 p.m. Oct. 5, at the Cromwell ReStore, Cromwell. All interested military families are invited to attend this informational meeting.

The meeting is intended to provide information about the Habitat for Humanity application process for homeownership. Middlesex Habitat will distribute applications for the Military Build program.

The basic requirements to obtain a Military Build - Habitat for Humanity Home: Must be a U.S. veteran or military service member (and their family); must have a DD Form 214 or current Military ID; must have a need for simple, decent housing; must meet the income requirements for a house; must be able to pay a low-interest mortgage for the Habitat house; and must be willing to partner with Habitat in building the house. Any eligible military individual/family interested is highly encouraged to apply.

The 3-bedroom home is located at 171 Hubbard Street in Middlefield. It will be renovated to meet Energy Star standards. Renovations of the house will begin in late 2020, and Middlesex Habitat is now starting the selection process.

Middlesex Habitat for Humanity is taking on-site precautions to help reduce the spread of COVID-19. RSVPs are required and children should not attend. If you are ill or have or had a fever in the past 72 hours, or have traveled outside the state in the past 14 days, do not attend.

All guests must sign in; masks are required and hand sanitizer will be available throughout the facility. Attendees will be spaced for adequate social distancing. Application packets will be available for contactless pickup. Information shared at the meeting will be available online

For more information or to indicate who will be attending, individuals/families should call the Middlesex Habitat office at 860.398.6483 or email Maria Lopez at mlopez@habitatmiddlesex.org.
President Donald Trump made it official on Saturday: He wants Amy Coney Barrett to fill Ruth Bader Ginsburgs vacant Supreme Court seat. And he relishes the upcoming confirmation battle that could solidify the courts conservative leaning for decades to come.

Standing in the White House Rose Garden on an overcast but warm fall day, Trump formally announced the 48-year-old federal judge  a devout Catholic and mom to seven kids who has served on the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals since late 2017  as his third Supreme Court nominee in just under four years.

Trump vowed Barrett would help ensure "the survival of our Second Amendment, our religious liberty, our public safety and so much more," nodding to his law-and-order rhetoric of recent months.

We must preserve our precious heritage as a nation of laws," Trump added, "and there is no one better to do that than Amy Coney Barrett."

Barretts nomination has thrilled social conservatives and members of the Trump base, who admire her anti-abortion comments and strict views on the Constitution. Those same views have alarmed Democrats and progressives, who fear she will imperil abortion rights, voting rights and healthcare rights.

In her brief remarks, Barrett seemed to allude to those fears, even though there's little chance any Democrat  or progressive groups  will be won over to Barrett's nomination.

I will be mindful of who came before me," she said, referencing Ginsburg's recent passing. "Judges are not policymakers."

Inside the White House, Barrett had the support of both chief of staff Mark Meadows and top attorney Pat Cipollone, two key aides involved in the selection process. On Capitol Hill, she had the backing of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. She visited the White House twice this week and had positive meetings, cementing her frontrunner status  which was established nearly two years ago when she was a leading contender during the search that ended in Justice Brett Kavanaughs nomination.

Story continues

Even though White House aides spent the week drawing out the selection process, floating other names as a nod key voting blocs, the president made up his mind early. He didnt even meet with the other leading candidate, Barbara Lagoa, a judge on the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, while traveling in her home state of Florida this week.

If confirmed by the Senate, Barrett will replace Ginsburg, the longtime liberal justice who died just over a week ago. Her appointment would firmly tilt the court toward the right for the first time in decades, potentially altering the outcome of key upcoming court cases on issues like Obamacare, reproductive rights and even the presidential election.

It solidifies the conservative 6-3 majority, said Carl Tobias, a law professor and expert on federal judicial selection at the University of Richmond Law School. Chief Justice [John] Roberts will not be as central as he was last term. I do not see much hope for progressives in the short term.

Barring structural changes to the court, he added, the conservative majority could last for decades, or at least a decade.

Supporters of President Donald Trump hold up signs as he speaks at a campaign rally, Monday, Sept. 21, 2020, in Swanton, Ohio.

The journey to Barretts nomination can be traced back to her confirmation hearing in 2017 for her current appeals court post. During the hearing, California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, pressed Barrett about her Catholic faith  the dogma lives loudly within you, she said. Barrett told senators her religious beliefs would not affect her decisions.

The White House  and Trump  took notice, said several people familiar with the administrations selection process. Staffers got coffee mugs made with the phrase emblazoned on them. Barrett became a minor celebrity in the West Wing. Trump started asking others about her. While she wasnt picked in 2018, she remained front of mind for Trump, the people said.

Once Ginsburgs seat opened up, Trump quickly settled on Barrett. After his first meeting with her, she started filling out the appropriate paperwork, the people added. On Saturday, Trump touted the fact that, if confirmed, Barrett would be the first female justice with school-aged children.

What I saw at her 2017 confirmation hearing, and what I saw day in and day out when I clerked for her, is shes got incredible fortitude and poise, said John Adams, a former judicial law clerk for Barrett and attorney at Eimer Stahl LLP. She will handle this process very well.

Trump unfurled his choice with predictable pomp and circumstance that paid little heed to the ongoing pandemic. Most guests in the large crowd of roughly 150 were maskless, including Dr. Scott Atlas  one the presidents key coronavirus advisers on Covid  and seated right next to one another. American flags were draped along the colonnade of the Rose Garden. State flags lined the other side that opens to the White House lawn.

Coming just five weeks before Election Day, Barretts nomination will ignite the enthusiasm of voters on both the left and right. In less than 48 hours after Ginsburgs death, the liberal group ActBlue raised roughly $100 million dollars for Democratic candidates, while conservative groups  concerned with deregulation, social issues and abortion rights  prepared tens of millions of dollars in ad buys and grassroots efforts for a contentious confirmation battle.

We are all in for a seven-figure effort along the kind of lines we did with Kavanaugh and Gorsuch, said Tim Phillips, president of Americans for Prosperity, a Koch-backed group concerned with economic and fiscal issues, referencing Trumps other Supreme Court pick, Justice Neil Gorsuch. This is a huge moment for the country.

Trump's 2020 rival, Joe Biden, admonished Trump's choice shortly after the announcement. In a statement, Biden argued Barrett would erode healthcare protections legalized under Obamacare, such as guaranteeing access to insurance for people with preexisting medical conditions.

"The United States Constitution was designed to give the voters one chance to have their voice heard on who serves on the court," he said. "The Senate should not act on this vacancy until after the American people select their next president and the next Congress."

For Trump himself, aides hope Barrett will help strengthen his bond with evangelicals and Catholics; support among these groups had slipped during 2020. Trump cannot afford to alienate or lose any parts of his base during a tight election year in which polls show Biden slightly ahead in battleground states like Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.

Trump likes her conservative principles and values and I think he likes the fact that she makes all the conservatives very happy, said a second Republican close to the White House.

The confirmation process will now move to the Senate, where Cipollone and Meadows will help Barrett with the outreach to lawmakers. She is expected to start doing mock hearings soon to prepare for her confirmation hearings, just as Kavanaugh did. He held at least six prep sessions with different people playing different senators.

The Senate Judiciary Committee will hold its confirmation hearing the week of Oct. 12, likely spanning three to four days. Then, Senate Republicans are aiming to confirm the nominee before the election, although Democrats are doing everything they can to delay the process with procedural moves. Several Republican senators attended Saturday's ceremony, including Sens. Ben Sasse, Mike Lee, Thom Tillis, Josh Hawley and Kelly Loeffler. At one point, Trump said he expected a straightforward and prompt confirmation, before adding to the senators: Good luck.

I have no illusions that the road ahead of me will be easy, either for the short term or the long haul," Barrett conceded.

Immediately after the ceremony, reporters asked Meadows if he was confident Barrett would be confirmed before Election Day. Im not confident that  that would be a discussion for the senators, Meadows said.

An ABC/Washington Post poll released Friday showed the majority of Americans believe the Senate should not confirm a new justice until after the election, when the winner of the presidential race is clear. Only 38 percent of Americans surveyed said the confirmation should happen before Nov. 3.

But Republicans have opted to seize on a rare opportunity to seat another conservative jurist who could serve for decades  even if it means potentially suffering through political backlash or losing their thin Senate majority.

In 2016, President Barack Obama similarly tried to fill a Supreme Court vacancy during an election year only to be rebuffed by McConnell, who controlled the Senate majority and argued a new justice should only receive a vote after the presidential election.

That year, Obama officially nominated Merrick Garland, the chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, in mid-March. Many Republicans refused to even meet with him in person. McConnell held the seat open for months until he and Trump could confirm Gorsuch, causing many liberals to feel like the seat had been stolen.

For liberals, it was a reminder of the high political value of a Supreme Court seat  something Republicans zeroed in on decades ago after the Senate in 1987 declined to confirm Robert Bork, one of President Ronald Reagans judicial picks.

Now, McConnell and other key Republicans, including Senate Judiciary Chair Lindsey Graham, say the argument for waiting for the election results no longer applies because the same party controls both the Senate and White House.

The intense focus on the Supreme Court confirmation helps Trump in many ways, even if it lets Democrats cast Republicans as hypocrites for going back on their previous arguments and rushing an election-year confirmation process. To start, the unexpected battle will divert voters attention away from more negative headlines about issues potentially damaging to Trump, like the ongoing pandemic or his refusal to commit to a peaceful transfer of power. Democrats have tried to play up the idea that a conservative court will dismantle Obamacare for millions of Americans during a once-in-a-century pandemic.

Trump had been looking for weeks for a message to supplant the terrible headlines about this administrations handling of Covid-19, which has killed over 200,000 Americans. A confirmation battle and all of the controversy it generates fulfills that need and gives the White House another topic to focus on at fundraisers, campaign rallies and even the upcoming debate on Tuesday, Sept. 29.

Some judicial experts, like Tobias, argue there is not enough time this fall to confirm a judge who will serve on the highest court for decades.

You cant do it right in 30 days, Tobias said. I dont think hearings could be any shorter than four or five days. By rushing it, you risk not having the public buy-in on the process.

Daniel Lippman, Marianne LeVine and Meridith McGraw contributed to this report.
India and Japan have decided to join hands in technical development of 5G and 5G plus technologies with the help of other QUAD strategic dialogue membersUS and Australiaand Israel. The development of next generation telecommunications technologies will be discussed between QUAD Foreign Ministers in a meeting in Japan next month.

According to authoritative government sources, while India and Japan have decided to pitch in for 5G and plus technologies, India is also eyeing the 3GPP, umbrella mobile telecommunications standard organization, and has been successful in the global standards consortium to accept the first Indian rural standard for telecommunication. India along with its partners now will be setting more technological global standards. It is understood that majority of 3GPP standards have been set by the Chinese telecommunication development companies.

Also read: High-speed train, Quad figure in 1st call between Japans Suga, PM Modi

On Friday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke to newly appointed Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and the two decided to take the bilateral special strategic and global partnership to a new level. It is understood Prime Minister Suga told PM Modi that Japan wanted to push QUAD with other three partners and contribute to multilateral efforts for a free and open Indo-Pacific. Both India and Japan have been at the receiving end of Chinese aggression this year with a stand-off with Chinese Army in Ladakh and muscle flexing in Senkaku Islands.

India and Japan have agreed to closely cooperate and develop the 5G and advanced technologies with US and Australia ramping up technological support. We are also taking help from Israel. There are discussions on within the government and our 5G policy will take a final shape in the coming days. But Japan will be a close partner nevertheless, said an official involved in the exercise.

Also read: Japan announces emergency loan for India to fight Covid-19 pandemic

On September 10, India and Japan signed an acquisition and cross servicing agreement that allows the Japanese Self Defence Forces and the Indian Armed Forces to share supplies and transport duties. Indian and Japanese navies are currently exercising with the possibility of Australian Navy joining the QUAD exercise in November not ruled out. While Japan is still coming to terms with its legacy of the past century, the Chinese aggression over Senkaku Islands has forced Tokyo to increase its defence budget as the ruling party leaders are very vocal about defending the contested Islands from the PLA Navy.

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LONDON, UK / ACCESSWIRE / September 26, 2020 / Many candidates are facing poorer career prospects and are getting into jobs that are not related to the knowledge and skills they have acquired from their three or four years of study. Likewise, more and more people who have already started their careers are finding it challenging to advance in their chosen professions or even progress.

The reasons for these are varied, from fear of the unknown to lack of clear career goals. However, the biggest reason is that they do not have access to better advice that will help them define and improve their skills and attributes, and how they can use these to break into certain industries or move forward in their current roles. In such cases, people should actually consider an often underutilised tool for professional growth that can also power their way to a successful career: Mentorship.

The power of mentorship is a known fact in the world of work. Many employer organisations have found that having a well-run mentorship scheme has a positive impact in recruitment, retention and productivity of their staff. A lot of employees who have access to mentorship, on the other hand, reported greater career satisfaction and success, including promotions, raises and better job opportunities.

Although these outcomes are encouraging, one problem with the traditional model of mentorship is that it is not as accessible as training and other professional development programs. Aspiring mentees have to scour through their network to find the right persons, contact the persons they have in mind to ask them politely, and express their desire to be mentored. While this approach works, there are many instances when aspiring mentees get ignored. This is especially true for students, new graduates and young professionals.

Speedy Mentors strives to change this archaic approach to mentorship by bringing the function online and making it remote and flexible. Through their online platform, anyone can have access to a mentor in their desired sector or subject of interest. Interested candidates can view the profiles of different mentors to discover their areas of specialisation and the kind of support they can provide to mentees. From there, they can book a mentor and enter in a mentoring relationship which can either be long and structured or a one-time, focused engagement.

Speedy Mentors platform also offers one-on-one sessions between the mentor and mentee. Through this, mentees can ask questions, receive advice in settling in to a new role, gain deeper insights into a particular sector, or discuss their professional career and goals. Also, as everything takes place online, the mentorship itself can be done as and when both the mentor and mentee are available. They can continue with their existing commitments and set a mentoring schedule that works for both of them.

According to Janet Thomason, a representative for Speedy Mentors, "We understand how challenging it can be to find a mentor who is inclined to support another person's advancement. Not only are there a lot of things to be considered, the chances of getting ignored or rejected are so high because many aspiring mentees are not sure how to approach the people they look up to, resulting in their interactions starting on the wrong foot. By providing a platform where aspiring mentees can easily connect with experienced mentors from different professional backgrounds and are willing to commit their expertise, experiences, energy and time, young people now have a better way to seek and accept guidance, feedback and support. They can then use that to expand their capabilities, improve their professional development outcomes, and achieve their career goals."

Speedy Mentors offer several mentorship options for those interested to try their service. For those wanting comprehensive guidance and consistent level of support in specific challenges they are facing, they may opt for longer mentorships that can go for days, weeks or months. For those who want to receive immediate assistance for urgent professional development or career-related issues, they may settle with brief mentorship engagements that can last for 30 minutes to an hour or more.

Another great thing about the platform is that there is a wide variety of mentorship agendas to choose from. These include CV feedback, career planning and strategy development, work review, study plan development, and continued learning. With these options, mentees can explore different paths and perspectives that will allow them to quickly adapt and evolve to the situations they are in.

Speedy Mentors have other projects in the pipeline that are targeted to further assist candidates in their professional development and career progression. One of these is the addition of interview preparation programs, which they are planning to launch later next year. "These programs are meant to help candidates break into jobs in top companies like Facebook, Google, Amazon, JP Morgan and more. We are planning for these programs to be a complete package. The bottom line is for these programs to help candidates become qualified for roles in the aforesaid progressive companies and enable them to overcome the challenges they could face during the recruitment process.

Mentorship is one of the best solutions to help people navigate their professional development and career advancement more effectively. Through Speedy Mentors' platform and support, it is now easier for them to make connections with industry professionals and build mentoring relationships that can deliver rewarding outcomes and potentially career-changing experiences.

Concerned Person Name: Ellen Davis

Company: Speedy Mentors

Website: https://www.speedymentors.com

Official Email: info@speedymentors.com

SOURCE: Speedy Mentors

View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/607932/Speedy-Mentors-Connects-candidates-with-Mentors-of-Various-Professional-Backgrounds-to-Help-Grow-Their-Job-Skills-and-Career-Prospects
Sri Lankan Navy boat sprays water on New Diamond after fire broke out off east coast of Sri Lanka

By Waruna Karunatilake and Nidhi Verma

COLOMBO/NEW DELHI (Reuters) - The owners of the New Diamond supertanker which caught fire with a cargo of two million barrels of oil aboard has agreed to pay 340 million rupees ($1.84 million) to Sri Lanka for its help in extinguishing the blaze and averting disaster.

The interim claim is for services provided by the Sri Lankan navy, air force, ports authority and Marine Environment Protection Authority (MEPA) after the fire on Sept. 3 until Sept 15, said Nishara Jayaratne, coordination officer of Sri Lanka's Attorney General.

Insurers of the vessel West of England will settle the bill, MEPA Chairperson Dharshani Lahandapura said.

The New Diamond, loaded with Kuwaiti oil, is chartered by Indian Oil Corp and is currently 66 nautical miles (122 kilometres) from Batticaloa on Sri Lanka's east coast.

MEPA has allowed the release of 20 crew members while one injured sailor is undergoing treatment in a private hospital in Sri Lanka, Lahandapura said.

The captain has not been allowed to leave the country as he is going through legal proceedings, she said.

Greece-based Porto Emporios Shipping Inc is the registered owner of the 20-year old Panama-flagged very large crude carrier, Refinitiv data showed.

Lahandapura said the interim claim does not include damages for the spill of marine oil. While it did leak fuel, its crude oil cargo remained intact.

The ship's managers, New Shipping Ltd, have appointed SMIT Singapore Pte Ltd to lead salvage operations.

(Reporting by Nidhi Verma; editing by Jason Neely)
New Zealands prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, has paid tribute to the police officer who was shot dead by a handcuffed suspect in Croydon.

Matiu Ratana, a 54-year-old sergeant, was originally from New Zealand, where he had served as a police officer after joining the force in 1991.

A friend told how Sergeant Ratana had moved to the south London custody suite, where he was killed on Friday, in order to be safer as he approached retirement.

Incredibly sad to hear news this morning that a Metropolitan Police officer killed in the UK was Matiu Ratana, a former New Zealand Police officer, Ms Ardern wrote on Facebook.

Sergeant Ratana worked in Auckland City and Counties Manukau until 2008, before returning to the UK. To all Matius whanau [extended family] across the world, we share your sorrow and have all our condolences.

His friend Neil Donohue described him as the nicest, most generous man you could meet, adding that he was just a really, genuinely nice guy.

Speaking of Sgt Ratanas move to custody work, he said: He thought it was his safest option just to see him through to his retirement and no one expected this to happen  certainly not within the police cells.

Describing his death as devastating, Sgt Ratanas partners sister told The Sun: He was dedicated to being a police officer and had almost 30 years of service. He knew the dangers of working in London, but for him it was all part of the job.

Alongside the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, the Metropolitan Police commissioner, Dame Cressida Dick, led police officers across the capital in a minutes silence on Friday.

Describing Sgt Ratana as a talented police officer, Dame Cressida said that he was big in stature, big in heart, friendly, capable, a lovely man and highly respected by his colleagues, and leaves behind a partner and adult son.

The 23-year-old suspect had been arrested during a stop and search for possession of class B drugs with intent to supply and possession of ammunition.

He was handcuffed behind his back, taken into the police station and sat in a holding area in the custody suite, the police watchdog said. He then opened fire while still in handcuffs as officers prepared to search him with a metal detector.

He also shot himself during the incident at about 2.15am and is in a critical but stable condition in hospital.

Investigations are continuing into how the suspect, who had been detained for possession of ammunition and possession of class B drugs, was able to access the weapon.

No police firearms were fired and the case is not being treated as terrorism-related.

While the suspect was reportedly not regarded by security services as a subject of interest, reports suggest he may have previously been referred to the anti-extremism Prevent programme.

A murder inquiry has been launched and investigators from the Independent Office for Police Conduct attended the scene.

The watchdog has obtained CCTV from the custody centre as well as body-worn video footage from the officers present, which will be reviewed in the coming days.

The sergeant is the seventeenth police officer to be fatally shot in the UK since the Second World War, and the first to be murdered with a firearm in the line of duty since PCs Fiona Bone and Nicola Hughes in September 2012.

Former Met superintendent Leroy Logan said there were questions to be answered around the circumstances that led to the shooting.

How did that person come to be in the station, whether it's in the yard or the building itself, and be able to produce a weapon, whether it's on them at the time? he said on BBC News.

Meanwhile, Andy Trotter, former deputy assistant commissioner of the Met and also a former chief constable of British Transport Police, said that increasing sentence lengths was not enough to prevent crime against emergency workers.

We are increasingly becoming a very difficult society to police, he told Times Radio.

We need to look right across the board on this, and just saying we're going to put the sentences up will not solve that. It's got to be about prevention and detection, and much more than just that.

Additional reporting by PA
Banjul, Gambia (PANA) - After a six-month hiatus due to COVID-19 border closures, Gambia's office of the International Organization for Migration (IOM) has resumed its Assisted Voluntary Return and Reintegration (AVRR) programme from Niger to Gambia, with the support of the European Union
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If theres one thing we can agree on, it is that Breonna Taylors death is a terrible tragedy. No one with a working heart and functioning brain will deny that. But who is to blame for her death? Were the police at fault? Was her boyfriend at fault? Is the legal system at fault? And how should the public respond to the verdict of the grand jury?

Reading the various accounts of the shooting, this seems to be the most reliable narrative.

1) Three Louisville, Kentucky policemen were issued a warrant to search an apartment for drugs in the middle of the night.

2) They knocked at the door of Breonna Taylors apartment around 12:40 AM.

3) Kenneth Walker, Breonnas boyfriend, says he heard the knock, asked loudly who was there (as did Taylor), but got no response.

4) The police claim to have identified themselves, but either way, we know they knocked on the door and, when they heard no response, they broke in using a battering ram.

5) As the police broke in, Walker fired once, as Taylor stood next to him. (According to her attorneys, she was shot in the hallway, not asleep in bed.)

6) Walkers shot hit one of the officers. The others responded with a hail of bullets, resulting in Taylors death, with the fatal bullet allegedly killing her within two minutes.

7) Since charges against Walker for attempted murder of a police officer were dropped, we believe his report that he was not aware they were police.

8) The grand jury found none of the officers guilty in the shooting of Taylor but did find one officer (whose bullet did not kill her) guilty of shooting recklessly into neighboring apartments. This officer was subsequently fired.

9) Prior to the grand jurys announcement on Wednesday, the city granted Taylors family 12 million dollars for her wrongful death.

How, then, do we sort out this painful, deadly story?

First, Breonna Taylor should not be dead. Let us not forget that for one moment. This has been acknowledged by the citys wrongful death settlement.

As reported by ABC News, Mayor Greg Fischer said that in addition to the monetary settlement, the largest in a police use-of-force case in Louisville history, the city will implement a series of police department reforms to prevent a tragedy like this from ever happening again.

Second, although the warrant was legally executed, critics have claimed that other factors were involved, including a move towards the gentrification of the neighborhood. According to Appeal.com, Whatever the truth in this case, academic research and historical scholarship show that policing can be particularly intense during the process of gentrification. This research suggests that the continued use of police to pursue economic development will most likely result in more needless stops, arrests, and deaths like Breonna Taylors.

This, then, is another question to be sorted out by others with detailed and factual knowledge. But it is understandable that many in the Black community will question the legitimacy of the warrant in the first place.

Third, when it comes to Kenneth Walker, what would you expect him to do? He hears a knock at the door in the middle of the night. He has no idea who is there. The next thing he knows, the door has been broken down and armed men burst in. He shoots at them to protect himself and his girlfriend.

Again, the fact that all charges against him were dropped indicates that his account was believed: he did not know he was shooting at police officers executing a search warrant. Should he be faulted? No.

Fourth, when it comes to the police, what would you expect them to do? They are looking for drugs and might encounter an armed drug dealer. They knock on the door, no one answers, so they break in, as per their warrant. The next thing they know, a shot is fired and one of them is hit. They respond with deadly force  and again, this is taking place in the middle of the night.

Should they be faulted? Obviously, some fault was found by the grand jury, but not in the killing of Taylor. She was an innocent victim in a case of mistaken identity on both sides, and there is no indication that the police were targeting an unarmed black woman.

As for the police, what else are they trained to do when shot at and wounded? Of course they shot back multiple times.

Fifth, when it comes to the grand jury, based on the evidence they had, they had no reason to charge the officers in Taylors death. Again, she was the innocent victim caught in a deadly crossfire between mistaken combatants.

Sixth, when it comes to the Black community, it is totally understandable that many would say, Here we go again! An unarmed Black person is killed in the middle of the night in the privacy of her own home, a woman with no criminal record. The system has failed us once more.

The fact that Louisville already paid out 12 million dollars in a wrongful death suit is bound to raise eyebrows. Why a monetary payment for wrongful death yet no criminal charges for wrongful death?

All this being said, violent riots, including shooting of police, are both unjustified and unproductive, even if some of the rage is understandable.

But I ask, again, once the warrant was issued, who was at fault? I dont see how Walker can be blamed for firing first. What would all the Second Amendment supporters say? I dont see how the police can be blamed for firing back. And I dont see how the grand jury can be blamed for reaching their verdict, based on the evidence presented, which found only the officer who had already been fired guilty.

Yet, before the grand jurys decision was announced, there was little question that no one would be satisfied with the outcome. Whatever the verdict, there would be fierce criticism from one side or the other. Thats why the city braced itself in advance.

Unfortunately, nothing can bring back Breonna Taylor, and the monetary payment to the family is a small consolation for her loss.

But that doesnt mean there are no flaws in the system and that no deeper questions should be asked.

We all agree that drugs and drug dealing are a terrible bane on our society, resulting in countless casualties every year. That means that routing out drug dealers is both necessary and good. And police officers put their own lives at risk in the process.

But is there a way to do this that will not put other, innocent lives at risk? Are there police reforms that can be implemented, as per the mayor?

Those are the questions we should be asking. Burning down another city or targeting police officers for death or engaging in angry, hate-filled rhetoric are evil themselves and will solve nothing.

So, what will it be? Will we continue to collapse into social anarchy? Or will we work together across racial and political lines to build a more perfect union?
When Linda Spangler asked her mother, in a video chat, what she would like as gift for her 92nd birthday, the response came promptly.

Id like a dog, Charlene Spangler said. Is Wolfgang dead? Wolfgang, a family dachshund, had indeed died long ago; so had all his successors. Ms. Spangler, who lives in a dementia care facility in Oakland, Calif., has trouble recalling such history.

Her daughter, a doctor, considered the request. Before visitors were barred from the residence because of the Covid-19 pandemic, Dr. Spangler had seen her mother every other day, often taking her to Lake Merritt in her wheelchair to see the ducks and to pat passing dogs.

In her facility, Charlene Spangler had eaten meals with several other residents, joined art classes and listened to visiting musicians.
Anthony Hopkins has admitted he's 'at peace' with his eventual death as he described life as a 'terminal condition' which brings a 'tremendous freedom.'

The veteran actor, 82, described how he has accepted that his eventual passing is 'inevitable' because there is 'nothing' he can 'do about it'.

Sir Anthony, who lives in Los Angeles, spoke about the subject as he prepares to star as a dementia sufferer in The Father which is set for release in January, marking his 60-year career on the big screen.

Open: Anthony Hopkins, 82, has revealed that there is a 'wonderful peacefulness' to death after describing how 'life' is a 'terminal condition' which brings a 'tremendous freedom'

Speaking to The Mirror, the Oscar-winning actor said: 'Your life is terminal. It's a terminal condition, you're not going to get off the planet alive.

'With that reality there's a tremendous freedom, a wonderful peacefulness about it.'

The actor made his debut role in the 1960 series A Matter Of Degree before landing his most iconic role as Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs in 1991.

Star: Sir Anthony, who lives in Los Angeles, stars as a dementia sufferer in The Father which is set for release in January marking his 60-year career on the big screen

Sir Anthony also portrayed Pope Benedict XVI in Netflix film, The Two Popes, in 2019 which received Golden Globe, Academy Award and BAFTA nominations.

The actor, who has one daughter, Abigail, 52, at one point revealed he had not spoken to her for 20 years.

He also described how he still feels 'slightly embarrassed' when he sees men 'cry' but gets 'tearful' at the T.S. Elliot poem - The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.

Role: Sir Anthony portrayed Pope Benedict XVI in Netflix film, The Two Popes, in 2019 which received Golden Globe, Academy Award and BAFTA nominations

Earlier this year Sir Anthony thanked his fans for their well-wishes as he gave an update after reaching day 10 of his voluntary isolation in March.

The actor revealed in an Instagram video that he'd been painting to pass the time, showcasing his impressive artwork as he did so.

Looking cheerful in a sky blue shirt and dark trousers, the Silence of the Lambs star addressed the camera as he revealed what he's been up to while remaining in his home.

He said: 'Hello everyone, well thank you for your generous compliments and well-wishes. As you see I'm in self-quarantine, I'm 82 years of age I've found lots of things to do.'

Keeping busy: He revealed in an Instagram video in March that he'd been painting to pass the time, showcasing his impressive artwork as he did so

Addressing his pet cat, he continued: 'For example, I played the piano for Niblo, he's busy at the moment, he's writing his memoirs!'

The star then went on to reveal one of the many activities he's been doing while in isolation, adding: 'I've also been painting, these are my latest paintings, just for the fun of it. I'm afraid Niblo does not really approve of my work, I think he's probably a better painter than me.'

A representative for the Oscar Winner told Page Six at the time that he was well and opted to enter a 'totally voluntary and preventative' self-isolation.

His wife Stella also confirmed that the star was still feeling well and that he has been staying at home with their cat 'painting, playing the piano and reading.'

MailOnline has contacted representatives for Anthony Hopkins for further comment.
A group calling itself Western Togoland Restoration Front (WTRF), the political wing of Homeland Study Group Foundation seeking independence from Ghana, in the early hours of Friday mounted roadblocks in a protest to demand Volta Region as a sovereign state.



The group burnt lorry tyres on the ECOWAS road at Tademe, some kilometres away from the Sogakope Bridge in the South Tongu District impeding vehicular movement.



An unidentified member of the group, who spoke to the Ghana News Agency (GNA) around 0556 hours on Friday the secessionist, who answered the call from the Chief Superintendent, Mr Dennis Fiakpui, the Sogakope Divisional Commanders phone said they had in their custody about three police officers including the one to which this phone belongs.



He stressed that the group meant the Western Togoland business and would not subdue any power.

In a press release purported to be coming from the secessionists earlier and titled, The State of Western Togoland Has Peaked the Consolidation Phase of Its Statehood the roadblocks were meant to assert the sovereignty of the southern sector.



The release among others demanded that Ghanas agreement to come to the negotiation table, an end to all political activities in the area and a 24-hour ultimatum for Ghanaian security agencies to leave Western Togoland.



All political activities within the new State are banned with immediate effect. Certain Radio stations are temporarily designated Western Togoland (WTL) State Radios till further notice, and all Media Houses within WTL are to focus their programming predominantly on WTL issues until further notice.



All Ghanaian security forces are ordered out of WTL within 24 hours and must not take any weapons or ammunition along with them. All detainees of Western Togoland independence struggle are ordered to be released immediately and all court proceedings relating to that are ordered terminated with immediate effect.



GNA sources in the area said the roadblocks however, had been removed following subsequent involvement of other security agencies

.

The secessionists have for years been advocating the independence of some parts of the country made up of the Volta Region, Oti Region and North East Region to be declared Western Togoland State.

Source: GNA









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Mthawira Catholic Parish, in the Archdiocese of Blantyre, Malawi, has crowned a group of young people under the Young Christian Workers (YCW) for toping contributions at parish fundraising event.

Luke Bisani  Blantyre, Malawi

The young people, members of the YCW at Mthawira Christ the King parish, led with the most contributions by collectively donating US$750. The Mthawira YCW actually comprises less than thirty active members.

The parish of Mthawira organised the event to raise funds for the completion of a security fence around the Church land. The parish also has plans to purchase a minibus. In all, the parish event raised US$ 6,533 from contributions of parish groups and Small Christian Communities.

Young people inspired by YCWs See, Judge and Act

Chairperson of the Mthawira Church Council, Gracian Tukula commended parishioners and in a special way the young people of the parish YCW. He praised the generosity and sense of responsibility demonstrated by the young people. He said they were pillars of the Catholic Church of the future.

Last year, they invited me to attend their end of year party and I honoured the invitation where I challenged them to do more in supporting the Church; that they should not look down upon themselves. Here they are, they have carried the day, said Tukula.

Tukula also challenged other Church groups under Mthawira Catholic Church to follow the good example set by parish YCW.

Leader of Mthawira YCW, Edgar Nyirenda, said their contribution to the fundraising drive was guided by the YCW motto that challenges them to See, Judge and Act.

When our leaders made an appeal to everyone in the Church to contribute generously, we saw it worthy to support the Church and the purpose of the event justified the judgement to support the Church hence the act, said Nyirenda.

A generous donation

In the context of Malawi, both the parish fundraising event and the generosity of the parish YCW are remarkable given that Malawi remains one of the poorest countries in the world. A 31 July 2020 World Bank Report noted that Malawi has recently posted significant economic and structural reforms to sustain economic growth. The economy is heavily dependent on agriculture, employing nearly 80% of the population. The country is also vulnerable to external shocks, particularly climatic disasters that range from drought, flooding and recently Cyclones. Apart from the weather, the COVID-19 pandemic has further negatively impacted economic growth.

(Amecea News)
FAIRFIELD  A Westport man was charged after he showed up at the front door of the Fairfield Democratic Town Committee office allegedly yelling profanities and insults at volunteers inside.

Michael Silverstein, 61, of Bayberry Lane, was issued a summons for breach of peace after the 4 p.m. Friday incident at the DTC office, 1 Sasco Hill Road.

One of the volunteer workers within the DTC offered to help the man. The man became confrontational, which caused the volunteer worker to take out their cell phone in an attempt to record the incident, said Fairfield Police Lt. Antonio Granata.

The male continued yelling profanities and then knocked the phone out of the volunteers hand, Granata said. The man left the scene in a vehicle prior to officers arriving. The license plate of the vehicle was provided to officers. The vehicle came back registered to an owner in Westport.

Police identified the man as Michael Silverstein of Bayberry Lane.

Silverstein confirmed he was at the DTC and had an altercation with one of the workers there, Granata said.

Reached Saturday, Silverstein, a supporter of President Donald Trump, said, I let my emotions get the best of me. I wish I didnt do it. Im better than that.

While he did say that he did terrorize and curse them out, he never made any threats.

The situation escalated quickly. I screamed and yelled, but I never touched (the volunteer worker), he said.

Silverstein alleged over the past four years, Trump supporters on a daily basis have been attacked, harassed and threatened. Im fed up. He criticized the mainstream media, liberals, the radical left and Marxists for criticizing Trump and his supporters.

Silverstein, a chiropractor, said when he saw all the Biden/Harris signs outside the DTC headquarters, he felt compelled to speak his mind.

The Fairfield Democrats on their Facebook page, posted We are grateful that all our volunteers, though shaken, are safe following this extremely upsetting event. This is exactly the kind of malicious behavior that is enabled and recklessly encouraged by our current president on a regular basis. And when our countrys leaders do not push back against Trumps incitements, this hateful conduct only gains more momentum.

We need leaders  here and across the country  who will stand up and state unequivocally: THIS. IS. NOT. ACCEPTABLE. Not here in Fairfield, not in Connecticut, not anywhere.
ANKARA: Turkey has been experiencing a deepening human rights crisis since President Recep Tayyip Erdogan took power. Recent actions of Turkey, both in the realm of domestic policy and foreign policy, have caught the attention of the world. Turkey, under the despotic rule of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, is witnessing a deplorable human rights situation, fraught with issues like mass state surveillance.

A number of countries and their leaders have come forward and condemned Turkish military offensive in Syria, and various human rights organizations have documented the human rights violations taking place under Erdogan. Of all the human rights violations taking place in Turkey, the violation of the basic freedom of expression and assembly has been the most visible.

In order to bring attention to these violations and regressive policies being taken up by Tayyip Erdogan in Turkey, Red Lantern Analytica, has written a letter to the UN High Commission for Human Rights.

In an era of realpolitik, we are witnessing the rise of countries that have been displaying expansionist and oppressive policies under the garb of democracy. These policies and consequent actions are aimed at undermining the fundamental principles of democracy and human rights. Countries like China, which are now being considered as rising superpowers, are at the forefront of such blatant human rights violations. But another country committing such human rights violations is Turkey," stated Red Lantern Analytica.

Turkey's blatant disregard for international agreements and multilateral organizations is a precursor to establishing a dictatorship under the garb of democracy. One might even argue that the human rights situation in Turkey is far worse than in China.

In 2019, world leaders from different countries joined each other in condemning Turkeys aggressive military offensive in Syria, including the European Union, the Arab League, Britain, Israel, Iran and Australia. The European Union criticized the human rights situation in Turkey this year.

This year itself, Human Rights Watch (HRW) stated that the UN Periodic Review, slated for this year, should address the sharp decline of rights in Turkey. Moreover, the UN Rights Chief has also urged Turkey to investigate possible war crimes in Syria. The Associated Press also reported that Turkey violated the international arms embargo imposed on Libya, the letter added.

This is not the first time that Turkey's President Erdogan has been accused of human rights abuses , a report published this year by Human Rights Watch, also expressing concern over the ever - increasing incidents in Turkey.

"Authorities continue to block websites and order the removal of online content while thousands of people in Turkey face criminal investigations, prosecutions, and convictions for their social media posts. There has been a dramatic rise in the number of prosecutions and convictions on charges of 'insulting the president' since Erdogans first election as president in 2014. Wikipedia remains blocked in Turkey since April 2017," according to a Human Rights Watch report published this year.

State surveillance is the key aspect of human rights violations taking place in Turkey today. It can be considered the umbrella human rights violation, under which score of human rights violations are taking place. Ultimately, it is leading to erosion of the fundamental right of Turkish citizens- freedom of speech and expression.

The decision of establishing the New police unit has led to intense pushback from the opposition parties. Former Prime Minister and leader of the Future Party Ahmet Davutoglu took on Erdogan and criticised Erdogan's move of directly controlling law and order in Istanbul. Similarly, Republican People's Party (CHP) leader Sezgin Tanrikulu moved a motion in the Turkish parliament questioning the move.

"Why is there a need to establish a unit in the General Directorate of Security, apart from the supervision of the governorship, within the body of the General Directorate of Security and directly in contact with the President. Who will supervise a power that is not under the control of the governors, and who will respond to the wrong practices of that power," Ahmet Davutoglu statement published on en24news.

The civil society and academicians have also begun to raise their voice opposing the dictatorial move of Erdogan, undermining the Turkish democracy. Prominent academician Mehmet Koksal argued that the new police unit shall be problematic as it would be directly controlled by the President and compared the new unit with Schutzstaffel force created by Hitler in Nazi Germany. Further, Turkish Bar Association Vice President Huseyin Ozbek argued that such a force under direct control of one person shall further lead to unlawful actions.

"This is a very dangerous development. This is how the SS (Schutzstaffel) police force was formed during the era of Hitler in Germany," Koksal said.
Two men have been arrested after a man was brutally stabbed to death in a suspected road rage incident in Sydney's west.

Ambulance crews and police discovered a 23-year-old man with stab wounds at Bunyarra Reserve on Russell Street, Emu Plains, on Thursday.

Paramedics attempted to treat his injuries though the man died at the scene.

A crashed car was also found nearby.

Ambulance crews and police discovered a 23-year-old man (pictured) with stab wounds at Bunyarra Reserve on Russell Street, Emu Plains, on Thursday

Paramedics attempted to treat his injuries though the man died at the scene (pictured, police and ambulance crew at the scene on Thursday)

Police arrested a 26-year-old man at a McCauley Crescent home, in Emu Plains, and a 22-year-old man at a Monica Avenue home, in Hassall Grove, on Friday.

They will allege both men gave police false and misleading information about the events leading up to the 23-year-old man's death.

Both men have been charged with concealing information about a serious indictable offence and hindering an investigation into a serious indictable offence.

They were refused bail and will front Parramatta Bail Court on Saturday.
Safe-living measures at Westlite Woodlands Dormitory. (PHOTO: Ministry of Manpower)

SINGAPORE  Migrant workers in dormitories may now be quarantined by levels or sections instead of entire blocks, following a review of the quarantine approach to minimise work disruption due to new COVID-19 infections.

In a joint media release on Friday (25 September), the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) and Ministry of Health (MOH) added that, in view of latest medical evidence, migrant workers who have recovered from COVID-19 and are within 150 days from their infection will not be quarantined, as they continue to have antibodies to guard against reinfection.

These changes come after a review of the results for more than 31 purpose-built dormitories, 20 decant sites, as well as 107 factory-converted dormitories and construction temporary quarters, and the outcomes following the imposition of quarantine.

The ministries also took into account that many dormitories have since implemented tighter safe living measures to limit inter-mixing between residents.

For workers to be quarantined by levels or sections, the dormitory must have no inter-mixing among workers; the workers must also observe safe-living measures, and segregation measures must be put in place by dormitory operators.

One such dormitory is the Westlite Woodlands dormitory. Following detection of a new infection through rostered routine testing (RRT), only 68 workers were quarantined on one level, instead of all 318 workers in the affected block.

This is because proper safe living measures were in place to ensure segregation, such that the remaining six levels were not affected.

232 new COVID-19 cases since 11 August

According to the media release, 232 new COVID-19 cases were detected through RRT since all dormitories were declared clear of the coronavirus on 11 August.

MOM and MOH said that, whenever a new case was discovered, the initial strategy was to quickly ring-fence the other workers living in the same dormitory block, and to test and isolate them to prevent further spread.

Story continues

Under the original measures, workers in the same block would be quarantined if they were not previously infected, or if 120 days have passed since their previous infection.

The Assurance, Care and Engagement Group (ACE Group), the MOM division in charge of dormitory COVID-19 operations, said it would continue to refine its quarantine strategy as advised by MOH, and based on the latest knowledge, on how transmission spread occurs in dormitory clusters, the specific risks in individual dormitories, and the susceptibility of recovered workers to reinfection.

It also urges dormitory operators to sustain the safe-living measures, workers to continue complying with the measures and remain within their residential zone, and employers to ensure their workers to adhere to the measures as well as undergo RRT consistently.

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re: The MG Gloster, now launched at Rs 28.98 lakh Such an amazing launch video. Instead of having media personalities/ famous car people launch the car, two of the top CXOs of MG driving and launching the car was really different. Also not to mention, staying true to the new normal, there was no stage/ crowd gathered and the launch video was very informative and interactive. Feature, size and capability wise, the Gloster seems to be a great car. Hope they play good with the pricing too.



The whole video seems to bet big on the following

1. British heritage (though we know the truth)

2. The twin turbo diesel engine (a lost opportunity for the Endeavour?)

3. ADAS

4. Offroad capability

5. Well appointed interiors (including a usable third row).



Also, the launch video started right on time. A recent "much anticipated" SUV launch on August 15th made us all wait for 15 - 20 minutes.



In the entire launch, I was not able to associate the product with the "Selfless" tag and using the word "Driven" multiple times with Autonomous Level 1 seemed a bit of an overkill. Last edited by NTO : 24th September 2020 at 12:03 .
A man was killed after crashing into a utility pole in Newark early Saturday morning, authorities said.

At around 12:30 a.m. Saturday, a man died when he drove his car into a utility pole at Hawthorne Avenue and Irvine Turner Boulevard, said Kathy Carter, spokeswoman for the Essex County Prosecutors Office. The fatal collision only involved one car, she said.

As of Saturday afternoon, the mans name was not released and no further details were available.

Thank you for relying on us to provide the journalism you can trust. Please consider supporting NJ.com with a voluntary subscription.

Rodrigo Torrejon may be reached at rtorrejon@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @rodrigotorrejon.
A man was killed in firing during the violent protest in Rajasthans Dungarpur where tensions escalated further on Saturday evening forcing the state government to rush three senior police officers to the district to control the situation.

Earlier in the day, candidates of a teacher recruitment exam confronted police and indulged in arson while a delegation of theirs met Tribal Area Development Minister Arjun Singh Bamniya in Udaipur.

While the meeting was going on, the protesters confronted the police again in the evening following which police opened fire to control the situation. However, police said it was not confirmed whether the man was killed in police firing or was hit by one of the bullets fired by the agitators.

Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot chaired a high-level review meeting in the evening and held discussions with education minister Govind Singh Dotasra and senior police officers.

To restore the law and order situation, DG (crime) ML Lather, ADG ACB Dinesh MN, Jaipur police commissioner Anand Srivastava and other senior officers have been sent to Dungarpur by helicopter at night, an official release said.

The chief minister once again appealed to the agitators to end the violence and said the government is ready to meet all the legitimate demands of any section of the society, the release said.

Governor Kalraj Mishra spoke to Gehlot on phone in Jaipur and called principal secretary (home) Abhay Kumar and ADG (law and order) Saurabh Srivastava at Raj Bhawan and directed them to control the situation, it said.

Meanwhile, the agitators pelted stones at police, torched a few other vehicles and continued to hold control over nearly 25 km stretch of the highway.

On direction of the chief minister, Bamniya, former Udaipur MP Raghuveer Meena and other public representatives of Dungarpur district met a delegation of agitating candidates to resolve the matter. The meeting lasted for nearly three hours at the residence of Meena in Parsad, Udaipur, which is nearly 60 km from the violence hit area.

We have appealed to the agitators to end the violence while assuring them that the government will do what is legitimate to meet their demand. The meeting was held in a positive manner, Meena told PTI.

Bamniya, Bhartiya Tribal Party (BTP) MLAs Rajkumar Roat and Ramprasad, Congress MLA Ganesh Ghogra, former MP Tarachand Bhagora, some advocates and members of the delegation of the agitating candidates were present in the meeting.

The protest was initially held by the candidates but we have reports that police and administration officials targeted local villagers and arrested them which intensified the violence and now it has become villagers versus police and administration there, Roat said. He said that the governments priority is to control the situation first.

After the meeting, Roat and Meena left for Kherwara in Dungarpur to convince the agitators. Meanwhile, fresh incidents of stone pelting and arson occurred on the highway while few more vehicles were torched on Saturday, police control room said.

Violence erupted on Thursday when the candidates of teachers recruitment examination-2018 blocked the Udaipur-Ahmedabad highway, pelted stones at police, damaged several properties and torched vehicles demanding filling of 1,167 general vacant posts with ST candidates. The violence continued on Friday and incidents occurred on Saturday as well.

IG Udaipur range Binita Thakur said that additional police forces have been deployed in the area and efforts are being made to restore the situation. Another police officer said that nearly 25 km of the highway is blocked.

The highway is blocked from Ratanpur to Khariwara. Once the situation is under complete control, traffic will be resumed on the highway, he said. The candidates have torched nearly 25 vehicles including buses, vandalised a petrol pump, hotel and other properties since Thursday.

The vehicle of SP Dungarpur was also torched on Thursday.

Thirty-five policemen including additional SP and deputy SP were injured in the stone pelting incident on Thursday.

The police have so far arrested 30 people in connection with the violence while mobile internet services have been suspended in the affected area in view of the tension.

Gehlot had on Friday appealed to the agitators to stop the violence and also held discussion with public representatives of Dungarpur with regard to the situation.
If Northam was right, why would it be late September and local governments have heard little to nothing about the states financial game plan? Why has it taken so long to develop a budget? How long will the discussion last? Will this be known as the endless session?

In a statement released Friday, House Speaker Eileen Filler-Corn, D-Fairfax, and House Appropriations Chairman Luke Torian, D-Prince William, said the House budget proposal will protect Virginias prized Triple-A bond rating under a diminished revenue reforecast. We hope so. Lawmakers need to exercise prudence during this time of economic uncertainty, and not take actions that would jeopardize the states financial standing.

To say its been an unusual session is an understatement.

In the past, special sessions were convened with a narrow focus and took place over a much shorter time frame, typically several days or weeks. The July 2019 gun-related session lasted roughly 90 minutes as Republicans, who then controlled the assembly, quickly shut down debate over potential safety measures sought by Democrats.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday questioned for how long will India, the world's largest democracy and home to 1.3 billion people, be kept out of the decision-making structures of the United Nations, asserting that reform in the responses, processes and in the very character of the global body is the "need of the hour."

In his pre-recorded video statement to the landmark General Debate of the 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly, Modi said the stability in the United Nations and empowerment of the world body are essential for the welfare of the world.

The prime minister's strong push for UN reforms and the much-delayed expansion of the powerful Security Council came as India will begin its two-year term as an elected non-permanent member of the 15-member Council from January 1 next year.

"For how long will India be kept out of the decision-making structures of the United Nations? How long would a country have to wait particularly when the transformational changes happening in that country affect a large part of the world?" Modi asked.

He said that while it is a fact that the faith and respect that the United Nations enjoys among the 1.3 billion people in India is "unparalleled", it is also true that the people of India have been waiting for a long time for the process for the reforms of the United Nations to get completed.

"Today, people of India are concerned whether this reform-process will ever reach its logical conclusion," he said, adding that every Indian today, while seeing the contribution of India in the world organisation, aspires for India's expanded role in the United Nations.



"Reform in the responses, in the processes, and in the very character of the United Nations is the need of the hour," he emphasised.

India has been spearheading decades-long efforts to reform the Security Council, saying a structure set up in 1945 does not reflect contemporary realities of the 21st Century and is ill-equipped to handle current challenges.



There is widespread support, including by four out of the five permanent members of the Security Council - US, UK, France and Russia -- for a permanent seat for India at the Council.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi also raised questions on the response of the United Nations in combating the COVID-19 pandemic, and assured the global community that India will use its production and delivery capacity to help all humanity in fighting the deadly disease.

"Over the last 8 to 9 months, the whole world has been battling the pandemic of the coronavirus. Where is the United Nations in this joint fight against the pandemic? Where is its effective response?" Modi said as he asserted that reform in the responses, in the processes, and in the very character of the United Nations is the need of the hour.

Prime Minister Modi said that even during these very difficult times of the raging pandemic, India's pharmaceutical industry has sent essential medicines to over 150 countries.

"As the largest vaccine producing country of the world, I want to give one more assurance to the global community today. India's vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis," Modi said in a strong assurance to the international community that is battling the devastating coronavirus pandemic.

The COVID-19 pandemic has so far infected over 32 million people and more than 993,500 people have died across the world. In India, the deadly virus has infected nearly 6 million people and killed more than 93,000.

The prime minister's remarks questioning the UN's effectiveness in combating the pandemic came amidst the strident criticism of the role played by the World Health Organisation by United States President Donald Trump, who this week alleged that the top world health body was virtually controlled by China.

Trump has repeatedly blamed China for the coronavirus pandemic which originated in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in December last year and accused Beijing of suppressing the details of the deadly contagion.

Modi told the 193-member UN General Assembly that in India and the neighbourhood, "we are moving ahead with phase 3 clinical trials in India".

He further assured that India will also help all the countries in enhancing their cold chain and storage capacities for the delivery of the vaccines.
Perched on the western extremes of Northern Ireland, Strabane is a town on the edge.

A few miles from the border with Donegal, boasting one of the busiest shopping complexes in Co Tyrone, it draws its trade from all directions.

It is also at the heart of Northern Ireland's fastest-rising Covid-19 caseload.

Walking through one of the car parks at the edge of the town's retail park, there is a constant stream of vehicles coming and going. Half of them have Donegal number plates.

People cross the border without blinking. From midnight on Friday night people living in Donegal were under new lockdown restrictions from the Dublin government.

Showing a united front, the Chief Medical Officers on either side of the border, Dr Michael McBride and Dr Ronan Glynn, have warned against any non-essential travel to and from Donegal.

There is a united front too from the Mayors of Derry and Strabane, and neighbouring Lifford. But is it a case of together in words, different in action, dependent on which side of an invisible line you live on?

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"I come here every Friday," said Rathmullan pensioner Martin Lynch, who lives in the south but stocks up on supplies in Northern Ireland. "It saves me 30-40.

"It will be strange having this side open and the other where I live closed. But I would rather see the hotels empty than the hospitals full. If we're told not to go anywhere, I'll not be going anywhere."

He was wearing a mask. And that is one thing consistently pointed out - anyone wearing a face covering is likely to be from the south.

"There's definitely more people wearing masks around Lifford," said Graham Neilands, who has come into town just a few miles on the other side of the border.

"I suppose we're a bit like this virus, we don't think of the border," he said. "We go wherever to shop, but there definitely seems to be a reluctance here to wear a mask here."

Dr Martin Coyne, a GP in Graham's home town of Lifford, said his practice had experienced a three-fold rise in cases over recent weeks.

"Until September 10 we had 17 positive Covid cases. By yesterday, we've had another 54," he said.

Dr Coyne said restricting movement between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic was "probably a good idea" and taking his advice, a family trip to Northern Ireland for David and Stacey Leydon was ending. They were heading through Donegal on their way home to Sligo.

"We've been here for a couple of days," said David. "We've found it quieter than usual. Face masks have been mandatory where we live and we haven't seen as many cases as the rest of the country. I don't know if that means we're doing something right, but we'll be heading home before midnight."

And it is that loss of trade that could well hit the north west economy over the next three weeks, perhaps longer.

Businesswoman Caroline Friel runs a snack food van at the retail park and has already started to see numbers decline. "In the last two weeks there has been a big drop in the number of people coming through," she said.

"I'll still be here on Saturday, but people have started to be a lot more cautious."

Further north, the president of Londonderry Chamber of Commerce, Redmond McFadden, said the restrictions were the "price we have to pay". "We have to get on top of this. We cannot be complacent. People must do the right thing, it's that simple," he said.

In the city, sailings of the Lough Foyle ferry to Donegal have been halted. Ireland, north and south, is not clear of choppy waters yet.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) announced a new team nine months after the party appointed JP Nadda as its new president that comprises 12 vice presidents, eight general secretaries, three national joint secretaries and 13 secretaries, with almost 60% of the office bearers being new.

Members of Parliament in Rajya Sabha Saroj Pandey and Anil Jain, and Ram Madhav and P Muralidhar Rao have been dropped as national general secretaries, but their exclusion has sparked speculation of a coming cabinet reshuffle, with some of them being accommodated.

Also read: State polls, regional outreach among the key reasons for rejig

The changes have seen the appointment of party functionaries from election-bound states of Bihar, West Bengal and Kerala in key roles -- a clear indication that the changes are being made with an eye on coming assembly elections.

Effort has been made to ensure there is representation from all regions of the country, from North-East to the Southern states. In keeping with the BJPs concerted attempt to give young people more opportunities; the average age of this team is much lower than the previous teams, said a party functionary who asked not to be named.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted his congratulations to the team and said: I am confident they will uphold the glorious tradition of our Party of serving the people of India selflessly and with dedication. May they work hard to empower the poor and marginalised.

The new team includes MP Dushyant Kumar Gautam, a Dalit leader, D Purandeswari from Andhra Pradesh, CT Ravi, an MLA from Karnataka, Tarun Chugh from Punjab and Dilip Saikia an MP from Assam in the list of the national general secretaries. All are new entrants.

Kailash Vijayvargia, Bhupender Yadav and Arun Singh have been retained as national general secretaries.

Among those dropped, while Madhav was in charge of the North Eastern states and Jammu and Kashmir, Rao was in charge of Karnataka and Rajasthan. Pandey and Jain were in charge of Maharashtra and Haryana.

New faces have been given a chance; dropping of some names from the national general secretaries list does not imply a falling-out of favour, said a second BJP functionary who asked not to be named.

The BJP has also announced the appointment of Rajesh Aggarwal, a former cabinet minister from Uttar Pradesh as the treasurer of the party; the post had been vacant since 2014 after the incumbent Piyush Goyal was appointed a minister in the Narendra Modi cabinet. Sudhir Gupta, an MP from Madhya Pradesh where several assembly seats are up for by-election, will be the joint treasurer.

There are several additions in the list of national vice-presidents, including West Bengal leader Mukul Roy. A former TMC leader, Roys appointment has scotched speculation that he will break away from the BJP in the election-bound state where friction within the party unit has become a cause for concern for the central leadership. Roys appointment however led to Rahul Sinha, who was dropped from the team to post a video to express his disappointment. A person familiar with the developments in the state said the changes have created friction in the state unit, as both Roy and Anupam Hazra who has been appointed national secretary are former TMC leaders.

Former Chattisgarh CM Raman Singh and former Rajasthan CM Vasundhara Raje remain national vice presidents as does Baijayant Panda.

Nadda is shortly expected to announce the states that the partys general secretaries will be in charge of. This will be followed by appointments of officer bearers at the state level.

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Even Japanese businesses seem more willing than ever to push that line. According to a July survey of 3,000 businesspeople by the economic newspaper Nikkei Shimbun and the Japan Center for Economic Research, more than 46 percent of respondents said that Japanese companies should do less business with China. About 18 percent said the opposite.

Public and political sentiment in Japan has been turning against China for years, and I think thats an entirely organic process, said Kristin Vekasi, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Maine who has studied how Japan has managed economic risk toward China.

Japan has rolled out a number of measures, to mixed success, in an effort to blunt Beijings reach.

The country has put strict limits on foreign participation in government procurement projects, throttled foreign investment in publicly traded domestic companies and set up a cabinet-level division tasked with monitoring threats to the countrys economic security.

Japan also tightened rules requiring foreign entities to seek government permission before investing in publicly listed companies that touch on national security, lowering the threshold to 1 percent from 10 percent of a companys shares.

Conservative Japanese politicians in the governing party believe the measures aimed at China have not gone nearly far enough. Legislative study groups in Japans Parliament are considering restrictions on foreign investment in real estate and on Chinese apps like TikTok.

Still, even some of the most vocal advocates are cautious about calling out Beijing by name.

In a recent interview, Akira Amari, a member of Parliament and former trade minister who leads a legislative group on economic security, said that the measures under consideration were not aimed at any one nation, but were intended to reduce economic security risks across the board.
Jacob Blake delivers a message from a hospital bed in a video released by his lawyer Ben Crump, in Kenosha, Wis., on Sept. 5, 2020. (Attorney Crump Twitter account/AFP via Getty Images)

Jacob Blake Was Trying to Kidnap Child When He Was Shot, Officers Lawyer Says

Jacob Blake was trying to kidnap a child when he attempted to enter a vehicle after resisting arrest last month, according to the police officer who shot him.

Rusten Sheskey told investigators he fired his weapon at Blake, who possessed a knife, because he was trying to protect his life and prevent Blake from kidnapping the child, who was in the backseat of the SUV, Sheskeys attorney said.

If Blake had been allowed to get into the vehicle and drive away, the question would have been why didnt you do something?' Brendan Matthews, the attorney, told CNN.

Matthews and a lawyer representing Blake, Benjamin Crump, didnt respond to requests for comment.

Sheskey heard a woman nearby say, Hes got my kid, hes got my keys, shortly before Blake escaped from officers who had tried to arrest him and walked around the SUV to the drivers side door.

Matthews said he was speaking about what transpired because he wanted to challenge what he described as an incomplete, inaccurate narrative that has spread widely.

Kenosha Police Officer Rusten Sheskey in an undated photograph. (Wisconsin Department of Justice via AP)

Matthews also said that Blake held a knife in his hand when he turned toward Sheskey, who then fired his gun seven times, striking Blake.

A second officer at the scene provided a similar account to investigators, according to the lawyer.

Brief, unfocused video clips showed the police shooting and some of what led up to the shooting, but the lack of body camera footage and more angles makes all of what happened unclear.

The Wisconsin Department of Justice said police officers went to the home in Kenosha on Aug. 23 after a female caller reported that her boyfriend was present and was not supposed to be on the premises.

Officers tried arresting Blake, 29, with two deploying their stun guns, but he resisted arrest and was able to free himself.

Blake then walked around the van and leaned forward into the drivers side area. While holding onto Blakes shirt, Sheskey fired seven times into Blakes back, investigators said.

Blake admitted that he had a knife in his possession and agents recovered a knife from the drivers side floorboard.

Vehicles are parked on Aug. 28, 2020, in Kenosha, Wis., where Jacob Blake was shot by police after resisting arrest on Aug. 23. (Russell Contreras/AP Photo)

Blake had a warrant out for his arrest when officers went to the home, according to court documents obtained by The Epoch Times.

The Kenosha Police Association, a police union, said in an Aug. 28 statement that officers went to the home because Blake was attempting to steal the callers keys/vehicle.

Blake had a knife that officers didnt initially see. They first saw him holding the knife while they were on the passenger side of the vehicle, the union said.

Officers at first tried speaking with Blake but he wouldnt cooperate and then resisted arrest, putting one officer in a headlock, according to the account.

Based on the inability to gain compliance and control after using verbal, physical and less lethal means, the officers drew their firearms, the union stated.

Mr. Blake continued to ignore the officers commands, even with the threat of lethal force now present.

The statement did not mention the prospect that Blake was kidnapping a child.

After the release of the statement, Patrick Salvi Jr., another Blake lawyer, said during an appearance on CNNs Situation Room that the allegations were overblown.

Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul heads to the podium for a news conference. Noble Wray, former Madison police chief, is third from left while Kenosha County District Attorney Michael Gravely is second from right, in Kenosha, Wis., on Sept. 21, 2020. (Dan Truttschel/Kenosha News via AP)

Jacob, as you can see in the videoand its a good thing theres a video, so many of these instances were not caught on video, and essentially the police, who have brutalized an individual, get to write up a report as to what happened, so thankfully there are videos of this, and everybody can see in that video, that in the moments leading up to him being shot point blank at least seven times in the back, that he was posing absolutely no imminent threat to these officers, he said.

The existence of a knife, apparently what their position is, if theres a knife in the vicinity, theyre free to use deadly force, he added.

Blake suffered severe wounds from being shot and is still recovering at a hospital. Sheskey is on leave as the investigation into the shooting continues.

Noble Wray, a former Madison police chief, was tapped this week to serve as an independent consultant in the case. He will review the evidence after state authorities finish the probe. Wray will ultimately turn over the evidence and a recommendation to Kenosha County District Attorney Michael Gravely, who will decide whether to file charges against any of the officers.
New Delhi: Eminent economist Isher Judge Ahluwalia, a recipient of India's third-highest civilian award Padma Bhushan, passed away on Saturday. She was 74.

Last month, she had stepped down as chairman of the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER) due to her declining health.

"The ICRIER family is profoundly saddened at the passing away of Chairperson Emeritus Dr. Isher Judge Ahluwalia this morning," the think tank said.

ICRIER director and chief executive Rajat Kathuria said, "I can say without an iota of doubt that ICRIER was in her DNA."

Ahluwalia was married to former deputy chairperson of the Planning Commission Montek Singh Ahluwalia and is survived by her husband and two sons.

She completed her PhD from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), an MA from Delhi School of Economics, and a BA (Eco Hons) from Presidency College, Kolkata. Her research was focused on urban development, macro-economic reforms, industrial development, and social sector development issues in India.

"Isher Ahluwalia who just passed away was one of India's distinguished economists, an MIT PhD, and author of an influential book 'Industrial Growth in India'. She built up ICRIER, a fine economic think tank. She had her own distinctive identity apart from being Montek's wife," former Union minister Jairam Ramesh tweeted.

Biocon chairperson and managing director Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw tweeted, "Isher Ahluwalia, my dear dear friend and a brilliant remarkable intellectual economist, passed away after a brave battle with cancer. My deepest condolences to Montek Singh Ahluwalia n his sons Pavan & Aman n the family. She will be hugely missed RIP."

"Deeply grieved by the passing of a dear friend of many years, the brilliant #IsherAhluwalia after a brave battle with cancer. Isher, I shall miss your presence so much. Your life story is an inspiration to all women who dare to dream of a better world. RIP, dear friend. @ICRIER," Nirupama Menon Rao, India's former foreign secretary tweeted.

Her two books Industrial Growth in India: Stagnation Since the Mid-Sixties' (1989, Oxford University Press) and Productivity and Growth in Indian Manufacturing (1991, Oxford University Press) are seminal contributions to the literature.

Her Breaking Through was completed during the time she was suffering from a serious illness.
On Friday, the airline agreed a deal with the British Airline Pilots Association (BALPA) to avoid compulsory redundancies among its pilots. Photo: Getty

EasyJet (EZJ.L) has rejected claims made by a union representative that the company is hanging by a thread, as reported by the BBC.

Martin Entwistle allegedly said that the budget airline is in a really dire situation, after a meeting with easyJets chief financial officer Andrew Findlay, in a leaked recording obtained by the broadcaster.

However, easyJet denies that the recording reflects what easyJet or its CFO said.

The airline told Yahoo Finance: We have been clear the whole industry has been impacted by the pandemic, however easyJet has taken a prudent approach to capacity and the right actions on cash preservation. The airline continues to keep all liquidity options under review, but no decisions have been taken.

Winter flying is always significantly lower than summer and easyJet will continue with its prudent and dynamic approach to capacity over the winter. No decisions have been taken and we will update the market in due course.

As we said at our recent trading update, changing restrictions and quarantine requirements continue to impact consumer confidence to book travel so we continue to call on the UK Government for sector specific support.

In response to the claims, BALPA said: The crisis in aviation is well known and something we have been highlighting for months. A local rep was recorded giving his own impression of some of the difficulties that easyJet - like all airlines - are facing.

The union added that it has confidence in easyJet's business plan to get through this winter period and help power the UK's economic recovery in the coming months.

READ MORE: Coronavirus: EasyJet jobs at risk as bases close and Ryanair axes flights

On Friday, the airline agreed a deal with the British Airline Pilots Association (BALPA) to avoid compulsory redundancies among its pilots.

BALPA said 727 pilots were at risk of losing their jobs earlier this year and that 60 pilots left voluntarily, while 1,500 opted for part-time working, the unions general secretary Brian Strutton hailed it a remarkable achievement.

Story continues

Strutton said: This is a remarkable achievement which has only been possible because of three groups of people  the [BALPA] reps, easyJet management who have worked with us constructively during this process, but most of all the easyJet pilots themselves who have volunteered in record numbers for part-time work and voluntary redundancy to help save their colleagues jobs.

The COVID-19 pandemic saw passenger numbers dwindle as the global aviation industry was hammered by the impact of grounded flights, especially during the lockdown and quarantine measures.

In August, Britains biggest budget airline said that it had raised an additional 203m from the sale and leaseback of its aircraft, as it further bolstered its balance sheet in the wake of the coronavirus crisis. It was also hit by the UK governments decision to add France to the quarantine list, after it ramped up its summer flight timetables to meet demand despite heightened uncertainty about the measures.

At the time, chief executive Johan Lundgren said that bookings for the rest of the summer were higher than expected, prompting the airline to expand its schedule to about 40% of capacity in its fourth-quarter between July and September, rather than the 30% expected last month.

Also in August, easyJet confirmed three UK bases will close, with the airline expecting a slow recovery amid the pandemic and slashing costs.

While in May, it announced plans to slash around 4,500 jobs globally, after warning it did not expect demand to reach pre-virus levels for another three years.

In June, the low-cost airline announced that it had delayed the delivery of 24 Airbus (AIR.PA) aircraft until sometime between 2025 and 2027, noting that it had secured additional flexibility from the French plane-maker.
(Natural News) Black Lives Matter (BLM) rioters are quick to hijack the death of Black people reported in the news, like Jacob Blake and Breonna Taylor. But who exactly is Breonna Taylor and why are BLM rioters claiming that she was unjustly murdered in her own home?

Charlie Kirk  the host of The Charlie Kirk Show and the founder and president of Turning Point USA  the largest and fastest-growing conservative youth activist organization in America, spoke up about the truth behind the death of Breonna Taylor.

Marching for no reason

In Kirks video, he decried the anarchists, BLM-incorporated democrats marching in the streets and trying to advocate for justice for Breonna Taylor without reading up on the facts.

Even Senator Harris, who Kirk claims will never be Vice President of the United States, says Taylors family deserves justice.

Here are the facts of the case.

The shooting involves an individual called Jamarcus Glover, who was Breonna Taylors ex-boyfriend. Taylor was knee-deep in crime with Glover, who used her address for deliveries.

Glover was arrested in a no-knock warrant.

Taylor was in business with Glover, and there was a second no-knock warrant issued for Taylors arrest.

Justified use of force

When Louisville police officers went to Taylors residence, they knocked even though it was supposed to be a no-knock raid. The officers then entered her home because there was no answer after they made their presence known.

Taylors new boyfriend then started shooting at the police officers, proving that Kenneth Walker is a criminal and a thug. (Related: One officer in Breonna Taylor case charged with wanton endangerment, Kentucky AG finds police use of force was JUSTIFIED.)

Walker fired a 9mm pistol at the officers who were simply doing their jobs and executing a search warrant. Walker shot Sergeant Jonathan Mattingly in the leg. Mattingly and Detective Myles Cosgrove then returned fire.

The police and Walker then continued to shoot at each other. Sometime during the shootout, Taylor passed away after being hit six times by police bullets.

A Jefferson County grand jury charged Brett Hankinson, now a former Louisville Metro Police Department detective, with three counts of wanton endangerment. Hankinson fired a total of 10 rounds, with some entering an adjacent apartment housing a male, a pregnant female and a child.

Hankinson has already been fired from the force, and he is currently facing five years on each of the three charged counts. It was also determined that the other two officers were justified in firing their weapons.

While Taylors death isnt an outcome anyone would defend, its worth noting that the police didnt walk into a random apartment. The police also didnt stroll up to a random person on the street execution-style and decided to kill this individual.

Taylor was standing in the hallway, next to Walker, who was in a shooting stance and was unharmed during the shootout. She was also dating Walker, a criminal, who decided to shoot at the police.

And so the grand jury in Jefferson County, Kentucky, poured over this information. This outraged people and some say its unfair that the police are only tried for reckless endangerment, which is probably a correct indictment for one of the officers for endangering some of the other residents in the adjacent apartments.

But if there was evidence for the grand jury to proceed with a murder indictment, wouldnt they have done that? Unfortunately, this grand jury was under such public pressure to go and proceed with that kind of indictment for murder.

Yet they didnt push through because the facts didnt warrant it.

Find out the truth and support the police

Think again before you write Breonna Taylors name on your helmet or you have a shirt that says Breonna Taylor. Know the facts of the case: That she was involved in a drug-trafficking criminal scheme, that she was dating Walker, a thug who tried to kill a police officer and her ex-boyfriend Glover, wasnt exactly an upstanding member of society.

Despite these facts, there are those who insist that Taylor must be remembered like Jacob Blake, who was accused of being a rapist. Before you start to create these nationwide emotives and quasi-pathological campaigns about unjust police killings, remember that Taylor would still be alive if her boyfriend Walker didnt try to kill a police officer.

Kirk clarified that he wasnt defending the fact that Taylor passed away in the crossfire. Rather, he called out the idea that police officers went out of their way to murder a defenseless Taylor in her bed when she was actually standing in the hallway.

The officers also knocked courteously even though they had a no-knock warrant. Know the facts, dont get angry because mainstream media tells you, and stand with police officers who acted correctly during the incident, advised Kirk.

If people are going to burn down another city because of Taylors death, Kirk warned that he and others like him, who respect the police, will not tolerate it.

Hold the line with truth because rioters want to burn down America at all costs, concluded Kirk.

Visit Rioting.news to learn more about these so-called unjust killings and the riots still going on in the country.

Sources include:

Brighteon.com

WashingtonExaminer.com
Saturday: Deadpool (2016) Channel 4, 9pm - Former Special Forces operative Wade Wilson (Ryan Reynolds) is a low-rent assassin who discovers he has inoperable cancer.

A recruiter (Jed Rees) from an experimental program known as WeaponX invites Wade to undergo a radical procedure, which aggressively attacks the cancerous cells.

Sadistic program director Ajax (Ed Skrein) and henchwoman Angel Dust (Gina Carano) torture Wade, transforming him into a hideously deformed mutant with the power of self-healing. Reborn as Deadpool, Wade sets out to wreak revenge on Ajax and his underlings.

Deadpool is a relentlessly lurid and unapologetically foul-mouthed treat, crammed to bursting with zinging one-liners. It all hinges on Reynolds' ability to charm us and he barrels through every frame with a cocksure swagger that is impossible to resist.

Sunday

The Fault in Our Stars (2014) Channel 4, 10.55pm

Sixteen-year-old Hazel Grace Lancaster (Shailene Woodley) was diagnosed with cancer at an early age. An experimental drug trial has slowed the spread of the disease, but Hazel is resigned to her grim fate. She reluctantly attends a cancer patients' support group at the behest of her mum (Laura Dern).

During one session, Hazel meets acerbic survivor Gus (Ansel Elgort), who lost his leg to halt the spread of his cancer. As the relationship intensifies, Hazel attempts to keep Gus at arm's length, warning that she is a 'grenade', destined to obliterate everyone around her.

The Fault in Our Stars is a beautifully sketched portrait of adolescence, adapted from John Green's bestselling novel, which deftly plucks heartstrings to the point that a trickle of tears threatens to become a torrent.

Monday

Stalag 17 (1953) Film4, 11am

The US inmates of a German Prisoner of War camp stage an escape, but when it goes wrong, they conclude that one of their number must have betrayed them to the Nazis. A

s far as most of the prisoners are concerned, there's only one candidate - cynical wheeler-dealer Sgt Sefton (William Holden), who seems happy to strike deals with their captors if it gets him a few extra home comforts. He realises the only way he's going to clear his name is by finding the real mole.

It's not every director who could find humour in a PoW camp, but Billy Wilder manages it with style. The result is a blackly funny satirical drama, which boasts great performances from an Oscar-winning Holden and Otto Preminger as the sneering camp commandant.
Saturday morning, the day after Gov. Ron DeSantis declared Florida in Phase 3 of the Plan for Floridas Recovery, the states COVID-19 dashboard reported 2,795 new cases and 107 more deaths.

The latter number pushes Florida past 14,000 resident deaths for the novel coronavirus pandemic. Since the state began counting, Florida has had 698,682 total cases, 14,090 total deaths, 14,022 of which were residents.

Two days this week, the Florida reported days of over 5% positive test rate and the average daily positive test rate rose for the first time in weeks, 4.25% to 4.68%.

The Florida Department of Healths report of the day-by-day positive test rate for the state.

Johns Hopkins Universitys Coronavirus Resource Center says Floridas positive test rate over the last week has been 10.87%.

South Florida counties

 Miami-Dade added 369 cases and 29 deaths, bringing its pandemic totals to 169,144 cases and 3,231 deaths, both by far the most of any Florida county.

After DeSantis executive order, Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez issued a statement that, though all business can open again, theyll still be subject to county guidelines. Miami-Dades new guidelines came down late Saturday night.

The average daily positive test rate rose from 4.13% to 4.65%.

 Another 180 cases and 15 deaths puts Browards numbers for the pandemic at 76,700 and 1,379, respectively. As in Miami-Dade, the average daily positive test rate edged up, 2.9% to 3.25%.

 Palm Beachs numbers, 160 cases and 15 deaths, were similar to Browards Saturday. Floridas third hardest hit county by the pandemic has had 46,183 cases and 1,342 deaths. Positive test rates stayed virtually the same, 3.78% on average to 3.71%.

 Monroes six new cases moves their total case count to 1,834. Their death toll remains at 22.

Current Hospitalizations

Government officials use current hospitalizations to decide the next action in dealing with the pandemic. On the state level, this has been steadily falling over the last month.

The Florida Agency for Health Care Administration reports the number of patients hospitalized statewide with a primary diagnosis of COVID. The data, which is updated at least every hour, does not distinguish between the number of COVID-19 patients in hospital intensive care units and those in acute-care beds, which require less attention from nurses.

Story continues

As of 10:46 a.m. Saturday, the AHCAs count was 2,107, down 14 from Friday night. Among South Florida counties, only Monroe had an increase and that the smallest of increases, from two to three hospitalizations. Otherwise, Miami-Dade was down seven to 268; Broward, down two to 213; and Palm Beach down 17 to 111.

Floridas current hospitalization data does not always match the hospitalization data reported in Miami-Dades New Normal dashboard. Officials say this could be for a number of reasons, including the frequency of daily updates.

Miami-Dades daily hospitalization count says its down to 337 with 112 of those being in intensive care unit beds, both numbers sliding downward over the past several weeks.

Miami-Dades chart of current hospitalizations and ICU bed usage from COVID-19

Testing

As of Saturday morning, 5,242,163 people had been tested in Florida, an increase of 29,021 from Friday morning. The rate of positive test returns moved by a miniscule margin, 13.35% down to 13.33%.

Restrictions lifted: Heres what you can and cant do in Miami this weekend
With growing social concern, backed by the scientific community, there is increasing pressure to address the effects of climate change globally. The economic viability of traditional energy sources such as fossil fuel has been called into question of late both for its environmental harm and it's long term ecological effects. Thus, it has become important to evaluate the performance of countries when it comes to tackling climate change issues. It is necessary to monitor such performances to understand what the future holds.

The Climate Change Performance Index

The CPPI, or The Climate Change Performance Index, is an independent resource used to monitor and track the climate protection and performance for countries around the world. The CPPI grades 57 countries, evaluating them with four key categories: their Global Greenhouse Gas Emissions (GHG), their renewable energy, their total energy use and their climate policy. 2020 is a pivotal year for climate change, as some vulnerable countries are already beginning to see the effects of climate change on their ecology and populations. The CPPI is a trusted and established independent source for quality information, although it should be noted that the ranks require data interpretation. The CPPI is calculated with production-based emissions, the current prevailing way to measure emissions, but not a flawless one. It is also true that the ranking system for countries is on a relatable scale, such as high, very high and low, very low. A ranking system such as this is inherently comparative, versus a more absolute ranking system, such as a statistically-based data set. Regardless, the CPPI remains an invaluable tool for tracking and ranking the initiatives of countries worldwide in the fight against drastic climate change. The CPPI was fully revised in 2015 to accommodate the Paris Agreement, a framework designed by the United Nations to combat the effects of climate change. Even with the simple guidelines and ranking system, no country has yet been able to place in the top three ranks.

The Best And The Worst

Caption

As sobering as it may sound, no country occupies the top three places for climate change action. This is because no country has performed well enough to in all four categories to rank in very high on the climate change index. For this reason, the top three performers rank only as high. The current top performers for 2020 are Sweden, Denmark and Morocco. Demark moved forward ten places in this single year, and Sweden has held the lead for two consecutive years.

Conversely, the bottom three performers are Chinese Taipei, which fell three places to rank 59th, Saudi Arabia, which continues to rank very low and, falling three positions since the previous year the United States now ranks very low. Canada and the USA are both currently sitting at a very low ranking in the categories of GHG Emissions, Renewable Energy, and Energy Usage but deviate on Climate Policy, where Canada outranks the USA.

Performance Of The US And Canada

Image credit: Halfpoint/Shutterstock.com

Canadas' total ranking is 55, putting it in the very low end of the scale across the CPPI categories, and is currently not on track to meet the -2 degrees Celsius target lines. Canada is ranked highly internationally, but there is a lack of cohesion between Canada's policies and the execution and implementation of those policies.

Image credit: Expatpostcards/Shutterstock.com

For the first time, The United States has ranked very low across all CPPI Categories. Research and industry experts point to recent social and political changes as causing the scoring. There is a problematic lack of connection on the USA's Climate action policies, as there is currently no target or policy for reducing the Countries' high GHG on a National level. The USA also faces additional challenges, as the country as a whole has a very poor public transit system, which creates more reliance on cars, which increases carbon emissions. Furthermore, the USA's industrial farming and forestry practices are unsustainable and ecologically destructive. These combinations of factors are just some, but not all, of the reasons the USA is currently trailing so low in the CPPI. The Trump Administration has removed The United States from the Paris Agreement, a decision that does not promote confidence in the USA's ability to be proactive about the global climate crisis. National experts have pointed to the Trump administration as a key player in the nation's reduced focus on climate action. While some areas of the states have met their targets for renewable energy and energy uses reductions, the enforcement of these targets varies widely across the USA.

At The Crossroads

Image credit: Lightspring/Shutterstock.com

The CPPI's 2020 ranking is a cause of concern. No country has sufficiently met the environmental targets to rank in the top three. The 2020 CPPI disclosed that, while it is clear that many countries are currently trailing in their targets, even a concerted effort across all countries may not be enough to provide long-term halting of climate change. While the outlook may look bleak, and true, there is substantial work left to be done to save our environment, the work the CPPI compiles acts as a milestone marker to humanity. The ranking order it reveals indicates where change is most urgently needed. The annual CPPI should be used as a motivating tool for the advancement and progression of environmental protection policies and active conversations about the best ways we can care for the planet we live on. The world is facing grave danger from climate change. The CPPI is one strongly researched resource that is crucial to understanding the full picture of our environmental impact on the Earth. The generation of humans on this planet today, and perhaps the next few generations ahead of us, are at a crossroads. We can use the data and research-based resources like the CPPI to galvanize a global effort to fight climate change, or we can ignore them, and await the consequences.
Ive written about the Latino vote for 30 years, and Ive been a Latino voter for longer than that.

So lately Ive been asked why Joe Biden has such a big problema with Latino voters, as well as why President Donald Trump is poised to do well with people whom he often mistakes for pinatas.

Both trends make sense to me, even as a Latino Never Trumper. In fact  although many commentators have recently noted that Bidens Latino support is falling, while Trumps stock with Latinos is on an uptick  I saw this hurricane coming a few months ago. Back in May, I wrote about how many Latinos dont like the former vice president or consider him their amigo.

Latinos are all about relationships. Biden doesnt have one with us, and he never has. Even with his half-century in elective office, its difficult to name a single piece of legislation that Biden has authored that specifically benefited Latinos.

Latinos apathy toward Biden has been hard to miss  even before they were largely left off the agenda last month at the virtual Democratic National Convention.

In November 2019, during the primary, Biden was confronted over his record with Latinos at a town hall in South Carolina. Carlos Rojas, a Latino immigrant advocate, grilled Biden about the reprehensible actions of President Barack Obama. Biden served at Obamas side for eight years with nary a peep publicly about Obamas assault on immigrants and refugees  record deportations, separation of families, kids in cages, etc. An impatient Biden snapped at Rojas: You should vote for Trump!

As you wish. Now many Latinos appear ready to take Bidens advice and vote for his opponent.

Polls show Trump performing well in Arizona, Texas and Florida  with 50 percent, 37 percent and 29 percent of the Latino vote, respectively.

For a Republican, anything north of 30 percent of the Latino vote is a decent showing, and getting more than 35 percent all but ensures that the Democrat doesnt stand a chance of winning.

As the liberal East Coast media  whose ignorance about all things Latino remains profound  whistle past the graveyard by claiming that Trumps Latino support is limited to anti-socialist factions, the wound is deeper than that. Biden is bleeding support from the Latino communitys quintessential swing voters  Mexicans and Mexican Americans in the Southwest.

It is counterintuitive that a group of voters that supported the Democratic nominee in the last 15 presidential elections, dating back to 1960, would desert the current Democratic nominee. Even more so that a healthy slice of these voters would back the most anti-Latino president since, well, the last president.

Then again, much of politics is counterintuitive. Catholic voters back Democratic politicians who support abortion rights and then demagogue Catholic judicial nominees as religious zealots. Meanwhile, evangelical Christians who preach morality and propriety have no qualms about supporting a Republican president who isnt even remotely acquainted with either concept.

This should have been the Latino election. Latinos are poised to surpass African Americans for the first time and become the largest group of nonwhite eligible voters in the United States. Both political parties should pay closer attention to the estimated 15 million Latino voters expected to cast ballots on Nov. 3, including the sizable number who live in four crucial battleground states  Colorado, Nevada, Arizona and Florida.

Keep a few things in mind:

There is no Latino bloc, but there is a Latino vote. Just as there is a Jewish vote, or an African American vote, or a working-class white vote. Its not that millions of people get together and decide beforehand who theyll support. But it is fair and helpful to track how certain candidates do with specific groups.

Republicans do well with Latinos who are conservative  Cubans, Venezuelans and Colombians. Democrats tend to have a lock on the liberals  Puerto Ricans, Dominicans and Central Americans. Mexicans and Mexican Americans are up for grabs as registered Democrats who will support moderate Republicans.

And while immigrant bashing has been shown to get our dander up, our top issues are jobs, the economy, education and health care. Though it is also fair to describe us as single-issue voters. That issue is respect. Along with family and an incredible work ethic, its everything to us. Ignore that fact at your peril.

And what about when Latinos have to choose between two candidates  each of whom has, at different times and in different ways, disrespected them? That prospect is dark and depressing.

Welcome to Election 2020.

ruben@rubennavarrette.com
The majority of governors in the United States have ordered or recommended that statewide school closures continue for the rest of the academic year to help reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. (CNN)

Idea for Pandemic Lockdowns Started With High School Science Project

Commentary

By now, millions of Americans have heard that a flawed computer model helped spur governments to order population-wide lockdowns in response to the coronavirusa model that assumed such lockdowns would help. Few, however, know the pedigree for this untested belief.

The New York Times reported the story with little fanfare in late April. The Untold Story of the Birth of Social Distancing, it explained, started as an important discovery kicked off by a high school research project pursued by the daughter of a scientist at the Sandia National Laboratories.

To call this a discovery, though, is to empty the word of meaning.

In 2006, 14-year-old Laura Glass developed a model of social networks in her high school in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Lauras dad, Sandia National Laboratories scientist David Glass, took notice. The two expanded on the idea by applying the model to a pandemic, and they published a paper on it with two other authors in a CDC journal.

Its called Targeted Social Distancing Designs for Pandemic Influenza.

The abstract summarizing the paper explains, For influenza as infectious as 19571958 Asian flu (50 percent infected), closing schools and keeping children and teenagers at home reduced the attack rate by >90%. Notice the tone. It suggests that closing schools works.

But the papers authors werent describing real school closures. Schools were closed only in a simulation. In reality, the authors told the model to say the attack rate would be lower and, behold, it was.

The eager authors of this paper sent their simulation to a Dr. D.A. Henderson, who was, as the NY Times explains, the leader of the international effort to eradicate smallpox and had been named by [President] Bush to help oversee the nations biodefense efforts after the 2001 terrorist attacks.

Henderson pushed back, saying that it made no sense to force schools to close or public gatherings to stop. Indeed, if authorities adopted such policies, he rightly discerned, the result would be significant disruption of the social functioning of communities and possibly serious economic problems.

Henderson had vast scientific expertise and broad and pertinent experience dealing with such crises. His advice? We should tough it out: Let the pandemic spread, treat people who get sick, and work quickly to develop a vaccine to prevent it from coming back.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention didnt know what to do if and when a pandemic should hit. Go with Hendersons plan, which had worked before and would likely work again, or go with the simulation? So, in 2008, the agency put out a survey of the U.S. adult population. They found that lockdowns would cause severe problems, especially for poor and minority populations. Undaunted, they did a second survey.

This time, the CDC sampled not just common citizens but representatives from the organized stakeholder public. These elite stakeholder representatives from affected sectors of the population expressed a high level of support for the  proposed package of control measures.

This time, in group sessions, the citizens came around to agreeing. The proposed measures would require sick peopleand people who knew the sick peopleto stay home. The proposed lockdown would mean canceling large public gatherings and altering work patterns to keep people apart. It would also mean closing schools and large day care facilities for an extended period.

As it happens, the Bush administration ultimately sided with the proponents of social distancing and shutdowns, the NY Times explained, though their victory was little noticed outside of public health circles. Their policy would become the basis for government planning and would be used extensively in simulations used to prepare for pandemics.

So, a survey steered by people with a vested interest in political control led the government to set aside Hendersons tried-and-true scientific expertise and experience.

Thats how, a decade before anyone had heard of the novel coronavirus, our public health bureaucracy committed itself and the American public to a radical experiment. They knewbecause their own research had told themthat it could cripple the economy, severely harm disadvantaged Americans, and subject millions of people to health risks from the response itself.

In 2020, officials finally got to run the test. All because a high school kid had told a computer what to say.

Douglas Axe, Ph.D., is the Maxwell professor of molecular biology at Biola University, the founding director of Biologic Institute, the founding editor of BIO-Complexity, and the author of Undeniable: How Biology Confirms Our Intuition That Life Is Designed.

William Matthew Briggs, Ph.D., is a statistician, scientist, consultant, and writer. He is also a policy advisor at The Heartland Institute, a former professor at the Cornell Medical School, and author of Uncertainty: The Soul of Modeling, Probability & Statistics. He blogs at WMBriggs.com.

Jay Wesley Richards is an analytic theologian, intelligent design and free-market advocate, and a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute. He serves as the assistant research professor in the School of Business and Economics at the Catholic University of America and is executive editor of The Stream.

D. Axe, W.M. Briggs, and Jay W. Richards are the authors of The Price of Panic: How the Tyranny of Experts Turned a Pandemic into a Catastrophe (Oct. 13, 2020).

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

Douglas Axe Follow Douglas Axe, Ph.D., is the Maxwell Professor of molecular biology at Biola University, the founding director of Biologic Institute, the founding editor of BIO-Complexity, and the author of Undeniable: How Biology Confirms Our Intuition That Life Is Designed. His latest book, co-authored with W.M. Briggs and Jay W. Richards, is The Price of Panic: How the Tyranny of Experts Turned a Pandemic into a Catastrophe.

William Briggs Follow William Matthew Briggs, Ph.D., is a statistician, scientist, consultant, and writer. He is also a policy advisor at The Heartland Institute, former professor at the Cornell Medical School, and author of Uncertainty: The Soul of Modeling, Probability & Statistics. He blogs at WMBriggs.com. His latest book, co-authored with Douglas Axe and Jay W. Richards, is The Price of Panic: How the Tyranny of Experts Turned a Pandemic into a Catastrophe.
Australian Treasurer Josh Frydenberg. (AAP Image/Lukas Coch)

Rolling coverage: For more Yahoo Finance stories on the 2020 Federal Budget, visit here.

Treasurer Josh Frydenbergs new recalibrated plan for economic recovery will come in two phases, and will hinge upon getting the unemployment rate below 6 per cent.

In a speech on Thursday evening, Frydenberg said the pandemic would leave the economy 6 per cent smaller by mid-2020 than originally forecast.

The Federal Governments former approach had been to deliver budget surpluses of sufficient size to reduce and eliminate gross and net debt in the medium-term.

But in the face of the Covid-19 crisis, this was no longer the prudent or appropriate course of action, the Treasurer said.

As our economic circumstances have changed, our fiscal strategy must also change.

The Government will adopt a new two stage fiscal strategy that emphasises jobs and growth. This is key to stabilising and then reducing our debt-to-GDP ratio.

What is the two-phase strategy?

The first phase of the new strategy will be focused on boosting business and consumer confidence and promoting jobs and growth throughout the economy, he said.

Our first priority must be to secure a strong and sustained economic recovery and drive the unemployment rate down as fast as possible.

This phase will involve a continuation of the stimulus payments, tax measures to promote business investment, and structural reforms, Frydenberg said.

However, Phase 1 will not move onto Phase 2 until the unemployment rate is comfortably below 6 per cent, he said.

Phase 2 will be about restoring Australias fiscal position.

There are three elements to this: a central focus on jobs and growth, a shift to stabilising gross and net debt, and rebuilding fiscal buffers to prepare for the next economic shock.

We have a big mountain to climb. But this is an achievable goal. And it does not require us to increase taxes or reduce spending on essential services, he said.

It will maintain our emphasis on fiscal discipline, lower taxes, containing the size of government and investing in a strong economy.

Story continues

Frydenberg also revealed that the budget would not contain higher taxes, but also indicated that it was looking at withdrawing government support.

Let me be clear. The road to a stronger economy and building back our fiscal buffers is not through endless Government subsidies, he said.

The original JobKeeper rate will end this Friday, with the new rate  which reduces payments by $300  to kick in on Monday.

Rolling coverage: For more Yahoo Finance stories on the 2020 Federal Budget, visit here.

Make your money work with Yahoo Finances daily newsletter. Sign up here and stay on top of the latest money, economy, property and work news.

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Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 17:08:46|Editor: huaxia

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People wearing face masks walk in Manila, the Philippines, Sept. 26, 2020. The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in the Philippines surged to 301,256 with 2,747 new coronavirus infections reported by the health ministry on Saturday. (Xinhua/Rouelle Umali)

MANILA, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in the Philippines surged to 301,256 with 2,747 new coronavirus infections reported by the health ministry on Saturday.

The ministry said the number of recoveries rose to 232,906 after 787 more patients recovered. Meanwhile, 88 more patients died from the pandemic, bringing the death toll to 5,284.

The capital region Metro Manila was the country's worst hit area with 1,115 cases newly confirmed on Saturday.

The ministry said over 3.37 million people in the Philippines have been tested so far.

Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said the ministry is seeing an "improvement" in the country's critical care utilization rate in the last two weeks, adding that there has been a "slow decongestion" in hospitals, including in Metro Manila.

Vergeire said the critical care utilization rate in Metro Manila, the epicenter of the COVID-19 outbreak, has gone down to about 60 percent from a high of up to 81 percent - a level considered the "danger zone" - in August.

The critical care utilization rate serves as an indicator based on the use of mechanical ventilators, intensive care unit beds and isolation beds in hospitals.

"We can see the slow decongestion of our facilities, meaning hospitals have the capacity to take in more COVID-19 patients," Vergeire said at a televised media briefing.

While the transmission rate has gone down to less than one and it now takes a long time for COVID-19 cases and deaths to double, she said the health ministry continues to monitor virus clusters in Metro Manila and other regions.

The health ministry is closely monitoring 1,963 virus clusters in hospitals, jails, and densely populated communities in the southeastern Asian country.

"We need to look at the other indicators because there are still specific areas in Metro Manila that there are still clustering of cases, and there is an observed increase of cases," she said.

Despite the improvement, she said the government needs to continue to strengthen the health system in its efforts to slow the spread of the novel coronavirus.

"Let us remain to be vigilant. Protect yourselves. Let us not be complacent because we are hearing that our health system capacity is improving. Let us continue to follow health protocols to prevent infection and protect our families," she said.

The Philippines continues to recruit more health workers, including doctors, nurses and medical technologists to help combat the COVID-19 pandemic. The health ministry said a total of 9,133 health care workers contracted the virus, including 60 deaths.

Metro Manila remains under general community quarantine until Sept. 30. The government will announce whether to ease or retain the lockdown status for the following weeks before the end of the month.

The Philippines has been under varying degrees of lockdown since mid-March. Enditem
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An "alliance of convenience" has been forged between the White House and the world's largest social network, said Sarah Frier and Kurt Wagner at Bloomberg Businessweek. "Facebook executives often point out that the company was seen as overly friendly to Democrats during the Obama years," and the Right continues to levy accusations of "anti-conservative bias." But employees have grown increasingly outspoken about a pattern of ignoring misinformation spread on the platform by President Trump and his supporters. Facebook made "rules against giving incorrect information about how to vote, but then froze when Trump actually put it to the test" in May. Facebook's head of policy, Joel Kaplan, vetoed a tweak of the news-feed algorithm after traffic began to drop for right-wing news outlets such as Fox and Breitbart. More recently, Facebook "seemed to back off" its voter registration efforts this summer after Republicans complained, reducing a two-day July 4 promotion across all its platforms to "a one-day push on Facebook alone."

Facebook's closeness with governments isn't confined to the U.S., said Craig Silverman at BuzzFeed News. Sophie Zhang, a former Facebook data scientist, wrote a 6,600-word memo "filled with concrete examples" of government officials manipulating the platform to sway political opinion. Zhang, who turned down a $64,000 severance to avoid signing a nondisparagement agreement, described a "lack of desire from senior leadership to protect democratic processes." How much longer will we put up with this? asked Jamelle Bouie at The New York Times. Though "lucrative for its founder," Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook has been "a disaster for the world itself." Like industrial-age steel companies that dumped waste into waterways, "Facebook pumps paranoia and disinformation into the body politic, the toxic byproduct of its relentless drive for profit."

Story continues

What really bothers the Left about Facebook isn't an attack on democracy, said Michael Brendan Dougherty at National Review. Liberals adored Facebook a decade ago when they believed it would "create progressive revolutions across the globe." They are angry now because while most news outlets "tilt toward the center-Left or Left," Facebook is "a place where conservatives can talk, and share ideas." The Left's real hope is that Facebook can be forced to censor these conservative views. Facebook is in an "unwinnable position" here: If it appeases progressives with censorship, angry Republicans will have a case for repealing Section 230, the legislation that protects Facebook from lawsuits and liability.

Facebook's business model is the real problem, said Pat Garofalo at NBC News. "Sensationalized content is how Facebook makes money." The longer you stay on Facebook, the more ads you see and "the more money it pockets." The most effective way to get you to stay on the site is to "hook you on addictive content," such as conspiracy theories and partisan rage. So Facebook has little incentive to curb extremist groups. "As with many of the problems Facebook causes, potential solutions run up against its profit motive."

This article was first published in the latest issue of The Week magazine. If you want to read more like it, you can try six risk-free issues of the magazine here.

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Hotels face shock treatment from CEB By Sunimalee Dias View(s): View(s):

Sri Lankas tourism industry is now faced with another crisis as their electricity bills have skyrocketed and with no revenues to pay they face the likelihood of disconnection.

The cabinet has approved that electricity charges made to the tourism industry be deferred by one year, City Hotels Association President M. Shanthikumar told the Business Times on Tuesday.

He noted that though this has been promised by the government the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) has asked them to pay penalties or face disconnection.

It was pointed out that currently the industry and mainly the city hotels are struggling to survive as there are no tourists visiting the country and food and beverage (F&B) is the only mode of revenue to the hotels.

Our people (hotels) are trying to borrow and pay but it is possible that some might be disconnected, he said.

It was noted that currently rooms in city hotels are shutdown but the air conditioning has to function to avoid any mildew from forming that could cost more to refurbish once operations commence subsequently.

Mr. Shanthikumar explained they were struggling as even the wage support loan promised to them has not been granted to hoteliers by banks claiming that they have not been informed accordingly.

We approached all authorities possible but still no action has been taken yet, he said.

He also pointed out that due to heavy competition there are big discounts offered to entice customers to dine at the respective hotels as a result of which they are unable to make sufficient earnings.

In addition employees currently on contract are not been renewed as some continue to work from home and the hotels have to continue to pay salaries on their own.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 21:19:27|Editor: huaxia

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LONDON, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Some 1,700 students at Manchester Metropolitan University have been told to stay in their rooms for 14 days after 127 tested positive for coronavirus, local media reported Saturday.

The incident was "the latest catastrophe in a week where wholly predictable -- and predicted -- COVID-19 outbreaks have caused havoc on campuses across the UK", said the University and College Union.

General secretary Jo Grady urged actions from the government and universities to protect staff and students.

"We warned last month of the problems with moving thousands of students across the country and the time has come for urgent action from ministers and universities to protect staff and students," said Grady.

A university spokesman said disciplinary action will be taken against any breaches, BBC reported.

Most parts of Greater Manchester have been subject to stricter restrictions since July after a spike in coronavirus cases.

The rate has also doubled in the city of Manchester to 1,026 positive tests in the week up to Sept. 22, compared to 515 cases in the previous week.

At least 32 universities across Britain have confirmed cases, while one other has suspected cases, Sky News reported.

More than 510 cases have been identified among students and staff since universities reopened, according to data collected by Sky News up to Sept. 25.

The British government announced Friday that more cities will go into local lockdown as part of its efforts to curb the sharp rise in coronavirus cases.

Britain recorded another 6,874 coronavirus cases, the highest daily increase since the pandemic outbreak in Britain, according to official figures released Friday.

The total number of coronavirus cases in Britain hit 423,236, while the coronavirus-related deaths reached 41,936 with 34 new deaths, the latest official data showed.

Meanwhile, countries such as Britain, China, Russia and the United States, are racing against time to develop coronavirus vaccines.

The British government's Chief Scientific Adviser Patrick Vallance has said it is possible that some vaccine could be available in small amounts later this year, but it is more likely that a vaccine will be available early next year, although that is not guaranteed. Enditem
New cases of Covid-19 are hitting fewer than one in 400 people in any of the countrys top ten virus hotspots, figures reveal.

As experts urged those in virus hotspots not to over-react, the most recently available weekly figures for Bolton  which has been topping the list  show that there were 696 new cases reported.

But as the town has a population of 287,000, the new infections represent less than a quarter of one per cent  or one person in 413.

Mortality figures for Bolton in the same period  the week up to last Tuesday  show that two people died as a result of Covid, compared with 37 people from other causes.

The same pattern is clear in the other hotspots, all of them in the North West or North East, with only fourth-placed Liverpool and tenth-placed Pendle recording any Covid-related deaths, at one each. In Liverpool, 61 people died from other causes.

Liverpool also had the highest figure for new Covid cases (1,132) in the hotspot top ten, but given its much larger population, that represented only 0.227 per cent of its residents, or one in 440.

Cancer specialist Professor Karol Sikora said it was important that the public, including those living in hotspots, did not over-react.

People gather near an information board that reads 'Don't mix with other households' in Bolton town centre following the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) September 22, 2020

In Spain, currently the worst-affected country in Europe where the infection rate is higher than these hotspots in the UK, the rate is about 320 people per 100,000, which is less than a third of one per cent  a very small number.

And then of course the number of those infected who are likely to die is far smaller again, so you have to keep things in perspective.

With cancer and heart and circulatory diseases accounting for more than 335,000 deaths a year, Prof Sikora added: There are much bigger killers out there than Covid-19. If we had figures for cancer and heart disease deaths being shown on the news every day, people might see this all a little more clearly.

Those conditions need to be treated when they occur and thats really a problem, so patients will suffer more because of the delays in access to treatment which are building up because of the pandemic.

Prof Sikora argued that the return to some kind of lockdown risked losing public support for the Government policy, which he said was already faltering,

All the time I see people getting more and more fed up with the restrictions, and I imagine thats even more the case in these hotspot areas.

He added: If I were in charge of this, Id be much more liberal  Id shield those who are known to be vulnerable: the elderly and those with other underlying health problems.

Then, for the vast majority, we need to slowly liberate people, not enforce a tighter lockdown.

Government test tsar has 770,000 shares in drugs firm that sold us 13million of 'pointless' antibody screening kits - after it emerged that Sir Patrick Vallance has a financial interest in company racing to find vaccine

Sir John Bell holds more than 773,000 of shares in pharma company Roche

The company sold million of pointless antibody screening kits to the UK

Bell is a top Government adviser on Covid and professor at Oxford University

In May, the Government agreed to buy 13.5 million of Roches antibody tests

A top Government adviser on Covid tests is a shareholder in the Swiss drugs firm that sold the UK millions of pointless antibody screening kits, a Mail on Sunday investigation has found.

Sir John Bell, regius professor of medicine at the University of Oxford, holds more than 773,000 worth of shares in Roche, the pharmaceutical company that made the kits.

He was also on the companys board as a non-executive director, but stood down in March.

In early May, the Government agreed to buy 13.5 million of Roches antibody tests, which the firm said were 100 per cent accurate. Sir John states he played no role in the decision.

Sir John Bell, pictured, regius professor of medicine at the University of Oxford, holds more than 773,000 worth of shares in Roche, the pharmaceutical company that made the kits. He states he had no role in the decision for Roche to purchase the antibody kits

There are two types of Covid test. Diagnostic tests tell patients if they currently have the virus, while antibody tests  like the Roche one  reveal if a person has antibody cells in their immune system that prove they had it in the past.

Following the deal, Sir John appeared on Channel 4 News and Radio 4s Today programme calling the tests a major step forward  but did not mention his links to the firm.

However, studies revealed that antibodies for Covid-19 quickly wane, and so testing for them reveals little. At the time of the Roche deal, Sir John said: If you test positive with this test, you can say for certain you have had the infection so you will have had Covid-19.

The news comes days after it emerged the UKs Chief Scientific Adviser, Sir Patrick Vallance, a former president of British drugs giant GlaxoSmithKline, still has a 600,000 shareholding in the firm which is currently involved in developing Covid vaccines. Health Secretary Matt Hancock told LBC radio that Sir Patrick, who also chairs the Governments expert panel on vaccines, abided by the rules.

In early May, the Government agreed to buy 13.5 million of Roches antibody tests, which the firm said were 100 per cent accurate (pictured: file photo)

After the Roche contract was signed, a Public Health England (PHE) evaluation found the tests may not be reliable, so plans to make them available to NHS and care workers were dropped.

Jon Deeks, professor of biostatistics at Birmingham University, called the tests pointless.

Sir John told The Mail on Sunday he disagreed with the PHE evaluation but admitted the Government has no real use for antibody tests right now. Asked if hed declared his interests in Roche to the Government, Sir John said: Of course they knew  the Department of Health has a long list of my interests.

He said that he did not sit on the advisory body involved in the decision to purchase the Roche antibody tests, adding: I did not know about the Roche contract until it was signed. I advised on [diagnostic] home-testing kits, not these ones.

While on the board of Roche, he received a salary of 260,000. He announced his decision to step down in December, but held on to his shares in the company, worth 773,000.

It emerged that the UKs Chief Scientific Adviser, Sir Patrick Vallance (pictured) a former president of British drugs giant GlaxoSmithKline, still has a 600,000 shareholding in the firm which is currently involved in developing Covid vaccines

The Oxford professor has worked as an adviser to the Department of Health and Social Care since 2017 in a variety of roles.

Under former Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt he helped explore ways the Government could work with drugs companies such as GlaxoSmithKline.

Among his numerous high profile appointments, he also sits on the board of Genomics England, a Government-funded company set up and funded by the Department of Health and Social Care to sequence 100,000 genomes from NHS patients.

Since March he has been chairman of the Governments New Test Approvals Group, which assesses virus diagnostic tests.
GODFREY  Drivers are needed for the buses that carry Alton School District students.

Up to 64% of school districts across the country are facing a mild or moderate school bus driver shortage, according to School Bus Fleet magazine. Another 17% report that their need for drivers is dire.

Illinois Central School Bus in Godfrey, which serves students in the Alton School District and some private sectors, is seeing firsthand the effects of the bus driver shortage.

Just our company is short about 250 drivers, said Contract Manager Sheri Kelley. Everybodys struggling.

The driver shortage is placing more pressure on Kelley and her colleagues during an already challenging time because of the pandemic. On Oct. 19, Alton students will resume limited in-person classes. Kelley said her biggest concern is for the overall well-being of the children.

We are not doing our children in this area a service by not having enough drivers, she said. I realize that theres a certain percentage that are being home-schooled right now, but all of the buses are still going.

Illinois Central School Bus Safety Manager Mary Daugherty elaborated on that concern, explaining the importance of maintaining a consistent driver on each route.

The kids benefit so much by having the same driver on their bus every day, said Daugherty. When we have to have a lot of substitutions because of the driver shortage, it makes it way harder on the kids and it makes it much much harder on the parents.

Both Kelley and Daugherty also expressed a need for drivers who care about children. Its not just a driving job, they said; its a job that is both challenging and rewarding for those who understand that drivers can make a big difference in the lives of the children they transport to and from school.

We want someone who is genuinely interested in making a concerted effort, cares about the kids and takes care of them, said Kelley.

Theres about half of the number of kids on the buses right now, but we need good quality people that can help these children out, she said. Weve got to make sure that we have good people that love children, not just somebody here for a paycheck. Its not just a job.

Recruiting manager Mark Walsh of the bus line said a school bus driver is often the only neutral person in a childs life.

They get lectured at school and they get lectured at home, said Walsh. Our bus ride is just a neutral safe zone for most of these children.

Although driving a school bus can be challenging, its also quite rewarding, according to Kelley.

Its not 100 percent positive and we all know that because children are children, she said. You dont have to be sunshine and roses every single day and sprinkle fairy dust on everything, but it can become a lifetime thing. It really can. I started as a bus driver because I needed something to do when my kids were in school and be off when they were off.

Illinois Central School Bus offers free training to new drivers and currently is offering a $2,000 sign-on bonus through Oct. 31. Drivers are guaranteed a minimum of 20 hours a week. They get the benefit of being off work when kids are out of school and can work more, if interested.

For those who find the prospect of driving a bus to be somewhat intimidating, Kelley would like to reassure prospective drivers that its not as scary as it looks.

When I first walked up to a bus, I thought theres no way, she said. But now, Im more comfortable driving a bus than I am my own truck.

For more information on becoming a school bus driver with Illinois Central School Bus, call Walsh at 618-466-5400 ext. 3405 or visit the bus garage at 4525 N. Alby St. in Godfrey.
Nobody knows exactly when Vietnamese begun drinking scented tea. Raising their tea cup and taking a sip, drinkers can taste the unique flavour of tea combined with the four-season floral scent. Hanoians are picky about their ways to enjoy dishes and drinks, so they have invented some of the top scented teas, such as Tay Ho lotus tea or narcissus tea. Life goes by, customs fade with the years but there are old folds that return and remain forever, and among them is the habit of enjoying scented tea combined with the method of weaving" the scent into the tea buds.

It was just 5 am in the early morning; Ms. Dan (97) woke up. After the morning personal hygiene work, she was waiting for her family members to bring home lotus for making scented tea. Like a young girl, lotus is at its best when it is just starting to bloom. Usually, lotus for tea making must be collected when the flower is just about to blossom, that is when the lotus is most fragrant. The harvest starts from just after 3 am in the morning and finishes at about 5 am, before the sun begins to shine, to keep the flower at its best in terms of fragrance. If just a few petals spread out, the lotus will be less aromatic, causing the typical lotus scent to be less pervasive in the tea.

The sound of motorbikes could be heard from the gate of Dans home, marking the arrival of the lotus. In her house on To Ngoc Van Street (Tay Ho District, Hanoi), her daughters, granddaughters and nieces-in-law join together in each stage of lotus tea making. Dan was not well these days but keeping her away from the lotus would make her even more tired. Dan asked her family members to arrange a folding bed for her in the living room so she may rest if she is was tired during the lotus tea making.

Each layer of lotus petals is separated, leaving only the seed pod and the pistil. Dan is 97 this year, yet she is still wise, making lotus tea for three months from mid-summer to early autumn. Dan spread a large lotus leaf into the basket. Her hands were shaking but remain very skilful. She did not need to look at the lotus pod but still separated the anthers precisely.

"This is exactly the Tay Ho lotus [lotus cultivated in Hanois Tay Ho (West) Lake]. After peeling off the outside petals, it will come to the inner layer. Tay Ho lotus has big petals with a more aromatic fragrance. It is often called the Bach Diep lotus because it is likely to have hundreds of petals in each flower. When the lotus is peeled in the very early stages of blooming, the inner petals still hold the pistil like this. Opening the inner lotus petals, you will see the lotus filaments. Lotus rice (the anther) is the small seeds at the top of these golden threads. We only collect the lotus rice, which is the "fragrant bag" of the lotus," Dan told a story about making lotus tea.

For Dan, at the age of 97, she has spent over seven decades making scented tea. When she was only nine years old, the little girl Nguyen Thi Dan usually travelled from her house near the West Lake to the Old Quarter to sell flowers to the wealthy in the streets of Hang Ngang and Hang Dao. Many Hanoians buy lotus to make their own scented tea. Dan also carried flowers to sell to many tea makers around Hanoi. When she was young, there were several dozen families making lotus scented tea in Quang An and Quang Ba around the West Lake. She learned how to scent lotus tea from her parents and from traditional families in the Old Quarter. As a result, many traders bought her flowers and asked her to make tea from them.

"At the age of 25, there were some people asking me why I didnt make scented tea for sale. This job is very elaborate, so I also hesitated. But from that year until now, I have not missed any lotus season," said Dan.

Dan's family make scented tea year round. Spring comes, marking the pomelo flower season, and her whole family will make pomelo flower tea. The pomelo flower season quickly passes, just in ten days, and they switch to jasmine tea, with the jasmine season lasts longer. But in mid-May, they stop making jasmine tea and switching completely to lotus. Jasmine tea is stronger than lotus regarding the floral flavour. Where jasmine tea needs only two to three "circles", lotus tea needs at least seven to make it fully scented.

The separated lotus rice will be mixed with tea to make lotus scented tea. After 18 to 24 hours, the rice will be sifted out, dried and then mixed again with tea. This process is repeated exactly seven times. To make 1 kg of lotus tea, about 1 kg of lotus rice is needed. To produce 1 kg of lotus rice, at least 1,000 flowers are needed. When the "weaving" is finished, the tea is no longer green, but turns red. That is the real "quality" of lotus tea. Soaking such tea up to six or seven times in water, it is still fragrant despite the teas flavour becoming much lighter. If you ever see a worker making lotus tea in a brilliant pink light, you can't help but fall in love with this tea. Thats why there are still artisans who have been attached to the tea making career for long like Ms. Dan.

Lotus is popular across the country and thus lotus scented tea can be found in many places nationwide, but Hanois Tay Ho lotus takes the top. The method used by Hanoians in preparing this typical tea is also more elaborate, causing Tay Ho lotus tea to become the typical drink for the elegance and delicacy of the Trang An (old name of Hanoi) people.

Tea artisan Hoang Anh Suong, the owner of the famous Truong Xuan tea lounge in Hanoi, said that Vietnam is one of the countries with the earliest tea cultures in the world. Vietnamese people have many different ways of enjoying tea. Floral scented tea is a separate "line" of tea. Vietnamese people have made many kinds of flower-scented teas from various flowers, such as sweet osmanthus, Aglaia duperreana, orchid, pomelo, Chloranthaceae, and jasmine. Although each has its own beauty, lotus scented tea is still treasured.

"The predecessors were so sophisticated that they took the morning dew drops from the lotus leaves to mash lotus tea. Now it is impossible to do so, but mashing tea with rain water is also very good. Each flower scented tea gives a different flavour, so the specialised pots for mashing tea are also different for each. In that way, we can fully enjoy the flavours of the flower scented tea, Suong said.

Although there are no specialised books about tea to become "tea scripture", tea appears in many ancient literature. In the collection Vu Trung Tuy But (Collection Written on Rainy Days) by famous scholar Pham Dinh Ho (1768-1839), a part of the collection was devoted to describing how to drink tea, showing that the way to enjoy tea at that time was very sophisticated. The talented writers of Hanoi such as Vu Bang and Nguyen Tuan also spend their best writing about tea. In Thuong Nho Muoi Hai (Missing Twelve), about the typical features of Hanoi during the full 12 months of the year, Vu Bang also mentioned a variety of tea scented with a flower that is not well known today  paperwhite narcissus tea.

The paperwhite flower is elegant with a slight regal fragrance, but is difficult to cultivate, causing it to be compared to a young sentimental woman. Beginning of the 12th lunar month is the time to start cultivating paperwhite. Having to "coddle" the flowers like a princess, the flower buds will grow up twenty days later. Tea makers must wait for some new flower buds to start blooming to start the tea making process. Tea in making paperwhite scented tea must be preserved for several years for its scent to recede such that it is suitable for being scented with paperwhite flowers. Each layer of tea will be covered by a layer of paperwhite flowers, making the process look like a "golden cup on a white jade dish". Again and again, the process is repeated until the makers feel it is enough, then all the tea batch will be sealed, waiting for the tea to suck enough fragrance. After repeating the process a few times, there will be a sweet tea with clear water and a gentle but discreet fragrance like a young woman's secret charm. It's so sophisticated that even among Hanoians in traditional wealthy families in the Old Quarter, not many can afford to make paperwhite tea. In the past several years, Hanois traditional pastime of paperwhite farming and enjoying has returned, and such tea has found its way back from the past.

In Hanoi, there is now a tea artisan, Nguyen Viet Bac, the owner of Thuong Tra tea room on Tong Dan Street, who is a connoisseur in cultivating narcissus and has also exerted efforts in making typical teapots for this precious flower. However, he does not hesitate to warn customers that if they are not good at scented tea making and connoisseur cultivation, they should not take the flowers to make paperwhite scented tea. Without proper treatment, the tea making process can allow the resin to contaminate the tea, causing allergies. Despite its unique taste, tea artisans must handle it very skilfully, like walking on a rope, if they don't want the enjoyers to have side effects when enjoying paperwhite scented tea.

Learning about Tay Ho lotus tea has been precious. Learning about narcissus tea is more surprising. Thats why many people call it enjoying tea, definitely not drinking tea, when talking about these scented teas.

In the past, Tay Ho (West Lake) had many lotus lagoons. Hanoians have been proud of their famous Tay Ho lotus. Locals in Quang An, a small area near the lake, have held the profession of making lotus scented tea for a long time. Now, the lotus cultivation areas have receded along with the pace of life. Quang An people have brought their traditional lotus seeds to cultivate in Thuy Phuong in Bac Tu Liem District then bought them to make lotus tea. Lotus in other places are hard to compare with the original Tay Ho lotus, but thanks to the extension of lotus cultivating areas, now more and more people are offered with a chance to enjoy lotus tea.

There was a time lotus tea enjoying seemed to disappear amid food was the top priority, but now, the lotus output from Quang An  the largest lotus tea centre in Hanoi  is measured in tonnes per year, even though just only several local families are cultivating this lotus variety. Many Hanoians now buy lotus to make scented tea by themselves. Just opening the lotus flower and put the dried tea in, then wrapping the petal up to "weave" the fragrance, thats all to make lotus tea. Enjoyers only need to wait until the following day to harvest their finished product. A small flower is enough to make tea for a single teapot, while the bigger ones can afford two pots. There are also sophisticated people who make lotus rice to add more flavour to their lotus tea. Not to mention the many others that have been enjoying making jasmine, Aglaia duperreana and Chloranthaceae scented teas. For enjoying narcissus tea, as this pastime of old has returned, many people have also rewarded themselves with elegant narcissus teapots. Life goes on. Selection goes on. Things that have been left in such processes belong to culture ...
Wrexham Trading Standards issue warning after reports of scam Netflix email targeting residents

This article is old - Published: Saturday, Sep 26th, 2020

Wrexham Trading Standards have been made aware of scam emails claiming to be from Netflix currently being sent to members of the public.

The email, which uses the Netflix logo, states Unfortunately, we are unable to approve your payment for your next subscription cycle, and you are then asked to update your payment information by pressing the button below.

It then asks people to update their current billing information.

However this is a scam and dont click on any links within the email.

This is the latest in a number of scam emails that are doing the rounds  including a fake email that has also been reported to Wrexham Trading Standards.

Cllr Hugh Jones, Lead Member for Communities, Partnerships, Public Protection and Community Safety, said: Please dont get caught out, and be extra cautious about giving out any personal information.

Always take the time you need to identify whether something could be a scam first.

If still youre not sure, get in touch with the brand or company directly.

The following advice has been issued to help residents stay scam aware:-

STOP  Taking a moment to stop and think before parting with your money or information could keep you safe.

CHALLENGE  Could it be fake? Its OK to reject, refuse or ignore any requests. Only criminals will try to rush or panic you.

PROTECT  Contact your bank immediately if you think youve fallen for a scam and report it to Action Fraud.

The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) created the Suspicious Email Reporting Service which makes it easy for people to forward suspicious emails to them.

The NCSC will then analyse the suspect email and any websites it links to.

If you have received an email which youre not quite sure about, you can forward it to the Suspicious Email Reporting Service by emailing report@phishing.gov.uk

If you think you may have been the victim of fraud or cyber-crime, you should report this to Action Fraud via their website or by calling 0300 123 2040.

Action Fraud is the UKs National Fraud and Cyber Crime Reporting Centre.

Consumer advice can be obtained from the Citizens Advice Consumer Service. They can be contacted on 0808 223 1144 (Welsh) or 0808 223 1133 (English).
Former Bihar DGP Gupteshwar Pandey met Chief Minister Nitish Kumar here on Saturday, lending credence to speculations that the IPS officers sudden move of taking VRS was propelled by the intention to join politics.

Pandey, who stepped down as the state police chief less than a week ago, however, insisted that he had walked down to the state headquarters of the JD(U), headed by the Chief Minister, to thank" Kumar for the trust reposed in him by the latter.

I discussed nothing political with the Chief Minister. I have worked with him for long and, after retirement, I just wanted to thank him for his support. If and when I decide to join any political party, I will make it known to all, Pandey told a posse of journalists waiting outside the JD(U) office at Birchand Patel Marg.

Although the IPS officer, who took VRS less than half a year before he was scheduled to superannuate, has chosen to keep his cards close to the rest, the grapevine has it that he is all set to join the JD(U) and get a ticket from one of the assembly segments in his native district of Buxar.

Reports in a section of the media also say that Pandey might be considered for the Valmiki Nagar Lok Sabha seat where a by-poll has been necessitated by the death of sitting JD(U) MP Baidyanath Mahto.

The JD(U) draws its support, largely, from among non-Yadav OBCs and Pasmanda Muslims. The party hopes that with the induction of Pandey it may be able to reach out to the Brahmins, traditionally supporters of the Congress who have gravitated towards the BJP of late.

Pandey had hit the headlines recently for his vocal condemnation of the non-cooperation meted out to the Bihar police team that had visited Mumbai to probe the death by suicide of Patna-born actor Sushant Singh Rajput.

With a candour that is usually not associated with bureaucrats, Pandey had lashed out at the municipal authourities in Mumbai when they had forcibly quarantined Vinay Tiwari, a young IPS officer from Patna who heading the investigating team until the probe was handed over to the CBI upon a request to the effect from the deceased actors father.

Pandeys comment, while he was still the DGP, that actress Rhea Chakraborty accused of abetment to suicide by Rajputs father did not have the aukaat (standing) to make any snide remarks against Nitish Kumar was also much talked about.

The Shiv Sena, which heads the ruling coalition in Maharashtra, had accused Pandey of acting as a political pawn of the ruling dispensation in Bihar ahead of the assembly elections.

Shiv Sena spokesman Sanjay Raut on the former DGPs VRS said, he was running a political agenda with his statements on the Mumbai case and now he is going to receive his award. Maharashtra Home minister and NCP leader Anil Deshmukh Friday said that Pandeys quitting the job confirmed his doubts that in Rajputs death case he was making comments not as a DGP but as a BJP leader.

Pandey has earlier brushed aside criticism from the Shiv Sena, saying they keep saying many things, I dont give much credence to it."

Pandey had resigned from service in 2009 to contest the Lok Sabha elections held that year. His resignation letter was, however, intriguingly not forwarded and he was reinstated into service a few months later.

Earlier, on Tuesday, decks seemed to have been cleared for Pandeys future move as his application for VRS received an expeditious approval from Governor Fagu Chauhan and an exception was made in his case with the waiver of a mandatory three-month long cooling off period for government servants.
Five employees and two patrons at the popular Toronto pub Yonge Street Warehouse near Ryerson University have tested positive for COVID-19.

Toronto Public Health issued a warning Saturday about a potential exposure between Sept. 10 and Sept. 17. Approximately 1,700 people may have been at the pub during this period of time, the news release reads.

Those who may have been to that location during that week have been asked to closely monitor for COVID-19 symptoms for two weeks after their visit.

Due to the recent surge in COVID-19 cases, Ontario has closed strip clubs and moved last call at bars and restaurants to 11 p.m.

CF Markville Mall in Markham is also reporting that two employees have tested positive for COVID-19.

The first case involves a Best Buy employee, who was last in store on Sept. 16. The second is an employee at Old Navy who was last in store on Sept. 17.

Appropriate deep cleaning measures are being taken according to a statement by Cadillac Fairview.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has accused the militant union at the heart of Sydney's waterfront dispute of "holding the country to ransom" as its industrial action at Port Botany causes major delays to farm exports.

Farmers throughout NSW are holding out for further breakthroughs in the dispute that threatens to hold back any post-drought boom for regional economies from increased global export markets.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison took aim at the "militant" Maritime Union of Australia over the Sydney port dispute. Credit:Getty Images

Speaking in Adelaide on Saturday, Mr Morrison took aim at the Maritime Union of Australia which has hit the port with stoppages, go-slows and overtime and upgrade bans in an employment row that has affected stevedores Patrick, Hutchison and DP World.

"At a time when we are in a COVID national recession, the worst elements of the union movement and the militancy of the MUA is on display," Mr Morrison told Liberal Party members at the party's South Australian conference.
Seven killed, 40 hurt in Korat bus-lorry crash

NAKHON RATCHASIMA: Seven people were killed and 40 others injured when a double-decker bus carrying health volunteers on a study trip to Pattaya rammed into a trailer lorry loaded with cassava roots at an intersection in Muang district of this northeastern province early on Saturday (Sept 26).

accidentstransport

By Bangkok Post

Saturday 26 September 2020, 02:56PM

Rescue workers try to retrieve injured and dead victims from a double-decker tour bus which overturned after ramming into a trailer truck in Muang district of Nakhon Ratchasima early Saturday (Sept 26). Photo: Prasit Tangprasert

The fatal crash happened at the Chai Mongkhol bypass on Ratchasima-Pak Thong Chai route in Muang district, said Pol Lt Anucha Khammuang, a duty officer at Pho Klang police station, who was reported around 3.48am on Saturday (Sept 26).

The tourist bus with Kalasin licence plates was carrying 47 health volunteers from Ban Nam Sai village in Chaturaphak Phiman district of Roi Et on a study trip to Pattaya in Chon Buri. The bus overturned when police and rescue workers arrived at the scene. Many passengers were injured and screaming for help as they were trapped in the wreckage, Bangkok Post reports.

Rescue workers rushed to retrieve all people from the wreckage. Seven people were found dead and 40 others injured. The injured were sent to nearby hospitals.

About 50 metres away, a 22-wheel trailer with Lop Buri licence plates overturned with cassava roots scattered over the road.

According to police investigation, the double-decker bus were one of the three tour buses taking health volunteers from Ban Nam Sai village in Roi Et for a study trip in Pattaya.

One survivor on the bus told police that the bus was travelling at such a high speed that the passengers could not sleep. Before the crash, the driver briefly slept at the wheel and some passengers urged him to stop for a rest. The driver said he could not do so because he had arranged to meet the drivers of the two other buses in Hinson hill area, said the survivor, according to the passenger.

According to police investigation, the double-decker bus were one of the three tour buses taking health volunteers from Ban Nam Sai village in Roi Et for a study trip in Pattaya.

One survivor on the bus told police that the bus was travelling at such a high speed that the passengers could not sleep. Before the crash, the driver briefly slept at the wheel and some passengers urged him to stop for a rest. The driver said he could not do so because he had arranged to meet the drivers of the two other buses in Hinson hill area, said the survivor, according to the passenger.
Sunder Sham Arora

Chandigarh: Terming the newly passed farm bills as black bills for the farmers and agrarian economy of the country, the Industries and Commerce Minister Sunder Sham Arora on Saturday accused the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led Central Government for ignoring the interests of farmers on one hand and securing benefits for corporate houses on the other.

Reiterating the commitment of Punjab Government to safeguard the interests of farmers at all costs, the Minister said that the Centre would not succeed in its nefarious design to destroy the agrarian sector.

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Sunder Sham AroraPunjab Government will stand by the farmers against the apathetic attitude of Centre at the behest of corporate houses and will work shoulder-to-shoulder in future too as the farmers of the state has been producing grains for the entire country since long, said Arora.

Demanding immediate revocation of anti-farmers, anti-arthiyas and anti-labourers bills, the Minister pointed out that these bills would badly ruin these sections of the society with adverse effects on the other sections.

The Minister said that the recent exclusion of cereals, pulses, onion-potatoes etc. from the list of essential commodities would further lead to hoarding and black-marketing across the country as the rates of food-grains were skyrocketing.

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Punjab government He said that these bills would never benefit the farming community but only be beneficial for the corporate houses. The Centre is conspiring to tinker with the Minimum Support Price, which will not be tolerated at any cost in larger interests of farmers, said the Minister adding that the newly passed farm bills were aimed at devastating the rural development across Punjab as the state would be bereft of Rs 4000 crore annual fund being collected by the Mandi Board once these Bills were converted into laws.

The Minister demanded that the Centre should immediate roll back these anti farmers bills, which are being strongly opposed by the farmers, arthiyas and farm labourers in the country.
The vaccine candidates in Phase 3 trials have been previously tested on smaller groups of people. Phase 3 involves administering a candidate and a placebo to hundreds more, to see whether they are safe to take and effective in stopping the coronavirus. Roughly 100,000 people are involved in those trials, based on Chinese company disclosures. Virtually all of them are in other countries, however, because the coronavirus has been largely tamed in China.

Still, the Chinese government had already approved three vaccines for emergency use on others at home. In July, it said it would prioritize medical workers, epidemic prevention personnel, border inspection officials and people who ensure basic city operations to receive vaccines.

Now, it appears that those groups could be expanding.

This month, the government of Shaoyang, a city in Zhejiang Province, asked local officials to identify more people who could qualify as emergency users. People in schools, kindergartens and nursing homes were recommended for inclusion, as well as travelers heading to medium- to high-risk areas.

Other government notices have asked local officials to identify people as candidates for getting vaccinations, though it was not always clear whether they would be inoculated before or after vaccines had cleared Phase 3 trials.

Tough containment efforts appear to have tamed the virus in most parts of China. Still, outbreaks in Beijing and the far west in recent months have spooked the countrys leaders, who worry that lockdowns could disrupt the economic recovery. Chinese public health experts are also concerned that the arrival of winter and the need to keep people indoors might usher in another outbreak.

A senior Chinese official said this month that a vaccine could be made available to the public as early as November. That same day, a spokeswoman for the United Arab Emirates Foreign Ministry said on Twitter that the government had authorized the Sinopharm vaccine to be given to its frontline workers after successful Phase 3 trials in the Emirates.
Seven-year-old Sophie Buchanan is missing her public library, which is yet to reopen months after the lifting of the NSW lockdown restrictions that forced its closure.

"I really love books and libraries have the most books," Sophie said. "At my school I can only borrow one book and two for school holidays - I've already finished one."

Most public libraries reopened in June, but seven-year-old Sophie's local library in Oatley is still closed. Credit:Wolter Peeters

Most public libraries in Sydney reopened in the first half of June, with social distancing and enhanced hygiene measures in place to prevent the spread of COVID-19. However, a number across the city remain closed and dozens more are operating reduced hours and restricted services as a way of managing exposure to coronavirus.

Sophie's usual library in Oatley is one of two in the Georges River Council area that remain closed; the other is South Hurstville. A council spokeswoman said these two libraries had a single entrance and the council was unable to ensure physical distancing inside.
KALAMAZOO  Western Michigan University reported 84 new coronavirus cases to its COVID-19 Dashboard Friday, Sept. 25.

Fridays new batch of cases pushes the schools total number of cases to 388 since students returned to campus back in August.

The data released Friday is from cases that were reported Sept. 21-23., as the university has been updating data from Sindecuse Health Center in its dashboard on Tuesday and Friday evenings each week.

WMU President Edward Montgomery sent an email to students and faculty on Monday, Sept. 21, to update community members where the university stands in its Safe Return Plan, saying the institution is currently in Phase 2 of its plan.

Community spread is a factor that we continue to watch carefully, Montgomery said. We assess our data at regularly scheduled meetings between WMUs COVID-19 Response Coordination team leaders and our county health officials. At its most recent meeting, the group concluded that we are seeing evidence of increasing disease transmission among WMU students.

Montgomery told WMU community members that the increase in cases was expected as a result of the back-to-campus return as well as Labor Day weekend.

The majority of the positive cases seem to be stemming from off-campus living situations and off-campus social gatherings, Montgomery said in the email.

Mona Shores High School announced in an email to parents this week that two students tested positive for coronavirus, and are believed to have been exposed during a weekend visit to Western Michigan University.

Health officials believe both students were exposed to the virus after visiting Western Michigan University the weekend of Sept. 12, the school said.

On Monday, the university announced that Sindecuse Health Center has expanded its testing capabilities.

Sindecuse had a handful of days where staff determined that capacity was not sufficient... Before we could call on Sindecuse to address the matter, the staff was already working on a solution, Montgomery said in an email.

Montgomery said that since the issue has been identified, Sindecuse has adopted policies and practices to expedite appointments and increase daily testing volume.

Through these measures, Sindecuse has more than doubled its testing capability without delay, Montgomery said.

The average number of tests over a 7-day period plummeted in September following the universitys five-day testing event at the Student Recreation Center on its main campus from Aug. 27 through Aug. 31. At that event, 1,128 people were tested over five days.

Days after the testing event, Sindecuse recorded averaging 235 tests per week. That measure hasnt made it above 192.8 since, and has stayed under 150 tests over a 7-day period for a large part of September.

Since Sept. 14, when Sindecuse was giving an average of 105.4 tests per week, the number of tests being administered is slowly increasing.

The health center has tested 2,227 people in September, 298 of which were administered on Sept. 1 and 588 that were given from Sept. 21-23. Less than 10% of the 23,363 students at WMU have been tested for coronavirus in September.

When asked if its possible to know how many people on Westerns campus are actually infected, Kalamazoo County Health Director Jim Rutherford told MLive last week that he doesnt think that level of information can be accurately determined. You would have to have daily testing of your entire population, and thats going to change over time, Rutherford said.

WMU has encouraged students living on-campus to seek testing but students are not required to do so. Currently, students are required to take a daily online survey, which grants them access to enter buildings on campus.

At Grand Valley State University, students will now be incentivized with $200 in tuition funds to take a coronavirus health screening test every day for the remainder of the fall semester, GVSU said in a Facebook post.

GVSU students were recently ordered to stay in their on- or off-campus residence for two weeks because of a surge in the number of coronavirus cases. GVSU has reported more than 600 positive cases since students returned to campus.

WMU students and community members seeking testing at Sindecuse can call the health center to set up an appointment at 269-387-3287, or set up an appointment through the Sindecuse online patient portal.

Also on MLive:

Western Michigan University freshmen rolling with the punches as they move in during a pandemic

University of Michigan reopening recreational sports facilities Sept. 28 after rise in coronavirus cases

After update, University of Michigan coronavirus dashboard shows more than 100 positive cases in last 2 weeks

Michigan State University, Ingham County work through issue in coronavirus data reporting
HOLYOKE  You can walk or run wherever you choose for Rays of Hope, Baystate Healths popular fall fundraiser, which is being held partly online this year due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Registration is $30 for the Rays of Hope Walk & Run Toward the Cure of Breast Cancer Hybrid Virtual Challenge 2020. Participants can sign up on the fundraisers website, where they may also create their own page to raise donations through October.

Maps and directions to replicate the traditional Rays of Hope routes through Springfields Forest Park are available as well on the website.

A drive-through Pride of Hope celebration for registered participants will be held Oct. 25 from 8-11 a.m. at the Baystate Health Education Center, 361 Whitney Ave., Holyoke.

A radio station will entertain during the celebration, and the drive-through under the fundraisers signature Hope Starts Here pink arch will offer participants the opportunity to pick up their 2020 T-shirt, included in the registration fee.

An online Pink Celebration follows at noon and will feature 2020 Rays of Hope chairs Jackie Rodriguez, a breast cancer survivor, and her husband Al, as well as Rays of Hope founder Lucy Giuggio Carvalho.

Rays of Hope, now it its 27th year, has raised more than $15.4 million to date. All funds remain local to support breast cancer survivors in Western Massachusetts, the Rays of Hope Center for Breast Cancer Research and community programs.

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Vietnamese scientists research on Covid-19 vaccine production at a lab of the Company for Vaccine and Biological Production No.1 in Hanoi, July 2020. Photo by VnExpress/Giang Huy.

A lot needs to be improved in the mechanism for recruiting, using, and remunerating talent in Vietnam, experts said at a recent forum.

Bui Nhat Quang, chairman of the Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences, said the contingent of Vietnamese intellectuals has been greatly boosted by the addition of dynamic and creative talent, reflected in every step of national development.

However, "Vietnam lacks quality leaders and managers, along with experts and scientists truly dedicated to their profession," he told a scientific forum hosted Friday in Hanoi by the academy, a state agency responsible for studying key domestic social science issues.

"We are in dire need of great intellectuals and leading experts ready to commence projects of a life time. The process of conducting scientific research and technology transfer at research institutes and universities still faces difficulties and limitations. Vietnamese intellectuals operate under creatively constrictive conditions and can only react passively to issues that impede the countrys development."

This is ascribed to the lack of an effective local mechanism for recruiting and managing talent, along with low salaries and bonuses, he said.

"Party and state guidelines regarding intellectuals are yet to be made adequate and synchronized to meet the requirements of reality."

Such limitations have resulted in a modest intellectual contribution to the country's socio-economic development, disproportionate to Vietnamese potential, Quang told the forum that gathered over 200 scientists, managers, and experts from different departments and ministries from national and local levels, research institutes, universities and organizations.

Speaking from his own experience, Professor Vu Duong Ninh, former dean of the Faculty of International Studies, University of Social Sciences and Humanities, Hanoi, said when previously charged with scientific research projects, especially doctoral dissertations, he always found them to be both serious and meticulous.

However, all those works got scuppered when it came to authors putting forward their personal recommendations and opinions.

"Many quoted the ideas of others or held forth generalized points of view, fearful their own opinions would cause unsolicited consequences," Ninh said.

"Vietnamese intellectuals have a great desire to contribute to the overall development of the country, especially its international integration. So they need to speak up, and make their opinions count," he said.

"Authorities need to encourage and protect researchers in presenting their views," he said.

In order to do so, he suggested Vietnam organizes more selective scientific discussions to affect feasible results.

Vo Dai Luoc, director of Vietnam Asia - Pacific Economic Center, said intellectuals are the most important Vietnamese force in the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

"However, Vietnam still lacks the necessary intellectual and creative freedom. Remuneration remains inadequate, with public sector wages are lower than private sector salaries."

Forum organizers said ideas contributed at the event would directly serve to grow Vietnams intellectual contingent in the period 2021-2030.
Find all of the most important pandemic education news on Educating N.J., a special resource guide created for parents, students and educators. As schools reopen across N.J., we want to know what is and isnt working. Tell us about it here.

The Middletown school district has ordered two signs that it deemed to be political messages taken down at its high school, one with the phrase Black Lives Matter and the other with Make America Great Again.

Former Board of Education candidate Mike Craig posted a photo of one of the images, a rainbow-colored Black Lives Matter message to Facebook, that read, In this class, we believe Black Lives Matter, womens rights are human rights, no human is illegal, science is real, love is love, kindness is everything. The message was posted on a science teachers desk in the front of the classroom, according to a screenshot of the post.

Keep up with the latest in N.J. schools coverage. Sign up with your email here:



In Craigs post, which garnered more than 1,600 comments, he encouraged parents to e-mail the school administration and demand it taken down.

Other Facebook posts showed a Make America Great Again banner, posted on a history teachers classroom door. The banner contained an American flag, President Donald Trumps name and the words, The 45th U.S. President with his slogan beneath it.

Middletown Board of Education President Pam Rogers said both teachers were asked to take their signs down after Walker received several angry emails from parents.

The reason they were taken down from what I understand  is that both were disrupting the classroom, Rogers told NJ Advance Media. In other words, students were either upset about things they saw on Facebook so whether they were in favor or against the signs, it was causing a lot of disruption in the classroom.

The We believe Black Lives Matter message was created by a woman in Wisconsin in the immediate aftermath of the 2016 election, though has since become a widely shared message promoting tolerance and progressive values. The Make America Great Again slogan was registered as a service mark by Donald Trump in 2015, shortly after he announced his run for President, and has come to be seen as his main campaign slogan.

Superintendent Mary Ellen Walker notified the school community of the removal at Middletown High School North in a brief statement related to recent events in the district.

Public schools have the responsibility to present information, aligned to the state standards and our district curriculum, in an objective manner, Walker wrote. Please be advised that this matter has been reviewed and mutually resolved in support of our efforts to promote a positive learning environment for all students.

The decision comes on the heels of a June letter, signed by more than 1,000 students, alumni and parents, calling on the school district to diversify its curriculum and prioritize anti-racism.

It is also imperative that the MTPSD commits to ensuring that ongoing discussions on topics such as racism, police brutality, mass incarceration, and white privilege are held within the classroom throughout the year, the letter reads.

In the same month as the letter, Jada Tulloch, Middletown High School Norths 2020 valedictorian, called out racism at Middletown schools with a viral video posted to Instagram. After her classmates gathered outside the Board of Education building to protest their in-person graduation being canceled, Tulloch urging students to stop trying to invalidate the Black Lives Matter movement and the protests against police brutality by comparing the injustices faced by minorities to the oppression that youre facing from the Board of Ed."

Rogers, a Democrat in a town where 60 percent of residents voted for Trump in 2016, said she personally did not agree that the items equally merited removal, but that the decision was made by the superintendent and informed by the districts legal department.

Craigs Facebook post called Rogers out by name, in whats become a heated fight for Rogers' re-election with plenty of mud-slinging from her opponents. A YouTube video from the channel Middletown Anonymous was posted last week, connecting Rogers to the Defund the Police movement, which she vehemently denies.

Its just ludicrous, ridiculous, insignificant, silly," Rogers said. Theres no ill will between Pam Rogers and the Middletown Police Department.

Walker did not respond to a request for comment.

As schools reopen across N.J., we want to know what is and isnt working. Tell us about it here.

Josh Axelrod may be reached at jaxelrod@njadvancemedia.com. Have a news tip or a story idea about New Jersey schools? Send it here.
The political advocacy group backed by billionaire Charles Koch is officially launching their campaign in support of President Donald Trump's latest nominee to the Supreme Court.

The Koch linked group, Americans for Prosperity (AFP), moved ahead with what will likely be an expansive and expensive campaign for the organization to help push Trump's nominee through the Senate. Trump on Saturday selected Judge Amy Coney Barrett to replace the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court.

Casey Mattox, the Vice President for Legal and Judicial Strategy at Americans for Prosperity, told CNBC that they plan to call on lawmakers to support Barrett's nomination, with the help of their large scale grassroots operation. They will initiate phone banking, push out direct mail and craft various digital ads that will try to convince senators to vote yes for Trump's nominee.

"A full scale campaign is now underway to mobilize our grassroots activists across the country to drive the confirmation of Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the high court. We'll be lighting up senators' switchboards," Mattox said.

AFP is going to argue that lawmakers should vote in support of Barrett because the group believes that as Supreme Court justice "she will embrace her role to safeguard the constitutional rights of the people while recognizing that we elect Congress, not the courts, to legislate," Mattox says.

Americans for Prosperity says it will be a full scale national campaign but their top targets will be senators in Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Iowa, Maine, North Carolina, South Carolina, Utah, and West Virginia. Some of their targeted lawmakers are Democrats including Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Doug Jones, D-Ala.

This will be the latest Supreme Court fight AFP will be involved with since Trump has become president. They ran campaigns backing Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh. During the Kavanaugh hearings, they committed seven figures to the cause.

Doug Jones said on Friday he would not vote for any Supreme Court nominee until after Election Day in November. He's currently up for re-election.

The Alabama lawmaker is one of many Democrats, including Joe Biden, who have come out publicly to push back on Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., for moving ahead with a nominee so close to the election.

With that, various outside groups have launched expensive efforts to either support or push back on Trump's maneuvers.

AFP will be the latest group to join the 2020 battle over the Supreme Court.
(Newser)  The brain-eating amoeba that recently turned up in Florida has resurfaced in a Texas town's water supply, KHOU reports. On Friday, Texas environmental officials told residents in several areas near Houstonincluding Lake Jackson, Brazoria, Richwood, Freeport, Angleton, and Oyster Creekto stop using tap water, even for bathing, after possible Naegleria Fowleri was spotted in the water. By Saturday that warning was lifted for all areas except Lake Jackson. ABC7 reports that roughly 58,000 people were affected by the advisory and long lineups were seen in Lake Jackson as people stocked up on water. On the bright side, the CDC notes that people can't get infected by swallowing water contaminated with the amoeba. Infections usually occur when it enters via the nose. (Read more brain-eating amoeba stories.)
Round wire gadgets to check coconut sizes and enforce control prices By Chris Kamalendran View(s): View(s):

Consumer Affairs Authority officials armed with improvised measuring gadgets will be deployed to check on the sizes of coconuts to implement the latest gazette notification on price control, a senior official said.

Consumer Affairs Authority Chairman and retired Major General D.M.S. Dissanayake told the Sunday Times that district offices had been adviced to measure the circumference of coconuts to determine if they were being sold at the controlled prices gazetted on Friday.

The gazette notification said a coconut with a circumference of 13 inches and above could be sold at a maximum price of Rs 70, a coconut between 12 and 13 inch circumferance at Rs 65 and a coconut below 12-inch circumference at Rs 60.

He said CAA officers had been told to prepare round wire frames according to the sizes which had been gazetted and check whether coconuts were being sold at the controlled prices.

The move came as coconut prices shot up to more than Rs 100 a nut with some consumers being able to buy only half a coconut. Meanwhile, Coconut Cultivators Association members have met Plantations Minister Ramesh Pathirana to discuss the demand by desiccated coconut millers to import frozen coconut kernel from the Philippines.

The associations president, Jayantha Samarakoon, said the stocks if imported would take five months to reach the country and by that time there would be enough production to meet the required demand.

Last year, Sri Lanka produced 3,085.6 million coconuts, according to a Central Bank report.
Mumbai, Sep 26 : Three Bollywood divas -- Deepika Padukone, Sara Ali Khan and Shraddha Kapoor -- are being questioned by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) in a drugs related case linked to the death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput.

The agency after questioning several other accused in the case has prepared a list of questions that it is seeking answers to from the three actors which can spell trouble for them.

According to NCB sources, the three actors have been asked to join the probe after several alleged chats came to light where drugs were being discussed. The source said that Deepika will be first asked to identify the mobile number in the alleged chat with her former manager Karishma Prakash. She will also be asked if she sent those messages or someone on her behalf sent the alleged messages enquiring about "maal" from Karishma.

The sources said that the NCB will also ask Deepika, who is the daughter of badminton icon Prakash Padukone, if she used to consume drugs, if yes, from where she used to procure them and who made the payment for the drugs.

The NCB will also ask her if she was procuring the drugs for her personal consumption or for someone else and since when she has been using these substances and who all were the persons who provided her these drugs. She will also be asked for how long she has known Karishma and Sushant's former talent manager Jaya Saha, who worked with Kwan Talent Management Agency.

Similarly, Shraddha, who is the daughter of actor Shakti Kapoor, will be asked about her alleged chats with Saha to get the CBD oil. The NCB source said that she will be asked since when she was procuring drugs and for whom and whether she consumed them and who paid for them.

The source said that Shraddha, who starred with Sushant in "Chichhore", will also be questioned about her visits to the Pawna resort, where the alleged drugs party was hosted, along with Sushant. She will be asked for how long she knew Sushant and did they consume drugs together and who procured the drugs for the parties, and who made the payment for them.

Meanwhile, Sara, daughter of actor Saif Ali Khan, is also being questioned in the case and will be asked if she too consumed drugs. Sara's troubles began after Sushant's girlfriend Rhea Chakraborty in a television interview claimed that the late actor got into the habit of smoking marijuana during the shooting of "Kedarnath".

Sara and Sushant were the lead actors of "Kedarnath". Sara will also be questioned if she knew of the drug usage by Sushant during the shooting of the film and from where these drugs came and who paid for them.

The NCB has already recorded the statement of Sushant's former manager Shruti Modi, Bollywood actor Rakul Preet Singh, Dharma Productions former executive producer Kshitij Prasad Ravi, Kwan Talent Management Agency CEO Dhruv Chitgopekar, producer Madhu Mantena Varma and several others.

The NCB has arrested Rhea, her brother Showik, Sushant's house manager Samuel Miranda, personal staff Dipesh Sawant and 16 drug peddlers in the case.

The NCB registered a case under the NDPS Act after the Enforcement Directorate (ED), probing a money laundering case linked to the death of Sushant on the basis of a Bihar Police FIR, wrote to the NCB. The ED had detected several drug chats from the seized electronic devices of the accused.

(Anand Singh can be contacted at anand.s@ians.in and Quaid Najmi can be contacted at q.najmi@ians.in)

Latest updates on Sushant Singh Rajput Death Mystery

-- Except for the title, this story has not been edited by Prokerala team and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed
SPRINGFIELD  House Speaker Michael Madigan said Friday he will not testify before the House Special Investigating Committee that is probing his role in a bribery scheme involving utility giant Commonwealth Edison, and its not likely that most of the other potential witnesses that Republicans want to hear from will testify either.

In a two-and-a-half-page letter to the committee, Madigan called the committee a political stunt being orchestrated by House Republican Leader Jim Durkin, of Western Springs, and said the ongoing federal criminal investigation, is more important than Mr. Durkins political theatrics.

For the record, I am not exercising my Fifth Amendment rights by not appearing before the committee, Madigan wrote. As I have said before, I have done nothing wrong.

Madigan, a Chicago Democrat and the longest serving state legislative speaker in U.S. history, was implicated in the bribery scheme in July when officials with ComEd entered a deferred prosecution agreement with the U.S. Attorneys office in which they admitted that over a period of years, they awarded jobs and contracts to close associates of Madigan in order to curry his favor for legislation that benefitted the company.

Madigan has not been charged, and the deferred prosecution agreement did not explicitly state that he had personally requested the favors or had direct knowledge of them at the time. He is referred to only as Public Official A, although the agreement makes clear the public official is the speaker of the Illinois House.

Republicans have filed a charge under House rules accusing him of conduct unbecoming to a legislator or which constitutes a breach of public trust. During the committees first meeting Sept. 10, GOP members introduced a list of witnesses they wanted to testify voluntarily. The list included Madigan along with several past and current employees of ComEd.

The committees next scheduled meeting is Tuesday, Sept. 29. In a letter to committee Chairman Rep. Emanuel Chris Welch on Thursday, Durkin indicated that one ComEd representative had agreed to testify and that he and the GOP teams attorney, Ron Safer, a former federal prosecutor, would lead the questioning.

Friday was the deadline for people on the proposed witness list to indicate whether they would testify. Durkin did not indicate which ComEd official had agreed to appear Tuesday. His spokeswoman referred questions about witness responses to Welch, who released letters late Friday from five of the proposed witnesses, all of whom said they were declining the invitation.

Those included Madigan, former ComEd CEO Anne Pramaggiore, and former ComEd lobbyists Michael McClain, a close confident of Madigans; Michael R. Zalewski, a former Chicago alderman; and Jay Doherty. That leaves only Fidel Marquez, who was recently indicted in the bribery scheme, and John Hooker as potential witnesses. The list also includes unnamed current or former employees of Commonwealth Edison.

The committee has authority to issue subpoenas for witnesses and documents, but Republicans so far have not indicated they intend to pursue that option.

The job of the Special Investigating Committee is to determine whether there is sufficient evidence to support the proposed charge. That would require a majority vote on the six-member disciplinary panel, which is evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats.

If the committee votes to approve the charge, a second, 12-member disciplinary committee would be formed to conduct what amounts to a trial. If that panel finds Madigan guilty, it would send a resolution to the full House, along with recommended disciplinary action that could range from reprimand or censure to expulsion from the House.
Culinary Detective: Kata Rocks shines in uncertain times

As I begin writing this weeks article, in the current turbulent world that we now find ourselves in, I cannot help but reflect on the relevancy of the quote from a famous Greek philosopher, Heraclitus who is probably best known for his statement, The only constant in life is change.

Culinary-DetectiveDiningChris-Watson

By Chris Watson

Saturday 26 September 2020, 11:00AM

Indeed, across the globe, we are experiencing such a massive change that I truly do occasionally wonder if the world will ever get back to normal. But as an optimist, we must carry on and embrace this new environment with all its challenges. One such person who has adapted well to these, ever-changing circumstances is Andrew Dickie, the recently appointed Executive Chef at the luxury Kata Rocks resort.

Arriving in Phuket at the beginning of 2020 from his previous role at the helm of an internationally renowned five-star hotel restaurant in Bangkok, I suspect that when he accepted this role, he, like many of us, had never heard of COVID 19. I suppose he set about reviewing where the culinary standards set by the previous incumbent were, and whilst maintaining the stalwart dishes on the menu to ensure acceptance from the regulars, established, and where he could put his mark with the addition of new and innovative dishes that more reflected his philosophy. Chefs do inevitably change establishments, driven by managements inherent desire to improve and this can be a tightrope in not changing too much, but showing skill and flair in updating and reinventing dishes to continually tantalise diners palates.

Then Phuket went into lockdown and Andrew spent weeks at home, no doubt conceptualising these new dishes. Now, I am delighted to say, Kata Rocks is back to normal, their monthly brunches full as ever and Andrew leading the kitchen into a new culinary era. A native Canadian, he has worked with several luxury chains including Hyatt and Four Seasons and is not a newcomer to this region. I recently caught up with him when he invited me over for a dinner to try out several of his new dishes.

Whilst Phuket has a multitude of high-end chic hotels, all with spectacular sea views, I am still spellbound when walking into the Kata Rocks clubhouse. The vista at sunset continues to surprise and delight.

Seated by the pool, I leave myself and my partner in Andrews hands. We begin with an elegantly presented bread and butter platter to nibble on, whilst Andrew prepares our amuse bouche, a marinated cube of watermelon; a truly refreshing flavour bomb. This is followed by a new dish of scallop crudo. A crudo (the Italian and Spanish word for raw) is invariably fish, marinated in a citrus dressing. Andrews dish uses the finest Hokkaido scallops dressed in homemade buttermilk, lending the dish a sublime creaminess, lemon juice, kaffir lime and green chili and topped with crispy potato for crunch. My partner has a classic lobster bisque; rich and decadent.

As we enjoy our appetisers, Andrew tells me of a couple of new dishes he plans to feature, an octopus carpaccio and a crab salad. These both sound stellar and accurately reflect Andrews culinary style of simple, light and enabling the products true flavours to shine through and, in his own words, sing. Andrew disappears to prepare our main courses leaving us to enjoy the sunset. I am delighted to see that the restaurant has several occupied tables in spite of the current challenges.

Chef Andrew returns, with my partners ribeye, a 400g prime cut from Nebraska, perfectly cooked; I am informed pan seared and butter basted; a classic technique I truly love, but admit I am still struggling to master at home. I am presented with a free-range duck, delicately brushed with maple syrup on a circular disc of granola containing walnuts, pistachio and oats, truly imaginative and a picture on the plate. The duck a triumph, accompanied with daikon and red cabbage. We barely have room for dessert, however Andrew whips up a sugar brioche with custard, vanilla cream and caramelised pineapple, all doused in a fairly well-known local prize-winning liquid.

I am impressed. It has been some time since I have eaten at Kata Rocks and based on this experience, I am confident this change in the kitchen will not only continue the high standards of the past, but elevate them to new heights. Chef Andrew  welcome to Phuket!

Chris is a former Michelin Guide Inspector who following an international career in hospitality spanning 30 years in both the Middle East and Asia, has now settled in Thailand and contributes a monthly restaurant column.
By Express News Service

CHENNAI: Nearly three months after launching a probe into the custodial deaths of a father-son duo in Sathankulam, the Central Bureau of Investigation has filed a chargesheet against nine Tamil Nadu police officials.

The chargesheet has been filed against inspector Sridhar, two sub-inspectors, two head constables and four constables.

The CBI took over the Sathankulam custodial deaths case on July 7 after the Centre gave its nod to the central agency to probe the deaths of P Jayaraj (59) and his son J Beniks (31), who were picked up for questioning by the Tamil Nadu police in Tuticorin's Sathankulam for allegedly violating lockdown rules on June 19.

This comes after the state passed a government order on June 29 deciding to accept the request of the Director General of Police to transfer the custodial deaths case registered in Kovilpatti East Police Station under Section 176 (1-A) (i) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 for investigation by CBI by issuing a notification under section 6 of Delhi Special Police Establishment Act, 1946 to facilitate a free and fair investigation.

The father and son were allegedly brutally thrashed by the police while in custody, leading to their deaths. While Beniks died at the Kovilpatti General Hospital on June 22, his father died on the morning of June 23.

The chargesheet was filed under section 120-B of the Indian Penal Code under sections 302 (punishment for murder), 342 (punishment for wrongful confinement), 201 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence), 182 (to use the lawful power of such public servant to the injury or annoyance of any person), 193 (punishment for false evidence), 211 (false charge of offence made with intent to injure), 218 (public servant preparing false record intentionally) and 34 (criminal act is done by several persons) and substantive offences thereof in the Designated Court at Madurai. One more accused, a sub-inspector, died during investigation. The police personnel were arrested during investigation and are presently in judicial custody.

After investigation, a combined chargesheet in both the cases has been filed. Further investigation is continuing to look into the role of other persons in the case.
Verdale Condo a masterpiece that will easily captivate with its design drew 268 people to its preview weekend in early September.

verdale condo

The price of one-bedroom units at the Verdale Condo start from S$791,000 while the price of two-bedroom units start from S$998,000.

Verdale condo isnt your usual condo that has the same basic features you can find everywhere. Verdale Condo has been designed with fittings and finishing that fit a premium modern residential property.

All appointment slots for the weekend preview launch of the 258-unit Verdale Condo in Bukit Timah were snapped up. The developers said interest was equally strong across all unit types.

The price of one-bedroom units at the Verdale Condo start from S$791,000 while the price of two-bedroom units start from S$998,000. The 99-year leasehold property consisting of seven five-storey blocks has a unit mix comprising one to five-bedders, ranging from 463 square feet (sq ft) to 1,873 sq ft, of which there are 12 duplex penthouse units.

Key Selling Points of Verdale Condo

The development is located in a tranquil landed estate enclave

Perfect of a balanced private and community living

Residents can conveniently access retail outlets.

Found in close proximity to the transport hub

The condo is near nature parks

Close to a wide array of reputable schools

Verdale Condo is a high-grade property that offers value for money. Its versatility as well as its location makes it ideal for your own residential use as well as an investment. Located in District 21, 2 De Souza Avenue, here is what this condo offers:

Premium Facilities

Verdale condo sits on a 1.49ha piece of land. Developed by the renowned C & C Pte., Verdale is expected to have a total of 280 units after completion. These are suitable units designed to cater to the needs of different families with units ranging from 1 to 5 bedrooms.

Besides that, this strata development also has full facilities for a condominium. They include a BBQ pavilion, a 50-meter lap pool, 24-hour security, playground, and a clubhouse among others. It should be noted that every household also has smart house technology.

Story continues

Most Sought-After Location

This up and coming condo is found along the Jalan-Jurong Kechil Road. The ideal location makes it a prime new property launch thats surrounded by a wide range of amenities. As a result, it promotes the convenient lifestyle that comes with city living. Some of the surrounding amenities that make Verdale attractive include:

A Versatile Transport Hub

Traveling from Verdale is quite easy thanks to the seamless transport network. The condos location next to the transport ensures that residents can quickly commute, especially if the way to access different amenities within the neighborhood or to other parts of Singapore.

The well-established transport system features the likes of Kranji Expressway, Bukit Timah Expressway, and the Pan-Island Expressway. Besides that, there is the Beauty World Downtown MRT station that plies this area.

Availability of Multiple Shopping Centers

Verdales neighborhood is strategically located close to multiple shopping centers. The condos prime location at the Jalan-Jurong Kechil Road means that residents can easily access shopping spots as well as Food and Beverage hideouts.

There is a plethora of malls that can efficiently cater to the needs of chronic shoppers. Additionally, getting your basic supplies only takes a couple of minutes. The best thing about Verdale condo is that you can take a ride or simply walk to the nearby malls. They include:

United square (it has Cold Storage supermarket)

Scotts Square (It has NTUC FairPrice supermarket)

Novena Square 2 (it has NTUC FairPrice supermarket)

Takashimaya and

Paragon (it has Market Place Supermarket)

Besides that, you can enjoy sampling different menus and drinks at eateries such as:

The Micasa Kitchen and Bar

Bukit Timah Market and Food Center and

The Woorinara Korean Restaurant among others.

Close Proximity to Elite Schools

If you have school-going children, you dont have to worry about sending them far from home. This is because this condo is very close to some of the most elite schools in Singapore. Within a 2 km radius, you can find learning institutions such as:

The Anglo-Chinese Primary School

Balestier Hill Secondary School

Raffles Girls Secondary School

Farrer Park Primary and

St Josephs Junior Institution

Its found within a Natural Habitat

Residents living in this condo will definitely enjoy the surroundings. Even though Verdale is close to an urban center, its neighborhood is rich with parks. You can even access and enjoy most of them weekly since they are within a walking distance from this condo. They include:

The Bukit Batok Town Park

Bukit Batok Nature Park

Bukit Batok Hillside Park

Hindhede Park

There is a lot the Verdale Condo, Singapore offers. But even though you might have a deep interest in residing here, what are your financial plans?

We understand that finding a mortgage in Singapore is a challenging and demanding task. You have to go through most institutions manually in order to compare Singapore home loans. However, with iCompareLoan Mortgage broker, you no longer have to exhaust yourself.

You can now conveniently and freely compare home loan Singapore online, from the comfort of your home. This is because good mortgage broker is a readily available solution that features all the vital information you need.

To find a mortgage that suits your need, simply visit a mortgage broker site, select the type of loan that you want, and key in the right details including the amount of loan, servicing period, and type of property youre interested in, etc. Its a versatile solution that gives you precise results within minutes.

The post Verdale condo continues to draw a lot of interest from potential buyers appeared first on iCompareLoan Resources.
Editors note: As part of the Staten Island Advance/SILive.coms year-long undertaking, The Disparity Project, we are shining a spotlight on the differences in opportunity and outcomes across the borough, focusing on key areas that include criminal justice, economic security, housing and education. This is the second in a series of stories focusing on educational inequities and struggles on Staten Island.

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- As New York City public schools reopen amid the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, experts and advocates are raising concerns that some of the students on the North Shore of Staten Island could experience learning loss -- which many believe began when schools shut down in March -- at a wider rate than their peers.

Impactful disparities exist between schools within the North Shore itself, and between schools on the South Shore compared to those on the North Shore, where schools are ethnically, racially and economically more diverse than the rest of the borough, research shows.

And some fear that the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic could widen the educational gap for some students -- including those in low-income families.

Noliwe Rooks, a professor of literature at Cornell University whose work explores such topics as race, capitalism and education, told the Advance/SILive.com this past spring that New York City children who were already struggling are going to fall further behind during the coronavirus pandemic.

The longer that this goes on and as long as were clear this is going to go on ... the children who are struggling, who are already behind grade level, who are socio-economically vulnerable, who are homeless, are going to fall further behind, she explained.

Rooks is the author of an award-winning book, titled Cutting School: Privatization, Segregation, and the End of Public Education."

ISSUES OF NEED

When New York City school buildings shuttered last March in an effort to stem the coronavirus outbreak, students in some areas of the North Shore were hit especially hard due to various issues of need, including a lack of the basics -- space, technology, school supplies and child care, advocates warn.

As New York City public schools reopen their doors to students, some kids are learning remotely full-time, and others are learning in a blended model -- spending some days learning in the classroom and some days learning remotely.

For blended learners, the return to campus is taking place in phases. Students in 3-K, pre-K and District 75 began reporting in-person on Monday. Students in K-5 and K-8 schools will begin reporting on Tuesday, Sept. 29, and middle and high school students will begin returning on Thursday, Oct. 1.

Daryl Hornick-Becker, of the Citizens Committee for Children (CCC), explained that space (especially in temporary housing), access to technology, English as a second language and supervision are all barriers that contributed to learning loss in the spring and will continue in the fall, as students continue virtual lessons.

In 2018, the CCC released a report, titled The North Shore of Staten Island: Community Driven Solutions to Improve Child and Family Well-Being, showing the wide social and economic inequities within the borough, and their impact on education.

According to CCC data, 12.5% of students in grades K-8 who live on the North Shore are in temporary housing. The report found that greater numbers of students in temporary housing tend to have higher chronic absenteeism rates -- which could reflect barriers that rise from housing insecurity.

And obstacles to effective virtual learning increase if English is not the primary language spoken in the home.

The majority of immigrant support services -- including English as a Second Language courses -- are clustered in either St. George-New Brighton or Port Richmond, according to the CCC. Interestingly, the two neighborhoods where the largest share of the population is foreign-born -- Mariners Harbor and Grymes Hill-Park Hill -- have a limited presence of these support services, CCC research showed.

The CCC, an independent, nonpartisan, privately supported child advocacy organization, grouped some of the North Shore neighborhoods together in its reporting, including Grymes Hill-Park Hill and St. George-New Brighton.

CHALLENGING ENVIRONMENTS

The second the DOE [Department of Education] went remote in the spring, there were some issues that were apparent immediately," Hornick-Becker said. Its so difficult to engage in successful learning in those kinds of environments; you dont need to be a student in this situation to understand."

When the citys students moved to distance learning last March, it was estimated that 300,000 students lacked an internet-connected device.

At the time, Nikkeya Gulley told the Advance/SILive.com that she was in desperate need of a computer for use by her five children, including three at PS 44. She explained that the only device her children would be able to use to log in for schoolwork was her cell phone.

I have to do my own schooling online because its closed, so how are they going to do their stuff online because my phone is overloaded? she asked, as she waited outside the Mariners Harbor school.

Many PS 44 parents who showed up at the the school that day in hopes of obtaining the tech needed for remote learning were told by a staff member that there were very minimal amounts of laptops for students -- and the parents were asked to only take a device if their family had a genuine need, depending on availability.

This March 2020 file photo shows Nikkeya Gulley, a mother of five children, as she waits outside PS 44 in Mariners Harbor in hopes of obtaining a laptop for remote learning after schools shuttered amid the coronavirus outbreak. (Staten Island Advance/Jan Somma-Hammel)

The DOE has said that, since last March, it has distributed nearly 322,000 devices citywide.

Since we transitioned to remote learning in the spring, we have made incredible progress toward closing the digital divide, lending 321,500 internet-enabled iPads to students, in addition to 175,000 school-based devices. Enabling hundreds of thousands of iPads with hotspots will expand our bandwidth even more, providing additional connectivity for our families who may not have internet at home, the DOE has said.

Hornick-Becker said that getting students the technology they need is a good first step, but its nearly impossible to avoid inequities and learning loss amid the health crisis.

And some parents have told the Advance/SILive.com that the city-supplied devices dont always work well.

PROBLEMS COULD BE INCREASED

Each and every barrier to me is a reason to not [open schools]. Each barrier has the potential to not get us to a new normal, but will further exacerbate the problems that those who are vulnerable are facing, said Michael DeVito, associate executive director of the New York Center for Interpersonal Development (NYCID), who added hes so afraid of the 2020-2021 school year that its keeping him up at night.

Going into the school has me the most concerned; I dont think were prepared. Were trying to think about a new normal but were trying to use old normal rules. Im not making a case for never going back, I am saying that its too early, DeVito said.

The DOE did not respond to multiple requests for comment regarding the various concerns raised in this report.

DeVito said that one of the biggest hurdles is going to be mental health and social and emotional well-being of the students.

In August, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that public school teachers will adopt a Bridge to School program in the first few weeks of school, aimed at helping students process social and emotional stress they may be experiencing.

DeVito said he is pleased the city recognized that student stress will be a challenge and set up resources, but he explained he fears it will not be enough, adding that difficulties in completing remote learning in the spring have taken a toll on students' motivation and mental health.

SO MANY CAUSES FOR CONCERN

This is the most complicated school reopening the district has ever attempted. There are so many causes for concern -- to say the least, Hornick-Becker said.

The misstep was planning, DeVito said, suggesting that the next few months should be focused on improving resources  especially for vulnerable populations  and spending money to improve virtual situations so that young people can better learn in the environment that theyre in.

Were not considering -- are the buses going to work? Were not considering -- do kids have school supplies? Can families afford supplies? Does the family have the right plans set up to deal with child care -- who gets that kid to school and who picks them up? he questioned.

The extra cost of school supplies alone for this school year is sure to be a barrier for some families.

Parents have told the Advance/SIlive.com that they have purchased double everything -- notebooks, crayons, folders and pencils -- so their children have supplies for both school and home. And then there is the potential high cost of technology if a family needs a device for remote learning.

In addition, some families may need to wait a few months to enroll in the free child-care for 3-K through eighth-grade students called Learning Bridges.

The city said 100,000 child-care seats will be available to provide relief to families who cant stay home or find alternate care for their kids on days they arent in school buildings. The sites will be operated by community-based organizations and other partners.

But only the first 30,000 seats will be available this month, prioritizing families with the greatest need, according to the city. By the end of October, the Learning Bridges program will have 70,000 seats available, and 100,000 seats available by the end of December, the city said.

The DOE said that Learning Bridges sites will be paired with schools and contracted early childhood programs so that students will be interacting with a similar cohort of students. Despite multiple requests, the DOE has been unable to provide a list of the sites.

However, the Jewish Community Center of Staten Island told the Advance/SILive.com that it would be offering the Learning Bridges program at five locations, working with one feeder school for each location.

But some parents have told the Advance/SILive.com that they are still in the dark as to whether they will be given a seat in the citywide program.

A LOT OF UNCERTAINTY

DeVito stressed that there are too many unknowns as we head into the academic year.

This is going to be an enormous waste of time and resources. Because as things dont work and as we start to see rises in cases in the city again, when theres all this blending and interaction, then everything will be shut down and what will we have gained? What was the value in attempting to go back? he asked.

(Eduction reporter Annalise Knudson contributed to this report.)

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Justice Department Calls on San Francisco to End Draconian One-Worshiper Rule for Churches

'This restriction suggests hostility to religious people and the free exercise of religion,' DOJ says

The Department of Justice (DOJ) on Friday called on San Francisco Mayor London Breed to end the citys one congregant rule and raise the allowable capacity in churches, alleging that current pandemic-related policy suggests hostility to religious people and the free exercise of religion.

Assistant Attorney General Eric S. Dreiband and U.S. Attorney David Anderson of the Northern District of California, in a letter (pdf) denounced as draconian San Franciscos restrictions regarding attending houses of worship, which generally let just one congregant inside at a time. Exceptions to the rule, according to the San Francisco order (pdf), are that a parent or guardian may be accompanied by their minor children or that a person with a disability may bring their caregiver.

While restricting indoor participation in worship to a single congregant, San Franciscos order allows multiple patrons in other indoor settings including gyms, tattoo parlors, hair salons, massage studios, and daycares, the DOJ said in a statement, adding that this is contrary to the Constitution and the nations best tradition of religious freedom.

While Anderson and Dreiband acknowledged the imperative to protect residents from the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus and noted exigent circumstances that, under the Constitution, permit temporary restriction on liberties, they said, there is no pandemic exception for the Constitution.

Even in times of emergency, when reasonable, narrowly-tailored, and temporary restrictions may lawfully limit our liberty, the First Amendment and federal statutory law continue to prohibit discrimination against religious institutions and religious believers, they wrote in the letter. These principles are legally binding, and the Constitutions unyielding protections for religious worshipers distinguish the United States of America from places dominated by tyranny and despotism.

The DOJ remarks echo those made by Salvatore Joseph Cordileone, the archbishop of San Francisco, in a recent op-ed in The Washington Post: I never expected that the most basic religious freedom, the right to worshipprotected so robustly in our Constitutions First Amendmentwould be unjustly repressed by an American government. But that is exactly what is happening in San Francisco.

San Franciscos order acknowledges the constitutional right to religious freedom but justifies the restrictions under the need to balance core First Amendment interests with public health, noting that engaging in in-person religious gatherings carries a higher risk of widespread transmission of COVID-19.

The restrictions on houses of worship are essentially the same as for the similarly constitutionally-protected right to free speech, as expressed by engaging in indoor political activity, which is also limited to one person in an office or facility at a time. The exception is that a second person may enter a political office or facility temporarily, such as for a brief meeting or to drop off materials.

While some San Francisco businesses, like restaurants, are entirely prohibited from having customers indoors, others, like barbershops, nail salons, and tattoo parlors are allowed indoor operations.

The Justice Department said in the letter that San Franciscos restrictions give preferential treatment to certain places, while they plainly discriminate against people of faith and their ability to gather and practice their faith at churches, synagogues, mosques, and other houses of worship.

Put simply, there is no scientific or legal justification for permitting a 20,000 square foot synagogue to admit only one worshiper while allowing a tattoo parlor to accommodate as many patrons as it can fit so long as they are 6 feet apart, Anderson and Dreiband wrote.

In response to the letter, San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera told Fox News that the city must be doing something right as its infection rates are lower than in many other big cities, adding that the federal government should focus on an actual pandemic response instead of lobbing careless legal threats. San Francisco is opening up at the speed of safety.

San Francisco recently announced plans that, starting Oct. 1, places of worship will reopen to 25 people indoors.

The mayor is sensitive to the needs of the faith community and peoples desires and needs to worship, both personally and as mayor, said Jeff Cretan, a spokesman for Mayor London Breed, according to the SF Chronicle. We are working with public health to do what we can, knowing we have to be cognizant of the risks with every step we take with reopening, whether that is schools or houses of worship.

Anderson and Dreiband said in their letter that the DOJ is reviewing its options and could take further action to protect the religious liberty rights of the people of San Francisco.
Rigo Luna of Rigos Kitchen is opening another restaurant in the Kingwood area.

Luna has been working in the food industry in the area since the early 1990s. He was a server at Ninfas in the location that became his restaurant, Rigos Kitchen, which is permanently closed.

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And Luna is now the title operator of El Tiempo Cantina in Kingwood, which has a grand opening on Monday, Sept. 28. The soft opening for the eatery kicked off on Saturday.

Luna worked for Ninfas on and off for about 12 years and worked at El Tiempo for about two years, he said. El Tiempos creator Roland Laurenzo is the son of Ninfa Laurenzo, affectionately known as Mama Ninfa around Houston.

Luna is operating his own family business through this franchise opportunity. His 21-year-old son Junior will be operating the restaurant along with his brother.

Were a family-owned restaurant, Luna said. We do caterings, we do deliveries, we have the best fajitas and margaritas in town.

Located at the new Centre on Northpark, El Tiempo Cantina will appeal to locals as a franchise name. The menus features dinner, lunch, bulk to-go, drinks, and brunch, including an option for bulk to-go fresh, handmade spicy pork tamales that require 24-hour advance notice.

What I expected, you know, to get a lot of the locals and to serve them with the best margaritas, the best fajitas, and the greatest customer service, Luna said.

On HoustonChronicle.com: With coronavirus, Houston Food Bank responds to its greatest challenge

The restaurant franchise was started by Domenic Laurenzo, executive chef and president of El Tiempo Cantina, along with his father. Even before the pandemic in December, Laurenzo said the location would focus on to-go options. Luna said they are familiar with protocols to help in preventing the virus.

We like to focus on great customer service, Laurenzo said. Obviously in todays modern age with social media and the millennials driving the to-go business, were going to focus hard on internal pick-up, customer pick-up, as well as to-go in that area. We think it will service the Kingwood area very well.

The restaurant is located at 1414 Northpark Drive, Kingwood, in the Centre on Northpark development. Hours of operation have not yet been listed. For more information, call the restaurant at 281-973-2424.

savannah.mehrtens@chron.com
While declines in U.S. hospital admissions during the onset of COVID-19 has been well-documented, little is known about how admissions during the rebound varied by age, insurance coverage and socioeconomic groups.

The decline in non-COVID-19 admissions was similar across all demographic subgroups but the partial rebound that followed shows that non-COVID-19 admissions for residents from Hispanic neighborhoods was significantly lower than for other groups.

The findings are reported in a new study in Health Affairs (released as a Fast Track Ahead of Print article) conducted by a research team from Sound Physicians, Dartmouth College, and the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth.

Our study shows that patients from Hispanic neighborhoods did not have the same rebound in non-COVID-19 admissions as other groups, which points to a much broader issue of healthcare access and equity for lower-income and minority patients." Jonathan Skinner, Study Senior Author and Health Economist, Professor, Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice, Geisel School of Medicine

Skinner is also the James O. Freedman Presidential Professor in Economics at Dartmouth.

As a result, these barriers may have contributed to higher in-hospital mortality rates in April for this group than for others," he added.

The study drew on data from 1 million hospital admissions (from hospital administrative data and electronic medical and billing records) from Sound Physicians, a large nationally distributed medical group with hospitals throughout the U.S. The data came from 201 hospitals in 36 states, including areas hit hard early on by the pandemic, including Wash., Mich., Ohio, and the greater metropolitan area of New York.

The research team looked at non-COVID-19 admissions for the top 20 acute medical conditions, from early February through early July. They found that non-COVID-19 admissions fell in March and reached its lowest point in April. The rebound leveled off in June/July, which was when there was a resurgence of COVID-19 cases in some regions.

The study's results reports the following:

From February to April 2020, declines in non-COVID-19 admissions were similar across all demographic subgroups exceeding 20 percent for all primary admission diagnoses.

The lowest point in non-COVID-19 admissions was in April during which the overall decline was 43 percent.

By late June/early July 2020, non-COVID-19 admissions had only made a partial rebound at 16 percent below pre-pandemic baseline volume. (Updated data suggests this partial rebound continued through the summer.)

During the June/July rebound period, non-COVID-19 admissions were substantially lower for patients from majority-Hispanic neighborhoods (32 percent below baseline) and remained well below baseline for patients with pneumonia (44 percent below baseline), chronic obstructive pulmonary disease/asthma (40 percent below baseline), sepsis (25 percent below baseline), urinary tract infection (24 percent below baseline) and acute ST-elevation myocardial infarction/heart attack (22 percent below baseline).

These particular diseases are reported in the results, as these were the acute conditions for which the declines were the highest. Most of the majority-Hispanic neighborhoods in this dataset were located in the Southwest and South-- Calif., Ariz., Texas, and Fla.

The research team speculate that the declines in medical admissions may have been due in part to a fear of contracting COVID-19 by both physicians and patients, greater use of telemedicine, and possibly lower transmission rates of non-COVID-19 diseases following stay-at-home orders.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 07:30:51|Editor: huaxia

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LIMA, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- Peruvian President Martin Vizcarra announced on Friday that international flights will resume on Oct. 5.

The approval of this measure occurred within the implementation of Phase 4 of the country's economic reactivation, Vizcarra said after a meeting with his Council of Ministers.

The president said the first international flights would be between Peru and certain countries in the region that "are safe from a health point of view."

Vizcarra said all international travel will be governed by strict health protocols, adding that if travelers wish to enter the country, "it will be required, among other things, that they have a negative COVID-19 test with a maximum validity of 48 hours."

The Peruvian government also stated that, in October, travel agencies and tour operators will be allowed to reopen services for authorized sites.

According to the Ministry of Health, Peru has registered 794,584 cases and 32,037 deaths from COVID-19 as of Friday. Enditem
A Laois councillor wants licences required for samurai swords and other potentially dangerous weapons, similar to a gun licence.

Cllr Aisling Moran made her request to senior Gardai at the quarterly Joint Policing Committee meeting this September.

Do you need a licence to have a samurai sword or a machete? There seems to be a lot of attacks around lately. If you dont need a licence, maybe its something you should consider, she said.

Supt Anthony Pettit said licencing was not needed.

Where the law stands, someone can have an ornamental sword on a mantlepiece, but if you are in a public place or in any circumstance where you have no excuse to have it in a public place, its an arrestible offence. he said.

Cllr Moran said that a gun on show still needed a licence, but Supt Pettit replied that guns can be deactivated and no longer need a licence.

She cited one particular incidence where she claimed that the traditional Japanese sword was used as a weapon and to intimidate.

There seems to be a lot more people bringing home swords and more people being attacked. There is a case I know where someone was attacked, they were sliced open. Now the person sits on their doorstep and goes out on the green swinging the sword, it is intimidating, she claimed.

The Garda Chief Superintendent John Scanlon said licencing knives would hinder tradesmen from carrying tools.

A young carpenter could have a Stanley knife, where does it start. If I meet a person on the street with a Stanley knife for no reason, its a crime. A lot of what ends up as weapons have practical applications. If we legislate for them we end up with a lot of administration. Licencing is a matter for the legislator, he said.
MOSCOW -- The video shows two baton-wielding police officers and a protester cowering on the ground as bystanders loudly demand his release.



As one of the officers turns to the camera, only his eyes visible behind a balaclava, the frame freezes and a message appears: Performing facial segmentation.



Within seconds, a computer produces the photo and personal data of a man identified as a 29-year-old from Minsk. The cursor clicks on a tab labeled Reconstruction, and the man's face is superimposed onto the officer depicted in the shot.





The video, which has gathered more than a half million views, was posted to YouTube on September 24 by Andrew Maximov, a 30-year-old, Minsk-born, U.S.-based digital artist.



It shows how artificial intelligence can be used to unmask law enforcement officers involved in the violent crackdown on protesters since the disputed August 9 reelection of Alyaksandr Lukashenka, who has led Belarus since 1994.

Maximov, who emigrated when he was 22 and now lives in Los Angeles, California, said the goal was to show police officers that they should not feel they can act with impunity.

The purpose "was to demonstrate to the people that, instead of upholding the law in Belarus, they are breaking it daily, that there is every technological capability available to put their faces onto the photo and video evidence of their offenses, he told RFE/RL.

Though there are very active 'de-anonymization' initiatives going on all throughout Belarusian society, we believe that making them that much more visual, by returning the faces to the 'scene of the crime,' so to speak, that should have a more pronounced effect," he said.



Maximov said he was on the front lines of the protests against Lukashenka's reelection in 2010, and this year, he said, I felt like I don't have a moral right to remain silent.

New Tech Tools

But the technology he promotes is part of a wider initiative aimed at revealing the identities of officers who have beaten activists, acting with impunity even as pressure mounts on Lukashenka to step down.



The Lukashenka regime, which has relied on secrecy and deniability, is also being challenged by a daring streak among the crowds it is struggling to control: Protesters are increasingly emboldened to rip off the masks of helmeted and balaclava-clad officers from the countrys feared security services, who can be seen fleeing the scene in numerous videos posted online.



Another tech tool being harnessed is the encrypted messenger app Telegram, which has continued to serve as a major conduit for news, information, and opposition tactics. On the app, which has bypassed Internet censorship imposed by Lukashenkas regime, the opposition channel NEXTA has amassed over 2 million subscribers.

NEXTA often shares posts from another channel, the Black Book of Belarus, which every day publishes the names, addresses, and other personal data of officials in Lukashenkas orbit and the security servicemen who help him stay in power.



Beyond exposing law enforcement, the oppositions digital campaign has also embraced tools that target other aspects of the Lukashenka regime.

One is a barcode scanner for smartphones which identifies products linked to companies that have sided with Lukashenka or in which the strongman has a stake, according to Siarhei Kastrama, a Prague-based lawyer who was involved in building the scanner.

Crisis In Belarus Read our ongoing coverage as Belarusian strongman Alyaksandr Lukashenka continues his brutal crackdown on NGOs, activists, and independent media following the August 2020 presidential election, widely seen as fraudulent.

I set up a database and a friend of mine, who is a programmer, developed the app, he said in an interview with Current Time.

Current Time is a 24-hour Russian TV network run by RFE/RL with assistance from VOA.



Belaruss capital has long prided itself on a vibrant and innovative IT sector that has managed to thrive amid an authoritarian political system. Since the August 9 election, however, many of its developers have left Minsk for nearby countries like Latvia and Poland, and a growing number of programmers are also turning to help the opposition movement at home.

But the tools and platforms that have been harnessed by the opposition, especially the publication of riot officers' personal data, are spurring some people to vigilantism.



On September 25, the words fascist and murderer were spray-painted onto a wall outside the entrance to a Minsk apartment block where Dzmitry Balaba, the head of the precincts riot police unit, was believed to live.



Theres nowhere to run, you rat, the message read. Balabas alleged address was published by the Black Book of Belarus.



Its also unclear how accurate initiatives like Black Book of Belarus are and there appears to be little independent oversight of the posts it publishes. Many include what they describe as the presumed address of the men they unmask and other presumed, unverified details.



The danger is that wrongful attributions by such platforms can lead to acts of retribution against people not linked to the crimes theyve been linked to online, some activists have warned.

In the YouTube video dated September 24, Maximov says he hopes the application of artificial intelligence will aid the efforts to blow the cover of the men who are prosecuting the Belarusian governments war on opponents. He also issues a warning to the countrys police.



Your children will look at your faces as you commit the most despicable acts in your lives and it seems you dont fully recognize the real precariousness of your situation, he says, as the names and photos of other alleged law-enforcement officers are revealed. You have no masks.

In his comments to RFE/RL, Maximov conceded that his technology is not perfect and that mistakes are unfortunately going to be made.

But he said any possible harm from misidentifying someone is outweighed by the overall benefit of holding some perpetrators accountable.



Privacy concerns surrounding any system of this kind are a huge deal for us and we would much rather it didn't have to exist at all, he said. But on an unlevel playing field, where hundreds of people are unlawfully harmed every day, if it has a chance of tempering the violence, then we have to give it a try.
President Donald Trump speaks during an event for black supporters at the Cobb Galleria Centre in Atlanta, Georgia, on Sept. 25, 2020,. (Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images)

Trump Unveils Promises to Black Americans With Platinum Plan

President Donald Trumps reelection campaign released a Platinum Plan that outlines promises he is making to black Americans over the next 4 years, if he remains the U.S. president. The plan seeks to uplift black communities through, in part, an investment of about $500 billion.

The Trump campaign announced late Friday: After years of neglect by Democrat politicians, black Americans have finally found a true advocate in President Trump, who is working tirelessly to deliver greater opportunity, security, prosperity, and fairness to their communities.

While Joe Biden takes black voters for grantedand even questions their blackness if they dare to support conservative idealsPresident Trump is working hard to earn the black vote through his Platinum Plan.

The presidents daughter, Senior White House Adviser Ivanka Trump posted details of the plan on Twitter late Friday.

President Trumps Promise to Black America  pic.twitter.com/IvK09l9iom  Ivanka Trump (@IvankaTrump) September 25, 2020

The Platinum Plan (pdf) is based on four core valuesopportunity, security, prosperity, and fairness.

The plan seeks to add some 3 million new jobs for the black community, create 500,000 new black-owned businesses, and increase access to capital in black communities by almost $500 billion.

Part of the plan includes bringing back manufacturing jobs to the United States to advance jobs and business, and having an immigration policy that protects American jobs. It also calls to increase activity in opportunity zones including benefits for local hires.

Trump is also promising access to better education and job training opportunities, and will work to advance home ownership opportunities and enhance financial literacy in the black community, according to the plan.

People listen while President Donald Trump speaks during an event for black supporters at the Cobb Galleria Centre in Atlanta, Georgia, on Sept. 25, 2020. (Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images)

Over the next 4 years, Trump promises to lower the cost of healthcare, and bring better and tailored healthcare to address historic disparities for the black community. The president will also ensure that black churches can compete for federal resources, and defend religious freedom exemptions to respect religious believers and always protect life.

The president also seeks to further criminal justice reform, with his plan saying that he will commit to working on a Second Step Act. He will also work towards safe urban neighborhoods with highest policing standards, the plan states.

Other aspects of the plan includes making Juneteenth a National Holiday, prosecuting the KKK, designating Antifa a terrorist organization, and making lynching a national hate crime.

Though black Americans have traditionally been shut out of opportunities to grow our own businesses and create generational wealth, President Trump is working hard to give us access to the American Dream, K. Carl Smith, Black Voices for Trump advisory board member, said in a statement.

President Trump is a businessman and understands that pride, community, and dedication are built through entrepreneurship.

President Donald Trump arrives an event for black supporters at the Cobb Galleria Centre in Atlanta, Georgia, on Sept. 25, 2020. (Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images)

President Donald Trump elbow bumps with Herschel Walker during a campaign rally in Atlanta, Georgia, on Sept. 25, 2020. (John Bazemore/AP Photo)

At a Black Voices for Trump campaign rally in Atlanta, Georgia, Trump characterized his Platinum Plan as a black empowerment plan, and warned black voters against supporting his opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden.

No one in Washington politics today has done more to hurt black Americans than Joe Biden, Trump told supporters on Friday. For half a century, Joes personally advocated or enacted virtually every policy that has caused pain and suffering in the black community. You know that.

In a statement prior to Trumps rally in Georgia, Biden said, As president, I will work to advance racial equity across the American economy and build back better  I promise to fight for black working families and direct real investments to advance racial equity as part of our nations economic recovery.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, Prince George (seated), Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis with Sir David Attenborough in the gardens of Kensington Palace. (Kensington Palace)

Naturalist Sir David Attenborough presented Prince George with a special gift as he joined the Cambridge family for a lockdown movie night.

Sir David, 94, gave George, seven, a fossilised giant sharks tooth to mark their meeting at Kensington Palace.

Prince William hosted the TV legend for an outdoor private screening of A Life On Our Planet, a documentary giving his first-hand account after decades of broadcasting on the natural world.

Kensington Palace teased the event on Friday night, sharing a picture on social media of two directors chairs, one marked Prince William and the other Sir David.

But a photo shared of the viewing shows the men actually sat in each others chairs during the outdoor, socially distanced viewing.

While it doesnt appear Kate and the three children joined them to watch the documentary, pictures released by Kensington Palace show the youngest royals getting to meet the veteran broadcaster, who are big fans.

In one, George looks fascinated by the sharks tooth he has been given, as he sits on a bench next to his father.

The tooth is from an extinct Carcharocles megalodon, one of the most feared predators of the sea, and was found by Sir David on a family holiday in Malta in the 1960s.

William and the veteran broadcaster watched A Life On Our Planet, Sir David's newest documentary. (WWF/PA Wire)

Read more: Harry and Meghan's political statements 'could harm US brand - but might help them internationally'

Charlotte, five, is unable to hide her joy as she looks at Sir David, with Kate smiling down on her daughter.

Sir David and William look to be sharing a joke in the moment, as they both laugh, while Louis, two, is distracted by something off camera.

Kate, 38, looks to have co-ordinated the family outfits in shades of blue, led by her own choice of a long blue shirt dress.

Charlotte complemented her grey dress with blue shoes.

George was wearing a blue checked shirt and trousers, while Louis was dressed in a blue jumper, over a similar checked shirt, and navy shorts, matching his brother and father.

Story continues

Its traditional in royal circles for younger boys to wear shorts with long socks, rather than trousers.

The Duke of Cambridge and Prince Louis watch as Prince George holds the tooth of a giant shark given to him by Sir David Attenborough. (Kensington Palace)

Earlier this week, Prince Williams own nature documentary, due out next month was revealed. He was joined by a crew two years ago to put together Prince William: A Planet For Us All.

In the trailer, he said: Now I have got George, Charlotte and now Louis in my life  your outlook does change. You want to hand over to the next generation, the wildlife in a much better condition.

The short clip shared on social media on Tuesday also showed Kate and William meeting Sir David, with Kate saying: The children were very upset that we were coming to see you and they werent coming.

Theyre massive fans of yours.

WATCH: Prince William says fatherhood gave him new sense of purpose

William and Sir David have established a good working relationship through their projects on the natural world. William interviewed Sir David at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland last year, and Sir David is supporting the royals Earthshot Prize.

The prize is an environmental award designed to help tackle issues like climate change. It was announced in December 2019, and more details are expected in the coming weeks.

David Attenborough: A Life On Our Planet is to be shown in cinemas from Monday and on Netflix from 4 October, with an accompanying book out on 1 October.
As the Narcotics Control Bureau begun questioning Bollywood actresses Deepika Padukone, Shraddha Kapoor and Sara Ali Khan today in Mumbai, the investigation into the Bollywood-drugs nexus certainly seems to be going deeper.

Former actress and BJP MP Roopa Ganguly, in a conversation with News18, said that she has heard many actresses names in drugs connection. But I know only Deepika Padukone, Dia Mirza very well, and Sara Ali khan from new generations of Bollywood," Ganguly said, and added that those actresses connection is surprising, not only for us and the industry, but for their fans as well.

But now these stars should cooperate and support the NCBs investigation to catch the main drug peddler and the main person who is playing behind the scene and providing drugs to the industry. There is certainly someone who is providing drugs to the industry and now that person is trying to manage and hide all the secret connections, A particular PR machinery is working to divert the issue," the former actress said.

She also talked about seeing people doing drugs at parties in the industry. Ganja and charas is not new to the industry. I have seen many industry people snorting white powder. I was also invited by a big director for a party during Mahabharat days and I was completely shocked to see the smoky and dark ambience. So I choose to leave that party immediately after greeting that director. It was not first and last incident, after that a big racket approached me many times in my hotel. I used to stay in Sea Princess hotel in Mumbai so people used to come with attractive offers like money and Dubai shows, and it was happening purposely to include me in their racket. I did not have a mobile phone at that time so I had recorded their conversation on a tape recorder and warned them that I would hand over that cassette to the police. I had cleverly managed distance myself from those racket and peddlers," Roopa claimed.

Roopa added that drug peddlers work in a bigger way and they attract stars with big money and other attractive offers. When actors get a big amount for Dubai shows and attractive gifts then they should think before accepting these things because those rackets will also demand something in return from the stars and that might be a drug delivery also so be careful and dont become greedy - just a suggestion for new generation stars," she said.
SCHENECTADY  The radio dial on Faranz Rahmans vehicle was twisted to 103.3 FM, so when the music of her new countrys anthem swelled inside the car, her son in the back seat smiled, and the family honked their horn.

God bless America, a speaker on a stage said, and cars across the Schenectady County Community College parking lot continued to honk because someone in the family was officially a U.S. citizen, including Rahman.

It was one of the states first naturalization ceremonies administered during the pandemic, and so it was a drive-in ceremony filled with masked faces, social distancing and people listening through their car radios to officials who were on a stage across the lot.

But on Friday morning, there were still hugs among the family members of the 43 applicants who were now Americans, and there were still eyes that communicated joy, which is what Rahman said she was feeling.

Im so happy. So, so happy, she said, her son in the back looking out the rolled-down window, still smiling. She arrived in New York from Afghanistan six years ago. She took the citizenship test once and failed. She took it again and, after months of studying, passed. And then she had to wait for coronavirus shutdown restrictions to ease.

Finally, on Friday, she drove through a checkpoint at the parking lot where they handed her a certificate that said, Citizen of the United States. It was a long road, and she never thought it would end in a drive-in of sorts, but she was with her family, and it was time to take pictures by the stage and American flag.

Next to Rahmans family was Heerawattic Indardass, posing in a mask while her family took pictures.

She felt relief to finally be there, to have a document declaring her citizenship. She was born in Guyana, a country in South Americas northeastern coast. Since she first arrived in New York 10 years ago, shed been waiting for this day. The official naturalization ceremony, the one presided over by Judge Mark Powers, was over  but the more personal celebration, Indardass said, was set for Saturday, and there would be fellow Hindus and spicy eggplant dishes and seven curry and family.

I feel relief to be here, but I also feel very happy, Indardass said.

By 10 a.m., the parking lot, the citizenship ceremony drive-in, was emptying. So Annie Ilunga, 74, figured it was time to get home and prepare the chicken feast, a staple in her native country, the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Her daughter, Aimee, was there to translate and spoil her with affection.

Felicitations, maman, Aimee told her mother, who had put on her best lavender dress and matching necklace, who had a bouquet of purple and yellow flowers in one hand and a tiny American flag in the other because this was her country now, too.

Aimee said that when her mother took the citizenship test for the first time, she didnt pass. So for nine months, she studied every day in the morning and night, under their homes porch.

Shes a teacher, so shes already educated. So its just the language, Aimee said.

Shed memorize and write down the questions and answers they usually ask on tests:

Who are your state's U.S. Senators?

From what country did the U.S. gain independence from?

What are two rights in the Declaration of Independence?

She passed the test, and now look at her, Aimee said.

Annie adjusted her mask. The more she smiled, the more it slipped from her face. They stood right outside of their car, posing for pictures.

Felicitations, maman. Felicitations.
By Express News Service

SRIKAKULAM: About 58 tribals have lost their jobs after the NTR Adventure Park was shut down from March 17 following lockdown. Though the State government had resumed tourist places, the district administration is yet to decide on resuming the parks.

The salaries of the employees have been kept pending since April. A majority of them have diversified into construction and agriculture sectors. They have approached the Integrated Tribal Development Agency (ITDA) to pay compensation for the period of the closure of the park, but to no avail.

The management pays salaries to the employees from the revenue obtained from the adventure park and the waterfalls. They are paid salaries ranging between Rs 7,000 and Rs 10,000 each, depending upon their nature of work.

Though the park was constructed by the ITDA and Andhra Pradesh Tourism Development Corporation (APTDC), it is maintained by the local tribal society, which is also responsible for the management of the park, including the payment of salaries to staff.

NTR adventure park manager Savara Raju said, On Saturdays and Sundays, we get revenue ranging from Rs 25,000 to Rs 50000 and Rs 10,000 to Rs 15000 in other days of the week. Under the impact of lockdown, the park has remained shut down from March 17.

With no employment, I started assisting my brother in agriculture works and also in selling the produce, Savara Raju said. District Tourism Officer Narayana Rao told TNIE that the plans are underway to resume parks, including the adventure park, from October 1.

NTR Adventure park still remains shut

Though the State government had resumed tourist places, the Srikakulam district administration is yet to decide on resuming the parks. The NTR Adventure Park still remains shut. District Tourism Officer Narayana Rao told TNIE that the plans are underway to resume parks, including the adventure park, from October 1.
Residents of the heavily militarized Indian-controlled region of Kashmir say security forces have arrested thousands of young men, raided peoples homes, inflicted beatings and electric shocks, and threatened to take away and marry their female relatives. Thousands of protesters over the past year have been wounded by shotgun pellets, including hundreds blinded in one or both eyes. For seven months, until March, the area was under a communications blackout, with social media and internet access banned.
The conversation around marijuana getting legalized in India has been happening for years now. However, with Bollywoods alleged drug connection being all the rage right now, the trend seems to be witnessing a change.

 Unsplash

In an almost unbelievable yet funny incident, four Delhi policemen, including two sub-inspectors and two head constables, posted at Jahangirpuri police station in Northwest Delhi, were suspended after they allegedly misreported the quantity of marijuana seized from a local drug peddler during a raid earlier this month.

 Reuters

The Delhi police personnel had seized 160 kilograms of marijuana but they reported only 1kg. The suspected peddler named Anil was later let off after the personnel allegedly took a bribe from him, a senior police officer said.



When the matter came into the picture, Anil was asked to disclose the names of the four policemen who were involved in the raid.

 Unsplash

According to reports, the four cops allegedly took Rs 1.5 lakh from Anil to hush up the matter, sold the rest of the ganja, and divided the money among themselves.



I mean, wow.

Earlier this month, 500kg of marijuana was seized by excise officials in Kerala's Thiruvananthapuram.

Clearly, all matters related to marijuana are taking precedence in the country right now. While certain high profile names are being dragged into the matter, one can expect the issue to continue to grow into an even bigger one in the coming days.
Vladimir Putin is not planning to attend Sunday's Russian GP.

The controversial Russian president normally attends the event at Sochi's Olympic Park.

Recently, after it emerged that Liberty Media would no longer invite Bernie Ecclestone to grands prix, the former F1 supremo said: "They might want to try it in Russia.

"I think I could probably find a pass."

However, 89-year-old Ecclestone has not made the trip to Russia amid the coronavirus pandemic, electing instead to stay in Switzerland with his wife and 12-week-old son Ace.

As for Putin, with whom Ecclestone personally negotiated Russia's first race deal in 2014, it is believed he will also skip this weekend's event.

"No, he doesn't plan to attend," Putin's press secretary Dmitry Peskov told the Tass news agency.

(GMM)
CNBC's Jim Cramer on Friday expressed some concerns about Palantir Technologies' upcoming public market debut, saying he sees positive trend lines in the company's financials but worried about the power concentrated in its founders' hands.

"Just don't pay up too much for this one," the "Mad Money" host said. "There's too much mystery to it and too much selfishness, too, at least when it comes to corporate governance."

Palantir opted to go public through a direct listing, not the traditional IPO process, so it will not be raising new money. Instead, existing shareholders will be allowed to sell their stock holdings to new investors.

Founded in 2003, the company's software platform was initially geared toward the U.S. intelligence community during the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. It later expanded its product offerings to serve large companies.

Palantir anticipates 42% revenue growth in 2020 to about $1.06 billion, according to a filing earlier this week. That would represent an increase of its 2019 figures, when sales grew 25% to $742.6 million. The newly Denver, Colorado-based company projects better than 30% revenue growth next year.

"Right now, the company has 125 customers in 36 industries spanning more than 150 countries. They're winning lots of new business, but they're also winning more business from old customers," said Cramer, who noted Palantir also has become more efficient and reduced the time it takes to install their software for a new customer.

There are some mixed signals on the financial side, Cramer cautioned. The company has a lot of stock-based compensation, used to attract and retain talent, and it also is "a long way from becoming cash flow positive," he said.

It posted negative $226 million in cash flow from operations in the first half of 2020, according to an SEC filing. "That's not great," Cramer said, but it is an improvement from negative $340 million in the same period a year ago.

"Basically, Palantir still loses lots of money and relies heavily on raising new capital in order to keep running," said Cramer, while noting margins are headed in the right direction. "There's nothing inherently wrong with that  when you've got a huge growth opportunity, you need to spend to take advantage of it  but it's definitely worth keeping in mind."

Palantir, which is known for its secretive culture, was co-founded by Peter Thiel, the tech entrepreneur and venture capitalist who is a long-time member of Facebook's board of directors. CEO Alex Karp is another founder, along with its president, Stephen Cohen.
Hamilton police say they are launching a new operation to crackdown on modified vehicles and excessive noise on the citys streets.

In a release, police announced that starting Friday, they would be introducing Project Drag Strip 8 to target Highway 8 from Centennial Parkway to Fifty Road.

It will target excessive speed, noise and modified cars, according to a release.

The new initiative comes nearly a week after an impromptu mega meet car show that saw several hundred vehicles and people descend on the parking lot of the Ancaster Cineplex.

The participants of the group involved are known to take over city streets to engage in drifting or full-on street racing, according to Supt. Will Mason.

The gathering was broken up by police  with the help of the Project Eliminate Racing Activity on Streets Everywhere (ERASE) task force  but no charges have been laid.

But, according to police, street racing only happens once in a while in Hamilton and charges are rare.

The latest crackdown is one of two that police have launched this year. This summer, the force ran Project Pit Stop from July 3 to July 19. After its first run, it was extended until Aug. 24.

According to police, officers issued 128 provincial offence notices, 58 Part 3 summons for more serious offences under the Highway Traffic Act (HTA), and made 13 arrests under the Criminal Code during the operation. Nineteen vehicles were also towed.

So far this year, police have doled out 133 stunt driving tickets compared to 80 in all of 2019.

There has also been an increase in community complaints related to modified vehicles and excessive noise, stated the release.

Project Drag Strip 8 will run from Sept. 25 to Oct. 8 and will move across the city if required.

Police are reminding residents that do modify their vehicles to check the Highway Traffic Act rules and regulations to ensure their alterations are allowed.

Do not render your vehicle unsafe to drive or disruptive to our peace. Slow down and respect our community, stated the release.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 16:54:06|Editor: huaxia

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BANGKOK, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Thirteen job-seeking Cambodian nationals were arrested on an illegal entry charge in eastern Thailand on Saturday, an army officer said.

The Thai army's Ta Phraya Task Force arrested one group of five Cambodians, including three females and two males, after they had trekked through a natural path across the Thai-Cambodian border into Thai territory in Ta Phraya district of Sa Kaeo province, according to deputy task force commander Col. Thiradet Limkhunakul.

Meanwhile, the Ta Phraya Task Force stopped a pickup truck carrying another group of eight Cambodians, including five females and three males, on a road in Ta Phraya district early Saturday, Col. Thiradet said.

Also arrested alongside the Cambodians was the pickup truck driver, a Thai national, on a human trafficking charge.

The Cambodians, who are yet to be repatriated, had allegedly intended to find jobs in Bangkok, Nonthaburi province and Nakhon Nayok province, the colonel said.

Thai authorities have stepped up security measures along the border areas with neighboring countries to keep out illegal foreigners and prevent a possible cross-border spread of the coronavirus. Enditem
Lanka demands USD 20m guarantee from fire-hit supertankers owners By Ranjith Padmasiri and Tharushi Weerasinghe View(s): View(s):

The Attorney General (AG) last evening forwarded a letter to the owners of ill-fated oil tanker MT New Diamond informing them to deposit USD 20 million in Sri Lanka as a guarantee until proceedings into a civil claim in relation to the case are initiated.

AG Dappula de Livera PC forwarded the letter regarding the guarantee after analysing the interim report submitted by the Marine Environment Protection Authority (MEPA) on the damage to the countrys marine environment caused by the oil leak from the vessel.

The report was handed over during a special meeting the AG and his team had with representatives of Government stakeholders involved in the operation to render assistance to the stricken vessel and prevent damage to Sri Lankas marine environment. Those who were present included the Navys Director Operations Admiral Y.N. Jayarathna, MEPA Chairperson Dharshani Lahanadapura and Merchant Shipping Director General A.W. Seneviratne.

Based on the contents of the interim report, the AG has determined that there are grounds to initiate legal proceedings for a civil liability claim against the Greek owners of the Panama-flagged tanker for damage caused to Sri Lankas marine environment due to the oil leak from the vessel.

In its interim report, MEPA had noted that it would take between two to three months to arrive at a final estimate of the damage caused. As such, the AG has taken steps to inform the owners of the vessel in writing to deposit a USD 20 million guarantee in the country until a civil claim has been initiated. The letter sent by the AG will be forwarded to the owners of the company through the law firm representing their Colombo based local agent.

In another development, the owners and salvors of the oil tanker agreed yesterday to immediately settle the entire claim of Government stakeholders amounting to Rs. 442 million for costs incurred when assisting the vessel after it caught fire following an explosion onboard on September 3.

MEPA Chairperson Lahanadapura told the Sunday Times that MT New Diamonds owners had been requested to select a route through which the ship can be towed out of Sri Lankan waters. The MEPA would grant approval for the passage of the ship once the payment for the environmental damages had been agreed upon, she added.

She also noted that the Merchant Shipping Secretariat had confirmed that the ship was in a condition to withstand the towing.

Meanwhile, Steiros Ilias, the Greek Captain of MT New Diamond is set to appear before the Colombo Chief Magistrates Court tomorrow after being issued notice. Captain Ilias is currently undergoing quarantine under the care of the Sri Lanka Navy at a hotel in Galle. Meanwhile, the rest of the tankers 21 crew members have been allowed to leave the country after completing their quarantine period.
The general view is that Bola Tinubu, former Lagos state governor and All Progressives Congress (APC) leader, will run for Presidency in 2...

The general view is that Bola Tinubu, former Lagos state governor and All Progressives Congress (APC) leader, will run for Presidency in 2023 but he has not announced any such intentions.

In fact, a few months ago he mocked those pundits who purported to know his political intentions.

Responding to the pundits, Tinubu said: Already you have assigned colourful epitaphs to the 2023 death of an alleged political ambition that is not yet even born.

However, his loyalists have continued to throw their weight behind him for the 2023 presidency.

One of them, Oyo North lawmaker Senator Abdulfatai Buhari, in a recent interview with journalist Edmund Obilo, stated that he will support Tinubu for the countrys top seat once he declares his intentions.

Buhari also reacted to the insinuations that Governor Kayode Fayemi of Ekiti State was working against Tinubus interest.

No. I am for Tinubu. I am not for Fayemi and I will not be in a meeting where somebody would be working against Tinubu. I am supporting Tinubu, Buhari stated.

Responding to a question on whether Tinubu was running for president, Buhari said, If he wants to be President, I will support him. I will campaign for him.

Buhari also spoke on the crisis rocking the APC in Oyo State.

The lawmaker noted that the disagreement was caused by the loss of the governorship seat to the Peoples Democratic Party.

He, however, said former Governor of Oyo State, Adebayo Alao-Akala, is the leader of the party in the state and he is working perfectly to make the party better.
She was in fifth grade at Matzke Elementary when she was diagnosed with cancer. The shocking revelation for an otherwise healthy and exuberant young girl was laced with the news that it was a rare form of cancer and she would have to take experimental treatments at M. D. Anderson Hospital in Houston.

Worried about her academics and desire to attend school, little Deena never felt alone.

Q&A: Northwest Assistance Ministries CEO Les Cave discusses NAMs continued service

The school district worked so well with my family to help me get over that time period, she remembers fondly.

They werent even sure if Id develop intellectually if I survived, she said.

She not only kicked her childhood cancer, but the survivor and 1995 graduate of Cypress Creek High School also made it onto the state volleyball team and finished in the top four percent of her class.

She was so committed to her schoolwork that she chose Fridays to take her chemotherapy so she would recuperate on the weekends and be back in class on Mondays.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Gov. Greg Abbott pledges $167 million to Texas rental assistance

I lived in the bathroom unable to keep anything down from the drugs, she said.

The district was so good to me, accommodating me. Im so grateful for this area, said the mother of two high school age boys now.

The financial stress of the chemo treatments that saved her life should have prevented her from going to college.

I still have the letters from the insurance companies denying payment for my treatments because it was experimental, she said.

I would not have been able to go, she said. The daughter of a preacher, the family would not have been able to send her.

Then her miracle came.

She had gathered with her family on Senior Night when her name was called to come to the stage. The CyFair Educational Foundation awarded her a $25,000 scholarship to attend Texas A&M in the fall. At that time, it would pay for all four years of her education.

She achieved a degree in applied mathematics and now works as a corporate executive in retail energy.

Deena Morgan never forgot what the district and the Foundation did for her, and she now serves on the board for CFEF and has an endowment of her own that she has sponsored for a CFISD student.

The Foundation was the reason I was able to go to college at all, she said. A lot of great things have happened in my life that came out of an awful time period.

She is one among hundreds of success stories resulting from the investments into education by the community through the Cy-Fair Educational Foundation.

During this, the 50th anniversary of the Foundation, they face an unprecedented challenge to overcome the unique obstacles by the coronavirus but are determined in their mission to provide assistance to students needing financial aid for college.

Executive Director Marie Holmes said its not their first rodeo and they will overcome.

There was the turndown in the oil and gas industry that threatened our ability to raise money, but we survived that, she said optimistically, and well survive this.

The Foundation began with meager means with the idea by then Superintendent Karl Bleyl. He lobbied the idea with colleagues in the late 60s and eventually met with Allen Labay, deputy superintendent; Rev. F. J. Aragon, pastor of Christ United Church; Jim Blackman who was shipping manager for Foleys; and attorney Herman Mead to establish what today is one of the oldest educational foundations in the state.

Keith Grothaus, the current chairman of the board, likened it to an old-time revival where They just kind of passed the hat around to some businesses, associates, and folks in the school district and raised $2,000 to get it started. All good things start small, he smiled.

During his 14 years on the board, Grothaus credited the legacy and trailblazing community leaders who have served or currently serve on the board.

Were blessed to have had a very conservative board of trustees who have been cautious with investments and the stewardship of the money donated for scholarships. Its been pretty amazing, he said.

The real fun, he said, was awarding deserving students money and seeing their reactions.

From crying, to jumping up and down, a few screams, and some doing a little dance, they run the gamut of emotions.

In years past, we would have told them on their Senior Night awards, he said, but with the coronavirus pandemic, we had to work to get them on a Zoom call.

Grothaus, Holmes, and a few board members would be on the call with the student and their parents.

To tell somebody on a Zoom call while theyre sitting in their living room that theyre about to go to Texas A&M (or any other college) because we just awarded them a $20,000 scholarship, to see the look on their face and their overjoyed parents is just such a great thing to be able to do, the board chair said.

Each campus has a scholarship team including CFEF board members who grade the applications. It can be a grind especially when they received more than 1,000 requests last year alone.

According to Holmes, the students apply online, and the Foundation board of trustee members grade each of the applications based on a three-tiered system: 25 percent for leadership, 25 percent based on academics, and the largest percentile of 50 percent dedicated to economic need.

The chairman said they rarely give scholarships to valedictorians or salutatorians per se because they are usually taken care of with other high-level awards that will help them achieve their goal.

We try to be the ones who gives a scholarship to the kid who might not receive one otherwise, he said, and as expensive as college is now, its even more important for us to raise money and help.

Not all of the awards are to students attending major universities.

We also gave about 50 scholarships for students to attend Lone Star College with $1,500 each, he said.

Grothaus cited one case in which the student had been living in their car the majority of their high school career.

She was going to classes, working, and going to the gym to shower, he said. She kept her grades up and did such a phenomenal job.

The chairman said the stories and hardships they see in the applications, and the resilience of the kids is inspiring.

In some cases, were giving scholarships to kids who are the first in their family to go to college, he said. Its life-changing.

With the assistance of a financial advisor and finance committee guiding investments, the Foundation has expanded their ability to help with a $13 million endowment that they hope to grow to $15 million in the near future.

We were well on our way until COVID hit, he said. To date, three of their annual fundraisers have been postponed and only one canceled.

They hope to use the interest on the endowment to completely fund the annual scholarships to the tune of $1.5 million.

With that amount of money, we should be able to increase the number of scholarships and the amounts as well, he said.

He commended the work of the 62 board members who labor raising money for the events, selling golf teams, tables at events, donating auction items, buying tables, buying tickets and raffle tickets.

It all helps us move forward, he said.

As many as five scholarships are awarded to students at each of the high school campuses. Some schools may have more because alumni from that school may have endowed scholarships specific to their own high school.

Holmes and Grothaus encouraged the public to consider endowments named for private individuals, corporations, or organizations in memory or honor of individuals.

A $20,000 endowment can begin with a $1,000 donation to begin and pay off the remaining $19,000 over seven years, she said. Once funded, an annual scholarship will be awarded.

To learn more about the work of the Foundation, visit www.thecfef.org.

dtaylor@hcnonline.com
Miami, Sep 26 : Authorities in the US state of Florida have decided to lift all Covid-19 restrictions on restaurants and bars effective immediately.

"There will not be limitations from the state of Florida. I think this will be very, very important to the industry," The Hill news website quoted DeSantis as saying at a press conference on Friday.

"Some of the local (governments) can do reasonable regulations, but you can't say no after six months and just have people twisting in the wind," he added.

While acknowledging that the Covid-19 pandemic was still a concern, the Governor said that his state was prepared if there was a surge in fresh cases and businesses should not be forced to close.

"We're prepared if we see an increase. We're not closing anything moving forward. We have the tools in place," DeSantis added.

In the middle of the year, Florida had emerged as a Covid-19 hotspot after a sudden spike in the number of confirmed cases, due to which the Governor has ordered bars to shut.

As of Saturday, the 'Sunshine State' has reported more than 696,000 coronavirus cases, with 13,914 deaths.
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President Donald Trump named federal judge Amy Coney Barrett as his choice for the U.S. Supreme Court Saturday, just a couple of hours before he holds a rally at Harrisburg International Airport.

If confirmed, Barrett will fill the vacancy created by the death of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg last week. The U.S. Senate must confirm the presidents pick and it appeared this week Trump had enough votes in the Republican-controlled chamber to get a vote.

Democrats, including U.S. Sen. Bob Casey Jr., have implored Trump and the Senate to wait until after the election. They argue its hypocritical for the Senate to move forward after refusing a vote on President Barack Obamas final nominee, Merrick Garland, in 2016, eight months before the election. Republicans at the time said the winner of the presidential election should fill the seat.

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden issued a statement criticizing Trump for moving forward with the nomination so quickly. In a statement Saturday, he urged the Senate, where he served for over three decades, to postpone a confirmation vote until after the election. He also made it clear he didnt support the nomination of Barrett.

She has a written track record of disagreeing with the U.S. Supreme Courts decision upholding the Affordable Care Act. She critiqued Chief Justice John Roberts' majority opinion upholding the law in 2012, Biden said in a statement.

The Senate should not act on this vacancy until after the American people select their next president and the next Congress, he added.

Republicans argue its a different situation because the president and Senate belong to the same party this year; that wasnt the case four years ago. U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., has said he would vote for the nominee if qualified. U.S. Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, also said hes willing to vote on Trumps nominee, almost assuring the president the votes needed for confirmation.

Barrett is widely respected as a jurist and conservatives have anticipated her nomination to the court.

Here are some reactions to Trumps nominee from Pennsylvanias elected officials. These come from statements issued by the lawmakers.

U.S. Sen. Bob Casey Jr., D-Pa.

"If confirmed, Judge Amy Coney Barrett will almost certainly vote to overturn the Affordable Care Act (ACA), which will adversely impact working families, children and seniors. I cannot support a Supreme Court nominee who would rip health care away from tens of millions, undermine the rights of workers and do the bidding of large corporations.

Instead of focusing on tackling the virus and helping millions get back to work, Donald Trump is trying to rush an appointment onto the Supreme Court to ensure that the nominee is the deciding vote to take away protections for 5.5 million Pennsylvanians with pre-existing conditions. President Trump is more concerned with his own election than protecting Americans from the deadly virus or creating millions of good paying jobs for the almost 750,000 out of work in our Commonwealth.

U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa.

"I am pleased that President Trump has nominated Judge Amy Coney Barrett to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Given Judge Barretts intellect, strong legal credentials, and impeccable character, I was proud to support her confirmation to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in 2017. These same attributes will serve her well on the nations highest court. As a working mother with young children, Judge Barrett would also bring to the Supreme Court a background that will add to its diversity.

Importantly, Judge Barrett has shown an unfailing commitment to the proper role of a judge  which is to apply the law, including the U.S. Constitution, as written, and not to decide cases based on a preferred policy or outcome. I look forward to reviewing Judge Barretts record further in the coming weeks and speaking with her soon as I consider her nomination.

U.S. Rep. John Joyce, Republican, 13th District

Judge Amy Coney Barrett is a qualified jurist and principled originalist who has a proven record of upholding the U.S. Constitution. The role of the U.S. Supreme Court is not to legislate, but rather to interpret the law. I encourage my colleagues to dispense with perpetrating personal attacks on the nominee and evaluate the jurist on the merit of her qualifications. Additionally, I urge the Senate to follow historical precedent and ensure that this nominee receives just consideration.

U.S. Rep. Dan Meuser, Republican, 9th District

Judge Coney Barrett has a proven record as an independent jurist who is widely respected across the ideological spectrum for her thoughtful decisions, rooted in the judicial philosophy of originalism. By filling the current vacancy on the Supreme Court, President Trump is executing his Constitutional authority and fulfilling his promise to the American people. I am confident Judge Coney Barrett will be a worthy replacement for Justice Ginsburg and look forward to a fair and swift confirmation process.

This post will be updated.

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The University of the Fraser Valley hopes its new Peace and Reconciliation Centre (PARC)  which the school says is the first of its kind in Canada  will help contribute to a more equitable society.

Professor Keith Carlson, the centre's chair, said institutions like universities and governments can often reinforce unequal power structures by excluding knowledge and experience from historically-marginalized communities.

The PARC was established to counter that by "bringing new voices to the table," he told Margaret Gallagher, guest host of CBC's On the Coast on Thursday.

Aside from collaborating with academic departments like Peace and Conflict Studies, the PARC will offer funding and scholarships to students and faculty, as well as community members not affiliated with UFV "who are looking for partners and allies to change the world," said Carlson.

The Abbotsford-based university says it has received substantial funding from the Oikodome Foundation, a local Christian charity.

UFV launched the PARC Thursday with a virtual event featuring speeches from Steven Point, the first-ever Indigenous chancellor of UBC, and former Ontario Premier Bob Rae, now Canada's ambassador to the United Nations.

'Deep listening'

Jacqueline Nolte, dean of UFV's college of arts, said the university envisions the PARC as a hub for constructive dialogue, research and creative expression aimed at building trust among diverse communities.

"We will facilitate deep listening and mediation such that all people will feel heard and acknowledged," she said in a news release.

The scope of the centre won't be narrow.

Along with relations between Indigenous people and settlers, Carlson said the centre could address everything from domestic violence to interfaith conflicts in the Middle East and Ireland.

Carlson, who holds the Canada Research Chair in Indigenous and community-engaged history, echoed Nolte's words.

"What we're saying [is] that we value Indigenous ways of knowing," Carlson said.

"The structures that underlie racism need to be dismantled so that everybody in this country [...] will be able to enjoy all the privileges that anybody who's of European descent [has]."
Press Release

September 26, 2020 De Lima files bill to stop EJKs, ensure an independent investigation of summary killings and provide compensation for victims Opposition Senator Leila M. de Lima has filed a measure which seeks to define and criminalize extrajudicial killings and related acts and guarantee state obligations to effectively investigate and properly document EJKs which remain unabated amid the COVID-19 pandemic. In filing Senate Bill (SB) No. 1842, De Lima, the staunchest critic of the administration's war on drugs, lamented that the global pandemic, which is the worst in recent memory, did not stop the bloodlust under the present regime. "Four years since the promise to win the drug war in three to six months was made - the promise remains unfulfilled, but the killings still persist, the air is still pervaded by the stench of cold blood, and the streets still are the playground of trigger-happy villains who slay without end," she said. "As Filipinos grappled to survive the world's longest quarantine, the killers roamed more freely - unchecked, without legal ramifications, and with even more impunity. While the people stayed in their homes as they were told, the bloodshed lingered like a virus so potent that the killings rose by half," she added. The Philippine National Police (PNP) reported that 5,526 suspects were killed in police operations from July 1, 2016 to June 30, 2019 but estimates by domestic human rights groups bring the death toll to as high as 27,000. Meanwhile, data from the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) revealed that the killings became even more malignant amid the pandemic as "the police killed 50 percent more people between April to July 2020 than they did in the previous four-month period." De Lima, a known human rights defender here and abroad, said the recent health crisis was also "used as a scheme to continue to perpetuate the brutal crackdown on activists and environmental defenders," citing recent murders of Zara Alvarez, a paralegal for the human rights group Karapatan, and Randall Echanis, a leader of the peasant group Anakpawis, in separate incidents. "Nakukulangan pa ba ang administrasyong Duterte sa dami ng namamatay? Libo-libo na ang biktima ng EJK. Libo-libo na rin ang namatay dahil sa pandemya. Pero walang patid pa rin ang mga karumal-dumal na pamamaslang!," De Lima said. SB No. 1842, which is adopted from the UP Law Center Institute of Human Rights (UP IHR) paper, provides for the definition of important terms that would prevent the perpetrators of EJKs from circumventing the law. For one, it seeks to define EJK as "the unlawful or arbitrary killing or arbitrary deprivation of life committed by State agents or non-State actors," who are either "acting under actual or apparent authority, or color of law, or upon the instruction of, or under the direction or control of, or by policy, order or behest of, the State in carrying out the conduct..." "It not only defines EJK, it likewise imposes punishment not only on state actors, but also upon non-state actors who are equally guilty of committing the atrocious act of extrajudicial killing. It imposes penalties not only upon the principals of the crime, but also upon the accessories thereof," she stressed. Under SB No. 1842, for the investigation to be effective, it is essential that the persons in charge of such investigation be independent, de jure and de facto, of the ones involved in the case - requiring not only hierarchical or institutional independence, but also actual independence. The measure also mandates that State officials who have authority to investigate extrajudicial killings must be rigorously trained on effective investigation to come up with science-based and objective assessment of the incident and be free from interference from officials involved, among others. "One of the most salient provisions is the section that provides for a prima facie case for arbitrary deprivation of life and presumption of liability. This provision would be a powerful deterrent that would make the perpetrators of EJKs think twice before pulling the trigger because they could no longer hide behind the flimsy excuse of impulse," she said. Acknowledging the importance of reparation of victims of EJKS, the bill also seeks to establish a Human Rights Violations Victims Fund where the victim or his/her legal heirs shall have the right to claim compensation from - for crimes committed against the victim's life, rights and dignity. "Compensation and reparation which, though could no longer bring life unduly taken back, could at least help the victims and their families to heal and move on from the trauma and the pain," she said. De Lima first filed SB No. 1197, also known as the "Anti-Extrajudicial Killing Act" during the 17 th Congress and refiled the said bill this 18th Congress as SB No. 371, but it gathered dust in the Senate Justice and Human Rights Committee under the Chairmanship of Senator Richard Gordon.
Argentina's Juan Imhoff said his try which sent Racing 92 into the European Champions Cup final with a 19-15 win over title holders Saracens on Saturday was "extraordinary".

Winger Imhoff crossed with five minutes to play after a Finn Russell chip and centre Virimi Vakatawa's pass against Sarries who will be relegated from the English Premiership for breaching the league's salary cap.

The Parisians will travel to either Toulouse or Exeter Chiefs, who play later in England, on October 17 for a chance at a first European crown.

"We found it hard to break the defensive line. We won with something extraordinary which breaks the system," Imhoff said.

"It's now 80 minutes, anything can happen. We're where want to be," he added.

Sarries director of rugby Mark McCall praised Russell and Vakatawa's combination.

"They have this moment of magic in them. Finn Russell has a great relationship with the 13. I'm incredibly proud of this bunch to back up last week with a performance," McCall said.

A maximum of 1,000 spectators were allowed into the 32,000-capacity La Defense Arena under new coronavirus restrictions that came into effect earlier in the day.

France winger Teddy Thomas made his first appearance since February's Six Nations victory over Wales.

The visitors named an unchanged side from last weekend's success at Leinster as Alex Goode continued to deputise for England captain Owen Farrell who has been banned for a dangerous tackle.

Iribaren opened the scoring with an 11th minute penalty goal before Goode, who scored 19 points in Dublin, brought the sides level at 3-3 with his own effort after 25 minutes.

Neither side managed to claim the ascendancy in an error-strewn opening and Iribaren and Goode slotted two further penalties for a 6-6 scoreline with both efforts kicked in eerie silence.

The first glimpse of brilliance from Racing's international-filled backline came with two minutes of the first half to go as Scotland fly-half Finn Russell cleaned up a Sarries kick inside his own 22m.

Story continues

He passed to Thomas out wide who ran free to chip ahead into open space and along with Imhoff forced full-back Elliot Daly to run the ball into touch.

Racing won a penalty after pressure from the resulting lineout and Iribaren claimed a 9-6 lead at the break.

Goode was successful with two further penalties inside the opening 10 minutes for a 12-9 advantage.

With half an hour remaining the hosts played a lineout quickly and Russell fed Simon Zebo on his 22m but the Ireland full-back knocked the ball on after a smothering tackle from Dominic Morris, a first-half substitute for Scotland centre Duncan Taylor.

Racing were pinned at the following scrum and Goode opened up a six-point gap.

Iribaren was replaced by 38-time France scrum-half Maxime Machenaud afterwards and despite pressure inside the Sarries half, the home side failed to find gaps in the disciplined away defence.

Machenaud closed the gap to 15-12 with a little over 10 minutes to play after Donnacha Ryan won a superb penalty at a ruck as Racing sensed victory and a place in the final.

But with five minutes to play they found the breakthrough as Sarries' defensive line faltered.

Vakatawa broke up field from a Russell chip to find Imhoff for the decisive try and Machenaud converted as Racing claimed a spot in the final, a third in the club's history after 2016 and 2018.

iwd/lp
The Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP) president and former union minister Upendra Kushwaha is an ambitious politician eager to climb to the top post in Bihar but he is so desperate to achieve his goal that his decisions often land him in a mess with little space in the political setup of the otherwise electorally complex state.

Kushwaha has been caught in the quagmire of his own political gaffes to the extent that he is fast turning out to be the persona non grata of Bihar politics. Having been shown the doors in the Grand Alliance or Mahagathbandhan led by the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) just before the upcoming state assembly elections, Kushwaha is now looking for a political platform with a favourable social equation to sail through the state assembly polls in Bihar.

It is learnt that he is desperate to join the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) or to form a third front in alliance with the likes of Jan Adhikar Morcha (JAP) chief Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav. Some other splinter groups may also join the bandwagon if a Third Front is formed.

But there are many stumbling blocks for Kushwaha in joining the NDA. First, his bete noire and Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar will not allow him to join the NDA given the antagonism they nourish against each other. Second, the number of seats Kushwaha has been demanding in the Grand Alliance may not be possible in the NDA because a tug of war is already on among the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Janata Dal (U) and the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) over seats.

In fact, the political stock of Kushwaha has been diluted over the years because of his flip-flops and poor electoral performances in the last assembly and Lok Sabha elections. His shallow perception of political realities of Bihar has cost him dearly and come as a roadblock to his high political ambitions.

Kushwaha stepped into politics in 1985 and became the state general secretary of the Yuva Lok Dal. He joined the Samata Party floated by George Fernandes and Nitish Kumar and became its general secretary. He was elected to the state assembly in 2000 and became the leader of opposition in a swift turn of events with the election of BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi to Lok Sabha.

Nitish was then mentor of Kushwaha and was instrumental in making him the leader of opposition in Bihar assembly in 2004 even though Kushwaha was then the first-time legislator.

However, Kushwaha started raising the issue of marginalisation of Koeri (Kushwaha) caste among the different social justice groups in the share of power. He was eventually dismissed from the Janata Dal (U) in 2007. He floated the Rashtriya Samata Party (RSP) in February 2009 with the support of the then deputy Chief Minister of Maharashtra Chhagan Bhujbal. Only nine months later, Kushwahas RSP merged into the Janata Dal (U) again in November 2009 following mending of his ties with Nitish Kumar.

He soon became disenchanted with the style of functioning of Nitish Kumar alleging that the governance has taken a beating in Bihar. He alleged that Nitish ran his government through autocratic means and that he had turned the Janata Dal (U) as his pocket borough. In due course, Kushwaha, who at that time was a Rajya Sabha member, again resigned from the Janata Dal (U).

Kushwaha floated the RLSP in 2013 and joined the NDA because Nitish Kumar had by then quit and allied with the Grand Alliance led by RJD led by Lalu Prasad.

In the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the RLSP won all the three seats it contested  Karakat, Jehanabad and Sitamarhi. Kushwaha was elected from Karakat seat and made minister of state in the Narendra Modi government. In the subsequent state assembly elections in 2015, Kushwahas party was part of theNDA and it contested 23 out of 243 assembly seats in Bihar. However, it won only two seats.

When Nitish Kumar quit the Grand Alliance and re-joined the NDA in 2017, Kushwaha started sulking and showing his reluctance by censuring the Nitish Kumar government on alleged mismanagement in the field of education and deteriorating law and order situation.

Before the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Kushwaha pitched for more than three Lok Sabha seats for his party to remain in the NDA. As his colleague and Jehanabad MP Arun Kumar had quit the party, Kushwaha was offered the existing two seats  Karakat and Sitamarhi. But Kushwaha wanted one more  Valmikinagar  held by BJPs Satish Chandra Dubey.

Eventually, he switched over to the Grand Alliance and contested the 2019 Lok Sabha elections on five parliamentary seats. Kushwaha himself contested from two seats - Karakat and Ujiyarpur. But he lost from both the seats and his party too failed to win even a single seat.

After drawing a blank in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the RLSP received another setback as its two MLAs  Lalan Paswan and Sudhanshu Shekhar  and lone MLC Sanjiv Singh Shyam joined the Janata Dal (U). The legislators had revolted against Kushwahas decision to snap ties with the NDA and join the Mahagathbandhan.

After his win in 2014 Lok Sabha polls, Kushwaha was visualised as an emerging leader of the Koeri caste with the capacity to transfer the votes of his community to the party or combination of his choice. He tried to drive a wedge in the famous Luv-Kush (Kurmi-Koeri) combination and worked for Koeri resurgence with a goal to assume political and administrative power.

He nourishes a secret wish of becoming the chief minister of Bihar. Kushwaha has been unequivocally declaring that it was now the turn of Koeris to rule in Bihar after the 15-year rule of Yadavas led by Lalu Prasad and subsequent 15-year rule of Kurmis led by Nitish Kumar.

Though he nurtures high political ambitions, he lacks the political consistency and dedication required to become leader of a particular caste group and an acceptable leader among other caste groups and communities.

He seems to have lost his charm before emerging on the political horizon of Bihar due largely to his frequent switchovers and inept handling of the political situation. He nourishes a far bigger ambition than his acceptability among the masses.

Kushwaha has also tried to unite the Yadavas and Koeris with his Kheer theory saying that a delicious Kheer (a dessert made of milk and rice) is possible only when the milk comes from the Yadavas and the rice from the Koeris. While the Yadavas constitute nearly 12 per cent of the total population, the Koeris account for 6 per cent of the total electorate in Bihar. But his Kheer theory has not yielded any result as he has been mistreated in the Grand Alliance.
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By Rachana Pradhan, KHN correspondent, reports on a broad array of national health policy decisions and their effect on everyday Americans. Originally published at Kaiser Health News.

Most Americans have never heard of Dr. Richard Whitley, an expert in pediatric infectious diseases at the University of Alabama-Birmingham.

Yet as the coronavirus pandemic drags on and the public eagerly awaits a vaccine, he may well be among the most powerful people in the country.

Whitley leads a small, secret panel of experts tasked with reviewing crucial data on the safety and effectiveness of coronavirus vaccines that U.S. taxpayers have helped fund, including products from Moderna, AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson and others. The data and safety monitoring board  known as a DSMB  is supposed to make sure the medicine is safe and it works. It has the power to halt a clinical trial or fast-track it.

Shielding the identities of clinicians and statisticians on the board is meant to insulate them from pressure by the company sponsoring the trial, government officials or the public, according to multiple clinical trial experts who have served on such panels. That could be especially important in the pressure-cooker environment of COVID vaccine research, fueled by President Donald Trumps promises to deliver a vaccine before Election Day.

As pharmaceutical companies work to produce one as quickly as possible, the boards anonymity has stirred concerns that the cloak of secrecy could, paradoxically, allow undue influence. Whitley, for example, represents the specialized world these experts inhabit  a professor revered in academia who also is paid by the drug industry.

Any political pressure to rush pharmaceutical companies or lean on federal regulators to prematurely greenlight a vaccine would undermine a system put in place to ensure public safety. Calls are growing for companies and the government to be more open about whos involved in reviewing the vaccine trials and whether board members have any conflicts of interest.

We want to know theyre truly independent, said Dr. Eric Topol, director of the Scripps Research Translational Institute and a specialist in clinical trials. The lack of transparency is exasperating.

Data and safety monitoring boards have existed for decades to vet new drugs and vaccines, acting as a backstop to help ensure unsafe products dont make their way to the public. Typically, theres one board for each product. This time, a joint DSMB with 10 to 15 experts will review unblinded data across trials for multiple coronavirus vaccines whose development the U.S. government has helped fund, according to five people involved in the Trump administrations Operation Warp Speed or other coronavirus vaccine work. It is run through the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the National Institutes of Health and consists of outside scientists and statistical experts, not federal employees, NIH Director Francis Collins said on a call with reporters.

Until they are convinced that theres something there that looks promising, nothing is unblinded and sent to the FDA, Collins said. I doubt if there have been very many vaccine trials ever that have been subjected to this size and the rigor with which its being evaluated.

The NIH safety board oversees trials in the U.S. from Moderna, Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca, U.S. officials and others involved in Operation Warp Speed said, but not Pfizer, which is fully funding its clinical trial work and established its own five-member safety panel. Pfizer has attested that it can conclusively determine by late October the effectiveness of its vaccine, being jointly developed with German company BioNTech. It secured a $1.95 billion purchase agreement with the Department of Health and Human Services for the first 100 million doses produced. The agreement gives HHS the option to buy an additional 500 million doses.

Moderna, Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca, which have either started or are aiming to soon begin large-scale trials in the U.S. involving thousands of patients, collectively have received more than $2 billion in government funds for vaccine development; billions more have been meted out under agreements similar to the HHS contract with Pfizer to buy millions of vaccine doses. Having one safety board oversee multiple trials could allow researchers to better understand the field of products and apply consistency across evaluations, clinical trial experts said in interviews.

One big advantage could be more standardization, said Dr. Walter Orenstein, associate director of the Emory Vaccine Center at Emory University and a former senior official at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. They can look at that data and look at all the trials instead of just doing one trial.

But it also means that one board has an outsize influence to dictate which coronavirus vaccines eventually succeed or come to a halt, all while most of their identities remain secret. The NIH declined to name them, saying they were confidential and could be identified only once a study was complete.

One exception to the mystery is Whitley, who was appointed as chair by Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nations top infectious disease official. Fauci said that following a combination of input from us and from him and other colleagues, the people who had the greatest expertise in a variety of areas, including statistics, clinical trials, vaccinology, immunology, clinical work, were selected for the panel.

Whitleys role became public when his university announced it, an unusual move. He is a professor as well as a board member of Gilead Sciences, which recently signed a contract with Pfizer to manufacture remdesivir to treat COVID-19 patients. Whitley, whos been on Gileads board since 2008, conducted research that led to remdesivirs development.

In 2019, he was paid roughly $430,000 as a Gilead board member, according to documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. That same year, he received more than $7,700 in payments from GlaxoSmithKline for consulting, food and travel, according to a federal database that tracks drug and device company payments to physicians.

GlaxoSmithKline and Sanofi are jointly developing a vaccine thats received $2 billion from the U.S. government under Operation Warp Speed; however, Whitley, through a university spokesperson, said his DSMB has not seen any GlaxoSmithKline COVID protocols. The companies have yet to begin phase 3 trials. Although he chairs a separate GSK data and safety monitoring board for a pediatric vaccine, he was vetted and cleared by the NIH conflict-of-interest committee with its knowledge of his involvement, the spokesperson said.

When handled responsibly, it is appropriate for physicians to collaborate with external entities, said UAB spokesperson Beena Thannickal, saying the university works with physicians to ensure that industry engagement is appropriate. It facilitates a critical exchange of knowledge and accelerates and advances clinical treatments and cures, and it fuels discovery.

Multiple experts praised his skill  Dr. Walter Straus, an associate vice president at the drug company Merck & Co., said Whitley is an eminence grise in pediatrics whom people trust.

I actually trust that process, and the fact that they asked Rich to do it makes me feel reassured because hes so good, said Dr. Jeanne Marrazzo, director of the University of Alabama-Birminghams division of infectious diseases.

Multiple scientists who have participated in data and safety monitoring boards maintain its important to keep the board anonymous to shield them against pressure or even for their safety. For example, when trials were conducted in San Francisco for HIV/AIDS research, the board was confidential to protect members from patients desperate for treatment, said Susan Ellenberg, a professor of biostatistics, medical ethics and health policy at the University of Pennsylvania whos written extensively on the history of DSMBs.

If approached by a patient, it would be very hard to tell you, Oh I cant help you. Its an unreasonable burden, said Ellenberg, who said she was involved in coronavirus-related safety boards but would not name them.

As part of a large-scale clinical trial, the DSMB and a statistician or team that prepares data for those individuals are generally the only ones who see unblinded data about the trial, making it clear who is getting what treatment. A firewall is set up between them and executives from the sponsoring company with financial interests in the trial. The companies sponsoring COVID vaccine trials are not part of any closed sessions during which unblinded data is reviewed. Those are limited to members of the DSMB, the NIAID executive secretary and the independent unblinded statistician who is presenting the data, a NIAID spokesperson said.

DSMB members or their family members should have no professional, proprietary or financial relationship with the sponsoring companies, and the NIAID DSMB executive secretary vetted all members for potential conflicts of interest, NIAID said in response to questions from KHN. Members are paid $200 per meeting.

Its generally done out of a sense of public service, said Dr. Larry Corey of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, who is working with NIH officials to oversee the U.S. coronavirus vaccine clinical trials. Youre doing it because of your sense of altruism and obligation to knowing the important role it plays in clinical research and the important role it plays in preserving the scientific integrity of important trials.

Moderna, AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer have each released protocols that include details on when their DSMBs would review unblinded information about trial participants, and at what points they could recommend pausing or stopping trials. The vaccine data and safety board organized by NIAID advises a broader oversight group consisting of the drug companies sponsoring the trial and representatives from NIAID and HHS Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority that reviews the DSMB recommendations. Ultimately, the drug company has final authority over whether to submit its data to the Food and Drug Administration.

Moderna and Johnson & Johnson are each aiming for their vaccines to have 60% efficacy, which means there would need to be 60% fewer COVID cases among vaccinated individuals in their trials. AstraZenecas target is 50%. The FDA has said any coronavirus vaccine must be at least 50% effective to secure approval from regulators. While the parameters of their clinical trials have similarities, there are some differences, including when and how many times the DSMB can conduct interim reviews to assess whether each vaccine works.

Pfizer is similarly aiming for its vaccine to be 60% effective. The company allows for four interim reviews of the data starting at 32 cases  a schedule that has been criticized by some researchers who contend it makes it easier for the company to stop the trial prematurely.

Pfizer declined to name the individuals on its monitoring committee, saying only that the group consisted of four people with extensive experience in pediatric and adult infectious diseases and vaccine safety and one statistician with a background in vaccine clinical trials. An unblinded team supporting its data-monitoring committee  which includes a medical monitor and statistician  will review severe cases of COVID-19 as they are received and any adverse events associated with the trial at least weekly.

There is an irresolvable tension between speed and safety, said Dr. Gregory Poland, the head of Mayo Clinics Vaccine Research Group. Efficacy is pretty easy to figure out. Its safety thats the issue.

California Healthline editor Arthur Allen contributed to this report.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 17:08:56|Editor: huaxia

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Bedouin people demonstrate their traditional cooking during the launching ceremony of the "Eco Egypt" campaign at Ras Mohammed reserve in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, Sept. 25, 2020. Egypt has launched a campaign to promote natural reserves and develop ecotourism. (Xinhua/Ahmed Gomaa)

SHARM EL SHEIKH, Egypt, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Egypt has launched a campaign to promote natural reserves and develop ecotourism.

The initiative, dubbed "Eco Egypt," was launched on Friday in Ras Mohammed protectorate in Egypt's Red Sea resort city of Sharm el-Sheikh. The campaign aims to support ecotourism in Egypt and encourage people to visit natural reserves to get to know the different cultures of the local populations as well as the role they play to protect the environment and biodiversity of the reserves.

The campaign is launched by the Ministry of Environment in cooperation with the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities and the State Ministry for Media and Information. The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the Integration of Biodiversity into Egyptian Tourism Project, funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF), are also partners.

Speaking at the launching ceremony, Egyptian Minister of Environment Yasmine Fouad said the ministry has prepared an integrated plan to support responsible and sustainable ecotourism, and to pump new investments into this sector in a way that supports sustainability of natural resources.

The minister stressed that the campaign opens new horizons for sustainable ecotourism in Egypt as one of the results of the ministry's strategy to develop natural reserves, noting that the strategy succeeded in developing the infrastructure and services provided to visitors in 13 reserves.

She said natural reserves are being developed and managed according to global systems in order to preserve them and maximize economic, social and cultural development.

According to the Egyptian Environment Ministry, Egypt has a rich natural heritage as natural reserves occupy 15 percent of the country's total land area.

The minister added that the ministry is also keen to maintain Egypt's biodiversity in a way that supports the environment and the national economy by attracting more investments to ecotourism-related activities, including camping, diving, star-watching and birdwatching.

"This would attract fans of this type of ecotourism from various countries of the world to get acquainted with the unique nature and distinctive culture of the nature reserves in Egypt," the minister said.

She said the campaign provides a model for sustainable development as it takes into account the environmental, economic, social and health dimensions of ecotourism by promoting it to revive the national economy, especially in light of the repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Fouad added that the campaign will last for three years, targeting the promotion of ecotourism in Egypt through the establishment of a website and a number of social media platforms, in addition to preparing publications to showcase Egypt's wealth in nature reserves, including stunning landscapes, animals, birds, and unique plants.

For his part, State Minister of Media and Information Osama Heikal stressed in his speech the importance of raising awareness of sustainable development issues, including preserving natural reserves.

He noted that the Ministry of Media and Information is keen to simplify the language of environmental dialogue in the media with the aim of developing awareness of environmental issues and sustainable development as well as creating the necessary community participation in that direction.

On the sidelines of the event, an exhibition of environmental industries made by the local residents of Ras Mohammed Reserve was held, during which they presented industries such as ceramics, clothes, textiles, ornamental tools, antiques, accessories and gifts.

An exhibition was also held at the reserve's visitor center, in which the most important types of coral reefs and photos of fish were displayed. The Ras Mohammed reserve is home to 220 types of coral reefs and about 1,000 different kinds of fish. Enditem
Sinha met Singh in New Delhi and discussed increased terror activities in the Valley and also the government's counter-terror plans to contain them.

New Delhi, Sep 26 (IANS) Lieutenant Governor of Jammu and Kashmir Manoj Sinha on Saturday appraised Indian Defence Minister Rajnath Singh about the prevailing law and order situation in the Valley.

Intelligence agencies have flagged that ahead of winter, Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence has planned to flood the Valley with weapons to create unrest in the valley and to do so, ISI has procured a sizable number of Hexacopters from a Chinese firm.

The agency said that the Chinese firm is associated with the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) on the pretext of protecting China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) assets.

Sources said that due to the strong anti-infiltration grid established by India's security forces, Pakistan is unable to push neither terrorists nor weapons to increase violence levels in the Valley.

"Pakistan's ISI has been given an ultimatum to push in maximum infiltrators along with weapons into Kashmir before the onset of winter, when the undergrowth/bushes in most infiltration prone areas will die down due to dew and snowfall," the source said.

It was further stated that the ISI has reportedly analysed the rules of engagement followed by Indian Security forces that they do not fire when an intruder along the Line of Control is seen without a weapon.

"Therefore, this modus operandi to infiltrate terrorists without weapons and sending weapons separately by drones or other means has been instituted to reduce the risk of terrorists getting eliminated at the Line of Control itself," the source said

Pakistan has been carrying out incessant ceasefire violations at Line of Control. Till July this year, a total of 2,662 ceasefire violation cases were reported in the Valley.

Last year, 3,168 ceasefire violations were reported. In 2018, the figure of ceasefire violations was 1,629. This year till July, a total 120 terror-related cases have been reported and last year during the same period - between January and July -- a total 188 cases were reported.

Similarly, this year till July, 35 security personnel lost their lives in the line of duty and last year during the same period 75 security personnel had lost their lives fighting terrorists.

--IANS

sk/ash
By PTI

NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday pitched for full implementation of a constitutional provision by the new Sri Lankan government to ensure devolution of powers to the minority Tamil community even as he announced a USD 15 million grant to the island nation for promotion of bilateral Buddhist ties.

The issue of Tamil reconciliation process figured prominently at a virtual summit between Modi and Sri Lankan Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa who assumed charge of the top post last month for a fresh tenure after his party secured a two-thirds majority in the parliamentary polls.

In the talks that lasted for about an hour, the two sides deliberated on ways to further boost maritime security cooperation, strengthen trade and investment ties and implementation of the East Container Terminal (ECT) project in Colombo port involving India and Japan.

On the Tamil issues, Prime Minister Modi emphasised that implementation of the 13th amendment to the Sri Lankan Constitution is essential for carrying forward the process of peace and reconciliation, Joint Secretary (Indian Ocean Region) at the Ministry of External Affairs Amit Narang said at a media briefing.

"Prime Minister Modi called on the new government in Sri Lanka to work towards realising the expectations of Tamils for equality, justice, peace and dignity within a united Sri Lanka by achieving reconciliation nurtured by implementation of the constitutional provisions," he said.

The 13th amendment provides for devolution of power to the Tamil community.

India has been pressing Sri Lanka to implement the 13th amendment which was brought in after the Indo-Sri Lankan agreement of 1987.

In the talks, India raised the issue of the ECT project in Colombo port as it was put on hold by the Sri Lankan government nearly a after a pact for its implementation was signed.

"Prime Minister Modi expressed confidence that the new government will take early and decisive steps for implementation of these projects," Narang said when asked about the project being implemented by India and Japan.

In the summit that lasted for about an hour, Modi also expressed his hope that the temporary restrictions imposed by the Sri Lankan side on the imports of some products will be relaxed soon since it will also benefit the economy and common people of the island nation.

In the talks, Modi announced a grant assistance of USD 15 million for the promotion of Buddhist ties between the two countries.

Elaborating on economic issues, Narang said technical negotiations on Sri Lanka's request for deferment of payment of debt to India and to grant an additional currency swap arrangement of around USD 1 billion is under discussion.

India has already provided Sri Lanka a USD 400 million currency swap facility to help it with economic recovery.

Narang said the two leaders also exchanged views on the fishermen issue, and agreed to continue and strengthen the ongoing "constructive and humanitarian" approach to address it under existing bilateral mechanisms.

"The discussions were held in a friendly, frank and cordial manner. The outcomes of the Summit are substantial, forward looking and also help to set an ambitious agenda for bilateral ties," he said.

Narang said the two leaders agreed to further strengthen cooperation in areas of maritime security, economy and trade, agriculture, animal husbandry, science and technology and health care.

He said the two prime ministers expressed satisfaction with the robustness of the security and defence cooperation between the two sides.

"They agreed to continue and further strengthen the mutual cooperation on personnel exchange and training, maritime security cooperation and India's support to Sri Lanka in the spheres of defence and security," he added.

In the talks, India's development partnership in Sri Lanka was discussed and both sides reached an understanding to extend a pact on High Impact Community Development Projects (HICDPs) for a five-year period beginning 2020.

"Both leaders agreed to continue the successful Indian housing project and gave instructions to the relevant officials to fast-track the construction of 10,000 houses in the plantation sector," Narang said.

In his opening remarks, Modi said he was confident that the massive electoral victory by the ruling party in Sri Lanka backed by Rajapaksa government's policies will facilitate deeper cooperation between the two countries.

Narang said Rajapaksa expressed his firm resolve to use the opportunity provided by the strong two-thirds majority achieved by his party-led alliance in the last month's elections to take India-Sri Lanka engagement to new heights.

It was Modi's first such virtual bilateral engagement with a leader of a neighbouring country.

For Rajapaksa, it was the first diplomatic engagement with a leader of a foreign country after he was sworn in as prime minister.

Narang said Rajapaksa made a special mention of the "excellent support" rendered by the Indian Coast Guard and Indian Navy to Sri Lanka in controlling a fire on board a ship carrying a crude oil cargo of 270,000 MT.

"Both leaders acknowledged the progress made in information sharing and cooperation in both counter-terrorism efforts and in dealing with regional drug trafficking," Narang said.

Modi and Rajapaksa also discussed the economic dimension of the challenges posed by COVID-19 and acknowledged the need for close coordination on issues such as trade and investment.

The Indian delegation at the talks included External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, National Security Advisor Ajit Doval and Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla.
Deepika Padukone

Mumbai: Bollywood actor Deepika Padukone reached the NCB office in south Mumbai on Saturday morning to record her statement in drugs probe linked to film star Sushant Singh Rajput's death, an official said.

Deepika arrived at the NCB guest house in Colaba, from where the central agency is operating, around 9.50 am.

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Sushant and Deepika

There is heavy police deployment outside the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) office, where barricades have been put up. Media personnel have gathered in large numbers for coverage.

Deepika has been summoned by the NCB as part of its probe into the alleged Bollywood-drugs nexus.

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There were reports that Deepika's husband and actor Ranveer Singh had asked the NCB if he could also remain present during her interrogation. However, the NCB had on Friday clarified that it did not receive any such request.

Deepika PadukoneTwo other Bollywood actresses- Shraddha Kapoor and Sara Ali Khan- are also set to appear before the probe agency on Saturday.

Deepika's manager Karishma Prakash, who was questioned by the team on Friday, has also been asked to remain present for further questioning on Saturday, another official said.

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Prakash's WhatsApp chats included conversations about drugs with one 'D' and the central agency wanted to find out who this person was.
The Committee for Public Education (CFPE) calls on all educators and education staff to defend historian Dr Joseph Scalice from attacks by the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP).

Scalices lecture, First as Tragedy, Second as Farce: Marcos, Duterte and the Communist Parties of the Philippines, delivered on August 26 at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, courageously exposed the historical and criminal record of Maoism and Stalinism in the Philippines.

Dr. Joseph Scalice

The CPP and earlier Stalinist parties utilised the Stalinist and Maoist two-stage theory to justify the deadly suppression of the working class and its subordination to the national bourgeoisie. This took the form of assisting the coming to power and then supporting the reactionary regimes of Presidents Ferdinand Marcos, Corazon Aquino, and most recently the fascistic Rodrigo Duterte.

Joseph Scalice at a teachers strike in Oakland, 2019, where he worked as a high school teacher

Scalices lecture has educated ordinary people in the Philippines and across the globe on Leon Trotskys program of Permanent Revolution, which calls for the complete political independence of the working class from all capitalist parties.

In response to Scalices exposure, the CPPs founder, Jose Maria Sison, has issued a barrage of falsifications, slanders and implicit threats of physical violence against him. These are the tactics of Stalinists, who cannot answer political exposures from the left and so resort to lies and intimidation.

Sison is attempting to re-write the historical record to suit the CPPs current political aims of supporting yet another Washington-backed regime-change in the Philippines. After supporting Dutertes rise to power, Sison is now calling for patriotic and pro-US sections of the military to back Vice President Leni Robredo.

In doing so, Sison is attacking the right and obligation of all historians and academics to research, document and publish the historical and political truth.

The defence of Scalice and academic freedom is inseparably connected to the broader issues facing educators. In Australia and internationally, university staff are being laid off in the thousands, while school teachers are being imperiled by COVID-19 infection, as part of the pro-business drive to reopen schools and workplaces. Academic freedom is under attack, as governments seek to subordinate educational institutions ever more directly to the dictates of the corporations and the military.

It is therefore critical that students, teachers, academics and workers study the political and historical lessons drawn by Scalice, circulate his lecture widely, and call on defenders of free speech and academic freedom to speak out in his defence.
A new report says that it is possible that Google will cancel the Clearly White colour variant of the phone altogether, which means that the Pixel 4a 5G will be available in a single colour variant.

Google will be hosting a special event on September 30 wherein the company is expected to launch the Pixel 5 5G and Pixel 4a 5G smartphones. Now, word is that Pixel 5 5G smartphone will not be arriving on September 30. Instead, the phone will be arriving in October.

As per a report by noted tipster Jon Prosser, the Pixel 5 5G will be available for pre-order on September 30 and it will be up for sales starting October 15. It will be available in Just Black and Subtle Sage colour variants.

Coming to the 5G variant of the Pixel 4a smartphone, the tipster says that the Just Black colour variant of the phone will also be available on pre-orders starting September 30. However, it will go on sale on November 19. And far the Clearly White variant of the Pixel 4a 5G is concerned, the availability of this variant has been delayed until 2021. The tipster also says that it is possible that Google will cancel the Clearly White colour variant of the phone altogether, which means that the Pixel 4a 5G will be available in a single colour variant.

Pixel 5 5G

(Just Black & Subtle Sage)

- Preorder: Sep 30

- Launch: October 15



They made an oopsie with the 4a 



Pixel 4a 5G (Just Black)

- Preorder: Sep 30

- Launch: Nov 19



Pixel 4a 5G (Clearly White)

- Delayed to 2021 

(Will most likely be canceled altogether) pic.twitter.com/Qh4L0TZ3Ry  Jon Prosser (@jon_prosser) September 25, 2020

As far as specifications are concerned, the Pixel 5 5G is expected to get a 6-inch OLED display with a 90Hz refresh rate. It is likely to be powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 765G processor with the X52 model for 5G connectivity along with 8GB of RAM and 128GB built-in storage. It is tipped to get a 16-megapixel camera and a 12-megapixel camera at the back and a 8-megapixel selfie camera in the front.

On the battery front, it is likely to run on a 4,080mAh battery that is coupled with 18W USB Type-C fast charging.
More than half of Suga Yoshihide's cabinet ministers were part of an Abe government -- a reflection of the new leader's intentions to continue his predecessor's policies.

Aso Taro will stay on as Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister. He has been in the position for more than seven years.

Kato Katsunobu takes over for Suga as Chief Cabinet Secretary -- leaving the post of Health Minister.

Motegi Toshimitsu will continue as foreign minister. Motegi was leading trade talks with the US and Britain.

Abe's younger brother Kishi Nobuo will take on his first cabinet post, as Defense Minister.

Takeda Ryota will oversee the telecommunications and broadcasting industries.

Kamikawa Yoko becomes Justice Minister.

Hagiuda Koichi retains his post as Education Minister.

Tamura Norihisa returns to cabinet to become Health Minister, a post he held under a previous Abe administration.

Nogami Kotaro is the new Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Minister.

Kajiyama Hiroshi retains his portfolio as the trade and industry minister.

Akaba Kazuyoshi, from the LDP's junior coalition partner Komeito, remains Infrastructure Minister.

Environment Minister Koizumi Shinjiro will continue his role.

Hirasawa Katsuei becomes the Reconstruction Minister.

Okonogi Hachiro will oversee the national police watchdog group.

Sakamoto Tetsushi is the Minister for All Citizens' Active Engagement.

Hirai Takuya will take on one of Suga's prioritized policies, the government's digitalization.

Nishimura Yasutoshi will continue overseeing Japan's coronavirus measures, to balance those efforts with the revitalization of the economy.

Kono Taro will shift to a new role in cabinet -- Administrative Reform Minister. Suga has emphasized the importance of work to create a more efficient government.

Hashimoto Seiko retains her position, taking charge of the postponed 2020 Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Inoue Shinji will take a new post in charge of the World Expo, to be held in Osaka in 2025.
Boris Johnson praised the dedication, courage and compassion shown by the recipients, who will be honoured along with people recognised for a broad range of achievements.

The list was due to be published in June but was pushed back to enable nominations for people playing crucial roles during the first months of the pandemic.

Mr Johnson asked in May for nominations of those who have gone over and above in their response to Covid-19.

The list, to be published on October 10, will include doctors, nurses, fundraisers and volunteers who stepped up amid the crisis.

Mr Johnson said: As we all redouble our efforts to control the virus, protect the NHS and save lives this winter, I am pleased we have an opportunity to recognise those who have given so much to this country already.

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The coronavirus pandemic is the greatest health challenge in our lifetime.

We all have to play our part, but the dedication, courage and compassion seen from these recipients, be it responding on the front line or out in their communities providing support to the most vulnerable, is an inspiration to us all.

We owe them a debt of gratitude and the 2020 Queens Birthday honours will be the first of many occasions where we can thank them as a nation.

Captain Sir Tom Moore was knighted by the Queen for his fundraising efforts during a unique open-air ceremony at Windsor Castle in July.
Patna, Sep 26 : As the Election Commission announced the dates for the Bihar assembly elections, it seems to be a direct fight between the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and the RJD-led Opposition Grand Alliance (Mahagathbandhan). However, in these elections several rookie parties and groupings will also be in the political fray.

One such grouping is the Left which had to be content with very few seats in the previous elections. Many other outfits will also come before the voters after having fought previous elections in alliance with other parties. These include the Vikassheel Insaan Party (VIP), Janata Dal (Rashtrawadi), Jantantrik Vikas Party (JVP) and others.

Former MP Pappu Yadav's Jan Adhikar Party (JAP) has announced it will contest on 150 seats. It is no secret that Yadav, a former RJD leader, has carved his own political space in many regions of Bihar. Speculation is rife that he will benefit from the hard work done in the last five years in some regions.

Pappu Yadav said Bihar is frustrated with the ruling party and the Opposition and was looking for an alternative political narrative offered by him.

JVP Chief Anil Kumar has also announced he will field party candidates on 150 seats. The party is considered strong in Buxar, Bhojpur and Rohtas districts.

Kumar said the development which has been claimed to have been done in Bihar has been exposed during the ongoing corona pandemic and such fake development promises were known to the people.

Former MP Ranjan Yadav, who has worked with RJD President Lalu Prasad Yadav in the past, is also in the electoral fray contesting on a Janata Dal (Rashtrawadi) ticket in these elections. Party workers showed their strength on Friday, taking to the streets in protest against the Farm Bills passed by Parliament.

Janata Dal (Rashtrawadi) Convenor Ashfaq Rahman said his party is contesting as a constituent of the Union Democratic Alliance (UDA) which gives people an alternative political choice.

The performance of the Left-centric parties is also not considered to be better in Bihar. In the last elections, the Left parties had to be content with only three seats. However, in this election the Left is set to enter the political arena aligning with the Opposition Grand Alliance.
Farmers protest with human skull, Delhi-Noida road blocked l Latest updates

Farmers intensified their protests across the country on Friday. Several roads were blocked by the protesting farmers. Farmers in Uttar Pradesh occupied the streets and several political parties joined the protests. Congress workers, AAP, Samajwadi Party workers joined protesting farmers. Delhi-Noida border was blocked due to the protest. Farmers in Tamil Nadu's Trichy were seen protesting with skulls and chains. Farmers sat outside the collector's office. Protest intensified in Punjab as farmers gathered in large numbers. Shiromani Akali Dal president Sukhbir Singh Badal, along with Harsimrat Kaur Badal, was seen holding a tractor rally. Watch the full video for more details. ...read more
President Donald Trump gestures to the crowd after speaking during a campaign rally at the Harrisburg airport on Saturday. Read more

MIDDLETOWN, Pa.  Hours after naming Judge Amy Coney Barrett as his choice to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the U.S. Supreme Court, President Donald Trump reminded hundreds of supporters at a Pennsylvania rally that he won the state four years ago and vowed to win by a lot more" in November.

The only way they can win Pennsylvania is to cheat on the ballots, thats the way I look at it, Trump said, renewing a claim hes often made, although election experts say evidence of voter fraud is exceedingly rare.

Speaking to a crowd filling a hangar outside the Harrisburg International Airport, Trump spent barely a minute savoring the opportunity to nominate a third Supreme Court justice in his first term, a nomination likely to sail through the Republican-controlled Senate. He called Barrett a brilliant legal mind and extraordinary scholar and told the crowd she will defend your God-given rights and freedom.

By contrast, he said, "the far left will pack the Supreme Court with radicals who would overturn the Second Amendment, strike the words under God from the Pledge of Allegiance, protect sanctuary cities, and declare the death penalty unconstitutional.

We will save your Second Amendment and together we will save our country, Trump said to cheers.

As a light rain fell, the president then fell during the nearly 80-minute appearance into a routine script of themes, complaints, and attacks  including criticism of Bill and Hillary Clinton, FBI agents, President Barack Obama, and U.S. Reps. Adam Schiff and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

He also repeated the false assertion that Joe Biden, the Democratic nominee, has vowed to ban fracking  thats not good for Pennsylvania  and claimed Biden would cut Social Security and institute socialized medicine.

Trump also warned that a Biden presidency would bring a massive tax increase, increased interest rates, and the countrys worst-ever economic depression.

We will crush the virus; our opponents will crush America, he said.

 READ MORE: Fact-checking Trumps claim that Biden would immediately eliminate fracking and mining in Pa.

The rally, just over five weeks from Election Day, comes four days after Trump made a campaign stop in Pittsburgh. Hes increased his visits to Pennsylvania, a critical state he won by just 44,000 votes four years ago and where, despite his predictions, the Republican president has consistently trailed Biden in polls this year. The two are scheduled to meet Tuesday night in the first presidential debate.

Gov. Tom Wolf had urged the president to cancel the event, citing public health concerns associated with the spread of the coronavirus.

Wolf, a Democrat whose attempts to restrict the size of outdoor gatherings was ruled unconstitutional this month by a federal judge in Pennsylvania, said holding the campaign event was misguided and dangerous, and asked Trump to put the health of his constituents ahead of his own political fortunes. In July, Wolf ordered people to wear face masks in all public places where people cannot stay reasonably apart.

Trumps campaign said all attendees would have their temperatures checked, be provided face masks, and be encouraged to wear them. Some wore them, others did not. The riser behind the president was filled with supporters wearing red and blue MAGA face masks.

The rally also comes at the end of a week in which Trump took the extraordinary stance of refusing to commit to a peaceful transfer of power should he lose the election. He continued to make baseless claims that the election would be rigged because of an increase in the use of mail ballots during the pandemic. Trump this week also seized on a news release from the Justice Department that said prosecutors were investigating the handling of a handful of mail ballots  including some cast for him  in Luzerne County, Pa.

FBI Director Christopher Wray told Congress on Thursday that the U.S. has not seen historically any kind of coordinated national voter fraud effort in a major election, whether its by mail or otherwise.

Still, Trump returned to the topic Saturday night, telling his supporters: Get out there and vote. And keep your eyes open if you see any shenanigans, which you probably will.

He also revisited his law-and-order platform, accusing Biden of surrendering the Democratic Party to flag burners and rioters and warned of a war on cops. A police union official then took the stage with the president and thanked Trump, saying: You, sir, have never turned your back on us.

The crowd erupted in chants of Back the Blue.

That theme was one that appealed to Tristin Goode, a financial analyst who drove to the rally with friends from her home in Somerset County, N.J.

We need law and order; we cant have this anarchy, Goode said.

Trump, she said, "cares about this country. He gave up a billionaire lifestyle with a supermodel wife because he saw this country needed to be saved.

Goode was among hundreds who came early to the event, packing the hangar to get seats close to the stage and watch a big screen that broadcast Trumps Supreme Court announcement from the White House Rose Garden.

Evelyn Conahan, 74, said she was thrilled by Trumps selection of Barrett.

I know shes conservative. She values life, said Conahan, a retired insurance salesperson from Hanover Township, Luzerne County. Conahan and her friend, Suzanne Gillis, a retired nurse, both wore face masks bearing Trump campaign logos.

He just wants whats best for our country, Conahan said of the president. I pray for him every night. Hes being attacked from all sides.
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Mumbai: Bollywood director Vishal Bhardwaj has rubbished claims that the Indian film industry has a toxic working culture or an insider-outsider divide, saying some people having vested interest are trying to malign its image.

Bhardwaj says he believes that people in the industry are always there to support each other and for somebody like him, who doesnt belong to any film family, it has been a cherishable experience. The death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput has triggered a lot of debates including one of outsider v/s insider, with many targeting the showbiz for ill-treatment of people who dont have any links within the industry. There is also a talk about the alleged drug-nexus.

Rajput was found dead at his Bandra residence here on June 14. During a virtual press conference of Screenwriters Association (SWA) Awards on Friday, Bhardwaj in response to a question posed by .
Guy Maine has been the CEO of BidEnergy Limited (ASX:BID) since 2018, and this article will examine the executive's compensation with respect to the overall performance of the company. This analysis will also look to assess whether the CEO is appropriately paid, considering recent earnings growth and investor returns for BidEnergy.

Check out our latest analysis for BidEnergy

How Does Total Compensation For Guy Maine Compare With Other Companies In The Industry?

According to our data, BidEnergy Limited has a market capitalization of AU$128m, and paid its CEO total annual compensation worth AU$650k over the year to June 2020. Notably, that's an increase of 33% over the year before. While we always look at total compensation first, our analysis shows that the salary component is less, at AU$300k.

For comparison, other companies in the industry with market capitalizations below AU$278m, reported a median total CEO compensation of AU$339k. This suggests that Guy Maine is paid more than the median for the industry. Moreover, Guy Maine also holds AU$183k worth of BidEnergy stock directly under their own name.

Component 2020 2019 Proportion (2020) Salary AU$300k AU$275k 46% Other AU$350k AU$215k 54% Total Compensation AU$650k AU$490k 100%

On an industry level, roughly 61% of total compensation represents salary and 39% is other remuneration. BidEnergy sets aside a smaller share of compensation for salary, in comparison to the overall industry. If total compensation is slanted towards non-salary benefits, it indicates that CEO pay is linked to company performance.

BidEnergy Limited's Growth

BidEnergy Limited's earnings per share (EPS) grew 26% per year over the last three years. Its revenue is up 77% over the last year.

Overall this is a positive result for shareholders, showing that the company has improved in recent years. It's great to see that revenue growth is strong, too. These metrics suggest the business is growing strongly. Moving away from current form for a second, it could be important to check this free visual depiction of what analysts expect for the future.

Story continues

Has BidEnergy Limited Been A Good Investment?

Most shareholders would probably be pleased with BidEnergy Limited for providing a total return of 548% over three years. So they may not be at all concerned if the CEO were to be paid more than is normal for companies around the same size.

In Summary...

As we touched on above, BidEnergy Limited is currently paying its CEO higher than the median pay for CEOs of companies belonging to the same industry and with similar market capitalizations. However, BidEnergy has produced strong EPS growth and shareholder returns over the last three years. So, in acknowledgment of the overall excellent performance, we believe CEO compensation is appropriate. And given most shareholders are probably very happy with recent returns, they might even think that Guy deserves a raise!

While it is important to pay attention to CEO remuneration, investors should also consider other elements of the business. That's why we did some digging and identified 3 warning signs for BidEnergy that investors should think about before committing capital to this stock.

Arguably, business quality is much more important than CEO compensation levels. So check out this free list of interesting companies that have HIGH return on equity and low debt.

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.



Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com.
New Delhi: India has once again provided financial assistance of 1.54 billion Nepalese rupees (about 96 crore Indian rupees) to its neighbour and friend Nepal. Even though Nepal is carrying out anti-India measures in China's provocation, Ms Namgyal Khampa, deputy head of Nepal mission at the Indian Embassy in Kathmandu, handed over the money released by the Government of India to the Secretary, Nepal Finance Ministry, Shishir Kumar Dhuna.

The financial assistance is given for the reconstruction of houses and schools devastated due to earthquake in Nuwakot and Gorkha districts of Nepal. It may be noted that more than nine thousand people died and about 8,000 houses were destroyed in the Nepal earthquake in April 2015. The Government of India had announced a grant of 1.5 billion dollars to Nepal to rebuild the destroyed houses and school buildings in the earthquake-affected Nuwakot and Gorkha districts.

India has sent assistance to the Government of Nepal. Under this, India has so far given 72 million dollars to Nepal. For rehabilitation of earthquake victims, MOU of $100 million grant was signed in February 2016 between India and Nepal for construction of 50,000 private houses in Nuwakot and Gorkha districts. In collaboration with the Government of India, 92% of the housing scheme being run in Nuwakot and Gorkha districts has been completed.

Fiscal deficit ceiling increases at Bill gets approved

Government of Karnataka passes this resolution regarding laborers

India lashes out at UN over these topics of discussions
An employee who worked at the Mesa Grande Taqueria restaurant in Auburn on Sunday, Sept. 20, has tested positive for the coronavirus, according to Cayuga County officials.

The employee worked from 10:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the restaurant at 100 Genesee St., Auburn.

Anyone who was at the restaurant during that time should monitor for Covid-19 symptoms for 14 days from the date of exposure. That means the monitoring period lasts through Oct. 4.

The Auburn restaurant will be closed until 11 a.m. Monday, the restaurant posted on its Facebook page:

We received news late yesterday evening that one of our staff members had a positive Covid-19 test, the post read. Due to concerns for our staff and customers' safety, we will be closed this weekend until we receive further information from the NYS Health Department. We would like to let everyone know that this employee was not in any contact with customers or food items while they were here.

Symptoms may appear two to 14 days after exposure to the virus, health officials said. Symptoms include:

 Fever or chills

 Cough

 Shortness of breath or difficulty breathing

 Fatigue

 Muscle or body aches

 Headache

 New loss of taste or smell

 Sore throat

 Congestion or runny nose

 Nausea or vomiting

 Diarrhea

Got a story idea or news tip youd like to share? Please contact me through email, Twitter, Facebook or at 315-470-2274.
Bihar Assembly Elections 2020: Sanjay Raut says issues from Mumbai can be made 'parcel' to Bihar

India

oi-Ajay Joseph Raj P

Mumbai, Sep 26: A day after the Election Commission of India announced Bihar elections to be held in three phases, Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut said if Bihar does not have enough issues, Mumbai can parcel some. Raut's jibe came in the backdrop of allegations that the death of Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput is being used as an election issue in Bihar.

"Elections in Bihar should be fought on the issues of development, law and order, and good governance, but if these issues have exhausted, then issues from Mumbai can be sent as parcel," the Shiv Sena leader said.

Bihar Assembly Elections 2020: 30.9 per cent prefer Nitish as CM

Bihar and Maharashtra police locked horns over the investigation into the death of Rajput who was found dead on June 14 at his Mumbai residence. Former Bihar DGP Gupteshwar Pandey accused Maharashtra Police of not co-operating with them. It is also being speculated that Pandey may join politics after he took a VRS.

Raut also hinted that the Shiv Sena may contest in the Bihar polls. "Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray will take a call on Shiv Sena contesting the Bihar elections in coming 2-3 days. The election in Bihar is held on caste and other things. Labour laws or farmers bills will not be an issue in Bihar elections," he said on Friday.

Deepika Padukone questioned in drug probe | India tears into Pakistan | Oneindia News

The Shiv Sena leader has been made a party in the case pertaining to the demolition of Bollywood actor Kangana Ranaut's office.

The MP has recently criticised the questioning of several Bollywood personalities by the Narcotics Control of Bureau in a drug case related to Sushant Singh Rajput's death.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Saturday, September 26, 2020, 12:31 [IST]
SHOTLIST MINSK, BELARUSSEPTEMBER 26, 2020SOURCE: TUT.BYRESTRICTIONS: NO RESALE - FOR EDITORIAL USE ONLYLOGO MUST REMAIN VISIBLE / MANDATORY ON-SCREEN CREDITNO CROPPING OR ZOOMING 1. Tracking shot police detaining prominent veteran activist Nina Baginskaya, people around saying: "what are you doing?"2. Tracking shot arrest of Nina Baginskaya from another axe. She was saying "do not touch me"People around saying "what are you doing?"3. Wide shot women marching4. Wide shot women marching and chanting: "President is Sveta"5. Wide shot women marching and chanting: "Live for Belarus" ///-----------------------------------------------------------AFP TEXT STORY: Ukraine president warns Belarus could face violent fate =(Picture+Video)= Bratislava, Sept 24, 2020 (AFP) - The crisis in Belarus could turn violent as it did in Ukraine unless the government there opens a dialogue with its own people, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned on Thursday.Speaking during a visit to Slovakia, Zelensky compared the situation in Belarus to the mass protests in Ukraine in 2013 and 2014 that ended up toppling a Russia-backed president."If the government fails to find a possibility to lead a dialogue with their own people, this government will not exist anymore," he told journalists after talks with Slovak President Zuzana Caputova in the capital Bratislava."We know what bloodshed is. We buried Ukrainians killed on Maidan, we saw people and buildings burning," he said, referring to the momentous protests on Independence Square in Kiev."What we see today is if the government does not stop these actions, especially the actions of law enforcement bodies directed against its nation, it will receive a very powerful response from the people," Zelensky said.Zelensky's spokeswoman Yuliya Mendel told AFP also on Thursday that a presidential visit to Belarus scheduled for October had been cancelled.Belarus, a former Soviet republic like Ukraine, has been rocked by unprecedented mass protests against President Alexander Lukashenko ever since his disputed re-election on August 9.Lukashenko, who has been in power for 26 years, has become increasingly reliant on Russian support as the demonstrations have continued.Ukraine joined many other countries on Wednesday in saying it did not recognise Lukashenko as the legitimate president of Belarus following his secrecy-shrouded inauguration ceremony.juh/dt/har
Hundreds of doctors, nurses and other heroes in the battle against coronavirus will be recognised in a bumper honours list to be published next month.

People who have made outstanding contributions in the UKs response to the virus will be rewarded in a special Queens Birthday Honours List on October 10.

Boris Johnson announced earlier this year that the Birthday Honours, normally released in June, would be put back to allow time to say thank you for the work of those on the frontline against the pandemic.

People who have made outstanding contributions in the UKs response to the virus will be rewarded in a special Queens Birthday Honours List on October 10. Pictured: Doctors, nurses and NHS staff clap outside the William Harvey Hospital in Ashford, Kent

Downing Street said yesterday that following approval from the Queen, the Covid heroes would be honoured next month in a bumper honours list which will also include recipients chosen before the pandemic for a broad range of achievements.

As the list would be the first to include Covid-19 nominations during the ongoing pandemic, it will prioritise frontline and community heroes, No 10 said.

They added that these recipients  like centenarian Captain Sir Tom Moore who has already been knighted for his inspiring fundraising  would be outstanding examples of contributions still being made right across the UK.

Downing Street said yesterday that following approval from the Queen, the Covid heroes would be honoured next month in a bumper honours list

The Prime Minister said: As we all redouble our efforts to control the virus, protect the NHS and save lives this winter, I am pleased that we have an opportunity to recognise those who have given so much to this country already.

The coronavirus pandemic is the greatest health challenge in our lifetime.

We all have to play our part, but the dedication, courage and compassion seen from these recipients, be it responding on the frontline or out in their communities providing support to the most vulnerable, is an inspiration to us all.

We owe them a debt of gratitude and the 2020 Queens Birthday honours will be the first of many occasions where we can thank them as a nation.

In The Mail on Sunday last week, former Conservative Party Deputy Chairman Lord Ashcroft suggested that NHS staff generally should be honoured with a collective award of the George Cross for their Covid heroics, just as the island of Malta was durig the Second World War for resisting Nazi aggression.

They added that these recipients  like centenarian Captain Sir Tom Moore who has already been knighted for his inspiring fundraising  would be outstanding examples of contributions still being made right across the UK

It comes at a time when Tory MPs  and even Boris Johnson's own Chancellor  are in revolt over the economic devastation caused by Covid laws, as mutterings grow louder about the state of the Prime Ministers mental, physical and financial health.

Sir Graham Brady, chairman of the backbench 1922 Committee, has led the opposition to Ministers ruling by decree over Covid regulations, while Chancellor Rishi Sunak is making increasingly muscular objections from within the Cabinet to the restrictions.

In the run-up to his decision last week to impose a 10pm curfew on pubs and restaurants, Mr Johnson was forced to mediate between Mr Sunak, who fears the restrictions are causing irreparable damage to the economy, and the pro-lockdown lobby led by Health Secretary Matt Hancock and Cabinet Office Minister Michael Gove.

At a Covid quad meeting on Friday, September 18  Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab is the other member  Mr Sunak effectively blocked Mr Johnson when he proposed a two-week circuit-breaking lockdown.

While No 10 and No 11 both deny the Chancellor implied that the issue was a resignation matter, his opposition was sufficient to force, at a subsequent meeting last Sunday, the idea of a 10pm curfew as a compromise measure.

When the issue was put to the full Cabinet on Tuesday, resistance flared again when Business Secretary Alok Sharma and Environment Secretary George Eustice suggested that it would be safer to taper the curfew with last orders at 10pm, rather than force everyone on to the streets at the same time.

But Mr Gove insisted that there should be a strict 10pm guillotine.

Tory MPs are in revolt over the economic devastation caused by Covid laws, as mutterings grow louder about the state of the Prime Ministers mental, physical and financial health

Complicating Mr Johnsons decisions are the different tribes of increasingly fearless Tory backbenchers, who  despite being unable to bitch and plot in now-shuttered Commons bars  are using private messaging sites to share their frustrations.

One tribe, which calls itself the Common Sense group, has held meetings with Chief Whip Mark Spencer to express anger at the control freakery exerted over the Prime Minister by scientific advisers such as Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty.

The 50-strong membership, which includes former Transport Minister Sir John Hayes and former Chancellor Lord Lamont, told No 10 that it was being too passive and reactive in the crisis.

As one former chief whip says: My advice to Boris and No 10 is to treat the views of the chairman of the 1922 Committee with at least the same level of respect as they accord to those of any scientist, medic or special adviser on this matter. They need to reverse-ferret as soon as possible.

The Common Sense group have also complained about the lack of legislation to tackle the problem of Channel migrants, and urged Ministers to be more anti-woke on issues such as the ban on Rule, Britannia! at the Last Night of the Proms and unconscious bias training. Some Tory MPs fear that the combination of political and personal problems could even lead to Mr Johnson quitting before the next election.

As one MP, who was alarmed by the pictures of Ms Symonds holidaying alone, says: Would even Churchill have been able to cope without Clementine?

Some MPs also make unsubstantiated claims that Ms Symonds, an environmental campaigner, interferes in the running of the country by marching into ministerial meetings to thrust Wilfred into his arms and being more interested in badgers than Brexit.

But her friends paint a picture of a young woman adapting to life in an intense public gaze, who needs to escape the pressures of No 10 by relaxing with trusted friends.

She was joined on her Italian holiday by feminist campaigner Nimco Ali, who has been at her side throughout her time in Downing Street, and Aline Nassif, a former colleague from Ms Symonds time working as a media adviser to John Whittingdale when he was Culture Secretary.

Ms Nassif is now the global head of communications for Bechtel, the American construction giant responsible for UK infrastructure projects such as Crossrail. One friend said: All of these whispering campaigns are just plain nasty. Carrie is a young woman and a relatively new mum. It seems to all be being done to upset Carrie, which in turn upsets Boris. Its baffling that anyone would do this to her.

They argue that becoming First Lady has been a shock to her. The friend added: She might have been involved in politics for some time but finding yourself in the limelight isnt easy for anyone.

This time two years ago nobody knew who she was. Being caught taking her holiday is something Carrie took on the chin but there is a certain mystery surrounding how she and her friends were found.

She clearly had no idea that there were any members of the paparazzi around. Women tend to do their hair if they know they will be seen.

After arriving home from Lake Como last Thursday, the couple spent Friday together in their No 10 flat, and were planning to spend this weekend together with Wilfred and dog Dilyn.

The friend concluded: She and Boris are very happy together. The only time theyre not really together is when he is off working as the Prime Minister.
New Delhi, Sep 26 : Jammu and Kashmir has got 21 new AYUSH Health and Wellness Centres to create a holistic wellness model aimed at reducing the disease burden and expenditure on healthcare of the intended beneficiaries.

The main focus of AYUSH interventions would be to empower the masses for "self-care" so as to prevent diseases through a healthy lifestyle, food, yoga, and medicinal plants.

Union Minister Jitendra Singh said that the AYUSH Health and Wellness Programme would not only provide services to the needy but also promote AYUSH at the international level.

Singh said this while laying the foundation stone of the Post-Harvest Management Centre for Medicinal Plants at Bhaderwah in J&K's Doda district, and launch of these 21 AYUSH centres in the Union Territory on Friday through video conference.

These 21 centres have been set up under the 'Ayushman Bharat' initiative.

Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for AYUSH Shripad Naik also attended the event.

The Post-Harvest Management Centre for Medicinal Plants would help develop the facilities for drying, sorting, processing, certification, packaging, and safe storage of raw herbal products cultivated and collected by local people so that its enhanced quality fetched a better price and augmented the income of farmers.

In his address, Naik said that the Post-Harvest Management Centre in Bhaderwah region was a long-pending demand of the area people and highlighted the huge potential of the region in the cultivation of many Himalayan medicinal plant species.

The Minister appreciated the effort of UT government officials in implementing a centrally-sponsored programme and stated that the government of India is according top priority to J&K for accelerating the pace of development.
OPINION: Our Sunday theme for letters is "I just had to laugh...," as a few letter writers were struck by the hilarity or inanity of headlines in the news. All that and more in our Sunday edition of Letters.
MIAMI (AP) - A daughter of Cuban exiles who has had a swift rise as a lawyer and judge is on President Donald Trump's short list to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the U.S. Supreme Court.

The president said Monday that he does not personally know Barbara Lagoa, but praised her as "terrific." Barely veiled was the fact that, as a Cuban-American from South Floridas city of Hialeah, her selection could benefit Trump in the Nov. 3 election, when Florida could be the ultimate kingmaker. Lagoa grew up in a heavily Hispanic suburb of Miami.

"Shes excellent. Shes Hispanic. Shes a terrific woman from everything I know. I dont know her. Florida. We love Florida. So shes got a lot of things - very smart," Trump said in a call-in interview with "Fox and Friends."

Asked whether politics would play a role in the decision, Trump responded: "I try not to say so. I think probably automatically it is. Even if youre not wanting to do that it becomes a little automatic."

Speaking to reporters at the White House later Monday, Trump said he might meet Lagoa when he travels to Florida on Thursday for a campaign rally in Jacksonville. "She has a lot of support," said Trump, who added he held calls on Sunday and Monday with some of the candidates he's considering. "I don't know her but I hear she is outstanding."

After the death Friday of 87-year-old Ginsburg, a liberal icon, Trump said he would name a woman as a replacement - possibly by Saturday. Trump said Monday he has about five top prospects.

U.S. Circuit Judge Barbara Lagoa, of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, is shown in this official undated photo released by the Florida Supreme Court. (AP Photo/Florida Supreme Court)

At 52, Lagoa would become the youngest member of the U.S. Supreme Court if nominated and confirmed.

Lagoa, an only child, once joked that after graduating from Florida International University leaving her close-knit Cuban-American family for New York to obtain her law degree from Columbia University "was not a popular decision in my house."

When she was picked for the Florida Supreme Court, Lagoa said her father gave up his dream of becoming a lawyer and that both her parents worked long hours while she rode her bike and roller skated down the streets of Hialeah where she was cared for by her grandmother.

"My parents sacrificed to send me to Catholic school further instilling in me an abiding faith in God that has grounded me and sustained me through the highs and lows of life," she said.

Lagoa is currently a judge on the Atlanta-based 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Trump appointed her to that post in 2019 and the Senate confirmed her on an 80-15 vote.

Before that, for less than a year she was a justice on the Florida Supreme Court after more than a decade on a Miami-based state appeals court where she wrote some 360 opinions. She was the first woman of Hispanic heritage on the state Supreme Court.

She's been in private practice, including work for Florida family members on the 2000 saga of the custody of Cuban rafter child Elian Gonzalez, which remains a hot-button issue in Miami to this day. Lagoa was also a federal prosecutor in Miami for a time.

A Lagoa nomination may impact voters in the suburb of Hialeah, a popular site for campaigns seeking to persuade undecided voters.

Last weekend, groups for Biden and Trump rallied Cuban-Americans with drive-by events waving flags in this bastion of working-class voters where precinct-level analysis suggest Trump was not as dominant among Cubans in 2016.

"It is extremely exciting to have a fellow first-generation Cuban-American from Hialeah," said Annette Collazo, also a daughter of exiles who is running as a Democrat for state representative in a district that includes Hialeah. "I temper that excitement with the reality. While diversity in background and views are extremely important, we also need diversity in judicial approach."

The process remains fluid, but as of Monday afternoon, conversations in the White House and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnells office were increasingly focused on two finalists: Amy Coney Barrett and Lagoa.

Coney Barrett emerged as the clear preference of a growing number of senators, largely because she is the much better-known of the two, having been through a grueling Senate confirmation process already and been embraced by the conservative base. Predictability is considered a crucial factor for the president and vulnerable senators so close to the election. Lagoa remains in the running, however, and those who know her well expect Trump to warm to her if and when they meet in person.

In her short tenure on the 11th Circuit, one controversial ruling in which she was among five Trump appointees in the majority was a 6-4 decision earlier this month that Florida felons had to not only complete their prison time but also pay any fines, fees and restitution.

There were calls from supporters of the original felon voting amendment for Lagoa and a fellow 11th Circuit Judge, Robert Luck, to recuse themselves from the case because they participated in a state Supreme Court case on the issue but neither did.

The decision upheld a state law passed by the Republican-led Legislature that critics say violates the spirit of a constitutional amendment overwhelming approved by Florida voters in 2018 that potentially would enfranchise tens of thousands of former felons without the monetary considerations.

Desmond Meade, who led the effort to pass the measure known as Amendment 4 , called the decision "a blow to democracy and to the hundreds of thousands of returning citizens across Florida."

When she was appointed to the state Supreme Court by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican Trump ally, Lagoa had this to say about the role of the courts:

"I am particularly mindful of the fact that under our constitutional system it is for the Legislature and not the courts to make the law. It is the role of judges to apply, not to alter, the work of the peoples representatives. And it is the role of judges to interpret our Constitution and statutes as they are written."

DeSantis said her credentials were "impeccable" and said Lagoa's background as the daughter of exiles who fled communist Cuba gave her a unique perspective on U.S. law. Lagoa was born in Miami in 1967 after her parents left Cuba.

"My parents, like many others, came to this country from Cuba to start rebuilding their lives in a land that offered them opportunity, but more importantly, freedom," she has said.

Lagoa is is also a member of the Federalist Society, a legal organization popular with conservatives. She is married to Miami lawyer Paul Huck Jr., whose father, Paul Huck Sr., is a senior judge on the Miami-based federal court. They have three daughters.

___

Anderson reported from St. Petersburg, Fla. Associated Press writers Steve Peoples in Montclair, N.J. and Jill Colvin in Washington contributed to this story.
The political friction between the U.S. and China over TikTok raises strategic questions for Japanese businesses that use the popular video-sharing app in advertising to young consumers.

High user engagement is among the platform's greatest strengths. Posts under a popular hashtag may draw over one hundred million views, and brands have seen success with "hashtag challenges" encouraging viewers to upload videos of themselves performing a particular task, tagged with a certain phrase.

But data security fears tied to Beijing plague the app in the U.S., with Washington threatening a ban. Chinese operator ByteDance recently agreed to hive off its international operations under a new subsidiary partly owned by Oracle and Walmart. Similar worries have arisen in Japan, and the ruling Liberal Democratic Party has discussed restrictions on Chinese apps, apparently with platforms like TikTok in mind.

Companies are responding in different ways. Coca-Cola (Japan), which had used the platform for marketing, stopped posting new content there in July after its American parent halted social media activity.

But Kao, a household goods manufacturer, said it continues to use TikTok after receiving assurances from the Japanese arm of ByteDance that it does not collect users' personal information.

Beverage maker Suntory Holdings will keep using the platform "for the time being while paying attention to various circumstances," a company representative said.

Cosmetics producer Shiseido, when asked about the potential for leaks of user information on TikTok, replied that it is "not in a position to comment." Sony, whose group companies post music and ads for anime on the platform, said it "cannot respond at this time."
The majestic California coastline of Big Sur is not the first place that comes to mind for the setting of a gruesome show about the underbelly of a mental asylum, but for Ratched co-creator and writer Evan Romansky, the postcard-worthy roads arent as serene as they may seem.

The landscape of Big Sur lends so much to the aesthetic of our show, says Romansky. It was great to be able to foreshadow twists and turns in the plot, along with the winding twisting roads of Big Sur. Youre traversing these nerve-racking roads, around every corner theres potential danger, just like the show.

Ratched, which rocketed to #1 on Netflix the weekend of its release, creates a new backstory for Mildred Ratched, the battleaxe of a mental health worker who lorded over the asylum in the book and subsequent film One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest. In the source material, the only biographical detail Romansky had to go on was her history as a military nurse. The blank slate of a character made it an appealing challenge for Romansky, who originally wrote the spec script while in grad school as a means to get an agent.

I loved the aspect that we didnt really know anything about her, other than she was an army nurse. As a writer, that was exciting, because I wasnt going to be retelling anything, I could totally create a backstory, he says.

The Netflix series envisions Ratched, played by Sarah Paulson, as an imposter expelled from the military. After a dishonorable discharge, she games her way into a job at a mental hospital in order to liberate her brother, who has been locked in the basement following a sadistic multiple homicide. Many more homicides follow, by means of both barbaric medical procedures and old-fashioned murder weapons.

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The natural wonder of California plays a large role in the series. Its just such a beautiful part of the country, we wanted to capitalize on that beauty and really showcase it, says Romansky. It makes a perfect backdrop for the hyper-stylized view of post-World War II aesthetics captured by director Ryan Murphy (American Horror Story). Theres a Mad Men-ish sense of haute fashion: Nurses are draped in tailored aquamarine outfits and the asylum itself looks more like an old Hollywood celebrity retreat rather than a hospital. Filmed at the Arrowhead Springs Hotel in San Bernadino, the setting actually served as the site of Elizabeth Taylors honeymoon with Conrad Hilton Jr. in 1950.

Netflix

Outside of the hospital, the characters spend much of their time at Big Sur fixture Lucia Lodge, a quaint collection of ten cabins built in the 1930s, perched just feet from the ocean. Although the interiors have been renovated, the facades remain largely unchanged. In the show, tense violent and sexual scenes take place inside the cabins, and the picturesque atmosphere makes them feel like a morose fairytale (the lodge itself is rumored to be haunted).

It's crazy. It looks fake on the show, like it does not look like it could ever be a real motel, says Romansky. It is absolutely stunning, it's probably one of the most beautiful places I've ever been to. It was the perfect, perfect find.

The Lucia Lodge in Big Sur has never before hosted a TV crew, since their rustic cottages are typically booked solid, and the agreement took months of coordination. In the show, the crotchety proprietor of the hotel rules it with an iron fist, which couldnt be more different from the actual owners.

They were a hundred-percent opposite of good old Louise on the show, says Romansky. They were the most warm and welcoming people ever. They were really great. I hope people check them out.

The shoot, which took place over three or four days in 2019, captured the attention of the small Big Sur community. A fleet of vintage period-specific cars parked out front drew neighborhood kids to the property. While there, they took advantage of snacks from the production companys catering car.

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It was a nice little treat for the kids. We have a nice little neighborhood of kids, and theres not usually too much going on here, laughs Lucia Lodge manager Jessie McKnight, who lives on-site.

Netflix

The lodge itself has had a rough few years. Between wildfires, landslides and the coronavirus, it has been forced to close repeatedly, and has just now reopened after the most recent fires.

On a normal year, were usually pretty full. But the last four years havent been normal for us, says McKnight. Currently theres a surprising amount of availability for the cabins, which range from around $200 to $450, but the show has certainly created an increase in email inquiries.

McKnight herself hasnt actually watched Ratched (its too disturbing for me), but recounts the elaborate lengths that the crew took to complement the scenery, including using a giant lamp to simulate a full moon during the nighttime shoots.

Although never featured in the show, the reputation of sexually liberated San Francisco hangs over the relationship between Nurse Ratched and her love interest, Gwendolyn Briggs, played by Emmy-winning co-star Cynthia Nixon (Sex and the City). Their romance parallels several hospital patients given horrific treatments for homosexual urges, with Ratcheds evolution resulting in some of her few moments of empathy towards her patients.

Under the lens of 2020, the characters' treatment of mental health is barbaric, and often harder to watch than the more traditional slasher scenes. The experimental procedures that take place at the institution, including lobotomies and hydrotherapy (essentially boiling patients alive), were accurate to the period. Rooting these treatments in reality makes them even more dreadful, especially when contrasted with the colorful costumes, like the pristine tailored suits of Dr. Richard Hanover, played by Jon Jon Briones ("The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story).

Netflix

The combination of the stylish and sinister, old Hollywood contrasted by old school torture, harks back to a vintage California thats as beautiful and troubled as it is today. The show can be excruciating to watch, and although some of the violence may make more sensitive viewers close their eyes, Romansky feels like Californias role is part of what makes the show so captivating.

We always wanted to give the audiences something to look at. Something as mundane as a car ride, a moment where its easy to look away and check your phone and potentially miss something, it suddenly becomes a must-watch for the scenery alone.

Dan Gentile is the culture editor at SFGATE. Email: Dan.Gentile@sfgate.com | Twitter: @Dannosphere
India on Saturday asked Sri Lanka to fully implement constitutional provisions aimed at giving more powers to Tamil-inhabited areas of the island nation even as Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a grant of $15 million for promoting Buddhist ties between the two sides.

Sri Lankas peace and reconciliation process figured in the first virtual bilateral summit between Modi and his Sri Lankan counterpart Mahinda Rajapaksa, which also focused on maritime security, countering the economic impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, and the development of the strategic Colombo East container terminal.

Modi called on Rajapaksas new government to work towards realising the expectations of Tamils for equality, justice, peace and dignity within a united Sri Lanka by achieving reconciliation nurtured by implementation of the constitutional provisions, according to a readout from the external affairs ministry.

He also emphasised that implementing the 13th amendment to the Sri Lankan Constitution is essential for carrying forward the process of peace and reconciliation, the readout said.

At a media briefing after the hour-long summit, joint secretary (Indian Ocean region) Amit Narang said India has always stood for peace and reconciliation, including through the full implementation of the 13th amendment to the Sri Lankan Constitution and this point was highlighted by the Indian prime minister.

The 13th amendment, an outcome of the 1987 India-Sri Lanka peace accord, is aimed at devolving more powers to the Tamil minority. Rajapaksa and his brother, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, have shied away from committing to full implementation of the amendment. They have also hinted they wont go against the wishes of the Sinhala majority while working on any resolution in Tamil-inhabited areas.

Modi announced a grant of $15 million for promoting Buddhist ties between the two sides. The grant will be used for construction and renovations of Buddhist monasteries, archaeological cooperation, reciprocal exhibitions of Lord Buddhas relics, and supporting the Buddhist clergy.

India will facilitate the visit of a delegation of Sri Lankan Buddhist pilgrims in the first inaugural flight to the sacred city of Kushinagar, which now has an international airport.

The contentious issue of the development of the Colombo East container terminal under a trilateral agreement signed by Sri Lanka, Japan and India in 2019 also figured in the talks, with Modi expressing confidence that the Sri Lankan government will take early and decisive steps for the early implementation of infrastructure and connectivity projects in line with existing understandings.

Narang described the discussions on this issue as positive and constructive, and said: Both sides remain committed to these ventures and are working towards ensuring their implementation for mutual benefit.

Last month, workers at Colombo port stopped work to protest what they described as the privatisation of the container terminal. They also sought a written pledge from the Sri Lankan president that the facility wouldnt be handed over to India. The agreement on the container terminal was signed by the previous government and the current administration has put it on hold.

This was Modis first virtual summit with the leader of a neighbouring country, and the Indian delegation included external affairs minister S Jaishankar, National Security Adviser Ajit Doval, foreign secretary Harsh Shringla. This was the Sri Lankan premiers first bilateral engagement with a foreign leader after the victory of his Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna party in parliamentary elections in August, and he was assisted by foreign minister Dinesh Gunawardena, fisheries minister Douglas Devananda and other ministers and senior officials.

The two sides agreed to extend an MoU on high impact community development projects by India for five years from 2020, and to continue the Indian housing project. The two leaders instructed officials to fast-track the construction of 10,000 houses in Sri Lankas plantation sector.

While discussing the economic impact of the pandemic, Modi and Rajapaksa underlined the need for close coordination on trade and investment and deepening the integration of supply chains. Modi expressed hope that Sri Lankas temporary restrictions on imports of some products will be relaxed soon.

India recently provided a $400-million currency swap facility to Sri Lankas Central Bank to tackle Covid-19-related disruptions, and an additional request for a bilateral currency swap of around $1 billion and the deferring of debt repayments were being discussed, Narang said. The Indian side also proposed a bilateral air travel bubble, he said, adding: We feel that early resumption of travel will assist in their economic recovery.

The two leaders also discussed security and defence cooperation and agreed to further strengthen cooperation on personnel exchanges and training, maritime security cooperation and Indias support to Sri Lanka in defence and security. The recent coordination by the armed forces of both sides in controlling the fire on the merchant vessel MT New Diamond, which was carrying a crude oil cargo of 270,000 MT, was acknowledged as an example of practical collaboration.
Nearly five dozen President Trump supporters gathered to protest a 'Coronavirus Death Scoreboard' sign that was installed in an Illinois park this month.

At least 50 pro-Trump demonstrators waved 'Make America Great Again' paraphernalia and the American flag as they protested along a roadway in the Chicago suburb of Northbrook.

According to Peter C., a high school student who organized the event, the turnout on Friday garnered more attention than initially thought.

'We were only anticipating 15 people coming,' Peter C. told Fox News. 'We got a lot more than 15.'

The energized crowd, filled with younger people and many with students from Peter's school, chanted 'Back the Blue' as cars sped by during rush hour.

A few dozen pro-Trump supporters gathered on Friday to protest a 'Coronavirus Death Scoreboard' that was installed last week

Pictured: Many people waved American flags and 'Make America Great Again' paraphernalia in response to critics

Just across the street stood the object of their ire and irritation: a sign placed in a public park that has been dubbed the 'Coronavirus Death Scoreboard.'

The Coronavirus Death Scoreboard debuted on September 18 at a local public park and displayed the number of COVID-19 deaths in America as it ticked past 200,000.

The sign read 'We're #1' and said 'Donald J. Trump, President,' at the bottom.

It was organized by local group Peaceful Communities and liberal activist Lee Goodman, who previously explained that the sign was meant to be a reminder of the countless lives lost in the pandemic.

'This display is a reminder of the continuing need to take precautions. Schools and businesses are reopening, but the disease is still spreading and people are still dying,' he told Patch.

A sign dubbed the 'Coronavirus Death Scoreboard' was installed in a public park in Northbrook last week by activist Lee Goodman and Peaceful Communities

Goodman told CNN that the Coronavirus Death Scoreboard had been vandalized five times in just six days after it was unveiled

'The U.S. has the highest number of COVID-19 deaths in the world. It is a tragedy and a disgrace that we have failed to do all we could to confront this public health crisis, and as a result, many people have died unnecessarily. But, we can do better in the future.

'We hope that public awareness will lead people to demand a more effective response by our federal government.'

Indeed, the United States has remained at the top of a grim list regarding COVID-19 cases and deaths throughout the pandemic.

The country just surpassed 203,000 deaths with a staggering 7million cases and counting.

Pictured: one pro-Trump protester holds a sign saying 'The Real News' and 'Trump 2020'

But supporters of Trump have perceived the Coronavirus Death Scoreboard as a visible and vocal slight against their candidate before the November 3 election.

The Coronavirus Death Scoreboard has since been vandalized, with Lee noting to CNN that he's surprised by the outrage.

'We've had vandalism before when we've put up displays, but I was shocked because we're all in this virus situation together,' he said. 'Frankly when we put it up, I didn't think anyone would pay any attention at all.'

The sign was vandalized five times in just six days. Much of the spray paint was used to cover Trump's name at the bottom.

Pictured: an event flyer for the Northbrook Trump Rally held on Friday

Peter C told Fox News that although the protest was done in part because of the sign, it also encompassed a range of embattled issues that underscored the political divide in the country.

'We're here to protest for the reopening of our schools, our education system, and the funding of our police,' said Peter.

He then alleged that 'You don't see the Republicans attacking other people' and cast blame solely on 'liberals' for 'attacking us, who are attacking our police.'

His comment comes after 17-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse was charged with first-degree murder in the killings of Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber.

The teenager had traveled to Kenosha on August 25 from his home in nearby Antioch, Illinois, in a self-appointed role to protect the streets of Kenosha where the police shooting of Jacob Blake had sparked unrest during protests.

According to prosecutors and court documents, Rittenhouse shot and killed 36-year-old Joseph Rosenbaum after Rosenbaum threw a plastic bag at Rittenhouse, missing him, and tried to wrestle his rifle away.

While trying to get away in the immediate aftermath, Rittenhouse was captured on cellphone video saying 'I just killed somebody.'

Huber was shot dead soon after and a third protester was wounded.

Kyle Rittenhouse, 17, is charged with shooting and killing two protesters and injuring a third on the streets of Kenosha on August 25 (right). The teen is pictured left with his mother

Rittenhouse is charged with first-degree intentional homicide in the killing of two protesters: Joseph Rosenbaum (left) and Anthony Huber (right)

At some point during the event, a small group of anti-Trump demonstrators arrived to counter protest.

Fox News reports that one person blasted that song FDT [F*** Donald Trump], while others chanted phrases like 'Black Lives Matter,' 'Loves Trumps Hate' and 'Super Callous Fragile Racist Sexist Lying POTUS,' in a Mary Poppins reference.

Richard and Florence, a couple from Northbrook, arrived to the pro-Trump demonstration because they found the sign 'defamatory' towards the president.

'Over 200,000 people have died. ... Every death loss is terrible, but it isn't the president's fault,' said Florence.

'They will not acknowledge that it came from Wuhan, China. They're not telling the truth.'

While the virus did originate in Wuhan, America's individual response and handling to COVID-19 fell largely on the Trump administration's shoulders.

Countries like New Zealand recorded their first confirmed case in February - one month after the United States - and have since been heralded as the gold standard for pandemic response.

Peter C.: 'We're here to protest for the reopening of our schools, our education system, and the funding of our police'

Under Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, New Zealand implemented a lockdown so severe that reclaiming a lost ball from a neighbor's yard was prohibited.

But the measures were successful at halting the virus' spread, and the country lifted its lockdown restrictions and declared itself virus-free on June 8.

Citizens there are now not required to social distance, and can visit bars, restaurants and public spaces freely again. As of Saturday, the country had amassed just over 1,800 cases and 25 deaths.

Meanwhile, the United States has continued to fumble its response.

This month, Trump admitted to downplaying the virus over fears people would 'panic' early on in the pandemic.

'I'm a cheerleader for this country. I love this country. I don't want people to be frightened. I don't want to create panic,' he told reporters at the White House.

'Certainly I'm not going to drive this country or the world into a frenzy. We want to show confidence. We want to show strength, we want to show strength as a nation. That's what I've done,' he added

'Leadership is about confidence. Confidence is confidence in our country,' he noted.

President Trump admitted this month that he downplayed the severity of the COVID-19 pandemic to avoid panicking citizens

He was criticized often throughout the pandemic for ignoring advice from public health experts, like Dr. Fauci, and encouraging a disregard for measures like face masks.

But protest attendees appeared to leverage their discontent at the anti-Trump protesters across the street and liberals in general.

'I think the liberals over there have a few people that have no answers,' Richard told Fox News.

'They've been sitting here now for the last hour swearing at us, giving us the finger, calling the president a racist. When I went over there to ask them how he's a racist, they have no answers. ... They just repeat what they hear on MSNBC, CNN, and all the liberal networks. ... They have a blind hatred for the president -- and no answers to why.'

Patch previously reported that the Northbrook Village Board discussed whether or not to remove the controversial signage, but ultimately voted that it would remain on the grounds of the First Amendment.

Northbrook resident: 'It is appalling that the Village would allow for such a sign to be displayed, especially because it has a clear political message. Take it down

On Friday, the pro-Trump rally was met with a small group of counter protesters but the event ended peacefully

Northbrook Village President Sandy Frum read emails during a meeting held Tuesday that summarized some locals anger.

'The sign needs to come down as soon as possible.' one resident wrote.

'It is appalling that the Village would allow for such a sign to be displayed, especially because it has a clear political message. Take it down.'

But other residents noted its importance in keeping awareness and vigilance up as the pandemic continued.

'As someone who is at high risk for COVID, I strongly support Lee Goodman's sign,' another local wrote.

'Quarantine fatigue is well-documented and is rampant in Northbrook. Glenbrook North is about to reopen and COVID-19 will be inevitably spreading as a result. The sign is a reminder of how important it is to wear a mask.'
The highest representative body of Turkmenistan - Khalk Maslakhaty (People's Council) - convened for a meeting in Ashgabat. Given the complex epidemiological situation in the world, the Khalk Maslakhaty participants from the regions of the country joined the meeting via videoconference.

The regular meeting of the People's Council of Turkmenistan chaired by President of Turkmenistan Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov brought together the speaker and members of the Mejlis, deputy chairmen of the Cabinet of Ministers, heads of ministries and specialized departments, members of public associations, elders, students and representatives of the mass media.

The Khalk Maslakhaty discussed key issues relating to Turkmenistans domestic and foreign policy, as well as ways for implementation of the long-term economic and social programmes. Issues relating to the constitutional reform were also in the focus of discussions.

As part of the Khalk Maslakhaty, the Mejlis of Turkmenistan convened for the eleventh meeting of the sixth convocation. The MPs reviewed the draft Constitutional Law On Changes and Amendments to the Constitution of Turkmenistan".

The MPs discussed in detail issues relating to the establishment of a new bicameral legislative body of the country, namely the National Council of Turkmenistan, and the forthcoming transition of Turkmenistans legislative body to the bicameral system. In this regard, the MPs discussed making relevant changes and amendments to the current laws of Turkmenistan.

The draft Constitutional Law On Changes and Amendments to the Constitution of Turkmenistan presented earlier to the regular meeting of the Mejlis of the fifth convocation was unanimously approved and adopted. The decision of the MPs on the draft Constitutional Law was announced by Speaker of the Mejlis of Turkmenistan Gulshat Mammedova at the continuing meeting of the Khalk Maslakhaty. Then, President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov signed the Constitutional Law On Changes and Amendments to the Constitution of Turkmenistan.

The Turkmen leader congratulated everyone on the adoption of the Constitutional Law "On Changes and Amendments to the Constitution of Turkmenistan that provides for establishing the bicameral structure of bodies performing legislative activities. The President instructed members of the government and the parliament, representatives of public associations and local authorities to work on the tasks arising from the Constitutional Law.

The Constitutional Law of Turkmenistan On Changes and Amendments to the Constitution of Turkmenistan comes into force on January 1, 2021. According to the Constitutional Law, the first elections of members of the Khalk Maslakhaty chamber of the National Council of Turkmenistan should be called by the President of Turkmenistan. In this regard, the head of state signed a decree on holding the elections of members of the Khalk Maslakhaty of the National Council of Turkmenistan, as well as conducting organizational work to operationalize this structure.

 TURKMENISTAN.RU, 2022
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BENGALURU: A day before the no-confidence motion, moved by the Opposition Congress, is expected to come up for discussion in the Assembly, Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa on Friday dismissed it saying he had no objection to it.They must move a no-confidence motion every six months so that I am safe for that much time, the CM said sarcastically when media persons asked him about the no-trust motion. The BJP had termed the Congress move as a political gimmick.

The BJP has 116 members in the 220-member House and the motion will not pose any threat to the government. It is being seen as an attempt by the Congress to get the CM to respond to charges on various issues including the governments failure to handle the Covid-19 situation.

The Congress had apparently not consulted the JDS over the no-confidence motion. On Friday, former CM and JDS leader H D Kumaraswamy said that as of Friday, the Congress had not consulted them and they will decide about it when the party approaches them. Hinting that the regional party is unlikely to support the motion, Kumaraswamy said every public representative needs to fulfil their responsibility.While moving the no-confidence motion, Opposition leader Siddaramaiah said they have lost confidence in the government.
Lebanon's prime minister-designate quit on Saturday after trying for almost a month to line up a non-partisan cabinet, failing despite French pressure on sectarian leaders to rally together to deal with the worst crisis since a 1975-1990 civil war.

Mustapha Adib, former ambassador to Berlin, was picked on Aug. 31 to form a cabinet.

He had tried to form a government of specialists in a nation where power is shared between Muslims and Christians and political loyalties tend to follow sectarian lines.

But his efforts ran into the sand over cabinet appointments, particularly the post of finance minister, who will have a crucial role in drawing up a programme to lift Lebanon out of a deep economic crisis.

Crushed by a mountain of debt, Lebanon's banks are paralysed and its currency is in freefall.

Talks with the International Monetary Fund on a vital bailout package stalled this year. The cabinet's first task would have been to restart negotiations.

Adib, a Sunni Muslim based on the sectarian system of power sharing, said he was stepping down from "the task of forming the government" after meeting President Michel Aoun, a Christian.

The cabinet formation hit a roadblock over a demand by Lebanon's two main Shi'ite groups, Amal and the heavily armed Iran-backed Hezbollah, that they name candidates for several posts including finance minister, a position previously held by a Shi'ite.

Adib held several meetings with senior Shi'ite politicians but failed to reach agreement on how the minister would be chosen. Shi'ite leaders feared being sidelined as Adib sought to shake up appointments to ministries, some of which have been controlled by the same faction for years, politicians said.

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Thajudeen murder: Case against ex-JMO concluded View(s):

While the Colombo High Court concluded the case against former Colombo Chief Judicial Medical Officer (JMO) Ananda Samarasekara for concealing evidence related to the murder of national rugby player Wasim Thajudeen, the case against another accused continues.

On Friday, High Court Judge Manjula Thilakaratne asserted that Prof. Samarasekera had passed away and closed further proceedings against him after considering the submission made by the Counsel appearing for the relatives of the former JMO.

However, the case continues against former Senior DIG (Western Province) Anura Senanayake, who is also accused of concealing evidence in relation to Mr. Thajudeens murder.
The Plainview Rotary Club met Tuesday the Plainview Independent School District Board Room. Those who couldnt make it watched via Zoom.

President Deana Sageser called the meeting to order. There were a few guests in attendance including our student of the month, Tiffany Gattis. The program for the day was presented by Rotarian Leslie Gattis and his daughter Tiffany. They are heading up a drive called Crutches 4 Africa. This is an effort that started in 2006 to collect old crutches, walkers, wheelchairs, baby joggers, baby bike trailers and other mobility devices.
Over the last six months, lawmakers in the Capitol have struggled to agree on a second large-scale stimulus package to help Americans survive the economic fallout of the pandemic. But after an initial swell of bipartisan sentiment to pass the CARES Act back in March, the two parties have remained far apart since then.

Both Republicans and Democrats agree that a stimulus needs to be passed, but the overall size and whether it should include a second round of $1,200 payments to qualifying individuals remain major points of tension.

The negotiators Nancy Pelosi for Democrats and Steven Mnuchin and Mitch McConnell on the Republican side have been at loggerheads on specifics of a significant second bill since June.

While Pelosi has dropped the $3.4tn overall spend proposed in the Democrats failed HEROES Act to $2.2tn, Mnuchin raised the White Houses offer from the $1tn in the HEALS Act - a bill proposed by GOP senators in July - to $1.9tn.

What is happening right now with stimulus bill talks?

The good news is that help is likely to come twice. The bad news is that it may still take a while for individuals to get those coveted $1,200 stimulus checks, if they come at all.

Since the election things have reached breaking point with a looming 11 December deadline for Congress to fund the government thus avoiding a shutdown. Theres hope of a smaller bill passing before Christmas during Donald Trumps lame duck session, then there are rumours that Joe Biden has something up his sleeve for January. Its unlikely that the pre-inauguration option will include a stimulus check for individuals at all.

Because the options are now split in two, well break it down.

New $908 billion bipartisan stimulus bill

A brand new bill put together by bipartisan moderates proposes spending much less generous than the Democrats would like, but significantly more than Republicans have been prepared to offer thus far.

The proposal was presented by a bipartisan group of moderate House and Senate members last week at a press conference. The bill amounts to a middle-ground option between McConnells current proposal and the Democrat House bill passed in October. The plan calls for $908 billion on a range of covid-19 relief measures.

During the presentation Mitt Romney, Republican of Utah said I happen to be a deficit hawk. I dont like borrowing money. I dont like spending money we dont have. But the time to borrow money is when there is a crisis. And this is a crisis.

Part of the bill provides for four months of additional unemployment benefits but in a compromise the top-up would be just $300 as opposed to the $600 Democrats were seeking. The bill also calls for state and local funding to the tune of $160 billion, which will pay for front line workers.

If the Senate fails to pass a vote on the $908bn bill on 10 December, the next possible date for a bill to be voted on would be in February.

However there is no provision in the bipartisan proposal for another $1200 stimulus check.

Senate Republican leaders quickly undercut the plan, offering up their own bare-bones proposal that stood little chance of passing through both chambers.

Second stimulus check: will Joe Biden save the day?

With prospects of a second stimulus check before Joe Biden is in the White House come 20 January waning, hopes are now being pinned on Joe Bidens plans in 2021 to bring much-needed help to individuals struggling through the coronavirus-induced economic crisis.

"If we don't act now, the future will be very bleak. Americans need help and they need it now. And they need more to come early next year," said Biden last week.

A government report on Friday showed the labour market slowing in November as the covid-19 pandemic eclipsed its levels of the spring. Some 179,124 new infections are reported each day, a record, and more than 276,000 Americans have died of the disease.

The president-elect said Friday's "grim" jobs report showed that economic recovery is stalling, urging Congress to pass a covid-19 relief bill immediately and follow up with "hundreds of billions of dollars" in more aid in January.

"Any package passed in the lame-duck session is not going to be enough overall. It's critical but it's just a start. Congress is going to need to act again in January," Biden told reporters in his hometown of Wilmington, Delaware.

"We're looking at hundreds of billions of dollars," he said.

So what do Republicans want?

So we know that Biden and many Democrats are in favour of a wider-reaching bill that includes checks send out to individuals who qualify, but what is it that the Republicans want exactly thats causing the deadlock? Something highly targeted, apparently.

Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who has proven to be one of the staunchest opponents to the HEROES Act, leads the Republican-held Senate, but perhaps not for long. The Democrats $2.2 trillion package is seen by McConnell as too far-reaching, so hes tabled his own.

McConnells skinny bill is a $500 billion package that includes support for small businesses and an extension of unemployment benefits but offers no further direct relief. Earlier this month, McConnell told reporters that he does not want another bill the size of the CARES Act: "I don't think the current situation demands a multitrillion-dollar package. So I think it should be highly targeted. His plan looks to be similar to the $500 billion McConnell has been pushing for months but that Democrats have long said is insufficient.

Upon retaining his seat in the Senate for Kentucky, McConnell was optimistic about the chances of another coronavirus relief bill before 2021: I think we need to do it and I think we need to do it before the end of the year.

Commentators believe that the reluctance on Republicans part to deliver a comprehensive package soon came off the back of news that several vaccines are unexpectedly highly effective.

Two birds, one stone with vaccine stimulus proposal

John Delaney, who was the House representative for Marylands sixth district between 2013 and 2019, is proposing paying Americans $1,500 in exchange for being vaccinated, in what he says is a "two birds, one stone" move that would help end the pandemic and alleviate the economic crisis it has created.

How badly does the US economy need stimulus?

A new report from the Economic Policy Institute recommends that Congress provide debt-financed fiscal support of $2 trillion between now and the middle of 2022, and then continue support on the order of $400 billion annually between then and the end of 2024, with a slow phaseout of this aid thereafter.

With millions of Americans unemployed directly owing to the coronavirus pandemic and the last trickles of enhanced unemployment benefits due to dry up come 26 December, Josh Bivens explains that this plan needs to first stop the economic bleeding and then repair the aspects that have been rotted away in order to rebuild a resilient economy.

Add to this the ticking time bomb of existing trickling benefits implemented by the CARES Act in March that are due to finally expire by 31 December 2020 and things start looking pretty desperate for a lot of Americans.
A TikTok star and mum of five has revealed shes been diagnosed with coronavirus while undergoing treatment for leukaemia.

Tia Bee Mele Stokes, from St George in Utah, was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukaemia in April and has become an online sensation for filming herself dancing in her hospital room.

The 34-year-old, who runs a dance studio called The Vault, has been praised by her more than one million followers for being so upbeat during such a difficult time.

If Im going to have cancer you better believe its going to be dancing fun cancer, she posted on her popular Instagram account on her fifth day of chemotherapy.

Tia Bee Mele Stokes, from St George in Utah, was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukaemia in April. Source: Instagram/@thetiabeestokes

However, Ms Stokes positive attitude took a hit on Tuesday (local time) when she announced she had also been diagnosed with coronavirus while staying in the hospital.

Asking for prayers more than ever right now and love, she wrote in an Instagram post.

My medical team is always concerned for me and ran some tests and I tested positive for COVID.

The 34-year-old said her doctors said it was inevitable she would catch the virus because she had no immune system.

They also told the mum she will have to fight it off on her own because any treatments could ruin her chances for a bone marrow transplant.

The 34-year-old said her doctors said it was inevitable she would catch COVID because she had no immune system. Source: Instagram/@thetiabeestokes

I know theres a miracle in this, she said.

In a video posted on the dance teachers YouTube account, she detailed her COVID-19 symptoms.

"I have zero energy, I have body aches, headache non-stop, sore throat, my cough has gotten worse, mucus, nausea, Ms Stokes said, adding she hadnt been strong enough to dance this week.

In an Instagram post on Thursday (local time), the mum said she was going to continue to fight despite being tested and uncomfortable.

Im choosing now to live, love and choose to see the good and find all the rainbows in every opportunity I get no matter how dark the days may seem, she said.

Story continues

The 34-year-old has been inundated with support from other social media users, with many people saying they were praying for her.

You got this! a woman wrote.

You are so strong. We are all cheering you on! another said.

Do you have a story tip? Email: newsroomau@yahoonews.com.

You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter and download the Yahoo News app from the App Store or Google Play.
With life set to return to the citys streets and the prospect of more relaxed rules for public gatherings, the second step of Melbournes road map to recovery spells a sense of relief to the citys food truck vendors.

While the humble street-side food truck might seem well positioned to capitalise on the push for outdoor dining, the past few months of stay-at-home orders have been a battle for survival.

Food truck pioneer Raph Rashid. Credit:Eddie Jim

Pioneer of Melbournes food truck culture Raph Rashid said the second lockdown led him to take his six trucks off the streets and shut shop for two months.

But last week, as spring descended on Melbourne, the owner of the Taco Truck and Beatbox Kitchen decided it was time to get the show back on the road.
No local government officials will be held accountable for an April sinkhole and mine collapse that displaced dozens of Black Hawk residents after a judge removed Meade County and former commissioners from a lawsuit.

More than 40 residents of the Black Hawk subdivision were evacuated and dozens more are afraid their homes could collapse or lose value after the sinkhole exposed that part of the neighborhood was built over a shallow and mostly hollow gypsum mine.

In May more than 140 current and displaced residents filed a $75.5 million lawsuit at the Meade County court saying the mine collapse and ensuing problems stem from the negligence of government and private entities.

But Judge Michael Day recently dismissed:

Meade County;

Bob Powles, Bill Rich, Tim Potts, Dayle Hammmock, Wayne Gutzmer, Carl Bruch, Curtis Nupen, Jim Schroeder and Dean Wink who were county commissioners at the time the plats for Hideaway Hills were approved;

Kirk Chaffee, county equalization director at the time the plats were approved;

Bob Mallow, Craig Shaver and Jack Wilson, county commissioners at the time the plats were approved, were dismissed because they were never served the lawsuit.

John Fitzgerald, attorney for the plaintiffs, previously removed current commissioners and the state of South Dakota in the hopes that doing so would allow the governments to help the displaced residents, including by applying to a FEMA grant.

Remaining defendants include title, engineering and real estate companies, plus developers, engineers and lawyers who worked on the Hideaway Hills subdivision. The South Dakota Housing Development Authority is also a defendant.

In other Hideaway Hills news, Meade County has removed its webpage that had history about the mine, information about the collapse and public documents about the creation of the community.

Jerry Derr, assistant to the Meade County Commission, said he created the page to help educate residents after the mine collapse rather then individually send them information.

The page served its purpose and thats why it went away, he said.

He said the residents now have a lawyer representing them and anyone can still access the documents through a public records request.

The lawsuit

The lawsuit contains 14 counts most dealing with negligence, breach of warrant and failure to warn  against dozens of entities and individuals.

It points to a preliminary plan for the development sent to the Meade County planning board, commissioners and planning staff in 2000 that mentions the existence of an underground mine and that field boring may be needed to identify any hazardous cavities. Its unclear if that testing ever took place.

The lawsuit also points to a disclaimer that the mine exists that Fitzgerald said the developers shared with contractors and realtors but not with the families and the countys Register of Deeds.

But even if there arent documents that show all defendants were warned about the mine in writing, Fitzgerald said, theres no way they wouldnt have known about it.

The old underground mine is well known by people in the community and everyone working on the project would have physically discovered or been told about it, Fitzgerald said.

Rebecca Mann, attorney for the defendant, wrote in her motion to dismiss that the disclaimer was provided after the plats were approved by the county.

Dismissal

Day granted the dismissal after Mann filed a motion to dismiss.

The claims against the Meade County defendants were dismissed for a multitude of reasons, all of which are set forth in my brief, Mann wrote in an email. The main reason, however, is that the claims are barred by the public duty rule which recognizes that governmental entities are generally determined to owe governmental duties only to the public, not to individuals.

Mann argued in her motion that plat approval is indeed a public safety issue but that it only applies to the greater public, not individuals. She cited two South Dakota Supreme Court rulings related to the public duty rule to back up her argument.

She said the information that Meade County allegedly knew about the mine doesnt meet the legal definition of having actual knowledge of a dangerous situation which requires officials to know of a violation of the law.

Mann also successfully argued that all of the defendants were improperly served to the county auditor instead of the county commissioner.

Fitzgerald argued that the county did have actual knowledge that the community was built over a dangerous mine and sewage lagoon. He cited the preliminary plan that was sent to the county and said one of the commissioners owned a home by one of the mine entrances. Fitzgerald said the commissioner had the National Guard close the entrance in the 1960s because he was afraid his children would get hurt in the mine.

Fitzgerald also argued that the county engaged in misfeasance, or willful inappropriate action, and malfeasance, or corruption and fraud.

Those are an exception to the public duty rule, he told the Journal.

His argument centered around Powles, who Fitzgerald said was involved with creating and providing services to Hideaway Hills and nearby communities while also serving as the chairman of the Meade County Planning Committee. He said the county commissioners were aware of Powles involvement with the communities.

Powles pushed to approve the dangerous subdivision because he was going to make a financial benefit, Fitzgerald said.

Powles currently serves as the site manager for the Northdale Sanitary District, the group that manages infrastructure in Hideaway Hills, according to the districts website.

Day declined to consider his misfeasance and malfeasance arguments, Fitzgerald said.

 Contact Arielle Zionts at arielle.zionts@rapidcityjournal.com.

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26 Sep 2020, 11:25 AM

COVID-19 vaccine: China claims WHO gave support, understanding for emergency use programme

The World Health Organization gave China its support and understanding to start administering experimental coronavirus vaccines to people while clinical trials were still underway, a Chinese health official said on Friday. China launched its emergency programme in July, having communicated with the WHO in late June, according to a National Health Commission official. Hundreds of thousands essential workers and other limited groups of people considered at high risk of infection have been given the vaccine.

E-commerce giant Flipkart onboards 13,000 kirana stores in eastern region ahead of festive season

Homegrown e-commerce giant Flipkart on Friday said it has onboarded over 13,000 kiranas in the eastern region to make faster deliveries to customers ahead of the festive season. The company also said this is part of a programme to onboard 50,000 kiranas across the country to provide a faster and personalised e-commerce experience to its consumers.

Lancet warns against 'false optimism' around COVID-19 situation in India

Medical journal The Lancet, on Friday, said that the government is putting "too positive spin" on the COVID-19 situation in India, calling on the country's leaders not to give false optimism to people. The journal, in an editorial, raised concerns about the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) "straying from scientific evidence", and cautioned against "unrealistic claims" amid the raging coronavirus crisis in the country.

GST compensation cess used elsewhere against law: CAG

The CAG has found that the Union government in the very first two years of the GST implementation wrongly retained Rs 47,272 crore of GST compensation cess that was meant to be used specifically to compensate states for loss of revenue. In its audit report of government accounts, the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) flagged that the amount was to be credited to the non-lapsable GST Compensation Cess collection fund for payment to states for loss of revenue due to implementation of GST since 2017, but the government did not do so, and thus violated the GST law.

Retrospective tax case: Vodafone wins arbitration against Indian govt

British telecommunications company Vodafone has won arbitration against India over the retrospective tax demand of Rs 20,000 crore. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that the Income-Tax department's conduct was in breach of fair and equitable treatment and that the imposition of tax liability on Vodafone violated the investment treaty agreement between India and the Netherlands, sources told Reuters.

Shapoorji Pallonji Group to recast Rs 10,900 crore debt under COVID-19 resolution framework

The Shapoorji Pallonji Group, which has decided to exit the Tata group, will restructure Rs 10,900 crore of its debt under the resolution framework for pandemic-related stress, a group official said. The relief is being sought under the one-time loan restructuring plan approved by the Reserve Bank. It allows financially stressed companies to recast their debt for two years.
Shraddha had worked with Rajput, who was found hanging in his apartment in suburban Bandra on June 14.

Bollywood actor Shraddha Kapoor reached the NCB office on Saturday to record her statement in drugs probe linked to film star Sushant Singh Rajput's death, an official said. A little later, Sara Ali Khan, whose name propped up during Rhea Chakraborty's questioning, too, reached the venue for questioning.

Earlier, actor Deepika Padukone reached the NCB guest house in Colaba around 9.50 am to record her statement.

Shraddha arrived at the NCB's zonal office in Ballard Estate in south Mumbai around noon. Shraddha's name cropped up during the interrogation of some persons, who were earlier summoned by the probe team, sources said.

Sara, the daughter of actor Saif Ali Khan, had flown from Goa after she was summoned by the NCB in the drug probe.

There were reports that Deepika's husband and actor Ranveer Singh had asked the NCB if he could also remain present during her interrogation. However, the NCB had on Friday clarified that it did not receive any such request.

The NCB probe team will record the statements of the three actresses in connection with the drugs case related to Rajput's death and Bollywood-drugs nexus as well, the official said.

Shraddha and Sara had worked with Rajput, who was found hanging in his apartment in suburban Bandra on June 14.

Meanwhile, there is heavy police deployment outside the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) office, where barricades have been put up. Media personnel have gathered in large numbers for coverage.
BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept. 26

By Nargiz Sadikhova - Trend:

The ethno fascism of Armenia is a menace to regional stability, Member of the Senate of Pakistan Anwar ul Haq Kakar told Trend.

Commenting on the presence of Armenian ASALA terror organizations in the occupied territories of Azerbaijan, Kakar said he strongly condemns terrorist activities on Azerbaijan's occupied lands, and Armenia's targeting of Azerbaijani civilians.

These actions are a crime against humanity. The ethno fascism by Armenia and the fact that a terrorist is treated as a hero in Armenia (Garegin Nzhdeh), is a menace to regional stability and is a grave violation of human rights, Kakar said.

I appeal to the international community to recognize these actions for what they are as soon as possible, and be wary of these trends as it can engulf not just immediate neighbors, but its protracted presence can ignite new fire in Europe too, Kakar said.

He once again emphasized that injustice anywhere should be obstructed or otherwise it has all the potential to become a new norm.

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, 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 the withdrawal of its armed forces from Nagorno Karabakh and the surrounding districts.

---

Follow the author on twitter: @nargiz_sadikh
Petoskey High School band directors, assistant principal remain on administrative leave

Superintendent Chris Parker addressed the situation regarding three band instructors and an assistant principal who are all currently on paid leave during Thursday's board of education meeting.
Ms. Boebert upset Mr. Tipton in June after a campaign in which she accused him of siding with Democrats too often and neglecting the district, which encompasses a huge swath of the western portion of the state, from Pueblo in the south to Steamboat Springs in the northwest.

Ms. Boebert said she was motivated in part by Mr. Tiptons reluctance to embrace a ballot initiative to block Colorado from entering a national compact in which states agree to award their presidential electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote. In an interview, she said the compact would allow populous states like California to steal Colorados electoral votes and boasted that she had been a top gatherer of signatures needed to get the referendum on the ballot. But she received what she described as an arrogant brushoff from Mr. Tiptons office.

I was told, We are focused on the 2020 elections, she said, recounting a conversation with an aide in the congressmans office. So after some consideration, I also became focused on 2020 elections.

Ms. Boebert had already established something of a name for herself. In September 2019, she drove nearly four hours along I-70 from Rifle to a rally in Aurora to confront Beto ORourke, then a Democratic presidential contender, about his debate pledge that Hell yes, we are going to take your AR-15, your AK-47.

I am here to say, Hell no, youre not, declared Ms. Boebert, who said that at 5 feet tall and 100 pounds, she needed a gun for self-defense. Video from the event attracted national attention and a new conservative celebrity was born.

She drew more attention in May when, appearing on the radio show of a QAnon believer, she expressed support for the conspiracy movement, saying that it reflected that more Americans were embracing conservatism. She has been trying to walk that back ever since, saying that she does not believe in QAnon and that it is mainly the news media that insists on raising the issue.

I am not a follower of the group, she said, and the subject did not come up at her freedom rally in Loma.
PM News reports that a stampede for the monetary gift doled out by Governor Aminu Tambuwal in Sokoto on Friday has led to tragedy after a policeman shot dead one person.

The policeman also injured three others.

The shooter, a police sergeant, identified as Bello Garba, was promptly arrested by the Sokoto Police Command.

His victims have also been identified.

Bello killed 25-year-old Aminu Abdulrahman and injured Junaidu Abba, Babangida Muhammad and Awaisu Alti, during the incident at Sultan Bello Jumuat mosque, in Sokoto..

The Commands Public Relations Officer, ASP Muhammad Sadiq, said all the victims were evacuated to Specialist Hospital Sokoto.

The injured will be treated, while an autopsy will be carried out on the dead.

Sadiq said victims were said to be sharing money doled out by Gov. Aminu Tambuwal after the Jumaat prayers to mark Nigerias 60th Independence anniversary.

Sadiq said that the Sergeant, of Counter Terrorism Unit Base 18 Gusau, was attached to Government House Sokoto.

He said that the policeman unprofessionally fired without reasonable justification at that material time.

The Sokoto State Police Command condemns in its entirety the unwarranted, uncivil and unprofessional conduct of a Police Sergeant on special duty in the state.

Commissioner of Police. Mr Sani Kaoje had ordered the detention and trial of the erring officer and charged the state Criminal Investigation Department to speed up investigation and come up with objective findings, Sadiq said.

He added that the commissioner also charged all officers and men of the Command to deploy professional acumen, including psychological capacity to enhance the safety of the people, and not to resort to using arms against the populace.

The incident occurred at about 2:30pm, shortly after the special Jumaat prayers offered in commemoration of Nigerias forthcoming 60th independence anniversary at Sultan Bello Jumaat Mosque.

The Governor of Sokoto State, Aminu Tambuwal while magnanimously giving out gifts to the needy, a brief distribution which gave birth to an upsurge in would-be beneficiaries.

However, in an unconventional effort to control the crowd after the departure of the governor the policeman fired the shot, Sadiq added.
Niagara Regions plan to protect residents at government-run long-term care homes  which includes conducting COVID-19 tests before most infected people would show symptoms  is an effort to balance infection control with social activities, says the director of the homes.

Henri Koning, director of senior services at Niagara Region, said newly imposed rules that will require a resident who leaves for a day trip to be isolated for 72 hours, followed by a test, is consistent with infection control protocols recommended by the provincial government and public health experts.

However, those experts  including Niagaras acting medical officer of health Dr. Mustafa Hirji have pointed out the novel coronavirus has to be present in a person long enough to have reproduced to a level that the current tests can detect it for them to be effective.

That usually takes five to seven days.

In that case, tests taken after just 72 hours of returning to a long-term care home might produce negative results for people who have COVID-19, which could result in the virus spreading in the facility.

Koning conceded 72 hours might not be long enough to detect the virus in some cases, but noted a resident will not be allowed to leave isolation until the test results are back, which can take a few days after the test was done.

If a resident begins to exhibit symptoms during that period and the test is negative, we would have them retested, she said.

The new rules were imposed when it became clear Ontario was moving into the second wave of COVID-19 infections, Koning said.

She said long-term care homes have to follow pandemic regulations set by the provincial government, which were established after long-term care and retirement homes were hit hard during the first wave which resulted in hundreds of deaths.

Most of Niagaras 64 COVID-19 related deaths involved people living in local long-term care homes  all of them privately owned.

We are proud of the fact that we had no deaths in our homes, said Koning. We want to ensure that it stays that way.

To that end, she said the Region is imposing extra infection control measures on municipally-run long-term care homes above what the province is requiring.

That included sending a letter to the family of residents asking them to carefully consider the risk before taking their loved one off their long-term care home property, given the danger presented by rising COVID-19 cases.

If a resident does leave, they will be subjected to the isolation period and testing in an effort to prevent the spread of the virus.

Hirji said while the 72-hour testing window is on the short side, the extra time waiting for the test result will aid in the effort to limit COVID-19 spread.

He echoed Konings concern about the risk of taking a resident out on a day trip, particularly to neighbouring regions where the COVID-19 infection rate is much higher than Niagaras.

Koning said if the current plan does not prove effective, the Region can change it. That could include extending the isolation period for a resident who has left the home.
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) at a border security discussion hosted by Center for Immigration Studies in Washington on July 30, 2019. (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times)

Tom Cotton Launches War Room to Help Fight Attacks on Trumps Supreme Court Nominee

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) has announced his office will operate a campaign-style war room to push back against attacks on President Donald Trumps nominee for the Supreme Court and promote the candidates appointment.

Today, I am launching an emergency Supreme Court War Room at scotuswarroom.com to help President Trump fulfill his constitutional duty to appoint the next Supreme Court justice, Cotton announced on Twitter.

In a video statement, Cotton said Trump would soon announce his pick for the nations highest court, characterizing the choice as a great nomination.

We already know Democrats are going to use every trick in the book to smear this nominee, he continued, saying he expects attacks on her religion and judicial philosophy.

He called his initiative an all-hands-on deck effort and urged people to support his war room initiative to help make sure that we confirm President Trumps pick for the Supreme Court.

The death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died at age 87 on Sept. 18 from cancer complications, vacated a seat on the nations highest court, also opening a fierce battle over nominating her replacement.

Democrat congressional leaders have urged the Senate not to consider Trumps nominee, arguing its too close to the election and expressing frustration with how the GOP-controlled upper chamber blocked President Barack Obamas nominee in 2016.

But the bulk of Republican senators say theres plenty of precedent for election-year nominations and that the same party controls the Senate and presidency this time around, making the situation different from 4 years ago.

President Trumps nominee will receive a vote on the floor of the United States Senate, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said last week, hours after Ginsburg died.

Trump on Saturday will announce his next Supreme Court nominee, the third in his first term, with the president widely expected to choose Amy Coney Barrett, a federal judge in Indiana.

Amy Coney Barrett during Senate confirmation hearing to be U.S. circuit judge on Aug. 4, 2017. (Screenshot via Senate TV)

Barrett is exactly the kind of justice President Trump wants, and that the country needs right now, so I think it will be her and that it should be, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) told The Epoch Times.

Barrett, who serves on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit, has been hailed by supporters for her judicial record and other qualities.

Time and time again, you hear people saying shes the smartest person in the room, Carrie Severino, president of the Judicial Crisis Network, told The Epoch Times.

In a preview of what is expected to be a heated debate around Barretts potential appointment, Cotton took to Twitter to denounce what he said were Democrat attacks targeting Barretts adoption of two children from Haiti.

Disgusting. The left now smearing Amy Coney Barrett for adopting children, Cotton wrote in a tweet, which included screenshots of a message thread calling for the press to probe the matter, alluding to impropriety by saying some adoptions from Haiti were sketchy as hell and her kids were scooped up by ultra-religious Americans.

Jan Jekielek and Zachary Stieber contributed to this report.
People visit an eco-agricultural sightseeing base at Dayan Village of Xingshi Township, Longli County of southwest China's Guizhou Province, Sept. 24, 2020. More than 400 mu (about 26.7 hectares) of chrysanthemum flowers have bloomed in the base, attracting people from various regions to visit. (Xinhua/Yang Wenbin)




Rochester police has announced its first ever female police chief after the city's entire command staff quit following protests over the cop killing of Daniel Prude.

Cynthia Herriott-Sullivan, a former lieutenant with the Rochester Police Department, was appointed to the role of interim chief of the addled force Saturday morning.

Mayor Lovely Warren announced her appointment in a press conference at City Hall where she said Herriott-Sullivan is the right person to mend fractured relations between the community and police department and bring about much-needed changes to law enforcement in the city.

This came after Warren fired former chief Le'Ron Singletary last week after he and several senior members of the force stood down en masse following a backlash over Prude's death.

Outrage erupted earlier this month when footage surfaced of black man Prude, who was suffering mental health issues, being suffocated by police officers in the streets of Rochester, New York, nearly six months ago.

Cynthia Herriott-Sullivan, a former lieutenant with the Rochester Police Department, was appointed as the interim chief of the addled force Saturday morning (pictured)

Warren said Herriott-Sullivan's appointment will have a 'significant impact' on Rochester and the police department.

'Given all that has been happening here in our own community and across the nation, it is abundantly clear that traditional policing practices must be altered and improved to better serve and protect our citizens,' she said.

'I am confident she will bring a different perspective and instill a fresh approach to policing both of which are very much needed in our city, particularly at this difficult time.'

Warren said Herriott-Sullivan has shown throughout her career that she cares about the 'well-being of our community' citing previous work as part of a critical response team investigation into the deaths of people in police custody.

Herriott-Sullivan will be the first woman in the history of the force to take up the top position.

She will start her new role from October 14 and is expected to serve until at least June 2021, when the city hopes to appoint someone permanent to the position.

Mayor Lovely Warren announced the appointment in a press conference at City Hall saying Herriott-Sullivan will be the first woman in the history of the force to take up the top position

Two other appointments were also made to the RPD command staff Saturday. Captain Gabriel Person (left) was promoted to Deputy Police Chief and Officer Moses Robinson (right) was promoted to a role focused on community engagement and violence reduction

Herriott-Sullivan said at the conference that 'I love this city and I'm going to give this my 120-30-40-50 percent effort.'

'Ironically, I left law enforcement because I wanted to have a bigger hand in keeping people out of jail rather than putting them in there,' she said, adding that she wanted to carry on focusing on ways to help people stay out of the criminal justice system through 'things like keeping kids off the school suspension track'.

'I know these are tough times but I believe strongly if we all bring our best to the table we'll be able to get it done,' she said.

Herriott-Sullivan was a cop with Rochester Police Department for 24 years from 1985 before retiring in 2009.

Since then she has held roles as the Deputy Director of the National Drug Court Institute in Virginia and CEO with Rise Up Rochester, a nonprofit that provides support to families of victims of violent crime.

Warren dismissed former chief Le'Ron Singletary (pictured) last week

She is currently the interim deputy executive director at the Rochester Housing Authority and Deputy Executive Director of Rise Up Rochester.

Two other appointments were also made to the RPD command staff Saturday.

Captain Gabriel Person, who joined the force in 2005, was promoted to position of Deputy Police Chief.

Officer Moses Robinson, a crime prevention officer, was promoted to a role focused on community engagement and violence reduction.

Robinson said it was time for a change in policing across Rochester and America.

'Law enforcement strategies across the country need to be reformed, readjusted,' he said.

'We need to now look at a multicultural, multi-disciplinarian approach to how we do law enforcement.'

The news comes after Rochester police has been rocked by scandal following Prude's death.

Former chief Le'Ron Singletary, who Warren said initially misled her about the circumstances of the killing, was ousted by Warren last Monday.

Outrage erupted this month when footage surfaced of black man Prude, who was suffering mental health issues, being suffocated by police officers in the streets of Rochester nearly six months ago (pictured)

Paramedics arrived as Prude was wrestled to the floor, still wearing the 'spit hood'

Singletary had announced his retirement the week earlier with his last day supposed to be September 29 as he slammed critics for trying to 'destroy my character and integrity.'

Several other senior police officials announced they would retire or leave top command positions after they faced a backlash over their handling of Prude's death.

But Warren said she had relieved Singletary of his duties effective September 21 and announced she had called for a federal investigation.

The mayor said she didn't see the bodycam footage of Prude's death until August 4 when city lawyers showed her and has accused Singletary of misleading her about the circumstances.

In emails between the pair released this month, Warren told the police chief she was 'outraged' and said he 'grossly underplayed' Prude's death by describing it to her as a drug overdose.

Daniel Prude, 41, stopped breathing as Rochester police were restraining him in March

She said Mark Vaughn, the cop who pushed Prude's head into the ground, should have faced an immediate disciplinary investigation and been fired back in March.

'Quite frankly, I would have expected the Chief of Police to have shown me this video in March,' Warren wrote in the draft email.

The toned down version sent to Singletary did not include that criticism.

The city's communications director Justin Roj and city corporation counsel Tim Curtin were also suspended without pay for 30 days.

Seven Rochester police officers have been suspended with pay in connection with Prude's death: Mark Vaughn, Troy Taladay, Paul Ricotta, Francisco Santiago, Andrew Specksgoor, Josiah Harris and Michael Magri.

Protests erupted in Rochester after the video of 41-year-old Prude's death was made public on September 2.

Prude's family released the footage and filed a civil lawsuit against the city, alleging its leaders and police department covered up the details of his death.

The shocking video shows cops covering Prude's head in a hood and pushing his head into the ground, until he passed out and later died.

Officers had responded to a 911 call from Prude's brother on March 23 asking for help in dealing with his erratic behavior.

Prude, who had mental health issues, was naked in the street when cops arrived.

They handcuffed him, leaving him undressed, and placed a 'spit hood' over his head.

A Rochester police officer holds Daniel Prude's head down during the deadly encounter

They then pinned him down on the ground, with his face pushed into the pavement, for two minutes.

Prude passed out and died a week later on March 30, when he was taken off life support.

An autopsy from the Monroe County Medical Examiner's Office ruled his death a homicide caused in part by 'complications of asphyxia in the setting of physical restraint'.

However no charges were brought against the officers and the video and incident was kept under wraps until Prude's family released it earlier this month and accused police of a cover-up.

Emails, police reports and other documents were then released by the city revealing Rochester police commanders had urged city officials to hold off on publicly releasing the footage.

Deputy Chief Mark Simmons cited the 'current climate' in the city and the nation in a June 4 email advising Singletary to press the city's lawyers to deny a Prude family lawyer's public records request for the footage.

Prude's family held a vigil in his honor on September 10 in Rochester (pictured)

Protesters on September 6 in Rochester following the public release of footage of Prude's killing

'We certainly do not want people to misinterpret the officers' actions and conflate this incident with any recent killings of unarmed black men by law enforcement nationally,' Simmons wrote.

'That would simply be a false narrative, and could create animosity and potentially violent blowback in this community as a result.'

'I totally agree,' Singletary replied, according to the emails.

An investigation has now been launched by the New York State Attorney General's Office into Prude's death.

Prude is one in a line of black men and women killed by cops in America in recent months, as protests demanding an end to police brutality and racism build nationwide.

Demonstrations erupted in May following the 'murder' of George Floyd by a Minneapolis cop who knelt on his neck for almost nine minutes until he passed out and died.

Prude is one in a line of black men and women killed by cops in America in recent months, as protests demanding an end to police brutality and racism build nationwide. Left George Floyd who was killed in May and right Breonna Taylor who was killed in March

Floyd's death reignited outrage over the death of Breonna Taylor, 26, who was shot six times when three plain clothes officers burst into her Louisville apartment on March 13 during a botched raid.

A grand jury this week returned a decision on possible charges against the three cops, choosing to indict just one of the officers - Brett Hankison - on the lesser charges of wanton endangerment.

The charges relate to him firing into a neighbor's apartment and no charges were brought in relation to Taylor's death.

In June, unarmed father Rayshard Brooks was shot dead while he ran away from cops in the drive-thru of a Wendy's restaurant in Atlanta.

Jacob Blake was shot seven times in the back by a white cop in front of his three young children on August 23, leaving the father-of-six paralyzed from the waist down.

One week later, 29-year-old Dijon Kizzee was shot and killed by two cops while he was out riding his bike in South Los Angeles.

Cops say Kizzee had dropped a pistol, bent down and picked it up when the officers shot him dead, while the attorney for his devastated family said cops shot him multiple times before leaving his dead handcuffed body in the street for hours.
Individual politicians are spending thousands of dollars a week of taxpayers' money to boost their "likes" and push political messages on social media, with data released for the first time by Facebook's Ad Library revealing how much MPs of all political stripes spend on the platform.

Politicians defended their use of advertising for social media likes as a way to connect with voters in the digital age, and pointed out it was cheaper than old-fashioned letter box drops.

The data shows Energy and Emissions Reduction Minister Angus Taylor topped the list of local politicians buying Facebook ads in the past month. In the 30 days to September 23, Mr Taylor sank $12,599 into 27 ads on the company's platforms, which include Instagram.

Federal Energy Minister Angus Taylor bought a series of Facebook ads to promote Australian National Flag Day.

Mr Taylor spent at least $3300 on six ads promoting Australian National Flag Day, proclaimed in 1996 to celebrate the first time the flag was flown on September 3, 1901. But many of Mr Taylor's ads did not start running until after the event.
A homeless black man shot dead by California police on Wednesday is a father-of-two, former bodybuilder who fell on hard times, DailyMail.com can reveal.

Family photos posted on Facebook show Kurt Reinhold, 42, smiling and hugging his elementary school-age son and daughter.

Reinhold was killed during a struggle with two Orange County Sheriff's Department deputies in San Clemente that was caught on camera on Wednesday.

The killing sparked protests on Thursday against police brutality which led to the city council imposing a curfew.

Police said Reinhold was homeless and had moved to the Southern California town from nearby Los Angeles in the past month.

It's unclear how the once happy Reinhold ended up in the streets. Photos posted on his Facebook page show happier, more prosperous days. The son of an elementary school teacher posted pictures of himself in 2015 dressed in a suit on a date with his children's mother at the Hollywood Pantages Theater where they saw a performance of Riverdance 2.

Kurt Reinhold, 42, was killed during a struggle with two Orange County Sheriff's Department deputies in San Celmente on Wednesday

Reinhold, who can be seen smiling in a photo with his two elementary school-aged children, moved from Los Angeles to San Clemente two months ago

Reinhold, pictured here with his mother, Latoya Courtney, on holiday in Aruba in 2016, was a bodybuilder. It's unclear how he fell on hard times

In another picture he posed in front of a black Mercedes car, and also shared family photos with the mother, Latoya Courtney, on holiday in Aruba in 2016.

Reinhold's family, seen hugging each other next to Black Lives Matter signs on the lawn outside their home in Los Angeles on Friday, declined to comment.

A neighbor told DailyMail.com Reinhold was a 'lovely man' and said they were devastated that the shooting left his two children without a father. The father-of-two was religious, describing himself online as an 'Apostolic Christian'.

It is not clear whether he was still in a relationship with his kids' mother Latoya, an LA-based nurse practitioner from St Louis, Missouri.

Video shared to social media on Wednesday showed Kurt Andras Reinhold (left) being shot dead by two Orange County Sheriff's Department deputies

Witnesses claimed that the deputies approached and stopped Reinhold, a homeless man in San Clemente, for 'jaywalking'

The Orange County Sheriff's Department released a photo that they said showed Reinhold reaching for a deputy's gun

Witnesses said the two officers stopped Reinhold for jaywalking, though Orange County Sheriff Don Barnes did not confirm the claims.

A bystander caught the man's altercation with two officers on camera, showing the 42-year-old stood in the middle of South El Camino Real outside the Miramar Hotel, shouting at the cops 'Don't touch me', while they told him to sit on the sidewalk.

After batting away the officers' outstretched hands and saying 'Where did I jaywalk? Why did you stop me?' while walking towards them, the two deputies tackled Reinhold to the ground and struggled with him.

Vehicles driving along the street block the cameras view of the struggle as one shot rings out, then another about five seconds later. The sounds of sirens wail the background.

A neighbor told DailyMail.com Reinhold was a 'lovely man' and said his family were devastated. It is not clear whether he was still in a relationship with his kids' mother Latoya, an LA-based nurse practitioner from St Louis, Missouri

In one photo posted to social media, Reinhold can be seen smiling as he poses next to a black Mercedes Benz

Reinhold's family, seen hugging each other next to Black Lives Matter signs on the lawn outside their home in Los Angeles on Friday, declined to comment

A makeshift memorial to Kurt Reinhold in front of the Miramar Hotel where he was shot and killed by Orange County Sheriffs in San Clemente

A photo of Reinhold, flowers and candles adorn the makeshift memorial in front of the Miramar Hotel

Another video shows authorities performing chest compressions in an effort to save Reinhold.

Sheriff Barnes said the grainy photo released by the Orange County Sheriff's Department showed Reinhold reaching for one deputy's weapon, though the sheriff said it's not clear if he was able to get it out.

Video from a witness recorded a deputy yelling 'he's got my gun!' four times during the altercation. But Barnes declined to release any video, saying he didn't want to influence witnesses who had yet to be interviewed by investigators.

He also said he didn't yet know why the two veteran officers on the department's homeless outreach unit tried to stop Reinhold on the street. Police made multiple attempts to get him help but he declined, Barnes said.

The two deputies are eight- and 13-year veterans who are part of a 25-member unit that attempts to engage with the homeless people and get them into service programs for mental health, drug addiction or other issues.

They are trained in de-escalation and crisis intervention. Barnes said deputies are taught to try to gain compliance without violence.

He said the tackling of Reinhold was 'not something we want to see happen.' The deputies have been placed on leave and the Orange County district attorney is investigating.

On Thursday morning, about 50 people protested Reinhold's killing and tried to block traffic in San Clemente, about 60 miles south of LA

An Orange County Sheriff's deputy directs a protester stay on the sidewalk on S. El Camino Real after Reinhold was shot dead on Wednesday

Four were arrested after they refused to get out of the street and a fifth was booked on a vandalism charge for scratching a sheriff's vehicle

On Thursday morning, about 50 people protested Reinhold's killing and tried to block traffic in San Clemente, about 60 miles south of LA .

Four were arrested after they refused to get out of the street and a fifth was booked on a vandalism charge for scratching a sheriff's vehicle, Barnes said.

Barnes acknowledged Reinholds death came at a tenuous time for the country.

'Given the current climate of police and community relations, I understand that this conversation is going to be a difficult one around this incident,' he said at a news conference.

'However, it is vitally important that we reserve judgement until a full and complete investigation has been complete by the Orange County District Attorney's Office.

'We will protect the First Amendment rights of those who want to publicly mourn Mr. Reinhold. What we as a community should not tolerate is commentary or action that serves to divide.

'Spreading rumors and misinformation about the identity of the decedent or the reason he was he was contact by deputies is irresponsible and dangerous.'
The 2020 version of Rosh Hashanah, the start of the Jewish High Holy Days that culminates with Yom Kippur on Monday, could be a sign of what upcoming holidays will look like.

Rosh Hashanah, which normally involves celebratory meals with friends and family and time to reflect at the synagogue, this year instead involved small dinners and lots of connecting via Zoom.

The coronavirus pandemics restrictions on socializing and the difficulties of traveling to see relatives means the holiday season is going to be very different this year. Its a situation many Bay Area families are wondering about, as Chuseok, Dia de los Muertos, Thanksgiving, Kwanzaa, Diwali, Christmas and other holidays approach.

When it comes to Dia de los Muertos, the Mexican holiday starting Oct. 31 that honors the dead, for example, the Centers for Disease Control suggests delivering traditional dishes to friends and neighbors in lieu of hosting a party. The federal agency also recommends that people avoid traveling for the holidays this year, advising, for instance, holding small family Thanksgiving dinners indoors or outdoor gatherings with a restricted number of guests.

Local Jewish families got a taste of what those kinds of restrictions mean with Rosh Hashanah. In many cases, though, they engaged in more traditions than usual  even if it meant ordering holiday foods from restaurants  as people hunted for meaning and connection during a challenging year.

Lawyer Debra Rubenstein, who moved to San Francisco from New Jersey four years ago, ate a Rosh Hashanah feast packaged for one from a local pop-up while joining her temples service on one phone as her mom and sister watched the same service from New Jersey on Rubensteins second phone.

It was nice to be together, even if just electronically, as normally Rubenstein wouldnt experience the same service as her family.

Yalonda M. James / The Chronicle

Looking ahead, Rubenstein says she is disappointed she likely wont be able to fly home: New Jersey has a 14-day quarantine period for residents of many states, though California was recently taken off the frequently changing list. She hopes there might be opportunities for an outdoor Thanksgiving with friends.

San Rafaels Andy Naja-Riese, who leads an agricultural nonprofit, also doesnt live close enough to family to see them. In past years, hed get together with a group of 10 friends for Rosh Hashanah, but with some of those people being at high risk of getting sick from the coronavirus, the gathering didnt happen.

He still felt like it was worth putting in the effort for a spectacular meal, though  even if it was just for him and his husband. He incorporated customs from his East Coast family, making this Rosh Hashanah one of his most traditional ever. The star of the feast was his moms coffee-infused magic brisket, which he had never made for a Jewish holiday before.

I was sad we couldnt enjoy it together, but at least I was able to send her photos and talk about the recipe, he said. I was able to honor her love and care.

For those living alone and far from family, restaurants provided a much-needed taste of tradition. Karen Adelman, co-owner of Berkeleys venerable Jewish deli, Sauls Restaurant & Delicatessen, said this was the busiest year by far for takeout Rosh Hashanah meals. Demand was so high that the restaurant stopped taking orders several days in advance.

Even if you have them by yourself or join your family by Zoom, the food is obviously a way of having continuity, she said. Certain foods just signify whats supposed to happen when everything else is a little uncertain.

Local grocers say they have already begun surveying their customers to help figure out how they should approach the coming holidays. Emily Lubomirsky of Lukes Local determined the Cole Valley market should offer its annual prepared Thanksgiving feast in a smaller format. So, in addition to its usual meal that serves six to eight people, there will be another option suitable for groups of three to five. The store also plans to offer individually sized a la carte options for the first time, such as a smoked turkey shepherds pie and Delicata squash stuffed with quinoa and pomegranate.

Similarly, online grocer Good Eggs is trying to source smaller turkeys after an informal poll of customers showed that 97% planned to celebrate Thanksgiving with a small group. Turkey feels like a comforting tradition people will want to have, but they might need a 15-pound bird for their group of four, said Jane Stecyk of Good Eggs.

Stecyk was shocked to see that 60% of customers in the poll said they were excited to cook for Thanksgiving this year. She expects that means people with more time on their hands will put in the effort to make something more ambitious than usual.

That was the case for Novato author Gabi Moskowitz for Rosh Hashanah. In a normal year, shed bounce between several events over the course of the holiday weekend, but safety restrictions meant she hosted just one meal for family members in her social bubble. To make it still feel like an important evening, she spent three days preparing a true feast: tomato-tinged brisket braised for six hours, roasted baby potatoes, kale salad with fresh figs, round challah and honey cake with sunken figs.

Moskowitz anticipates her annual Hanukkah party with friends and neighbors wont happen this December, but she plans to apply lessons learned from Rosh Hashanah for the eight-day event, as well as for Thanksgiving and other holidays.

I found that looking for places to make meaning and looking for adaptations to long-standing rituals was the key to not getting lost in a sea of despair, she said. Even on a tiny scale, I can try to find ways to make it as special as possible.

Janelle Bitker is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: janelle.bitker@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @janellebitker
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 21:10:44|Editor: huaxia

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Huang Kunming, a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and head of the Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee, attends the online 27th Beijing International Book Fair in Beijing, capital of China, Sept. 26, 2020. (Xinhua/Yan Yan)

BEIJING, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- A senior official of the Communist Party of China (CPC) on Saturday stressed high-level exchanges in book publishing to promote communication between civilizations, as well as people-to-people connectivity, during a visit to the online 27th Beijing International Book Fair.

Huang Kunming, a member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and head of the Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee, noted the need to grow the international presence of more fine publications that demonstrate the charm of Chinese culture and the values shared by all of humanity.

The quality of publications should be given prominence, Huang said, adding that various topics, such as the fight against poverty and China's epidemic-fighting spirit, should be highlighted.

It is necessary to expand the channels and platforms of communication, ensuring that the rest of the world better understands China through the publishing industry, Huang said.

He also urged greater efforts in the publishing of original and digital works, providing people with more substantial, richer and higher quality publishing products and services.

With Cuba as the country of honor this year, the book fair had attracted nearly 1,400 registered online exhibitors from 97 countries and regions as of Friday, with more than 38,000 books on display. Enditem
ABC presenter Leigh Sales has called for NSW's health minister to follow in the footsteps of his Victorian counterpart and resign over the Ruby Princess cruise ship debacle.

Jenny Mikakos quit her portfolio a day after Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said she was partly responsible for the state's bungled COVID-19 hotel quarantine scheme.

Victoria's deadly second wave, which resulted in more than 18,000 new infections and 750 deaths, can be traced back to outbreaks at two Melbourne hotels used in the quarantine program.

The outbreak came after NSW's Ruby Princess fiasco, which saw 663 passengers contract COVID-19 at the beginning of the pandemic. There were 28 deaths, including 20 in Australia and eight in the United States.

ABC presenter Leigh Sales (pictured) has questioned why NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard did not resign over the Ruby Princess debacle

Brad Hazzard is seen during a press conference in Sydney on July 14, 2020

Sales compared the two deadly outbreaks following the resignation of Ms Mikakos on Saturday and posed a question to NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard.

'The minister whose department allowed passengers off the Ruby Princess, the end result of which was 28 deaths,' she wrote on Twitter.

'Q Brad Hazzard - Jenny Mikakos is accountable for the mistakes for her department and has resigned - why did you not do the same?'

The ship - which was low on medical supplies and swabs for COVID-19 tests due to shortages - left Sydney on March 8 for New Zealand and returned 11 days later.

Passengers were allowed to disembark before the results of 13 expedited tests, which showed at least three people had the virus.

The 7.30 presenter made her bold suggestion by replying to a tweet from the minister.

Sales compared Victoria's disastrous hotel quarantine program to the Ruby Princess debacle

Jenny Mikakos quit her portfolio a day after Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said she was partly responsible for the state's bungled COVID-19 hotel quarantine scheme

He wrote: 'Sorry to see Jenny Mikakos resign. She has worked tirelessly in this pandemic.'

'Premier Andrews assertion that the Health Minister was responsible for the Quarantine system lacks logic.

'How could a health minister direct police to be involved?'

Mr Andrews told reporters on Saturday Ms Mikakos texted him to advise of her decision and he had not asked her to resign.

He believed her resignation 'was the appropriate course of action to take' but would not explain why he thought it was the right decision.

Mr Andrews said he would leave analysis about Ms Mikakos' resignation to the final report to come out of the inquiry into hotel quarantine.

Victoria's second wave came after NSW's Ruby Princess fiasco, which saw 663 passengers contract COVID-19 at the beginning of the pandemic. Pictured: The Ruby Princess departs Port Kembla, south of Sydney, on April 23

'She's a very, very hard working person and I'm grateful to her for her efforts ... I wish her well for the future,' he said.

He would not be drawn on interpreting Ms Mikakos' resignation statement, which she released hours earlier on Saturday morning.

Ms Mikakos also intends to resign from parliament after Mr Andrews on Friday gave evidence to the hotel inquiry, where he pointed partial blame at the minister for her role in the quarantine scheme, which led to the state's deadly second wave of infections.

In her one-page statement, she said the premier's comments led her to believe she couldn't continue serving in his cabinet.

'I am disappointed that my integrity has sought to be undermined,' she said.
Its been a while since NASA updated the programs status. Its over a year and a half since Artemis was officially launched, so we were in need of some fresh news. Thankfully, the American space agency delivered, and now we know about a bit more about the program than before.First off, the way to get there. To get people to the Moon NASA will be using the Space Launch System (SLS) for a rocket, and the Orion capsule for a spacecraft. Orion is already complete, and awaits to be paired with the SLS once the rocket clears the hot fire test later this fall, in October.Then, the missions. There are for now just 4 planned for the immediate future.will launch for the Moon in 2021 with no crew, to test performance, life support, and communication capabilities. Two years later, in 2023, another dry run (that means there will be no landing on the Moon), this time with astronauts on board, will be launched  this is calledDuring this second mission, NASA will attempt a series of tests, including a so-called proximity operations demonstration. This will require astronauts to manually pilot Orion to assess the spacecrafts handling qualities and related hardware and software. Rendezvous, proximity operations, docking, and undocking, all will be tested during this mission.It isthat will actually put human boots back on the Moon. Scheduled for 2024, the mission would see men and women touching down on the Moons South Pole, opening a new chapter in the history of space exploration.NASA has not actually made up its mind on how this is going to go. As you already know by now, there are plans to build a space station to circle the Moon, called Gateway . The agency is trying to decide on whether Artemis III should dock with the station and then head down to the surface, or go for a direct landing, bypassing it.As a side note, assembly on this lunar station won't start before 2023, when the power/propulsion element and the habitation/logistics outpost will launch for Lunar orbit, so it might not be ready in time for the Artemis III arrival., on the other hand, and all the subsequent missions, still unscheduled, will make full use of the Gateway capabilities. NASAs plan is to have Orion dock with the station, unload two astronauts there, and take another two down to the surface.Separately from the main Artemis program, NASA is also working with private partners to send an army of robotic missions to the Moon in preparation for human arrival. Starting 2021, two such missions are planned each year, carrying dozens of new science investigations and technology demonstrations.The ultimate goal is, of course, to have a permanent presence on the surface of the Moon. Called, the outpost would comprise according to NASA new rovers, power systems, habitats, and more for long-term exploration of the Moon. An actual timeline for the Base Camp was not provided.With bipartisan support from Congress, our 21st century push to the Moon is well within Americas reach, said NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine in a statement released last week.As weve solidified more of our exploration plans in recent months, weve continued to refine our budget and architecture. Were going back to the Moon for scientific discovery, economic benefits, and inspiration for a new a generation of explorers. As we build up a sustainable presence, were also building momentum toward those first human steps on the Red Planet.
His Excellency Papa Owusu-Ankomah, High Commissioner of Ghana to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland with concurrent accreditation to the Republic of Ireland has ended his tour of duty successfully and returns to Ghana with lots of experience and enthusiasm to contribute positively to the development and growth of Ghana in the realization of the Presidents agenda of Ghana Beyond Aid.



It may be recalled that His Excellency Papa Owusu-Ankomah was one of the first High Commissioners/Ambassadors that the President, His Excellency Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo commissioned to represent Ghanas interests in the United Kingdom.



Having been mandated by the President to represent him in the United Kingdom with concurrent accreditation to the Republic of Ireland, and promote the interest of Ghana, protect the interest of Ghanaians in his jurisdiction, His Excellency Papa Owusu-Ankomah discharged his mandate with distinction and acquitted himself excellently.



His Excellency Papa Owusu-Ankomah who arrives in Ghana on Saturday, 26th September 2020, leaves the shores of the United Kingdom with a great vacuum, having projected the image of Ghana positively in UK and Ireland, culminating with several successful reciprocal VVIP visits between both countries. Notable amongst these VVIP visits was the most recent one by the President of the Republic of Ghana to UK where he, together with about twenty-two (22) other African countries, participated in the first-ever UK-Africa Investment Summit.



On the side of the United Kingdom, his able leadership saw the Prince of Wales, Prince Charles and his wife visit Ghana.



These are but a few of the VVIP visits that can be mentioned. The visits and other high-level meetings facilitated by His Excellency Papa Owusu-Ankomah has witnessed the deepening of the bilateral relations between Ghana and the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland.



Having notified the diplomatic community in the United Kingdom of his departure, a number of the diplomatic community leaders sought to eagerly meet with him to bid farewell. Owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, he granted audience to most of the diplomatic corps virtually. The Marshal of the Diplomatic Corps, Alistair Harrison CMG CVO, called on His Excellency Owusu-Ankomah to bid him farewell and used the opportunity to present to the High Commissioner a parting gift from the Queen, which was a picture of the Queen and Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh. He had warm words of inspiration for the High Commissioner of deepened relations between Ghana and the United Kingdom and the excellent work undertaken by the High Commissioner. He also wished the High Commissioner well in his future endeavours.



His Excellency Papa Owusu-Ankomah as per the usual practice called on the Minister for Africa of the United Kingdom, Mr. James Dundridge, who represented the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, Rt. Hon. Dominic Raab.



Minister James Duddridge recalled the excellent relations that exist between Ghana and the U.K. which most recently, had enjoyed further boost due to the effective and prominent role that the High Commissioner played during his tenure. Most importantly, the Minister recalled the participation of the President of Ghana at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM), and the UK-Africa Summit both held in London in April 2018 and January 2020, respectively and expressed profound gratitude to the High Commissioner for institutionalising his good works based on a rich experience which had led to uncountable highlights of his stay in the U.K.





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North Macedonias interior minister said two police officers were suspended Friday over the beating of a Roma man, a form of brutality that rights groups said is a disturbingly frequent occurrence.

Interior Minister Oliver Spasovski said one of the officers was also charged with unjustified use of force. His colleague was suspended for allegedly doing nothing to stop the beating of the man, who was involved in a car accident in the southern town of Bitola.

The action came after the country's Avaja non-governmental organization posted a video on social media allegedly showing a policeman brutally beating and kicking the Roma man on Saturday.

The Interior Ministry strongly condemns any case of violence, especially when it is committed by a police officer," Spasovski said. No such act can be justified.

The Avaja NGO said another three Roma men reported that they also were recently beaten by police in Bitola. The organization is planning a Saturday protest against police brutality targeting the Roma, who comprise about 2.7% of North Macedonia's 2.1 million people.

North Macedonia's Helsinki Committee also strongly condemned the man's beating and said police frequently brutalize Roma people. The rights watchdog said it recorded another incident three months ago when police allegedly beat homeless Roma living in the main railway station in the capital, Skopje.
Young family lost because authorities didnt care enough By Nadia Fazlulhaq Hills are alive with unsound buildings - Boowella ground could not support five storeys View(s): View(s):

Lack of finance for geosurface analysis, political interference at local authority level, failure by the State to obtain professional assistance and the absence of continuous reviews of buildings is putting lives in the central hills in danger, experts warn.

The tragedy this week at Sangamitta Mawatha in Buwelikada, Kandy that took the lives of a young family could have been prevented if early preventive measures had been taken, experts said.

Today, the house and boutique hotel owned by lawyer Achala Ekanayake, 32, and her husband, businessman Chamila Prasad, 35, is a huge pile of debris. Where once was heard the sound of lullabies and baby cries and giggles, there is now silence.

The catastrophe occurred when the adjoining five-storey building collapsed in the early hours of September 20, burying one-and-a-half-month-old baby Onela and her young parents. Army and police rescue teams first recovered the baby but she died on admission to hospital. The bodies of the parents were recovered almost eight hours after the collapse.

The owner of the five-storey house, Anura Lewke, his wife and children, escaped unhurt when their house collapsed. They gave no warning of impending collapse to their neighbours.

University of Peradeniya Senior Professor of Geology, Athula Senaratne said the name of the suburb where the house lay, Bhuwelikada, means  boowella or loose soil, which would indicate the ground could not support a weight of five storeys.

The foundation itself is in question, Dr. Senaratne said. It is clear that it was not built according to construction standards, and not even included in the original plans is the fact that the intention was to put four more storeys.

Since 2011, it has been compulsory to obtain NBRO clearance. But this building was constructed in 2006-7. We have doubts about the foundation, Prof. Senaratne said.

A circular was issued in 2011 (No. NBRO 2011/1) following a Cabinet decision giving powers to the NBRO to issue Clearance Certificates through Landslide Risk Assessment Process (LRAP) for any construction activity proposed in 10 landslide- vulnerable districts: Nuwara Eliya, Badulla, Kegalle, Kalutara, Kandy, Matale, Matara, Galle and Hambantota. It is compulsory to obtain NBRO clearance at the initial stage of any development activity.

It was noticed that some gullies coming down the slopes were blocked both above and below by houses, Prof. Senaratne said. There is also evidence of a pipeline leakage. There have been multiple failures that have led the ground to let go of the construction that it could not bear any more.

He said the government should not wait for an emergency to call on the advice of experts, whether geologists, structural engineers and planners, but obtain their support continuously, eliciting assessments and recommendations.

Our universities are geared with the most qualified persons  there are so many volunteers from the Peradeniya University itself. It is saddening that our expertise is rarely requested, he said.

Local authorities, the main approval bodies, especially ones run by pradeshiya sabhas, have greater political influence in construction in Badulla, Kandy and Nuwara Eliya districts.

Prof. Senaratne said the Tourism Ministry also should initiate a general assessment of properties in the Central and Uva provinces.

There are many risky constructions in the Ella, Bandarawela and Haputale areas. Not all need to be removed or relocated; there are plenty of remedial measures to strengthen the structure, he said.

The head of the National Building and Research Organisations (NBRO) Landslide Division, R.M.S. Bandara, said approval agencies, namely local authorities, had failed to conduct post-construction reviews.

This young family fell prey to a construction of a multi-storeyed building that was built in a way that the soil of the valley could not cope with. The foundation was laid for two floors but ended up supporting five storeys. The soil failed to carry the weight of five floors. With rains, the valley can have a certain amount of erosion. This collapse is not due to a landslide or land subsidence but mainly to a construction default, he said.

Mr. Bandara said since the guidelines were issued in 2011, more than 90,000 building reviews have been conducted and recommendations made.

But then approval agencies should make sure the owners follow the recommendations, Mr. Bandara said. The absence of this has led to building owners putting up storeys without informing the approval agency.

Kandy Municipal Commissioner Chandana Tennakoon said cannot comment as a report on the accident is being prepared for the Central Province Governor.

The senior geologist attached to the NBROs Kandy district office, Samantha Bogahapitiya, said at present the soil is observed by its outer appearance. Geo-technical analysis of a slope needed drilling to bedrock.

It is a good move to conduct a building survey for buildings before 2011. That wont be an easy task as Kandy itself has about 35,000-40,000 buildings, he said.

Senior Superintendent of Police (Kandy), Sudath Masinghe said as this was a construction failure, original documents including plans are to be submitted to court for further action to be taken.

If it is proven that the owner has not taken precautionary measures or has misled authorities, it will be deemed a criminal offence due to the deaths of three people, he said.

He also said the owners had acted irresponsibly by not informing police or neighbours when there were signs that their house could collapse.

Officials from the Kandy Municipal Council refused to comment on this.

Additional reporting and pix by our Kandy Correspondent Shane Seneviratn

How a five-storey house started from the bottom By L.B. Senaratne in Kandy The owner of the collapsed five-storey building, Anura Lewke, a former Basnayake Nilame, had obtained approval for the building in Bhuwelikada in 2007 stating he intended to build a basement and one floor, according to the records now in possession of the Urban Development Authority. The Bhuwelikada area has become increasingly popular among local and foreign tourists visiting Kandy. Guesthouses and rest rooms are mushrooming in the area. The Director of the Urban Development Authority (UDA) in Kandy, N.A.S.N. Nissanka, said only a detailed investigation by qualified engineers could reveal the cause of the collapse. The first application for this building was made in 2006 to the Kandy Municipal Councils (KMC) planning committee. In 2007, approval was given by the planning committee, where the UDA has a representative, for a basement and one floor. Then in 2009, another application was made for a basement and two floors. Then, in 2016, another application was made for a basement and two other floors, he said. Each time, approval for the building work was granted by the municipal council. Mr. Nissanka said the problem lay with many applications being submitted with the basement being mentioned in all of them. The KMCs planning committee should also be held responsible, the UDA Director said. There is a shortage of staff to monitor such constructions but, then, this building stood out prominently, being a huge, five-storeyed building. It is also a concern that the KMC granted approval for another basement on top of a basement. This is highly suspicious, he said. The UDA has reportedly sent its findings to the Presidential Secretariat. Central Province Governor Lalith B. Gamage said plans are underway to identify all unauthorised buildings or parts of buildings. Mother weeps for the family buried alive Building collapse survivor Jayanthi Kumarihami Ekanayake, 59, wept as she described how she visited her late daughter, Achala Ekanayake, to help take care of baby Onela. That night, she said, we went to sleep at about 11pm. When I woke at 1am there was no sound. Later, still early in the morning I woke up hearing a loud crash to find the wall of my room slanted over and the ceiling fan hanging by wires. I immediately took my phone and called 119. Only after two hours did I realise that the five-storey house next door had collapsed onto ours. I kept shouting out that there are three others in the house, she said. I plead with President Rajapaksa to instruct officials to take strict action against those who do not adhere to safety measures despite their position or rank, Mrs. Ekanayake said. The young woman who died, Achala, from Keppetipola, Welimada, came from a family of vegetable farmers. A bright student, she passed the Grade 5 scholarship examination and entered Bandarawela Central College from the junior school in Welimada. Obtaining a law degree from the Open University, she took oaths as an attorney-at-law in 2018. While working as a lawyer in Nuwara Eliya she met Chamila Prasad through a mutual friend. They were married in November last year and on August 1 this year, baby Onela was born. Both of them lived on the top floor of the hotel owned by my son-in-law, Mrs. Ekanayake said. After the Easter Sunday attack and COVID, the income from the hotel was limited. Because she was expecting a baby and because of the COVID threat Achala decided to stay at home while her husband ran a small eatery in Kundasale, the distraught mother said. Chamila Prasad had lost his father recently and his mother died when he was just five years old. Chamila was overjoyed when his daughter was born; he was a hands-on father, always helping his wife whether it was cooking, sweeping or even singing lullabies to his newborn daughter, Chamilas relatives said. His eldest brother, who lives in the United Kingdom, was permitted to attend the funeral under strict quarantine regulations and allowed to pay his last respects while in an ambulance. The sight of the weeping uncle showing a smiling photo of baby Onela brought tears to many at the funeral.

Suspect building application bypassed most officials Central Province Governor Lalith B. Gamage said everyone who had given approval for the construction of the five-storey building that collapsed should be at fault.By Monday (28) we will receive the complete report from the NBRO on the possible cause of the collapse, he said. The Sunday Times has learned that although all members of the Planning Committee of the Kandy Municipal Council should sign documents of approval of construction applications, only two officers had signed one of the applications to build additional floors onto the building at the centre of the inquiry. According to a municipal engineer, there are 256 illegal constructions in the Kandy municipal limits. A lobby group, the Organisation for the Protection of Public Property, said it had raised questions of the number of illegal buildings in Kandy and the number of cases filed in the courts to demolish property built over public drainage lines. Organisation Secretary Anura Gonawela said demolition orders for nearly 250 unauthorised constructions have been obtained from the Magistrates Court, but these orders had not been implemented. That makes it contempt of court as well, he said.
STRATFORD  Bunnell High School will be closed for the next two weeks in an abundance of caution after the district said two more people tested positive for COVID-19.

District officials initially said the school would be closed on Tuesday after several teachers had direct exposure with the coronavirus, Superintendent Janet Robinson wrote in the letter earlier Friday

Later in the day that closure was extended to two weeks.

Any student or staff which has been directly in contact with the positive person will be contacted individually and should remain in quarantine for 14 days, Robinson said in her followup letter Friday evening.

The school was already due to be closed Monday due to Yom Kippur.

Students will return to hybrid learning - meaning some in person learning - beginning Oct. 12.

Earlier in the day, Robinson said a number of students were also among those exposed to the virus.

The towns school buildings are closed Wednesdays for all students to participate in distance learning days under the school districts hybrid learning plan.

The building will receive a thorough cleaning while closed, Robinson said.

The superintendent did not say exactly how many people had been exposed, but said those affected have been told to isolate themselves for 10 days and given instructions on steps to take before returning to school.

Anyone who is considered a close contact has been contacted or will be contacted by school or local health officials and provided with instructions on the appropriate steps to take, Robinson said.

The news of the closure comes after a staff member at the school tested positive for COVID-19 earlier this week. The superintendents letter did not indicate whether officials believed the exposures reported Friday were connected to that case.

The superintendent said the last day the staff member who tested positive was in school was Monday.

Last week a staff member at Stratford High School tested positive for COVID-19.

In that case, officials said they do not believe the staff member was at the school while contagious.

The superintendent shared a list of preventative measures for students and staff and reminded anyone who is feeling ill to stay home and report their symptoms to a medical provider.

The superintendents letter included a link to an advisory from state officials about what to do if a student or family member has possible coronavirus symptoms.

We are closely monitoring this situation and working with the Stratford Public Health Department and will provide you with updates as we know more, Robinson said.
Karan Johar

Mumbai: Filmmaker Karan Johar issued a statement debunking the media reports alleging that narcotics were consumed at one of his house parties, calling the claims baseless and false.

In a lengthy statement shared on Instagram, the filmmaker said neither he consumes narcotics nor does he promote usage of any such substance.

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Karan JoharJohar's response came after an old video from a star-studded party at his residence resurfaced on social media, amid Narcotics Control Bureau's (NCB) drugs probe in connection with actor Sushant Singh Rajput's death.

In the short clip, first posted by the filmmaker on Instagram last year, actors Shahid Kapoor, Deepika Padukone, Ranbir Kapoor, Varun Dhawan, Arjun Kapoor, Malaika Arora, Vicky Kaushal among others can be seen partying together. It is being alleged that drugs were consumed by several top film personalities at this party.

"Certain news channels, print/electronic media and social media platform(s) are wrongly and misleadingly reporting that narcotics were consumed at a party that I, Karan Johar hosted on July 28, 2019 at my residence. I had already clarified my position way back in 2019 that the allegations were false," Johar said in the statement.

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Karan Johar

I am reiterating that the allegations are completely false and baseless. No narcotics substance was consumed at the party. I would like to once again state that I do not consume Narcotics and I do not promote or encourage consumption of any such substance," he added.

The director said such "slanderous" statements and news articles have subjected him, his family, colleagues, and banner Dharma Productions, to "hatred, contempt and ridicule".

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Karan Johar

Johar said in the past few days media has resorted to distasteful, distorted and false allegations, and if the baseless claims continue to malign his image he wouldn't be left with any other option but to legally protect his rights.

I hope the members of the media would exercise restraint else I will be left with no option but to legally protect my rights against this baseless attack on me," he said.
A Minnesota mom has been charged with murdering her disabled 13-year-old daughter after allegedly turning off the alarm on her emergency medical device and depriving her of life-saving care while her husband was on a fishing trip.

Elise Nelson, 35, of Paynesville was charged Wednesday over the death of her child Kylie Larson back in June.

Kylie had several medical conditions from a loss of oxygen at birth including cerebral palsy, respiratory failure and developmental delay.

She required around-the-clock care, including the use of a pulse oximeter device that monitored her oxygen level and pulse rate and sounded an alarm if they dropped below a certain level.

Police said Nelson deliberately tampered with the medical device and allowed her child to die.

Minnesota mom Elise Nelson, 35, has been charged with murdering her disabled 13-year-old daughter after allegedly depriving her of care and silencing the alarm on her medical device

Nelson was the only person home with Kylie when she died on June 21.

The mom had been caring for her daughter alone for four days between June 18 to June 21, while her husband was on a fishing trip and her other daughter was staying with a family friend.

Authorities allege that during the four-day period Nelson tampered with Kylie's pulse oximeter device, silencing its alarm before ultimately turning it off.

The device can be tampered with to manually change the level at which the the alarm will sound.

Nelson allegedly altered the medical equipment so the alarm would not sound when her daughter's oxygen and pulse levels dropped below 90 percent.

Then, on the morning of June 21, she allegedly raised the level from 74 percent back to 90 percent before turning the alarm off altogether, according to data from the machine.

When the family friend tried to drop off Nelson's other daughter, they could not get hold of her, says the criminal complaint.

Nelson was charged Wednesday over the death of Kylie Larson, 13, (pictured) back in June. Kylie had several medical conditions from a loss of oxygen at birth including cerebral palsy, respiratory failure and developmental delay

Nelson texted the friend hours later saying she had been giving Kylie CPR for an hour and was waiting for emergency services to arrive.

But the mom didn't call 911 for another 20 minutes after sending the text, according to authorities.

Police arrived at the home to find Kylie lying on the living room floor.

Nelson allegedly told police her daughter had flatlined after her oxygen levels fell to 86 percent.

The teen was rushed to hospital and was pronounced dead.

An autopsy revealed Kylie died as a result of both complications during birth and being deprived of care by Nelson.

Kylie required around-the-clock care, including the use of a pulse oximeter device that monitored her oxygen level and pulse rate and sounded an alarm if they dropped below a certain level. Police said Nelson deliberately tampered with the device and allowed her to die

Her death was ruled a homicide and Nelson was charged with second-degree intentional murder and manslaughter in Stearns County District Court.

She was booked into jail Wednesday where she is being held on $500,000 bail without conditions or $350,000 with conditions.

She is scheduled to appear in court on October 8.

Kylie's devastated family paid tribute to the teen in an online obituary where they described her as a 'gift from God' and a 'sweet soul'.

'Kylie enjoyed being outside and moving around, whether it be spinning around in her chair, going for walks with friends and family, or traveling to new places. She loved spending time with her family and going for boat rides,' her family wrote.

'Her fellow schoolmates looked forward to pushing her around in the halls and laughing with her. You saw her sweet soul and smile in her eyes.'
Shelton McElroy of the Louisville Community Bail Fund posts bail for clients.

LOUISVILLE, Ky.  It was after midnight when Louisville police hauled the last of 127 people into jail following Wednesday night's Breonna Taylor protests, but bail fund advocates were already at work.

Checking records and calling relatives to see who couldn't afford to bail themselves out, Shelton McElroy within hours posted a bond from a pool of donated money, scrambling to set up post-release support, from transportation to legal referrals.

Organizers know it doesn't take long for anyone stuck behind bars, whether on a minor or major charge, to lose a job, an apartment and their footing in life because they can't afford pretrial bail.

"We're always in action mode  just trying to get people out," he said.

The work of nonprofit bail funds in Louisville and across the country  which serve low-income people languishing in jail pretrial solely because of unaffordable bail  have gotten both a national spotlight and massive financial infusion after receiving millions in donations since racial justice protests began in late May over police killings.

While bailing protesters has gotten much attention, the majority of protesters in Louisville have been released without cash bail. Yet the influx of funds has bolstered the funds' everyday work with average citizens, stuck in jail under a cash bail system that discriminates against the poor and disproportionately impacts people of color.

Nationally, about 60% of people in U.S. jails are awaiting trial, many because they can't pay their bonds.

"Rich people get out of jail. If youre poor, you sit in jail," said veteran criminal defense attorney Ted Shouse, who has worked with the Bail Project, one of two Louisville funds.

Despite their new largesse, leaders of Louisville's two bail organizations and other advocates are still not able to fill the need, especially in rural Kentucky. They want lasting change that will put them out of a job.

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"Permanent bail reform is still so needed," said Shameka Parrish-Wright, the Bail Project's manager who also is a protest leader  and who herself was arrested Thursday during demonstrations on charges that her lawyer said are bogus.

While she was released from jail the same night without a cash bail, too many others with low-level charges commonly are not, advocates say.

Proponents, which include some prosecutors, want to do away with bail for all but the most dangerous defendants. They point to studies that show defendants with no bail are just as likely to return to court as those with bail.

Breonna Taylor protest updates: Sit-in on Brooklyn Bridge; Protests in LA, Seattle, Chicago, Philly

They say new attention to the funds' work  coupled with coronavirus-related jail releases and trial delays that are leading some judges and prosecutors to rethink and minimize cash bail  makes for a promising window for long-sought legislative reform.

Whats happening right now is unprecedented in terms of how many people are aware of the problem, said McElroy, of the Louisville Community Bail Fund, who argues cash bail pressures defendants to accept plea deals, fuels mass incarceration and ruins lives.

Louisvilles two bail funds  the Bail Project, part of a national network that received $16 million in donations since protests began, and Black Lives Matter-run Louisville Community Bail Fund, which got more than $3.5 million  together as of mid-September had posted bonds for at least 483 people since protests began.

Demontez Campbell is among those who have been helped by the Bail Project.

The Louisville Bail Project has helped 2,300 people since it started in 2018 and 380 since April, among them 37 protestors. Most fell under the groups $5,000 soft bail cap. The majority of those it helps have a felony charge. The Louisville Community Bail Fund has bailed out at least 103 people since protests began, focusing on those with larger bails averaging $20,000, said one of its coordinators, Channelle Helm.

Both said they provide pretrial support such as court reminders, rides and housing, job and legal referrals. MeElroy said clients are met at the jail door, with water, a phone to use, clothing if they need it, a ride  and a plan to support them.

At least 90% of clients return to court, Parrish-Wright said.

Kentuckys pandemic-related efforts to administratively release defendants, embraced by some prosecutors, defense attorneys and judges, is also bolstering the case against cash bail as people return to court and stay out of trouble.

Though data is still being collected, in many cases people aren't reoffending or failing to show up to court at significantly higher rates, according to some judges, attorneys and prosecutors.

This is helping change peoples minds. The old lock-them-up-and-throw-away-the-key until their trial, that group is being proven wrong, said Jefferson Commonwealth Attorney Tom Wine.

Louisvilles jail population has fallen to less than 1,300 inmates, compared to being routinely more than 2,000 last year. But that could ramp back up after the pandemic subsides, and some state officials have said a return to pre-pandemic levels is possible.

Shouse said the group would like to "work its way out of a job" through lasting reform.

This is the moment," he said, noting that protests' spotlight on criminal justice inequities including cash bail and the pandemic have raised awareness and "brought us to a place where real bail reform is possible.

Under Kentucky law, judges are required to set bail based on the seriousness of the alleged crime; the potential danger of release to the community; the defendants ties to the community; and the likelihood the defendant will appear.

While federal courts can hold defendants with no bail, judges in Kentucky must set bail in all but capital murder cases. However, it doesnt have to be full cash. They can release a person on their own recognizance, order an unsecured bond where no money is due unless the person fails to return, including some signed by a family member or third-party. Kentucky doesn't allow bail bonds businesses.

Breonna Taylor: 1 hurt after car crashed into crowd at Los Angeles protest

Bails are supposed to be "reasonable," but a persons ability to pay is often given scant consideration, Shouse said. Instead, bails are set by "custom, practice, moral disapproval and the charge before the judge," he said.

Judges get pretrial services risk assessments on a defendant. But sometimes bail decisions occur in minuteslong hearings that can be not as thorough as they should be, said Jefferson County Attorney Mike OConnell, who favors cashless bail for lower-level cases, with fuller hearings on more serious ones.

Sometimes people with overdue fines or restitution for crimes like criminal mischief are jailed under a bond in the amount they owe. While that prompts some to quickly come up with the money, others are left in jail because they genuinely can't pay it, said District Judge Stephanie Pearce Burke.

In Kentucky in 2016, there were 64,123 defendants charged with nonviolent, nonsexual crimes jailed before trial because they could not afford their bail, according to a study of state court data by the nonprofit Louisville-based Pegasus Institute. They spent an average of 109 days in jail.

Shelton McElroy, standing, confers with Chenelle Helm outside the Jefferson County Clerk's Office before posting bail for clients as part of their work with the Louisville Community Bail Fund.

A Kentucky Center for Economic Policy report last year found that 57% of criminal district court and circuit court cases in Kentucky are subject to pretrial monetary bail, with 39% actually resulting in pretrial release.

In the six months Demontez Campbell sat in Hardin County jail, for example, unable to make bail while awaiting trial for third-degree burglary, he lost his job and place to live.

To get out and repair his life, he pleaded guilty and was put on probation. But then he missed a court date and faced another $1,500 bond he couldnt afford. He turned to the Louisville Bail Project to pay it  saving him, he said, from another devastating setback.

It would have knocked the wind out of me trying to rebuild my life, my relationship with my daughter, said Campbell, who also got help with rides to court, bus tickets and job referrals.

In recent years, states from California to New York have enacted changes to limit money bail. New York last year restricted the use of bail for many nonviolent crimes, which reduced jail populations but sparked a backlash after opponents argued some were committing new crimes.

'Mad. Pissed. Upset.': A day later, Breonna Taylor's mom returns to site of protests

Louisville Democratic State Sen. Morgan McGarvey said he plans to introduce or support such legislation next year, though details haven't been worked out. Those who work in the court system have different ideas about what that might look like.

Annette Karem, a Jefferson district judge, said she favors reducing cash bail use and adding funding to expand pretrial release conditions like home incarceration or drug treatment. Some prosecutors want expanded detention hearings and bail with more non-financial conditions. Shouse supports releasing all charged with a misdemeanor and or lower-level Class D felonies on their own recognizance unless a hearing is requested.

But state Sen. John Schickel, a Republican, opposes legislative bail limits on certain crimes, which he said would limit a judges discretion and could be open to abuse. Cash bail is really something that protects citizens from being held by the government, he said.

In January, Kentuckys Public Advocacy Department petitioned the state Supreme Court to fix what it called a broken and unconstitutional system. It argued that county jails are clogged with people who cant afford to post bail, which was overused for minor offenses. Kentucky and U.S. constitutions prohibit excessive bail.

Gov. Andy Beshear has urged the legislature to consider changes to the bail, parole and probation systems as part of an effort to ease jail and prison overcrowding.

It seems like everyone agrees its an unfair system. But the difficulty is creating a system that establishes who should be let out and who shouldnt, said Kate Miller, advocacy director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky. But I do think all this will add momentum.

For now, people like Mitzi Wilson are relying on bail funds.

About two years ago, she said, the $10,000 bond holding her son on a robbery charge might well have been a million.

"Couldnt afford the bail, not even a lawyer, none of that, she said.

Freed with the help of both groups, her son also got support: rides to probation and help with a job to get his life on track. He was later sentenced to probation. Hes now staying out of trouble, Wilson said. The help was so important.

Such work began having a national moment after millions of dollars were donated to such funds when protests sparked by police killings of Taylor in Louisville and George Floyd in Minneapolis first broke out.

The Minnesota Freedom Fund first gained attention, drawing tens of millions in donations, and since then celebrities and activists have helped drive donations to funds around the country.

The 80 funds in the National Bail Fund Network have bailed out more than 10,000 people in recent months, the group said.

Louisville's Black Lives Matter group had started bailing people out since 2017, Helm said, but it was few and far between until donations flooded in. Its been really exciting. Were a grassroots organization. So its been extremely overwhelming, Helm said.

Police and prosecutors have long raised concerns about judges releasing defendants accused of violent crimes to await trial, and some in Louisville cited concern about the bail fund posting bonds of up to $100,000 on charges such as assault and domestic violence. Wine said his office has had to notify victims in some cases.

McElroy said they give each case a "high level of consideration" of the circumstances, talking to attorneys and families, and consider victims. And he said that even people with serious charges should be presumed innocent and allowed to prepare a defense outside of jail just like wealthier defendants.

Research also shows people incarcerated pretrial are actually more likely to be found guilty and to receive harsher sentences, according to the Kentucky Economic Policy Center.

Its a way to pressure you into making a plea deal, McElroy said, which he said has made some prosecutors reluctant to embrace bail reform.

The funds get referrals from public defenders, calls from parents or phone calls from jail. The Bail Project reviews documents and talks to inmates and families to decide who could benefit from bail, what support they have and need.

Bail Project client advocate Savvy Shabazz headed to court to post bail for the group's clients in Louisville.

In Louisville, the vast majority of protesters have been released on their own recognizance, with some being stuck with higher bonds on more serious charge or because of past charges such as missing a court appearance.

Many of the protesters arrested Wednesday in the wake of the decision not to charge any officers directly in connection with Taylor's death were also released on their own recognizance, some advocates said.

Breonna Taylor: What's next for the 2 officers who weren't indicted in the shooting?

On a Friday earlier this month, Bail Project client advocate Savvy Shabazz walked into a downtown bank and withdrew $40,700 from the bank teller.

He slid it into his pocket and walked down to the courthouse to free the latest 11 jail inmates  each behind bars solely because they couldnt afford their bond.

Once theyre out, the Bail Project offers support so they reappear in court. It could mean rides, bus tickets, housing or job referrals and reminders and help getting to court appointments so they can get the money back and reuse it.

The money we used to get you out? We need those funds to get someone else out, he tells clients.

Follow Chris Kenning on Twitter: @chris_kenning.

This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Louisville bail funds: Meet the groups bailing protesters from jail
By Azernews





By Ayya Lmahamad

Revenues of Azerbaijans gold mining company Azergold CJSC from export of precious metals amounted to AZN 493 million ($289.9M) during the four years of companys activity, the Ministry of Economy has reported.

The company exported over 202,000 ounces of gold and over 350,000 ounces of silver from Chovdar mine during four years of its activity.

Of these funds, AZN 36.7 million were transferred to the state budget in the form of taxes and social payments.

Moreover, the companys net profit amounted to AZN 35 million ($20.5M) during the years 2016-2019, of which AZN 15 million (8.8M) were directed to increase the charter capital.

Gold mining in Azerbaijan is currently carried out by two companies - AzerGold CJSC, which owns 51 percent in Azerbaijans gold share, and Anglo Asian Mining PLC, with 49 percent of shares.

Extraction of the first gold in Azerbaijan started in 2009, and silver in 2010.

AzerGold CJSC is a national mining company, which was established on February 11, 2016 according to the presidential decree.

It should be noted that AzerGold increased its revenues from the sale of gold and silver in the first eight months of 2020. Thus, the companys revenues increased by $16 million or 32 percent in the reporting, amounting to $68.5. During the reporting period, AzerGold produced 39,312 ounces of gold, which is by 4,752 ounces or 14 percent more than initially planned. The production volume increased due to optimization works in production and introduction of new technological methodologies.

The company recently started geophysical and geological exploration in the countrys Dashkasan iron ore deposit with a proven reserves of 270 million tons. In August, President Aliyev ordered to allocate AZN 3 million ($1.7M) from the state budget of 2020 to AzerGold to begin preparation of the primary document of assessment of the Dashkesan iron ore deposit.
Veolia plans to raise price for a 29.9% stake in Suez-CEO A Veolia logo is seen at the Veolia Household Waste Recycling headquarters in Lezennes

PARIS (Reuters) - French utility Veolia <VIE.PA> will increase its offer to buy the bulk of Engie's <ENGIE.PA> stake in smaller rival Suez <SEVI.PA> and has the financial capacity to do so, CEO Antoine Frerot said on Friday.

Frerot also told reporters that Veolia would not ask for a seat on Suez' board if the company buys Engie's stake.

He did not specify by how much Veolia would increase its offer.

Veolia last month offered Engie 2.9 billion euros (2.66 billion pounds) for a 29.9% stake in Suez, with a view to subsequently taking full control of its rival by buying up more shares.

Engie, which owns almost 32% of Suez, rejected Veolia's initial advance but has said it would consider a higher offer.

Suez sees Veolia's bid plan as hostile and is working on finding a consortium of investors to put together a rival bid for Engie's stake.

The company also set up a foundation to protect its water business in France that Veolia plans to sell to Meridiam Infrastructure.

Frerot said he was hoping to find a way to fend off the foundation that Suez put in place.

Suez shares were up 4.15% at 0856 GMT.

(Reporting by Benjamin Mallet; writing by Matthieu Protard; editing by Jason Neely and Barbara Lewis)
Federal Judge Amy Coney Barrett speaks during the University of Notre Dame Law School's commencement ceremony in 2018. (Robert Franklin / Associated Press)

To the editor: Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), when she expressed concerns about Amy Coney Barrett's Roman Catholic religious "dogma" during her confirmation to the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in 2017, was reminded by people who knew our Constitution well about Article VI. ("If Amy Coney Barrett is nominated and confirmed, it will be a shame for the Supreme Court and the country," Opinion, Sept. 24)

Here is the relevant portion of that article: "No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States."

In writing about Barrett, who is seen as President Trump's top pick for the Supreme Court, columnist Harry Litman needs to be open to the fact that this nation is composed of citizens with many opinions and points of view, not those exclusively of the Democratic Party's left wing.

Elizabeth Norling, Long Beach

..

To the editor: I'm fascinated by the "originalist" theory of interpreting the U.S. Constitution. Does that mean we should go back to a time without electricity, cars and plumbing?

More importantly, America's founding fathers didn't include women. A woman such as Barrett couldn't have become an attorney much less a federal judge. What exception to an originalist reading entitles Barrett's career to exist?

Make no mistake about it: Women's access to a full range of family planning choices is one reason that we're no longer enslaved by our reproductive systems. Once-impossible paths are now open to us. We women didn't even get the right to vote until a little over a century ago.

Under an originalist interpretation of the Constitution, how many precious rights would be now have to surrender?

I'll never get to argue a case before the Supreme Court. However, I'm rooting for all those nimble-minded attorneys who will turn the originalist theory into the double-edged sword that it is. I hope to live long enough to see that day.

Betty Rome, Culver City





This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Sunday update: Authorities have found Garrows body, family says.

Sullivan, N.Y.  Dozens of responders are continuing to search for a missing woman in Madison County.

The search for Elizabeth Garrow, 19, resumed early Saturday morning. Over 75 officers and trained rescuers hailing from nine agencies are canvassing the county for Garrow, a mother who disappeared four days ago from Canastota, county spokeswoman Samantha Field said.

We have several locations throughout Madison County we are looking at, Field said.

She declined to specify exactly where deputies are searching.

READ MORE: Missing CNY womans sisters worry foul play: Whoever knows something needs to say something

Elizabeth Garrow, 19, of Canastota, was last seen at a Dunkin' cafe in Canastota on Sept. 23.Madison County Sheriff's Office

For the second day in a row, Sullivan appeared to be the base of operations for the search for the Madison County Sheriffs Office.

Marked and unmarked police vehicles from a host of departments, including Wilderness Search and Rescue, parked outside the Bridgeport Fire Departments station at 2219 Route 31. Some rescuers wore camouflage clothing.

Garrow was last seen between 11 a.m. and noon Wednesday at the Dunkin' at 369 N. Peterboro St., deputies said. When she was last spotted, Garrow was with George McDonald Jr., her husband, deputies said.

Garrow has a 1-year-old daughter named Annovia. She recently told her sisters she was six weeks pregnant.

McDonald, 24, of Sullivan, was arrested Friday for violating probation and is being held in the Madison County Jail. His charges are not related to his wifes disappearance, deputies said.

George McDonald Jr., 24, the husband of a missing Madison County woman, was arrested Sept. 25, 2020, by the Madison County Sheriff's Office for violating probation. Officials said the charge is not related to the disappearance of Elizabeth Garrow. McDonald was the last person seen with his 19-year-old wife before she went missing from the Dunkin' on North Peterboro Street in Canastota.Madison County Sheriff's Office

The Madison County District Attorneys Office said McDonald is also facing a second-degree criminal contempt charge.

The sheriffs office has identified "persons of interest'' while investigating Garrows disappearance, Field has said. No information about how many people are being investigated or what theyre suspected of has been released.

Garrow was dedicated to her daughter, her sisters said, and stayed in close contact with her family. That dedication makes her sisters fear foul play.

This is very unusual for her, said Emily Lloyd, one of Garrows big sisters. She wouldnt leave.

Elizabeth Garrow's sisters say she was always on her phone, sharing photos of her with her 1-year-old daughter Annovia. (Provided Photo)

Deputies have asked anyone with information to call (315) 366-2311.

The sheriffs office was assisted Saturday by:

New York State Forest Rangers

Bridgeport Volunteer Fire Department

New York State Environmental Conservation Police

Canastota Police Department

Madison County Search and Rescue

Oswego County Search and Rescue

Massasauga Search and Rescue

Wilderness Search and Rescue

Staff writer Samantha House covers breaking news, crime and public safety. Have a tip, a story idea, a question or a comment? Reach her at shouse@syracuse.com.
TIRANA, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- The Chinese Embassy in Albania has donated on Friday 150 "friendship trees" to Tirana, marking the 100th anniversary of the city becoming Albania's capital.

Chinese Ambassador to Albania Zhou Ding and Deputy Mayor of Tirana Municipality for Foreign Relations Anuela Ristani planted some of the trees in the park of the Artificial Lake in Tirana.

Speaking at the ceremony, Zhou said that the trees, donated ahead of the 71st anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China, which falls on Oct. 1., symbolize the everlasting friendship between the two countries on the occasion of the two anniversaries.

Zhou said Tirana is a strong and lively city. "Despite the shocks of several earthquakes and COVID-19 pandemic, residents here always face challenges and difficulties with courage and solidarity."

The ambassador recalled that on the onset of COVID-19 outbreaks in China, the Tirana municipality initiated a campaign to support China's fight against the pandemic by rejecting stigmatization and discrimination.

"We are very proud of having a real friend like Albania and very proud of China's contribution with medical equipment in Albania's battle against the pandemic," Zhou added.

Zhou said that Tirana is moving forward on the path of green and sustainable development, stressing that China is ready to work together with Albania and Tirana on promoting green economic recovery.

In her remarks, Ristani praised the donation of the Chinese embassy.

"This is absolutely a very special gift for Tirana, more special than in any other year, especially in this difficult time, when it is not easy for our friends to wish or be present during our celebrations," Ristani said.

Among those present at the ceremony was Head of the Friendship Parliamentary group between Albania and China, Member of Parliament (MP) Bashkim Fino.

Fino thanked the Chinese embassy and the ambassador on behalf of the Albanian Parliament and the Albanian people for the continuous assistance given to the country.

Fino called the donation as a "great help and extraordinary care shown by the Chinese Embassy."

Tirana was declared the capital of Albania on Feb. 11, 1920.
A letter late Friday was sent to Commissioner George P. Bush at the Texas General Land Office enjoining his support for federal monies to build a detention basin on the 171.1 acres of land the county owns east of T.C. Jester Boulevard.

The letter was penned by State Representative Sam Harless who voiced his strong support for the project.

Cypress Creek Flooding Series: Frustrated Cypress Creek group asks county for two solutions to flooding

Harless extolled the Flood Districts commitment to the project expending their own funds for everything except for construction costs. They are seeking $10 million in a grant application called the 2015 Floods State Mitigation Competition with a $200,000 local contribution.

The Flood Control District has identified several projects in the Cypress Creek area, and this project will be the first to bring meaningful flood damage reduction benefits to the communities I represent and in the heart of an area severely damaged from floods such as Hurricane Harvey, the representative wrote.

Applications for the Community Development Block Grant for Mitigation or CDBG-MIT are due Oct. 28, 2020 and could provide the momentum needed for meaningful change.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Gov. Greg Abbott pledges $167 million to Texas rental assistance

Sam is a real champion of our community regarding the flood prevention measures needed to mitigate flooding in the Cypress Creek Watershed, said Glenn Wilkerson, president of the Cypress Creek Flooding Task Force.

Wilkerson and many of his members were among the 200-plus citizens who joined in on a Zoom meeting on Sept. 22 with Flood Control District experts who explained the coming work and funds needed on the T.C. Jester Stormwater Detention Basin and the Westador Stormwater Detention Basin.

HCFCD was seeking feedback and during the meeting received nearly 100 comments.

Suffice it to say, community support for this is very strong, as is mine and we ask for your consideration of the benefits of this application, Harless closed in his letter.

Alan Black, P.E., director of operations at the HCFCD, led the presentation giving an overview of the project and then zeroing in on available details.

The bond was approved on Aug. 25, 2018 just over two years ago. The bond identified 181 projects across all 22 watersheds. By the second quarter of 2020, 144 of those projects have been initiated, including the two in the Cypress Creek watershed. At least 38 projects were added based on community input at a cost of approximately $400 million-plus.

With the $2.5 billion in bond funds and an additional $2.4 billion in partner funds ($680 million of which has already been received), the Flood Control District anticipates a total revenue of $4.9 billion dedicated to the projects.

We made it clear from the outset that we would need funding partners to fully construct the projects on the list, Black said.

Those additional funds will come in the form of grants which HCFCD must apply for, advocate for, and compete against other projects for available funds. Fortunately, the CDBG-MIT grant doesnt come with a requirement of a local match.

The funds are granted by Housing and Urban Development and administered by the Texas General Land Office for mitigation priorities that are targeted to reduce long-term risks for communities like Cypress and those along the Cypress Creek.

Jonathan St. Romain, one of the HCFCD experts on the Zoom call felt a lot was accomplished with the meeting.

These are two projects that, if implemented, will impact the community positively, he said.

He clarified that the $100 million for right-of-way was exclusively for Cypress Creek acquisitions.

It is important to note that land acquired using this money can be used for detention basins all along Cypress Creek. As I pointed out Tuesday night, this has the potential to impact many projects, he said.

St. Romain said he failed to point out in the meeting that they have several other Cypress watershed bond program items.

Heres a synopsis of the highlights of information given during the Tuesday night meeting. For a complete rebroadcast of the meeting, visit the Harris County Flood Control District website.

SYNOPSIS

The funding being sought in the Community Development Block Grant was approved by Congress more than two years ago in the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018. The State of Texas was allocated $4 billion.

According to the supplied timeline, the process is currently in the community outreach phase with the meeting on Tuesday night, and early next month will achieve the draft applications spot on the dial.

Approximately 17 projects across Harris County qualify for the CBDG-MIT grant and meetings are also being held in those communities for responses.

A regional drainage study for Cypress Creek recommended nearly 25,000 acre-feet of additional stormwater detention to help mitigate flooding in the area.

The area is overdeveloped and much of It came before current regulations around onsite detention were in place. That presents a completely different challenge for the Flood Control District as they try to make purchases of land around those who dont want to sell leaving them with a patchwork for detention basins instead of entirely contiguous land mass.

We recently completed a regional drainage study for the watershed and confirmed that flooding along tributaries of Cypress Creek is predominantly caused by water from a rising Cypress Creek backing up into those tributariesnot a lack of sufficient stormwater conveyance or drainage capacity on the tributaries themselves, Black said.

Black put the 25,000 acre-feet of added detention into perspective.

Since the Flood Districts creation in 1937, weve constructed approximately 50,000 acre-feet of detention, he said.

The approach of the Cypress Creek Implementation Program, Black said, provides a holistic view of activity in the watershed and enables the Flood Control District to deliver projects strategically and efficiently in a heavily developed area. The HCFD has employed Jones and Carter as the consultants on the project. They began late in the summer and anticipate having the projects prioritized by next summer 2021.

Projects are expected to include stormwater detention basins, projects to improve the channels ability to carry stormwater on various Cypress Creek tributaries, and right-of-way acquisition for floodplain preservation.

Black said this combination should achieve the desired outcome.

To expedite projects, HCFCD would begin projects on land already owned by the county.

Black explained the lifecycle of a project can be expected to take between three and five years.

The lifecycle starts with a feasibility study to determine if there is a good project to be built, he said. Its followed by a Preliminary Engineering Report, the initialization of right-of-way acquisition which can take 12-18 months of legal work alone.

They must also secure an environmental permit which can take an additional year. Then comes the utility relocations, if necessary, and a final design. Once the design has been approved, construction begins.

Black also emphasized that each of the 141 projects underway around the county are all affected by their own timeline and can be impacted by available funding.

Stormwater detention basins are a place to store potentially damaging floodwaters temporarily until the channels can safely carry the water away, Black said. As flat as Harris County is, most of our stormwater has to be excavated.

The basins can be several hundred acres in size and often resemble lakes. Black said when they are dry, they are simply large open spaces. Those spaces can include park benches, trails, and playground equipment. However, each of those items mean water displacement, something they view as using sparingly in order to make room for the most storage in a flood.

On the west side of T.C. Jester, the District plans to begin rough grading excavation in the next few months through their Excavation and Removal program.

This is a program where we allow a contractor to excavate at their discretion, with a set footprint based on their business model of selling fill material, Black explained. The material is excavated at little to no cost to the District, another cost savings to taxpayers. It also allows the project to get started while the engineering and final design are being finalized.

The goal for the Westador Stormwater Detention Basin is to construct a stormwater detention basin on the main stem of Cypress Creek. It will require the combination of property owned by the District and Westador MUD and could hold as much as 500 acre-feet of detention. Black said they will be selecting a consultant soon to begin the preliminary engineering report.

dtaylor@hcnonline.com
Serbia wants to further develop friendly relations with Turkey in the future, said the country's president Friday, Trend reports citing Daily Sabah.

Aleksandar Vucic's remarks came after a working lunch with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Istanbul.

"(With Turkey) we want to keep our best level relations and further develop friendly ties in the future," said Vucic.

Turkey has an important influence in the Western Balkans, he stressed, adding that there existed excellent communication between the two countries.

''This is very important from our perspective. Turkey is one of the most important regional powers and also a one moving to a more prominent position in the world with each passing day,'' said Vucic.
Mumbai: Kangana Ranaut was in the mood for spiritual nostalgia over the weekend, as she took to social media on Saturday and shared a picture from the time she visited Shri Kashi Vishwanath Temple in Varanasi.

In the image, Kangana is seen meditating along with actress Juhi Chawla and spiritual leader Sadhguru.

"This picture is from my recent visit to Kashi Vishvanath. Har Har Mahadev," she wrote alongside the snap on Twitter. The post shows Kangana dressed in ethnic saree, teaming up with a maroon shawl. She also wears a garland.

This picture is from my recent visit to Kashi Vishvanath. Har Har Mahadev pic.twitter.com/7L8ul8Dsic  Kangana Ranaut (@KanganaTeam) September 26, 2020

Kangana has been in the news for consecutive controversies. She declared 99 per cent of Bollywood was on drugs, and then locked horns with the Shiv Sena government in Maharashtra by saying the situation in Mumbai had become as bad as POK. This was followed by Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) initiating a demolition drive at her office in the city, which was stayed after a High Court order.

On the work front, the actress has three films coming up -- the J. Jayalalithaa biopic "Thalaivi", the action thriller "Dhaakad", and "Tejas", where she plays a fighter pilot.
By Express News Service

MANGALURU: Kannada television host and dancer-turned-actor Anushree appeared before the Central Crime Branch and Economics and Narcotics police on Saturday and was grilled for over three hours in connection with a drug case.

She was questioned by Vinay Gaonkar, DCP (Traffic and Crime), at the office of the Assistant Commissioner of Police at Panambur. She was summoned to appear before September 29.

Speaking to reporters after the questioning, Anushree said she answered all the queries posed by the police regarding her link with Tarun Raj, who has been named by Kishore Aman Shetty and another accused who were arrested on charges of consuming and possessing drugs. "I am ready to appear for questioning before the police again if required," she said.

Asked about reports of her missing the questioning on Friday, she clarified that she was supposed to reach Mangaluru on Friday and the questioning was scheduled for today.

"I know them both (Tarun and Kishore) since they were my choreographers. Tarun was my choreographer for a dance show around 12 years ago. I have not attended any parties," she said when asked about media reports that she was part of drug parties organised by the accused.

She added that the public should support the police who are cracking down on the drug menace.
MITA 300x250

Man in the Arena, a documentary of Roger Ailess 50-year career from campaign strategist to cable news mogul to fallen icon, won the Grand Prize at the Anthem Libertarian Film Festival September 22. Accepting the award, director Michael Barnes said, One of the keys to understanding Roger Ailes is that he was a middle America guy who was a relentless champion of the underdog. Roger made it possible for underdogs to win. He excelled in leading long-shot campaigns against formidable foes, often in one-sided contests. You have to measure the good with the bad, the failures with the successes. And it puts meaning and context to the incredible life and Shakespearean downfall of an icon.

Speed of Life, directed by Liz Mansashil and described by festival producer Jo Ann Skousen as sci-fi that isnt dystopian, romance that isnt formulaic, time travel that isnt predictable, and with a good dose of laughter won the award for Best Narrative Feature.

Now in its tenth year, the Anthem festival was shut down less than two weeks before show time due to heightened Covid restrictions. I was devastated for our filmmakers-- the actors, directors, musicians, editors, producers, set designers, scriptwriters, costumers, and everyone else who contributes to the making of a film, Skousen said. We were thrilled when Salem Media provided a platform where we could stream the festival online.

Anthems motto of individuality, choice, and accountability can be seen in the themes of the 31 films selected for screening this year. They include films about education, journalism, and government regulation; history and politics; love and sacrifice; and individuals overcoming obstacles through resourcefulness and self-reliance. Award winner Get Off, a short narrative by Iranian filmmaker Teymour Ghaderi, is a good example of that resourceful and resilient spirit. It follows a plucky teenaged girl as she dodges police to get her bicycle across town when her male friend is unable to provide the required escort.

Other winners include The Teleios Act (Grant Bergland, director) for short narrative, The Big Skim (Molly Dedham, director) for short documentary, and They Say It Cant Be Done (Michael Ozias and Patrick Reasonover, directors) for Documentary Feature.

When asked about her personal favorite, Skousen responded, Im the mother to my festival. I dont have favorites. But in this divisive and violent year, I especially appreciate Whats Your Number? by Sigal Erez. She took a symbol of violent oppression the number tattooed on an arm-- and turned it into an expression of hope -- the numbering of our souls. I dont think any other film so clearly expresses the intrinsic value of each individual and Anthems motto of individuality, choice, and accountability.

The festival can be viewed on SalemNow.com through October 1.

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University Health System is looking to buy two office buildings to keep up with its quickly expanding workforce.

Officials hope to secure a $28 million deal for the buildings, located in University Park, a 3.2-million-square-foot business park near DeZavala Road and I-10.

About 1,000 of UHSs 8,600 employees hold non-clinical positions and currently work in seven office buildings around San Antonio.

UHS leases most of those facilities, an annual expense of $2.3 million. The acquisition is expected to start saving the system money in two years and will have a positive bottom-line impact in its third year, according to UHS documents.

University Health System has grown significantly in terms of locations, services and staff over the past decade as weve seen demand for services dramatically increase at University Hospital and across our large network of primary care and specialty care locations, spokeswoman Leni Kirkman said in a statement on Friday.

On ExpressNews.com: University Health System scoops up land on Loop 1604 for future hospital

In 2010, UHS employed 4,600, almost half as many people as it currently employs.

The taxpayer-funded hospital operator also brings in much more revenue. Ten years ago, UHS brought in $894 million in revenue, and this year expects to record $2.1 billion.

Kirkman said non-clinical employees work at University Hospital, the historic Robert B. Green hospital building and a business center on I-10 that the system purchased in 2006.

When UHS outgrew these locations, it began leasing space around town, including offices in Corporate Square, Chisholm Building, Highpoint Tower and University Park. The last of the leases expires in 2024.

Google

UHS expects to close on the purchase of the two buildings by Dec. 31, but would still need to finish out the office space.

Board documents show renovations, electrical and computer wiring changes and cubicle furniture will cost roughly $10.6 million, which would bring the total project cost to $38.6 million.

The buildings owner is Clarion Lion Properties Fund, an international real estate investment firm, which bought the pair of properties for $26.8 million in 2014. Previous tenants include USAA, which used more than 75 percent of the space, and a call center.

Google

Neighboring businesses include biomedical and health care companies, including Acelityand UnitedHealth Group.

SA Inc.: Get the best of business news sent directly to your inbox

Kirkman said the work groups that frequently interact include payroll and human resources, which can be located adjacently.

At the start of the pandemic, we quickly made accommodations to staff with temporary solutions like splitting shifts and enabling work from home, she said. These buildings provide a long-term solution as they will be configured to ensure staff have adequate space and barriers to reduce viral transmission.

Laura Garcia covers the health care industry. To read more from Laura, become a subscriber. laura.garcia@express-news.net | Twitter: @Reporter_Laura
CoWorks officially opened its doors in Brandon this past week, inviting local business owners and entrepreneurs to tour the facility from Monday to Friday.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 26/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

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CoWorks officially opened its doors in Brandon this past week, inviting local business owners and entrepreneurs to tour the facility from Monday to Friday.

Community manager Meaghan Harwood told the Sun that this staggered grand opening was used to try and maintain physical distancing while also giving interested parties a better idea of what a flexible workspace has to offer.

"Its actually been working really well," she said on Thursday. "I was super nervous, but its been fantastic. Its given me the ability to bring people through for safe tours and then do all of the cleaning and wiping down afterwards."

Harwood also used these tours to lay out the basic concept of a flexible workspace to those who are not familiar with this particular set-up.

"Basically, its an arrangement in which workers of different or the same companies share an office space, allowing cost-saving and convenience through the use of common infrastructure such as equipment, utilities, receptionists, custodial services and, in some cases, refreshments," she said.

For example, Harwood revealed that CoWorks offers a "hot desk" option, where a single client can book a spot and sit anywhere in the buildings main foyer, while also having access to Wi-Fi, a kitchen and other amenities.

Those seeking more private accommodations can take advantage of CoWorks executive offices, which can be used to host potential clients in a more professional setting than a residential home or local coffee shop.

Harwood said the popularity of flexible workspaces has been on the rise in Prairie cities like Winnipeg and Edmonton; a fact that encouraged her partners to bring this concept to Brandon for the benefit of small business owners and entrepreneurs alike.

"Theres also some talks about maybe using one of the offices as a business setting for (college) students, so that they know the feel of getting out in the real world and being in an office setting," she said.

Plus, Harwood said these flexible workspaces are becoming much more relevant throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, where overriding health concerns are causing traditional office culture to fracture.

And given the warm reception that shes received from the local business community so far, Harwood thinks that CoWorks has a pretty good chance of establishing a decent foothold in the Wheat City, especially for those who dont have the funds to rent out the entire floor of an office building for their start-up.

"So were just giving that ability to the Brandon business community, and to the schools, to be able to run a business without the huge overhead," she said.

Anyone interested in renting office space from CoWorks, or finding out more information about the facility in general, can contact Harwood at 204-717-1770 or hello@coworks.ca.

 kdarbyson@brandonsun.com

 Twitter: @KyleDarbyson
Abasi Joy Una, a Nigerian lady has called on the people of Nigeria to embark on a global scale virtual protest, in an attempt to demand accountability and transparency from the government on October 1 which marks the 60th independence anniversary of Nigeria.

In a post shared on her Twitter page, Una implored Nigerians to join her in demanding better governance come October 1.

The lady who is also a blogger has already displayed flyers for the protest on her page where she stated the mission and goal of the virtual protest.

She added that anyone who wishes to be a part of it must upload a one-minute video sharing their thoughts about the country and areas in which they hope to see improvements, using the hashtags, 'wearetired, wecandobetter'.

The young advocate told The ICIR that she desires for Nigerians to channel their inner patriotism and demand good governance from its leaders but wants them to do so in a civil manner.

I know it's hard to be a Nigerian but I hope people can manage to be civil in this virtual protest. There are ways to be assertive without being insultive, Una said.

While protests are a common thing in Nigeria and a necessity in every democracy, President Muhammadu Buhari administration has taken strict measures against critics both online and offline.

At different times in different states in Nigeria, police have clamped down and arrested protesters who have dared to resist unfavourable government policies.

Earlier in the month, Police in Lagos State reportedly arrested activists protesting against the recent hike in the pump price of petrol and electricity tariffs in the country.

Similarly, back in August, about 60 protesters were arrested in Abuja, after police took over the protest which was staged to demand good governance.
The European Union (EU) and Kazakhstan held their 18th meeting of the Cooperation Committee, online, on Friday, 25 September 2020, Trend reports citing Kazinform.

The EU is Kazakhstan's first trade and investment partner, representing over one third of Kazakhstan's external trade and over a half of total foreign direct investment in Kazakhstan. Kazakhstan is the first Central Asian country with which the EU signed an Enhanced Cooperation and Partnership Agreement (EPCA), which entered into force on 1 March 2020. Both the EU and Kazakhstan expressed their strong support for strengthening relations, the official website of the EU Delegation to Kazakhstan reads.

The Cooperation Committee discussed the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and the importance of strengthened multilateralism. The EU and its Member States have mobilised 123 million for Central Asia. In July, the EU launched a comprehensive 3 million Central Asia COVID-19 Crisis Response Solidarity Programme, with a primary focus on Kazakhstan. The programme, implemented by the World Health Organisation, will provide support over a period of two years to mitigate the current outbreak of the pandemic and contribute towards longer-term resilience of the national health systems. The EU commended Kazakhstan for playing its part in providing humanitarian assistance to its neighbours and to some EU Member States.

The EU and Kazakhstan reviewed their cooperation in the following fields covered by the EPCA: the rule of law, good governance, the protection of human rights, economic developments and reforms, energy, transport, environment, climate action, mobility and people-to-people cooperation, education, science, civil society and regional cooperation.

The EU recalled that in the current COVID-19 pandemic, emergency measures, in Europe and elsewhere, should not be used to limit the democratic space, to censor freedom of expression and access to information online and offline, to limit the work of human rights defenders, journalists or other professionals. In relation to the new law on freedom of assembly adopted in May, the EU stressed that the implementation of this law should uphold the fundamental rights of the citizens of Kazakhstan. The EU congratulated Kazakhstan for its progress on the path to a full abolition of death penalty, which is a cruel, inhumane and degrading punishment that violates the right to life. Kazakhstans ratification of the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights is in process. Furthermore, in 2020, Kazakhstan substantially increased its voluntary contribution to the International Commission against the Death Penalty. The Cooperation Committee discussed the progress made in the framework of the high-level EU-Kazakhstan Business Platform set up in June 2019. The EU welcomed efforts undertaken to improve the investment climate while encouraging further sustainable implementation of planned reforms, in particular the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) recommendations in relation to strengthening private sector development and protection of investments.

The EU welcomed Kazakhstans National Strategy towards a Green Economy and stressed that the European Green Deal would be at the heart of EU recovery efforts. The EU is prepared to offer expertise, finance projects, exchange on regulations and principles for sustainable finance and development.

Under Erasmus+, 115 million was earmarked for higher education cooperation with Central Asia for the 2014-2020 period. Kazakhstan has been the major beneficiary of this funding. By the end of 2020 some 3,400 Kazakh students and staff will have come to Europe to study or teach, while Kazakh institutions will have hosted over 1,500 Europeans. These Erasmus+ opportunities will continue in the 2021-2027 programme.

The EU recalled that Kazakhstan is welcome to participate in the remaining calls for research proposals, in particular the upcoming Horizon 2020 European Green Deal call for research & innovation proposals. The Cooperation Committee also discussed EU-Central Asia regional cooperation including in the field of security, counter-terrorism, fighting drug trafficking and border management.
Three people have been confirmed dead as a truck fell into the Epe River from Berger Bridge late Friday night.

As at Friday night, the number of people in the six tyres truck were uncertain as rescue officials could do nothing this Saturday morning.

Dr Femi Oke-Osanyintolu, Director General, Lagos State Emergency Management Agency, LASEMA, had said the Agency received information late last night of an accident involving a Volvo tipper that fell off the Berger bridge in Epe into the Epe river.

Upon arrival at the scene of incident, it was discovered that the six (6) Tyre Truck was loaded with Sand .The number of people in the truck was unknown.

Since it was the late hours of yesterday night, a combined team of Agency responders, Marine Rescue Unit, Nigeria Police and Local Divers have been carrying out Search and Rescue operations.

No deaths or casualties confirmed at present, he had said.

However, on Saturday, Oke-Osanyintolu confirmed that three adult male were brought out of the River dead.

The six (6) Tyre Truck has been located and retrieved along with the bodies of three adult male.

A combined team of Agency responders, Marine Rescue Unit (LASWA & LASEMA), Nigeria Police and Local Divers have been carrying out Search and Rescue operations, he said.

He said further search by a team of police and LASEMA was still on.
By Express News Service

HYDERABAD: Chinta Yoga Hemanth Kumar, who was murdered in cold blood on Thursday, and Dontireddy Avanti lived in the same locality in Chandanagar and knew each other for over a decade. They fell in love and were in a relationship for four years till they got married on June 11 at the Sub-Registrars Office in Quthbullapur. Soon after, they went into hiding and once they received their marriage registration certificate, the couple approached Cyberabad Police Commissioner VC Sajjanar seeking protection.

Sajjanar directed them to the Chandanagar police station, citing jurisdiction, and instructed the personnel there to counsel Hemanth and Avantis families. When the couple and their families were summoned to the police station, Avanti was allowed to speak to her parents for around three hours. She later informed the police that she would live with her husband and his family, and that they were facing a threat from her people.

Avanti made to give up her share of family assets

Prior to this, when the couple had eloped, Avantis parents had lodged a missing persons complaint at the Chandanagar police station. But as soon as the couple received their marriage certificate, Avantis parents took her to the registrar offices at Shankarpally, Kondapur and Kandi, police investigation has revealed. They made her sign sale deeds, stating that she has given her share of the familys assets, properties and businesses back to them and would never stake claim to these. This process was completed in a week.

ALSO READ | Newlywed couple from Hyderabad becomes victim of honour killing, husband strangled to death

Hemanths father Murali Krishna said the family might have been worried that she would claim her share in future, especially after the Supreme Courts recent judgement on giving share to daughters, whatever the case may be. However, Avanti said her family never contacted her ever since she married Hemanth. When they got to know of her relationship with him, they forced her to quit her job, took away her mobile phone and confined her at home, she alleged.

Police investigation further revealed that Avantis family had considered giving her a hefty sum to leave Hemanth. They had even offered him a huge amount but he refused to take the money. On Sunday, her parents Laxma Reddy and Archana, and uncle Yugandhar Reddy decided to kill Hemanth. Yugandhar, along with three contract killers, drove away with Hemanth towards Zaheerabad. Yugandhar tried to offer him money to leave Avanti, but Hemanth stood his ground. Though Avantis parents were not physically involved in the killing, they were following up the situation over phone.

Cops harass Hemanths dad

During questioning, the police harassed Hemanths parents, his father Murali Krishna has alleged. They would call me to the police station every day, take my mobile phone and make me wait till evening. I would stand at the police station all day and return home in the evening, he said.

The personnel were harsh and rude to him during questioning. The friendly policing that we hear and read about was nowhere to be seen. I am witness to this. I think Avantis parents, being richer than us, have influenced the police to act in their favour and harass us. They think their money can do anything and buy anything. Even now, their confidence to do anything with money has made them kill my son, without any fear for the police, the law or the strict punishments. It is our misfortune that the law supports such killers, while people like us suffer in silence, the father said.

Meanwhile, Avanti said she had hoped that her family would take her back. Four days ago, when my uncle Vijayender spoke to me and enquired about my well-being, I was happy. I was happy that my family was starting to accept me, but I never imagined that they would kill Hemanth and destroy our lives. Had I known that my family is so inhuman, I would have died at my home itself, without marrying Hemanth, she said.

Honour killings in Telangana

June 2020: 55-yr-old Gondigalla Galaiah was brutally murdered at Narayanpur in Bhongir district, after his son eloped with a girl from the same community. As the couple could not be traced, the girls family killed the boys father. The case is being investigated.

June 2020: A couple killed their minor daughter at Shantinagar in Jogulamba-Gadwal district, after she fell in love with a boy from another caste and got pregnant with his child.

October 2018: Gaddi Kumar, a youngster, was found murdered in a cotton field in his village at Shankarapatnam in Karimnagar district. His girlfriends family members have been arrested and the case is in the pending trial.

March 2018: Perumalla Pranay was killed in broad daylight in Miryalaguda town of Nalgonda district, when he accompanied his pregnant wife Amrutha to hospital. Contract killers employed by Amruthas father T Maruthi Rao hacked Pranay to death. Two years later, Maruti died by suicide in Hyderabad. The Nalgonda police, who had already filed a charge sheet, informed the court before the trial could begin that the accused died.

May 2017: Naresh Amboji was charred to death by his wife Swathi Reddys family. After Nareshs murder, Swathi hanged herself at her parents place. The case is pending trial.

April 2017: Manthani Madhukar was found dead under suspicious circumstances in a lake near his home in Peddapalli. Following honor killing allegations, his family moved the HC and a re-postmortem was ordered.
Togo's Prime Minister Komi Selom Klassou and his government have resigned in a political reshuffle delayed by the Coronavirus pandemic.



The resignation came after President Faure Gnassingbe won his re-election in March, extending his 15-year-old rule and a family dynasty that began when his father took power in a 1967 coup.



Komi Selom Klassou has served as prime minister since 2015. Commenting on the resignation of the prime minister, Gnassingbe congratulated Klassou and his team for their "economic, political and social efforts and the encouraging results despite the health crisis around the world."



The presidency did not say when a new prime minister would be appointed.









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The Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Amendment (FCRA) Bill, 2020 was among the pieces of legislation with far-reaching consequences passed by Parliament this week without any discussion following the Oppositions boycott. While the passage of any legislation without adequate stakeholder and public consultation as well as Parliamentary debate is a cause for concern, the FCRA Bill itself signals the states deep mistrust of civil society organisations. This is hardly unique to the NDA.

The original act was passed by the Indira Gandhi government in 1976 ostensibly to control foreign funding of political organisations but effectively as a means to control dissent. If the UPA sought to make the Act more restrictive through its consolidating update in 2010, the 2020 Bill can only be described as draconian. While multiple aspects of the Bill will effectively throttle the functioning of civil society organisations, the two most egregious are the reduction of the amount of foreign funds that can be spent on administrative expenses from 50% to 20% and the barring of organisations with FCRAs to transfer funds from foreign sources to other such groups.

While the former will stifle organisations working on advocacy, legal interventions, training and research, the latter will starve grassroots groups without the resources to fundraise as several non-profits are also funding organisations. The effects will be a body blow to democracy and freedom as well as to the physical and mental well-being of communities served by non-profit organisations. Ironically, while the Bill is ostensibly aimed at improving transparency, the NDA has twice amended the 2010 Actthrough money billsto allow a flow of funds from foreign companies after a 2014 Delhi HC verdict found both the BJP and Congress guilty of violating the Act.

Although NGOs are often vilified as greedy, corrupt and even communal in public discourse, the sector overall fills the gap in government services. In just the past few months, NGOs have transported stranded migrant workers, helped rebuild lost livelihoods and collaborated with government agencies on outreach work, stepping in often even as the state faltered. Regulations that would make such work virtually impossible deserve more consideration and discussion. Bearing this in mind, the President should send the Bill back to Parliament for a proper study, consultation and debate.
Heads of both basic and senior high schools (SHSs) in the Ashanti Region have called on the government to consider factoring into the programs of both the Ministry of Education (MoE) and the Ghana Education Service (GES) a quarterly disinfection exercise in schools.

This, according to them, would not only fight the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) but also protect the students from contracting it.

The heads of schools made the call on Thursday, 25 September 2020 during the third phase of the nationwide disinfection and fumigation exercise in basic and SHSs in the Ashanti Region.

Speaking to journalists, the Headmaster of Kumasi Academy, Mr Samuel Kwame Gato, entreated the MoE and GES to consider the matter of quarterly disinfection in schools seriously, particularly as the virus was still lurking.

He said the first and second exercises helped his school a great deal, thus insisting that the third one would do same as they welcome the second year students back to school.

He was optimistic that there would not be any contraction of the disease by any of his students even though boarding facilities would not be provided for the day students amongst the student population.

At the Ibadan Rahman SHS in Asokore Mampong, the Headmaster, Mr Adam Abdul Jamal, reinforced his colleagues position, stating that for now regular disinfection was very critical in curbing the virus, especially in the schools.

According to him, though his school did not record any positive case of the virus, the disinfection exercise would help allay the fears of members within the school environment.

For his part, the Programmes Director, SOS Childrens Village, Kumasi, Mr Bernard Amoako, explained that in the wake of the pandemic, it was necessary for the disinfection exercise to be carried out on quarterly basis.

Being a viral disease, he said the regular repeat of the exercise would help contain the virus and, therefore, encouraged students to return to school.

The General Manager (GM) of Zoomlion Ghana Limited for Ashanti Region, Mr Philip Asante Yeboah, stressed that the exercise was helpful in containing the virus.

He further noted that because no one knows the behaviour of the virus, it was necessary to carry out the exercise regularly to ensure safety among the school community.

Some of the schools that were disinfected were Kumasi Academy, Parkoso Cluster of Schools, Ibadan Rahman SHS among others.

The Municipal Director of Education, Asokore-Mampong, Mrs. Hajia Katumi Natogmah Attah, said the disinfection was the only way out of the pandemic.

According to her, testimonies from the previous exercises indicated that the chemical used in the disinfection was equally potent in fighting off other viruses.

She expressed appreciation to the government and the Zoomlion for the collaboration.
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 Heavier droplets emitted when someone talks, coughs, sneezes or breathes. These droplets may be loaded with a higher volume of virus because of their size, but they also tend to drop to the ground within 6 feet of the person who emitted them. Masks seem to be particularly helpful in preventing this type of spread.

 Surface contamination that happens when respiratory fluids end up on a desk, door handle or any other touchpoint. If someone touches the virus-covered surface and then rubs their eyes, nose or mouth, they could get infected. (Many researchers say this type of spread seems to be rare.)

 Aerosols, which are a microscopic mist of particles emitted by talking, breathing, sneezing and coughing. Because they are so light, aerosols tend to float  not quickly drop  and can move with the airstreams in a room.

Researchers are still trying to figure out how much aerosols contribute to Covid-19 transmission. Rutherford points to about two dozen well-documented cases, as he describes them, including a restaurant in China and a nursing home in the Netherlands. Out of 25 million cases, we maybe have 24 cases where we can clearly say this was aerosol transmission, he said.
Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry said he has launched an investigation into the situation, citing possible infringement of the child's constitutional rights.

"I am alarmed by what appears to not only be multiple violations of both the State and Federal Constitutions, but also blatant government overreach by the school system," Landry said in a news release. "I have begun investigating this matter and plan to take action in defense of this young man and his family and all families who could suffer the same invasion of their homes and constitutional rights."

"For anyone to conclude that a student's home is now school property because of connectivity through video conferencing is absurd," Landry. said. "It is ludicrous for this All-American kid to be punished for taking responsible actions just as it is for his parents to be accused of neglect."

Kimbrough wrote a letter to Gray expressing his understanding of the difficulties schools are facing during the pandemic. However, he wondered whether the school system had adequate policies for situations like Ka Mauri's.

School Board member Simeon Dickerson seconded that, saying the school should have backed off once they realized it was a BB gun.
As their fallen comrades sons embarked upon their first day back at school in Ohio, members of the Toledo Police Department showed up in full uniform, and full force, to escort them.

Younes and Maytham Dia, the sons of Toledo Police Officer Anthony Dia, who was killed in the line of duty, did not have to bear their first-day nerves alone. Photos taken on Sept. 8 show the brothers wearing matching thin-blue-line shirts, backpacks, and masks, outside their home, surrounded by protective police officers.

Younes and Maytham Dia on their first day of school. (Courtesy of Toledo Police Department)

Another image, shared on Facebook by Toledo Police, shows the boys standing outside Jackman Road Elementary School with a large group of officers and members of the school community.

Today is the first day of school for Younes and Maytham Dia, the police captioned their series of pictures. Rather than walk to school alone, dozens of Toledo Police officers came to make sure they got there safely.

Toledo Police Officer Anthony Dia, who was shot and killed in the line of duty (Courtesy of Toledo Police Department)

Twenty-six-year-old Officer Anthony Dia was shot by an intoxicated 57-year-old man while responding to a call in a Home Depot parking lot on July 4, according to a Facebook post by Toledo police. Dia approached the man and checked for his safety. However, according to witnesses, not long after, the man turned around and fired a round from a handgun, striking the officer, who was in his department-issued body armor. Unfortunately, when responding officers transported Dia to a local hospital, it was determined that he had died from injuries.

The suspect, who fled, was discovered in the woods with the help of a drone and a K-9 unit with what appeared to be a gunshot wound to the head. He later died.

Toledo Police held a procession and memorial service for Dia three days after his tragic death. During the ceremony, a moving letter was read aloud by the officers cousin, Moustafa Rahal.

They were Dias words; the father of two had penned a letter to his family a few months prior in the event that he was killed in the line of duty.

This is not our final goodbye, Dia had written, according to WTOL 11. I know that one day we will all see each other again, but until then Ill ask Allah to let me visit you all as much as possible, and Ill watch over you as much as I can.

During the service, Lieutenant Kellie Lenhardt said: We are humbled by his ultimate sacrifice and as long as his name is spoken, he will never be forgotten.

We would love to hear your stories! You can share them with us at emg.inspired@epochtimes.nyc
India extended $15 million to Sri Lanka for the promotion of Buddhist culture between both the nations as Prime Minister Narendra Modi held a virtual bilateral meeting with his Sri Lankan counterpart Mahinda Rajapaksa on Saturday.

The $15 million will be used to renovate Buddhist monasteries, promote the shared culture between both nations with connection to Buddhism and support Buddhist clergy. India is currently discussing Sri Lankas request for the $1.1 billion bilateral currency swap. India is also discussing the issue of deferring the debt repayments by Sri Lanka.

During the summit, Modi and Rajapaksa also discussed trade ties between the two countries. PM Modi conveyed to his Sri Lankan counterpart that he hopes Colombo relaxes temporary restrictions on import of a few Indian products. India also proposed launching a bilateral air bubble with Sri Lanka for travel between both countries.

Both nations also agreed to extend MoU on certain high impact community development projects over the course of the next five years.

In his address, PM Narendra Modi highlighted that under Indias Neighbourhood First policy, India prioritises its relationship with Sri Lanka. The relations between India and Sri Lanka are thousands of years old. According to my governments neighbourhood first policy and SAGAR doctrine, we give special priority to relations between the two countries, he said.

PM Modi also requested Rajapaksa to look into the issue of Sri Lankan Tamils and as a part of reconciliation efforts ensure the government works towards realising their expectations.
If we all read the same things, how dull would that be? I've been focusing on fiction during these strange days  but for those who thrive on nonfiction, here are six acclaimed new paperbacks just for you.

"Furious Hours: Murder, Fraud, and the Last Trial of Harper Lee" by Casey Cep (Knopf). I devoured this book last year, as will all fans of true crime, Lee's work and/or well-written narrative nonfiction. Cep examines Lee's attempts, in the later years of her career, to report on and write a book about a notorious Alabama serial killer in 1970s Alabama. "Furious Hours," taking us into atmospheric courtrooms in the Deep South, reads like a novel, and you leave it thinking that the story of the accused killer, the Reverend Willie Maxwell, would make a hell of a movie.

"Sontag: Her Life and Work" by Benjamin Moser (HarperCollins). Winner of this year's Pulitzer Prize for biography, this hefty book (800-plus pages) examines the life of one of America's best-known public intellectuals, Susan Sontag. "An authoritatively constructed work told with pathos and grace," wrote the Pulitzer committee, "that captures the writer's genius and humanity alongside her addictions, sexual ambiguities and volatile enthusiasms."
The COVID-19 tally in Pune district



of Maharashtra mounted to 2,73,012 with addition of 4,180 new cases in the last 24 hours, a health official said on Saturday.

With 93 people succumbing to the infection, the total fatality count in the district reached 6,220, he said.

A total of 1,695 patients were discharged from hospitals in the last 24 hours.

"Of the 4,180 fresh cases, 1,637 infections were reported from the limits of Pune Municipal Corporation, which now has 1,40,588 patients. A total of 1,151 new cases were reported from Pimpri Chinchwad area, where the COVID-19 count now stands at 75,267," the official said.

The number of positive cases in rural, civil hospital and Pune Cantonment Board areas has increased to 57,157, he added.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
A 23-year-old woman was shot in the leg and taken in good condition to Holy Cross Hospital. A 29-year-old woman was shot in the arm and was taken in good condition to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn. Two men, both 30, suffered gunshot wounds to the leg and abdomen. One got himself to Holy Cross Hospital, and the other went to the University of Chicago Medical Center, where he was listed in serious condition, police said.
Dr Glynn is appealing to people in Dublin, Donegal, Louth, Kildare, Wicklow, Cork and Galway to pay particular attention to public health advice.

Stricter Level Three measures are now in place for Donegal and Dublin while spikes in the 14-day incidence rates of other counties are being closely monitored by the National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET).

NPHET is also due to advise the Government as to whether cities, such as Cork and Galway, could be placed on higher Covid-19 restrictions instead of locking down entire counties.

Nuala O'Connor from the Irish College of GPs says people reducing their social contacts will make the biggest difference.

"What we need to do is we need to empower everybody to really understand that it really is the personal actions of each and every one of our citizens.

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"Whether or not there are particular restrictions in place, it's how each and every one person chooses to act and chooses to spend their time- that's what is going to get us back in control of this virus."

On Friday 326 cases of Covid-19 were confirmed in the Republic, with no additional deaths recorded.

Dr Ronan Glynn on how each of us can live safely with this virus over the coming months. Do not underestimate the value of your individual actions. Please stick with this and together we will get through #COVID19 #StaySafe [for subtitles/closed captions, select "cc"]. pic.twitter.com/HdO92ycHBa  Department of Health (@roinnslainte) September 25, 2020

In a statement from NPHET, Dr Glynn said: Today I am asking people everywhere but particularly in Donegal and Dublin to pay special attention to the public health advice.

I ask every individual to take personal responsibility to prioritise who you need to see, limit the size of your social network and reduce your social contacts over the coming days and weeks.

Because while there is every chance that other areas will have to move to Level Three, there is nothing inevitable about it. We have seen previously how people working together can turn the tide on this virus and bring increasing trajectories back under control.

Know how valuable your individual actions are. Your choices and your actions are part of how we will succeed.
Oman's Public Establishment for Industrial Estates (Madayn) said it is currently working on implementing several projects at Nizwa Industrial City, which include expansion of phases Three and Four on an area of one million sq m and implementing a second entrance to the industrial city.

Furthermore, a number of investment opportunities were announced recently in Nizwa Industrial City, specifically those related to commercial services and the residential city.

The total investment volume of Nizwa Industrial City has surged to over RO369 million ($956 million) during the first half, thus marking a growth rate of 1.13% compared to the same period last year, said its top official.

"The total workforce in the industrial city has surged to 6,100 and the total area of the industrial city has surpassed 3 million sq m," stated Nizwa Industrial City Director General Engineer Saleh bin Salman Al Abri.

"The number of projects in Nizwa has reached 150 during the first half, of which 128 are operating, 10 are under construction and 12 been allotted with space," he added.

Al Abri was speaking at a ceremony where Madayn signed an agreement with Oman's higher education ministry for boosting co-operation in the fields of scientific research and innovation.

The agreement, which comes in line with the significance of establishing robust partnership and integration between various bodies, was signed by Dr Rahma bint Ibrahim Al Mahrouqiyah, the Minister of Higher Education, Research and Innovation, and Hilal bin Hamad Al Hasani, Chief Executive Officer of Madayn.

As per the agreement, Madayn will provide training opportunities at the industrial cities for the undergraduates, and vocational colleges students.

The cooperation programme also aspires to enhance the exchange of consultations and expertise to support the development of scientific research and innovation in the industrial fields, and adopt the results and outputs of innovative and viable research and project ideas and transform them into investment projects and opportunities according to mechanisms agreed upon by the related parties, said the statement.

According to experts, this cooperation programme will play a major role in developing the curricula of higher education institutions regarding the various specialisations that are linked with the industrial needs of the sector and the companies in the industrial cities.

Additionally, the programme will encourage the investing companies in the industrial cities to offer scholarships for higher education studies, in order to meet the employment requirements in the companies, sectors and industrial cities that fall under the umbrella of Madayn.

Following the deal, Dr Al Mahrouqiyah toured Nizwa Industrial City along with the ministry's undersecretaries Dr Muna bint Salim Al Jardaniyah, Dr Bakhait bin Ahmed Al Mahri and Dr Saif bin Abdullah Al Haddabi as well as Madayn CEO Hilal bin Hamad Al Hasani.

The minister also visited Al Anwar Ceramic Tiles, Sledgehammer Gulf, and Gulf Energy nits in the industrial city.-TradeArabia News Service
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A West Australian man who flew into Brisbane from overseas overnight on his way home has tested positive to COVID-19 while in quarantine.

The man, in his 40s, was one of three new cases recorded in Queensland overnight, taking the total number of active cases to seven.

Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk.

The other two victims  a man in his 40s and another in his 60s  were crew members from a foreign vessel. Both were in hospital when they tested positive.

All passengers from the inbound flight remain in quarantine.
A Vietnamese entrepreneur is promoting Vietnamese handicraft products by using traditional material like sedge, rattan, bamboo and wood to make environmentally-friendly bags.

Tran Van Hung's products.  Photo courtesy of Tran Van Hung

The idea of making bags from natural material came to me when I saw two female foreign tourists wear sedge bags with different patterns, said 27-year-old Tran Van Hung from the northern province of Thanh Hoas Nga Son District.

They impressed him and made him wonder why he had never seen such products, even though sedge trees are abundant at his motherland. So he resolved to come back home to develop the product.

I couldnt sleep that night, just thinking of it and the next day I decided to quit my job.

He started learning about the trade by visiting villages with the traditional handicraft of sedge knitting.

Hung admitted that its very difficult to turn an idea into reality.

I knew a lot of challenges lay ahead because I had no money nor knowledge in the field. However, with experience gained during my studies, I believed that I can do it, he said.

Hung was born in a poor family in Nga Son District, which is famous for sedge knitting products.

After finishing high school, he enrolled in the Hanoi Community College where he specialised in electrical engineering.

To make a living, he worked several jobs, including as a waiter and distributing leaflets.

Hung said he travelled far and wide to learn about production methods of handmade bags, but no one was willing to share the experience with him. Fortunately, at a last resort, a couple from Hue City agreed to teach him how to knit bags as well as knowledge on handicraft.

Tran Van Hung makes bags from traditional materials including sedge and bamboo in combination with leather.  VNA/VNS Photo Nguyen Nam

Having spent a month there, Hung came back home to continue his journey.

In 2018, he set up a company specialising in making sedge bags at home. He borrowed VND10 million (US$431) from his sister and some money from his friends to buy raw materials and hire workers.

The proverb the first step is always the hardest proved to be true in this case.

At the beginning, not many people bought the products made by his company. However, Hung insisted on offering the products in many shops and supermarkets in Thanh Hoa, Hanoi and HCM City.

His efforts paid off. After several months, the products caught the attention of consumers.

Now, they are on sale not only at home, but also on Amazon and Ebay with prices from VND800,000  3 million (US$34-129).

To make the products different, Hung combined various traditional materials available in the country, including sedge, rattan, bamboo and wood with imported genuine leather.

He decorated the bags with shells, gravel, sand, flowers and grass to make the products stand out.

Hung also did market research to improve the bags.

It is essential to focus on the elegance and sophistication when manufacturing bags to enhance their competitiveness, he said.

As the product is made by hand, workers must do it carefully.

It takes me between two-three days to complete a bag, he said, adding that it took a long time to design, choose the material and finish a product.

When asked about his response to feedback, Hung said the company always received positive responses as well as suggestions to make the products even better.

Whenever I receive feedback from customers along with photos of Co May - the brandname of the bags - in different countries, I am both touched and proud to have contributed to promote Made in Vietnam traditional handicraft products across the world, Hung said.

My target customers are those with high income. They love liberal style and craft value. They are interested in quality, cultural identity and particularly they always want to refresh themselves, he said.

He said the value that his project brought about to the community was that it motivated young people to return to their homeland to create products which are the strength of the region. It contributed to preserve the traditional identity of each region.

The project also helped disadvantaged women in the village live better and happier when they were self-employed while helping young people obtain certain skills, taking part in community activities in the commune, and have a scientific mindset, he said.

Duong Thi Thoa, Secretary of Nga Son Districts Youth Union, said Hung was an outstanding example in the start-up movement in the district. He was not only excellent in doing business but also actively participated in Youth Union work and helping disadvantaged people.

Workers make decorations for a bag made of bamboo. VNA/VNS Photo Nguyen Nam

Thanks to paying attention to the products quality and being innovative in designing new models, his family has become better off.

He also creates stable jobs for five people with a monthly salary of VND4 million per person.

Thoa added: With the initial successes with the eco-friendly product, Hung has spread the entrepreneurial spirit to youth union members in the locality and they feel motivated to work harder.

Hungs project won first prize in a contest on start-up ideas organised by the provincial Youth Union in 2020.

According to Hung, the biggest difficult for a young start-up was fear.

Due to fear, we don't dare realise our dreams, he said.

Hung said the most important thing was to strive and learn because most success comes from hard work.

Once you understand and love the profession, you will discover a lot of interesting things from your products."

Hung is continuing to make efforts every day to fulfil his dream of turning Co May into the top fashion brand for bags in Vietnam.

He also wants to cooperate with clothing brands as well as expand production to create more jobs for local residents. VNS

Mai Hien & Nguyen Nam

Sending grass-based bags to the world With a desire to make use of traditional materials combined with modern leather to create environmentally-friendly products, Tran Van Hung in Thanh Hoa province has been making bags from grass for over two years.

Vietnamese students make biodegradable bags from algae Algae is an extremely cheap raw material and algae-made products have competitive advantages as they are friendly to the environment, nonpolluting and completely biodegradable.
Community healthcare volunteers check the temperature and oxygen level of slum residents during a campaign for testing, in Mumbai on Wednesday.

: Kerala's daily COVID-19 graph continues to surge with 7,006 new cases being reported on Saturday, taking the infection count to 1,66,939 and over 50,000 people are presently under treatment, state Health Minister K K Shailaja said.

In the last 24 hours, 58,799 samples have been tested.

The southern state has been witnessing a massive spike in daily cases since the past few days.

While 6,477 cases were detected on Friday, it was 6,324 on Thursday and 5,376 on Wednesday.

The toll has climbed to656 with 21more fatalities, the minister said in a press release here.

As many as 3,199 people have recovered from the infection while 1,14,530 have been discharged so far after treatment.

In Thiruvananthapuram district, 1,050 cases were reported, followed by Malappuram (826), Ernakulam (729) and Kozhikode (684), while three districts recorded over 500 cases and two over 400 cases on Saturday.

Of the positive cases, 68 had returned from abroad and 177 from other states and 6,668 were infected through contact.

As many as 93 health workers tested positive today, the highest from Thiruvananthapuram.

At least, 2,22,330 people are under observation, including 27,883 who are in hospitals, including3,446 admitted today.

So far 27,17,040 samples have been sent for testing.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
That outbreak grew by six people to 16 cases Friday, including one person who remained hospitalized, Holmes said.

Asked whether the Health Department is investigating the Eagles Club for possible health directive violations, Holmes said department staff continue to focus on identifying those exposed by the outbreak.

The cluster likely will infect more people and it brings a clear lesson, he said.

"Had they been wearing masks, we would not have this outbreak," Holmes said.

Health Department staff encourage anyone who attended the event to contact the department immediately.

With hospitalizations from COVID-19 rising in Lincoln, the city's hospitals had only 30% of their intensive-care unit beds available, Holmes said.

The Health Department and the hospitals have a surge plan to handle an influx of coronavirus cases, but at this point, he said hospitals have the capacity to convert other beds into ICU beds or transfer some patients for care at other hospitals.
The thirst for absolute power, false claims and the 20th Amendment Bill View(s):

Given highly misleading justifications of the draft 20th Amendment advanced by Government Ministers, including those who profess to have some knowledge of the law and the Constitution, the record must be set straight even if that is the very least that is done.

Allegedly undemocratic nature of the CC

The claim made by Education Minister GL Peiris to the media this week that transferring the Presidents powers to make key appointments to an unelected Constitutional Council (CC) is undemocratic, falls squarely into this category of patently false explanations. This is not a new argument. On the contrary, this claim has been regularly trotted out by politicians whenever the Constitution is captured by political majorities that use the electoral mandate to whitewash naked grabs for absolute power.

In law, the Supreme Court went into this question very well when it considered both the 17th (2001) and 19th (2015) Amendments to the Constitution. Very evidently, it rejected the claim of transferral of powers from the President to the CC. That reasoning, it is of note, impacts not only on the constitutional nature of that objection but also on the allegedly undemocratic nature of the CC that is being repeatedly drummed into our incredulous ears by spokespersons of the ruling party.

In sum, the argument presented by lawyers while objecting to the mechanism of a CC was that it impinges on the sovereign power of the people and thereby fetters the executive power of the President. The Court disagreed. It was pointed out that the CC was a representative body, reflecting views of the diverse groups in Parliament and that its non ex-officio members were (meant to be) apolitical persons of eminence and integrity.

Only a restriction of Presidential discretion

As such, there is only a restriction in the exercise of the discretion hitherto vested in the President. That restriction would not be an erosion of the executive power of the President, thereby offending Article 3 read with Article 4(b) of the Constitution. The Court indeed, went further. It pointed out that the purpose and object of the CC is to impose safeguards in respect of the exercising of the Presidents discretion and to ensure the propriety of appointments made by him to important offices in the executive, the judiciary and to the independent Commissions. In fact, it sets out a salutary framework in which these appointments will be made.

In respect moreover of the clause that called upon the President to obtain the views of the Chief Justice and others in appointing judges of the superior courts (which constitutional duty is now taken away by the draft 20th Amendment), the Supreme Court observed that, seeking the views of different stakeholders can in no way be offensive to the exercise of the powers of appointment a consultative process will only enhance the quality of the appointments concerned. (vide Supreme Court Determination on the 19th Amendment Bill, April 2015).

Ironically, the Bench of the Court in deciding that the replacement of the CC with a Parliamentary Council by the Rajapaksa driven 18th Amendment was constitutionally proper (2010), relied on this same logic. It held that, what the CC did was not of such fundamental character as would restrain the President in his or her executive power. Thus, bringing in a Council which had only the power to make non-binding observations in respect of presidential appointments amounted to a mere redefining of the restrictions placed on the President by the CC and as such, the abolition of the CC was constitutional.

A Constitution that swings like a political yo-yo

All this is testimony to the fact that our Constitution is made to swing like a yo-yo to the whim and fancy of whatever the political move of the day. More pointedly, it makes nonsense of the oft repeated cries by the Government that the 19th Amendments CC set up a competing power centre to the President, thus making governance impossible. That is a barefaced lie. The competing power centres here arose in the political struggle between the two bitterly opposed leaders of the SLFP and the UNP with the 19th Amendment falling between the two equally ineffective stools of the Office of the President and the Office of the Prime Minister.

That must not be confused with the CC as a salutary constitutional safeguard. In truth, propagandists who mix up the concept of the CC in theory with practical of deficiencies of the CC in functioning must be roundly told off for indulging in disgraceful circus tricks. Under the 17th Amendment, the majority of the CC included distinguished lawyers and judges who endeavored to bring apolitical balance to the prejudiced decision making of politicians. By that very fact, the 17th Amendments CC was short-lived.

Let us remember also that this experiment was crippled by a consensus of the political establishment which included all the parties, the UNP and the JVP along with the Kumaratunga led SLFP. That undermining of the first CC was only taken to its logical ends by the Rajapaksa (the First) Presidency. This collusion between the Government and the Opposition of the day to whittle down constitutional restrictions on political power was conveniently forgotten when blind faith was reposed in the Sirisena-Wickremesinghe yahapalanaya administration to deliver on the Constitution.

Abolishing of constitutional safeguards executed to military precision

Under the 19th Amendment, that majority was reduced to a minority. The decisions of this CC were not uniformly wise as seen by its much critiqued appointment of an Inspector General of Police who was not fit to hold that office. Perhaps also, the functioning of some of the bodies to which members were recommended to be appointed by the CC left much to be desired. However, the decision-making of the CC as representative of the entire Parliament as the Court pointed out in 2001 and in 2015, was harmonious. There were no public dissents registered.

But a more publicly accountable process regarding which warnings were sounded very early on in 2015, including in these column spaces, would have saved the CC much grief later. The CC may have taken better heed of the ancient Roman (albeit sexist) warning that Ceasars wife should not only be above suspicion but must be seen to be above suspicion as well. Predictably, as the yahapalanaya coalition splintered, poisonous arrows of the Pohottuwa, now in Government, found an easy target in the CC. This was how the propaganda campaign for the demolition of constitutional checks and balances was meticulously planned and executed to military precision, resulting in what we now have before us, the draft 20th Amendment to the Constitution. Behind this draft Amendment, power hungry motives predominate notwithstanding protests that the people wanted this through their votes in 2019 and 2020.

What the people wanted was an end to the ceaseless kindergarten bickering between a Prime Minister and a President resulting in a breakdown in government and the security of the nation. What was called for was governance with democratic checks and balances, not the concentration of power in one individual. As presented in Parliament this Tuesday, the draft 20th Amendment is a surgically lethal strike to the democratic heart of Sri Lanka. Its proponents cannot shrug away the historic responsibility laid on them in this regard by hiding behind false and contemptible claims.

Let that be categorically said.
Loading Months later, in her testimony before the hotel quarantine inquiry, Ms Mikakos said she was unaware private security guards were being used until the first COVID-19 outbreak in late May. April 9: Infection risk becomes clear This was the day it became clear to Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton there were "considerable risks" at the hotels. Fronting the inquiry on September 16, Professor Sutton said it was evident by April 9, two weeks after the quarantine program was set up, it lacked a clear leader and line of accountability to the Deputy Chief Health Officer.

He also gave evidence on September 16 he had "no oversight" of infection-control measures at the hotels. May 6: The "perfectly" handled outbreak that wasn't so perfect Before the second wave, there was the Cedar Meats abattoir outbreak, dubbed "Victoria's Ruby Princess" by the opposition.

Ms Mikakos did not see it this way. Rather, she said, the government had handled the outbreak "perfectly".

A week later, Cedar Meats was known to be responsible for 91 infections. Professor Sutton admitted he should have shut the facility after the second case instead of waiting for the third, contradicting Ms Mikakos' claims. June 30: Flights diverted, Corrections Victoria takes over quarantine Amid damning evidence of the failings of the hotel quarantine program, Premier Daniel Andrews asked Prime Minister Scott Morrison to divert international flights away from Melbourne.

This would allow the quarantine program to be "reset" under the new management of Corrections Victoria, he said. The Rydges on Swanston hotel in Carlton where a COVID-19 outbreak led to 90 per cent of Victoria's second wave cases. Credit:Penny Stephens This is also the day Mr Andrews announced the inquiry into the quarantine program and warned 10 Melbourne hotspot postcodes they were about to return to stage three restrictions. It wasn't to end there. July 23: The birthing backflip Ms Mikakos told journalists at a press conference that partners or support people could stay as long as necessary during the birth of a child, but for only two hours once the new mother had been moved to postnatal care.

Following an outcry from expecting parents, Ms Mikakos changed the government's position. Now partners could stay as long as required on the day of the birth, but only two hours on any day thereafter. Loading July 28 and August 8: The strain builds. Ms Mikakos, then a regular at the daily press conferences, paused and choked back tears at an appearance on July 28 as she discussed the mounting COVID-19 death toll in aged care facilities. Close to midnight on August 9, she took to Twitter in a lengthy thread recalling the death of ancient Greek ruler Pericles in the plague of Athens in 430BC.

She tweeted the coronavirus pandemic was "outside all of our collective experiences" and there was no "go-to manual" of how to appropriately respond. "I have put every ounce of energy Ive had into that effort. If it wasnt enough, then Im deeply sorry," she wrote. "Let the independent judge do her job, let the cards fall where they may. I believe there is nothing to fear in seeking the truth. The truth will set you free." August 4: The raucous session of Parliament Unhappy at being dragged into a parliamentary sitting day against the advice of the Chief Health Officer, Ms Mikakos refused to answer questions from the opposition about the botched hotel quarantine program and the government's response to the pandemic.

Health Minister Jenny Mikakos in Parliament on the day she refused to answer Opposition questions. Credit:Jason South You dont think its dangerous to be ignoring the Chief Health Officers advice? Ms Mikakos said. Whats the message youre sending? The Labor-majority lower house heeded Professor Sutton's advice and cancelled proceedings. Ms Mikakos said she would provide written answers to the opposition's questions. She missed the parliamentary deadline for those responses by five hours. September 23: The wall crumbles

Pressure mounted on Ms Mikakos when fellow cabinet ministers Martin Pakula and Lisa Neville pointed the finger at the Health Department as being in charge of the hotel quarantine when the second wave began. Police Minister Lisa Neville swears on an upside down bible that she doesn't know who made the decision to use private security guards. The inquiry also heard Health Department boss Kym Peake failed to tell Ms Mikakos about serious welfare concerns from Victoria's three most senior health experts. Loading September 24: Mikakos fronts inquiry

In a three-hour grilling, Ms Mikakos became the third minister to deny responsibility for key elements of the hotel quarantine program. She said she had not been involved in the set-up of hotel quarantine and did not seek updates about it until two months later  after the first coronavirus outbreaks. This is despite the Health Department being the lead agency. Ms Mikakos repeatedly referred to a "multi-agency response with shared responsibility". She agreed she had not been across the program's governance, lines of responsibility or the negative reviews from senior health officials. Even though she appeared next to Martin Pakula in a March press conference as he announced the use of private security guards, she told the inquiry she wasn't aware they were working in the hotels until late May.

Earlier in the day, the Health Workers Union accused her of "breathtaking incompetence" and called for her to resign. September 25: The Premier's final nail Appearing before the inquiry, Mr Andrews contradicted Ms Mikakos' assertion that she did not bear overall responsibility for the program. In the early stages of quarantine, when the Health Department became the lead agency, "I then regarded Minister Mikakos as accountable for the program", Mr Andrews wrote in his submission. The Premier also did not know who decided to use private security in the hotels.
There is a principle of European law known as subsidiarity. Under that principle, the European Union can only act if it can be shown that the action taken at that rarefied level would be more effective than action taken at the national or local level. In other words, decisions should be taken as near the grassroots as possible. Subsidiarity should surely underpin the relations between Indian states and the central government because the country is a federation with power divided between the central government, state governments and panchayats.

But there has always been a question mark over the extent to which India is a federation. Many years ago, I heard the distinguished civil servant, former governor of the Reserve Bank of India and confidant of Jawaharlal Nehru, LK Jha, say India had a centrist Constitution with federal trimmings. Over the last week or so, its federalism which has been questioned in the rowdy controversy in Parliament over the government taking decisions on agriculture and other subjects which many state governments insist it is their right to take. The government has insisted that it needs to legislate so that all farmers, everywhere in India, have the freedom to sell their produce anywhere.

The prime minister did promise co-operative federalism when he first came to power but as Member of Parliament (MP) Dinesh Raj of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) said: The cooperative federalism the Prime Minister claimed to have championed is going exactly the other way. Congress MP Manish Tewari told Parliament a bill about the governance of cooperative banks was a frontal assault on the federal structure of the Constitution. The manner in which the bills were passed, the lack of discussion, the questionable parliamentary procedures could not be described as cooperative. At one stage, seven bills were passed in under four hours in the Rajya Sabha. Nor, of course, could the abuse of the Deputy Speaker of the Rajya Sabha by Opposition members be described as cooperative.

When the states agreed to surrender their rights to levy a number of different taxes and the central government replaced them with the one Goods and Services Tax (GST), chief ministers (CMs) were guaranteed that any loss of income they suffered would be made up by the central government for five years. Now, with the decline in economic activity caused by the pandemic, the central government does not have the revenue from GST to compensate the states. The CMs say the Centre should borrow money to pay the compensation guaranteed to them, but the Centre insists that the states should borrow money to fund any deficit they suffer.

Why does federalism matter so much? India is rightly proud of its diversity and it is federalism which protects that diversity. Take, for instance, language. Without the creation of linguistic states with their own official languages, what would the fate of Tamil in the South, or Oriya in the East, Gujarati in the West and Punjabi in the North have been? Federalism should also play an important role in the system of checks and balances intended to prevent the accretion of too much power at the Centre. It should increase the efficiency of a democracy because its principle of subsidiarity reduces the inefficiencies of top-down government.

Unfortunately, recent events have shown how far India is from being a cooperative federation or union of states. Without cooperation, Indian federalism will be just a trimming.

The views expressed are personal
Childrens Day View(s):

Happy Childrens Day from all of us here at the Funday Times. Childrens Day is celebrated to increase awareness of the rights, care and education of children. We hope you have a special day!

The UN agency for children

In the aftermath of World War II, the plight of Europes children was grave, and a new agency created by the United Nations stepped in to provide food and clothing and health care to these children.

In 1953, UNICEF became a permanent part of the UN. Following more than a decade of focus on child health issues, UNICEF expanded its interests to address other issues, such as education, that were important for a childs wellbeing.

In 1965, the organization was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for the promotion of brotherhood among nations.

Today, UNICEF works in more than 190 countries and territories, including Sri Lanka!







Declaration of the Rights of the Child

In 1959, the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration of the Rights of the Child, which defines childrens rights to protection, education, health care, shelter, and good nutrition.

l The hope, vision and commitment of world leaders in 1989 led to the Convention.

l The Convention is the most rapidly and widely ratified international human rights treaty in history. The Convention changed the way children are viewed  now they are seen as human beings with a

distinct set of rights.

l Despite this progress, the Convention is still not fully implemented or widely known and understood. Millions of children continue to suffer violations of their rights when they are denied adequate health care, nutrition, education and protection from violence.

l Poverty affects children disproportionately. Around the world, one out of five children lives in extreme poverty. Their families struggle to afford the basic health care and nutrition needed to provide them a strong start. This can have a lasting effect

 in 2019, 149 million children under the age of five were stunted.

l Despite great progress in school enrolment in many parts of the world, more than 175 million children are not enrolled in pre-primary education. Many will never learn to read or write.

It is up to todays generation to demand that world leaders from government, business and communities end child rights violations now, once and for all.
Bengaluru: Equine Biotech, a startup incubated at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), has developed an indigenous RT-PCR diagnostic kit called Global diagnostic kit" for accurate and affordable" diagnosis of COVID-19. The test kit, based on Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR), the gold standard for COVID-19 diagnosis, has been approved for use in authorised COVID-19 diagnostic labs by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), according Bengaluru-based IISc.

The test takes about one and half hours to confirm the presence of SARS-CoV-2 in patient samples, said Utpal Tatu, Professor in the Department of Biochemistry, IISc, and founder of Equine Biotech. Our startup has been working on testing for coronavirus infections for many years, even before the COVID-19 pandemic started.

This experience has helped us engineer the kit for COVID-19," Tatu was quoted as saying in an IISc statement. The kit is an easy-to-use, multiplex RT-PCR kit with 100 per cent specificity, and its run time is relatively short when compared with the kits available in the industry, according to the startup.

It is currently seeking to licence its new COVID-19 test kit and work with med-tech companies and other industries for mass producing, marketing and distribution of these kits. PTI RS APR RAVINDRANATH 09261518 NNNN.

Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor
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According to our research of Connecticut and other state lists, there were 8 registered sex offenders living in zip code 06478 as of January 22, 2022.

The ratio of all residents to sex offenders in zip code 06478 is 1,638 to 1.

The ratio of registered sex offenders to all residents in this zip code is lower than the state average.


A Burlington County man allegedly duped people into paying him hundreds of thousands of dollars by jumping from a fraudulent foreign currency trading scheme to a fraudulent car lease scheme, in a house-of-cards-style operation, authorities said.

On Friday, authorities arrested Michael Salerno, 51, of Mount Laurel and charged him with 23 counts of wire fraud and six counts of mail fraud in an indictment, Philadelphia U.S. Attorney Jennifer Arbittier Williams said in a statement. Through multiple fraud schemes, Salerno allegedly stole thousands from people by tricking them into paying him for a foreign currency trading business and then by getting to them to pay for car leases, the statement said.

Between September 2016 and November 2018, Salerno ran multiple businesses that each were supposedly trading foreign currencies, the statement said. By lying to clients, Salerno had victims pay advance fees that were usually more than $1,000 to hire him, he said.

Salerno allegedly told victims that if one of his companies were hired, he would give them access to $10 million to use on the foreign currency market. To instill confidence in him and his businesses, Salerno posed as a sophisticated and successful businessman, despite having a history of bankruptcy and federal tax charges, according to the statement.

Through his network of fraudulent foreign currency trading businesses, Salerno embezzled more than $300,000 from victims, the statement said.

In 2018, the U.S. Attorneys office started a criminal investigation into Salerno and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission filed an injunction against him, the statement said. But Salerno simply moved to the next scheme, the statement said, shifting his efforts to a car lease and loan scheme.

Between May 2018 and December 2019, Salerno ran AccuOne Financial, Inc., a company that claimed to help clients get ride of unwanted automobile leases, the statement said. At the same time, the company also claimed to offer automobile leases to people with credit that prevented them from getting a lease.

In order to scam both sets of clients, Salerno would take the cars from the first set of clients, barely making any lease payments, and then gave the cars to the second set of clients, who paid him monthly fees, the statement said.

The clients who wanted to get out of their leases would ultimately end up continuing to make payments, while the other clients would sometimes have cars repossessed, the statement said. In this scheme, Salerno stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from victims, the statement said.

When Salernos foreign currency trading scheme came crashing down around him, he very quickly moved on to an alternative way of swindling people out of their money with car leases and loans, Williams said in the statement. The damage done by such corrupt financial schemes can be catastrophic to innocent peoples credit and financial security. We will continue to hold those who commit crimes like the ones alleged here accountable for their misdeeds.

Thank you for relying on us to provide the journalism you can trust. Please consider supporting NJ.com with a voluntary subscription.

Rodrigo Torrejon may be reached at rtorrejon@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @rodrigotorrejon.
Groups launch 'celebrating girls' campaign to combat sex selective abortion in India

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Alliance Defending Freedom International and a coalition of human rights groups have launched a campaign aimed at combatting the problem of sex-selective abortions in India.

Known as the celebrating girls for LIFE, the campaign was announced Tuesday by ADF International, which was founded in 1994 and based in Vienna, Austria.

The campaign will include a short film contest and webinars leading up to Oct. 11, which is widely observed as the International Day of the Girl Child.

The acronym LIFE stands for Love, Inheritance, Freedom, Equality, with each point centered on combatting culturally-ingrained gender bias against girls.

Tehmina Arora, director of ADF India, said in a statement released Tuesday that they hope to tell the stories of girls and women in India and celebrate every girls right to life.

India has lost 12 million girls to sex-selective abortion in the last three decades. It is time to address this issue, especially as International Day of the Girl Child approaches, said Arora.

We hope this campaign will help bring this grave violation of rights to light and increase the correct implementation of Indian law, which prohibits sex-selective abortion.

Other organizations involved in the campaign include the Evangelical Fellowship of India, Girls Count, the National Council of Churches in India, Vanishing Girls, VIVAT International, Red Rope, and Women of Worth.

The practice of sex-selective abortion has been widely denounced, with prominent public figures including former President Jimmy Carter among those spreading awareness about the issue.

In an interview with David Letterman in 2014, the former president said, "160 million girls are now missing from the face of the earth because they were murdered at birth by their parents or either selectively aborted when their parents find out that the fetus is a girl."

"Well, it's the worst human rights abuse on earth and it's basically unaddressed  So that many people are missing and they're all girls who are missing."

In August, PLOS ONE published a paper that concluded that India will have approximately 6.8 million fewer female births between 2017 and 2030 because of sex-selective abortion.

According to the paper, the sex birth ratio (SBR) of India has been imbalanced since the 1970s, with researchers attributing this to the intensity of son preference in Indian culture and fertility squeeze, or a pressure to have a smaller family household.

The masculinized SBR for India is a direct result of the practice of sex-selective abortions at the national level, explained the researchers.

Some states, such as Punjab, have experienced an early and rapid rise in birth masculinity since the 1980s, whereas in North Indian states, the masculinized SBR started to increase later.

The paper proposed better identification, monitoring, and education in the worst affected regions of India to help respond to the issue of missing female births.

Our study highlights the need to strengthen policies that advocate for gender equity and the introduction of support measures to counteract existing gender biases that adequately target each regional context, concluded the researchers.

Future work may include additional sources of heterogeneity, such as education, religion, and ethnicity, for projecting the SBR in India and extending the SBR predictions for longer-term projections.
San Francisco, Sep 26 : Microsoft is planning to release a new Xbox app for iOS that allows users to stream their Xbox One games on their iPhones.

The new Xbox app will arrive in the App Store soon that includes a remote play feature, which lets Xbox One console owners stream their games to an iPhone, reports The Vege.

This new app and its remote play capability is different from Microsoft's xCloud gaming service.

Whereas xCloud allows players to stream Xbox games directly from Microsoft's servers to their phone in any location, remote play on the new Xbox app on iOS requires players to be connected to their own Xbox.

One will be able to access an Xbox console over Wi-Fi, or even an LTE or 5G connection, too.

Just like the recently-launched Xbox app on Android, the iPhone version will also include the same new design and new features.

One can quickly download or share game clips and screenshots captured on an Xbox One or Xbox Series X/S console, and can even manage console space and delete games.

In addition, this new Xbox app is also a lot faster than the previous iOS version.

Currently, Microsoft is testing the Xbox app with TestFlight members and will be available generally in the App Store soon for everyone to download.
President Trump and Andrew Cuomo have traded barbs after the president criticized him and suggested New York could be last to receive a coronavirus vaccine because the governor wants to conduct its own tests to make sure it was safe.

On Thursday, Cuomo said that New York state would conduct its own verification of any federally approved vaccination, citing concerns that the vetting process is overly politicized.

But on Friday evening, Trump slammed the governor for his comments while further denigrating Cuomo over New York state's performance on care homes where ar least 6,600 people have died from coronavirus.

'Governor Andrew Cuomo of New York wants to put New York at the END of the Vaccine List in that he doesn't trust the @FDA or Federal Government, even though the Vaccines are being developed by the finest Labs in the World. Wish he trusted us on Nursing Homes!' the president wrote.

President Trump tweeted on Friday night blasting New York Governor Andrew Cuomo saying he 'wanted New York to be last on the list to receive the vaccine'

Trump's tweet came after Cuomo said on Thursday that New York state would conduct its own review of any coronavirus vaccines approved by the FDA

Speaking on MSNBC on Friday night, Cuomo said the he saw Trump's tweet as a veiled threat that his state would be the last to receive the vaccine.

'Is Donald Trump saying that he can somehow withhold a vaccine from the state of New York?' host joy Reid asked.

'That's called a threat. That's called, 'I will put New York at the end of the list.' That's what he's trying to say. But look, I don't trust the president and I don't trust the FDA. The American people don't trust the FDA,' Cuomo said.

'They denied COVID was here. They're denying it now. The doctor is exactly right, Joy. They're actually doing fewer tests. Florida now does fewer tests than they did two months ago. This is the Trump doctrine. Do fewer tests so you will show fewer cases. Remember he said if you test less, we'll have fewer cases. That's what he's doing,' Cuomo continued.

'Trump has politicized this entire situation and overridden health and science with politics. When we look back at this, it is reprehensible. We lose more people than the UK, France, Italy combined every day. It's disgusting. '

Minutes after phoning into the cable news channel, Cuomo tweeted similar thoughts.

'Mr. President, stop making illegal threats. Maybe you will wake up your DOJ. You said yourself that the FDA was making 'a political move' on vaccines. Surely Americans can't trust a political FDA. Don't you remember saying that? I guess it's hard to keep track of all the lies,' Cuomo wrote.

He quickly followed it up with another tweet moment later.

'You want us to trust you on Covid? FACT: Your Covid record: 203,000 deaths. More Americans die every day from Covid than in China, Italy, France, the UK, and Spain COMBINED. Are all of those leaders better than you?'

.@joyannreid: "Is Donald Trump saying that he can somehow withhold a vaccine from the state of New York?"@NYGovCuomo: "That's called a threat. That's called, 'I will put New York at the end of the list.' That's what he's trying to say. But look, I don't trust the president." pic.twitter.com/GujhHGEPkr  The ReidOut (@thereidout) September 25, 2020

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said that he saw President Trump's tweet that the state might be last to receive a vaccine as an 'illegal threat'

Cuomo's first tweet was quickly followed up with a second, above, which questioned the president's success rate at dealing with coronavirus

On Thursday, Cuomo, a Democrat, said he feared the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is facing political pressure from the White House to approve a vaccine before the November 3 presidential election.

'The first question is, is the vaccine safe? Frankly, I'm not going to trust the federal government's opinion,' Cuomo said during a press conference on Thursday.

'New York State will have its own review when the federal government is finished with their review and says it's safe.'

The governor, who has repeatedly criticized Trump and his administration's handling of the coronavirus pandemic, told reporters he was going to form a review committee to advise the state on the safety of a vaccine.

Speaking on MSNBC on Friday night New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said that he saw Trump's tweet as a vailed threat that his state would be the last to receive the vaccine

There are more than 170 coronavirus vaccine candidates in various stages of development around the globe, according to the World Health Organization.

At least 10 are currently in large-scale trials in humans in the US and around the world to prove the jabs are both safe and effective.

Cuomo said he was alarmed when Trump said earlier this week that the White House 'may or may not' authorize new FDA rules hardening clinical trial standards needed for vaccine approval.

'That sounds like a political move,' Trump said of the news and hinted that the White House may reject the FDA's plans.

'I don't see why it should be delayed further. That is a lot of lives you're talking about,' the commander-in-chief added.

The review committee will advise New York on the safety and efficacy of the first jab to receive emergency use authorization (file photo)

Cuomo said the comments showed the president is 'in dispute' with the agency.

'The FDA says they want to make the approval more rigorous, more transparent. The president says they're trying to politicize it,' he said.

'Why would the FDA be politicizing the approval? Between the president and the FDA, only one entity is engaged in the political process and is headed for the Election Day. It's not the FDA.'

Cuomo says the review panel will be compromised of physicians, researchers and public health experts who will review the same data the FDA does.

He says the committee will advise him 'so I can look at the camera and I can say to New Yorkers that it's safe to take.'

New York state plans to create a review committee under the direction of its Department of Health to vet any coronavirus vaccine approved by President Donald Trump's administration

When it comes to care homes in New York state, the coronavirus exacted a punishing toll.

New York state officials report that at least 6,656 residents in care homes died, though that number is an undercount that doesn't include patients who died after being transferred to hospitals.

New York health officials have conducted nearly 1,900 inspections at the state's 613 nursing homes and 540 adult care facilities since March 1 and found safety shortcomings at 77 nursing homes during the pandemic.

It included basic infection-control violations like failing to have staff wear masks or wash their hands, according to records and state officials.

State and federal inspection records show that about half a dozen homes were cited for failing to isolate COVID-19 patients from residents who didn't have the virus.

At least 20 were cited over staff neglecting to wash their hands or properly use face masks, gloves or gowns.

In New York, many nursing homes struggled with high death rates due to the COVID-19 outbreak and resulted in more than 6,600 deaths

Cuomo announced in April that homes could face $10,000 fines per violation or lose their license for failing to follow the rules.

Inspectors found infection-control violations at 62 nursing homes - or about one in 10 in the state.

The 200-bed Harlem Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation in New York City was fined $24,000 after a May inspection found infection-control problems, including patients not wearing masks

Nursing homes are still struggling to obtain enough staff and protective gear while sorting out sometimes-conflicting state and federal regulations.

New York now requires patients to test negative for the coronavirus before they are admitted to nursing homes. It has eased restrictions on visitors who might bring the disease in with them but requires that facility staff get tested weekly and have access to a 60-day supply of protective gear.

In the early months of the outbreak in New York, some nursing homes had problems acquiring enough protective equipment or were lax about distributing it to staff or patients.

The 200-bed Harlem Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation in New York City was fined $24,000 after a May inspection found infection-control problems, including patients not wearing masks.

In addition to infection-control violations, inspectors cited at least eight nursing homes for failing to accurately report COVID-19 deaths to the state or for letting the relatives of patients wait days and weeks to learn about new infections and deaths within facilities.
Judge refuses to hold John MacArthur, Grace Community Church in contempt without trial

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A California judge has sided with California Pastor John MacArthur and Grace Community Church in yet another hearing over the churchs decision to hold indoor public worship services amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

On Thursday, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Mitchell L. Beckloff ruled that MacArthur and his Sun Valley-based church are entitled to a full trial on the merits of their challenge against state and local orders prohibiting indoor church gatherings before they can be held in contempt for violating the orders.

For nearly three months, the county has sought to shut down the church and hold MacArthur in contempt for repeatedly violating the order. However, attorneys at the Thomas More Society have argued that the governors orders violate several provisions of the state constitution.

This week, Beckloff ruled that the courts must first decide on the constitutionality of the shutdown orders before the county can pursue contempt charges.

Due to the states shut-down orders, the contempt trial is not expected to take place until early 2021.

The court scheduled a hearing to be held on Nov. 13 regarding the scope of the churchs challenge. A preliminary injunction was issued earlier this month by Beckloff prohibiting the church from conducting, participating in or attending any indoor worship services until the case is resolved.

Lawyers for MacArthur and Grace Community applauded the judge's decision Thursday.

Thomas More Society Special Counsel Charles LiMandri explained in a statement that the ruling prevents the countys attempted rush to judgment in its continued prosecution of MacArthur and Grace Community Church, who are exercising their First Amendment rights.

We are pleased that Judge Beckloff indicated he agreed with the major points that we made on behalf of Pastor MacArthur and Grace Community Church and we are very gratified that the judges ruling today reflects that he appreciates the importance of the constitutionally protected rights at issue in this case," LiMandri said.

Thomas More Society Special Counsel Jenna Ellis called the ruling significant, saying that no person can or should be held in contempt of a constitutionally invalid order.

Los Angeles County continues to presume that its order is valid, with utter disregard for First Amendment protections, she said.

Its tyranny to even suggest that a government action cannot be challenged and must be obeyed without question. This case goes to the heart of what our founders designed for the purpose of legitimate government  not to be above the rule of law. Pastor MacArthur is simply holding church, which is clearly his constitutionally protected right in this country.

In a statement, MacArthur, who is also an internationally syndicated radio host and former president of The Masters University, pledged Grace Community Church would continue to meet despite continued opposition.

We are holding church, he said in a statement shared by Thomas More Society. The Lord Jesus requires us to meet together and we will continue to do that because we are commanded to and because it is our right.

The pastor said that the church is very grateful to Beckloff for providing full due process and recognizing the importance of these constitutional protections.

The reality is that the county cannot show that their order is even rational, much less necessary, he stressed. They have also applied their orders arbitrarily and discriminatorily against churches and we enjoy a heightened protection in America to hold church. Ill continue to stand firm and we will continue to fight to protect religious freedom for the church.

Listen to MacArthur explain why his church is defying orders:

In addition to seeking a court order to close Grace Community, Los Angeles County officials have used various methods to prevent the congregation from gathering.

Last month, the county told the church it would terminate a lease for a parking lot the congregation had used for 45 years.

Last week, MacArthur revealed that he recently received a letter threatening up to six months in jail if he continues holding indoor worship services.

Of course, my biblical hero apart from the Lord Jesus Christ is the Apostle Paul, MacArthur said in an interview with Fox News' Laura Ingraham. And when he went into a town he didn't ask what the hotel was like. He asked what the jail was like because he knew that's where he was going to spend his time.

So I don't mind being a little apostolic  if they want to tuck me into jail, I'm open for a jail ministry, he continued. I've done a lot of other ministries and haven't had the opportunity to do that one. So bring it on.
Glenda F. Ruf joined her heavenly father on September 25, 2020.

Glenda was born in LaFollette, Tn., on January 5, 1946, but later resided in Knoxville, then Chattanooga. In her 30s she made the bold decision to further her education and become a nurse. She worked in the nursing field for 30 years, primarily at Fort Sanders Regional Medical Center and Covenant Home Care and Hospice. Nursing was her passion and served as her mission field for many years. She often expressed herself by writing beautiful songs and poems, many of which she shared with family and friends on special occasions. Those who knew her understood her love for books (particularly Danielle Steele), crocheting, the Atlanta Braves and her sweet dog Sassie. Glenda loved the Lord. She was a spiritual role model to many and a true prayer warrior. She served many roles in her lifetime including daughter, sister, mother, aunt, Mammaw, Mimi and friend to many.

She was preceded in death by her husband, Al Ruf and a daughter, Tammy Miller.

Survivors include her children, Betty (Jim) Anderson, Scott (Sherri) Ruf and Marcy (Dale) Ledford; five grandchildren, Derrick Anderson, Christine Moretto, Jeffrey Greeson, Kelly Smith and Zachary Ledford; two great-granddaughters, Zoie Walton and Aurora Greeson; and a sister, Jean Shearer.

The family will receive friends from 4-7 p.m. on Monday, Sept. 28, at the East Chapel of Chattanooga Funeral Home, 404 South Moore Road followed by a funeral service at 7 p.m. in the funeral home chapel with the Reverend Jamie Colbert officiating. Burial will be in East Tennessee State Veterans Cemetery in Knoxville, at 2 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 29.

Please share your thoughts and memories at www.ChattanoogaEastChapel.com.
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Joshua Rodriguez handcuffed after arrest in Centerville, Utah View Photo

Sonora, CA  The alleged shooter in the murder of 17-year-old Eric Aguiar in a parking lot at Sonora High School has been caught in Utah.

Tuolumne County Sheriffs officials relay that 20-year-old Joshua Rodriguez of Tuolumne was arrested in Centerville, Utah. Sheriffs detectives had discovered Rodriguez had fled there and contacted Centerville police to help capture him.

Centerville Police relay that Rodriguez was found hiding out with a woman in a camper trailer located in the backyard of a residence in Centerville and was taken into custody shortly after midnight this morning.

Police recount that due to the dangerous nature of this situation, the Bountiful Metropolitan SWAT team was called in to make the arrest. The SWAT team reports it utilized a flashbang, also known as a flash grenade or less-lethal explosive device, no one was injured, and no damage occurred to private property during this operation.

At the scene, officers found a knife, a cell phone, and some marijuana. Centerville Police add that the female was detained and questioned, but subsequently released without charges. Currently, Rodriguez is being held at the Davis County Jail awaiting extradition back to Tuolumne County.

The deadly shooting of Aguiar took place on Wednesday, September 16th. At the time, Sonora Police Chief Turu VanderWiel told Clarke Broadcasting that there were several possible suspects on the run and that they should be considered armed and dangerous, as reported here. A day later the SPD turned the case over to the sheriffs department due to limited resources, as detailed here.
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The late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg laid in state at the U.S. Capitol on Friday, becoming the first woman in the country's history to be honored this way.

Politicians, military leaders, and Ginsburg's family and friends were among those who paid respects in front of her flag-draped casket placed in the Capitol's Statuary Hall.

"It is my sad honor to welcome so many who loved Justice Ginsburg to this celebration of her life here in the United States Capitol," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a statement, calling her "petite in size, monumental in impact."

2020 Democratic presidential nominee and former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden also attended the ceremony to honor the legendary jurist.

Biden noted that he was the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee during Ginsburg's confirmation process when she was nominated by then President Bill Clinton in 1993.

"It was like when I met her when I did her hearing. I was the chairman of the committee when she was confirmed," Biden said of Ginsburg. "Wonderful memories."

Bryant Johnson, Ginsburg's personal trainer, did three push-ups to pay tribute to the liberal icon, who was consistent in her workouts and became an unlikely fitness role model.

U.S. President Donald Trump paid his respects to Ginsburg on Thursday when she laid in repose at the top of the steps of the Supreme Court building, where tens of thousands of public mourners lined up to bid their farewell.

Lying in state is a tribute reserved for distinguished government officials and military officers, when their caskets are displayed in the Capitol or a government building, either in Washington, D.C. or at the state level. Lying in repose is the tradition in which remains of the deceased is made available for public viewing in a building other than the U.S. Capitol.

A renowned champion of women's rights, Ginsburg died last week at the age of 87 due to complications related to metastatic pancreas cancer. She was the second woman appointed to the highest court in the United States.

Ginsburg will be laid to rest at Arlington National Cemetery, which is across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C., according to the Supreme Court.

Trump will name Ginsburg's replacement on Saturday afternoon, with multiple media outlets reporting on Friday that he will pick Amy Coney Barrett, a conservative judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, to fill the seat.

Any Supreme Court nominee needs to be confirmed by the Senate with a simple majority vote. Republicans, who have a 53-47 advantage in the chamber, appear to have enough votes to approve Trump's candidate despite fierce pushback from Democrats.
Talk show host Jimmy Kimmel pranked people into believing Donald Trump chose daughter Ivanka for the Supreme Court.

The comedian, a vocal critic of the president, tricked passersby in Los Angeles for the latest edition of his Lie Witness News segment.

I was wondering, how far would be too far for Republicans to support Donald Trump, Mr Kimmel said on Jimmy Kimmel Live.

So we went out on the street to do a socially distant survey.

Mr Trump has promised to quickly fill the Supreme Court vacancy created by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, with reports that his nominee will be conservative judge Amy Coney Barrett.

One of Mr Kimmels producers took to the streets outside his studio and asked people how they had reacted to Trump picking Ivanka Trump for the job.

I was a little surprised, said one man quickly.

I think its a good pick. Shes a smart businesswoman. Shes educated. Really good institutions.

"And I think shes gonna be good for the economy, or excuse me, not the economy, good for the country.

But others were not so impressed, and as the segment went on producers ramped up the questioning.

At one point the producer claimed Trump had made his announcement with Ivanka sat on his lap.

And they then claimed that she was intent on overturning Row Row v. Your Boat, a spoof reference to the landmark Supreme Court abortion case Roe v. Wade.

That image of Ivanka on his lap was completely and totally inappropriate, said another victim .

Its the president of the United States, the biggest and the greatest country on Earth. That absolutely should not happen.

Finally Kimmels claimed that Trump stood on the White House lawn and said that Ivanka is just like Ruth Bader Ginsburg, but f***tons hotter, and added that it was time to add some sex appeal to the court.

But they pushed it too far and were caught out by one woman.

Its a very sexist thing to say, definitely not something that the president should say about other women, she said before asking if it was something you guys make up for the program.

So thats not true? Oh my God, I look like an idiot now because Id never heard of that, she added when told it was all for the show.

But I can imagine him doing this stuff. Thats the crazy part.
In its first major campaign across India, Entri, a local language learning app for jobs, has signed up Rajasthan Royals cricketer Robin Uthappa as its brand ambassador and has also partnered with Hotstar to run ad campaigns in five different languages throughout the ongoing IPL season.

Entri expects this move to accelerate its user adoption in the country, especially in the Hindi belt, a company press release said.

Mohammed Hisamuddin, founder and chief executive officer, Entri said, "Robin was an easy choice because he was an early backer of Entri and also the fact that he could speak 4 different languages that Entri had courses in, helped make the decision."

"The user demography we are targeting are cricket crazy and we believe campaigns with the former Indian cricketer during the IPL season would help Entri grow faster across India," he added.

The company was able to more than double its revenue to $2.5 million ARR this quarter compared to the previous quarter and is expecting the Robin campaigns during the IPL will help it to double its revenue again to reach the target of $5 million ARR by the end of this year.

Entri is a learning app for jobs in India, which provides different types of learning content(mock/adaptive tests, flashcards, video lessons) in local languages for job aspirants, that prepares them to get a government or private job.

Founded by MohammedHisamuddin and Rahul Ramesh in 2017, Entri started from Kerala with Malayalam content and has since launched Tamil, Kannada, Telugu, and Hindi content.

Three million users have used Entri so far (out of which 90k are paid users) and the platform is now adding 10,000 users every day, a company press release said. It is on track to reach 5 million users in 2020 and is targeting 10 million users in the next 18 months.

Starting first by providing courses for government recruitment exams in Malayalam, Entri presently offers more than 150 courses including for government jobs and upskilling courses like Spoken English, sales, customer care in five different local languages.

According to Mohammed Hisamuddin, Entri is targeting a market with more than 400 million people in India who are looking to upskill in their own language to get better-paying jobs.
Bars have been allowed to reopen in Telangana after nearly six months. (Representational image)

Hyderabad: The Telangana government on Friday evening announced that it was allowing the reopening of bars, clubs, and tourist bars with immediate effect. Permit rooms will not be allowed to reopen until further orders.

In his orders, chief secretary Somesh Kumar laid down eight conditions for establishments to follow. These include that there be mandatory thermal screening at the entrance.

The orders mandated crowd management in parking lots, provision of hand sanitiser and face masks for bar staff and crew. The orders prohibited gatherings inside the premises.

The orders prohibited holding musical events or opening dance floors.

Mangements must ensure deep cleaning and sanitisation of the premises every morning and evening and every seat must be sanitised before a new customer occupies it. The orders said that it was the managements responsibility to ensure proper ventilation in the premises.

Around 1,400 bars, pubs and liquor-serving outlets in hotels and restaurants and clubs have been closed since March 25 as part of the nationwide Covid-19 lockdown. The government had on May 6 allowed the sale of liquor in shops.
Will make water supply good in Delhi as in developed countries: CM Kejriwal

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New Delhi, Sep 25: Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Saturday said his government would make water supply in Delhi as good as in developed countries and it is hiring a consultant for this purpose.

He also dismissed allegations that water supply in Delhi was being privatised. "Some opposition leaders are saying water supply in Delhi is being privatised. It can never happen and I assure you this," the chief minister said.

First look of Delhi-Meerut RRTS train unveiled, to have WiFi onboard

"We are hiring a consultant to tell us how to improve water supply management and ensure that not even a drop of water is wasted," Kejriwal said during a digital press conference. He said that in the capital cities of developed nations, water is available round-the-clock with proper pressure and there is no need for a submersible pump.

Deepika Padukone questioned in drug probe | India tears into Pakistan | Oneindia News

"We will make it happen in Delhi. The city's water supply will be as good as in developed nations," Kejriwal said, adding that accountability should be fixed for each drop of water and there should not be any wastage.

Bihar Assembly Elections 2020: Sanjay Raut says issues from Mumbai can be made 'parcel' to Bihar

The chief minister also informed the press briefing the Delhi government was in talks with Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh for increasing water availability in the national capital.
Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (Dewa) has announced that it had received 10 local and international prestigious awards this year so far.

Dewas achievements underline the competitiveness of Dubai and its global position, it stated.

"Dewa has done this by anticipating the future; using scientific planning, innovation, and a state-of-the-art infrastructure that meets the highest international standards," remarked Saeed Mohammed Al Tayer, the managing director and CEO of Dewa.

"This is in addition to providing electricity and water services using the latest Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies, and disruptive technologies that deliver the highest levels of availability, reliability, efficiency, and sustainability," observed Al Tayer.

Dewa Academy, one of the most pioneering initiatives that invest in youth and provides vocational qualifications for Emiratis, received the Hamdan bin Rashid Al Maktoum Award for Education-Supporting Institutions.

The Dubai utility had also received two of the most important awards in the Global Good Governance, 3G, Awards 2020 from Cambridge IFA in the UK.

It received the 3G Leadership Award 2020, and Saeed Mohammed Al Tayer received the 3G Personality of the Year for good governance and sustainability.

Dewa also won the US SEAL (Government Sector), (Sustainability, Environment Achievement & Leadership) Awards for Environmental Initiatives due to the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park, the largest single-site solar park in the world using the Independent Power Producer (IPP) model.

The Solar Park has a planned capacity of 5,000MW by 2030, with investments of AED 50 billion.

Dewas efforts to engage society members in achieving sustainable development won a UK Peer Award for Commitment to Excellence, stated Al Tayer.

This was for its initiatives and programmes to engage customers and use the latest technologies at its Customer Happiness Centres.

Dewa had also received International CSR Excellence awards for Water Saving, Community Commitment, Volunteering, and Partnerships for its Advanced Metering Infrastructure-Water project and Zayed al Khair treatment camp in Bangladesh, and its overall voluntary work, which supports social, economic and environmental development efforts; and the Dubai Building Permit System initiative, DP.

It had also won an AI Breakthrough Award for Transactional Robotics Innovation for its virtual employee Rammas.-TradeArabia News Service
Colombo, Sep 26 : Former Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena should take the sole responsibility of the coordinated 2019 Easter Sunday carnage, former IGP Pujith Jayasundara said, adding that the massacre that killed over 250 people was well planned.

He made the remarks while testifying before the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI), set up to probe the attacks, on Friday, reports The Daily Mirror newspaper.

Jayasundara told the PCoI that after he had received the report about the April 9 intelligence alert from State Intelligence Service (SIS) Director Nilantha Jayawardena, he had forwarded it to SDIG of Western Province Nandana Munasinghe, SDIG Crimes, STF Chief M.R. Latif, DIG Special Protection Range Priyalal Dassanayake and Director of Terrorist Investigation Division (TID) Waruna Jayasundara.

He said that he also telephoned all SDIGs in charge of the respective provinces.

The former IGP claimed that although he had given specific instructions about the possible terror attack to all the senior police officers, during investigation it was found that all his call records were deleted.

"Former President Sirisena's brother was the head of the Sri Lanka Telecom and Mobitel during this period. The Commission should probe thoroughly to find what had happened to these call records," Jayasundara said.

He also claimed that his phone conversations had been tapped by the SIS and also deployed officers near his residence to monitor him.

Jayasundara added that Abdul Latif Jameel Mohammed, who killed himself at the Dehiwala Tropical Inn Lodge, had met intelligence officers 45 minutes before the blast.

The former IGP's testimony comes after Defence Secretary Kamal Gunaratne said last month that security agencies received 97 warnings prior to the attacks, The Daily Mirror reported.

On April 21, 2019, three churches in Negombo, Batticaloa and Colombo and the hotels -- Shangri-La, Cinnamon Grand, Kingsbury and Tropical Inn -- in the capital city were targeted in the series of coordinated suicide bombings, which apart from the victims also injured more than 500 people.

Sri Lankan authorities attributed the attacks to little-known local Islamist extremist groups, National Thowheeth Jama'ath and Jammiyathul Millathu Ibrahim.

However, the Islamic State terror group claimed the attacks.
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's US election intervention 'violated' the terms of the 'Megxit' deal the couple have the Queen, according to senior royal aides.

Their comments could further risk their links to the monarchy, with sources claiming that senior courtiers are discussing how to further distance London royals from the couple.

In their message, Harry and Meghan called on American voters to 'reject hate speech, misinformation and online negativity' in 'the most important election of our life.'

Their comments, which came in a Time 100 video to go with the publication of this year's list of the most influential people, have been widely interpreted to be a swipe at U.S. president Donald Trump. The list does not include the royal couple.

Members of the royal family are supposed to be politically neutral, and under the Sandringham accord - agreed in March when the pair quit their royal duties - the Sussexes vowed that 'everything they do will uphold the values of Her Majesty'.

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle spoke out about the upcoming U.S. election, in a stark break with British tradition that prohibits royal involvement in politics. Senior sources suggest that in doing so, the couple broke their agreement with The Queen

However, according to The Sunday Times, royal aides have said that the couple's comments last week have broken their promise from earlier this year.

'The [royal] family are all wringing their hands, thinking: where is this going and does this abide by the deal to uphold the values of the Queen? The feeling is it's a violation of the agreement,' one source told the newspaper.

The sources say that if the agreement is deemed to have been violated, Prince Harry's chances of resuming his connections to the Royal Marines and other military posts he is said to hold dear could be under threat.

The arrangement the Sussexes have with the royal family will be reviewed after a year by The Queen, the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Cambridge.

The Times reports that the Queen agreed to keep the positions vacated by Prince Harry open during the review period so that he could return if it was deemed appropriate. One such position is the captain general of the Royal Marines.

'The door was left open,' said one aide. 'There were some things that Harry hoped he could opt back into. He dearly wants to hang on to the Royal Marines and the military appointments. That will be harder now.' This will likely come as a blow to the Prince.

The couples' roles as president and vice-president of the Queen's Commonwealth Trust is also expected to come under review, and conversations last week reportedly even included whether they could be stripped of their HRH titles.

Currently, Harry and Meghan still have these titles, but are not allowed to use them.

However, one source told The Times that the view is they couldn't remove Harry's title, pointing to the fact that even Edward VIII kept his HRH when he abdicated.

Royal sources claim that the Monarchy was embarrassed by the couple's comments, with one senior aide questioning what The Queen would say to Donald Trump should he make another visit to the UK after her grandson and his wife spoke out against him

Buckingham palace sough to distance itself from their remarks, with royal sources saying that the monarch had been embarrassed by the comments, asking what the Queen is supposed to say should Donald Trump have another presidential visit.

'If Trump is re-elected and makes another visit here, what is the Queen supposed to say when her grandson and his wife have effectively campaigned against him?' said a source.

A spokesman for the Sussexes said: 'The duke's message is not in reference to any specific political party or candidate, but is instead a call for decency in how we engage with each other.'

Harry and Meghan, now ensconced in an L.A. mansion, made their remarks just weeks before the November 3 elections with Americans in some states already going to the polls.

The Duke of Sussex urged people to 'reject hate speech' while the Duchess called it the 'most important election of our lifetime' in remarks which made waves on both sides of the Atlantic.

Meghan Markle would 'seriously consider running for president' Meghan Markle would 'seriously consider running for president' if she and Prince Harry ever 'gave up their titles,' a source close to the royal has claimed. The Duchess of Sussex, 39, and Prince Harry, 35, now ensconced in an L.A. mansion, recently recorded a video message for Times 100 urging Americans to vote, hinting they support Democrat Joe Biden. They made their remarks just weeks before the November 3 elections with Americans in some states already going to the polls. 'One of the reasons she was so keen not to give up her American citizenship was so she had the option to go into politics,' a source close to the couple claimed, speaking to Vanity Fair's Katie Nicholl. 'I think if Meghan and Harry ever gave up their titles she would seriously consider running for president.' However, others working closely with Meghan claimed that she has no intentions of a career in politics. 'While there's no denying she is interested and engaged in politics as a topic, she harbors no ambition to enter a career in politics herself,' a well-placed source told the publication. Advertisement

Royal insiders voiced concern in Britain where the Queen and her family are expected to remain politically neutral at all times, with one saying that Harry and Meghan had 'crossed a line'.

Buckingham Palace also distanced itself from Harry's remarks by saying that 'the Duke is not a working member of the royal family' and describing his comments as 'made in a personal capacity'.

Trump slammed Meghan Markle from the White House podium after the video message was released, urging Americans to vote and hinting they support Democrat Joe Biden.

'I'm not a fan of hers,' Trump said Wednesday to a question posed by DailyMail.com. 'I would say this - and she has probably heard that - I wish a lot of luck to Harry because he's going to need it.'

'As we approach this November, it's vital that we reject hate speech, misinformation and online negativity,' said Harry  in a line some observers in Britain and the U.S. immediately took to be a plug for Joe Biden and a slap at President Trump.

Said the California-born Markle, 39: 'We're six weeks out from the election, and today is Voter Registration Day.

'Every four years, we're told the same thing, 'This is the most important election of our lifetime. But this one is. When we vote, our values are put into action, and our voices are heard.'

For his part, Harry said: 'As we approach this November, it's vital that we reject hate speech, misinformation and online negativity.'

Harry urged Americans to be careful about what kind of content they consume online.

'When the bad outweighs the good, for many, whether we realize it or not, it erodes our ability to have compassion and our ability to put ourself in someone else's shoes. Because when one person buys into negativity online, the effects are felt exponentially. It's time to not only reflect, but act,' he said.

Harry is said to be hopeful that he can retain some military duties, but the video message is thought to have put his chanced of being allowed to do so at risk

While many viewers saw Harry and Meghan's comments as a thinly-veiled endorsement of Biden, a source close to Harry insisted the Duke was not referring to Trump or any other individual.

'The duke was talking about the tone of debate in the run-up to an election which is already quite febrile,' they said.

'He is not talking about any candidate or specific campaign. He is building on a lot of stuff that he's said before about online communities, how we engage with each other online, rather than specifically making any political points.'

SARAH VINE: Do Meghan Markle and Prince Harry actually WANT to be stripped of their titles?



Donald Trump is not my favourite person. But I couldnt help feeling a certain grudging admiration for the old dunderhead last week. Asked what he thought of the Duke and Duchess of Sussexs decision to interfere in the US presidential election, he just gave a wry smile and said: I wish a lot of luck to Harry because hes gonna need it. Mr Trump doesnt always have a great way with words but even his sternest critic would have to concede that, on this occasion, he displayed an admirable flash of wit. A member of the British Royal Family, a scion of Empire, telling Americans how to vote in their own elections? Good luck with that, Harry. Because, of course, the Yanks famously love being bossed around by pampered English princes. Look how well it turned out for George III. Seriously, though, if Harry and Meghan hoped to boost Grandpa Bidens poll ratings, they may well have just shot themselves in the Manolos. Asked what he thought of the Duke and Duchess of Sussexs decision to interfere in the US presidential election, Trump just gave a wry smile and said: I wish a lot of luck to Harry because hes gonna need it If theres one thing guaranteed to get your average, red-blooded Republican off straight to the polling booth, its the sight of a couple of entitled celebrities accusing them of being ignorant hate-mongers  from the comfort of an 11million mansion. At home, too, this intervention marks a turning point in the increasingly toxic soap opera of Harry and Meghan. Because what the Prince has just done  break the cardinal rule of British Royalty, that is to say openly intervene in not just an election, but a foreign election  takes the growing rift between him and the Palace, to borrow a term from the American military, to DEFCON 3. It would appear to be  and I am increasingly certain of this  a deliberate act of aggression designed to leave the Queen with no choice but to strip the pair of their Royal titles. Such an act would play perfectly to their imagined narrative of always being the victims. The speed with which Harry has gone from being the most relatable member of the Royal Family to someone who appears intent on not only rejecting everything the institution stands for but doing his utmost to undermine it, is astonishing. It had already become clear, even before he met Meghan, that the Prince was struggling to find his feet as a Royal. He harboured a lot of pent-up resentment, not only towards the constraints of the institution itself, but also towards his family for the way his mother had been treated. He wanted out, whether he realised it fully or not, and Meghan was his ticket I dont think it was any coincidence that he chose as his bride a woman who was always going to struggle with the restrictions of monarchy. He wanted out, whether he realised it fully or not, and Meghan was his ticket. Had he married some honking Camilla, content to push a pram around Windsor while wearing a pair of wellies and a Barbour, he would have been for ever trapped in the role of spare, relegated to a life in his brothers shadow, always the also-ran, like his Uncle Andrew. Meghan was never going to put up with that kind of life. That was abundantly clear right from the start to anyone with eyes in their head. This way, he gets to find freedom and sock it to the institution which, it is increasingly apparent, he despises. No more dreary wet weekends pressing the flesh with commoners for Harry: its all Netflix and chia seeds now. And the fact that, by his actions, he is boxing his family  and with it his long-suffering granny  into a corner is just the cherry on the cake. So, yes, Mr Trump is right to wish Harry luck. After all, its a huge gamble hes taking. I just hope the poor deluded boy knows what hes letting himself in for. How British royals are expected to keep out of politics Under Britain's constitutional monarchy, powers which theoretically belong to the Queen - such as appointing ministers and approving legislation - are exercised in her name by political leaders. This system means that political decisions are taken by the elected government rather than unelected royals, while keeping the monarchy as a symbol of the British state and its traditions. The royals' political neutrality, which the Queen has scrupulously observed for 68 years, is key to maintaining this balance and to preserving the monarchy's popularity. A YouGov poll earlier this year found majority support among both Conservative and Labour voters as well as Brexiteers and Europhiles for maintaining the British monarchy. The Queen's uncle King Edward VIII had to abdicate in 1936 because the government refused to support his planned marriage to American divorcee Wallis Simpson - fatally compromising his neutrality. While there is no law explicitly preventing the royal family from voting in UK elections, doing so would be an unacceptable breach of protocol. The Queen holds weekly conversations with her prime ministers and she is entitled to 'advise and warn' them when necessary, but the nature of her advice is never made public. Even her guarded comment that voters should 'think very carefully about the future' ahead of the 2014 Scottish independence referendum was seen as an unusual intervention. Prince Charles is known for writing lengthy letters to ministers on policy subjects such as agriculture, some of which were made public in 2015. William and Kate have also spoken out on the environment, launching a prize to tackle climate issues last year. Princess Diana - who like Harry and Meghan became semi-detached from the monarchy - was known for her campaigning on land mines, once allegedly describing the UK government's policy as 'hopeless'. Her involvement sparked criticism from some Conservative MPs, but the Labour government that took office shortly before her death was more favourable to her campaign. Advertisement

By Sarah Vine for the Daily Mail
Forget about it, its over. Democrats need to put the Supreme Court appointment fight behind them as quickly as possible and move on to the real battle in November.

They have no power in the Senate, and they cannot afford to spin their wheels over an appointment whose conclusion is already foretold by the Republican majority.

And there is no avenue of attack open to them. The fear of a rollback of Roe vs. Wade or a shutdown of Obamacare plays well in blue states, but it also carries the potential for blowback in the battleground states.

Like it or not, the question of who succeeds the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg plays big in the media and with the base of both the Democratic and Republican parties, but it doesnt resonate with the average American.

Instead of dragging out the inevitable, Democrats should cut their losses and concentrate on winning the presidency.

Joe Biden is ahead in the polls, but hes hardly a sure thing. Hes never going to be a rock star, and the issues that have carried him so far  President Trumps coronavirus failings, the economic downturn  could still wane by election day.

Its all coming down to a mandate on Trump. Bidens problem is, that puts it all in Trumps hands  not Bidens.

Served cold: Democrats best revenge for the Republican court packing is to win the White House and Congress in November  then immediately admit the heavily Democratic District of Columbia and Puerto Rico as the 51st and 52nd states.

It would forever shift control of the Senate to Democrats and go a long way toward fixing the red-state bias of the electoral college.

Mail storm: President Trump is being his usual idiot self when he raises questions about the validity of voting by mail. But at least when it comes to California and a handful of other states that automatically send out mail ballots, he does have a point.

Most states require voters to ask for mail ballots, which is how California used to do it. That way, they know a real person is reaching out.

The way its working in California this year, however, every active voter on the state rolls will be sent a ballot. No request required.

What much of the public does not know is that its very hard to strike someone from the voter rolls. The rule is, if someone misses two consecutive federal general elections  a presidential election and a midterm  and then misses two more after failing to respond to a mailed query from county registrars, theyre supposed to be tossed off the rolls.

So, you can be gone from your registered address  or dead  for a long time before the state gets around to erasing you. Some estimates say that up to 10% of Californias 20 million registered voters arent where the state thinks they are.

Nonetheless, ballots will be going to their listed addresses. So some people who have moved wont get ballots. Residents at the old addresses will get ballots for people who are no longer living there or are no longer living, period.

There are safeguards against fraudulent voting  for starters, registrars carefully check signatures on the ballot envelopes to make sure they match whats on file with the state.

I hope so, because any screwups will give weight to cockamamie voter fraud conspiracies, which is just what Trump wants.

Tough question: Youre a practical kind of politician, someone told me on a Zoom round table the other day. Whats your position on whether Ruth Bader Ginsburg should have resigned when Barack Obama was still president and given him the opportunity to name her replacement instead of Donald Trump?

I said: Your definition of me as a practical politician is correct. And being a practical politician, Im not going to answer that question. Thank you.

Dancing in the streets: Johns Grill has taken outside dining to a new level.

Carlos Reyes, the violinist with the enhanced sound system, turned Ellis Street between Stockton and Powell into a dance hall last Sunday, with everybody in masks and 6 feet apart, shaking it like it was the Summer of Love on Haight Street.

And heres hoping you can shake it wherever you are.

See you next week.

Want to sound off? Email wbrown@sfchronicle.com.
The head of the HSE has called for the public to galvanise young people to help curb the spread of Covid-19.

Paul Reid said the country should avoid knocking down the youth of Ireland amid concerns of further restrictions following a growing number of Covid-19 cases.

It emerged during the week that people aged 15 to 34 account for 40% of Covid-19 cases in the past two months, despite accounting for just a quarter of the population.

On Friday, acting chief medical officer Dr Ronan Glynn and his Northern Ireland counterpart, Dr Michael McBride, made a specific appeal to teenagers and people in their 20s and 30s in Co Donegal and Londonderry to reduce their social contacts.

Young people have made this country an even better place to live, in my book. Marriage equality, climate change awareness & much more, all enabled by them. Again we put a weight on their shoulders to help us with #COVID19. Let's not knock, but galvanise them once again.@HSELive  Paul Reid (@paulreiddublin) September 26, 2020

Donegal moved to risk level three of the Governments plan to deal with Covid-19 following advice from the National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET).

The restrictions will last for three weeks.

The chief medical officers said they were concerned about the significant proportion of cases in young people in Donegal and Derry, and asked teenagers and those in their 20s and 30s in particular to reduce their social contacts.

On Saturday another 248 cases of Covid-19 were confirmed in Ireland, the National Public Health Emergency Team (Nphet) said, bringing the total to 34,560.

How are we doing? The number of new cases per day remains high. Its possible that incidence is rising more slowly in recent days, but its too early to tell. If we are starting to suppress the virus again, take this as encouragement to maintain and redouble our efforts. 1/7 pic.twitter.com/GrF3ew0SpE  Professor Philip Nolan (@PhilipNolan_SFI) September 26, 2020

A further five deaths due to the virus were reported, bringing the toll to 1,802.

People under the age of 45 represented 67% of the cases.

On Saturday, Mr Reid tweeted: Young people have made this country an even better place to live, in my book.

Marriage equality, climate change awareness and much more, all enabled by them.

Again we put a weight on their shoulders to help us with Covid-19. Lets not knock, but galvanise them once again.

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The Government has also imposed country-wide level three restrictions on colleges, which will see most lecturers moved online.

Higher education institutions are to adopt the same health measures already in place in Dublin for the next two to three weeks.

Minister for Further and Higher Education Simon Harris said on Friday that colleges and libraries will remain open.

Taoiseach Micheal Martin voiced concerns earlier this week about the 18 to 34 age bracket, particularly as many students return to third-level colleges.

Mr Martin said college life will not be normal for students.
B oris Johnson has announced that frontline workers who played a key role in the fight against coronavirus will be recognised in the Queens Birthday Honours next month.

The Prime Minister praised the dedication, courage and compassion shown by the recipients.

They will be honoured along with people recognised for a broad range of achievements.

The list was due to be published in June but was pushed back to enable nominations for people playing crucial roles during the first months of the pandemic.

Boris Johnson has said key workers will be recognised / PA

Mr Johnson asked in May for nominations of those who have gone over and above in their response to Covid-19.

The list, to be published on October 10, will include doctors, nurses, fundraisers and volunteers who stepped up amid the crisis.

Coronavirus hits the UK - In pictures 1 /81 Coronavirus hits the UK - In pictures A deserted Westminster Bridge PA A man wearing a face mask or covering due to the COVID-19 pandemic, walks past customers sat outside a restaurant AFP via Getty Images Boris Johnson addresses the nation on the Coronavirus lockdown Andrew Parsons Runners pass cardboard cutouts of Britain's Queen Elizabeth II and Prince William during the London Marathon in London AP An empty escalator at Charing Coss London Underground tube station Jeremy Selwyn Electronic bilboards displays a message warning people to stay home in Sheffield PA A sign is displayed in the window of a student accommodation building following the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Mancheste Reuters People take part in a 'We Do Not Consent' rally at Trafalgar Square, organised by Stop New Normal, to protest against coronavirus restrictions, in Londo AP People sing and dance in Leicester Square on the eve on the 10PM curfew Reuters Hearts painted by a team of artists from Upfest are seen in the grass at Queen Square, following the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Bristol Reuters Graffiti reads 'good luck and stay safe', as the number of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) cases grow around the world, under a bridge in London Reuters A sign is pictured in Soho, amid the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in London Reuters Prime Minister Boris Johnson gestures, during a coronavirus briefing in Downing Street, London AP A person runs past posters with a message of hope, as the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues in Manchester REUTERS Riot police face protesters who took part in a 'We Do Not Consent' rally at Trafalgar Square, organised by Stop New Normal, to protest against coronavirus restrictions in London AP An image of The Queen eith quotes from her broadcast to the UK and the Commonwealth in relation to the Coronavirus epidemic are displayed on lights in London's Piccadilly Circus PA Military vehicles cross Westminster Bridge after members of the 101 Logistic Brigade delivered a consignment of medical masks to St Thomas' hospital Getty Images Durdle Door in Dorset Reuters Captain Tom Moore via Reuters Mia, aged 8, and Jack, aged 5, take part in "PE with Joe" a daily live workout with Joe Wicks on Youtube to help kids stay fit who have to stay indoors due to the Coronavirus outbreak PA An NHS worker reacts at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital during the Clap for our Carers campaign in support of the NHS Reuters Goats which have taken over the deserted streets of Llandudno @AndrewStuart via PA Tobias Weller PA Novikov restaurant in London with its shutters pulled down while the restaurant is closed London Landscapes: Hyde Park and the Serpentine, central London. Matt Writtle A newspaper vendor in Manchester city centre giving away free toilet rolls with every paper bought as shops run low on supplies due to fears over the spread of the coronavirus PA Theo Clay looks out of his window next to his hand-drawn picture of a rainbow in Liverpool, as the spread of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continue Reuters A young man cuts another man's hair on top of a closed hairdresser in Oxford Reuters General view of the new NHS Nightingale Hospital, built to fight against the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in London via Reuters Jason Baird is seen dressed as Spiderman during his daily exercise to cheer up local children in Stockport, as the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues Reuters A woman wearing a face mask walks past Buckingham Palace Getty Images A man holds mobile phone displaying a text message alert sent by the government warning that new rules are in force across the UK and people must stay at home PA Medical staff on the Covid-19 ward at the Neath Port Talbot Hospital, in Wales, as the health services continue their response to the coronavirus outbreak. PA Prime Minister Boris Johnson taking part in a virtual Cabinet meeting with his top team of ministers PA A shopper walks past empty shelves in a Lidl store on in Wallington. After spates of "panic buying" cleared supermarket shelves of items like toilet paper and cleaning products, stores across the UK have introduced limits on purchases during the COVID-19 pandemic. Some have also created special time slots for the elderly and other shoppers vulnerable to the new coronavirus. Getty Images People on a busy tube train in London at rush hour PA Mia, aged 8 and her brother Jack, aged 5 from Essex, continue their school work at home, after being sent home due to the coronavirus PA Children are painting 'Chase the rainbows' artwork and springing up in windows across the country Reuters Social distancing in Primrose Hill Jeremy Selwyn A general view of a locked gate at Anfield, Liverpool as The Premier League has been suspended PA Homeless people in London AFP via Getty Images A piece of art by the artist, known as the Rebel Bear has appeared on a wall on Bank Street in Glasgow. The new addition to Glasgow's street art is capturing the global Coronavirus crisis. The piece features a woman and a man pulling back to give each other a kiss PA The Queen leaves Buckingham Palace, London, for Windsor Castle to socially distance herself amid the coronavirus pandemic PA A general view on Grey street, Newcastle as coronavirus cases grow around the world Reuters Matt Raw, a British national who returned from the coronavirus-hit city of Wuhan in China, leaves quaratine at Arrowe Park Hospital on Merseyside PA Britain's Chief Medical Officer Professor Chris Whitty (L) and Chief Scientific Adviser Patrick Vallance look on as British Prime Minister Boris Johnson gestures as he speaks during a coronavirus disease (COVID-19) news conference inside 10 Downing Street Reuters The ticket-validation terminals at the tram stop on Edinburgh's Princes Street are cleaned following the coronavirus outbreak. PA Locked school gates at Rockcliffe First School in Whitley Bay, Tyne and Wear PA A sign at a Sainsbury's supermarket informs customers that limits have been set on a small number of products as the number of coronavirus (COVID-19) cases grow around the world Reuters Jawad Javed delivers coronavirus protection kits that he and his wife have put together to the vulnerable people of their community of Stenhousemuir, between Glasgow and Edinburgh AFP via Getty Images A sign advertising a book titled "How Will We Survive On Earth?" Getty Images A man who appears to be homeless sleeping wearing a mask today in Victoria Jeremy Selwyn A pedestrian walks past graffiti that reads "Diseases are in the City" in Edinburgh AFP via Getty Images Staff from The Lyric Theatre, London inform patrons, as it shuts its doors PA A quiet looking George IV Bridge in Edinburgh PA A quieter than usual British Museum Getty Images A racegoer attends Cheltenham in a fashionable face mask SplashNews.com A commuter wears a face mask at London Bridge Station Jeremy Selwyn A empty restaurant in the Bull Ring Shopping Centre Getty Images A deserted Trafalgar Square in London PA Passengers determined to avoid the coronavirus before leaving the UK arrive at Gatwick Airport Getty Images

Mr Johnson said: As we all redouble our efforts to control the virus, protect the NHS and save lives this winter, I am pleased we have an opportunity to recognise those who have given so much to this country already.

The coronavirus pandemic is the greatest health challenge in our lifetime.

We all have to play our part, but the dedication, courage and compassion seen from these recipients, be it responding on the front line or out in their communities providing support to the most vulnerable, is an inspiration to us all.

We owe them a debt of gratitude and the 2020 Queens Birthday honours will be the first of many occasions where we can thank them as a nation.

Captain Sir Tom Moore was knighted by the Queen for his fundraising efforts during a unique open-air ceremony at Windsor Castle in July.
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Shehroze Chaudhry, charged with a terrorism hoax

A Canadian man whose claims of being a murderous member of Islamic State featured in a popular podcast has been charged with fabricating his story.

Shehroze Chaudhry, 25, was arrested in Burlington, Ontario under the country's terrorism hoax law.

In a statement the Royal Canadian Mounted Police said: "The charge stems from numerous media interviews where the accused claimed he traveled to Syria in 2016 to join the terrorist group and committed acts of terrorism.

"Hoaxes can generate fear within our communities and create the illusion there is a potential threat to Canadians, while we have determined otherwise."

Chaudhry was charged with perpetrating a hoax related to terrorist activity and will appear in court on Nov 16.

In 2018 he featured, as Abu Huzayfah al-Kanadi, in the award-winning New York Times podcast series "Caliphate," which was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize and has been downloaded millions of times.

On social media he claimed to have carried out two execution-style murders for Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, and to have been part of its religious police.

The podcast led to heated debate in Canada's parliament with Justin Trudeau being accused of allowing "bloodthirsty terrorists to walk on our streets".

According to families of Canadians who went to join Isil it also had a major impact on their efforts to repatriate relatives.

Sally Lane's son Jack Letts, known as "Jihadi Jack," held dual UK-Canadian citizenship, but was stripped of his British one after going to Syria to join Isil.

She told The Telegraph: "There was a meeting in Sulimaniyah, Iraq, between Canadian officials and the Kurdish autonomous administration (holding the Isil prisoners in Syria), where everything was due to be signed, and then it all came to a halt.

"A British MP who went told us the Canadian citizens were 'only a week away' from being repatriated. That was the great mystery in April 2018, why everything suddenly changed."

Story continues

Chaudhry, the son of a kebab shop owner, faces a maximum five year prison sentence if convicted.

Canada's law on terrorism hoaxes is usually used in cases of fake bomb threats.

This is the first time it has been used in a case where someone is accused of spreading fear with false claims and wasting police time.

In the Caliphate podcast Chaudhry described murdering a drug dealer.

He said: "The blood was just, it was warm, and it sprayed everywhere, and the guy cried, was crying and screaming.

"Its hard. I had to stab him multiple times. And then we put him up on a cross, and I had to leave the dagger in his heart."

However, some of his claims were later questioned.

He claimed to have joined Isil in 2014 but documents obtained by Canadian media suggested he was a student in Lahore, Pakistan at that time.

On one occasion he said he was with Isil for just under a year, but another time he said it was less than six months.

Rukmini Callimachi, the journalist behind the podcast, defended her work.

She said "multiple" US intelligence agents had confirmed Chaudhry went to Syria.

She added: "The narrative tension of our podcast 'Caliphate' is the question of whether his account is true. In Chapter 6 we explain the conflicting strands of his story, and what we can and cant confirm."

A Canadian police spokesman said: "The RCMP takes these allegations very seriously, particularly when individuals, by their actions, cause the police to enter into investigations in which human and financial resources are invested and diverted from other ongoing priorities."
Totally agree with all the posters above - you cannot possibly see "all" of Switzerland in what will amount to 4 days of sightseeing. Normal recommendation for the Luzern area is 4 nights which gives 3 full days of sightseeing. (It deserves more). Interlaken is the worst tourist trap in the country and to be avoided (plus there is nothing to see in Interlaken itself - neither lakes nor mountains or even a nice small Swiss town!)

You will spend the better part of a day going to the Jungfraujoch (you cannot go to the Jungfrau itself - the mountain - unless you are an experienced climber but you can look at it). It is, as I think Steve said, hugely expensive. The Swiss Travel Pass only gives a 25% reduction on the fare, Half Fare Card 50% which is better. Schilthorn has better views and is easy to work into a day visiting Murren and the Lauterbrunnen valley. Maybe just do that? Schilthorn is less than half the cost of the trip to the Jungfraujoch. It will take you 3 hours to reach the area from Luzern so there goes another morning! And in the same area are two wonderful lakes - Thun and Brienz. Maybe one day for the mountains and the next for the lakes?

Basel is indeed a lovely city and has arguably the most elegant "old town" in the country plus 40 museums on all sorts of topics. But you cannot do and see everything, or even much of anything in 4 days and I would not take time out from Luzern in your case.

Here are some websites - use them to search hotels and then book directly with the hotel chosen to get best prices:

For all travel -
In the past week, public health officials have watched with increasing concern the steady rise of COVID-19 cases in Winnipeg, many the result of community transmission.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 25/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

In the past week, public health officials have watched with increasing concern the steady rise of COVID-19 cases in Winnipeg, many the result of community transmission.

On Friday, with 54 new cases of the novel coronavirus in the province, 44 of them in the Manitoba capital, they decided action was needed.

Effective Monday, the Winnipeg metropolitan region will be have its status under the province's pandemic response system elevated to restricted (orange).

The main effects are that masks must be worn in all indoor public places in Winnipeg and neighbouring municipalities, and gatherings in settings not already restricted by public orders, such as weddings, will be reduced to 10 persons.

"The indicators, especially in the Winnipeg health region, are certainly trending in the wrong direction," said Dr. Brent Roussin, the province's chief public health officer, in announcing the measures at a hastily scheduled news conference.

While western Manitoba was once the province's COVID-19 hot spot, leading public health officials to impose temporary restrictions in Prairie Mountain Health, Winnipeg is now the major concern. As of Friday, the city had 401 of Manitoba's 487 active cases.

"The indicators, especially in the Winnipeg health region, are certainly trending in the wrong direction."  Dr. Brent Roussin

The current five-day test positivity rate is 3.1 per cent in Winnipeg, 2.6 per cent provincewide.

Health officials are troubled by the growing number of cases linked to bar-hopping. In recent weeks, half of the new infections have been connected to bars, pubs and restaurants.

Roussin said Friday that while people in the Winnipeg metro region will have to wear masks as they walk in and out and about in bars and restaurants  as opposed to when they are seated  there will be no further restrictions on such establishments.

Restrictions as of Monday: Masks must be worn in all indoor public places; Indoor and outdoor gatherings will be limited to 10 people; All other existing orders and rules, governing schools, child care centres, retail outlets, indoor sports, museums, theatres, gyms and casinos, will remain the same; click to read more Masks must be worn in all indoor public places; Indoor and outdoor gatherings will be limited to 10 people; All other existing orders and rules, governing schools, child care centres, retail outlets, indoor sports, museums, theatres, gyms and casinos, will remain the same; Restaurants and bars won't face new restrictions immediately, although masks must be worn by patrons walking to and from tables; Seating in churches will continue to be set at 30 per cent of capacity, although church cohort groups, now limited to 50 persons, will be cut back to 10. Employees of private businesses will not, as a matter of course, be required to wear masks indoors. However, masks or non-permeable barriers are required in workplaces that deal with the public. Close

However, he said the government will immediately begin to consult with the industry about new measures that can be taken in the near future.

While case counts have mainly been rising in the Winnipeg health region, 17 surrounding municipalities are included in the new order for practical purposes. People in these communities regularly travel to Winnipeg for work or school, and their proximity to the city would make it easy for groups to circumvent size restrictions on gatherings by moving events a short distance away.

In addition to the Winnipeg, neighbouring municipalities are affected including Selkirk, Stonewall and Niverville.

The restrictions will remain in place for a minimum of four weeks, representing two virus incubation periods.

Roussin said officials won't be able to judge how effective the new restrictions are for at least a week or two.

As of Monday, masks are mandatory in all indoor public places in the metro region. The limit of 10 on gatherings applies, whether it is an indoor or outdoor setting.

Mask-wearing on the menu, but little else changing at city bars, eateries Click to Expand The mandatory mask rule for public places will apply to bars and restaurants. (Mikaela MacKenzie / Winnipeg Free Press files) Posted: 7:00 PM Sep. 25, 2020 Many of the recent COVID-19 infections in Winnipeg have been linked to bar-hopping and restaurant-going 20-somethings, yet Manitoba's new pandemic restrictions taking effect Monday dont specifically target drinking establishments and eateries. Rather than ordering licensed establishments in Winnipeg and the surrounding communities to stop serving alcohol at an earlier time, as Quebec, Ontario and B.C. have done to slow the spread of the virus, Manitoba's chief public health officer said consultation with stakeholders is needed first. Read Full Story

However, existing orders and rules for schools, child care, retail outlets, museums, theatres, gyms and casinos remain the same for the time being.

Manitoba imposed similar restrictive measures on Aug. 24 in Prairie Mountain Health, which includes Brandon, when cases in that region spiked. The restrictions were lifted on Sept. 18, after the situation was brought under control.

"We were able to make significant change in the Prairie Mountain Health region in a relatively short period of time, and we are looking to do the same in the Winnipeg health region," Roussin said on Friday.

While health officials did not impose restrictions on Prairie Mountain Health until the test positivity rate there exceeded five per cent, they knew exactly where the case clusters were, Roussin said.

"We don't have that benefit here in Winnipeg," he said, noting that the virus is more dispersed in the community.

He implored Winnipeggers to reduce the number of close contacts they have with people outside the home. Visiting people outdoors is safer than in enclosed spaces, he said.

Reacting to the announcement, NDP Leader Wab Kinew said "it's a pretty serious day for everyone who lives in Winnipeg."

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"I think this is a time for us all to remember that we have to work together to slow the spread of COVID-19," he said. "Lets wear our masks, lets limit our interactions in social settings and get back to the basics (that) helped Manitoba to be so successful for so long."

The province said 1,607 laboratory tests for COVID-19 were completed on Wednesday, and a whopping 2,354 tests were completed on Thursday.

Also, officials declared outbreaks over at Fred Douglas Lodge and Concordia Place personal care homes.

 with files from Carol Sanders

larry.kusch@freepress.mb.ca
F ewer than 0.1 per cent of train passengers stopped for not wearing face coverings have been handed a fine, official figures show.

British Transport Police (BTP) said officers stopped 14,726 people from July 15 to August 15 for failing to comply with the requirement, but issued just 14 fixed penalty notices.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson doubled starting fines for not wearing masks on public transport to 200 this week after scientists warned rule-flouting was at a worrying high.

BTP said fines are used as a "last resort". Travellers are allowed to present Government exemption cards without medical evidence.

Figures released to the BBC under freedom of information laws also showed officers recorded 50,729 "interventions" with passengers not wearing face coverings between 30 July and 8 September, with 7 per cent told to leave the train.

Fewer than 0.1 per cent are being handed fines / PA

A total of 37 fines were issued between June 15, when the rules came into force, and July 14. Several rows on the railway network between passengers, some involving the police, have gone viral in recent weeks seeing maskless people confronted.

Last month, police said a train passenger was head-butted to the floor and repeatedly punched in the face for asking a fellow passenger to wear a face mask on a service between Slough and Langley in Berkshire.

Politicians have also been caught out. Conservative MP for Devizes, Danny Kruger, apologised for not donning a mask on a train, while DUP MP for East Antrim, Sammy Wilson, said being pictured by a passenger maskless felt like East Germany under the Stasi.

A BTP spokesman said: "British Transport Police has been working with rail industry staff since face coverings became mandatory on public transport in England on 15 June 2020 to engage with passengers, explain the importance of preventing the spread of the Covid-19 virus and encouraging people to wear face coverings.

"Enforcement, in the form of fixed penalty notices, has only been used as a last resort."
The chairman of Serum Institute of India, Pune Adar Poonawalla has estimated that the government would need to spend Rs 80,000 crore over the next one year to buy and distribute coronavirus vaccines to everyone in India.

Questioning the health ministry and the Prime Ministers Office in a tweet, Poonawalla said, Quick question: will the government of India have 80,000 crores available, over the next one year? Because that's what @MoHFW_INDIA needs, to buy and distribute the vaccine to everyone in India. This is the next concerning challenge we need to ...
A 32-year-old man has



been booked in Odishas Bargarh district for allegedly manufacturing fake COVID-19 vaccines, police said on Saturday.

A case was filed against Prahallad Bisi, a class 7 dropout, after the officials of the Drug Control Administration and police raided his house in Rushuda village in the Bheden Police station area on Friday, they said.

Twelve bottles of the fake injections, labels and syringes were seized in the raid, they added.

Drug Inspector of Bargarh Sashmita Dehury said she came to know from a person that Bisi was claiming that he had made a vaccine for COVID-19 and wanted to sell it in the market.

A case under the Drugs and Cosmetic Act has been registered against him in the Bheden police station, the official said.

"We have seized injection vials with a label reading 'COVID-19 vaccine' from the possession of the accused," Dehury said.

"If required we will send those glass vials for testing after taking permission from the court," she added.

However, Bisi did not sell the fake vaccine to anyone so far, she said.

The Drug Inspector of Sambalpur, S Mallick, who was also present during the raid, said, "When we asked him how he made the vaccine and what the ingredients were, he told us that it was top-secret and he would not reveal it."



"We also found in his house some fake injections for the treatment of infertility. Labels reading Ovu Stop was there on those fake injections, Mallick said, adding that he had made the injection by mixing tetanus toxoid, cefotaxime sodium and castor oil.

Bisi claimed the "COVID-19 vaccine" he made was "100 per cent successful".

"It is a combination of different allopathy medicines," he said.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
U.S. Rep. Elissa Slotkin, D-Holly, is seeking a second term after flipping Michigans 8th congressional district, while GOP challenger Paul Junge is vying to reclaim the seat for Republicans.

Slotkin is a former CIA analyst elected in 2018 to represent a district that supported President Donald Trump two years earlier. Junge, a former prosecutor and television anchor, argues he can better represent the politically-mixed district, though Slotkin touts a bipartisan record in her first term.

Junge earned the Republica Partys nomination by winning a four-way primary with 35% of the vote. Slotkin ran unopposed in the Democratic primary.

Libertarian candidate Joe Hartman is also on the Nov. 3 ballot. Hartman, a tax accountant and former math teacher, is not taking campaign donations and said hes running to bring more awareness to libertarian issues.

The 8th District covers the traditionally Republican-leaning Livingston County, Democratic-leaning Ingham County and portions of Oakland County that have begun to trend blue in recent elections. However, Trump won the 8th District by 7 percentage points in 2016 and will be on the ballot with Junge on Nov. 3.

Slotkin won by a narrow 3.5 points in 2018. She lost Oakland and Livingston counties but won Ingham County by a wide margin, giving her enough votes to become the first Democrat to represent the 8th District since 2001.

Slotkin acknowledged she represents a Republican district during an interview with MLive. She said she is taking the Junges challenge seriously, despite a major difference in fundraising between the two candidates.

Slotkin says shes running for reelection to reduce the cost of prescription drugs, expand health care access, support middle-class jobs and bring decency and integrity back to politics.

The congresswoman serves on the House Armed Services Committee and Homeland Security Committee. During her first term, Slotkin introduced several bills to provide greater transparency on prescription drug prices, improve election security, help the Department of Defense acquire software more quickly, improve conditions for detained migrants, prevent changes to Title IX and end the use of PFAS.

The freshmen congresswoman views herself as a moderate Democrat. She said bipartisanship runs in my blood in the first debate with Junge.

Junge argues Slotkin is less bipartisan than she appears to be in campaign advertisements. Junge, who briefly worked in the Trump administrations U.S. Citizen and Immigration Services, says Slotkin votes with her party on important issues including impeaching the president.

Junge is running a traditional Republican campaign, pledging to oppose tax increases, abortion rights and sanctuary cities." He said ending the coronavirus pandemic and helping businesses recover is a top priority.

Slotkin voted to support the Heroes Act in May, a $3 trillion stimulus package meant to supplement the CARES Act passed through a bipartisan vote earlier this year. The GOP-led U.S. Senate is unlikely to take up the bill.

Slotkin is a member of the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus working to restart negotiations on the next round of COVID-19 relief.

The caucus proposes a $1.5 trillion package, which includes funds for food assistance, stimulus checks, home payment assistance, unemployment benefits, testing, aid for state and local governments, health care providers, and a wide variety of other measures.

Slotkin said House and Senate leadership havent expressed much interest in the proposal, but it serves as a good compromise that enumerates some bipartisan points of agreement. She is pushing for Congress to pass another round of COVID relief before the election.

Its ironic, I think that everyones asking whether we really have enough time to get a COVID package done when the Senate is talking about racing a Supreme Court nomination through the system, Slotkin said.

Junge agreed that Congress should provide a boosted $600 unemployment benefit and support for state and local governments facing budget shortfalls due to the pandemic. However, he said the pandemic shouldnt be seen as an opportunity to lavish funds" on states that have managed their finances irresponsibly.

The candidates agreed to participate in three debates. Slotkin and Junge met in the Lansing studio of WLNS last week for their first debate.

A second televised debate is scheduled Sept. 27 on WDIV-TVs Flashpoint program. A third will be broadcast Oct. 6 on WHMI-FM radio in Howell.

Heres where the candidates stand on several issues, according to candidate questionnaires compiled by a partnership between MLive and the League of Women Voters. Access the full guide and search for candidates in your area at vote411.org.

Junge did not complete the voter guide. His positions on the following questions are gleaned from interviews, his campaign website and other campaign materials.

HEALTH CARE: What do you see as the federal governments role in health care? Given the Covid19 pandemic, what are your concerns and plans regarding U.S. health coverage, policies and programs, including Medicare and Medicaid?

ELISSA SLOTKIN, DEMOCRAT INCUMBENT: All Americans deserve access to affordable health care, and Ill continue to defend funding for Medicare and Medicaid. We need to defend and advance the progress made under the ACA, and I believe that must include allowing a Medicare buy-in for anyone at any age. Health care reform must be accompanied by serious prescription drug pricing reform, which is why I worked to pass two major bills through the House that would lower the cost of prescription drugs. COVID-19 has reminded us of the inequalities in our healthcare system, and we must act to ensure all Americans have access to an affordable future vaccine.

PAUL JUNGE, REPUBLICAN: Junges campaign website states a commitment to protect employer-provided healthcare.

In an interview, Junge said hes not interested in repealing the Affordable Care Act but acknowledged the law could be overturned by the Supreme Court later this year. He said Congress must act to protect people with pre-existing conditions if that occurs.

I think you could you can write laws independent of the Affordable Care Act that say insurance companies cannot deny coverage because someone has a pre-existing condition, they cannot make pricing differences on their coverage because of a pre-existing condition, Junge said.

Per his campaign website, Junge seeks to make prescription drugs more affordable and supports efforts to curb opioid abuse, and lower out-of-pocket costs by increasing the availability of generic drugs, speeding up the FDA approval process and providing greater transparency for healthcare costs.

JOE HARTMAN, LIBERTARIAN: I support removing government meddling from healthcare. During the first few weeks of the Covid pandemic, the CDC prohibited competition in development of tests. This is just one example of how the political control over the healthcare industry limits the options for consumers and creates costly barriers to necessary medical services. Due to regulatory capture, government agencies often slow development of and access to new medicines, devices, and technologies that may improve quality of care and reduce cost of care.

ECONOMY: What federal policies do you support for a healthy economy and to help the broader American public improve their economic positions?

SLOTKIN: Michigan is the birthplace of the middle class, and we must enact policies that help Michigans middle class succeed. The COVID-19 crisis shows that bringing manufacturing back to the U.S. is a homeland security and economic imperative, and our recovery plans should reflect that. For our communities to thrive, we need to invest in preparing our workforce for the 21st century workplace. Businesses tell me they have trouble finding the local talent they need to compete, especially in fields like IT and health care. We should invest in job training programs to match talent to opportunity in our own communities.

JUNGE: Junge supports policies enacted by Trump to build a booming economy, according to his campaign website. He also supports policies that simplify the tax code, and ensure trade agreements benefit American workers per the website. Junge supports incentives to encourage businesses to bring jobs back to the U.S. and reduces Americas reliance on Chinese goods.

Socialism, tax hikes, and crippling regulations would destroy any hope of a robust economic recovery, and we need a strong recovery to provide quality jobs, hope and opportunity for every American, Junge states on his campaign website.

HARTMAN: The only defensible role of government in the economic realm is to protect property rights, adjudicate disputes, and provide a legal framework in which voluntary trade is protected. I advocate for removing unproductive regulations, reducing and eliminating taxes, and getting government out of the way of private enterprise. These regulations, including intellectual property laws and occupational licensing, actively hurt people by stifling human energy, innovation, and well-being.

ELECTIONS: What federal policies do you advocate regarding elections, campaign funding and voting rights? Do you support mailing ballots to all eligible voters?

SLOTKIN: I dont take corporate PAC money, so my constituents know I work for them, not special interests. We need to curb unlimited spending in elections, end partisan gerrymandering, and upend a culture of corruption. I have led legislation to prevent foreign interference in our elections by ensuring foreign governments cant purchase domestic political ads. I supported the reforms MI voters approved in Propositions 2 & 3 and Secretary of State Bensons efforts to ensure voters can vote by mail. I am a co-sponsor of the Voting Rights Advancement Act, which would ensure minority voters are given equal access to the ballot.

JUNGE: Junges campaign website includes no references to policies related to elections.

HARTMAN: The Libertarian Party presidential ticket will be on the ballot in all 50 states and should be included in the presidential and vice presidential debates. Ranked choice voting sounds like a good idea. Based on the 10th amendment, I advocate for the passage of the Daylight Act, which would end federally mandated clock changing by allow the laws passed by state legislatures to implement permanent daylight savings time.

SOCIAL INJUSTICE: Do you believe there is systemic racism, economic disparity, and other social injustices which should be addressed by Congress? If so, what policies do you support?

SLOTKIN: Congress must address systemic racism and inequality. I was a co-sponsor of the Voting Rights Advancement act, which requires states to seek federal permission before making changes to election procedure that could impact accessibility for communities of color. We must address racial disparities evident in police abuses and in the disparate impact of COVID-19 on communities of color. I support survivors of sexual assault and harassment, and introduced legislation to stop Secretary DeVos from making it harder for survivors to successfully come forward with Title IX claims. I also am a supporter of the Equality Act.

JUNGE: Junge said he opposes defunding police departments, but does support banning chokeholds, no knock-warrants and other reforms to prevent excessive use of force. Junge is a former prosecutor.

When youre talking to communities that are victimized by crime, they dont want less police they want more police, Junge said. But, there are always opportunities for improvement and reform.

He expressed frustration that some politicians have not taken a stronger stance opposing violence and destruction displayed in several cities surrounding protests against police brutality. Junge said Democrats have demonized law enforcement while Wiking at mob violence.

HARTMAN: The most explicit example of systemic racism is the social security system. The taxes are confiscated from workers and benefits are paid to older people. The system disproportionately hurts low income workers by reducing their discretionary income. Based on the demographics of these groups, the outcome reflects systemic racism. Abolishing payroll taxes would be an effective way to reduce systemic racism and wealth inequality. Ending the drug war, ending qualified immunity, and demilitarizing the police would help to reduce the social injustice imposed by law enforcement.

ENVIRONMENT & ENERGY: What policies do you support to meet U.S. energy needs while protecting our water, air and land for current and future generations?

SLOTKIN: The development of clean energy technologies like wind and solar not only helps our environment, it also means economic potential. Michigan has always been a leader in manufacturing, and I will fight to make sure were in a position to welcome the next generation of high-skilled, well-paying jobs to our state. I believe access to clean water is a homeland security issue, because it is about the safety of our communities. I championed six provisions to protect against the forever chemical PFAS that were signed into law by the President. In Congress, I am a member of the bipartisan Great Lakes Taskforce.

JUNGE: Per his campaign website, Junge opposes a ban on fracking and supports policies to ensure America has energy independence. Junge also supports protecting the Great Lakes and fully-funding Congressional programs to preserve the valuable ecosystem.

In order to reduce carbon emissions, we must encourage the private sector to continue innovating renewable energy sources, including hydropower, nuclear, wind, and solar, Junge states on his website. We dont need a big government answer that will only result in higher taxes and job-killing regulations. By encouraging research and development of new technologies that reduce emissions and grow our economy, we can ensure Michigan families continue to have access to clean, reliable, and affordable energy.

HARTMAN: I support policies that would remove the government barriers to replacing coal-burning and oil-burning power plants with safe, non-polluting, high-tech nuclear power plants. Generation IV nuclear power is an effective way to reduce carbon emissions. I also support deregulating the use of off-grid solar power.

IMMIGRATION: What policies do you support relative to immigration into the U.S.?

SLOTKIN: Our immigration system is broken and not working for anyone. Im committed to working on a bipartisan basis for reform that is keyed to the needs of our economy, including strengthening border security, reforming our temporary worker programs, and providing a path to citizenship for Dreamers. I wrote bipartisan legislation that passed the House to ensure humane treatment in immigration detention centers. I co-sponsored the Farm Workforce Modernization Act, which would establish a program for agriculture workers in the US to earn legal status through continued agricultural employment & contribution to the US economy.

JUNGE: Junges campaign website touts his previous role as a media relations officer for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Junge was an external affairs official for 8 months but left the administration to spend time with his ailing father, who died in 2019.

Junges website states he supports the presidents efforts to build a wall on the southern border with Mexico and end sanctuary cities.

HARTMAN: I advocate for expanded immigration and welcoming peaceful people to immigrate to the United States. A truly free market requires the free movement of people, not just products and ideas.
Flames burn near power lines in Sycamore Canyon in Montecito in 2017. Utilities are turning to computer modeling to predict where their equipment poses the greatest fire threat. (Mike Eliason / Associated Press)

When freak lightning storms passed over Northern California's wine country last month and sparked hundreds of wildfires, a newly established network of remote weather stations, orbiting satellites and supercomputers spun into action and attempted to predict the spread of what is now known as the LNU Lightning Complex fire.

Firefighters and technologists have long dreamed of a formula or device that would accurately predict the spread of fire, much the way meteorologists predict the possible impact of extreme weather, but it's only recently that big data and supercomputers have begun to show promise as a means of fire forecasting.

"I think a firefighter starting out today in his or her career, they're going to see something to the point where they leave the [station] on the fire, they'll have a simulation on their screen of where the fire is going to go, where they need to do evacuations," said Tim Chavez, a fire behavior analyst with Cal Fire since 2000.

Past forecasts relied on huge assumptions about the landscape and upcoming weather, but today's forecasts are based on a web of remote weather stations, cameras and satellites merged with ground-level details on vegetation and moisture. Now California firefighters and the state's largest power utilities are hoping these networks will help them to better plan evacuations and more precisely target power shutoffs in times of emergency.

The technology Cal Fire uses, created by La Jolla-based Technosylva, was brought into the department in July under a three-year, $8.8-million contract and has yet to be fully rolled out across the agency, department spokeswoman Christine McMorrow said. But the program has already been used by a handful of Cal Fire analysts who ran simulations of where the flames were expected to be eight hours later.

"We did one for the LNU Complex and it did show a rapid rate of spread," McMorrow said, referring to what is now, at well over 360,000 acres burned, the fourth largest fire in state record books. "They are pleased with what they're getting from it."

Story continues

The state's big three electric utilities are also using the technology.

In August, Edison said it ran simulations of potential fires before shutting off power to circuits in Los Angeles and Kern counties. A few weeks later, PG&E ran simulations of where the LNU Complex fire was headed before they decided to spray some 7,000 power poles with retardant.

When wind events are in the forecast, Edison, PG&E and San Diego Gas & Electric said their preemptive power shutdowns should affect about 30% fewer people than they did last year, in part due to a better grasp of where the fire threats are greatest.

Facing serious liability under California's inverse-condemnation laws, utilities shut off sections of their grid on hot, windy days, when the equipment is most at risk of sparking a wildfire. Last year, such power shutoffs led to millions of Californians going for days without electricity.

If the fuels data is good, if the weather data is good and the location is correct, our models provide a good ballpark, said Technosylva President Joaquin Ramirez. Its a young science, but were on the right track.

Difficulties remain in accurately predicting extreme fire behavior, however.

When the federally managed North Complex fire jumped a river and sped into Berry Creek on Sept. 8, killing more than a dozen people, "the spot fire moved 20 miles beyond all models identified," the fire's incident commander, Jay Kurth, wrote in a public letter.

Similarly, when SDG&E tried to re-create simulations of large fires they experienced in 2003 and 2007, Technosylva's models were less extreme than what actually happened. While the Technosylva software uses data more refined than its competition, experts say the fundamental science behind predicting what a fire will do hasn't changed, more or less, in half a century.

There's really only one model that's used for fire spread models  it's the Rothermel model," said Chris Lautenberger, co-founder of fire spread modeling company Reax Engineering, which also holds a contract with PG&E. "Technosylva uses that, our model uses that. So what differs from model to model is more the assumptions and approximations that are made."

The Rothermel model is a mathematical equation established in 1972 by a former General Electric engineer to explain the rate of a fire's spread. It models ground fires in light brush and grass, and has become the foundation upon which most fire predictive models  from crown fires to fire spotting  were built.

My model has lasted through 50 years because it could do the work, Richard Rothermel, 90, told The Times in a recent interview from his Montana home. Now, the problem is people expected it to do far more than it was designed to do.

With that in mind, officials with all three utilities said that while they're using fire spread modeling to inform their power shutoffs, it's not the deciding factor.

If youre looking for a dead-on representation of the footprint of that fire, its going to be off, said Edisons fire scientist, Tom Rolinski. Its a model, and all models are wrong. We just dont know where theyre wrong.




(Newser)  It appears that President Trump has his new Supreme Court nominee. The Washington Post, Politico, the New York Times, and Axios all report that sources are pointing to federal appeals court judge Amy Coney Barrett as Trump's pick to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a move that would significantly push the Supreme Court even further to the right, with a 6-3 conservative majority. The 48-year-old Barrett, who has served on the US Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit since 2017, would be the third relatively young conservative justice appointed by Trump to the high court, joining Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, both in their 50s, on the bench.

story continues below

Barrett, whom the Times calls a "polar opposite" to Ginsburg, was in the running to replace Justice Anthony M. Kennedy when he retired in 2018. Trump, however, was said to be "saving" the devout Catholic, known for her deeply conservative views on such topics as abortion and LGBT issues, for when Ginsburg's slot opened up. A caveat from the Times, though, on Trump's supposed nominee: "As they often do, aides cautioned that Mr. Trump sometimes upends his own plans." On Friday night, in response to questions from reporters on his pick, Trump would only say he's made his pick "in my own mind, yes," and that "I havent said it was [Barrett], but she is outstanding," per Politico. (Read more US Supreme Court stories.)
Its that time of year...and by that we mean its the time when the royal family opens up their accounting books for the public to see.

Yesterday, Queen Elizabeth's Keeper of the Privy Purse (aka her treasurer) detailed the households expenditure in a handful of financial documents. And while these reports are disclosed annually, this year it was done three months late due to the coronavirus pandemic. While they usually remain focused on the finances from the fiscal year, this time the reports also focused on the future, specifically, how the family will deal with the challenging times ahead. Unsurprisingly, theyre expecting a drop in income.

While the report highlights another busy year, it fails to give an accurate picture of the financial challenges we now face over the next few years brought about by Covid-19, Treasurer Sir Michael Stevens said in an official statement. We have no intention of asking for extra funding and will look to manage the impact through our own efforts and efficiencies.

If you didn't know, Queen Elizabeth and the rest of the royal gang receive money from something called the Sovereign Grant. Per the Royal Family website, funding for the grant comes from a percentage of the profits of the Crown Estate revenue (a collection of lands and holdings in the territories of England, Wales and Northern Ireland). However, the Evening Standard adds, that the queen received a raise from an increase in taxes, which also comes from the SG and is the portion of her money paid by taxpayers.

So, what exactly does this mean for Her Majesty? While the sum she receives cant go down (according to the Sovereign Grant legislation), the 94-year-old monarch will most likely not receive the annual increase that she usually does. And according to Town & Country, the royal household has been put on a recruitment freeze and pay freezes have been implemented as well.

Even with all of this uncertainty, the palace remains optimistic. Although Covid-19 has temporarily changed the format of engagements and events, it has not changed the sense of continuity, reassurance and recognition they provide, Stevens continued. Her Majestys programme, supported by Her family, will continue to develop meaningful ways to lead the nation through this time.

For more information on the royal familys annual finances, visit here.

RELATED: How Much Is Queen Elizabeth Worth? More Than Youd Think
Increasingly hostile rhetoric from Beijing, and a growing number of incursions by the Chinese air force and navy into Taiwanese territory, point to China's determination to occupy the self-proclaimed island state. Will the US honour promises to Taipei and come to the rescue if push comes to shove?

Chinese military exercises "are rehearsals for taking over Taiwan, said the Beijing-controlled Global Times newspaper in an editorial published on 18 September. What is needed is a political reason that can turn them into a real battle to smash Taiwan independence forces.

According to Taiwan News, the exercises by the mainland's People's Liberation Army involved dozens of transgressions into Taiwanese territory. The online newspaper claims that PLA Airforce Shaanxi Yun-8 anti-submarine propeller planes entered the Taiwanese Air Defence Identification Zone (Adiz), followed by submarines.

Over the following days, dozens of incursions ensued, obliging the Taiwanese air force to scramble jet fighters in response. As a result, Taiwan said China had "threatened regional peace and stability". And Taiwan elevated its air defence alert level.

The Chinese exercises lasted for two days. Incursions into Taiwanese territory took place mainly in the south-western corner of the island's Adiz with some planes approaching Taiwan as close as 166 kilometers, according to estimates of the Taiwanese Defense Ministry. Apart from the Yun-8 planes, single engine Chengdu J-10 jet fighters, and Sukhoi-30 fighter aircraft purchased from Russia, also took part in the exercises. Transgressions into Taiwan territory continued after the main exercises had been completed.

China's exercises seem to have been an impromptu reaction to the visit of US Under Secretary of State for Economic Growth, Energy, and the Environment, Keith Krach, the highest-ranking American official to make such visit in 40 years, on September 17.

That visit took place during an increasingly harsh war of words between Washington and Beijing, with US President Donald Trump accusing China of, at least, mismanaging the Covid-19 crisis. The two superpowers are locked in a vicious trade war; the US suspects China of human rights violations in Xinjiang, and there is a US-Chinese standoff over the South China Sea.

Staggering amounts of military hardware

In the annual report on Military and Security Developments Involving the People's Republic of China 2020, presented to Congress by US Secretary of Defense Mark Esper on 1 September, it is noted that China, with 350 ships and submarines, has the largest navy in the world, compared to the US with 293 vessels.

The report also mentions that China has staggering amounts of new military hardware, including over 1,250 ground-launched ballistic missiles, and one of the world's largest forces of advanced long-range surface-to-air systems, including Russian-built S-300s and S-400s.

Citing military incursions into Taiwan's air- and sea space in 2019, the report says that the PLA continues to prepare for contingencies in the Taiwan Strait to deter, and if necessary, compel Taiwan to abandon moves toward independence. The PLA also is likely preparing for a contingency to unify Taiwan with the mainland by force, while simultaneously deterring, delaying, or denying any third-party intervention on Taiwan's behalf."

Smearing and slandering China

Wu Qian, the spokesperson for the Chinese Department of Defence, reacted to the US report in an angry speech on 13 September, saying that Washington was wantonly distorting the relationship between the CCP and the military, while exaggerating the so-called 'Chinese military threat' making it another example of the US smearing and slandering of China and the Chinese military.

The speech also reiterated that Taiwan is an inalienable part of China," adding that if anyone dares to try to separate Taiwan from China, the PLA will take all necessary measures to resolutely defeat attempts and actions that interfere in China's internal affairs.

The question now is: will the US stand up to any eventual Chinese military aggression? In several policy documents based on the Taiwan Relations Act, Washington has promised to support Taipei and increase arms sales. But in the increasing chaos surrounding the US presidential election and the uncertain outcome of that poll, it is likely that Washington will have other priorities than what's happening in the East China Sea.
Security guards wearing masks and armed with restrainers stand guard at the entrance to the Auto China 2020 show in Beijing, China on Saturday, Sept. 26, 2020. The auto show, the first major in-person sales event for any industry since the coronavirus pandemic began, opens Saturday in a sign the ruling Communist Party is confident China has contained the disease. Still, automakers face intensive anti-virus controls including quarantines for visitors from abroad and curbs on crowd sizes at an event that usually is packed shoulder-to-shoulder with spectators. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan)

Ford, Nissan and BMW unveiled new electric models with more range for the Chinese market on Saturday as the Beijing auto show opened under anti-virus controls that included holding news conferences by international video link.

Automakers are looking to China, the first major economy to start recovering from the coronavirus pandemic, to drive sales growth and reverse multibillion-dollar losses.

Auto China 2020, postponed from March, is the first major trade show for any industry since the pandemic began. The ruling Communist Party's decision to go ahead with it reflects official confidence China, where the pandemic began in December, has the disease under control.

"The 2020 Beijing motor show is a symbol of hope," BMW AG's China CEO, Jochen Goller, told reporters who wore masks but stood shoulder-to-shoulder at the event. He paid tribute to Chinese medical workers who "made it possible for us to enjoy this large-scale event today."

Authorities ordered limits on crowds at the event, which attracted 820,000 visitors at its last installment in 2018. Employees walked through the cavernous exhibition center carrying signs that said, "Be Sure to Wear Masks."

China's auto market, the world's biggest, already has rebounded to sales above pre-pandemic levels. Purchases rose 6% in August compared with a year earlier, while U.S. sales were down 9.5%.

A security guard wearing mask and armed with a restrainer stands guard at the entrance to the Auto China 2020 show in Beijing, China on Saturday, Sept. 26, 2020. The auto show, the first major in-person sales event for any industry since the coronavirus pandemic began, opens Saturday in a sign the ruling Communist Party is confident China has contained the disease. Still, automakers face intensive anti-virus controls including quarantines for visitors from abroad and curbs on crowd sizes at an event that usually is packed shoulder-to-shoulder with spectators. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan)

Global and Chinese automakers displayed dozens of electric models, part of a race by the industry to meet Chinese government sales quotas imposed to promote the technology.

The Communist Party wants to make China a leader in the technology and has used subsidies and other support to transform it into the biggest EV market, accounting for about half of global sales. Beijing ended restrictions on foreign ownership of electric vehicle producers in 2018 to spur competition.

Electrics increasingly offer speeds and acceleration to rival gasoline engines in an effort to make the technology a mainstream product. Some promise ranges of up to 600 kilometers (370 miles) on one charge, or more than the average tank of gasoline, to combat "range anxiety," or consumers' fear of running out of power.

Ford Motor Co. held the China debut of its all-electric Mustang Mach-E SUV. It promises 0-to-100 kph (0-to-60 mph) acceleration in 3.5 seconds.

Security guards wearing masks and armed with restrainers stand guard at the entrance to the Auto China 2020 show in Beijing, China on Saturday, Sept. 26, 2020. The auto show, the first major in-person sales event for any industry since the coronavirus pandemic began, opens Saturday in a sign the ruling Communist Party is confident China has contained the disease. Still, automakers face intensive anti-virus controls including quarantines for visitors from abroad and curbs on crowd sizes at an event that usually is packed shoulder-to-shoulder with spectators. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan)

Nissan Motor Co. showed its all-electric Ariya SUV, which it said can travel up to 610 kilometers (380 miles) on one charge.

The Ariya "sets the tone for a new Nissan," said CEO Makoto Uchida in a video showed at the company stand.

Most foreign-based auto executives stayed home due to travel restrictions that require visitors arriving in China from abroad to undergo a two-week quarantine. Some planned to hold news conferences by video link. Several brands broadcast their events online to reach auto writers abroad.

BMW displayed its iX3 electric SUV, which Goller said will be produced at a factory in China's northeast for sale worldwide. The company also held the global debut of its M3 sedan and M4 coupe, reflecting the growing importance of China's luxury market.

Demand for electrics weakened last year as Beijing started to wind down subsidies. They were due to end this year, but regulators extended them at a lower level through 2022 to help the industry weather the pandemic.

Security guards wearing masks and armed with restrainers stand guard at the entrance to the Auto China 2020 show in Beijing, China on Saturday, Sept. 26, 2020. The auto show, the first major in-person sales event for any industry since the coronavirus pandemic began, opens Saturday in a sign the ruling Communist Party is confident China has contained the disease. Still, automakers face intensive anti-virus controls including quarantines for visitors from abroad and curbs on crowd sizes at an event that usually is packed shoulder-to-shoulder with spectators. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan)

China's major auto shows, held in Beijing and Shanghai in alternate years, are the industry's biggest events, attracting every global automaker and dozens of new but ambitious Chinese brands. The last Beijing auto show in 2018 received 820,000 visitors, according to organizers.

This week's event follows a smaller auto show in July in the western city of Chengdu with 120 exhibitors, equal to about 10% of the size of the typical Beijing and Shanghai shows.

Explore further China auto show forging ahead under anti-virus controls

 2020 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Wrightbus may have gone under if Invest NI had not pumped in 2.5m of rescue funding that was later ruled to be unlawful state aid, the auditor general has said.

Stormont's business support agency awarded the loan to the troubled bus building company in July 2019. The payment was to allow the company to survive until a buyer was found.

Three months later, with Wrightbus having formally gone into administration, the Ballymena manufacturer was acquired by Bamford Bus Company, owned by English industrialist Jo Bamford.

The 2.5m loan was distributed prior to the approval of the European Commission, which adjudicates on state aid funding.

Invest NI did inform the Commission of its intent to provide the loan but paid it out before the move was approved.

While the Commission ruled that rendered the loan "unlawful state aid", it took no further action against Invest NI.

Expand Close Report: Auditor General Kieran Donnelly examined Invest NIs accounts / Facebook

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Auditor general Kieran Donnelly examined the circumstances behind the loan in his report on Invest NI's annual accounts for 2019/20.

He said the agency told him it was "not uncommon" for rescue aid to be awarded prior to final approval of the Commission.

Invest NI said if it had waited for final written approval, the subsequent sale of the company would not have happened.

Mr Donnelly said: "Whilst I note the breach of Article 108(3) (Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union), I accept that the purpose of the loan was to secure the continuance of the Wrightbus operation until a buyer could be found and without providing the funding the successful outcome may not have been achieved."

Mr Donnelly also audited 3m of grants awarded to the Wrightbus Group by Invest NI since 2014. He said all relevant checks had been carried out to "ensure the funding met the requisite criteria of the funding schemes used".

The auditor general also said Invest NI had appropriately managed any potential conflict of interest situation that may have arisen from a senior member of Wrightbus's executive management team sitting on the Invest NI board.

Mr Donnelly said that he received assurances that any issues were avoided as the board member was excluded from any relevant conversations about Invest NI's relationship with the bus builder.

Turning to the Department for the Economy's annual accounts, the auditor highlighted issues around the repayment of 225m of loans to bail out the troubled Presbyterian Mutual Society in 2008.

Mr Donnelly said 50m of that total was at the end of the list of creditor priorities and was unlikely to be ever repaid.

He said the remaining 175m was being repaid in annual instalments, facilitated through the sale of the society's loanbook, which mainly comprised retail outlets and offices in Scotland and the north of England.

Mr Donnelly said that while full repayment of the 175m was due by November this year, as of March 31 only 78m had been recouped.

He noted how the Covid-19 crisis had "seriously affected" the planned exit arrangement and the department was reviewing a potential extension of the loan facility.


A new opinion study shows the world is growing less accepting of migrants. The latest version of the Migrant Acceptance Index was released Wednesday by Gallup, an American company known for its public opinion research.

North Macedonia, Hungary, Serbia and Croatia were at the top of Gallups list of least-accepting countries. Several South American countries also became clearly less welcoming of migrants, the poll found.

The poll was made up of more than 140,000 interviews in 145 countries and areas. It included questions about people's positions on migrants living in their country, marrying into their families and becoming their neighbors.

Scores for the latest Migrant Acceptance Index go from zero to nine, with a higher number meaning greater acceptance. Gallup reports a decrease from 5.34 to 5.21 between 2016 and 2019.

Gallup migration expert Julie Ray told the Reuters news agency that the worldwide decrease in acceptance happened mostly because of changes in Latin American countries.

Countries that saw some of the biggest score drops have taken in millions of Venezuelans fleeing their countrys humanitarian crisis. The largest changes came from Ecuador, Peru and Colombia.

Peru's score fell from 6.33 in 2016 to 3.61 in 2019. The number of Colombians who said it was a good thing that migrants lived in their country dropped from 61 percent to 29 percent.

At first, many of the migrants and refugees were welcomed in these countries, the report says. But public acceptance began to change as their economies, their health, education and social assistance programs were affected by increased demand, the report notes.

Most welcoming

Canada, Iceland and New Zealand were among the most welcoming countries, Gallup found.

Ray noted that the United States, which was sixth in the index, also has a welcoming position toward migrants.

Americans are mostly very accepting of migrants," she said, even as immigration continues to be a big issue for the administration of President Donald Trump.

Experts also note that, around the world, younger people often show greater acceptance of migrants. So do people with higher levels of education.

Gallup first released its Migration Acceptance Index in 2017, following a strong reaction to the migrant crisis in Europe 2015. It developed the index to measure peoples acceptance of migrants in Europe and the rest of the world.

Im Susan Shand.

VOAs Aline Barros reported this story. Susan Shand adapted it for Learning English. Ashley Thompson was the editor.

________________________________________________________________

Words in This Story

poll - n. asking people their opinions to measure agreement or disagreement with a policy or regulation

index - n. a list
By Trend

Worthless statement of Armenian Foreign Ministry can't deny the truth said by the president of Azerbaijan, Spokesperson for Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry Leyla Abdullayeva said.

Abdullayeva made the remark commenting on the statement by the Armenian Foreign Ministry regarding Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev's speech at the UN General Assembly, Trend reports on Sept.26.

"In his speech at the general debate of the 75th session of the UN General Assembly, President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev clearly and with facts informed the world community about the failed policy of Armenia and its current leadership," Abdullayeva said.

She noted that the present Armenia is a country facing a deep demographic, social and economic crisis, the main reason for which is the implementation of an aggressive policy against Azerbaijan.

"Despite the fact that two years ago the regime changed in Armenia, the current government continues the policy of the previous, criminal junta regime, the spokesperson pointed out. In Armenia, where human rights are grossly and widely violated, judges are exposed to pressure, opposition activists and political opponents are arrested, a dictatorship regime has been created. The authorities declaring that they received a mandate from the people, are very far from ensuring the interests of the people."

While the hands of the previous Armenian president are stained with the blood of the crimes committed during the war against Azerbaijan, especially against women, children and the elderly, killed with utter cruelty in Khojaly, the blood of a 76-year-old man who was killed in Tovuz district on July 14 this year is on the conscience of the current leadership, she noted.

"Lies, duplicity, falsehood, provocation and finally, war crimes are the main qualities peculiar to the current Armenian leadership, Abdullayeva said. The absurd statement of the Foreign Ministry of the country ruled by a man who is unable to fulfill any of his promises given to the people when coming to power, pushes the country to the abyss."

As the spokesperson stressed, Azerbaijan understands that Armenia, enviously observing the development, success and progress achieved by the Azerbaijani state from the outside, has no choice but to make such absurd statements.

"Instead of engaging not in chatter, but in demonstrating concrete activities, the current leadership of Armenia, which has declared that it came to power on the basis of the peoples mandate, must first of all stop territorial claims to neighboring states, put an end to the occupation policy and respect international borders of neighboring states, she concluded.

--

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
A near-complete set of Roman armour has been discovered by archaeologists working in Germany.

Experts working at Kalkriese, Germany, unearthed an entire cuirass belonging to a Roman soldier who belonged to one of three legions wiped out by Germanic tribesmen in 9 AD.

A cuirass is a piece of armour that protects the front and back of the torso made up of a breast and back plate.

A near-complete set of Roman armour (pictured) has been discovered by archaeologists working in Kalkriese, Germany

The archaeological discovery is believed to be the oldest and most complete of its kind ever made

The armour dates back to 9AD and is believed to have belonged to a Roman soldier involved in the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest

Full set: The complete Roman cuirass discovered in Germany by archaeologists

A cuirass is a piece of armour that protects the front and back of the torso made up of a breast and back plate

The Times reports that the director of the museum at Kalkriese, Stefan Burmeister, thinks the armour belonged to a Roman soldier who was sacrificed by German warriors after the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest.

He told the paper that the new find - which is the oldest and most complete Roman armour find ever - is both unique and tragic.

Near to the soldier's shoulders a shrew's fiddle was found which was used to lock a person's wrists in an iron board around the neck.

Given the value of the Roman armour, experts were left wondering why the Germanic warriors didn't loot any trophies, but Burmeister explained that the execution of the soldier may have been a sacred ritual.

The armour, believed to be the oldest and most complete ever, was discovered by archaeologists in Kalkriese which is believed to be the site of the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest in 9 AD

An experts at the museum in museum at Kalkriese carefully works on a discovery

Also discovered with the armour was a Roman shrew's fiddle (pictured) which was used to lock the hands of a person near to their neck

The Battle of the Teutoburg Forest: A painting in 1909 depicts the bloody conflict which resulted in a devastating Roman defeat

He said: 'Maybe we have a ritual context to the situation here. In that case the body and equipment would have been taboo.'

The Battle of the Teutoburg Forest saw almost 15,000 Roman soldiers slaughtered at the hands of Germanic soldiers and is considered to be one of the two great military defeats in the Empire's history.

As they travelled through the thick forest towards a winter fort, they were subjected to small hit-and-run attacks by Arminius, a warlord from the Cherusci tribe.

The Romans had been under the command of Publius Quinctilius Varus, a general under the emperor Augustus when they were defeated.

Experts examining the discovery believe that the craftmanship is better than previously thought and that it showed how Roman design changed over the centuries.
LISBON, Portugal, Sept. 23, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Hovione today announced the signing of a partnership agreement with Ligand to significantly ramp up the production output of Captisol(). Captisol(), a Ligand product, is a chemically modified cyclodextrin proven to improve the solubility and stability of drugs. It is used in the formulation of Gilead's COVID-19 treatment Veklury() (remdesivir). Hovione is the sole producer of this key enabling excipient.

The COVID-19 pandemic has to date killed one million people; studies show that in the next 3 months cumulative deaths may more than double.

"To meet Captisol() demand associated with Veklury(), Hovione will soon be producing per month the quantity it usually produces in one year. This sudden spike in demand has required unique mobilization efforts across the Hovione network to secure additional raw material supply, execute major capital expenditure projects at our sites, maximize operational efficiency, hire additional talent and identify external partners to expand our overall capacity. The pharmaceutical supply chain is working together in an unprecedented fashion to treat patients and save lives. Hovione is privileged to be part of this truly global response," said Jean-Luc Herbeaux, Chief Operating Officer.

"Ligand values its longstanding partnership with Hovione," said Matt Foehr, President and Chief Operating Officer of Ligand. "Their excellent customer service, global commitment to quality and high pharmaceutical standards make them an ideal partner for Captisol(), a critical component for a number of life-saving medicines. We commend them for responsibly and efficiently partnering with Ligand to manage the scale up and expansion of their operations to contribute to global health during the pandemic."

About Captisol()

Ligand's Captisol() technology is a patent protected, uniquely modified cyclodextrin, with a chemical structure that was rationally designed to enable the creation of new products by significantly improving solubility, stability, bioavailability and dosing of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs). It uses a green manufacturing process that uses water as process solvent.

About Veklury() (remdesivir)

Gilead Sciences' Veklury() is an investigational nucleotide analog with broad-spectrum antiviral activity both in vitro and in vivo in animal models against multiple emerging viral pathogens. Multiple ongoing international Phase 3 clinical trials are evaluating the safety and efficacy of Veklury() for the treatment of SARS-CoV-2 infection, the virus that causes COVID-19, in different patient populations, formulations, and in combination with other therapies. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) expanded the Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) enabling use of the investigational antiviral Veklury() to treat all hospitalized patients with COVID-19, in addition to the previous authorization for patients hospitalized with severe COVID-19.

About Hovione

Hovione [http://www.hovione.com/] is an international company with over 60 years of experience as a Contract Development and Manufacturing Organization (CDMO) and is currently a fully integrated supplier offering services for drug substance, drug product intermediate and drug product. With four FDA inspected sites [http://www.hovione.com/hovione-worldwide] in the USA, China, Ireland and Portugal and development laboratories in Lisbon, Portugal and New Jersey, USA, the company provides branded pharmaceutical customers services for the development and compliant manufacture [http://www.hovione.com/products-and-services/contract-manufa...] of innovative drugs including highly potent compounds. For generic pharmaceutical customers the company offers niche API products. Hovione also provides proprietary product development and licensing opportunities for drug products [http://www.hovione.com/products-and-services/contract-manufa...]. In the inhalation area, Hovione is the only independent company offering a complete range of services. Please visit www.hovione.com [http://www.hovione.com/]

ContactIsabel Pina.Director External Communications ipina@hovione.com[mailto:ipina@hovione.com] Tel: +351 21 982 9362, +351 91 750 7462

Web site: https://www.hovione.com//
Fredericktown Alderman Rick Polete and Madison County Presiding Commissioner Jason Green spoke at the Madison County Chamber of Commerce Zoom meeting, Sept. 3.

Polete spoke first, saying the biggest thing going on with the City of Fredericktown right now is the placement of all residential and commercial electric and water meters.

"It's about a million dollar project," Polete said. "It's going to be an awesome thing because there won't be any miss reads, there won't be any late reads. Your meters are going to be read the same time every month and it should make for a lot of consistency throughout the city of Fredericktown for our electric and water meter readings and bills."

Polete said the new meters are going to be a great advantage to the community and a huge asset to the workers at City Hall.

"Next thing is weve been speaking to representatives of the mines over there, the cobalt mines," Polete said. "We are in the process of possibly annexing their property into the city of Fredericktown. That is going to double the size of Fredericktown, square foot wise, pretty close."

The next topic Polete brought up was the sports complex. He said it is pretty much complete and the city is getting ready to put a concession stand out for bid in the very near future.

"We do have an architect who has drawn up some plans for us, so hopefully this fall, this winter we can get that concession stand built, containing restrooms and storage and have that complex ready to go come spring," Polete said. "Id like to get the high school baseball team out there this spring to kind of kick it off for us."

Polete then discussed the half cent sales tax, Prop P, passed for the fire and police complex.

"Weve got enough sales tax stored up to make a down payment now, so we are going to be moving forward with that," Polete said. "You will probably see some ground breaking begin on that building in spring of 2021 hopefully, depending on how everything goes. That is pretty exciting that we are going to get a brand new police station and a major expansion to the fire station."

Polete said, if you drive by the current Fredericktown Fire Department, you will see a huge empty lot of which will be the location of the complex.

"Other than that, we are just like everyone else we are dealing with the COVID, ready for it to go away, and get things like the county fair and the Azalea Festival and things like that up and going again and try to get everyone up and going again as soon as we can," Polete said.

Green said things with the county are going fairly well. He said sales tax revenue has increased quite a bit this year.

"It was going flat until March hit and I guess a bunch of people bought toilet paper and food and after that they were buying guns and TVs with all this money going around," Green said. "I think we were up, at one point, 9 percent compared to last year, the sales tax revenue."

Green said, while sales tax revenue is going well, he is concerned about the gas tax. He said a lot of the money for roads comes from the gas tax and if that goes down, the percentage the county receives will be lower leaving the commissions wondering what next year will look like.

"We've been doing some new paving and some overlaying," Green said. "There is a problem hill going out to Amidon that there is just no way to fix, so it is going to get paved."

Green said the county has $300,000 to $400,000 left of the CARES Act Funds.

"We are still getting more applications coming in," Green said. "We might have to be a little more particular because it is surprising how fast the $1.4 million goes when you get into medical equipment and that sort of thing."

Green said the commissioners biggest priorities were the health department, hospital and some of the public services. He said, if there is money left at the end of the year, they may look into non-public entities.

In chamber business, President Tessa Rehkop had an announcement for the group.

"Im super excited, several months ago we applied for the Scrap Tire Material Grant with the Missouri Department of Natural Resources and we just found out that we were awarded the grant," Rehkop said. "Its for picnic tables and benches for the Azalea Park and they will go under the Azalea Park Pavilion. It is 12 picnic tables and 12 benches. They are really nice."

Rehkop said the value of the grant is about $14,000. She said she would like to thank Vicki Moyers, the Fredericktown Azalea Festival Board and the City of Fredericktown for their parts in making the funding and project a success.

"I was kind of thinking, these picnic tables and benches are supposed to be here in a couple weeks, so they might actually be ready to go under the pavilion for our next meeting," Rehkop said. "So depending on what the case numbers are maybe we could have a socially distanced luncheon down under the pavilion in Azalea Park. It would be neat to have a luncheon on the new benches and tables."

The next meeting of the Madison County Chamber of Commerce will be at 11:30 a.m., Oct. 1 with the location to be determined.

Victoria Kemper is a reporter for the Democrat News. She can be reached at 573-783-3366 or at vkemper@democratnewsonline.com

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When close to half the companies in the United Kingdom have price-to-earnings ratios (or "P/E's") below 17x, you may consider John Wood Group PLC (LON:WG.) as a stock to avoid entirely with its 40.3x P/E ratio. Although, it's not wise to just take the P/E at face value as there may be an explanation why it's so lofty.

With earnings that are retreating more than the market's of late, John Wood Group has been very sluggish. It might be that many expect the dismal earnings performance to recover substantially, which has kept the P/E from collapsing. You'd really hope so, otherwise you're paying a pretty hefty price for no particular reason.

Check out our latest analysis for John Wood Group

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If you'd like to see what analysts are forecasting going forward, you should check out our free report on John Wood Group.

Does Growth Match The High P/E?

John Wood Group's P/E ratio would be typical for a company that's expected to deliver very strong growth, and importantly, perform much better than the market.

Retrospectively, the last year delivered a frustrating 26% decrease to the company's bottom line. This has erased any of its gains during the last three years, with practically no change in EPS being achieved in total. Therefore, it's fair to say that earnings growth has been inconsistent recently for the company.

Shifting to the future, estimates from the analysts covering the company suggest earnings should grow by 68% each year over the next three years. With the market only predicted to deliver 15% per year, the company is positioned for a stronger earnings result.

In light of this, it's understandable that John Wood Group's P/E sits above the majority of other companies. It seems most investors are expecting this strong future growth and are willing to pay more for the stock.

The Final Word

We'd say the price-to-earnings ratio's power isn't primarily as a valuation instrument but rather to gauge current investor sentiment and future expectations.

Story continues

We've established that John Wood Group maintains its high P/E on the strength of its forecast growth being higher than the wider market, as expected. Right now shareholders are comfortable with the P/E as they are quite confident future earnings aren't under threat. It's hard to see the share price falling strongly in the near future under these circumstances.

Plus, you should also learn about these 2 warning signs we've spotted with John Wood Group (including 1 which doesn't sit too well with us).

You might be able to find a better investment than John Wood Group. If you want a selection of possible candidates, check out this free list of interesting companies that trade on a P/E below 20x (but have proven they can grow earnings).

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.



Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com.
GREENWICH  Even as the Greenwich school district is reporting no new positive cases of COVID-19 this week, at least some students and staff at the International School at Dundee have been told to quarantine.

We were notified (Tuesday) morning that ISD had a group of children who were together over the weekend, and one of the parents in attendance consequently tested positive for COVID-19, school officials said in a message to ISD parents sent Sept. 22. The children who were exposed to the parent are in quarantine as of today.
The Managing Director of the Ghana Publishing Company David Asante has called on the Electoral Commission to sit up and address concerns over the voters register.

According to him, the commission must work to win the confidence of Ghanaians as the 2020 election approaches.

It comes after the opposition NDC raised concerns over deleted names in the voters register. The party says the ongoing voters register exhibition exercise must be extended in order for the anomalies in the register to be resolved.

Speaking on the Hotseat on Starr FM Friday, Mr Asante who also doubles as the convenor of pressure group Let My Vote Count Alliance, the EC must resolve all the concerns that have been expressed by political parties over the register before the polls.

As I sit here, I agree with calls that the EC must sit up, they must work to win the confidence of the general population so that the results of the polls will be acceptable to all, he told host Kwame Danso-Acheampong.

He, however, criticised former President John Mahamas call that the NDC will not accept the results of a flawed election.

John Mahamas call that foreign observers should arrive early in this country is unnecessary. We have been running elections here without them. In this country, who determines what a flawed election is? The reasoning that their members have been deleted from the register is weak.

NDC on Volters register

The opposition NDC has urged the Electoral Commission to ensure a credible and transparent election adding that it will not accept results of a flawed election.

The latest caution by the NDC comes after the party alleged that the EC was deliberately taking out names of its members from the newly compiled voters register after omissions were identified in some polling stations across the country during the ongoing exhibition exercise.

The EC has denied the allegation and subsequently extended the duration of the exercise by two-more days, to end September 27.

But flagbearer of the party John Dramani Mahama has warned the election management body that its credibility was at stake and must put in place measures to ensure the upcoming poll is fair to all stakeholders.

Even though Mr Mahama acknowledged that the NDC has exhibited restraint since the electoral process started, he stated that the party will not allow the EC usurp the peoples mandate.

Addressing the nation on Thursday September 24, Mr Mahama noted we in the NDC have exhibited restraint at all times in this electoral process, even now we are committed to doing so. But we will not accept the result of a flawed election.

He went on we will certainly not look on, neither will we shirk our civic responsibility and allow the EC, whether it intends to or sheer incompetence to usurp the peoples mandate in the December 7 polls.

We want to see fairness, transparency, and integrity in the process leading up to the elections. The EC will take responsibility and act in good faith to resolve them, he added.

---starrfm
Three fire incidents were reported from three different areas in outer Delhi between Friday night and Saturday evening. Although goods worth several lakhs of rupees were gutted, no loss of life was reported from any of the three incidents. A fireman was injured during the fire operation at one spot, senior fire officials said.

The first fire broke out in a three-storey shoe manufacturing factory in Narela industrial area on Friday night. One fireman was injured while containing the blaze, fire department officials said. Cooling operation continued till Saturday afternoon.

Also Read: Delhi Police arrest man who trafficked woman, abandoned her when pregnant

Delhi Fire Services (DFS) director Atul Garg said that nearly 100 fire fighters and 26 fire tenders were involved in the fire fighting operation. Our firemen managed to douse the flames by 8 am on Saturday. The cooling operation, however, continued till afternoon. Fire operator Ramesh received minor injury in his hand. He was admitted to a nearby hospital and was discharged after medical attention, said the DFS chief.

According to Garg, the fire department received a call at 10.45 pm on Friday regarding a fire in the basement of a shoe manufacturing factory in Narela industrial area. Initially and 10 fire tenders were rushed. But as the fire was spreading rapidly, 16 more fire engines were sent from the nearby fire stations. The blaze had engulfed the entire 350 square metres of the factory building.

Some workers were present inside the factory when the fire started. All of them came out safely before the blaze engulfed the factory, said a police officer from the Narela Indistrual Area police station, requesting anonymity.

As many of them had left, we are trying to know how many workers were working there. Prime facie, short-circuit appeared to be the reason behind the fire. However, the exact cause of fire will be ascertained only after the factory is inspected by our experts, the officer said.

The second incident was reported from Jwalapuri area near Nangloi, where fire broke out in a godown of plastic and other goods around Saturday noon. Sixteen fire tenders worked for nearly five hours to douse the flames and contain the situation.

In the third incident, a shoe manufacturing factory in Peeragarhi Industrial area caught fire around 6 pm on Saturday. Eight fire tenders controlled the blaze within half an hour
A day after the Election Commission of India announced the schedule of Bihar elections to be held in three phases on October 28, November 3 and 7, Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut said if Bihar doesnt have enough issues, Mumbai can parcel some. His jibe came in the backdrop of allegations that the death of Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput, who hailed from Bihar, is being used as an election issue in Bihar.

Elections in Bihar should be fought on the issues of development, law and order, and good governance, but if these issues have exhausted, then issues from Mumbai can be sent as parcel, the Shiv Sena leader said.

The state police departments of Bihar and Maharashtra locked horns over the investigation into the death of Rajput who was found dead on June 14 at his Mumbai residence. Former Bihar DGP Gupteshwar Pandey accused Maharashtra Police of not co-operating with them. It is also being speculated that Pandey may join politics after he took a VRS.

The Shiv Sena may contest in the Bihar polls, Raut hinted. Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray will take a call on Shiv Sena contesting the Bihar elections in coming 2-3 days. The election in Bihar is held on caste and other things. Labour laws or farmers bills will not be an issue in Bihar elections, Raut said on Friday.

The Shiv Sena leader has been made a party in the case pertaining to the demolition of Bollywood actor Kangana Ranauts office.

The MP has recently criticised the questioning of several Bollywood personalities by the Narcotics Control of Bureau in a drug case related to Sushant Singh Rajputs death.

(With agency inputs)
After the second dose of tablets, my labour progressed very quickly. I wanted to stop time. I didnt want to deliver this baby. That would mean it was over, that he really had died, and there was no way of reversing or changing his fate. It was as intense and as painful as all of my other deliveries. I had naively thought that because I was delivering a pre-term baby, it would somehow be physically easier. By some small mercy, it was faster, but in no way did that dampen the pain. Loading The thing that still haunts me is the silence of the delivery room. No excitement, no reward after a painful labour, no first cry. The first of many lost firsts. No first tooth, first step, first word. Our babys life began and ended the second he was born. During the final excruciating stage of labour, pushing went against every instinct. The contractions felt like my body was failing me. The experience was truly traumatic. I dont think I will ever get over or come to terms with it. The midwife gently wrapped up our little boy and handed him to me. He was beautiful: tiny and perfectly formed. He looked so much like my other newborns, just smaller, darker, and still. The first thing I said to Josh was, He looks just like you. Later, Josh told me that this broke his heart. To watch the son he hadnt wanted to see or hold arrive as a perfect little version of himself made his babys existence seem very real. Our enormous loss was immediately apparent. For Josh, the baby had been an abstract. He hadnt felt him move inside his tummy, or had him live and grow inside him for almost six months. But the moment his baby was earth-side, he could see that he was his son, his child  but one he would never see grow, or get to know.

I knew instantly that this baby wasnt a Marcus: he was too delicate. I searched my brain for a different M name and stumbled upon Miles. It suited him. It wasnt a name Id considered and I had only ever met one Miles (spelt Myles), which appealed to me. I wanted our little boy to have a unique name. When I first held him, I tried to soak up every detail of his little face. I could see he would have been handsome and quite possibly tall, like his dad. He had very long legs, a button nose like his sister and ears like mine. I couldnt get over how lovely he was. I had been terrified that Id be repulsed by him, unable to hold him or love him. But I felt the opposite. Knowing how short our time together would be, I wanted to make the most of it. Annabel holding her precious Miles in her hands. Credit:Courtesy of Annabel Bower My placenta had other ideas: it was stuck. The second midwife who was assigned to us, an absolute angel, tried a few things. She was almost apologetic. An obstetrician was called in and tried to manually extract it, but after some uncomfortable prodding and pulling, it was decided I needed to go to theatre. I remember signing forms, agreeing to various things, talking to the anaesthetist, and everyone saying how sorry they were that I would have to go through surgery on top of labour. By this stage, I couldnt have cared less what they did to me. They could have amputated an arm, for all I cared: I felt dead inside and was physical and emotionally at rock bottom. Surely whatever was next could not be harder than what I had just endured. An orderly came in, a big bruiser of a guy with tatts and piercings. Hello love, Im Marcus, Ill be taking you through to theatre. I couldnt believe wed almost given Miles the name of this gentle soul in a gruff casing. This confirmed wed picked the perfect name for our little boy. He was definitely a Miles, not a Marcus.

The surgery felt surreal. Waiting in recovery afterwards was torture. The spinal block Id been given had a greater effect than intended. I had no feeling up to my shoulders and ended up unable to walk until midnight. The lovely anaesthetist apologised and said it often happened with smaller people, as the dose sometimes had a greater impact. Id delivered Miles at 5.45pm, was in surgery by 6.30pm, and was still in recovery at 8.30pm. I was freezing, itchy, starving and, above all, heartbroken. How had this happened? Why had this happened? Had it really happened at all? I just wanted to get back to my room and see Miles. Josh had gone home while I was in surgery to feed the dog and bring me back something to eat. I felt like I should be incapable of such a mundane task as eating. I had just lost my baby: how could I still have my appetite? It was the first of many, many times I felt guilty for how I felt, or for doing something I wanted or needed to do. I didnt know how to act. There was no guidebook for what was ahead, and I had no idea how I was going to make my way through any of it. Loading So that is our story, and Miles story. A baby boy we so desperately wanted and, through a cruel twist of fate, had to say goodbye to. The days, weeks and months ahead were the hardest of my life. I was scared the loss would break me. That I would never be the same again, or would remain in the first, shocking stage of grief forever. Words cannot adequately describe the horror of it. But its a hopeful story: I was determined to survive, even if some days I didnt believe I would  and on some of the really early dark days, I didnt even know if I wanted to. Everyone responds to and recovers from a tragedy like this differently, but I hope that hearing someone elses experience brings other baby-loss parents a little bit of comfort, eases their isolation, and makes them feel like theyre not alone.
- William Ruto criticised the government over its failure to priotise job creation for the unemployed graduates

- He hit out at the proponents of the BBI which he said would only create more positions for the politicians and not address "hustlers'' plight

- Many challenged him to show how exactly he has empowered youths in his capacity as deputy president

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The Deputy President William Ruto has of late been critising his own government in a strategic move seen as a way of distancing himself from the Jubilee failures.

If the Ruto is not indirectly accusing the government of targeting his allies in corruption purge, he is perhaps questioning President Uhuru Kenyatta's Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) agenda.

READ ALSO: Nelson Havi curses Babu Owino days after being made Maragoli elder: "You'll not be re-elected

UhuRuto unveiling the Jubilee "Tano Tena" manifesto in 2017. The duo promised close to 1 million annual jobs. Photo: Uhuru Kenyatta.

Source: Facebook

READ ALSO: David Maraga rejects Malala's 3 goats donation, reminds senator he has case in court

But it was the latest affront on Thursday, September 24, that the Jubilee administration which first came to power in 2013, failed on job creation which they promised.

Ruto was in Kitengela in Kajiado county when he hit out at the proponents of the BBI which he said would only create more positions for the politicians and not address "hustlers' plight."

"We don't want to talk about power, we want to talk about empowerment, we don't want to talk about positions we want to talk about jobs because positions are for a few people but jobs will benefit everyone," the DP said.

READ ALSO: Nairobi: Woman dies after spending night at lodging with husband's brother

Ruto said many Kenyans are unemployed. He criticised the government over joblessness. Photo: William Samoei Ruto.

Source: Facebook

READ ALSO: Having a man's name on your ID, living in his house isn't marriage proof, court rules

However, it was his position that many youths remain unemployed which put him in trouble with the very Kenyans he was apparently speaking for.

Many challenged him to show how exactly he has empowered youths in his capacity as deputy president before blame UhuRuto failures on imaginary enemies.

"Thanks so much Mr DP, now tell us how you empowered Kenyans and more so addressed the plight of Kenyans while you were still in good terms with the so called deep state!!You have had the opportunity to do exactly that! Who are we to believe you?" scoffed Angela Masai.

Ruto had in 2017 during the unveiling of the Jubilee manifesto promised 500,000 annual jobs as well as 10,000 paid government graduate internships yearly.

"DP is very good in oratory skills..but actions zero..he should have done what he goes around saying..he is part of the incumbent regime..he should not shift the blame..but be accountable," interjected Makau Kimwele.

"Eight years being the second in power what have you done and now you want us to believe you are the saviour...resign first ,stop criticising a government which you are part of bure kabisa," added Salome Gatonye.

Here are more reactions sampled from TUKO.co.ke post soon after Ruto's function.

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My mother abandoned me with two holes in my heart - Baby Petra's story | Tuko TV.

Source: TUKO.co.ke
OTTAWA - The minority Liberal government has reached a deal with the New Democrats over legislation to support workers during the COVID-19 pandemic, securing the backing needed to survive a confidence vote on the throne speech.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 25/9/2020 (484 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Conservative House Leader Gerard Deltell arrives at a party caucus meeting in Ottawa on Tuesday, Sept. 22, 2020. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick

OTTAWA - The minority Liberal government has reached a deal with the New Democrats over legislation to support workers during the COVID-19 pandemic, securing the backing needed to survive a confidence vote on the throne speech.

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh touted the deal as "historic" and said changes demanded by his party to Bill C-2 will ensure that millions of Canadians will be entitled to two weeks of paid sick leave, rather than just the thousands he claimed would have benefited under the government's original proposal.

"Today is a historic moment," he told a hastily called news conference on Parliament Hill late Friday.

"Because this is the first time ever in the history of our country that we have a federal program now for paid sick leave  we believe this is a first step towards creating a permanent program that should be a part of our Canadian social safety net."

Singh declined to give details of the changes the NDP has won to the legislation until they are formally tabled in the House of Commons on Monday.

But if they reflect the deal struck Friday, Singh said the NDP will support fast-tracking the bill through the Commons in "one or two days" and will also support the throne speech, which must be put to an eventual confidence vote.

The minority Liberals need the backing of at least one of the main opposition parties to avoid defeat on the confidence vote, which would plunge the country into an election just as a second wave of COVID-19 is surging across the country.

Gov. Gen. Julie Payette, followed by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, arrives for the throne speech in the Senate chamber in Ottawa, Wednesday, Sept. 23, 2020. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang

The government had already agreed earlier in the week to another key NDP demand: that Canadians who've been left without jobs or fewer hours of work due to the pandemic will continue to receive $500 a week in benefits.

That is the same as they have been receiving under the Canada Emergency Response Benefit which ends Saturday. The government had originally proposed payments at $400 a week.

With the end of the CERB, which has been used by almost nine million Canadians to stay afloat during the pandemic, the government is transitioning recipients back to a more robust, generous employment insurance regime.

For those who don't qualify for EI, Bill C-2 will create a temporary new Canada Recovery Benefit as well as a sick leave benefit and another benefit for caregivers who are forced to stay home to care for a dependant who falls ill or is forced to self-isolate.

Applications for the recovery benefit are to open Oct. 11 and, for the other two benefits, on Oct. 4.

To avoid leaving some Canadians in the lurch without any financial support, Singh acknowledged the urgent need to get the bill passed swiftly.

He blamed Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for the "time crunch," nothing that he prorogued Parliament in August, preventing it from dealing with anything until after the new session opened this week.

Nevertheless, Singh said the NDP will support the government in getting the bill passed quickly next week, bypassing the normal legislative process that can take months or even years.

"We need to speed up the passage of this legislation so that it gets in place quickly and so that there's not a break in support for families that need the support," he said.

The Liberals also cheered the deal.

"We are entering the second wave and millions of Canadians are still struggling to make ends meet," government House leader Pablo Rodriguez said Friday on Twitter.

Jen Zoratti | Next A weekly look towards a post-pandemic future delivered to your inbox every Wednesday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

"We now have an agreement with the NDP on a bill that will deliver the help that Canadians need. It's by working together that we will get through this pandemic."

The government has set aside Monday and Tuesday for debate on the bill.

Earlier Friday, the Conservatives attempted to win support for a motion calling for the Commons to sit on Sunday as well so that MPs could have more time to debate Bill C-2. While they agreed that Canadians need support, they argued that MPs also have a duty to scrutinize legislation that will cost the federal treasury billions.

They did not get the unanimous consent needed to pass the motion.

The Conservatives have already said they will vote against the throne speech and the Bloc Quebecois say they are leaning that way unless the Liberals meet demands from the provinces to add billions to annual federal health transfers by next week.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 25, 2020.
Care home chiefs fear deadly mistakes made at the peak of the coronavirus pandemic risk being repeated as councils offer them extra cash to take Covid-positive hospital patients.

More than 15,000 people died of the virus in care homes earlier this year, according to official figures, after it was reported that many elderly residential facilities were flooded with Covid-19 patients returning from hospital.

Now, despite a Government pledge to place a protective ring around vulnerable residents, care homes in Cumbria are being offered 1,500  double the local weekly fee  to take Covid-positive patients from hospital.

Birmingham city council has been offering 1,000 incentives for months while Morecambe Bay clinical commissioning group wrote to care homes offering them extra cash only last month.

Trafford council in Greater Manchester has also warned care homes to ready themselves for a fresh wave of hospital discharges, telling them to expect Covid-positive patients within just two hours of their discharge from hospital.

TEST RESULT WARNING: Nadra Ahmed, of the National Care Association said: In the Governments winter plan they talked about making discharges safe. We have had reports from providers whove taken people from hospital with negative test results and theyve tested them on arrival and their tests come back positive.

Eileen Chubb, from the whistleblowing charity Compassion in Care, said: Its the same attitude to elderly people all over again  rushing them into care homes. Theyre sacrificing people needlessly.

Roger Waluube, manager of Pelham House care home in Folkestone, Kent, said: It is completely unacceptable to transfer people from the hospital into the community when you think they could pose a risk to others.

In April, hospitals were told to stop sending untested patients to care homes following a spate of outbreaks, and Health Secretary Matt Hancock pledged to strengthen the protective ring around them. Government guidance now states that no care home should be forced to admit a resident if it is unable to cope with Covid-19.

But care homes in Cumbria were sent a letter last month from the local council and NHS trust asking them to take Covid-positive hospital patients. The 1,500 payments cover the cost of additional care and are only open to homes that have been Covid-free for 28 days. Local authorities pay 550-600 per week on average, the National Care Association says.

Judy Downey, of the Relatives and Residents Association, said the incentive was perverse, adding: What are we saying about older people in care homes? That they are collateral damage? Its not humane.

Highlighting another issue, Nadra Ahmed, of the National Care Association, said: In the Governments winter plan they talked about making discharges safe. We have had reports from providers whove taken people from hospital with negative test results and theyve tested them on arrival and their tests come back positive.

Despite a Government pledge to place a protective ring around vulnerable residents, some care homes in the UK are being offered financial incentives to take Covid-positive patients from hospital. Pictured: Careworker Fabiana Connors visits client Jack Hornsby at his home during the coronavirus pandemic on May 3, 2020

Professor Adam Gordon, of the British Geriatrics Society, who led a Covid red-zone ward in hospital during the first wave, said: Its clear from Government advice that they recognise the mistakes from last time  too much movement of staff between care homes and too much movement between hospitals and care homes.

Whats not clear from their winter plan is whether we have sufficient mechanisms to prevent those mistakes being repeated. In Scotland they do not send Covid-positive people into care homes. In England that is still a possibility and the reliance is on the care home to get it right.

Tony Carling, a care home operator in Cumbria, has decided not to take Covid-positive patients, but fears it could be a costly move. He said: The majority of our clients are funded by local authorities, so its very difficult to turn down. You are under extreme financial pressure as to whether you get further business from that authority if you dont support their needs.

Roger Waluube, manager of Pelham House care home in Folkestone, Kent (pictured) said: It is completely unacceptable to transfer people from the hospital into the community when you think they could pose a risk to others

Mike Padgham, of the Independent Care Group, said: If youve got lots of empty beds, its not long before your business no longer becomes viable. Homes operate at about 90 per cent occupancy. The challenge with the pandemic is that youve got a stark choice between putting your business at risk or accepting new people with a risk.

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: We have ring-fenced 1.1billion to support care providers to prevent infections, and are making 3.7billion available to councils.

We have provided 200million items of PPE and are enabling care providers to meet all their Covid-19 PPE needs free of charge. Last week we announced over 500 million extra funding to restrict movement of staff between homes to stop the spread of the virus.

Outbreaks soar fourfold among elderly residents Covid outbreaks in care homes have increased fourfold in the past two weeks, raising fresh concerns that they are once again becoming deadly coronavirus hotspots. According to recent figures, there were 35 covid-related outbreaks in care homes in the first week of September  which rocketed in the second week to 228 incidents. The latest weeks statistics reveal a dip, to 134 outbreaks in care homes, but show how the virus has continued to spread since the start of the month. It means the number of Covid outbreaks in care homes has become as high as it was in the second week of May. With infections rising at a worrying rate across the country, care homes are yet again among the worst-hit locations for coronavirus outbreaks, vying only with schools for the highest number of cases. Jason Oke, senior statistician at the University of Oxford, said: Acute Respiratory Infection incidents broadly followed the trends in Covid cases, so as the cases pick up in September it is not surprising that incidents in care homes should follow in the absence of any effective measures to prevent it. Advertisement

The new care home scandal: BARNEY CALMAN investigates the appalling tragedy of the elderly and vulnerable kept apart from their loved ones for months by Covid rules - and now there's no end in sight

By Barney Calman, Health Editor For The Mail On Sunday

The woman on the phone is in pieces. Ive been in lockdown in my care home since March, and they wont release me, she sobs. My husband lives here, too, but they wont let me see him. Hes in another room, on a different floor. He is 100 and he has dementia. He needs me. Its wicked. Just wicked.

Her name is Margaret and she is almost 92 years old. She has lived through a world war. She can remember times when scarlet fever, typhoid and polio killed thousands every year.

But this is so much worse, because of what theyre doing to us, she continues.

Before the pandemic struck and residents were confined to the home, shed visit the local gym twice a week  and even made the local news for doing so.

After we speak, I find the interview. In it, shes quoted saying: My advice to you all, whatever age you are, is to keep active. Avoid getting bored and fill your lives with things that can keep your mind and body healthy. You are never too old.

A nurse in PPE speaks to a resident at the Wren Hall care home in Nottingham

The Margaret I spoke to couldnt have been more different. Crushed. Angry. Afraid.

Staying fit also helped her control the symptoms of chronic lung disease. Having been cooped up since March, her condition has now worsened considerably.

She told me: They say Im being shielded for my health but no one has asked us, and they dont think about how what theyre doing is making us suffer.

Im not scared of this virus. Not a bit. And I understand the risk. But my husband and I are in our last years and I am frightened I wont see him again if this goes on for much longer.

Over the past three weeks, The Mail on Sunday has reported on a new crisis engulfing Britains care homes: thousands of residents who have been kept in almost complete lockdown since March.

Visits are barred, or drastically limited. Families have been torn apart  blocked from seeing loved ones. Residents held captive in their rooms.

Weve now received hundreds of emails, letters and calls like Margarets, each telling a similarly harrowing story.

A husband who once spent hours every evening with his wife, reduced to gazing at her through a locked glass window once a week for 15 minutes. Children, forced to watch as their once-happy parents wither and waste away, starved of any contact, comfort or love.

Parents seeing their young disabled children forcibly held down by care home staff, simply for trying to give their mum or dad a hug.

George had a visit from a loved one through a window at Digby Manor Residential Care Home, Birmingham

It goes on and on. A sea of misery. This newspaper raised the alarm earlier this month, as dementia charity Johns Campaign launched a legal bid to try to force the Department of Health and Social Care to revise guidance that it says has led to this situation.

The instructions, published by the Government in July, make limiting infections a priority above all else. But the lack of any other clear directive has led to many care homes implementing blanket bans. And these are, arguably, in breach of human rights.

Last week, the Government responded. Or rather, they emailed the Johns Campaign legal team, Leigh Day, to say they couldnt respond yet because they were extremely busy dealing with the pandemic. But this is the pandemic.

Now the Joint Committee on Human Rights has warned that it, too, believes emergency corona legislation  passed without the scrutiny of Parliament  risks infringing human rights.

In its report, published last week, chairman Harriet Harman singled out the blanket bans on care home visits for being unjustifiable. Another word that came up a lot was disproportionate.

Having spoken to scores of families, Im simply left wondering how, in a supposedly civilised society, is this happening at all. Johns Campaign lawyers Leigh Day say that if the Government doesnt stop fobbing them off, and respond fully, at end of the month they will go to the High Court regardless. Because, make no mistake, this kind of treatment is also lethal.

Alzheimers and other forms of dementia already kill hundreds of people each day  but numbers have risen by a disturbing 52 per cent since these measures began. And no one should be surprised when numbers continue to climb, as the detrimental effect of sensory deprivation, seclusion and long-term solitary confinement are well known.

Government decision-making is, they say, being led by the science. But clearly they missed the decades of research in to how such torturous conditions can cause rapid mental and physical deterioration even in young, fit people.

Dementia charity Johns Campaign launched a legal bid to try to force the Department of Health and Social Care to revise guidance that it says has led to this situation

Interestingly, many of these studies were done in high-security prisons. And thats just how the current care home situation is described, over and over, in the emails and letters and calls: its like being in prison. Worse, in fact  as there is no end in sight. How can this be allowed to go on?

The situation for those in care, if anything, has worsened over the past weeks. With Covid cases rising across the country, local lockdowns mean further tightening of rules.

In Scotland, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has banned people from going into each others homes, plunging elderly people still living at home into further isolation. And this is intended to go on for six months.

Of course, those most vulnerable to corona shouldnt be exposed unnecessarily. But many will die as a direct result of these measures.

And it will be a horrible, drawn-out and lonely death.

One that leaves only lingering guilt for those left behind, who have told us time and time again that they will never forgive themselves for not fighting harder.

Of course they feel like that. But really, there was nothing they could have done.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock has often spoken about the protective ring he promised to throw around the elderly in care. Is this really what he meant?

Its a complex situation, without doubt. But the risk posed by a handful of consistent visitors is low, so there must be another way.

Mr Hancock, who was too busy with the pandemic to respond to the care homes crisis did, last week, seem to have time to do an interview with Sky News on the sex lives of students.

But soon, with a looming judicial review, ever more angry MPs, and as calls for a full public inquiry continue to grow, he will have nowhere to hide.

Meanwhile, Margaret lives in terror of her eye check-up at the local hospital  because, when she gets back, she will be put into the solitary confinement of quarantine for two weeks.

Locked in her room. Alone.

I dont know how much longer I can go on, she says. I just want my life back.
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The Kochi firm has patented the molecule in India, US, EU and rest of the world

At a University of Maryland lab, people infected with the new take turns sitting in a chair and putting their faces into the big end of a large cone. They recite the alphabet and sing or just sit quietly for a half hour. Sometimes they cough.

The cone sucks up everything that comes out of their mouths and noses. It's part of a device called Gesundheit II that is helping scientists study a big question: Just how does the virus that causes COVID-19 spread from one person to another? It clearly hitchhikes on small liquid particles sprayed out by an infected person.

People expel particles while coughing, sneezing, singing, shouting, talking and even breathing. But the drops come in a wide range of sizes, and scientists are trying to pin down how risky the various kinds are.

The answer affects what we should all be doing to avoid getting sick. That's why it was thrust into headlines a few days ago when a U. S. health agency appeared to have shifted its position on the issue, but later said it had published new language in error.

The recommendation to stay at least 6 feet (2 meters) apart some authorities cite about half that distance is based on the idea that larger particles fall to the ground before they can travel very far.

They are like the droplets in a spritz of a window cleaner, and they can infect somebody by landing on their nose, mouth or eyes, or maybe being inhaled.

But some scientists are now focusing on tinier particles, the ones that spread more like cigarette smoke. Those are carried by wisps of air and even upward drafts caused by the warmth of our bodies. They can linger in the air for minutes to hours, spreading throughout a room and build up if ventilation is poor.

The potential risk comes from inhaling them. Measles can spread this way, but the new is far less contagious than that.

For these particles, called aerosols, 6 feet is not a magic distance,'' says Linsey Marr, a leading researcher who is studying them at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg. But she says it's still important to keep one's distance from others, the farther the better, because aerosols are most concentrated near a source and pose a bigger risk at close range.

Public health agencies have generally focused on the larger particles for That prompted more than 200 other scientists to publish a plea in July to pay attention to the potential risk from aerosols.

The World Health Organization, which had long dismissed a danger from aerosols except in the case of certain medical procedures, later said that aerosol transmission of the coronavirus can't be ruled out in cases of infection within crowded and poorly ventilated indoor spaces.

The issue drew attention recently when the U. S.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention posted and then deleted statements on its website that highlighted the idea of aerosol spread. The agency said the posting was an error, and that the statements were just a draft of proposed changes to its recommendations.

Dr. Jay Butler, CDC's deputy director for infectious disease, told The Associated Press that the agency continues to believe larger and heavier droplets that come from coughing or sneezing are the primary means of transmission.

Last month Butler told a scientific meeting that current research suggests aerosol spreading of the coronavirus is possible but it doesn't seem to be the main way that people get infected.

Further research may change that conclusion, he added, and he urged scientists to study how often aerosol spread of the coronavirus occurs, what situations make it more likely and what reasonable steps might prevent it.

Marr said she thinks infection by aerosols is happening a lot more than people initially were willing to think. As a key piece of evidence, Marr and others point to so-called superspreader events where one infected person evidently passed the virus to many others in a single setting.

In March, for example, after a choir member with coronavirus symptoms attended a rehearsal in Washington state, 52 others who had been seated throughout the room were found to be infected and two died.

In a crowded and poorly ventilated restaurant in China in January, the virus evidently spread from a lunchtime patron to five people at two adjoining tables in a pattern suggesting aerosols were spread by the air conditioner. Also in January, a passenger on a Chinese bus apparently infected 23 others, many of whom were scattered around the vehicle.

Butler said such events raise concern about aerosol spread but don't prove it happens. There could be another way for tiny particles to spread. They may not necessarily come directly from somebody's mouth or nose, says William Ristenpart of the University of California, Davis. His research found that if paper tissues are seeded with influenza virus and then crumpled, they give off particles that bear the virus. So people emptying a wastebasket with tissues discarded by somebody with COVID-19 should be sure to wear a mask, he said.

Scientists who warn about aerosols say current recommendations still make sense. Wearing a mask is still important, and make sure it fits snugly. Keep washing those hands diligently. And again, staying farther apart is better than being closer together. Avoid crowds, especially indoors.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
A Tokyo court ruled Thursday that the 39-year-old second daughter of executed AUM Shinrikyo cult founder Shoko Asahara can take possession of his cremated remains, sources familiar with the matter said, in the latest development in a long-running family row over his ashes.

Asahara's ashes have been stored in a detention house in the Japanese capital since he was hanged in July 2018 along with 12 other members of the doomsday cult for crimes including the 1995 sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway, which left 14 people dead and more than 6,000 others injured.

The decision made by the Tokyo Family Court is likely to exacerbate the rift within Asahara's family over who will gain possession of his ashes, with his fourth daughter, 31, planning to lodge an appeal with the Tokyo High Court.
The Trump administration has asked a court to throw out a lawsuit attempting to stop construction of a border wall in south Texas, rejecting claims the policy is racially motivated.

The proposed barrier between the US and Mexico would be built along the Rio Grande River, stretching for about 111 kilometres between Webb and Zapata counties.

US President Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Atlanta on Friday. Credit:AP

Residents in the regional city of Laredo have mounted a legal challenge against the President, claiming the plan will destroy the environment, won't stop illegal entries into America, and will result in locals having their land seized by the government based on "white nationalist motives".

"Time and again President Trump speaks of immigrants, Mexicans, Mexican-Americans and people from the border as criminals and dehumanises them in order to justify the construction of a border wall," says a lawsuit filed on behalf of Zapata Council and local landowners.
The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) has advised Pakistan to undertake "immediate corrective actions" and suspend the issuance of any new pilot licenses in the wake of a scandal over falsified licenses, according to an official and a document seen by Reuters.

The recommendations from ICAO, a specialised agency of the United Nations that works to ensure safety in international air transport, come days after Pakistan opened a criminal probe into 50 pilots and five civil aviation officials who allegedly helped them falsify credentials to secure pilot licences.

"Pakistan should improve and strengthen its licensing system to ensure that it takes into account all necessary processes and procedures and prevents inconsistencies and malpractices before new licenses are issued and privileges of suspended licenses are re-established," said ICAO, in a previously unreported letter to the Pakistan Civil Aviation Authority (PCAA) last week.

A Pakistani aviation ministry official told Reuters that the country has not issued any new licenses since July, in the wake of the scandal.

A PCAA spokesman did not respond to a request for comment.

Also read: US aviation regulator downrates Pakistan's air safety rating over pilot licences issue

Also read: Pakistan fake licenses case: Aviation regulator issues show-cause notices to 193 pilots
(Natural News) In response to the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19), Congress passed a temporary moratorium on evictions. On Sept. 1, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), with the help of the Department for Health and Human Services (HHS), published an order that created a second, more expansive eviction moratorium. The National Apartment Association (NAA)  a trade group of apartment owners  and individual landlords are suing in federal court because they believe the eviction moratorium is unconstitutional.

On March 27, Congress passed the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act, which included a limited and temporary moratorium on evictions for tenants living in certain types of federally supported housing. This moratorium expired on July 24.

However, the Trump administration, with the help of the CDC, issued a new moratorium entitled Temporary Halt in Residential Evictions to Prevent Further Spread of COVID-19. This new moratorium, which went into effect on Sept. 4 and lasts until the end of the year, covers almost all renters across the United States. (Related: California just declared war on property owners by banning evictions, allowing people who dont pay rent to occupy homes they dont own.)

The moratorium allows tenants to stay in their rented property if they notify their landlord that they recently had to deal with large medical bills, a loss of income or are ineligible to receive financial assistance from the government. They further have to argue that, if they were to be evicted, they would be forced into homelessness or a different kind of unsafe living situation.

The moratorium covers renters who earn less than $99,000 a year. The CDC states that property owners who try to defy the eviction moratorium could be sent to jail for up to a year and be made to pay a fine of up to $250,000.

Local, state and federal government agencies are doing everything they can to try and expand their power during the pandemic. This includes both hold orders on evictions as well as the creation of mandates for vaccinations. Listen to this episode of the Health Ranger Report, a podcast by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, and learn about why America is turning into a medical police state.

Landlords arguing CDC overstepping its authority

The NAA joined a group of landlords in filing a lawsuit, known as Richard Lee Brown v. Secretary Alex Azar, et. al., seeking to get the moratorium rolled back. The case was filed at the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia.

The lawsuit names HHS Secretary Alex Azar and Acting CDC Chief of Staff Nina B. Witkofsky as the defendants, and they are asking that the court vacate their September 1, 2020 Order, which suspended lawful residential evictions as applied to Plaintiffs.

The NAA and the landlords are being represented by the New Civil Liberties Alliance, a nonprofit dedicated to protecting civil and constitutional rights from being violated by the overreach of the Administrative State.

According to the lawsuit, the CDCs moratorium is a violation of their constitutional rights because the federal agency did not specify which law they based their authority to halt evictions on.

Agencies have no inherent power to make law, and nothing in the relevant statutes or regulations gives the CDC the power or authority to issue an eviction-moratorium order, said the NCLA.

The NAA and the landlords are arguing that the CDC is using the order to commandeer state officials into working for them by enforcing an eviction moratorium that is not backed by federal law.

They are also arguing that, because they, as property owners, continue to cover the costs of maintenance, utilities and other expenses, they have a right to expect that their tenants pay their fair share and if they are unable to do so should not be expected to continue living in someone elses property.

When will the federal government learn that Congress makes the laws, not federal agencies? said NCLA executive director and general counsel Mark Chenoweth. NCLA looks forward to vindicating the civil rights of our clients to access the courts, enforce their rental contracts and preserve their rights to reclaim their own property.

The CDC is arguing that their powers come from the Public Health Service Act and other related federal regulations that give it the authority to enact reasonably necessary policies that can halt the spread of diseases such as COVID-19.

Industry officials and experts agree that moratorium is short-sighted and harmful

Since filing their lawsuit, the NCLA has received an overwhelming amount of positive responses from people all across the country who say that the eviction moratorium is harming them.

This speaks to the serious damage caused by the CDCs lawless effort to rewrite the law, said Caleb Kruckenberg, the NCLAs litigation counsel, in a statement. We are thrilled to represent the members of the NAA and the brave property owners who are standing up to this abuse of power.

Another group of property owners in Tennessee filed their own lawsuit in federal court against the CDC. They are also arguing that the moratorium is unconstitutional and that by issuing it, the federal agency is preventing landlords from accessing due process with respect to their private property.

Many other officials and experts in the rental housing industry have warned the CDC that their moratorium will have very devastating effects on landlords, especially on small landlords who only own one or a handful of properties.

David Howard, the executive director of the National Rental Home Council, argues that the moratorium might actually cause more economic harm than it believes it is preventing, as it puts tenants in the position of having to pay back several months worth of rent once the moratorium ends, which might put them into debt and cause them to sink deeper into poverty.

Learn more about how local and national governments are attempting to deal with the pandemic by reading the articles at Pandemic.news.

Sources include:

TheEpochTimes.com

MarketWatch.com
HANDWARA: The Jammu and Kashmir Police, along with 32 Rashtriya Rifles and 92 Battalion CRPF launched a cordon and search operation at an orchard in Mandigam Kralgund and arrested a terrorist associate, identified as Akeel Parray.

Sources said the joint team acted on specific inputs they received about the presence of a terrorist aide in the area and launched the operation. "During the search and check one person was found in the suspicious condition who on seeing the search party tried to escape from the spot but was chased and apprehended by the search party," a police official said.

Police recovered arms and ammunition from his possession.

Live TV

The apprehended person during preliminary questioning disclosed his identity as Akeel Ahmad Parray, son of Wali Mohd, and resident of Mandigam Kralgund. During questioning, he admitted being working as an associate for terror outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba.

In this context, an FIR - 90/2020, Under Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act was registered at Kralgund police station.

Further investigation into the matter is under process.
SPRINGFIELD (AP)  With the nation racing to come to grips with centuries of racial sins, officials plan to remove the Capitol lawn statue of Stephen A. Douglas, whose forceful 19th century politics helped forge modern-day Illinois but who also profited from slavery.

Just inside the Statehouse hangs another revered depiction of an Illinois legend  and longtime Douglas rival  who expressed white supremacist views: Abraham Lincoln. The immense painting in the governors second-floor office depicts a Sept. 18, 1858, debate between the two men that opened with these words from Lincoln, who was vying for Douglas Senate seat and was still two years away from running for president:

I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and Black races.  There is a physical difference between the white and Black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality.

When the Douglas statue is put in storage this fall, it will become the latest in a line of monuments, from Confederate generals to Christopher Columbus, to come down during the global reckoning on race sparked by the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis police custody. There has been no discussion, though, about removing likenesses of Lincoln, the president whose Civil War victory freed the slaves, despite his earlier views on race.

At a certain point, where do you cut it off? Jefferson, he wrote the Declaration of Independence. You separate that from him being a slave owner, St. Louis tourist Eric Zuelke said during a recent visit to the Douglas statue, referring to Thomas Jefferson.

Lincoln believed that slavery was morally wrong and, like Douglas, he opposed it, although the two differed on how to end it. While his thinking evolved in the White House, Lincolns advocacy for Black people in 1858 stopped at recognizing their natural rights under the Declaration of Independence that all men are created equal, though his was still a radical position for the time.

Douglas contributions to the modern-day Illinois economy and transportation network cannot be overstated. But he retained a 20% share of a family-owned 200-slave Mississippi plantation, a little-known fact that led Illinois House speaker in July to recommend removing Douglas likenesses from the Statehouse.

On the day in the eastern Illinois city of Charleston depicted in Robert Roots 1918 painting  the fourth of seven celebrated debates around the state that helped make Lincoln a national figure  Lincoln felt pressured to respond to Douglas repeated taunts of Lincoln as a Black Republican who stood for Negro equality.

Teresa Haley, who heads the Springfield branch of the nations oldest civil rights group, the NAACP, said she thinks the Douglas statue should be removed to show intolerance for racism and white supremacy. Although Lincoln also had racist views, he was a president and the one who freed the slaves, she said.

Theres something about erasing things from history that we still need to be aware of, Haley said. But theres also something about glorifying that negative part of history as well. And this is the part that hurts all people.

Lincoln isnt blameless on race off the debate stage.

Allen Guelzo, a Princeton University scholar and three-time Lincoln Prize winner, noted that in 1847, Lincoln unsuccessfully represented slave owner Robert Matson in court to retrieve fugitive slaves in a free state from among those Matson rotated between his land in Kentucky and eastern Illinois to skirt Illinois anti-slavery law.

Guelzo, who co-created a five-step decision-making analysis for the removal of newly scrutinized memorials, believes that if Illinois uproots Douglas, Lincoln should follow, disqualified by the Matson case and his stance during the Charleston debate.

If an offensive racial opinion is the only yardstick that we use to measure people today, they will have to pull down monuments to everybody from before 1950, Guelzo said.

Complicating matters is the idea that without Douglas, there might never have been a Great Emancipator. Douglas position that territorial voters in an expanding country should decide whether to allow slavery incensed Lincoln, luring the former congressman out of political retirement to challenge Douglas. Each of the 1858 debate sites, from Freeport to Jonesboro, memorializes the men  most with full-size statues.

Dismantling those or taking down just Douglas would sort of erase one of the most important political discussions ever held in the country, said Harold Holzer, another Lincoln Prize winner and Civil War expert at Hunter College in New York. Holzer said Mary Lincoln, who prodded her husband to greatness, and Douglas are the two best things that happened to Lincoln.

Jim Edgar, who requisitioned Roots painting for his office when he was Illinois secretary of state and had it moved to its current location for his 1991-1999 tenure as governor, said that like most politicians seeking to remain viable, Lincoln felt the need to play to the crowd in Charleston.

When I was campaigning, you never wanted to say something you didnt believe, or say something that later youre going to deny, but at the same time, you understand that youve got to get elected to get something done, said Edgar, a Republican from Charleston.

He pointed out that despite the ugly stance Lincoln took that day, he clung to the notion that Black people were among those who were created equal according to the Declaration of Independence. It was a radical view for the time that continued to evolve until, by wars end, Lincoln embraced citizenship for Black people.

As for Douglas, after he lost the presidency to Lincoln in 1860, he emerged a staunch Unionist and Lincoln ally, said Guelzo, adding that his dying words to his sons in 1861 were, Tell them to obey the laws and the Constitution.

Those words are inscribed on the base of the Statehouse statue.

___

Follow Political Writer John OConnor: https://twitter.com/apoconnor
- The President's daughter wedded her lover on Saturday, September 26, morning

- Zambia's president shared an emotional post explaining how much honoured he was to walk her down the aisle

- The president was later spotted in a video walking his daughter down the aisle at the church looking all emotional

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It is every parent's dream and joy to walk their children down the aisle.

Many feel very much honoured and respected by their children when they are presented with the opportunity and chance to ''brag'' about the fact that they raised them well.

READ ALSO: TZ socialite Amber Rutty, hubby slapped with 5 year jail term for posting their bedroom video online

Zambia's president Edgar Lungu said the daughter honoured them with the wedding. Photo: Edgar Lungu/Facebook

Source: Facebook

READ ALSO: Zari Hassan's sister Ashley unveils her mzungu baby daddy and netizens are impressed

Zambia President Edgar Lungu is the man feeling the aforementioned right about now, just moments after seeing his daughter off to her new home.

TUKO.co.ke has learnt that the president's daughter Tasila Lungi exchanged marital vows with the love of her life Patrick Mwansa on Saturday, September 26, morning.

The lovebirds officiated their union at the St. Ignatius Parish Catholic Church.

Well, before the bride could get to the church, she received all the blessings from her parents specifically her father who actually walked her down the aisle as he handed her over to her man.

To start off the day, president Edgar shared several photos of himself, his family and his daughter in her gown, preparing to leave for church on social media.

READ ALSO: Thiago Alcantara: Liverpool complete signing of Spanish midfielder on a 4-year deal

Accompanying the photos, the president disclosed how emotional he was to finally see off his daughter, who will always be his baby.

Edgar added that his daughter had honoured them with the official church wedding.

He also congratulated his daughter and her man on the caption and wished them all the happiness even as they start a new life.

''Giving your daughter away is not an easy thing for a father. I woke up with mixed emotions. In my eyes she's still a little girl, my little girl. Tasila has honoured us, and I was filled with joy as I proudly walked her down the aisle, giving her hand in marriage to Mr. Patrick Mwansa. To both of you, look to God and your marriage will be a success. The bible says in Ephesians 4:2 "Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love." And in 1 Peter 4:8, the bible says "Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins. May God bless your union.'' he wrote.

READ ALSO: Kibicho aongoza mkutano wa Mt Kenya katika mkahawa wa Thika Greens usiku

The president was later spotted in a video walking his daughter down the aisle at the church looking all emotional.

Many people were touched by the video of the president and could not help but laud him for being and showing the qualities of a good dad.

TUKO.co.ke understands Tasila and her boo have been undergoing marriage formalities such as pre-marriage lessons at St. Ignatius Parish in Lusaka as required by the Catholic Church.

The two had earlier on held a public engagement at the aforementioned church and duly informed the world about their upcoming wedding, which has finally come to pass.

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Barbados is one of dozens of countries part of China's Belt and Road Initiative

It funds infrastructure projects in exchange for power over countries in deals

China's hold over developing countries has been described as a 'chokehold'

Boris Johnson has ordered diplomats to launch a new drive against Chinese expansionism after Beijing was accused of placing pressure on Barbados to remove the Queen as its head of state.

The island is one of dozens of countries which form part of Chinas Belt and Road Initiative, under which Beijing lends money to poorer countries to help them to fund critical infrastructure projects such as ports and high speed rail lines.

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With China able to seize control of the finished project if the countries default  and frequently demanding preferential terms in trade deals as a condition of the loans  it has led to what one No 10 source described as a Chinese chokehold over much of the developing world.

Mr Johnson, who fears that the economic damage caused by Covid-19 will make countries even more vulnerable to domination, is to demand that China is more transparent about its financial dealings with other countries.

Boris Johnson has ordered diplomats to launch a new drive against Chinese expansionism after Beijing was accused of placing pressure on Barbados to remove the Queen as its head of state. Pictured: Chinese President Xi Jinping with Queen Elizabeth II at a state banquet at Buckingham Palace, London, during his state visit to the UK in 2015

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Barbados, which gained independence in 1966, announced last week that it would become a republic in 2021: Governor-General Dame Sandra Mason said that the time has come to fully leave our colonial past behindBarbadians want a Barbadian Head of State.

US intelligence, which has been shared with the UK, has indicated that pressure was brought to bear on Barbados by its Chinese paymasters to cut their colonial ties.

Tom Tugendhat, Tory chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, says that the incident showed how the Chinese are tying new nations into their own imperial order by deploying debt diplomacy.

Writing in todays Mail on Sunday, he says: Barbados may be the latest trophy in Beijings imperial string of pearlsthe Great Game has given way to the Great Gamble as countries are taking loans from Chinese state banks and betting they can pay them back before the default clauses come due.

A No 10 source has described China's 'Belt and Road' initiative as a 'chokehold' on the developing world

He adds: We should remind our Caribbean cousins that a constitutional monarch, particularly under our peerless Queen, is the best defence against tyrants.

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Figures seen by the MoS have revealed for the first time the true scale of Chinas reach over poorer countries, with money owed to China accounting for nearly one third of some countries GDP.

Pakistan is top of the list of recipients, with Islamabad owing China a total of 27 billion. The most leveraged country is Cambodia: the 5 billion it owes accounts for 29.5 per cent of GDP.

Other major recipients include Laos, with 26.1 per cent of GDP, Zambia with 23.4 per cent, Ethiopia with 17.7 per cent, and Belarus with 13 per cent.

Mr Johnsons new drive marks a sharp change of policy from previous Tory Governments: Theresa Mays Chancellor, Philip Hammond, pushed for Britain to fully endorse Chinas global investment drive.

A No 10 source said: As coronavirus devastates developing countries, many are finding themselves in a Chinese chokehold as a result of the huge debts they owe'

Mr Hammond complained recently about an outbreak of anti-Chinese sentiment in the party after Tory MPs objected to technology firm Huawei being given a key role in building the UKs 5G network.

And in 2017, the year after leaving Downing Street, David Cameron announced that he was helping to set up a $1 billion UK-China Fund to seek opportunities for co-operation between the two countries in technology.

A No 10 source said: As coronavirus devastates developing countries, many are finding themselves in a Chinese chokehold as a result of the huge debts they owe.

The Belt and Road Initiative is an expansionist Chinese Marshall Plan  for instance Beijing is funding a high speed rail line in Laos which is costing the equivalent of more than a quarter of the countrys GDP.

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'China is doing this in the least transparent way  providing high-interest and unsustainable loans collateralised against countries natural resources. They are in danger of being forced to sell out future generations to meet their present debts.

The source added: As a member of both the UN Security Council and G20, China needs to step up to its obligations and end its chronic lack of transparency.

Charlie Robertson, the author of The Fastest Billion: The Story Behind Africas Economic Revolution and an expert on Chinese debt diplomacy, said: China is doing what Britain did in the Victorian era  exporting its savings to other countries as an exercise in global domination.

It has inevitably led to conspiracy theories about China hoping that the countries will default so they can seize critical infrastructure.

TOM TUGENDHAT MP: Beijing wants to do with loans what the Soviet Union failed to achieve with tanks

By TOM TUGENDHAT, CHAIR OF FOREIGN AFAIRS COMMITTEE FOR THE MAIL ON SUNDAY

Around the world, the Communist rulers of China are planting flags with the speed of a Victorian adventurer claiming lands and seas that others once thought their own or neutral.

Using debt instead of gunboats, the Chinese are tying new nations into their own imperial order.

It looks like Barbados may be the latest trophy in Beijings imperial string of pearls.

Last week, the island announced that, after nearly 400 years, the monarchs of Great Britain would no longer rule over them. Not that this Queen ever really did.

Chinese President Xi Jinping with the Duchess of Cambridge and Queen Elizabeth II at a state banquet at Buckingham Palace, London, during the first day of his state visit to the UK

As a constitutional monarch, Queen Elizabeth has never exercised any power over the 300,000 inhabitants.

Barbados is, and has been for decades, an independent constitutional realm and a democracy in the Commonwealth.

So why the change? What has triggered the Barbadians to find a new head of state and end the symbolic rule of the worlds most respected head of state?

If theres one thing we know for certain, its nothing the Queen said or did that triggered the change. In fact, its nothing the British Government did either.

The move were seeing has everything to do with a new scramble for power. The Great Game has given way to the Great Gamble as countries are taking loans from Chinese state banks and betting they can pay them back before the default clauses come due.

The Queen and Prince Philip bid farewell to Chinese President Xi Jinping and his wife Peng Liyuan at Buckingham Palace in 2015

Ports, stadia, roads and railways are being built on the never-never with the firm expectation that the loan will never be called in.

But like the Pied Piper, the lure of free money is masking a hidden agenda  this isnt about development, its about domination.

Around the world, were beginning to see the real cost of cheap loans. Its true the Sri Lankan government werent asked to abide by any good governance principles when they signed for the loans that built the port at Hambantota, as more principled lenders might have demanded. But that didnt mean the money came without strings attached.

Unlike a World Bank loan, or UK development aid, there was no renegotiation when they defaulted. It triggered immediate repossession. China secured a 99-year lease on a major Indian Ocean harbour.

The same has happened in countries around the world as debt is cheaper than gunpowder  a Chinese invention, of course  and much more effective. Chinese bankers and their cheap cash loans are doing the work once carried out by Royal Navy officers and company men on sloops and frigates sailing out of London and Amsterdam.

Queen Elizabeth ll inspects a guard of honour as she arrives in Barbados on October 31, 1977

Theres no shortage of flattery, of course. Last year, Prime Minister Andrew Holness of Jamaica signed up to Beijings Belt and Road Initiative  a series of vast infrastructure projects financed with Chinese cash  and was given the all-star treatment at the Shanghai trade forum.

A few years earlier, it had been Freundel Stuarts turn. Barbadoss then prime minister signed up to the scheme, known as the new silk road, and even discussed co-operation with the Peoples Liberation Army.

China is attempting what the Soviets failed to achieve with guerrillas and revolutionaries. Theyre trying to rewrite the global operating system. And theyre succeeding. International co-operation from trade to technology doesnt just happen, its organised.

Groups with dreary names meet in dull rooms to discuss regulations for everything from the wavelengths of radio communications to the naming of websites. Its not exciting but it matters.

Chinese President Xi Jinping with the Duchess of Cambridge at a state banquet at Buckingham Palace, London

Until now, this has been based on principles that we wrote. British lawyers, insurers and bankers were the inky lifeblood of the empire and the rules they scribbled underwrote global trade.

Their principles of individual rights, privacy, and the rule of law they encoded into our way of life still dictate the way we work. Chinas Communist rulers have taken against such principles, and the international rules-based order they make possible.

Beijings new colonists have no time for independent actors on the world stage, seeing central control as the key to success. And thats a challenge to us all. Because its not just those who have agreed to bow to the new Emperor who will live with the change.

We are all under the shadow of a new throne. China is looking to replicate its own repressive system of internal command and control on a global scale. Just as their 34 provinces (35 with Taiwan) must obey the rules of the General Secretary of the Communist Party, so the new colonial outposts must vote as directed too.

In just a few years, China has gone from leading one UN agency to four  and their decisions are being felt.

Take the case of one of them, the 155-year-old International Telecommunication Union.

This recently discussed moving away from the Western distributed network model for the internet, over which the state has little power, to one based around capital cities around the world  reflecting the authoritarian outlook of its Chinese Secretary-General Houlin Zhao.

India is in no doubt what all this really means  Chinese princes are threatening their borders once again. And we should wake up, too. So, what should we do about it? How do we avoid another imperial clash or  worse  conquest?

The Queen pictured with Governor-General of Barbados Dame Sandra Mason at Windsor Castle in 2018

We can learn from our past. Just as we built the biggest empire the world has ever known, we dismantled it too.

We know that the principles we encoded into the post-war treaties and institutions have helped nations to succeed and determine their own futures.

They prevented Soviet expansion and helped bring about the longest period of peaceful global growth in history. We can do that again.

We need to bring people together under the rule of law and the principles of individuality, sovereignty and freedom.

And if were going to disentangle Chinas debt traps, well need generous support for real projects, and well have to stop corrupt profits  and those who control them  from hiding in British jurisdiction.

Foreign policy, from the Indian Ocean to the Caribbean is not just about foreigners. Its also about us and protecting our values and interests. Its also about remembering what matters and letting our friends know we care.

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Today, in Bridgetown, Barbados we should remind our Caribbean cousins that a constitutional monarch, particularly under our peerless Queen, is the best defence against tyrants that we know.
Some stories sound too fantastic and heroic to be true - like Shubhangi Patil's story of having ferried her ailing mother 300 km on a scooty, during the lockdown only to travel all the way back for her board examination. However, this one is as real as it gets.

Despite having driven 300 km to and fro, Shubhangi secured 87 percent in her exams and became eligible to get Rs 25,000 as per the chief minister's laptop scheme. Unfortunately, her mother, who was an angandwadi worker isn't alive to witness her achievement.

Shubhangi lost her father - a farmer - in 2009, and ever since, it was her mother who took care of all her needs. However, her mother's health started worsening during the lockdown, and Patil and her elder sister had no financial support. They had no choice but to take their mother to her their maternal home.

TOI (Shubhangi Patil)

She told Times of India, We only had Rs 500 left with us so I decided to take her to my nanis place as I knew my mama could pay for the hospital charges. I tucked her behind me with a blanket and drove my scooty 300 kms to Chopda in Maharashtra. I had to go back home for my exam and my mother passed away in June."

Now, she plans to invest the amount she has procured for her college fee. This year, 1,964 students of Indore division were selected under this scheme and out of that, 806 are from Indore district.

TOI (MP CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan)

Based on guidelines of the scheme, Class 12 state board students who score more than 85 percent are eligible to win the amount of Rs 25,000 for laptops. Some of the candidates are getting re-totaling and revaluation done, and once they have their rectified scores, they will be eligible to apply for the scheme.

TOI

Joint director of Indore divisions school education department, Manish Verma told TOI, Out of the total selected candidates nearly 10% students are from extremely humble backgrounds."
Law for the people or people for the law? View(s):

The idea of written law goes back to the ancient Mesopotamian culture that prospered long before the bible was written or civilisations of Greeks and Romans that followed. In fact, the oldest known evidence of a law code is tablets from the ancient city of Elba in modern Syria, known as Hammurabis code dating back to 2400 B.C.: To bring about the rule of righteousness in the land, to destroy the wicked and the evildoers; so that the strong should not harm the weak.

Aristotle also wrote: Law should govern.

Law has been defined as a body of rules of action or conduct by a controlling authority, and having binding legal force. That which must be obeyed and followed by citizens subject to sanctions or legal consequences, is a law.

In terms of Article 4 (c) of the Constitution, the judicial power of the people is exercised by the people via courts.

The law can be considered as the law of the people, only when the people are accorded due standing in the law process, and afforded the right to manage their own affairs. The law is just and fair only when it is equitable in its application.

Now a question has been posed: Is the law for the people or are the -eople for the law? It is abundantly clear that the law is of the people for the people and binding on all citizens alike, including those who govern. But the question has become pertinent due to things as they stand. In practical terms, it is apparent that the law is being manipulated to serve a category of people over the general citizenry.

When the law is for the people, it cannot be selective. But those in the legal profession have accorded themselves special benefits and privileges to the detriment of others. By sleight of hand, however, they make out that these laws are made by the peoples representatives in parliament.

Simpler and cheaper means of achieving law and order is not to the liking of those in the legal profession whose vested interests are diametrically opposite to the interests of the people.

A case in point is the law on Conciliation Boards introduced by Parliament in 1959. This was essentially a law for the people. This form of a law had a clear merit. Lawyers were specifically debarred from participating in the conciliation process. The reasons for exclusion of lawyers were evidently because their professional interests were in conflict with community interests. Conciliation was also based on acceptance of the settlement by the people themselves. Such settlements were easy because parties to dispute themselves participated in the process. Furthermore, recognition of the outcome was easy because of the intervention of village elders whose social standing in the community was high. It also has a further advantage of peoples interest over professional interests. This mode of law and order was in respect of minor crimes and disputes that would otherwise have led to major crimes. Expenses too were minimal.

It is in recorded history that Governor Colebrooke had witnessed a conciliation in progress under a mango tree at Teldeniya in 1833 and highly commended it. Conciliation was a tremendous success.

But this law of the people, for the people, was stiffly opposed by those in the legal profession. Their opposition was on the basis that Conciliation Boards were a usurpation of judicial power of the courts. This is the height of absurdity! How can it be said that the people have usurped their own power? It is clear that those with vested interests want to cling on to power usurped from the people. Seems like they look at it as prescriptive rights!

Another point of contention was that adjudication should be at the hands of trained legal professionals; that they alone understand the ramifications of law making and adjudication process. Most people who have retained legal professionals, know what the real ramifications are  Laws Delay being the main curse.

The 1973 Administration of Justice Law (AJL) was another instance of law change initiated from outside the coterie of legal professionals. The AJL was law for the people where time and expense and laws delay along with other dysfunctions of the process was minimised. But the AJL too was vigorously opposed by legal professionals who lost out in the expediting process. They bid their time till 1978 when with change of government, the AJL was overturned through political influence.

An idea of monopoly control drives through the veins of those with vested interests. They do not conceive that others, besides courts, can help in the judicial process for law and order. A statement in this context by Prof Eric Jensen of the Stanford University in a lecture at the Open University Sri Lanka very recently is relevant in this context: There is, in fact, no fine distinction between judicial decision and decisions of public servants. The decisions of the public servants affect the lives of the people far more and more seriously than decisions of court. There are many rules and regulations to this process, acted upon on a day-to-day basis, even on an hourly basis. Terms such as collaborative justice, contributory justice, are ideas not entertained by courts and their professionals. Law in courts then is less for the people.

More examples can be given on the adverse effects of monopoly control of laws if not for space restrictions.

Law and order can be served better if police can deal with minor cases directly, without delay. At the same time, law and order can be served if the public service authorities can contribute their administrative capacity to the formal law, commonly so understood. In a sense therefore, the ability of formal law to serve law and order is greatly enhanced by the support of others. These others outside courts deal with less serious crimes, offences and disputes; the courts handling major crimes.

It is time that the law itself comes into serious review with a view to enhancing law and order, and thereby the police task.

(The writer is a Retired Senior Superintendent of Police. He can be contacted at

seneviratnetz@gmail.com)
The

Reemploy Tennessee

initiative begins on Sunday. The Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce Development reminds unemployment claimants that is the day the work search requirement resumes to remain eligible to receive benefits.

If a claimant chooses to continue receiving unemployment benefits, they must make at least three potential job contacts between Sunday and Saturday, Oct. 3. They will then report those work search activities during the certification week that begins Sunday, Oct. 4. This will be part of the weekly certification process moving forward. 3. They will then report those work search activities during the certification week that begins Sunday, Oct. 4. This will be part of the weekly certification process moving forward.

If a claimant has a definitive return-to-work date due to a temporary layoff, or a COVID-19 related exemption, they do not need to complete this requirement. The system will not prompt exempt claimants to complete the work search portion of the certification process.

Most claimants are required to search for work. Self-employed individuals can fulfill this requirement by performing work activities.

If a claimant fails to complete work searches or activities, the system will automatically deny their benefits for that week.

Claimants who are out of work and do not have a job to return to, or a return-to-work date, are required to complete weekly work searches.

Work search activities for self-employed individuals can include calling on clients, advertising business services, posting business-related social media content, enhancing the businesss website, submitting bids or proposals, applying for contract or gig work, or attend training. Self-employed claimants need to continue taking proactive steps to reopen their businesses. If they do not plan to reopen their business, they must complete traditional work searches.

Claimants who are temporarily laid off or furloughed, and have a return-to-work date, are not required to complete weekly job searches.

Claimants, who are union workers, and attained employment through their union hiring hall, are not required to complete weekly job searches.

Claimants who are out of work due to one of the COVID-19 reasons listed in the CARES Act may be exempt from performing job searches. They must self-certify they are unable to look for work due to one of the approved COVID-19 designations but are otherwise able and available.

Reemploy Tennessee

can assist claimants with fulfilling the work search requirement and put them on the path to new employment or job training.

Jobs4TN.gov combines the Departments Unemployment Division and its Workforce Services Division into a powerful workforce development tool for Tennesseans searching for a new job. This integration allows claimants access to more than 210,000 current job openings across the state, career services and job training opportunities  all online.

For one-on-one assistance, career specialists at Tennessees more than 80 American Job Centers can work with job seekers to provide customized job searches, job fairs, Reemployment Services and Eligibility Assessment (RESEA) appointments, and help them determine if job training assistance is available.

Career specialists can also work with a claimant to find free or reduced costs for transportation, childcare, uniforms, or other requirements needed to make a successful return to Tennessees workforce.

All these services are provided by the state of Tennessee at no cost to the job seeker.
Presidential orders: Land acquired for new medical faculty View(s):

A 7.7270 Hectare land in Kalutara is to be acquired to construct the new medical faculty for the University of Moratuwa. This was announced through a gazette issued on Wednesday.

Accordingly, the land plot called Thiththagasmullalanda Watta at Puhambugoda in the Dodangoda area of Kalutara would be acquired. The gazette notification was issued by President Gotabaya Rajapaksa in his capacity as the Urban Development and Housing Minister.
SEOUL, South Korea and BEIJING, Sept. 26, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Today at the 16 th Beijing International Automotive Exhibition (Auto China 2020), Beijing Hyundai Motor Company shares its game-changing electrification vision that is driving its transformation into a Smart Mobility Solution Provider. At the show, Hyundai premieres its RM20e electric racing midship sports car prototype, Elantra N TCR and Prophecy concept EV model, demonstrating the reach of its EV ambitions. All-new Tucson as well as all-new Elantra also make their debuts to Chinese customers.

RM20e is the first high-performance electric sports car Hyundai has developed, utilizing its industry-leading electric powertrain. Started in 2012, Hyundai embarked on a project called RM (Racing Midship) to develop and connect new high-performance motorsports technologies for future N models. Since the project's initiation, RM models have undergone extensive road testing to validate newly developed technologies, evaluate their effects on performance, and improve them for subsequent applications on future N models.

Albert Biermann, President and Head of R&D Division of Hyundai Motor Group, announced Hyundai Motor Group's electrification vision through a virtual presentation. "It is our responsibility to save the planet, so that future generations can thrive in a clean environment," said President Biermann. "To achieve the goal of clean mobility, Hyundai has secured the capacity to develop all types of eco-friendly vehicles, including hybrid, plug-in hybrid, battery electric and fuel cell electric vehicles using Hyundai's own technologies."

Hyundai's booth at the motor show also features its Prophecy concept EV that captures the brand's electrification direction, which makes its China debut at the Beijing Motor Show. Hyundai is also promoting its recently launched IONIQ dedicated EV lineup brand that is central to its 'Strategy 2025' electrification roadmap.

More information about Hyundai Motor and its products can be found at:

http://worldwide.hyundai.com or http://globalpr.hyundai.com

SOURCE Hyundai Motor
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will deliver his virtual UN General Assembly address on Saturday. The Prime Minister's pre-recorded video statement is expected to be broadcast live at the UN General Assembly hall, New York, at 09:00 am local time or 06:30 pm IST. He is the first speaker in today's UNGA session.

India's agenda for the ongoing 75th UNGA session will be to push for bolstering global action against terrorism. India will also bat for transparency in the listing and delisting process of terror entities and individuals by the UN sanction committees.

Being among one of the largest troops contributing to the UN missions, India is also expected to seek intensive engagement in finalising mandates for UN Peacekeeping Missions. Besides this, India is also expected to put the spotlight on its role as the "pharmacy of the world", while detailing its contribution to the global fight against COVID-19 by providing aid to over 150 countries.

Other issues on India's checklist at the UNGA are sustainable development goals (SDGs) and climate change. India will also dwell on its commitment to the idea of global partnership under the sustainable development goals, including on climate change.

Meanwhile, Indian delegate at the UNGA, Mijito Vinito tore into Pakistan for raising the Kashmir issue at the 75th UN General Assembly. Exercising his right to respond to Pakistan PM Imran Khan's comments, Vinito said all new rules brought in J&K are India's "internal affair".

While presenting India's position on the Kashmir issue, the Indian delegate through the UNGA sought Pakistan to vacate all the illegally occupied parts of Kashmir. Vinito further went onto state that Imran Khan's pre-recorded statement was an "incessant rant" replete with "lies, misinformation, warmongering and malice."

(Edited with agency inputs by Mehak Agarwal)

Also read: J&K integral part of India, only dispute left now is about PoK: India at UN
According to the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission, an unidentified gunman on September 25 started firing shots at people in Ethiopias western Benishangul-Gumuz region, leaving at least 15 dead. Out of the 15 people, 4 are confirmed to be women. In a press release, the EHRC said, The Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is deeply alarmed by the surge in attacks against civilians in the Benishangul-Gumuz Region.

Unrest in Ethiopia

The press release quoted the EHRCs chief commissioner, Daniel Bekele saying, Civilians are being subjected to repeated attacks with unmitigated cruelty in Benishangul-Gumuz. Federal and regional authorities should take the required steps to enforce the rule of law and bring perpetrators to account.

Two similar incidents have been reported earlier this month in the same zone, on September 6 and September 7-13. These incidents resulted in the killings of various civilians and displacement of over 300 people.

Read: Ethiopia Charges Prominent Opposition Figure With Terrorism

Ethiopia, Africas second-largest country by population, is not only struggling to avoid a war with Egypt but also to pull itself out of the economic crunch caused due to the ongoing pandemic. Apart from this, it is reportedly on the verge of transitioning to democracy or descent into violence. The Oromo people are the countrys largest ethnic group but have faced decades of discrimination, exclusion from politics and operation.

Read: Ethiopia Opens Facility To Make Coronavirus Test Kits

Abiy Ahmed came to power in 2018 and since then Ethiopias ethnic situation has become complicated. While many have dubbed Ahmeds position as a victory for the community, many have said that it might cause hindrance for their demands like great autonomy for Oromia.

Meanwhile, the situation in Ethiopia is getting more complex with each passing day. While some want the nation to be decentralised, some want it to be coherent. Experts suggest that these grievances were forcefully suppressed before he came to power, he gave greater freedom to civilians and press, released political prisoners and dissidents.

Read: US Mulls Cutting Foreign Aid Worth $130 Million To Ethiopia Over Nile Dam Dispute: Reports

Also Read: Ethiopian Region Votes, Defying Federal Government And PM

(Image Credits: Unsplash)
Jaipur, Sep 26 : As the World Tourism Day will be celebrated on Sunday this year amid the coronavirus pandemic with the theme "Tourism and Rural Development", the Rajasthan government's new tourism policy complements the theme keeping rural tourism in focus.

The Rajasthan government's new tourism policy provides for innovative tourism products and services with the focus on lesser known destinations especially in the rural areas, confirmed tourism officials.

Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot has also directed the promotion of tourism in villages as a means to improve the rural economy, they said.

"Across the world, Covid-19 has impacted the livelihoods of millions of people related to travel and tourism. Rajasthan government is effectively working to mitigate its effect in the state. The new tourism policy and other initiatives by the government are offering support to the industry. As the situation eases and India passes through unlock phases, the facilities for the visitors need to be revamped and aligned with the new normal," said Alok Gupta, Principal Secretary Tourism, Rajasthan.

The tourism sector has been the worst-hit by the Covid-19 pandemic and is striving for revival and needs more infrastructure support. The Rajasthan Tourism Policy 2020 promotes new investments in developing new tourist venues with the focus on strengthening infrastructure and improving road, rail and air connectivity, the official said.

There was also an added emphasis on the safety and security of the tourists. The policy thus has been creating a conducive environment for enabling the tourism sector in the state. Promoting local craft and cuisine has also been made part of the policy, he added.

The state government has offered several relief measures for existing tourism businesses in view of Covid-19. The tourism department has also formulated strategies to ensure safe tourism by issuing Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs). The tourist destinations and monuments are being sanitized and there is added emphasis on social awareness and hygiene in the new policy.

The state government has already declared reimbursement of the state's GST share to hotels and restaurants, the motor vehicle tax has been relaxed for vehicles of more than 22-person capacity and relaxations have been given in renewal of bar licences. In order to allow businesses to operate in a safe environment, the tourism department has issued SOPs for hotels, restaurants and film shoots in the state, officials confirmed to IANS.

The tourism department has also been working to promote skill development, strengthening of the Tourist Protection Force, promoting tourist start-ups and other experiential tourism initiatives.
When it comes to racial segregation and poverty gaps, Albany is one of the worst cities in America for people of color, according to a report from the Urban Institute, a nonprofit research group.

Of the 274 large cities that the institute measured for how adept they were at including low-income and minority residents in the city's economic prosperity, Albany placed near the bottom at 234. Albany's ranking plummeted between 2016 and 2013, when it fared better at number 174.

As for the other large New York cities looked at by the Urban Institute, Rochester and Buffalo ranked worse than Albany, at 241 and 249 in the survey, respectively. New York City ranked 189th for racial inclusion nationwide.

Though Albanys racial diversity has increased throughout the years  around 50 percent of the citys population are now people of color, compared to 30 percent in the 1980s  the study shows that in nearly every metric of inclusion, Albany fares worse than the national average.

People have repeatedly pointed out to our local government officials that were a deeply unequal city, said Alice Green, executive director of The Center for Law and Justice. They say, This is going on all around the country. But the study shows its very severe here.

More Information To read the Urban Institute study, go to https://www.urban.org/research/publication/inclusive-recovery-us-cities/view/full_report To look at a map of all cities and how they differ on racial disparity go to: https://apps.urban.org/features/inclusion/index.html?topic=map See More Collapse

The Urban Institutes dashboard was first published in 2018, but updated on Sept. 15 with new data. The statistics were crunched largely from U.S. Census data, and racial segregation research done by Brown University.

The rankings looked at income and racial segregation; the percentage of people of color; working-poor families; rent-burdened residents; high school dropouts, and the gap between poverty, education and homeownership rates of minority versus white non-Hispanic residents.

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The average index score for racial segregation across all cities was 35. The institute pegged Albany with a score of 42, indicating more segregation in the city than there is nationwide.

The racial homeownership gap was 31 percent in Albany, compared to 21 percent across all cities measured.

Albanys racial poverty gap was 17 percent; the 274 cities averaged at 11 percent.

The average index score for income segregation was 0.11  and Albanys is 0.18, one of the highest among all cities included in the study.

Its of great concern to see these numbers, Green said. It just shows yet again how much inequity exists here.

Christina Stacy, a senior researcher at the organization, said the report was created in order for cities to have a useful resource to reference.

The institute defines inclusion as the ability of all residents  particularly those who have been historically excluded  to contribute to, and benefit from, economic prosperity.

Stacy said the institute hopes city leaders and community organizers can use the data to identify areas where the city is struggling.

Weve heard from cities that have recovered economically  that bold public leadership is really important, Stacy said. Weve also heard that building voice and power with people who havent traditionally and historically been included in decision making is super important.

Stacy said high-ranking cities in the report tend to think of inclusion and economic growth as going hand in hand  not as alternatives.

Some people think, Well just grow first and then later worry about inclusion. But that really cant be the way that it is, Stacy said. Inclusion and equity has to be central in decision making, particularly at times like this when were in a recovery period.

Green said she hopes this report makes the inequality in the city even more clear.

We need to acknowledge the historical role of white supremacy, and not only its harmful effects on people of color, but the general community and the economy, Green said. I hope that we seriously pay attention to this data and what it means for the city of Albany.
New Delhi: The Delhi Urban Shelter Improvement Board (DUSIB) will provide in-situ rehabilitation to at least 353 slum dwellers in a housing society being built for the economically weaker sections (EWS) in Central Delhis Karol Bagh, the government said on Saturday.

The decision was taken in a Board meeting chaired by chief minister Arvind Kejriwal held on Friday.

Slum dwellers living in Princess Park area near India Gate were displaced because of the construction of the National War Museum by the Ministry of Defence. As per a survey carried out by DUSIB, 203 families are living in that area. On eligibility determination as per the Delhi Slum & JJ Relocation and Rehabilitation Policy 2015 (Now known as the Mukhya Mantri Awas Yojana), they will be allotted houses at Dwarka till houses at Dev Nagar near Karol Bagh are constructed, which will take nearly 18 months, the government said in a statement on Saturday.

Until the flats are ready, residents of Princess Park will be shifted to ready houses by DUSIB at Sector 16-B, Dwarka. Later, they will have the option to shift to the newly constructed housing premises in Dev Nagar.

Slum-dwellers from 150 jhuggis at the Dev Nagar plot will also be shifted to Dwarka to facilitate the construction of 784 houses. After allocating houses for inhabitants of Princess Park and Dev Nagar, the remaining houses will be used for in-situ rehabilitation of slums nearby, the government said.

DUSIB will construct 784 houses at a multi-storied (stilt plus 14 stories) building in Dev Nagar at a cost of Rs 102 crore. The houses will have two rooms, a kitchen, bath, and toilet with amenities such as parking space, parks, community halls, etc.

The project will be completed in 18 months, a senior DUSIB official said.

Salient Features of the Project:

- Number of EWS flats 784

- Number of stories Stilt +14

- Carpet area of one flat: 26.47 Sqm

- Super area including balcony: 42.91 Sqm

- Number of units on each floor: 56

- Total plot area: 9345.00 sq m

- Facilities in one unit: One living room, one bead room, one kitchen, bathroom
For the New World Order, a world government is just the beginning. Once in place they can engage their plan to exterminate 80% of the world's population, while enabling the "elites" to live forever with the aid of advanced technology. For the first time, crusading filmmaker ALEX JONES reveals their secret plan for humanity's extermination: Operation ENDGAME.

Jones chronicles the history of the global elite's bloody rise to power and reveals how they have funded dictators and financed the bloodiest warscreating order out of chaos to pave the way for the first true world empire.

Watch as Jones and his team track the elusive Bilderberg Group to Ottawa and Istanbul to document their secret summits, allowing you to witness global kingpins setting the world's agenda and instigating World War III.





to Ottawa and Istanbul to document their secret summits, allowing you to witness global kingpins setting the world's agenda and instigating World War III. Learn about the formation of the North America transportation control grid, which will end U.S. sovereignty forever.





Discover how the practitioners of the pseudo-science eugenics have taken control of governments worldwide as a means to carry out depopulation.





View the progress of the coming collapse of the United States and the formation of the North American Union.

Never before has a documentary assembled all the pieces of the globalists' dark agenda. Endgame's compelling look at past atrocities committed by those attempting to steer the future delivers information that the controlling media has meticulously censored for over 60 years. It fully reveals the elite's program to dominate the earth and carry out the wicked plan in all of human history.

Endgame is not conspiracy theory, it is documented fact in the elite's own words.




A 24-year-old mother of three is still fighting for life after a horror crash involving a maxi-taxi near Newcastle on Saturday morning.

The sister of Tamika Wever, Tash Reid, urged drivers to "think" before getting in the car.

"My sister is up there fighting for her life because of idiots, absolute idiots," she told Nine News outside of John Hunter Hospital on Sunday.

"She [Tamika] is not in a good way, it's terrible, I don't know to put it into words ... we just need her to get better and get out of here. We all need her home, her little boys need her home."
Sri Lanka will ban the import of most plastic products in a bid to protect wild elephants and deer that die eating the waste, the environment minister announced Friday.

Plastic in Sri Lankan landfills is a major killer of elephants, with autopsies showing kilos of it in the stomachs of animals who died after rummaging at dumps.

Environment minister Mahinda Amaraweera told parliament legislation was being drafted to stop imports of plastic goods, including polythene, that end up in landfills. Officials said it would be introduced within months.

"Plastics are doing untold damage to our wildlife -- elephants, deer and other animals," Amaraweera told AFP shortly after his announcement.

"We need to take immediate action to arrest this situation."

Sri Lanka has already banned the manufacture or import of non-biodegradable plastic used for wrapping food and shopping bags since 2017.

Endangered wild elephants are protected in Sri Lanka by law although clashes with farmers are claiming a heavy toll on both sides.

President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has given wildlife officials two years to implement a plan to reduce human-elephant conflict that has claimed the lives of 607 elephants and 184 people since last year.

Amaraweera said the proposed import ban -- that covers mainly toys and household utensils -- will be extended to local manufacturing, but did not give a timeline.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 15:26:15|Editor: huaxia

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by Yosley Carrero

HAVANA, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- Bilateral relations between China and Cuba will continue to be reinforced for a brilliant future, a Cuban expert has said.

"The two countries share common goals and principles such as solidarity and mutual respect," said Jose Luis Robaina, a senior researcher at Havana's Center for the Study of International Politics.

Robaina made the comment to Xinhua during a recent interview, which came ahead of the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic ties between China and Cuba to be marked on Sept. 28.

"The friendship between the two governments and peoples have stood the test of time thanks to the excellent links that unite the Communist Party of China and the Communist Party of Cuba," he said.

In September 1960, the leader of the Cuban socialist revolution Fidel Castro received approval from a cheering crowd of nearly 1 million people at Havana's Revolution Square, who welcomed the decision to establish diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China, according to the expert.

Some weeks after this unique moment in the history of the Cuban diplomacy, he said, the two countries formally started to pave the way for a longstanding and unwavering relationship.

In addition, the spirit of comradeship has accompanied the relationship between Chinese and Cuban leaders over the past six decades, including visits at the highest level, he said.

Robaina, 74, studied Chinese history at Peking University between 1963 and 1966, worked as a correspondent in Beijing for Cuba's Prensa Latina news agency between 1980 and 1989, and served as a diplomat in the Cuban embassy in China between 2001 and 2004.

"Cuba was the first country in the western hemisphere to establish diplomatic relations with China, which has become the island's second biggest trade partner," he said.

The expert said many Cuban and Chinese people have benefited from academic exchanges throughout six decades, and have become pillars of the strong bilateral cooperation.

While hundreds of Cubans have visited China for training courses in different areas such as aviation, oil extraction, and public transport, he said, Chinese students have learned Spanish in the Caribbean nation.

"No other country provides Cuba with more technical assistance than China, which has contributed to helping the island improve public transport and develop projects related to the use of renewable sources of energy, just to mention some examples," he said.

The two countries have strengthened relations during the COVID-19 pandemic, as the Chinese government, companies and social organizations have been sending medical supplies to Cuba, and experts from both sides have been sharing scientific data about the deadly disease.

"Cuba and China have successfully managed the health emergency, using similar protocols and providing medical assistance to the world as part of the global response to the novel coronavirus," he said.

The participation of Cuba in China-proposed Belt and Road Initiative, he said, will boost economic integration between Caribbean nations and create a more dynamic business environment for the region.

Robaina said that the 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly has confirmed China and Cuba have to continue working together in promoting multilateralism and international cooperation, while building socialism for the wellbeing and improvement of livelihood of their peoples. Enditem
Still unsure about whether to invest more of your marketing efforts in SEO during the Covid-19 pandemic?

Want to know why some brands have been increasing, instead of cutting, their SEO budgets amid all this uncertainty?

Lets take a look at how the unique strengths of search engine marketing (SEM) have helped a few discerning businesses stay afloat while others have faced extinction. As youll see, SEM isnt going anywhere  in fact, itll be particularly essential to businesses well after the pandemic ends.

The impact of Covid-19 on marketing spend

First, lets take a look at what exactly happened to the world of marketing as the Covid-19 pandemic shut down entire countries worldwide.

Related: Want to Rank Higher on Google? Learn SEO Strategies From an Expert.

The panic surrounding the novel coronavirus early this year caused many businesses around the world to cut back their marketing and advertising spend. Given travel restrictions and lockdowns (as well as decreased spending in the wake of unprecedented furloughs and layoffs), shutting down or severely limiting Marketing functions seemed like the best way to "cut the fat" for many struggling businesses.

In fact, eMarketer predicted an 8.714.8% decline in search ad spend during the first half of 2020 (compared to the same period in 2019), while the World Economic Forum reported a 9% decline in ad spend across Europe by June, with the cut going as deep as 12% in some regions.

Meanwhile, a survey conducted by Marketing Week and Econsultancy on 447 brands across the UK revealed that only 7% of businesses realized the opportunity that lay in the crisis and increased their marketing spend. According to the survey, a further 29% of businesses planned to maintain their marketing budgets, while 50% wanted to make cuts.

Data from one report by AIB showed a similar trend, with 70% of ad buyers adjusting or pausing their advertising accounts. Interestingly, 16% of the respondents were still undecided on what to do.

In a world still grappling with the new normal dumped on us by the pandemic, inaction could be just as harmful to your business as budget cuts (if not even worse).

1. SEO: The low-cost alternative to paid advertising

Rather than cutting their ad budgets, forward-looking businesses redirected their money to more cost-effective strategies. And SEO remains at the forefront when it comes to cost-effective marketing strategies.

Related: Start Learning SEO and Social Media Marketing for $30

According to one report by marketing analysis firm Conductor, more than 50% of marketers believe that SEO is even more important during COVID-19. Another 63% are of the opinion that the role of SEO will increase during this time (against a paltry 5% that thinks it will decrease).

Theres no denying that the pandemic has taken a financial toll on businesses across the world. But your business doesnt have to go offline. While budgets might be tight, its not necessary to shell out big bucks for paid advertising, Many businesses have managed to maintain high visibility without heavy expenditures thanks to the low cost and high effectiveness of SEO.

The best part? Unlike paid advertising (the ads stop running as soon as you pull your money), once youve implemented a strong SEM strategy, SEO will continue to drive traffic to your business without you having to lift a finger.

2. Ecommerce continues to dominate

Online shopping is convenient. It saves consumers time (and, often, money), not to mention that it brings nearly limitless options (and, therefore, competition). Its been the go-to way to shop for many since its rise to popularity.

But during the pandemic, as weve faced stay-at-home orders and limited commercial reopening, even consumers that previously preferred in-person shopping have resorted to online shopping. This has created a trend that has seen businesses with an online presence reap the greatest rewards. Whats more? Customers are doing more of their shopping onlineeven with the easing of restrictions.

A survey conducted by PYMTS revealed that 7% more retail shoppers are buying their goods online as physical stores have started to reopenthats compared to mid-April when most brick-and-mortar stores were closed. And according to another study conducted by McKinsey, consumers are expected to shop online at higher rates even as lockdowns continue to lift.

Related: Want to Rank Higher in Google and Amazon Search? This $29 Course Can Help.

If consumers simply liked online shopping before the pandemic, now they love it. Or, more realistically, theyve realized that they depend on it now more than ever.

Either way, the winning business is the one that can be found online. And the best way to be seen onlineespecially before your competitorsis with SEM and SEO-optimized content.

3. Local businesses are in the spotlight

With restricted movement, weve seen consumers doing more of their shopping as close to home as possible. A surge in local searches with an emphasis on near me queries is evidence of this, as is research conducted by Deloitte showing that 59% more consumers in the UK have patronized local businesses since lockdown was enforced.

Interestingly, its not just the travel restrictions that have made consumers choose to shop locally: Customers say their shopping trends have been motivated by a desire to support local retailers and service providers during the crisis.

As local search has become a crucial link between businesses and customers, location-specific SEO has been a lifeline for those who were able to maintain their SEM efforts during the pandemic lockdown.

To help businesses take full advantage of the increase in local search volume, Google optimized Google Maps and Google My Business to help meet consumer demands. Attributes such as Dine-in, Takeaway, and Delivery are now available in search results.

4. Previous SEO efforts are still making money

SEO isnt a quick fixits a long-term strategy. Brands that have been consistent in their efforts are reaping the benefits of their hard work more and more each day. Those that restricted or stopped their marketing efforts when the pandemic hit, however, may not enjoy as much success as those that stayed on course.

That said, businesses that have only recently recognized the benefits of SEO and began adopting and implementing SEO strategies may not be as far behind as they think. The long-term benefits of smart decisions made today will, aside from increasing the chance of growth during COVID-19, sow the seeds for marketing and advertising success for many years to come.

What every business should do ASAP

With over a decade helping enterprise-level businesses successfully reach and grow their online audience, I can tell you a few facts about SEO:

i. Its about driving conversions, not ranking higher just for the sake of it.

ii. Its a very data-driven discipline where everything can and should be measured. Very little SEO has to do with "gut" instinct.

iii. Its like a tree: It takes time and tending. But once it grows, it will bear fruit for a very long time.

You know, just 10 years ago, the companies that now dominate organic search traffic today may have also thought that they were falling behind the competition. The last thing you want is to feel like that 10 years from now, too.

Related:

Learn Google Ads and SEO Strategies to Grow Your Business

4 Ways SEO Will Help Your Business Stay Afloat During the Pandemic

Why Every Brand Should Have a Blog



Copyright 2020 Entrepreneur.com Inc., All rights reserved
A key feature of Donald Trump's presidency has been his application of business strategy to foreign affairs. The administration has benched the traditional diplomatic operatives of the State Department in favor of a strike force of men and women with lifetimes of experience at securing tough business deals. The president believes that it makes no sense for America's interests to be negotiated by career bureaucrats from Foggy Bottom while the expertise of American business titans sits untapped.

Throwing out NAFTA after three decades of harm to America's labor force, taking on China's predatory trade practices and dependence on slave labor, refusing to subsidize Chinese pollution while handicapping America's economy with the frivolous and ineffectual Paris Agreement, pursuing bilateral trade deals instead of massive regional deals such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership that allow economic bullies like China to take advantage of the United States  these are the fruits of an American economic policy pursued aggressively by businesspeople, not diplomats.

President Trump has applied this same calculated business approach to foreign conflict zones. Whether it is the recent peace deals between Serbia and Kosovo or between Israel and the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain (and the promise of many more such Middle East deals to come); his unrelenting economic pressure on Iran; his pursuit of trade and foreign policy alliances with India, Japan, and Australia; his expanded partnerships with Southeast Asian and Indo-Pacific nations within China's imperialistic reach; his pursuit of greater economic and cultural ties to Central European countries struggling for self-determination in the shadows of both Russia and the European Union; or his open lines of communication with North Korea's Kim Jong-un  President Trump's approach to world affairs has set aside seventy-five years of post-WWII American diplomacy for the strategic tools and outlook of the businessman.

This Trump Era realignment of foreign policy has been startling for naysayers, but it has proved to be effective both in achieving success for America and in producing novel workarounds for decades-long international disputes. Although volumes will be written to describe the Trump Doctrine's rebalancing of global power, it is worth highlighting some key "tactics" the president consistently applies when pursuing strategic foreign affairs objectives:

(1) When possible, be courteous.

The president is known for being a brawler who will "punch back ten times harder," but he never criticizes foreign leaders unless America is being directly threatened. Although he has taken assertive positions against Russia, China, Venezuela, Iran, and North Korea, President Trump generally refrains from attacking those countries' leaders directly. The president's critics routinely criticize his exchanged pleasantries with foreign dictators, but President Trump consistently demands from foreign adversaries that negotiations  whether over trade or war  begin with common courtesies.

(2) Be clear in your intentions, while guarded in your plan of attack.

When North Korea's Kim Jong-un threatened Guam with physical destruction, President Trump responded by making clear that the language of war was not only intolerable, but would be "met with fire, fury and frankly power, the likes of which this world has never seen before." The world worried about nuclear war. Instead, President Trump and Supreme Leader Kim have transitioned from hostile rhetoric to the exchange of warm letters and have taken the historic step of meeting at the Demilitarized Zone between the two Koreas. Whether it is Iran, Syria, North Korea, or ISIS, the president does not mix signals when it comes to violence. At the same time, he avoids "red lines" or publicly declared plans of attack. When violence is necessary, he keeps all options open until the moment of decision.

(3) Keep your word.

After Obama's foolish backtracking from his own "red line" established to deter Syria's use of chemical weapons, President Trump demonstrated to the world that his promises should be taken lethally seriously. In April of 2017, after Bashar al-Assad conducted a massive chemical attack against civilians in the town of Khan Shaykhun, President Trump launched fifty-nine Tomahawk cruise missiles at Syria's Shayrat Airbase. Likewise, after repeated harassment of U.S. forces in late 2019 by Iranian elements, and after repeated warnings of retaliation from President Trump, the president directed the assassination of Iran's Quds Force commander, Qassem Soleimani. President Trump never bluffs.

(4) There are more tools than diplomacy and war. Use them all.

When our ostensible ally Turkey took up military positions in preparation for attacks against Kurdish forces essential to the United States' destruction of ISIS, President Trump successfully backed Turkey down by promising to "obliterate" Turkey's economy should the attack proceed. The president has used economic pressure as a means to persuade hostile nations into releasing unjustly held American prisoners. Likewise, he has used the economic power of sanctions to weaken Iran and Venezuela and tariffs to bring China to the negotiating table. More than any American president since WWII, President Trump has utilized the might of America's economy as a substitute for military action.

(5) If you must fight, win.

President Obama allowed ISIS to prosper by precipitously pulling troops from Iraq, strengthening Iran militarily and economically, and ignoring the consequent power vacuum left behind in the Middle East. President Trump promised to destroy ISIS and did so.

(6) Every problem presents an opportunity.

President Trump turned Obama's misguided mission to strengthen Iran into an asset by pursuing military and economic alliances with Iran's Arab enemies that would concomitantly advance regional peace with Israel. He has turned communist China's military imperialism into strong military alliances and expansive economic trade deals between the U.S. and India, South Korea, Japan, Australia, and Brazil.

(7) Some problems must be made bigger to be solved.

John Kerry and Barack Obama sought peace in the West Bank by worrying about Israel's borders. President Trump looked beyond the West Bank by making Middle East peace about more than the Palestinians.

(8) The world is divided between freedom and control. Always strengthen individual freedom and free nations.

Whether in his solidarity with Poland and Hungary and the Czech Republic against bullying by Russia and the European Union; his vociferous support of regime protesters in Iran, freedom fighters in Venezuela, and independence warriors in Hong Kong and Taiwan; or his continued support of American-owned businesses over multinational conglomerates, President Trump always pushes individual freedom over coercive government and institutions.

(9) Institutions that no longer serve their purpose should be abandoned.

The president has never bowed down to the "cult of internationalism" that has produced a U.N. Human Rights Council run by tyrants and a World Health Organization corrupted by Chinese influence. When international institutions betray their purpose, President Trump disposes of them.

(10) Never stop pursuing the goal, even after victory.

Every day the president looks for another peace deal in the Middle East, another trade deal to empower American manufacturers, another military alliance to weaken Iran and China. Every deal is just one step forward to the next one. His critics despise this transactional approach, but where they have failed in their pursuit of massive international treaties, President Trump has succeeded by accomplishing strategic objectives, a little at a time.

The Trump administration has sent an army of boardroom warriors to represent American interests overseas, and the results have been immediate and substantial successes for the United States in areas long deemed too difficult or too complicated for progress. The ways in which the president chooses to exercise power, sometimes with subtle finesse and sometimes with overwhelming clarity, are strengthening America's place in the world. President Trump has taken the "art of the deal" and catapulted it into a global playbook.

Image: Gage Skidmore via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0.
Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden speaks during a Biden for President Black economic summit at Camp North End in Charlotte, N.C. The final stretch of a presidential campaign is typically a nonstop mix of travel, caffeine and adrenaline. But as the worst pandemic in a century bears down on the United States, Joe Biden is taking a lower key approach. Read more

WASHINGTON  Ahead of the first debate-stage matchup between President Donald Trump and his Democratic challenger Joe Biden, each campaign is promising a stark contrast in policy, personality and preparation.

Trump has decided to skip any formal preparation. And while Biden's team believes the significance of the debate may be exaggerated, the Democratic nominee has been aggressively preparing to take on the president.

Biden's campaign has been holding mock debate sessions featuring Bob Bauer, a senior Biden adviser and former White House general counsel, playing the role of Trump, according to a person with direct knowledge of the preparations who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal strategy. Bauer has not actually donned a Trump costume in line with Trump stand-ins from previous years, but he is representing his style and expected strategy.

Im sure the president will throw everything he can at (Biden). My guess is that theyre preparing for that -- bombarding him with insults and weird digressions, said Jay Carney, a former aide to Biden and President Barack Obama.

I think it's an important moment  I think its really important for President Trump, because the direction of this election has been pretty stable for a long time now, and he needs to shake it up as any candidate would whos behind," Carney added. The question is, can that work?

Trump and Biden are scheduled to meet on the debate stage for the first time Tuesday night at Case Western Reserve University and the Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio. The 90-minute event moderated by Fox News host Chris Wallace is the first of three scheduled presidential debates. Vice President Mike Pence and California Sen. Kamala Harris, Biden's running mate, will also debate in October.

For some, the debates represent the most important moments in the 2020 campaign's closing days, a rare opportunity for millions of voters to compare the candidates' policies and personalities side-by-side on prime-time television. Trump has been trailing Biden in the polls for the entire year, a reality that gives the president an urgent incentive to change the direction of the contest on national television if he can.

Others, including those close to Biden's campaign, do not expect the debates to fundamentally change the race no matter what happens, given voters' daily struggles with the pandemic and the economy. They also point to high-profile debates in past elections thought to be game-changing moments at the time but that ultimately had little lasting effect.

Those with knowledge of Bidens preparations suggest he will not take the fight to Trump if he can avoid it. But on Saturday, at least, he was on the attack when he discussed his strategy on MSNBC.

Im prepared to go out and make my case as to why I think hes failed and why I think the answers I have to proceed will help the American people, the American economy and make us safer internationally, Biden said, arguing that Trump wont persuade voters with broadsides because the people know the president is a liar.

He also compared Trump to Adolf Hitler's propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels, saying, Hes sort of like Goebbels. You say the lie long enough, keep repeating, repeating, repeating, it becomes common knowledge.

Biden said he doesnt expect Trump to articulate a detailed vision for a second term.

He doesnt know how to debate the facts, because hes not that smart, Biden continued. He doesnt know that many facts. He doesnt know much about foreign policy. He doesnt know much about domestic policy. He doesnt know much about the detail.

While Biden has said he will try to be a fact checker of sorts on stage, the Democrat is being advised to avoid direct confrontations and instead redirect the conversation to more familiar campaign themes of unity and issues that matter most to voters: the economy, health care and the pandemic.

Arguing over facts, litigating whether what hes saying is accurate, that is not winning to Biden, said Jen Psaki, a former Obama aide who is close to Bidens team. This is an opportunity to speak directly to the American people. His objective should be to speak directly to them, but not be pulled in by Trump. That is hard.

Trump has not been doing any formal preparation, according to aides and allies who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations.

No set has been constructed and aides refused to say whether anyone is playing Biden. Trump, instead, has maintained that the best preparation is doing his day job  particularly his frequent and often contentious interactions with reporters. White House aides also scheduled an ABC town hall earlier this month to expose Trump to real voter questions for the first time in months in preparation for the second debate.

Privately some aides and allies are worried that Trumps lack of formal preparation will lead him to fall into the same hubris trap as other incumbents in their first general election debate. Obama, for example, famously struggled in his first matchup against Mitt Romney in 2012.

But other Trump backers are confident that the president is ready to handle any tough questions or pushback from Biden.

The debates matter, said Lara Trump, a senior adviser to the campaign and the president's daughter-in-law. Donald Trump certainly did a great job on the debates (in 2016) and I think this will be no different."

Lara Trump also seemed to simultaneously raise and lower expectations for Biden.

Joe Biden spent a lot of time in his basement to study up. Hes been in this game for 47 years. I assume hell do okay, she said. Quite frankly, the bar has been lowered so much for Joe Biden that if he stays awake for the whole thing its like maybe he won.

The mixed messages were in line with those of Trump's allies who spent much of the year raising questions about Biden's physical and mental strength, while in recent days trying to cast him as a strong and experienced debater facing a relative neophyte in Trump.

A former reality show star, the president is keenly aware of the power and pitfalls of live television. Aides say he is acutely mindful of the power of moments to define how a debate is perceived and that he intends to make his share of them happen.

It remains to be seen how aggressively Trump attacks Biden. He has warned apocalyptically about the consequences of a Biden victory and is never one to shy away from a fight. He is also an avowed counterpuncher and will surely respond to any attacks by Biden in kind.

Terry McAuliffe, the former Virginia governor and onetime national Democratic chairman, said Biden must fashion a succinct, debate-stage version of his message since the spring: draw a straight line from Trumps personal deficiencies to his handling of the pandemic, its economic fallout, the national reckoning on race and then explain why a Biden presidency would be different.

Trumps just looking for a Hail Mary here, McAuliffe said. He knows hes in trouble.

___

Peoples reported from New York. Associated Press writer Bill Barrow in Atlanta contributed to this report.
After several documents and a desktop went missing from the Diva ward office, the Thane Municipal Corporation (TMC) has filed a case of theft and criminal breach of trust against the then assistant municipal commissioner of Diva, Sunil More. More allegedly took a few files and his desktop from the ward office with the help of his friend, who has also been booked, few hours after receiving his transfer order. Suspecting foul play, the civic body initially set up a departmental inquiry, following which registered a complaint against More on Saturday.

Mahesh Aher, assistant municipal commissioner of Diva ward, who took charge after More, learnt about the theft on September 18 and brought it to the notice of the civic commissioner.

An officer from Shildaighar police station said, According to the complaint filed by Aher, two sets of computers were installed in the Diva ward office, one in the assistant municipal commissioners office and another for other clerks. On September 17, More received the transfer order around 6pm when he had left office. He returned to the office around 8.30pm, took a few documents and his office computer in his private car with the help of his friend Firoj Khan, 40.

Police said, More and Khan have taken official files without permission out of the office, did not return it and are using it for their personal benefits. It is a clear case of theft. We have registered a case under sections 409 (criminal breach of trust) and 380 (theft in dwelling house) of the Indian Penal Code.

Aher said he filed the case after consulting the civic commissioner. He told HT, The working hours of our office is up to 6pm. More had left office at 5.30pm on September 17, after which he received his transfer order. He then came to the office along with Khan around 8-8.30pm and took his computer and a few files. When I joined on September 19, the security informed me about the issue. Suspecting foul play, I consulted the commissioner who told me to register a complaint if the desktop and documents arent returned.

More could not be reached for comment.
Builders work on a new house after Australia's central bank raised interest rates by 25 basis points to a six-year high of 6.25 percent Wednesday in an effort to head off inflationary pressures in Melbourne, 08 November 2006. (WILLIAM WEST/Getty Images)

Federal Govt monitoring HomeBuilder program

Australian federal government is monitoring its HomeBuilder program, which provides grants of $25,000 for new homes and major renovations, amid reports some people may miss out because of a construction backlog.

Under the current settings, home builders must begin construction within three months of signing a contract to be eligible for the federal government payment.

But some building companies have become so swamped they are telling customers they can no longer guarantee starting work within that time frame.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison said right now the settings are as they are.

But were watching those things closely, he told reporters in Adelaide on Sept 26.

The whole purpose of the HomeBuilder program was to get projects happening now, not 12 months from now.

So we want to keep pressure in the system.

Morrison said the government was conscious of the response to the program and was listening carefully.

He said the government remained in close liaison with the building industry and state governments.

The HomeBuilder program has been tremendously successful, he said.

Its an absolute job creator and its also providing that support to rebuild our economy.

All states and territories have signed up to the HomeBuilder program, with applications being taken until the end of December.

For major renovations with a value of at least $150,000, the grant will be paid after construction has begun.

With new homes, grants will be paid after the foundations have been laid and the first progress payment has been made.

But some people who recently signed contracts are at risk of missing out because of delays with planning approvals and the high volume of construction work in the pipeline.

Some builders are telling new customers they cannot meet the deadline to begin work within three months.

Tim Dornin in Adelaide
CLEVELAND - Large majorities of voters in the swing states of Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin believe presidential elections should be decided by the national popular vote instead of through the Electoral College system, according to a newly released poll from Baldwin-Wallace University.

But theres a marked partisan divide on the issue.

In every one of the states examined by the BW Great Lakes Poll, at least 70% of Democratic respondents said theyd prefer using the popular vote to select presidents rather than Electoral College system, which gives every state a number of electoral votes equal to its representation in Congress.

The idea was less popular among Republicans, whose last two presidents, Donald Trump and George W. Bush, ended up in the White House after winning in the Electoral College while losing the popular vote. Around half of the Republican respondents in each state said they favored retaining the Electoral College, with roughly a third of Republicans preferring use of the popular vote. The rest said they were unsure.

Ohios Republicans supported the Electoral College system more than than their counterparts in other states, with 56.3% backing. Around 27% of Ohio Republicans supported using the popular vote to decide the presidency. Seventy-six percent of the Ohio Democrats surveyed said they favored the popular vote, while around 10% backed using the Electoral College.

The idea of using the popular vote to decide the presidency instead of the Electoral College was more popular among women than men in every state.

Results of the latest poll on use of the electoral college didnt differ much from the last BW poll, which asked voters the same questions in January.

Baldwin Wallace Universitys Community Research Institute partnered with Ohio Northern University and Michigans Oakland University, to query more than 1,000 self-identified likely voters in Ohio, MIchigan and Pennsylvania, and more than 800 in Wisconsin using Qualtrics, an online sample aggregator. The states were picked because all went for President Barack Obama in 2012 and President Trump in 2016 -- three of four by slim margins. The polls overall error margins in each state were: plus or minus 3.6% for Michigan and Pennsylvania, 3.3% for Ohio, and 3.7% for Wisconsin.

Baldwin Wallace University political scientist Thomas Sutton said the pollsters asked the Electoral College question again to determine whether results would change closer to the general election. He predicts the Electoral College will likely be a subject of scrutiny and concern during this years election, especially if final vote tallies are delayed in some states, as occurred in Florida during the 2000 election.

There is also a lot of scrutiny over the fairness of the Electoral College, where sparsely populated states like Wyoming might have each of their Electoral College votes represent 200,000 people, where each electoral vote in a state like New York represents at least double that amount of people," Sutton says.

Cleveland.com this week will publish a series of stories digging deeper into the findings of this poll. Find those stories, as well as stories from previous BW polls, at this link.

See full poll results and polling details (pdf)
The Baltimore Sun reports Maryland will become the first state in the nation to ban polystyrene food containers when the law goes into effect on Thursday. Maine, New York and Vermont have passed similar bans, although none of those other measures has taken effect yet.
Mumbai: Actress Deepika Padukone was on Saturday questioned here for five hours by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) probing the alleged Bollywood-drug nexus linked to film star Sushant Singh Rajputs death case, an official said. Padukone was confronted with her manager Karishma Prakash during questioning, sources said.

Prakashs WhatsApp chats, including purported conversations about drugs with one D, are on the radar of the anti-drugs agency, sources had said. Padukone, who reached the NCB guest house in Colaba in south Mumbai around 9.50 am, left around 3:50 pm, a police official deployed outside the guest house said.

After questioning, both Padukone and Praksh were allowed to go home around 3.40 pm, NCB sources said. Prakash first came out of the guest house, followed by Padukone.

They left in their cars separately, the police official said. Media personnel were present in large numbers outside the barricaded area near the guest house.

There were reports that Padukones husband and actor Ranveer Singh had asked the NCB if he could also remain present during her questioning. However, the NCB had on Friday clarified that it did not receive any such request. The NCB is also questioning actresses Shraddha Kapoor and Sara Ali Khan at its office separately in connection with the alleged drug nexus.

The federal agency had arrested actress Rhea Chakraborty, her brother Showik, and some suspected drug peddlers, earlier. Rajput (34) was found hanging in his apartment in suburban Bandra on June 14.
Geri Gust stopped the conversation when she noticed an unlikely survivor of the wildfires dangling from a branch.

Hey, I still have wind chimes! she said, walking over to a bush at the edge of her property and unhooking a butterfly-shaped ornament with a large green marble inside a metal spiral. Just look at that!

It was a discordant moment of forced joy amid the ruined landscape that is much of Gates, a tiny town east of Salem that suffered an outsize proportion of the damage wrought by this seasons second-largest fire in the early morning hours after Labor Day.

Just over two weeks after the flames tore through the canyon, destroying hundreds of homes and killing four people, the mental and emotional fog has been slow to clear for the towns residents.

Wildfire damage in Gates, Oregon off Highway 22 in Marion County on Monday, Sept. 21, 2020. Wildfires ripped through the small town of less than 500 people a little over a week ago, destroying many homes and businesses. Sean Meagher/Staff

Some rummaged through ash, metal, roof tiles and stray concrete in search of tools, resilient trinkets and anything else that may have survived. Utility workers along Oregon 22, the main road through the Santiam Canyon, cleared debris and mended power lines. Locals who still have homes managed a torrent of donations to help those who dont.

For the most part, though, the real work has yet to start. Much of what was destroyed remains in undisturbed piles of rubble, often next to the skeletal remains of cars  one of the few possessions still recognizable after a blaze.

The Beachie Creek fire, which combined with fires near Gates started by downed power lines, destroyed 486 homes across the approximately 193,000 acres it touched, state officials said.

At first glance, the carnage can be hypnotizing, drawing gasps and pulling newcomers' eyes to those objects that kept the form of what they were before Sept. 7. But the piles of debris strewn through the town quickly dissolve into a single gray, black and rust-brown scene.

From the beginning, the emotions have been complicated.

Gust, 64, said she evacuated her home just before it was too late. She couldnt bring herself to do anything to get ready to leave, she said, and sat in a corner and cried.

I sucked my thumb, she said, crying like a baby.

WILDFIRE TRACKER: See all fires in Oregon and across the nation

Back this Tuesday with her boyfriend, Gust was trying to hook a neighbors camper to a friends pick-up truck, so they had somewhere better than a tent to store the things they extracted from the remains of their double-wide manufactured home.

But the friends truck wasnt wide enough. That meant they couldnt move the camper the 40 or so feet from one property to the next.

Gust was categorical when asked if she would consider using the camper while it was on the neighbors property.

At some point, your pride just kicks in, she said.

The couple has applied for Federal Emergency Management Agency help twice. They were denied both times. The Red Cross is putting them up at a hotel until Oct. 2, and theyre still not sure where theyll go next. Their home was not insured.

STRANGE THINGS HAPPEN

For some, hope is the only option when they dont know what happened to their most precious possessions.

Fran Howe and her husband Larry Tripoli pulled past the Marion County Sheriffs Office and National Guard roadblock at milepost 33, on the eastern edge of Gates, followed by two friends who came from Seattle. It was the second visit to their property since it burned down in as many days.

An insurance adjuster was on the scene when they arrived, his laptop on the trunk of the car.

The Santiam River flowed nearby as a chainsaw on their neighbors property buzzed, interrupted by the intermittent crack-thud of falling trees. The smell of soot wafted up the property on a breeze coming up from the river and past the leveled house.

Howes childhood friend, Deb Fitz, stood in the corner of what used to be the dining room, where Howe kept an antique chest with jewelry she had collected for years, and fished out a bent and discolored silver bracelet with a centerpiece stone  the most intact item she found.

Deb Fitz rummaged around in the remains of her friend Fran Howe's house, looking for any salvageable jewelry in what used to be the dining room. Most of what she found had melted together into unrecognizable globs.

Fitz and Howe, both 63 and former military kids, have been friends since second grade. They stayed close even as their fathers moved bases.

Fitz eventually moved to Seattle, and she and her partner would come down to visit at least a few times a year. They would sit on the deck facing the Santiam, drink sangria and watch rafters go down the river. The last time Fitz was here was also for a difficult occasion: Howes mother was dying.

Now, Fitz said she and her partner have come to help any way they can, though theyre mostly in listening and hugging mode for now.

Its a blank sheet of paper, she said, And I want for them to scribble in and let us know what they need.

She turned around from the dining room corner where she was fishing for jewelry and, laughing, pointed to a lop-sided, rusted and collapsed bed frame: The bed shed use when she visited.

Fran Howe and Larry Tripoli realized they had to run when they saw flames bursting out of their neighbor's fence. The couple and their three dogs took refuge in the Santiam River until rescuers took them out 18 hours later. They returned to their property this week to talk through next steps with an insurance adjuster and to look for whatever items may have survived the fire.

Howe has also found some unexpected things. In the remains of a shed packed with holiday decorations, Howe found a flat porcelain Christmas ornament with Santa depicted on one side. It needed no more than a moist wipe to look fresh.

But what Howe is really looking for is far more precious -- the wooden urn containing her mothers ashes. The box was in a nightstand on the first floor, Howe said, so perhaps it was protected when the second floor collapsed. Its worth a shot.

Howe has two weeks to look for that and anything else she wants to keep before she goes in for back surgery, after which it will be difficult to do more than the most basic physical tasks, and her husband will have to take over.

Then, theres her cat, Minoue.

Moments before the couple ran down to the Santiam River to escape the approaching fire, Tripoli opened a sliding glass door. He hoped the cat, which had hidden under a bed, would know to bolt if the fire got to the house. If it did, then Howe wasnt worried, she said. It had been feral and could survive in the woods.

The first time she came back after the fires, Howe brought two metal bowls for food and water and put them in front of the pole barn that stands unscathed next to the homes remains.

Fran Howe hasn't seen her cat, Minoue, since she ran from the Beachie Creek fire that soon engulfed, and then destroyed, her home. But her husband left open a sliding door to give the cat a way out. They just don't know if the cat took it.

I hope shell come, Howe said.

The hard choice ahead will be whether they should rebuild. First, the septic tank, well and trees must be inspected. Then, they have to think  something theres been little time for in the last two weeks.

Its a complicated decision. They love the space  they put 13 years into it and had planned to retire there. But the reality of reconstruction is daunting.

I think it would be sad if we leave, Howe said. But its going to be sad if we rebuild, too.

Fitz was quiet, spending minutes at a time simply looking in the direction of the gutted house and the river. It hit her for the first time how close her friends were to the fires  the ground was scorched almost all the way to the riverbank.

The work with the insurance company wrapped up in about two hours. Fitz got in the car to start towards Salem. A carrier Howe wanted to take in case they found the cat was in the back.

Fitz had looked at the bowl of food Howe had left the previous day. It looked like it hadnt been touched.

But, you know, she said. Strange things happen.

CANYON STRONG

Rick Smart and Jeremy Smith stood outside of Kelly Lumber Sales, in Mill City, a town west of Gates that also sustained damage in the wildfires, though not nearly as bad as Gates.

The men tripped over each other to describe the work they had done to help the community.

Smith, 44, said he had put his crew of five concrete-layers on 12-hour shifts hauling water and hose houses down to protect them from encroaching fires, he said, and personally spent about $750 on fuel and $8,000 to pay his employees to do it. Smart, meanwhile, said locals had been coming to his Facebook page for live updates on their homes.

Posted by Jeremy Smith on Wednesday, September 9, 2020

Smart called Smith to let him know his home was still standing.

I said, Bro, were saving houses, Smith said.

Neither one of them took anything for the work they did, though an anonymous donor paid Smiths water bill for the next six months or so, he said.

This video contains graphic language:

Posted by Rick Smart on Tuesday, September 8, 2020

A White Grand Cherokee Jeep pulled over as they spoke. A woman stepped out and walked up to Smart, pushing a small wad of cash towards his chest.

I dont want that, Smart, 46, said as she implored him to take the money. You know better than that.

I know you, thats why I want to help, she replied as he tried to turn away.

All he could do was offer her a hug, he said. And then another one.

Keep your head up, Smith told her. Its all going to be good.

Canyon strong, she said, before heading back to the car.

The men collected themselves, looking down at the ground and then each other.

I was right about to tell her to split, Smith said. Before I got emotional.

ITS OVER, MAN

Perry Drevo sat in a chair on the neighbors nearly immaculate lawn. That neighbors home was untouched, the green grass offering little to no fuel for the fire. But Drevos home was leveled, charred remains of appliances sticking out from pieces of slate, metal and ash.

Drevo, 74, said that before she evacuated, she grabbed only her puppy, an Australian Shepherd named Eddy, and two days' worth of clothes.

The rest, she said, well, you can see what happened.

The house, on the Linn County side of Gates, stood right on the bank of the Santiam River, and her son, Sam Drevo, needed to clear the toxic ash from the area closest to the bank before the rains came. The area nearest to the river was covered with the remains of a deck Sam Drevo built in the spring  his covid deck.

Wildfire damage in Gates, Oregon off Highway 22 in Marion County on Monday, Sept. 21, 2020. Wildfires ripped through the small town of less than 500 people a little over a week ago, destroying many homes and businesses. Sean Meagher/Staff

Trees flanked the opposite bank, and salmon were spawning in a small eddy.

This is Salems drinking water, Sam Drevo said. Think about that.

The first order of business that Monday was to remove the thousands of screws hed used on the deck. He and his friend, Andrew Hansen, rolled a wheeled magnet back and forth across the soft ground, then lifted the contraption over a wheelbarrow and let the screws fall with a clatter.

A hole in the ground hidden in the trees emitted a slow plume of smoke that Sam Drevo and Hansen hadnt noticed at first.

Not too much to worry about burning down now, Sam Drevo said after Hansen pointed out the spot fire.

Sam Drevo, whod also lost property in the fire, brought a crew of about 15 people in to finish the job Tuesday. They brought in five tons of hay that they laid over the ground near the bank of four nearby homes and laid down tubes by the river to prevent erosion.

Still, Sam Drevo isnt hopeful about the future of the town or the river. He listed a variety of numbers, from the hundreds of thousands of acres burned to the homes destroyed.

Its over, man, its over, Sam Drevo said. I dont know what to say.

Were you affected by the wildfires? Get in touch.

-- Fedor Zarkhin

fzarkhin@oregonian.com | 971-373-2905 | @fedorzarkhin
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My wife and I watched NCIS Tuesday night. When the show ended, Love Island began. We watched the first minute and were so shocked we turned the television off.

CBS describes the show this way: Love Island is the sizzling summer series based on the international smash hit and cultural phenomenon. The matchmaking begins as a group of single Islanders come together in a stunning villa in Las Vegas, ready to embark on a summer of dating, romance, and ultimately, relationships.

Note the order: dating, followed by romance, which then leads to relationships. Not the reverse.

The description continues: Every few days the Islanders pair up and those who are not coupled are at risk of being dumped from the island. When the swimsuit-clad contestants began to pair up in the part of the show we saw, it was obvious what came next.

Heres my point: CBS airs this highly sexualized show at 8:00 p.m. (CT), early enough for my grandchildren to watch.

An army of law clerks

An army of more than a hundred former law clerks for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg met her casket at the Supreme Court yesterday. They accompanied it up the steps to the Great Hall for the private ceremony and public viewing that followed.

One of Justice Ginsburgs greatest legacies is the degree to which she influenced the generations following her. As the Wall Street Journal notes, Few generations of lawyersparticularly womenhave looked to her as a role model as much as the students entering the profession today.

Her iconic cultural status and tireless work on behalf of womens equality changed the legal profession. One recent graduate credits the composition of her law-school classnearly equal numbers of men and womenlargely to Justice Ginsburgs pioneering path.

One of the mantras of our relativistic culture is that we have no right to force our values on others. Ruth Bader Ginsburg clearly did not ascribe to this philosophy with respect to the values she championed. Whether we agree or disagree with those valuesand many of us do bothwe can learn from her culture-changing example.

In fact, we must.

Optimism by another name

According to historian Maurizio Valsania, pessimists have been forecasting the demise of America since our founding. For example, in the 1800 election, one newspaper predicted these results if Thomas Jefferson were to be elected: Murder, robbery, rape, adultery, and incest will openly be taught and practiced, the air will be rent with the cries of the distressed, the soil will be soaked with blood, and the nation black with crimes.

In a day when France and Great Britain were the global superpowers, our infant nations future was perilous. From then to now, voices predicting doom have seldom been in short supply.

However, as Valsania notes (following the work of political scientist Francis G. Wilson), there are two types of pessimism in America: absolute and conditional. Absolute pessimism is the belief that the nation is a big lie, a fraud, a trick that cunning white males have been playing on women, native populations, African Americans, working classes, immigrants. As such, this nation deserves to be cursed, canceled, sunk, forgotten.

By contrast, conditional pessimists deliver a prophecy of disaster because they want to provide a new hopeful solution. They speak to Americans sense of pride, exhort them, incite them, mobilize them, increase the level of commitment to a common cause and enact a ritual whose upshot should be a deeper awareness.

Valsania calls this type of pessimism optimism by another name.

God has no grandchildren

It is incumbent upon Christians to follow the example of Justice Ginsburg by investing in the coming generations. In our case, the stakes are even higher, since Christianity is always one generation from extinction.

As evangelist Reinhard Bonnke noted, God has no grandchildren. He has only children. Scripture agrees: To all who did receive [Jesus], who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God (John 1:12). Note the little word with global implications, all.

However, we should engage our broken culture with the kind of conditional pessimism that warns of Gods judgment against sin while offering his grace to sinners. We should be famous for hope, not hate; for generosity, not guilt.

Of all people, we who have experienced the crucified love of Jesus should be especially passionate about offering such love to all.

Identifying our enemy and trusting our refuge

Love Island and all it represents should call us to brokenhearted intercession, not self-righteous condemnation. Those who made the series and those who watch it are not the enemythey are deceived by the enemy (2 Corinthians 4:4). And there, but for the grace of God, go we.

When we are discouraged by the sinfulness around us, this testimony can be ours: When the cares of my heart are many, your consolations cheer my soul (Psalm 94:19). And we can say with the psalmist, The Lord has become my stronghold, and my God the rock of my refuge (v. 22).

Then we can pray for God to use us to lead others to make him their refuge as well.

I read John Baillies classic A Diary of Private Prayer each morning and evening. His prayer for this morning includes this petition: Teach me, O God, to use all the circumstances of my life today to nurture the fruits of the Spirit rather than the fruits of sin.

Lets make his prayer ours today.

Originally posted at denisonforum.org
The North America surety market was valued at US$ 8,573. 43 million in 2019 and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 6. 4% during the forecast period from 20202027 to reach US$ 13,498. 40 million by 2027.

New York, Sept. 26, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "North America Surety Market Forecast to 2027 - COVID-19 Impact and Regional Analysis By Bond Type ; and Country" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p05974409/?utm_source=GNW

The surety market is traditionally a local business based on know-how of the local market.However, with increasing globalization, large surety market players are setting up operations in developing markets such as Canada and Mexico.



One of the major challenge faced by surety companies is to acquire the knowledge on local political and regulatory landscape. Global companies, however, have the capacity to hire professional local underwriters to compete in the market.

Many of the mature economies across the globe are facing major challenges owing to their ageing infrastructure. For instance, as per the American Society of Civil Engineers, the US would need around US$ 4.5 Tn by 2025 to upgrade the state of its roads, bridges, airports, dams, schools, and more. Moreover, ageing power generation and distribution infrastructure are becoming a key biggest challenges for utilities in developed countries. For instance, in the US, the power grid is believed to be valued an estimated US$ 876 Bn, renovating infrastructure would cost hundreds of US$ Bn, as per the US Department of Energy. Upgrading generation, as well as transmission facilities in these countries, would draw significant investments hence, the surety market is expected to bolster.

Since, the US has a higher concentration of manufacturing and construction industry players, and the country is experiencing unparalleled growth in COVID-19 infected patients, the government has enacted strict lockdown measures, thereby terminating several construction activities.This has been reflecting delay in project completion, which is a key concern for the construction companies.



As of December 31, 2019, there were 323 insurers in the country that reported direct premium written for the surety market.The insurers that wrote performance bonds are expected to observe a rise in claim frequency and severity as a result of unemployment, constrained cash flows, and other phenomena impacting businesses.



Canada and Mexico have numerous smaller enterprises operating in the construction industry.The COVID-19 pandemic has raised significant concerns over their businesses as respective governments have enacted strict lockdown and social distancing measures.



Attributing to the lockdown measures, several construction players in Canada and Mexico experienced tremors in respective business. This situation is foreseen to continue till 2021, which is further expected to stall the year-on-year growth of surety market in the two countries.

The overall North America surety market size has been derived using both primary and secondary sources.To begin the research process, exhaustive secondary research has been conducted using internal and external sources to obtain qualitative and quantitative information related to the surety market.



The process also serves the purpose of obtaining overview and forecast for the surety market with respects to all the segments pertaining to the region.Also, multiple primary interviews have been conducted with industry participants and commentators to validate the data, as well as to gain more analytical insights into the topic.



The participants who typically take part in this process include industry expert such as VPs, business development managers, market intelligence managers, and national sales managers along with external consultants such as valuation experts, research analysts, and key opinion leaders specializing in the North America surety market. CNA Financial Corporation, The Travelers Indemnity Company, Liberty Mutual Insurance Company, Chubb, and The Hartford among others are among the key players serving the surety market in North America.

Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p05974409/?utm_source=GNW



About Reportlinker

ReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place.



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JACKSONVILLE, Fla.  President Donald Trump said during a campaign rally in Jacksonville on Thursday that he will announce a woman as his Supreme Court pick on Saturday and he challenged Democratic nominee Joe Biden to release his own list of potential Supreme Court candidates.

Trump said Biden doesn't want to release a list because he is beholden to "the left."

Biden has said the winner of the November election should fill the seat left vacant by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

"If he puts an extremist into that position, he loses everything that's like normal," Trump said. "If he goes the other way, he loses the left. I'd love to have him put out the list. I'd like to see what happens. I can already tell you, the people on that list, it would not be good. It would not be pretty. That would be the end."

'Honor her wish': Trump is jeered as he pays his respects to Ruth Bader Ginsburg at Supreme Court

President Donald Trump waves to the crowd as he leaves Thursday, September 24, 2020 at the Great American Comeback Event at the Cecil Commerce Center in Jacksonville, Florida. (Will Dickey/Florida Times-Union)

Trump did not drop any hints about who he will announce on Saturday beyond saying the selection will be a woman. It would be Trump's third appointment to the Supreme Court.

Trump spoke for about an hour at the outdoor rally at Cecil Airport.

As Trump tries to repeat his 2016 win in Florida, the Jacksonville area will once again be key, said Michael Binder, director of the University of North Florida Public Opinion Research.

Binder said that, like 2016, Trump needs to run up big victory margins in the counties surrounding Jacksonville. Even if Trump loses Duval County, he just needs to keep the margin close, Binder said. In terms of Northeast Florida, a tie in Duval "essentially would be a win for Trump," Binder said.

Looking forward to the debate Tuesday with Biden, the first face-to-face showdown between them, Trump simultaneously said Biden is "the lowest-energy individual I've ever seen" and also an experienced debater "who has been doing it for 47 years."

Story continues

"Maybe he'll be like Superman for 15 minutes," Trump said.

More: Top Senate Judiciary Democrat Feinstein says she doesn't 'have the power' to block Trump's Supreme Court nominee

With Florida a pivotal state, Trump said Hispanics are supporting his re-election. He said he has released hurricane relief aid to Puerto Rico, which still is recovering from Hurricane Maria in 2017, and he said he is moving to revive the pharmaceutical manufacturing on the island.

He criticized Biden for the deal the United States made with Cuba to move toward normalizing relationships when Biden was vice president in Barack Obama's administration.

"My opponent stands with socialists and communists," Trump said. "I stand with the proud people of Cuba, Nicaragua, Venezuela."

A confirmed crowd size was not immediately available, however, First Coast News reported the venue holds "close to 15,000 people." Bleachers and folding chairs were packed tightly together, limiting the ability for people to socially distance.

Masks were rarely spotted, nor were they required. But the Trump campaign did give masks to each attendee that walked in. Temperatures were also checked upon entrance.

City of Jacksonville officials said they'd "prefer social distancing," but since the event was outdoors, no city ordinances about COVID-19 safety were violated.

This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Trump spotlights the Supreme Court during Florida campaign stop
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Vietnam's Ministry of Planning and Investment is calling for feedback on a draft decree to prevent Vietnamese nationals from investing in overseas real estate for the purpose of buying foreign citizenship, money laundering and other illegal activities.

The U.S. National Association of Realtors (NAR)s 2017 Profile of International Activity in U.S. Residential Real Estate found that Vietnam accounted for two percent of the reported purchases by foreign buyers of residential properties in the U.S. between April 2016 and March 2017, ranking ninth.

Vietnamese buyers were estimated to spend US$2-3 billion buying U.S. residential properties during the 12-month period from April 2016, according to NAR.

However, a leader of the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) in Ho Chi Minh City stated that no Vietnamese citizen has so far been granted official licenses to make a transfer for overseas investment due to complicated procedures.

According to Vietnams current laws, Vietnamese individuals and organizations wishing to transfer investment money abroad need to obtain an offshore investment license issued by the Ministry of Planning and Investment.

This implies that Vietnamese individuals purchases of overseas residential properties up until now are unofficial.

In a recent draft decree on offshore investment, the investment ministry proposed that officials and civil servants, professional officers, non-commissioned officers and soldiers, state-owned enterprises leaders and managers, juveniles, people with limited capacity for civil conduct, and persons being examined for penal liability should not be allowed to make overseas investment.

The ministry also proposed that the SBV provide related information before granting licenses for offshore investment from VND20 billion ($861,600) and above that are not subject to the prime minister or the National Assemblys approval.

The purposes of the proposed requirements are to prevent people from making unofficial offshore investments on residential properties in order to buy foreign citizenship, launder money or perform other illegal activities.

However, the proposed requirements have faced questions about their effectiveness.

According to Nguyen Van Toan  vice chairman of the Vietnam Association of Foreign Investment Enterprises (VAFIE), the on-the-table decree will inadvertently make it difficult for legitimate investors.

Currently, Vietnamese individuals only need to pay money to service companies to make offshore investments so that they can relocate to other countries, according to Toan.

I do not object to the solutions given in the [draft] decree but it is necessary to consider the effectiveness of the solutions, whether they can really prevent the abuse of policies to buy foreign citizenship, Toan said.

According to Dr. Duong Kim The Nguyen  vice-dean of the Faculty of Laws at the University of Economics Ho Chi Minh City, the legislators should focus on how to ensure that individuals sources of income are legal rather than prohibiting their offshore investments.

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US-China conflict: What UN needs is a ceasefire inside its own Security Council By Thalif Deen View(s): View(s):

UNITED NATIONS (IPS)  With more than 20,000 civilians killed last year in conflicts in 10 countries  Afghanistan, Central African Republic, Iraq, Libya, Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan, Syria, Ukraine and Yemen  UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres reiterated his call for a global ceasefire: a proposal which failed to generate a positive response since he first announced it last March.

But with the UNs most powerful body remaining deadlocked  and facing a bloodless confrontation between two major powers  the United Nations now seems to be in need of a political ceasefire at its very doorstep: inside its own 15-member Security Council (UNSC).

On September 22, the opening day of the annual high-level debate in the General Assembly, the US and China, two veto-armed members, battled it out with accusations and counter-accusations.

The public confrontation between the two countries is likely to bring the UNSC to a standstill  perhaps with a worse-case scenario of the US and China vetoing each others resolutions proving the Security Council has outlived its usefulness.

Dr Richard J. Ponzio, Director, Just Security 2020 and Senior Fellow at the Washington-based Stimson Center, told IPS that beginning in March, the U.S. blocked passage of a UNSC resolution (until July) endorsing Secretary-General Guterres call for a global ceasefire, to ensure that during the pandemic, life-saving assistance can reach the most vulnerable.

Similar to its rationale then, he said, President Trumps main emphasis in his annual General Assembly address was to pin the blame on China for the spread of the coronavirus.

In both tone and substance, Dr Ponzio pointed out, President Trumps UNGA speech contrasted with his contemporaries, including Chinese President Xi Jinping, Russian President Vladimir Putin, and French President Emmanuel Macron.

Whereas President Trump elected in his brief remarks to mainly attack China for spreading COVID-19 and other transgressions, the other world leaders spoke at length about the need for global cooperation and a rules-based international order to better cope with global threats and challenges, he noted.

Trump intensified his long running trade wars and political battles with China when he launched a blistering undiplomatic attack on Beijing, during his address to the General Assembly.

While singing the praises of his own achievements, he singled out Beijing: We must hold accountable the nation which unleashed this plague onto the world: China.

Trump also accused China of controlling the World Health Organisation (WHO) and dumping millions and millions of tons of plastic and trash into the oceans, overfishing other countries waters, destroying vast swaths of coral reef, and emitting more toxic mercury into the atmosphere than any country anywhere in the world.

One news site ran a fitting headline which read: Trump at the UN: America is good, China is bad.

Taking a passing shot at Trumps unilateralism, Chinese President Xi Jinping told the Assembly humanity will win this battle against the virus, and any attempt of politicising the issue, or stigmatisation, must be rejected.

COVID-19 reminds us that economic globalisation is an indisputable reality and a historical trend, he said.

Burying ones head in the sand like an ostrich, in the face of economic globalisation, or trying to fight it with Don Quixotes lance, goes against the trend of history, he noted.

China has no intention to fight either a Cold War or a hot one with any country Let this be clear: The world will never return to isolation, and no one can sever the ties between countries, Xi said, pointing out that China will not engage in zero sum game.

In his 75th anniversary speech, Xi was equally hard-hitting: No country has the right to dominate global affairs, control the destiny of others, or keep advantages in development all to itself. Even less should one be allowed to do whatever it likes and be the hegemon, bully or boss of the world. Unilateralism is a dead end.

Meanwhile, as the UN commemorates its 75th anniversary, the most widespread criticism against the UN is focused largely on the Security Council where member states have failed, over the last 25 years, in their longstanding efforts to reform and expand it.

Perhaps the harshest criticism is its inability  and its monumental failure  to resolve long-outstanding problems: including finding a homeland for the Palestinians.

Stephen Zunes, Professor of Politics at the University of San Francisco, who has written extensively on the politics of the Security Council, told IPS it is noteworthy that the majority of vetoes in the Security Council in recent decades have been in regard to resolutions addressing violations of international humanitarian law.

Both the United States and Russia have repeatedly abused their veto power to protect allied governments from accountability. This does even include the dozens of other initiatives that were tabled or otherwise prevented from coming up to a vote.

Virtually all of these resolutions were under Chapter VI of the UN Charter, so these were simply about recognising and deploring such violations and did include military intervention, sanctions, or anything else, but they were still blocked from being passed, in most cases by a single negative vote, he pointed out.

Both Moscow and Washington have essentially sent a message that their allies, such as Syria and Israel respectively, can act with impunity.

In 2002, I wrote this article (link below) in response to the Bush administrations effort to justify its planned invasion of Iraq by emphasising the importance of enforcing UN Security Council resolutions.

https://fpif.org/united_nations_security_council_resolutions_currently_being_violated_by_countries_other_than_iraq/

However, in addition to the dozen or so resolutions they alleged were being violated by Iraq, a conservative estimate reveals that there are an additional 88 Security Council resolutions about countries other than Iraq that were also then being violated, said Zunes.

This raised serious questions regarding the Bush administrations insistence that it is motivated by a duty to preserve the credibility of the United Nations, particularly since the vast majority of the governments violating these resolutions were close allies of the United States, which blocked the Security Council from enforcing them.

The total now is closer to 100, said Zunes.

(The writer can be contacted at thalifdeen@aol.com)
Sarafa Ayuba, a commercial motorcyclist, has hung himself in Ibadan.

Premium Times learnt that Mr Ayuba, a 22-year-old commercial motorcyclist, hung himself in an uncompleted building beside his uncles house at Amuloko area in Ibadan on Friday.

The incident occurred in Ona Ara local government area of Ibadan in Oyo State.

Mt Ayubas uncle, Kazeem Tijani, who broke the news, said that his nephew left home on Thursday but did not return till he was found in the uncompleted building.

Mr Tijani added that two black plastic bags were seen on the ground with his (Ayuba) pair of sandals also there.

Items found in the bags included a white garment, two types of perfume, a new white singlet, chin chin, and biscuits.

Ayuba got the motorcycle on hire purchase basis and he was paying the instalments adequately. He was my brothers son. He was not indebted to anyone and he was not starving at all. He was not married. He has been living with me for the past two to three years.

He was working with me before he got okada. He was initially a tailor and he was doing fine. We have searched his room but we could not find any note that he could have left; though we could not search his body. I have called our relations in Apomu; they are on their way.

The public relations officer of the states police command, Olugbenga Fadeyi, when contacted said he was not aware of the incident.

Mr Fadeyi who spoke with Premium Times on Saturday said that he will find out from DPOs in Akanran and Ogbere and noted that attempted suicide is a criminal offence.

He said, someone has called me but, I said that I have not heard about it. If anyone attempts to kill himself and is caught, he will be arrested because attempted suicide is a criminal offence.

Attempted murder is a criminal offence. But, I will find out from the DPO in Ogbere or Akanran if they are aware of the incident.

But the chairperson, Okada Riders Association, Amuloko branch, Oluwatosin James, confirmed the incident.

Mr James described Mr Ayubas death as a rude shock.

He said, The news of Ayubas death came to us as a rude shock. It is this morning that we heard of the news at the park. He was very reticent and would not fight anybody. Once he did his okada business in the morning, he would go and park and go to his uncles shop to assist him.

Out of N390,000 that he got for the Okada on instalment, only N77,000 that is remaining. There was no issue of threat to him from the person who gave him the okada. In fact, the person is like a brother to him. So, we are confounded over this incident.
scmp.com - Jan 20

Fumio Kishida, Japans new prime minister, may become the nations first leader in the post-Cold-War era to not have visited Washington in the first 10 months of his term, without a specific reason.
After Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan went on an anti-India rant during his speech at the United Nations, the Indian Mission used its right to reply to expose the country on the international stage.

AP

The "only crowning glory" that Pakistan has to show to the world for the last seven decades is terrorism, ethnic cleansing, majoritarian fundamentalism and clandestine nuclear trade, India said in a scathing response. Read more



Delhi's Air Quality May Turn 'Poor' In Few Days, Thanks To Stubble Burning By Neighbour States

The Delhi AQI has been moderate for the last one week but now it is inching towards an unhealthy zone due to the stubble burning by farmers and it will turn poor by Wednesday as predicted by the forecaster.



AFP

The national capital's air quality is likely to slip into the "poor category by Wednesday, SAFAR said. Read more



African Swine Fever Affects Assam As Govt Orders Culling Of Over 12,000 Pigs

In a major hit to Assam's piggery sector, as many as 18,000 pigs have died after contracting the incurable African swine fever (ASF) across 14 districts of the state.

REUTERS

Owing to which, chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal, ordered culling of nearly 12,000 pigs in a bid to check the spread of the contagious and fatal disease. Read more



Delhi Police Seized 160 Kg Ganja, Reported 1 Kg & Sold The Remaining; Also Let Off The Peddler

In an unbelievably shocking incident, four Delhi policemen, including two sub-inspectors, have been suspended for allegedly taking a bribe from a drug peddler who was arrested with some 160 kg of cannabis.

AFP/ REPRESENTATIONAL IMAGE

According to reports, the cops had seized nearly 160 kilograms of marijuana from a room in Jahangirpuri B-block on September 11 from a man identified as Anil. Read more



Lesbian Couple In UP Seeks Police Protection After Family Threaten Them of Dire Consequences

Even after the historic decriminalisation of homosexual relationships two years ago, families are still after the life of couples who choose to be with their partners.

AFP/Unsplash

A recent incident was reported from Uttar Pradesh where a lesbian couple, wanted protection as there was objection from their families. Read more



Six Held For Capturing Blackbuck In Hingoli District Of Maharashtra

Six persons were arrested for allegedly capturing a blackbuck in the forests of Hingoli district in Maharashtra, a forest official said.

Unsplash

The arrests were made based on a video of the incident that surfaced on social media earlier this week, in which the accused were seen trapping a blackbuck with the help of a net, the forest official said.official said. Read more
As an artiste, Rajeev Khandelwal believes in taking up projects that satisfy his creative urge, and to in the process, he has even turned out many offers be it on TV, in films or the web. Happy with the decisions he has made irrespective of peoples perceptions about him, things have been so far so good for the actor.

When I say no to films, TV or web offers, there are times when Im not taken nicely. Sometimes, senior makers took offence. But then thats not my problem. People need to understand that Im not saying no to them but the project. I think this is short-sightedness on their part in not understanding where my no is coming from, as not everything matches my scheme of things. Both the makers and I should be open that at any point if they think I dont fit the bill, theyll have the right to consider other options, he says, adding tat even if its the script which he doesnt like, I should have the choice to opt out.

Talking about his initial days, Khandelwal admits that like any other newcomer, he, too, was prepared for challenges.

I wasnt a trained actor, so I knew I had to learn the craft. Ive never been influenced by any formula. During Kahiin To Hoga, I was tagged a romantic hero and was expected to continue doing similar shows and films. But look at my career; I havent done much romance on screen, quips the 44-year-old.

Asked if he has ever given too much though to which medium he is being a part of, Khandelwal says things matter to the audience and to actors, its only the project that count.

When I did Aamir (2008), people started predicting me as the next superstar. But for me, it was just a project, I never thought Im graduating to films. So, afterwards, I did the show Sacch Ka Saamna before again doing films like Shaitan, Soundtrack (both 2012) and Table No.21 (2013). Had I wanted to make it big just in films, Id have hired a PR machinery to push myself. Many also said being an outsider I didnt get good film offers. I wanted to tell them to look at my career first and then comment, he retorts, adding that the insider vs outsider doesnt make sense to him.

The actor asserts that its easier for people to lament about not getting opportunities but did you work hard? he asks pointing how many actors got a good break after 10-15 years of being around.

Elaborating on this, he recounts, While doing workshops with Nawazuddin (Siddiqui; actor) during Aamir, Id think why isnt he getting opportunities? And look at him now. When I came to Mumbai from Delhi, I stayed for a year at my friend Deepak Malwankars (cinematographer) place. Both he and his elder brother, Sanjay Malwankar (cinematographer), were already known in the industry. My only condition was that Deepak wont introduce me to anyone. Many actors, directors would come to meet him and ask about me but he never said anything and respected my decision. I wanted to do everything myself rather than sharing whatever good, bad or average Ive achieved till date with a godfather.

Mention the prevalence of nepotism in the film industry, and the actor is quick to add that it will always be there. Its understandable that people will support those close to them. But considering yourself a victim of nepotism isnt right. Its easy to blame others and circumstances, but its difficult to hold yourself accountable, concludes Khandelwal.

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Author tweets @Shreya_MJ

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Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 15:48:15|Editor: huaxia

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by Matthew Rusling

WASHINGTON, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- The United States 2020 election might see a larger number of young voters cast their ballots and accordingly make a difference to the result, even if they have been a minority voting bloc, according to statistics and experts.

"Young people have historically voted in lower numbers than older people. That still is likely to be the case. But (former U.S. Vice President Joe) Biden outpolls (President Donald) Trump by more than a two to one margin among young people," Brookings Institution Senior Fellow Darrell West told Xinhua.

Some experts said the upcoming battle over a Supreme Court nominee will mobilize the youth to vote to some degrees.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed away earlier this month, allowing the president to appoint someone new to the highest court position. Competition has already sparked between the two parties.

Biden has tried to activate the youth by using celebrity spokespeople, such as allowing rap sensation Cardi B to hold a recent virtual conversation with the Democratic nominee, but some of his own party members cast doubts on whether those efforts will bear fruit.

According to the latest Forbes Under 30 Voter Survey in partnership with John Zogby Strategies, 57 percent of likely young voters said they would choose Biden over Trump. The Democratic candidate even hit a record 60 percent when the same poll was conducted in June.

Trump may have gained some young supporters during the 2020 Republican National Convention in August by elaborating his vision for the country, and the percentage has jumped from 31 in June to 35 now, according to the Forbes survey.

The survey disclosed that most young people say they are "definitely" or "very likely" to vote this year, which almost doubled the 46 percent that voted in 2016.

Despite this, experts believed that although the young group may favor Biden over Trump, they are not likely to vote in large numbers and especially during the pandemic.

Christopher Galdieri, assistant professor at Saint Anselm College, told Xinhua that exacerbating that trend is the "disruption of college life across the country, which means the usual registration and mobilization techniques are going to come up a bit short."

Considering nearly half of those voting for Biden plan to do so by mail, Galdieri worried young people tend to make mistakes in filling out forms.

"Young voters are more likely, all things being equal, than older voters to make errors completing and turning in absentee ballots. In key states with close races, that could make an impact," he said.

Among Generation-Z and millennial voters, Biden's numbers are generally the same as that of former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton in 2016. Enditem
Actor Rhea Chakrabortys advocate Satish Maneshinde has alleged that agencies probing Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajputs death case are being pressured into reaching a predetermined conclusion on the eve of Bihar assembly elections.

Maneshinde was responding to Rajputs familys counsel and senior advocate Vikas Singhs claim that a senior AIIMS doctor had told him long back that the actor died by strangulation and not by suicide. Singh, on Friday, also wondered why the Central Bureau of Investigation was delaying registering a murder case despite the tell tale signs.

Maneshinde responded by demanding that the CBI constitutes a new medical board to keep the investigation impartial and free from any inference.

The disclosure of a 200% conclusion by an AIIMS Doctor in the team headed by Dr Gupta in the SSR case, on the basis of photographs, is a dangerous trend. To keep the investigations impartial and free from inference, the CBI must constitute a new medical board, said Maneshinde.

He went on to suggest that the sensational claims made by Singh could be linked to Bihar elections.

The agencies are being pressurised to reach a predetermined result for obvious reasons on the eve of Bihar Elections. We have seen the VRS of DG (Gupteshwar) Pandey unfolding a few days back. There should not be a repetition of such steps, said Maneshinde.

Also Read: Sushant Singh Rajputs family feels probe is going into different direction: Lawyer

The latest round of war of words between the two sides started with Vikas Singhs tweet on Thursday morning, stating: Getting frustrated by the delay in CBI taking a decision to convert abetment to suicide to Murder of SSR. The Doctor who is part of AIIMS team had told me long back that the photos sent by me indicated 200% that its death by strangulation and not suicide.

Later in a press conference on Thursday, according to ANI, Singh had said that Rajputs family is disappointed that the investigation in the case has been derailed and what had begun as a probe into the circumstances leading up to Sushants death on June 14, had transformed into an investigation into an alleged drugs subculture in the film industry.

The family feels that the investigation is going in such a way that the truth is not coming out. The NCB (Narcotics Control Bureau) case has become like the Mumbai Police investigation, all stars are now being called. It is just a Mumbai Police type of investigation. Sushants case has taken a back seat, the lawyer said, according to news agency ANI.

Also Read: Mukul Dev on the Bollywood drug nexus case: Look at it as a cleaning drive, not slandering of the film industry

Vikas Singh also demanded that the forensic response of the AIIMS team involved in the probe should be made public and questioned why the investigative agency had not held a press conference till date.

Why is CBI not converting this to murder from abetment? The investigation is not on track. I will not say I am not happy with CBI, but its the lack of importance that the case is getting is what I am worried about. The forensics response of the AIIMS should be made public that is what will satisfy the family, he said.

Dr Sudhir Gupta, the chief of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences forensic team conducting an examination of Sushants death case, has rejected these claims.

No conclusion or conclusion opinion of homicide or suicide could be made by seeing ligature marks and scene of occurrence. Its difficult for doctors and next to impossible for general people..., he was quoted as telling Times Now.
With an addition of 85,362 coronavirus cases and 1,089 deaths in 24 hours, India's COVID-19 count on 26th of September reached 59,03,932 cases, says the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. 9,60,969 out of the total cases are currently active, 48,49,584 have been discharged, while 93,379 lost the battle against the novel coronavirus disease.

Maharashtra continues to be the worst-hit state with a total of 13,00,757 cases, including 34,761 deaths, followed by Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.

Around 75 per cent of the new cases are found to be concentrated in ten states and UTs.



India conducted 14,41,535 sample tests in a single day on 25th of September, taking the total number of samples tested so far to 7,02,69,975, according to the data from the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR).



Overall, India rallies behind the US, which has recorded 70,32,524 cases and 2,03,657 deaths.



As of the 26th September morning, the total number of cases in the world stood at 3,24,71,119 and the fatalities stand up to 9,87,593.







Source: Medindia

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The recovery rate stands at 81.74 per cent, while the fatality rate has come down to 1.59 per cent.
LOUISVILLE, Ky.  After months of demonstrating and demanding justice for Breonna Taylor, supporters are left grappling with the stinging aftermath of the investigation and a fractured relationship with law enforcement that, for some, may be damaged beyond repair.

The community is hurting, LeAndrea McCampbell, 31, told Yahoo News. We feel like weve lost.

McCampbell joined hundreds of protesters on Friday evening in Downtown Louisville, where angry and dejected supporters marched the streets crying out for justice for Taylor. It was the third day of demonstrations since a grand jury returned no indictments in the death of Taylor, a young Black woman who was shot and killed in March by police officers executing a warrant at her residence. Protests have been occurring across the country.

The news that no one would be charged directly with Taylors killing outraged supporters in Louisville and across the nation whove been calling for the three police officers involved to be arrested and charged in her death.

Only one officer, former Louisville Police Detective Brett Hankison, faces charges. He was indicted Wednesday on three counts of wanton endangerment for firing his handgun into nearby apartments on the night of the shooting, Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron announced at a press conference.

The other two officers involved in the case, Sgt. Jonathan Mattingly and Detective Myles Cosgrove, were not charged.

I was honestly not surprised, Bryson Townsend, 27, told Yahoo News. I kind of knew what was going to happen  like, Im a Black man living in America. Its just the reality of the way things go. But [there] was a glimmer of hope, so Im disappointed.

Tamika Palmer, right, the mother of Breonna Taylor, listens to a news conference in Louisville, Ky. (Darron Cummings/AP)

State Rep. Charles Booker, who narrowly lost the Democratic primary to take on Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, was in Downtown Louisville for the protest and told Yahoo News that the Wednesday announcement felt like a second death.

Weve just gone through a period of grief all over again, Booker said. The announcement, in a lot of ways, was like her dying all over again. And so now this is a moment of what do we do next? How do we keep doing? I feel that need, that I feel that pain and we can get through this. We can get through this and we can build, we can fight for justice.

Story continues

Taylor, 26, died shortly after midnight March 13 after police arrived at her home while she and her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, were sleeping. According to a statement from the city, officers executed a no-knock warrant at the home but knocked anyway and announced themselves before breaking down the door.

Walker said he heard a pounding at the door but didnt hear police announce themselves, the city said. He fired his gun and hit Mattingly in the thigh, according to Cameron. The officers all returned fire.

Cameron said a ballistics analysis determined that Cosgrove fired the fatal shot. Hankison, who was fired in June, was criminally charged because he shot into two nearby apartments, allegedly endangering three individuals who were in one of the apartments.

Cosgrove and Mattingly were placed on administrative leave after the shooting. On Wednesday, Cameron said the two men were justified in the shooting because Walker fired first.

But the justification had little impact on protesters belief that the officers are responsible for Taylors death.

I think its just horrible, Leslie McBride, 62, told Yahoo News. They should have charged all three. And not just with some Mickey Mouse wanton endangerment charge.

At a press conference Friday morning, activist Tamika Mallory called for all three officers to be fired.

They murdered Breonna Taylor, she said. And until those officers are fired from this department, I promise you, I promise you, we will continue to make these streets hot.

Victoria Gunther marches with Black Lives Matter protesters on Friday in Louisville, Ky. (Darron Cummings/AP)

Tensions flared between police and protesters at Fridays demonstration, where one Black protester screamed at an officer in his vehicle as multiple police cars drove slowly behind protesters. Do you know why were angry? the protester asked. Do you know what its like to be Black?

For McCampbell, a mother of four, the shooting and the outcome reinforced a deep distrust of law enforcement.

I dont trust the police, she said. And that is a scary thing. If I cant trust the people who are supposed to protect and serve me, then who can I trust?

Mallory, who organized the protest Friday evening, told Yahoo News she has no faith in police or the criminal justice system.

Ive not had any real faith that law enforcement, or the criminal justice system, is going to operate in the way in which it should.

Earlier Friday, attorneys for Taylors family and supporters called on Cameron to release the transcript of the grand jury proceedings  which are typically private  so that they can see what evidence was presented to the jury. Several protesters told Yahoo News they believe the public has a right to know who was on the jury and what information they were given.

The community deserves to know exactly how he went through his process, Booker said Friday. What did he recommend? What are the reports in the transcripts that the grand jury was considering as they made their determination? Did he even step up to provide accountability for Breonna to begin with? Um, weve gone through too much, and this is too central to all of the work we have to do as a community for us to not understand what happened.

Thumbnail credit: Darron Cummings/AP

_____

Read more from Yahoo News:
Lindsey Graham apparently needs money for his Senate reelection campaign. And so the South Carolina Republican has taken his appeal for funds to an unusual venue: cable news.

Specifically, Fox News. In a pair of interviews on the network on Thursday, Graham pleaded with Fox viewers for campaign cash, in an emotional appeal almost as weepy as Jerry Lewis in one of the later hours of his old charity telethons.

"I'm getting overwhelmed," he told prime-time host Sean Hannity. Then, he turned to Hannity's viewers, adding: "Help me. They're killing me moneywise. Help me. You did last week. Help me again."

A few hours earlier, on the "Fox & Friends" morning program, Graham delivered a similar message. "My opponent [Democrat Jaime Harrison] will raise almost $100 million," he said. "I'm being killed financially. This money is 'cause they hate my guts," he said, apparently referring to Democrats.

Politicians appearing on TV news often sneak in a reference to their campaign websites in an effort to attract supporters and their contributions. But such a direct appeal for donations, especially in a news interview on such a high-profile venue as Fox, is rare.

Fox has often been accused by critics of favoring Republicans, and President Donald Trump in particular. Frequent appearances on the network can help boost a candidate's profile and conservative bona fides.

But it doesn't regularly feature politicians using their airtime to advance fundraising goals. Graham's comments assume Fox's audience is sympathetic to him and supports his reelection.

As it was, Graham's reelection campaign wasn't even the intended topic when he was booked on Fox, according to a network spokesperson. The ostensible reasons for interviewing him were to elicit his comments on a Senate report about former vice president Joe Biden's son, Hunter, and about President Trump's expected Supreme Court nominee. (Graham has said he favors pushing forward with the nomination only days before the election, despite opposing a vote on President Obama's nomination of judge Merrick Garland in 2016 under similar circumstances).

Graham seemed to bring up the subject of money unprompted, as a kind of add-on to the interviews. During his interview with Hannity, he slipped it in after the host said, "I've got to run."

Fox "had no knowledge that he would solicit donations on air," the network said in a statement.

As a general matter, news organizations are broadly exempt from federal campaign finance regulations that prohibit candidates from soliciting funds during TV interviews without a series of disclosures and disclaimers, said Brett Kappel, a Washington lawyer who specializes in campaign-finance, lobbying and government-ethics laws.

The Federal Election Commission has never sanctioned - or even warned - a major media outlet for not having the required disclaimers during a broadcast interview in which a candidate solicited funds, he said.

But any complaint about the lack of disclaimers would implicate both the candidate and the station that broadcasts the solicitation, Kappel said: "Running solicitations without disclaimers would raise the issue of whether [Fox] crossed the line from a protected press entity and became a corporate contributor to Graham's campaign." While the likelihood of enforcement action is low, "it would be an issue [Fox] wouldn't want to have to address."

Graham, a close ally of President Trump's who is seeking his fourth term in the Senate, has won reelection with ease in the past. But this year, he is facing a close race against Harrison, a former state legislator and state Democratic Party chair. Recent polls indicate that the race is a toss-up.

Harrison, however, has consistently outraised Graham. In August, he pulled in about $10.6 million, more than Graham's entire haul during the second quarter, according to federal disclosures. Graham's support of a speedy vote to replace the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg led to a surge in fundraising for Harrison this week, which may explain Graham's plea for money on Fox.

Harrison threw Graham's Fox comments back at him. Over a clip of Graham's appearance on "Fox & Friends," he tweeted, "Anybody else get the sense that @LindseyGrahamSC just realized he's going to lose on November 3rd?"
A female 'poo jogger' left a disgusting surprise in a family's driveway while on an early morning run.

Fiona Mays, from Leederville in Perth, said the jogger defecated next to her home on Friday morning before her family had left to go to work.

Ms Mays shared graphic details of the 'urgent poo' on social media and described how she was forced to clean up the vile mess.

'So this morning there was a lady jogger around 8am who decided to leave us a nice Friday present,' Ms Mays captioned a photo of the mess.

A female poo jogger left a vile 'urgent poo' (pictured above) in the driveway of a family home on a busy street in Leederville, north Perth, at about 8am on Friday morning

Fiona Mays shared a picture and details of the disgusting mess to social media (pictured) and said her family assumed the jogger had wandered into their driveway to use the bin

Ms Mays said the family assumed the jogger had wandered into the driveway to use the bin outside their Oxford Street home.

'She came down our driveway and we thought nothing of it and maybe she was putting something in our bin...

'Until we left for work and saw she had left us a big sloppy s**t... f*****g disgusting,' Ms Mays explained.

She said the woman was aged in her 40s or 50s and wearing jogging gear.

'Not sure if she is known around the area or has done it anywhere else.

'She was mooching around our drive and then must of done it,' Ms Mays wrote.

Ms Mays said she was 'surprised no one saw her at that time of the morning' and the family lived in a busy area.

'The reason I put it up is I know there has been a few serial pooers and was wondered if anyone else knew of her.

'I think it's disgusting that someone feels the need to go on private property and leave that for someone else to clean.

'In my opinion s**t your pants and clean your own mess!'

Leederville residents labelled the act as 'totally disgusting' and said there was 'no excuse for it'.

'What is wrong with people?' one commenter asked.

'As if a person did this on someone's property,' another user wrote.

'What the actual f*ck. Is this something you should report to the police?'

The strange incident is not an isolated one in Australia, with similar cases also unfolding in Sydney and Brisbane.

Last year, Sydney PR queen Roxy Jacenko had her office blighted by an unknown woman who later came to be known as the 'Paddington Pooper'.

High-flying business executive Andrew Douglas Macintosh became Australias original poo-jogger in 2018, after being photographed with his pants down in a Brisbane park.
MotorK, a Milan, Italy-based automotive sales and marketing technology company, raised more than 10 in equity and debt financing.

The round was led by Real Web while illimity, a high-tech bank specialized in SME credit, is the sole provider for the debt facility.

This new financing will allow the company to fast-track the release of new digital and technological tools consolidating the wide marketing suite range of products and services already available to dealerships and manufacturers. The capital raised will also be used to strengthen the international team. MotorK recently announced senior hires, including the appointment of the Chief Growth Officer, the Chief Product Officer and the Country Manager for the Spanish market.

Founded in Italy in 2010 and led by Marco Marlia, CEO, MotorK is an automotive-specific sales and marketing technology company with a mix of SaaS products and digital auto expertise. It offers cloud-based products and services specifically designed to empower the auto industry to better manage the digital customer experience. The company, backed by 83 North and Zobito, is serving 90% of the car brands and more than 1.500 dealers in EMEA. It is present in Italy, Spain, France, Germany and the UK.

In the next months, MotorK will reveal major evolutions for its flagship products: WebSparK  the automotive digital experience platform built to maximize lead generation  and LeadSparK  the comprehensive and integrated tool designed to manage leads and CRM activities.

FinSMEs

27/09/2020
Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has urged the Centre to accord classical status to Odissi music as it has at least 2,000-years old tradition and is based on Shastra having its own Raga.

Patnaik in a letter to Union Minister of State for Culture and Tourism, Prahlad Singh Patel on Friday said, It (Odissi music) has a distinctive rendition style based on codified grammar, the characteristic giti system of classical texts and having its own tala, different from Hindustani and Carnatic music. No doubt Odissi music has all the requisite and exclusive characteristics to be recognised as classical music, the letter said.

Patnaiks letter came a few days after the states Heritage Cabinet approved a proposal to move the Centre seeking classical tag for Odissi Music (vocal and instrumental).

The chief minister in the letter said the Odisha government has already undertaken pioneering efforts to get classical status for Odissi music at an institutional level by establishing the Guru Kelucharan Mohapatra Odissi Research Centre and Odisha Sangeet Natak Akademi with the purpose of promotion of music, dance and drama in the state.

The state government had also established the Utkal University of Culture way back in 1999.

Odissi music has made significant impact on Indian cultural scenario. Several Odishan playwrights, sculptors, painters and choreographers have earned national and international fame, he said.

The chief minister said while Odissi dance has been recognised as one of the classical forms, Odissi music is yet to get the recognition as a classical form at the national level.

I would, therefore, request you to kindly appreciate our heritage, the elegant and classical elements of Odissi music and confer classical status to Odissi music (vocal and instrumental) to fulfil the long cherished dream of music lovers of Odisha and that of India, Patnaik said.

(This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text.)

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New York (United Nations) 26 September 2020 (SPS)- The Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Lesotho, Honorable Dr. Moeketsi Majoro, afirmed that Lesotho will continue to stand with the people of Western Sahara in their quest for independence, in his address before the 75th UN General Assembly Today.

The situation in Western Sahara also merits our attention. The General Assembly has consistently reaffirmed the inalienable right of the people of Western Sahara to self-determination. We express our disappointment at the lack of progress in this regard, he stressed.

He further recalled that twenty-nine years have passed since the Security Council approved the Settlement Plan and subsequently established the UN Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO), with the mandate to implement the plan.

He criticised the UN Security Council failure so far to implement its relevant resolutions on the conflict, considering It was unfortunate that the self-determination referendum has not been held and the Security Council appears reluctant to use all diplomatic tools at its disposal to ensure compliance with the peace plan.

He further considered that the UN should not abandon African Unions efforts to find African solutions to African problems, stressing that the determination of Africa to address, through the AU, the problem of conflicts on the continent should not be misconstrued as absolving the United Nations from its responsibility for peace and security where Africa is concerned. (SPS)

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Lashana Lynch describes her No Time To Die character Nomi as a 'bad a** ninja' (Image by Universal Pictures)

Lashana Lynch has opened up about the modern approach that No Time To Die has taken with its female characters, saying that she felt a self of empowerment as she worked on the James Bond blockbuster.

The beloved spy franchise has a long and complicated history with its treatment of women. But during her conversation with Tech Radar the Captain Marvel star made it clear that all of the female characters in No Time To Die feel completely authentic and know that theyre enough.

Read More: 'No Time To Die': Lashana Lynch takes centre stage for Nokia launch photos

You just have this whole sense of empowerment that is really important to feel when you're going to work, but also important to show younger generations coming up."

Lynch also discussed the long conversations that she had with producer Barbara Broccoli, director Cary Fukunaga, and No Time To Dies writers, including Phoebe Waller-Bridge, about her character Nomi.

MONTEGO BAY, JAMAICA - APRIL 25: (L-R) Cast member Lea Seydoux, director Cary Joji Fukunaga, cast members Ana de Armas, Daniel Craig, Naomie Harris and Lashana Lynch attend the "Bond 25" film launch at Ian Fleming's Home 'GoldenEye' on April 25, 2019 in Montego Bay, Jamaica. (Photo by Slaven Vlasic/Getty Images for Metro Goldwyn Mayer Pictures)

She then went on to describe Nomi as powerful, committed, and forward-thinking, while admitting that she truly believes she is the best person at MI6.

But the most tantalising description that Lynch provided of Nomi was her insistence that she is a bada** ninja, something that she was more than happy to portray on screen.

Lynch also teased that Nomi and Bonds relationship evolves throughout No Time To Die, as they start off the film as two very different people who are forced to work together for the first time.

Read more: International No Time To Die trailers reveal huge 007 spoiler

Clearly Lynch had the time of her life working on No Time To Die, too, something that she predicted before she was even cast, as she knew she could bring something special [to the franchise] that they hopefully hadnt seen before.

Well see if Lynch does just that when No Time To Die is finally released, which will hopefully be on November 12 in the UK.
Egypts public prosecution ordered on Saturday the detention of three suspects pending investigation into the Fairmont rape case, where a number of men are accused of raping a woman at the Fairmont Hotel in Cairo in 2014.

The suspects  who have been identified as Ahmed Toulan, Amr Hussein and Khaled Hussein  were arrested by Egyptian police on Saturday after they were returned to the country by Interpol following their arrest in Beirut in August.

The three men, as well as other suspects, had fled to Lebanon after the rape, dubbed the Fairmont Nile City Hotel rape case, was brought to light.

Two other suspects in the case fled Lebanon before they could be apprehended, according to Lebanese authorities.

Two of the defendants in the case, which so far involves a total of nine suspects, were arrested earlier, including one suspect who was apprehended as he attempted to flee Egypt.

The whereabouts of the remaining suspects are currently unknown.

The suspects in the case, which has gained widespread attention on social media over the past two months, reportedly hail from affluent and powerful families in Egypt.

The alleged rape has been under investigation by Egyptian authorities since 4 August, when a complaint about the incident was filed with the country's prosecutor-general.

The complaint was first sent to the National Council of Women (NCW) by a woman alleging she was raped by several men at the luxurious Fairmont Hotel in Cairo in 2014.

The victim and a number of witnesses have been questioned by the prosecution, the prosecution said on 24 August.

The case went viral in July on different social media platforms after an anonymous Instagram account published posts accusing a group of young men of being involved in a gang rape following a party at the hotel.

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If the French economists' plans go ahead there could be no Christmas shopping on the Champs-Elysees

Two Nobel Prize-winning economists on Saturday urged France to consider an Advent lockdown so that family Christmas celebrations can go ahead with reduced risk of coronavirus transmission.

Such a "clear, uniform and transparent" option would reduce infection dangers for the most vulnerable people including the elderly, Esther Duflo and Abhijit Banerjee wrote in an op-ed for daily Le Monde.

The married couple, who won the Nobel jointly in 2019 for their work on reducing poverty, suggested "a nationwide lockdown during the Advent period from December 1 to 20".

Duflo and Banerjee suggested that their calendar would have a limited impact on schools and be less economically harmful than "cancelling Christmas" altogether -- or than a harsher lockdown later if year's-end festivities triggered a wave of infections.

If the plan went ahead, "people could be encouraged to do their Christmas shopping in November", the pair said.

With new daily cases rising sharply, the government could otherwise find itself forced to lock people down over the Christmas period, or even to "ban travel and family gatherings", they warned.

France has reacted to the swift re-emergence of Covid-19 hotspots by reimposing restrictions like earlier closing for bars on 12 large towns and cities, including the capital Paris.

Still harsher measures in Marseille, with bars and restaurants closed altogether, have triggered protests from the hospitality industry.

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Poland is enjoying a moment as one of the few countries we can visit without having to self-isolate on our return to the UK  and its a place for a wonderful autumn or winter break.

Warsaw, the capital, is a delight, often overlooked in favour of Krakow, with its lively nightlife, and Gdansk, home of the Solidarity docks.

Explore Warsaws beautifully restored old town, which stages a lovely Christmas market; visit top-class museums (including the worlds best vodka museum, naturally); wander along the pretty River Vistula; and round off the day with a tipple of the nations favourite drink in a candle-lit bar somewhere off Old Town Market Place.

DAY ONE - AFTERNOON

Glorious revival: Distinctive pastel-coloured buildings in the centre of Warsaw, rebuilt after being destroyed during the Nazi occupation

Wizz Air, Ryanair, British Airways and LOT, Polands national airline, keep fares to Warsaw competitive  another great reason to go.

A taxi from Warsaw-Chopin airport to the city centre costs about 8. Head straight for Old Square, which was flattened during the Warsaw Uprising against Nazi occupation in 1944 but has been painstakingly rebuilt  a process that took until 1962. Its distinctive mustard-yellow, pink and pale-blue buildings are back to their former finery, with spidery lanes running off the square where youll find art galleries and cafes.

For lunch, try Restauracja Portretowa, which serves traditional Polish food, including venison stew, pickled herring and pancakes with caviar. Then visit the splendid hilltop Royal Castle, former home of Polish monarchs, which took until 1984 to be restored (zamek-krolewski.pl/en).

EVENING

It may be a long way from its HQ in Singapore, but Raffles decided to try its luck in Warsaw in 2018, opening the Raffles Europejski hotel (raffles.com/warsaw) in a 19th Century building that had been badly damaged in 1944.

Nowhere in the city is more glamorous than its Long Bar. Join the cocktail-sipping crowd with a Warsaw Sling with gin and quince. Then live it up even more in the restaurant: zurek soup with pork and marjoram, seabass with horseradish, and a top-notch cheesecake. Three courses with wine costs about 40.

DAY TWO - MORNING

First, visit the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, a 20-minute walk from the old town. This is in a strikingly stark metal-and-glass building in which the core exhibition recounts the 1,000-year history of Polish Jews, including harrowing documentation of the Second World War (polin.pl/en).

Then take the metro beneath the River Vistula to the Praga district and a completely different museum.

The Polish Vodka Museum is on the site of a former distillery, now home to bars, restaurants, fashion boutiques and Warsaws Google Campus. Check the website to see when the hour-long tours in English run (muzeumpolskiejwodki.pl/en/).

Youll learn the difference between rye, barley, wheat, oat and potato-based vodkas  and the tour culminates in a tasting, naturally.

AFTERNOON

Visit the Palace of Culture and Science, the extraordinary, rocket-like tower which was completed in 1955 on the orders of Stalin

TRAVEL FACTS British Airways (ba.com) flies from Gatwick to Warsaw from 66 return. Rooms at Raffles Europejski Warsaw cost from 200 B&B. Hotel Indigo (hotelindigo.com) has rooms from 85. For more about Warsaw, go to warsawtour.pl. Advertisement

Skamiejka is a Russian restaurant close to the vodka museum (call 00 48 512 123 967 to book a table). The solanka soup with beef, pork, pickles, capers and olives is spicy and rather delicious. Follow this with melt-in-your-mouth beef stroganoff with wild mushrooms and onions. Itll cost about 10 for two courses with a drink.

Close by is the delightfully named, eclectically decorated bar W Oparach Absurdu (The Vapours of the Absurd), which was playing old Rolling Stones and Jimi Hendrix songs when I visited.

Then cross the river again to visit the Palace of Culture and Science, the extraordinary, rocket-like tower which was completed in 1955 on the orders of Stalin.

From the top of the 778ft building you can enjoy a superb view of the capital in its entirety: suburbs with tower blocks and factories framing the horizon  reminders of Communist days gone by.

On the ground floor, theres an atmospheric cinema showing films in English with Polish subtitles.

EVENING

Take a stroll along the promenade beside the River Vistula and try one of the many cafes and restaurants.

DAY THREE - MORNING

Before you fly home, visit the Church of the Holy Cross, the glittery gold, ornate church near Old Town Market Square where the heart of 19th Century composer Frederic Chopin is buried in one of the pillars.

Afterwards, make your way to the excellent Chopin Museum, not far down a hill, to learn about the tragically short life of the musical genius (muzeum.nifc.pl/en).
Goji berry growers and processing companies in Jinghe County, northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, have embraced a bumper harvest this year, thanks to more goji derivative products.

On the production lines of Qirui Biotech Co., Ltd., packaged goji primary pulp are neatly arranged, with the aroma of goji berries filling the workshop.

After a few procedures such as washing, smashing, and filtering, fresh goji berries will be processed into packaged primary pulp and sold online and offline across the country.

Founded in 2019, Qirui Biotech has rapidly developed into one of the leading deep-processing enterprises of goji berries, also known as wolfberries, across the region. Juice, primary pulp, beer, enzymes, and other health care products made of goji berries are gaining popularity among consumers at home and abroad.

"In the past, many local goji processing enterprises only produced dried berries, with low prices," said Zhang Qin, general manager of Qirui. "At present, more companies are beginning to produce goji derivative products, which increases the added value of goji berries a lot."

Currently, Qirui has an annual production capacity of 800 tonnes of goji enzymes, 1,800 tonnes of primary pulp, 3,000 tonnes of juice, and 10,000 tonnes of beer, and has exported products to 30 countries and regions. In 2019, the company achieved sales of more than 25 million yuan (around 3.67 million U.S. dollars).

"We are now developing goji coffee," said Zhang. "We hope we can produce more derivative products of goji berries in the future."

China's goji berry history dates back thousands of years. In ancient herbal medicine, its functions included protecting the liver, improving eyesight, and conserving strength.

Jinghe County, known as the "hometown of the Chinese wolfberry," has a total planting area of over 8,600 hectares with an annual output of 260 million yuan. There are 13 goji processing companies, building 23 goji brands, and developing 14 derivative products.

Rich derivative products rely on high-quality goji berries. In recent years, Jinghe has made great efforts to help growers improve the quality of goji berries and increase their income.

The country has so far established 25 goji planting cooperatives to bring the scattered farming masses together and promote large-scale standardized planting. Those cooperatives are responsible for the supply of the means of production, the organization of technical services, and the marketing of output.

"Therefore, the processing companies are not worried about the quality of goji berries, and farmers are not worried about the market," said Li Jiangwei, a goji grower at Akqi Farm, a township in Jinghe.

In 2019, Li contracted a 40-hectare goji plantation, joined a local cooperative, and began with the green and standardized farming of goji berries.

"In the past, goji growers had a high yield but a low income due to the poor quality of goji berries. The sale prices were only about 10 yuan per kg," said Li. "But now we can sell 30 to 40 yuan per kg after we followed the standardized farming methods."

"Goji berries have sweetened us growers' lives," said Li.
Amy Coney Barrett, a 7th Circuit Court of Appeals judge, is poised to be President Trump's third nominee to the Supreme Court. (University of Notre Dame)

In nominating Judge Amy Coney Barrett, President Trump has chosen a well-regarded legal scholar who has strong appeal to conservatives and who almost surely would move the high court significantly to the right on abortion, guns and other high-profile issues.

If the Senates Republican majority holds to its plan to quickly elevate her to the Supreme Court, her confirmation to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg would mark the sharpest ideological shift in a new appointment in the nearly three decades since Clarence Thomas, a 43-year-old conservative, was narrowly confirmed to succeed liberal Justice Thurgood Marshall in 1991.

Barrett, 48, is a former Notre Dame law professor and a favorite law clerk of the late Justice Antonin Scalia, who remains an icon in conservative legal circles, much like Ginsburg is regarded by liberals.

Barrett has a limited record as a judge with over three years on the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago. But as a law professor, she wrote several lengthy articles on when justices should consider overturning long-standing precedents, including the Roe vs. Wade decision that granted the right to abortion.

Both sides in the decades-long fight over abortion believe shes likely to provide the key vote to overturn or dramatically scale back nationwide abortion rights, giving conservative states the power to outlaw some or all abortions, as many did before the high courts 1973 Roe ruling.

She has also indicated support for a broad view of gun rights under the 2nd Amendment, another area in which she could cement a majority to change the law.

As an appeals court judge, Barrett joined a dissent in 2018 when her colleagues struck down an Indiana law, signed by Mike Pence when he was governor, that would have outlawed abortions that were based on the race, sex or disability of a fetus. The dissent, written by appeals court Judge Frank Easterbrook, referred to the Indiana statute as an anti-eugenics law.

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Indiana took the case to the Supreme Court, which in May of 2019, after five months of internal debate, refused to hear the states appeal. The justices voted to uphold a less significant part of the law that required abortion clinics to bury or cremate fetal remains.

Although the Supreme Court has had a conservative majority for years, it has repeatedly disappointed antiabortion activists. In June, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who had been a steady foe of abortion, voted with the courts four liberals, including Ginsburg, to strike down a Louisiana law regulating abortion clinics.

Roberts said he was constrained to follow precedent: The Louisiana law was identical to a Texas statute that had been struck down in 2016. Justices Samuel A. Alito Jr., Neil M. Gorsuch, Brett M. Kavanaugh and Thomas sharply dissented.

If Barrett joins them in the fall, the court will have at least five and possibly six justices who are inclined to give the states far more authority to restrict or even forbid abortion. And the issue is likely to be tested soon, since a dozen Republican-led states have recently passed measures that would ban some or nearly all abortions.

She has strongly indicated that she takes a less strict view of when to follow precedents, a legal principle known as stare decisis.

Stare decisis is not a hard-and-fast rule in the Courts constitutional cases, Barrett wrote in a 2013 law review article, explaining: I tend to agree with those who say that a justices duty is to the Constitution and that it is thus more legitimate for her to enforce her best understanding of the Constitution rather than a precedent she thinks clearly in conflict with it.

The issue of precedent has become the focus of extraordinary attention in Supreme Court confirmations, largely because of the divide over abortion.

Thomas was asked repeatedly about Roe and abortion in his hearings. He said he had not had time to debate the issue. Eight months after joining the court, he voted in dissent to overturn the Roe ruling entirely.

When Roberts and Alito had their hearings, they told senators that Roe was a precedent that deserved respect. Gorsuch and Kavanaugh also described Roe as a settled precedent that had been reaffirmed in more recent cases, notably a 1992 case called Planned Parenthood vs. Casey. The courts precedents should not be overturned lightly, they said.

Clues to Barretts views come not just from her articles, but also from a letter she signed in 2012 with other conservative academics that sharply criticized the Obama administrations rule that required religious employers, acting through their insurers, to provide a full range of contraceptives to their female employees.

Compelling religious people and institutions to play a role in providing abortion inducing drugs is a grave violation of religious freedom, the letter said.

Abortion rights advocates said they were alarmed by her nomination.

Judge Barretts record suggests that there isnt a restriction on abortion that she doesnt support, said Leila Abolfazli, director of reproductive rights for the National Womens Law Center.

By contrast, Helen M. Alvare, a critic of abortion rights who teaches at the Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University in Arlington, Va., said Barrett had not spelled out her views on the right to abortion.

But should she be skeptical of Roe and Casey, this simply puts her in the company of numerous male and female constitutional scholars who have concluded that the U.S. Constitution is silent on abortion, which is rather a subject for state law.

Self-described womens groups should be ecstatic that, in the 21st century, a woman who is highly accomplished both intellectually and in her family life, has made it all the way to the very top of a previously male-dominated arena, Alvare said.

On gun rights, Barrett could extend Scalias legacy. Last year, she dissented when the 7th Circuit, in a 2-1 ruling, upheld federal law and took away the gun rights of a Wisconsin resident who had pleaded guilty to defrauding Medicare.

Legislatures have the power to prohibit dangerous people from possessing guns, Barrett wrote in Kanter vs. Barr. But that power extends only to people who are dangerous.

UCLA law professor Adam Winkler said Barrett is likely to be a strong vote in favor of relatively expansive 2nd Amendment rights.

She apparently has a broader view of gun rights than even Justice Scalia, he added, noting that in the courts 2008 ruling in District of Columbia vs. Heller, which said the 2nd Amendment covered an individuals right to own a gun, Scalia explicitly said he was not casting doubt on felon-possession bans.

For the last decade, the high court has refused to go beyond rulings in 2008 and 2010 that struck down citywide bans on handguns in Washington, D.C., and Chicago. The justices recently turned away challenges to state measures, including in California, that limit who can carry a concealed weapon or restrict the sale of rapid-fire rifles.

With Barrett there will likely be five justices in favor of expanding 2nd Amendment protections, Winkler said.

Democrats are also likely to argue that Barrett represents a threat to Obamacare and its insurance protections for tens of millions of Americans with preexisting medical conditions.

On Nov. 10, a week after the election, the high court is scheduled to hear a case brought by Texas Republican attorney general and supported by the Trump administration that seeks to strike down the entire law, including the protections for people with preexisting conditions.

The case is called California vs. Texas because, unlike most cases involving a federal law, California Atty. Gen. Xavier Becerra, not the Justice Department, is defending Obamacare.

It is not clear whether Barrett will participate if she is confirmed by then. But if the current justices were to split 4 to 4 on the outcome, they would probably hear a second round of arguments so Barrett could cast the deciding vote.

In her writings, she has been highly critical of Chief Justice Roberts for casting the key votes to preserve the law in 2012 and 2015 over fierce dissents by Scalia. Roberts pushed the Affordable Care Act beyond its plausible meaning to save the statute, she wrote in a 2017 article.

Barrett was born in New Orleans in 1972 and was raised in Metairie, the eldest of seven children. Her father was a lawyer for Shell Oil Co. She attended a Roman Catholic girls high school there and graduated from Rhodes College in Memphis, Tenn., a private liberal arts school affiliated with the Presbyterian Church. She then went to Notre Dame Law School, where she graduated first in her class in 1997.

She came to Washington to clerk for Judge Laurence Silberman on the D.C. Circuit and then for Justice Scalia during the 1998-99 Supreme Court term. She worked several years in Washington before returning to South Bend, Ind., in 2002 to begin a teaching career at Notre Dame.

She and her husband, Jesse Barrett, a former prosecutor who is now in private practice, have seven children, including one with Down syndrome and two who were adopted from Haiti.

In Trumps first year in office, she was nominated and confirmed to the 7th Circuit.

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic this year, she regularly commuted nearly two hours from South Bend to Chicago to hear cases.





For the record:

10:10 AM, Sep. 26, 2020: An earlier version of this article misrepresented the period of time that has passed since Justice Clarence Thomas was confirmed to the Supreme Court as more than three decades. Thomas was confirmed in 1991, less than three decades ago.



This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Centre used GST compensation cess elsewhere, violated law: CAG

The CAG has found that the Union government in the very first two years of the GST implementation wrongly retained Rs 47,272 crore of GST compensation cess that was meant to be used specifically to compensate states for loss of revenue.

In its audit report of government accounts, the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) flagged that the amount was to be credited to the non-lapsable GST Compensation Cess collection fund for payment to states for loss of revenue due to implementation of GST since 2017, but the government did not do so, and thus violated the GST law.

"The GST Compensation Cess Act, 2017 provides for levy of cess for the purpose of providing compensation to the states for loss of revenue arising due to implementation of GST for a period specified in the Act," CAG said.

As per the Act and the accounting procedure, the entire cess collected during the year is required to be credited to a non-lapsable Fund (the GST Compensation Cess Fund) which shall form part of the Public Account and shall be used for the purpose mentioned i.e., for providing compensation to states for loss of revenue.

CAG said out of the Rs 62,612 crore GST Compensation Cess collected in 2017-18, Rs 56,146 crore was transferred to the non-lapsable fund.

In the following year (2018-19), Rs 54,275 crore out of Rs 95,081 crore collected was transferred to the fund.

The short transfer in 2017-18 was Rs 6,466 crore and in 2018-19 it was Rs 40,806 crore, CAG said adding the Centre used this money for "other purposes" which "led to an overstatement of revenue receipts and understatement of fiscal deficit for the year."

The short-crediting was a violation of the GST Compensation Cess Act, 2017.

The issue of compensation cess is driving a wedge between the Centre and states at the GST Council - the highest decision making body of the GST regime that had subsumed 17 different central and state taxes such as excise duty and VAT.

States have not been paid their promised compensation for letting go their powers to levy taxes on goods and services since last fiscal. The Centre says a slowdown in the economy has meant that not enough money is being collected by way of cess that is levied on luxury and sin goods.

The Centre has asked states to borrow for meeting the revenue shortfall. States ruled by Congress, Left, TMC and AAP have opposed the move completely arguing that the Centre should borrow and provide to states, since states have given majority of their taxation powers to the Centre under GST regime introduced in July 2017.

The CAG findings run contrary to Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman's submissions in Parliament last week that states could not be compensated for revenue shortfall from the Consolidated Fund of India (CFI) relying on an opinion from the Attorney General of India which stated that there was no such provision in the law.

"Audit examination of information in Statements 8, 9 and 13 with regard to the collection of the cess and its transfer to the GST Compensation Cess Fund, shows that there was short crediting to the Fund of the GST Compensation Cess collections totalling to Rs 47,272 crore during 2017-18 and 2018-19," CAG said in the audit report.

The short-crediting, CAG said, was a violation of the GST Compensation Cess Act, 2017.

"The amount by which the cess was short credited was also retained in the CFI and became available for use for purposes other than what was provided in the Act," it said.

According to CAG, the Finance Ministry accepted the audit observation and stated in February 2020 that the proceeds of cess collected and not transferred to Public Account would be transferred in the subsequent year.

"Short crediting of cess collected during the year led to an overstatement of revenue receipts and understatement of fiscal deficit for the year," CAG said.

Further, any transfer in the subsequent year would become an appropriation from the resources of that year and would require Parliamentary authorisation, it said asking the Finance Ministry to take immediate corrective action.

As per the approved accounting procedure, GST Compensation cess was to be transferred to the Public Account by debit to Major Head '2047-Other fiscal services' Instead, the Ministry of Finance operated the Major Head '3601-Transfer of Grants in aid to States'

"The wrongful operation has implications on the reporting of Grants in aid since the GST Compensation Cess is the right of the states and is not a Grant in aid," CAG said.

The GST (Compensation to States) Act guarantees all states an annual growth rate of 14 per cent in their GST revenue in the first five years of implementation of GST beginning July 2017. It was introduced as a relief for states for the loss of revenues arising from the implementation of GST.

If a state's revenue grows slower than 14 per cent, it is supposed to be compensated by the Centre using the funds specifically collected as compensation cess. To provide these grants, a GST compensation cess is levied on certain luxury and sin goods.

The collected compensation cess flows into the CFI, and is then transferred to the Public Account of India, where a GST compensation cess account has been created. States are compensated bi-monthly from the accumulated funds in this account.

However, instead of transferring the entire GST cess amount to the GST compensation fund, the CAG found that the Centre retained these funds in the CFI and used it for other purposes.

ALSO READ: GST compensation: 21 states go for Option 1 borrowing plan

ALSO READ: GST revenues crash 25% for 26 states
The World Health Organization on September 25th warned that the global death toll by novel coronavirus could hit 2 million before an effective vaccine comes to use. The WHO's emergencies head, Dr Mike Ryan said that the figure could go higher as well. The novel coronavirus is believed to have originated in a wet seafood and meat market in Wuhan before spreading across China and subsequently across the globe. The virus, named COVID-19 by the WHO, has infected 32,793,21 people worldwide with the global death toll reaching over 900,000.

World battles coronavirus pandemic

A few days ago, WHO director Dr. Hans Kluge warned nations against shortening the two-week quarantine period. Kluge stressed that even a slight reduction in the length of the quarantine could have a major effect on the spread of COVID-19 which returned to alarming rates of transmission in Europe this month. The WHO official added that the quarantine should only be reduced if it is scientifically justified. While WHO has repeatedly asserted that it wont change its two-week quarantine rule, there are many nations that have reduced the number of days in isolation.

Read: Peru Extends Coronavirus-linked National State Of Emergency Until Oct 31

Europe is experiencing its second wave of the novel coronavirus as cases of the coronavirus in Europe were "almost back" to the same levels seen in March. ECDC director Andrea Ammon told the European Parliament virus cases across the continent have been increasing for more than 5 weeks. Talking about the situation in Europe, Dr Ryan said that there has been a worrying increase of diseases in Europe. He emphasized on the need for lockdowns as he said that lockdowns are the last resort and Europe has entered the last resort territory.

Read: Coronavirus: Chinese Health Authorities Discover Virus Contamination On Seafood Packages

Countries like Peru, Israel, South Korea and Australia have also seen a resurgence in cases. On September 25, the Peruvian government extended the national state of emergency until October 31 in order to stem the spread of the novel coronavirus. In Australia, Victoria has been the epicentre of the cases as it accounts for 75% of cases and 90% of deaths. However, New Zealand has eased restrictions as Prime Minister Jacinda Arden recently announced that most of the country will be moved to the lowest virus alert setting as they are edging towards eliminating COVID-19. However, she also added that Auckland needs more time to eliminate the stubborn cluster of infection that was detected last month in the city. Arden said that caution is required in the centre of the outbreak as elimination was still New Zealands target.

Read: 'WHO Backed China For Emergency Use Of COVID-19 Experimental Vaccines As Early As In June'

On the other hand, Israel has reimposed the lockdown. Following a drastic resurgence in new COVID-19 cases and fearing the consequences of mass gatherings during the upcoming holiday season, Israels cabinet decided to reimpose a three weeks national lockdown on Sunday, September 13. The lockdown will last till October 9 and during the reimposed lockdown, shops, schools and restaurants will remain closed and Israelis will have to contend with restrictions on movement.

Read: London Put On COVID-19 Watchlist As Coronavirus Infection Rate Rises Again Across UK

Also Read: Nepal Urges SAARC Nations To Convene 19th Summit Soon; To Collectively Fight Coronavirus Pandemic

(Image Credits: Unsplash)
You wouldn't think this is necessary to say in America, but a lot of what's going on in 2020 is hard to believe. So let's try to agree on this, at least: Democracy matters.

That this needs to be asserted at all suggests just how far we have journeyed into territory that should trouble anybody who cares about the claim in our national anthem that ours is "the land of the free." But here we are.

Freedom, as we've always understood it in the United States, relies upon the ability of citizens to choose the course for their community, under rules we have agreed upon to protect both the authority of the majority and the rights of minorities. Since 1789, our Constitution has been that guiding rulebook.

Our democracy is threatened when those rules are violated, and also when the philosophy undergirding our society is placed at risk  when the norms protecting citizens' ability to control their government and enjoy its benefits are eroded.

Democracy is threatened when those in power try to make it harder for citizens to vote  by enacting voter ID laws, for example, or by limiting polling places or massively purging voter rolls (a tactic especially popular in recent years in areas with a history of racial discrimination in administering elections).

Democracy is threatened when those in power abandon the civil norms that have maintained our system of government for generations  as happened four years ago, when Republicans leading the U.S. Senate refused to even consider a Supreme Court nomination because it was made in an election year.

Not that our democracy is perfect. Twice in this century, and twice before, the presidential choice of a majority of voters has been stymied by the Electoral College, which gives extra weight to less populous states. That's anti-democratic, but it's in the rulebook we honor.

But no rulebook can force officials to behave with the country's best interests at heart. When a president implies that citizens' votes don't matter, by baselessly warning that the coming election is unlikely to be fair, then democracy is threatened. When that president repeatedly says that he might not give up power if he loses, democracy is threatened.

That's not just Donald Trump saying whatever comes to mind, as he often does. It's not harmless talk, as some conservatives who can't help but be embarrassed by the president's rants often assert. No, for once, Donald Trump is telling us the truth.

Experts who have studied the rise of autocrats note that citizens often make the mistake of doubting that incipient despots mean what they say. Before Rodrigo Duterte became president of the Philippines, his threats to bypass the justice system to stop drug trafficking sounded like tough campaign talk, not policy plans. But in the first 90 days of his bloody presidency, police and Duterte-backed vigilantes killed more than 3,000 people.

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Trump, not incidentally, is a fan of Duterte, as well as of other leaders moving their countries away from democracy, including Hungary's Viktor Orban and Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Democracy is threatened when America doesn't assert its founding values globally.

So Trump is telling us exactly what he intends to do, in words indicating that he sees nothing wrong with squelching democracy if that's what it takes to hold what he most desires: the center of attention.

Nor should we be reassured by the quick response of Republican officials this week saying that if Joe Biden wins the election, there will of course be a peaceful transition. The definition of "win" is malleable, and Republican senators have always yielded to their president. Trump is setting the stage for a brutal battle if he seems to have lost  perhaps even trying to get states to swap Biden electors chosen by voters with electors selected by Republican-led legislatures. As the Senate moves to quickly seat a new Supreme Court justice whom the president may ask to sustain his efforts to cling to power, democracy is threatened.

Trump wasn't kidding when he praised China in 2018 for eliminating the two-term limit on Xi Jinping's presidency. "I think it's great," he said. "Maybe we'll have to give that a shot someday." As his former fixer, Michael Cohen, has observed, Trump doesn't kid, because he doesn't have a sense of humor.

This month a global project that measures representative government, based on hundreds of indicators assessed annually by thousands of experts, reported that America's democracy has already eroded to a point that usually leads nations to full-blown autocracy. The U.S., it reported, is undergoing "substantial autocratization."

So, yes, it is necessary to say this: Democracy matters, and it is threatened.
There were reports floating in the media recently that veteran actress Zarina Wahab had been hospitalised again after her discharge from Mumbai's Lilavati Hospital. Zarina Wahab had earlier been admitted to the hospital after testing positive for COVID-19.

Zarina's actor son Sooraj Pancholi rubbished the reports of his mother being hospitalised again. He was quoted by The Times of India: "My mother is at home, and my father hasn't tested positive. Around 10 days ago, she flew back from Hyderabad, where she had gone to meet her family, and fell sick the same day. My father took her to the hospital, and she tested positive for COVID-19. She was asymptomatic. She was admitted and discharged five days later after testing negative, and since then, she has been in isolation at home."

Zarina Wahab further revealed that she has completely recovered from COVID-19 and her quarantine period has also come to an end. The tabloid quoted her as saying, "I am completely fine and at home. In fact, my quarantine period ended on September 24. However, I am taking it easy and resting at home."

Sooraj Pancholi denied the news that his father Aditya Pancholi had tested positive for COVID-19.

Recently, the Hero actor hit the news for the wrong reasons when his name was linked to actor Sushant Singh Rajput and celebrity manager Disha Salian's death cases. However, Sooraj slammed these reports in a strongly-worded Instagram post and accused the media of 'harassing' him with false reportage.

Speaking about films, Sooraj Pancholi will next be seen in the biopic on Indian boxer Hawa Singh.

ALSO READ: Sooraj Pancholi Opens Up About His Alleged Connection To Sushant And Disha Salian's Death

ALSO READ: Disha Salian's Parents, Sooraj Pancholi File Complaint Against Puneet Vashisht For Defamatory Post
KENILWORTH (NJ) (dpa-AFX) - As another month comes to a close, we take a look back at some of the highlights of the regulatory front, before looking forward to what October brings. New data from the 2020 National Youth Tobacco Survey (NYTS), released by the FDA in partnership with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, show that about 3.6 million U.S. youth currently use e-cigarettes compared to 5.4 million in 2019. This is indeed good news. However, a lot of work remains to be done and the FDA is doing all it can to curb youth use of e-cigarettes. On September 9, the FDA issued warning letters to XL Vape LLC, Flavour Warehouse Ltd., and Pretty Women UK Ltd. which have been selling or distributing unauthorized electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS) products, to remove those products from the market. Opioid overdose is another health crisis plaguing the country. According to a report by the New York Times, the year 2020 will witness the sharpest increase in annual overdose deaths since 2016. There were 70,980 overdose deaths in 2019, an increase of 4.6% over 2018, as per the CDC data. On September 10, the FDA issued warning letters to 17 website operators for illegally selling unapproved and misbranded opioids online. As of this writing, the FDA has approved 40 novel drugs so far this year compared to just 27 during the same period (Jan-Sep) last year. Now, let's take a look at the biotech stocks facing FDA decision in October. Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX

Werbehinweise: Die Billigung des Basisprospekts durch die BaFin ist nicht als ihre Befurwortung der angebotenen Wertpapiere zu verstehen. Wir empfehlen Interessenten und potenziellen Anlegern den Basisprospekt und die Endgultigen Bedingungen zu lesen, bevor sie eine Anlageentscheidung treffen, um sich moglichst umfassend zu informieren, insbesondere uber die potenziellen Risiken und Chancen des Wertpapiers. Sie sind im Begriff, ein Produkt zu erwerben, das nicht einfach ist und schwer zu verstehen sein kann.
Showing the grit and determination that's propelled him to a 10-year career with 52 wins and more than $444,000 in earnings, Union Man Hanover repelled all rivals en route to victory in the Saturday (Sept. 26) feature at Exhibition Park Raceway.

Stephen Trites pointed the 11-year-old son of Artiscape - Up Front Rose to the front end in the $1,500 Winners Over Pace and took advantage of his rail position to make the lead ahead of his four rivals. JJ Breanne (John Davidson) attempted to engage Union Man Hanover into the first turn and rolled offstride. The pacing mare quickly reset and pestered the pacesetter through a :28.3 opener and :57.3 half. As the field approached the third station, JJ Breanne started to feel the burn of that first-over grind and her strides started to shorten. Union Man Hanover continued strong on the lead through that 1:27.4 third quarter and his :31.1 final stanza was more than enough as he tripped the timer some four lengths to the good in 1:59. Ultimatelyhandsome (Kyle Mason) held off Bugger Max (Mark Haig) for place.

Now a winner of four races from 15 seasonal starts, Union Man Hanover is trained and owned Robert MacNeil of Saint John, N.B.

The MacNeil stable also captured the back-up pace with Magical Alex, as Mark Haig guided the 13-year-old son of Harrods - Magical Ball to a wire-to-wire 2:01 score for his 60th career victory.

To view the results from the Saturday card of harness racing, click the following link: Saturday Results - Exhibition Park Raceway.
News organizations have been losing ad revenue to online companies such as Facebook and Google for years. Over that time, theyve been begging the federal government to help them survive by forcing the tech giants to share their revenue.

Now, the Liberals are pledging to do just that. But will that help actually materialize, and will it be enough?

Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault first raised hopes in the Canadian news industry earlier this month in interviews where he labelled the refusal by tech companies to share ad revenues with publishers as immoral and unacceptable. He also voiced support for Australias ongoing effort to force such payments and decried Facebooks obstinance there, in particular, as bullying.

Then, just this past Wednesday, the government doubled down on its stance in the throne speech, which was delivered by Gov. General Julie Payette.

Web giants are taking Canadians money while imposing their own priorities. Things must change and will change, she read. The government will act to ensure their revenue is shared more fairly with our creators and media and will also require them to contribute to the creation, production and distribution of our stories, on screen, in lyrics, in music and in writing.

The speech lacked specifics, however, leaving some in the embattled media industry to wonder if their optimism might be misplaced.

Theyve talked about them paying their fair share, but the language has been very ambiguous, says Daniel Bernhard, executive director at journalism and broadcasting advocacy group Friends of Canadian Broadcasting. I remain hopeful, but I wouldnt call myself expectant or optimistic.

Bernhard points out that the government has been talking tough about the tech industry without meaningful action for years. Until that changes, the Canadian news industrys collective eyes will remain glued to Australia.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission  or ACCC  is in the process of finalizing a code of conduct bill for a parliamentary vote. The rules would require the tech companies to negotiate terms for hosting snippets of news stories on their platforms. If agreements cannot be reached, an arbitrator would determine payments.

The rules would also require the companies to provide reasonable advance notice of changes to algorithms that would affect news rankings and presentations, to give publishers an adequate chance to adjust their offerings.

Google has responded by informing users in Australia that the new terms would degrade some of its services. Facebook has gone further by threatening to remove local and international news from its platforms there, which includes Instagram.

In its assessment published earlier this month, the Dallas-based International News Media Association suggested the companies are making threats because Australias rules could easily be emulated in other countries.

Because of the global nature of the Big Tech platforms, the highest bar for regulation becomes a global standard, the organization said in a blog post. The outcome in Australia will become the new bar for every countrys publishers seeking an equitable financial relationship with Facebook and others.

The ACCC is being supported by Australian news organizations such as Rupert Murdochs News Corp. The Canadian government has similarly been lobbied by Canadian publishers including The Globe and Mail, Postmedia and Toronto Star parent Torstar, who in May collectively penned an open letter urging immediate action that would force revenue sharing.

Advertising revenue at news organizations has been in decline for years and has been exasperated by the COVID-19 pandemic, the publishers said. Conversely, ad revenue has been climbing for the tech companies. Facebook, for example, posted ad revenue of $17.7 billion (U.S.) in the first quarter of 2020, up 17 per cent from $15 billion a year earlier.

Together, Google and Facebook accounted for 78.3 per cent of the $7.6 billion online advertising market in Canada and about 42 per cent of the total $14 billion in ad spend across all media in 2018, according to the Canadian Media Concentration Research Project (CMCRP).

At the crux of the dispute are the news-story snippets displayed on Facebook and other online platforms. News publishers say these summaries count as content that they have paid to produce and that are being used to draw users to the platforms.

Its driving eyeballs to their site so they can sell ads, says John Hinds, president and chief executive of News Media Canada, a trade association that represents daily, weekly and community newspapers of which all Torstar papers are members and pay fees. Their business model is based on monetizing our content and we dont get any payment for it.

Facebook says Australias proposed rules overestimate the value of news content on its platform, which is dwarfed by the traffic it sends back to publishers. The company says it sent 2.3 billion clicks to Australian news websites in the first five months of 2020.

In both Australia and Canada, the company says it would prefer to support news creation through the various programs it funds.

In Canada, for example, the company says it has invested $9 million over the past three years in partnerships, including programs with The Canadian Press, the Canadian Journalism Foundation and the Ryerson School of Journalism.

Removing news in Australia is not the outcome weve been working towards, it is our last choice, says Kevin Chan, global director and head of public policy for Facebook Canada. We want to work with news organizations and governments to support the development of sustainable business models.

Other media observers say Australias approach doesnt address the larger issue, which is that Facebook and Google have too much power when it comes to advertising and competition in general. Governments could be better served by looking at ways to curtail that dominance, which could include further enforcing privacy and antitrust laws.

Theres an absolute need to deal with this, says Dwayne Winseck, a professor at the School of Journalism and Communication at Carleton University and head of the CMCRP. The data and privacy protection part of it is for real and the Australian approach doesnt deal with any of it.

Critics of both the Australian and Canadian stances also say that the countries respective news industries are only going to hurt themselves by pushing for revenue sharing. If Facebook makes good on its threat to pull news, publishers could see declines in traffic.

If you lose those referrals for which they pay nothing, it seems likely to have an impact on the bottom line, says Michael Geist, the Canada Research Chair in internet and e-commerce law at the University of Ottawa. Itll be discouraging for many news organizations to find that their content is easily replaceable.

Google supports that view, saying that news-related queries account for a fraction of overall searches and therefore ad revenue. In Canada, news-related queries accounted for just 1.5 per cent of overall searches and $9 million in revenue from clicks on ads against those queries last year. Conversely, the company says it sends users to news sites 24 billion times a month globally.

A recent analysis by University of Quebec at Montreal media professor Jean-Hugues Roy suggests such numbers overstate the overall value the platforms deliver to news organizations. Facebook, for example, earns between 35 and 58 times more from news it hosts than publishers do from traffic sent their way, he wrote in a blog post.

Though many community papers support the Canadian governments stance, some newer, online-first publishers oppose the revenue-sharing plan and dont want to see the tech platforms block snippets because both would likely involve someone having to decide what qualifies as a news organization.

I certainly wouldnt be comfortable with Facebook making that determination, says Jesse Brown, publisher of independent news organization Canadaland. I have just as many problems with government making that determination.

Either way, media watchers dont expect the Canadian government to act quickly despite its tough posturing, which will likely leave Australia to do the heavy lifting.

Canadian governments have not had a great track record at striking out boldly to set a standard for cultural information, says Jeffrey Dvorkin, former director of the journalism program at the University of Toronto Scarborough Campus. Theyre going to wait to see whose heads get chopped off first.

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By Trend

The number of confirmed coronavirus cases for September 26 in Uzbekistan increased to 54,660, Trend reports with reference to the statistics of the Uzbek Ministry of Health.

To date, 50,954 patients have fully recovered in the country, while 451 have died.

At the moment, 3,255 patients are treated in medical institutions in Uzbekistan following the standards, 718 of them are in serious condition, and 289 patients are in critical condition.

According to the Ministry of Health, all new cases were identified among those who were in contact with patients. In particular, 112 cases were revealed in Tashkent, 29 cases in Namangan region, 15 cases in Andijan region, 14 cases in Syrdarya region, 13 cases in Jizzakh region, 12 cases in Samarkand region, and 3 cases were revealed in the Tashkent region.

From October 1, all border crossing points in Uzbekistan will be open for road, rail and air transport.

Under the instructions of the president of Uzbekistan, unlimited movement of vehicles, as well as local air and rail travel in Uzbekistan, was resumed since August 15, 2020. Also, from August 17, 2020, Tashkent resumed public transportation.

Citizens are required to wear masks when entering public transport (buses).

The first case of coronavirus infection in Uzbekistan was detected on March 15 in the laboratory of the Research Institute of Virology; it was an Uzbek woman who returned from France. The Ministry of Health later announced that her son, daughter, husband, and grandson also tested positive for coronavirus.

The outbreak in the Chinese Wuhan city - which is an international transport hub - began at a fishing market in late December 2019.

The World Health Organization (WHO) on March 11 declared COVID-19 a pandemic. Some sources claim the coronavirus outbreak started as early as November 2019.

Uzbekistan as an active member of the WHO European Regional Office has joined the Coronavirus vaccination program.

-

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
The chief suspect in a double stabbing in Paris told investigators he carried out the attack in anger over caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad recently republished by Charlie Hebdo, a judicial official has said.

Two people were wounded after Friday's attack with a meat cleaver outside the newspaper's former offices in eastern Paris.

Counter-terrorism authorities are investigating the stabbings as an Islamic extremist attack and seven people have been detained, including a main suspect known as Ali, 18.

Charlie Hebdo lost 12 employees in an al Qaida attack in 2015 by French-born extremists who had criticised the prophet cartoons.

The newspaper, which routinely mocks religious figures of all kinds, republished the caricatures the day before the trial into the 2015 attacks opened earlier this month.

It drew threats from militant groups as well as criticism from Muslims in multiple countries.

The magazine's location is now secret but Ali apparently believed the magazine's offices were still there.

The chief suspect in a double stabbing in Paris (pictured) told investigators he carried out the attack in anger over caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad recently republished by satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo

Firefighters move an injured person to an ambulance after two people were stabbed close to the former headquarters of Charlie Hebdo magazine in Paris

French police officers stand guard in front of the former Charlie Hebdo offices, on Rue Nicolas Appert in Paris today

Questioned by investigators, he acknowledged carrying out the attack and said he sought to target Charlie Hebdo because of the caricatures, according to an official close to the investigation.

Ali had been arrested a month ago for carrying a screwdriver, but was not on police radar for Islamic radicalisation, interior minister Gerald Darmanin said.

He said the screwdriver was considered a weapon, but did not explain why.

'But manifestly it's an act of Islamist terrorism,' Mr Darmanin said in an interview with the France 2 television station.

'Obviously, there is little doubt. It's a new bloody attack against our country, against journalists, against this society.'

A suspect is detained in Paris yesterday after two people were injured in an attack near the former Charlie Hebdo offices which is being treated as possible terrorism

One of the stabbing victims is treated after the meat cleaver attack near Charlie Hebdo's former offices in Paris. Both victims are expected to survive

The meat cleaver used in the attack is left on the ground in Paris after two people were stabbed

Ali arrived in France three years ago as an unaccompanied minor, apparently from Pakistan, but his identity was still being verified, the minister said.

Seven others were detained in the aftermath of Friday's attack, including a 33-year-old Algerian, but one has been released.

Five of those in custody were detained in the Paris suburb of Pantin in a residence where Ali is believed to have lived.

The two people wounded in Friday's attack were a woman and a man working at the Premieres Lignes documentary production company who had gone outside for a cigarette.

Company co-founder Luc Hermann told broadcaster France-Info that they remained in hospital but their condition was 'reassuring'.

Prime minister Jean Castex, visiting Paris police headquarters on Saturday, pledged to step up the fight against terrorism, saying: 'The enemies of the republic will not win.'

Forensic experts work at the scene after the rampage which has left two in a criticial condition

Two men have been arrested after they were spotted with blood on their clothes near the attack

Two of the victims have been confirmed as a man and a woman who are employees of Premieres Lignes, a French news and video agency

Interior minister Gerald Darmanin said the man - named as Ali - arrived in France three years ago as a minor, apparently from Pakistan, but his identity was still being verified. he added that the attack was 'an act of terrorism'

The interior minister conceded that security was lacking on the street where Charlie Hebdo was once headquartered, and ordered special protection for all 'symbolic sites', noting in particular Jewish sites around the Yom Kippur holiday this weekend.

A Jewish grocery store was targeted days after the Charlie Hebdo newsroom massacre, in what authorities say were co-ordinated attacks.

Dramatic pictures showed Ali crouching on the floor in a yellow Manchester City top and tracksuit bottoms.

Undercover officers, identified by their orange arm bands, stood over the suspect before he was taken to a high security police station in the French capital.

Terror police have taken up the case, and French prosecutors suspect an extremist motive because of the place and timing of the stabbings - near the former Charlie Hebdo premises during a trial relating to the 2015 massacre.

French firefighters move an injured person to an ambulance after two people were stabbed close to the former headquarters of Charlie Hebdo magazine in Paris

French soldiers rush to the scene after people were injured following the attack by a man wielding a knife

Witnesses said two of the victims were having a cigarette break outside their office when the attack took place

The victims work for Premieres Lignes, a French news and video agency whose staff rushed to help Charlie Hebdo survivors after the rampage which killed 12 people.

Fourteen suspects are currently on trial for allegedly helping to plot the Islamist attack, with proceedings suspended yesterdatin the wake of the latest violence.

One suspected attacker was arrested on the steps of the Bastille Opera after witnesses spotted blood dripping from his clothes, said an investigating source.

'He was arrested within minutes by police, and then a second man was arrested on a Metro train because of suspicions that he may be connected with the attack,' they said.

Paris prosecutor Jean-Francois Ricard said a 'main perpetrator' had been arrested along with a 'second suspect', adding the main attacker did not know the people who were stabbed.

Charlie Hebdo (former offices pictured) now publishes from a secret address in Paris, and many staff members have bodyguards

Police said there was 'extreme concern' today that those responsible for the stabbings might strike again

Local schools in the 3rd, 4th and 11th arrondissements have been shut down, and people are being advised to stay in their offices and homes

One witness at the Bastille Plaza, Kader Alfa, said he 'saw a guy that was in his 30s or 40s with an axe in his hand who was walking behind a victim covered in blood'.

Two suspects were taken to a high-security police station in central Paris, where they were being questioned on Friday afternoon.

The second suspect was described in French media as a 33-year-old Algerian, but it was unclear whether or how they were connected.

The attack is being investigated by specialist anti-terror prosecutors who have opened a probe into charges of 'attempted murder related to terrorism' and 'conspiracy with terrorists.'

French PM Jean Castex initially said four people were injured, but the Paris prosecutor later clarified there were two victims.

An armed police officer stands at the scene of the horrific stabbings as two fight for their lives after the attack

A large police presence was seen immediately after the stabbings as schools and the Metro were shut down

Mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo visited the knife attack near the former offices of Charlie Hebdo

Two of the victims have been confirmed as a man and a women who are employees of Premieres Lignes, a French news and video agency

The pair work in the production team for the company which has released a number of documentaries and previously won a Pulitzer Prize for work on the Panama Papers investigation.

The prime minister noted the 'symbolic site' of the attack, 'at the very moment where the trial into the atrocious acts against Charlie Hebdo is under way.'

The PM, who attended the scene with Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo, added the lives of the two victims 'are not in danger, thank God.'

One police source said a machete had been found at the scene. Another police source said a meat cleaver had been found there.

The two people are in 'an extremely bad way', said an investigating source, although their lives are not thought to be in danger.

'Two colleagues were smoking cigarettes in the street. I heard screams. I went to the window and saw a colleague, bloodied, being chased by a man with a machete,' added another employee, who asked not to be named.

'I saw a second neighbour on the floor and I went to help.' A witness from the production company said she saw the attack being carried out.

She said: 'Two colleagues were smoking a cigarette at the bottom of the building. I heard screams and went to the window and saw one of my colleagues stained with blood, being followed by a man with a machete on the street.'

Police and emergency vehicles are pictured at the scene after the gun rampage at the Charlie Hebdo offices in 2015 which left 12 people dead

Premieres Lignes founder Paul Moreira told BFM television that the attacker fled into the metro, and the company's staff members were evacuated.

It is unclear what motivated the attack or whether it had any link to Charlie Hebdo, which moved offices after they were attacked by Islamic extremists in 2015.

The trial has heard that the attackers sought to avenge the Prophet Muhammad, nearly a decade after the magazine published cartoons mocking him.

In a Twitter post yesterday, Charlie Hebdo expressed its 'support and solidarity with its former neighbours... and the people affected by this odious attack.'

Witness Hassani Erwan, 23, told AFP: 'At around midday, we went to have lunch at a restaurant but as we were arriving, the owner started to cry 'leave, leave, there's an attack!'

'We immediately ran away and locked ourselves ourselves inside a shop with four other customers.'

A person who lives on the street told Le Parisien: 'It's starting again, the same fear there was five years ago, the same images in the street, it's heart-breaking.'

Police earlier warned there was 'extreme concern' that those responsible for the stabbings might strike again before the 'main attacker' was arrested.

Local schools in the 3rd, 4th and 11th arrondissements have been shut down, and people are being advised to stay in their offices and homes.

The Kouachi brothers, Cherif (left) and Said (right), entered Charlie Hebdo's premises and carried out the brutal attack five years ago

Valerie Pecresse, president of the Ile-de-France region of Paris, said: 'Extremely shocked by the murderous attack near the former offices of Charlie Hebdo, in a Paris arrondissement which has already paid a heavy price for violent terrorism.

'I give all my support to the authorities which are now tracking the perpetrator.'

Murmurs broke at the terrorism trial as the news of Friday's filtered through to the courtroom.

Charlie Hebdo now publishes from a secret address in Paris, and many staff members have bodyguards.

Moreira, the production company founder, described yesterday how Premieres Lignes had been on the front line of the 2015 massacre.

'We were there during the Charlie Hebdo attack. We were among the first to enter the room, we had helped the survivors.

'We note that there is now the trial of the January 2015 attacks, and that it is the same building. There are people who think that it is still the premises of Charlie Hebdo.'

Following the attacks in 2015, Premieres Lignes staff member Edouard Perrin said they barricaded the entrance to their own offices, and put bulletproof vests on.

'We took refuge on the roof,' said Mr Perrin. 'This is when I start filming on my laptop. There was an exchange of fire between the police and the terrorists coming out of the building. 'Bullets were whistling above our heads. In all, about fifty were shot, and I filmed the last ten shots.

'My fear was that they would see us, come back and finish us. We are journalists and, for them, we are not just civilians.'

This court sketch shows the fourteen accused and their lawyers at the opening of the trial of the accomplices in jihadist killings in 2015

It comes as a trial takes place in the French capital concerned with the January 2015 attacks that shocked the world after 12 people died.

Their primary targets were staff at the satirical magazine which had published a series of cartoons mocking the Prophet Muhammad.

The principal terrorists  who were all known to the French security services  were all gunned down by police themselves, but 14 defendants are currently on trial facing life in prison for 'complicity in terrorism'.

Friday's attack took place close to the old Charlie Hebdo offices, which were attacked by Paris-born brothers Said and Cherif Kouachi in 2015.

It marked the opening of the criminal trial by re-publishing cartoons mocking the Prophet Muhammad.

Critics said the publication had deliberately used blasphemy to stir up hatred against Muslims around the world.

The deeply incendiary images originally led to riots across the Muslim world when they were first published in the Danish daily Jyllands-Posten on September 30, 2005.

Charlie Hebdo then published them in full in 2006, leading its writers and cartoonists to receive regular death threats.

This led up to the atrocities of 2015, when the Kouachis stormed into their offices and opened fire.

A message of solidarity with Charlie Hebdo - containing the popular slogan 'je suis Charlie' (meaning 'I am Charlie') - is laid out in Paris after the attack in 2015

Both ISIS and Al-Qaeda claimed responsibility for the 2015 attacks, which were the beginning of a wave of terrorism across France.

Another defendant is Willy Prevost, a close friend of Coulibaly, who is said to have provided vehicles including a car.

The others on trial are Nezar Mickael, Pastor Alwatik, Amar Ramdan, Said Makhlouf, Mohamed-Amine Fares, Michel Catino, Abdelaziz Abbad, Miguel Martinez and Metin Karasular.

All are accused of providing varying levels of support to the Kouachi brothers and Coulibaly.

The trial is being presided over by five specialised terrorism magistrates, headed by Judge Regis de Jorna.

The entire process will be filmed so that a record can be placed in France's National Archive, but the images will not be broadcast live.
By Michelle Nichols

NEW YORK (Reuters) - As China and the United States feuded at the United Nations this week over COVID-19 and climate, one of the world's smallest states pleaded for detente.

"Micronesia asks our American and Chinese friends to reinforce their cooperation and friendship with each other ... to achieve what is best for our global community," the Federated States of Micronesia President David Panuelo told the U.N. General Assembly in a video address.

Micronesia - with a population of about 113,000 - and its Pacific Island neighbors have long been stuck in a diplomatic tug-of-war between the world's biggest economic powers as China takes on U.S. influence in a region Washington has considered its backyard since World War Two.

During his Friday address to the gathering of world leaders - pre-recorded due to the pandemic - Panuelo acknowledged that competition had been beneficial for some people in the Pacific.

But he warned that the efforts "also potentially threaten to fracture long-standing alliances within our Pacific community, and could become counterproductive to our collective desire for regional solidarity, security, and stability."

The U.S.-Chinese showdown is now playing out at the 193-member United Nations, where Beijing has pushed for greater multilateral influence in a challenge to traditional U.S. leadership. Tensions between the two superpowers have hit boiling point at the world body over the deadly coronavirus pandemic.

Micronesia's plea stood out during the annual - yet virtual - gathering of world leaders at the United Nations this week because while most countries called for unity to combat COVID-19, other references to U.S. and Chinese frictions were generally oblique.

International Crisis Group U.N. director Richard Gowan said most leaders want to avoid getting entangled in the tensions.

"A lot of the U.N.'s members think the U.S. is destructive and China is power-hungry. They don't find either very appealing," he said. "Ambitious Europeans like (French President Emmanuel) Macron see a chance to fill the leadership gap, so they are willing to challenge Beijing and Washington."

Story continues

RIVALRY

Macron addressed the General Assembly on Tuesday after U.S. President Donald Trump demanded that China be held accountable for having "unleashed" COVID-19 on the world, prompting Beijing to accuse him of "lies" and abusing the U.N. platform to provoke a confrontation. [nL5N2GJ4P2]

"The world as it is today cannot come down to simple rivalry between China and the United States, no matter the global weight of these two great powers, no matter the history that binds us together," Macron said.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres also warned the world is heading in a dangerous direction and "cannot afford a future where the two largest economies split the globe in a Great Fracture  each with its own trade and financial rules and internet and artificial intelligence capacities."

In the Pacific, China has been forging stronger economic ties with small island nations, and drawing countries out of their long-term alliances with Taiwan, winning over Kiribati and the Solomon Islands in the past year.

China considers Taiwan its own territory with no right to state-to-state ties. Four of Taiwan's remaining 15 diplomatic allies are in the Pacific - Palau, Nauru, Tuvalu and the Marshall Islands. All four states spoke in support of Taiwan during their leaders' addresses to the United Nations.

Though tiny in land mass, Pacific nations control vast swaths of highly strategic waters, forming a boundary between the Americas and Asia. As oceans warm and sea level rises, they are also on the frontlines of the global climate crisis.

"It is my hope ... that the United States of America and the People's Republic of China jointly champion global causes for global solidarity and cooperation, from climate change to COVID-19," Panuelo said.

(Reporting by Michelle Nichols; Editing by Mary Milliken and Sandra Maler)
A video which is being shared on the internet shows Aamir Khan in full costume, talking to his production team before a shot for his upcoming film Laal Singh Chaddha. Aamir can be seen in a clean-shaven look with his hair styled neatly. He is sporting an orange t-shirt and high-waist blue jeans.

Many fans commented on how young the actor looks in the video clip, and expressed that they can't wait to watch the movie.

Watch the video here.

For those who don't know, Laal Singh Chaddha is a Hindi remake of the Hollywood film Forrest Gump, which starred Tom Hanks in the lead. Aamir will be sharing screen space with Kareena Kapoor Khan. The two will be reuniting on screen after a long time. They were last seen together in the 2012 film Talaash.

Kareena, who is pregnant with her second child, left for Delhi last week with hubby Saif Ali Khan and son Taimur, to shoot her portion in the film before her baby bump becomes evident.

Laal Singh Chaddha is being directed by Advait Chandan with the script written by Atul Kulkarni. Earlier scheduled for a Christmas 2020 release, it was later postponed due to the Coronavirus pandemic. Ajit Andhare, chief operating officer of Viacom18 Studios, said that the film will now release on Christmas 2021. "We will still keep the Christmas date, not 2020, but in 2021. #LaalSinghChaddha. New Release Date. @aamir_khan @Viacom18Studios. All focus on film completion for now!" he had tweeted.

Aamir was last seen in Thugs Of Hindostan, which also starred Amitabh Bachchan, Fatima Sana Shaikh and Katrina Kaif.

ALSO READ: Aamir Khan Thanks Ministry Of Jal Shakti For Recognising 'Paani Foundation' And It's Incredible Work

ALSO READ: Kareena Kapoor Khan Thinks Laal Singh Chaddha Is Aamir Khan and Her Best Work!


The following list includes recent reports from the Midland County Sheriffs Office and the Midland Police Department. Compiled by reporter Mitchell Kukulka.

Monday, Sept. 21

10 p.m.  A deputy was dispatched to the area of M-20 near 9 Mile in Lee Township in reference to a report of a 42-year-old man who allegedly had his leg ran over by a vehicle. Upon investigation, it was learned the man had not been run over at all, they were attempting to corral a cow and they were following the cow in a pickup. The man was riding in the bed of the pickup and was able to get a rope around the cow's head. When the vehicle stopped, the man jumped from the bed of the pickup and landed on uneven ground, injuring his ankle/leg.

8:25 p.m.  A deputy was sent to the City of Coleman for a report of a fire and an argument. Coleman Fire Department arrived and put out the fire, and the deputy arrived a short time later and made contact with the business/property owners, who reported they wanted to contact Coleman Police and file a report with them on the next business day.

5:56 p.m.  A deputy backed a Michigan State Police trooper on a felonious assault complaint in Greendale Township.

12:06 p.m.  A deputy was dispatched to a Geneva Township residence in reference to a car-deer crash.

11:50 a.m.  Deputies responded to a single-vehicle crash in Sanford.

11:22 a.m.  A deputy made contact with a 79-year-old Homer Township woman in reference to suspicious activity at her residence. The woman said an unknown subject has been knocking on her door and windows in the very early morning on weekends. A similar incident was taking place a little over six months ago, and started back up this weekend. The woman said family and friends were going to set up a few trail cameras on her property in an attempt to obtain pictures of the unknown subject. It's suspected the unknown subject(s) may be neighborhood kids, but the complainant is very concerned due to living alone, with the death of her husband last year.

10:16 a.m.  Deputies responded to a Lee Township residence after a 31-year-old man pushed an 18-year-old woman. The woman did not wish to pursue charges. The man said he pushed the woman out of self defense. The parties were separated.

9:38 a.m.  A deputy was dispatched to North Meridian Road near Beech Street in Sanford in reference to a hit-and-run crash. An unknown vehicle traveling northbound on North Meridian Road left the roadway to the left and struck a traffic sign and a parked pick-up truck. The suspect driver failed to report this crash and fled the scene. The report is inactive pending further information.

8:43 a.m.  Deputies responded to a car-deer crash in Larkin Township.

6:01 a.m.  Deputies responded to a car-deer crash in Lee Township.

5:48 a.m.  Deputies responded to a car-deer crash in Ingersoll Township.

Sunday, Sept. 20

9:49 p.m.  Deputies responded to a car-deer crash in Warren Township.

9:07 p.m.  Deputies responded to a car-deer crash in Lee Township.

8:59 p.m.  A homeowner called 9-1-1 to report a man was looking in her window and waving at her. The man also knocked on the door. The homeowner did not know who the man was, so they called 9-1-1. The homeowner called back and said the man had shot a deer and was looking for permission to go onto their property. No deputy response was needed.

8:39 p.m.  Deputies responded to a car-deer crash in Geneva Township.

2:59 p.m.  A 27-year-old Jerome Township woman, reported she was notified by her bank that a check had bounced in her account and she realized a check has been stolen out of her check book. The woman said she has been in contact with her bank, and as of right now, she has not lost any money. The complaint remains under investigation.

1:57 p.m.  A 39-year-old Jerome Township woman reported her 63-year-old mother in-law said she wanted to shoot herself. Deputies spoke with the 63-year-old and it was determined that she was not suicidal and said it out of anger.

11 a.m.  A deputy was dispatched to a Mounty Haley Township residence to complete a car-deer crash report, which occurred earlier in the morning.

7:34 a.m.  A subject failed to pay for $17.99 in gas from a Sanford station.

7:34 a.m.  A subject failed to pay for $41.19 in gas from a Sanford station.

4:45 a.m.  Deputies were dispatched to a Warren Township residence in reference to a suicidal 17-year-old female. Deputies spoke with the teen and her mother, and she was transported by EMS to the hospital for evaluation.

4:36 a.m.  Deputies responded to a Porter Township address in reference to a domestic assault. A 39-year-old woman assaulted her 42-year-old husband. The husband had minor injuries, but refused EMS. The woman was arrested and transported to Midland County Jail without incident.
In memory of Gamini View(s):

Gamini Fonseka, who is known as a the Crown king of Sri Lankas silver screen died on September 30, 2004

Born on March 21, 1936 Gamini joined cinema as an assistant to Willie Blake who was doing Rekhawa (Silver Line) with Dr. Lester James Peries. Over the years he has played over 100 films and won Presidential, Sarasavi and OCIC awards. In addition to being an actor Gamini joined direction with Parasathu Mal in 1966 and he made over 10 films until he made his last Anthima Re in 1998.

The 16th death remembrance of Gamini will take place on September 30 at 6 pm at the National Film Corporation and the event will be followed by a screening of one of Gaminis films.

Compiled by Susitha Fernando
Nepal's cases jumped to 71,821 after 1,207 new cases were reported on Saturday while the death toll increased to 467 with eight new fatalities.

According to the Ministry of Health and Population, so far, 53,013 COVID-19 patients have recovered, 1,147 of them in the past 24 hours.

The Kathmandu Valley has recorded the highest number of cases with 724 new infections in the past 24 hours.

The government lifted restrictions on long-haul transportation last week. Domestic flights, too, resumed operations after six months on Monday.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Police in Tokyo have arrested a former member of the popular Japanese male pop group TOKIO for allegedly riding a motorcycle while under the influence of alcohol.

The police say they arrested 48-year-old Yamaguchi Tatsuya on Tuesday after he hit a car waiting at a traffic light. An amount of alcohol nearly five times the legal limit was detected in his breath when they were called to the scene.

Neither the driver of the car nor Yamaguchi were injured.

Investigative sources say Yamaguchi told them he was on his way to a friend's house, and admitted to riding a motorbike under the influence and causing the accident.

Yamaguchi was fired by his agency in May 2018 for molesting a high school girl he invited to his house.

He told a news conference at the time that he had been drunk and his lack of self-discipline had led to the incident.
Labour has a three-point lead over the Conservatives, according to a new poll, putting Sir Keir Starmer above Boris Johnson for the first time.

The survey, by Opinium for the Observer newspaper, put Labour on 42 per cent, with the Tories on 39 per cent.

It is the first time Labour has been ahead of the Government since early July 2019, when Theresa May's time in office was coming to an end.

The poll also suggested 55 per cent of voters believe Sir Keir is ready to be prime minister, and 40 per cent believe Labour is ready to form the next government.

It is the latest poll to suggest unease among voters at Mr Johnson's handling of the coronavirus crisis.

In the early stages of the pandemic, 65 per cent of voters surveyed backed the Government's handling of Covid-19, but the latest poll suggested only 30 per cent now approve.

The survey, by Opinium for the Observer newspaper, put Labour on 42 per cent, with the Tories on 39 per cent

It is the latest poll to suggest unease among voters at Mr Johnson's handling of the coronavirus crisis

It comes at a rough time for Mr Johnson as his enemies spread false rumours about a split from Carrie Symonds and friends mutter about his health.

The Prime Minister also faces rebellions from the Chancellor, Tory MPs - and even his own children.

'We thought  uh-oh, trouble at t'mill,' said one Tory MP. 'He's got enough to worry about without a break-up as well.'

Rumours of a split are dismissed by the couple's friends, who blame Boris's growing legion of political enemies for spreading the claims to 'destabilise' him. It comes at a time when Tory MPs  and even his own Chancellor  are in revolt over the economic devastation caused by Covid laws, as mutterings grow louder about the state of the Prime Minister's mental, physical and financial health.

'For God's sake, she is surely allowed to go on holiday?' says one. 'And he is quite busy, you know. Imagine what they would have said if he had taken the time off to be with her.'

The pictures of 32-year-old Ms Symonds relaxing at the 600-a-night Grand Hotel Tremezzo on Lake Como carried uncomfortable echoes for some MPs of Princess Diana posing in front of the Taj Mahal in 1992, sending a signal to the world about her doomed marriage to Prince Charles.

Boris Johnson's girlfriend Carrie Symonds was pictured enjoying a holiday in Italy without the Prime Minister

But while Diana engineered the situation to her own advantage, insiders say that Ms Symonds  who was pictured with their four-month-old son, Wilfred, strapped to her front  was just enjoying a private break with friends after a gruelling few months.

Even Boris's closest allies do not, however, dispute that the Prime Minister is caught in a vortex of professional and personal problems which are without precedent in recent political history.

So far this year, he has endured a ruinously expensive divorce, a brush with death and then fatherhood at the age of 56  all while battling the lingering after effects of coronavirus, trying to limit the damage inflicted by the pandemic and preparing for a possible No Deal Brexit at the end of December.

No 10 was furious over a briefing last weekend which described Mr Johnson as having 'misery etched on his face' because he was weighed down by the financial burden of supporting six children and missing his ex-wife, Marina Wheeler.

A former adviser to Mr Johnson, who has remained close to Ms Wheeler, is being blamed for the 'brutal and personal' attack, with one source claiming they had already 'confessed and apologised'.

While the claim that the Prime Minister was struggling to get by on his 150,000 salary was greeted with scepticism, there is no doubt that he has paid an emotional price for his divorce, with his four children with Ms Wheeler struggling to varying degrees to accept his relationship with Ms Symonds.

Tory MPs are in revolt over the economic devastation caused by Covid laws, as mutterings grow louder about the state of the Prime Minister's mental, physical and financial health

One source said: 'It must be painful for Boris to have finally made it to No 10 without his children being around. The contrast with Tony Blair, who was always posing with his kids on the steps of No 10, is stark. It is deeply unfair, because he has worked so hard to provide for them.'

Shortly after Mr Johnson became Conservative leader last year, he caused mystification in the Commons after he was seen sprinting from the Despatch Box at 12.45pm and running straight out of Parliament. It later emerged that he was frantic because he was late for lunch with his daughter.

The private angst comes as he faces the extraordinarily complex challenges of the Covid pandemic, with tribes of rebellious Tory MPs managing to make the Government's 80-strong majority look uncomfortably slim.

Sir Graham Brady, chairman of the backbench 1922 Committee, has led the opposition to Ministers 'ruling by decree' over Covid regulations, while Chancellor Rishi Sunak is making increasingly muscular objections from within the Cabinet to the restrictions.

In the run-up to his decision last week to impose a 10pm curfew on pubs and restaurants, Mr Johnson was forced to mediate between Mr Sunak, who fears the restrictions are causing irreparable damage to the economy, and the pro-lockdown lobby led by Health Secretary Matt Hancock and Cabinet Office Minister Michael Gove.

At a Covid 'quad' meeting on Friday, September 18  Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab is the other member  Mr Sunak effectively blocked Mr Johnson when he proposed a two-week 'circuit-breaking' lockdown.

While No 10 and No 11 both deny the Chancellor implied that the issue was a 'resignation matter', his opposition was sufficient to force, at a subsequent meeting last Sunday, the idea of a 10pm curfew as a compromise measure.

When the issue was put to the full Cabinet on Tuesday, resistance flared again when Business Secretary Alok Sharma and Environment Secretary George Eustice suggested that it would be safer to taper the curfew with last orders at 10pm, rather than force everyone on to the streets at the same time.

Aline Nassif, a former colleague from Ms Symonds' time working as a media adviser to John Whittingdale when he was Culture Secretary, joined Ms Symonds in Italy

But Mr Gove insisted that there should be a strict 10pm 'guillotine'.

Complicating Mr Johnson's decisions are the different tribes of increasingly fearless Tory backbenchers, who  despite being unable to bitch and plot in now-shuttered Commons bars  are using private messaging sites to share their frustrations.

One tribe, which calls itself the 'Common Sense' group, has held meetings with Chief Whip Mark Spencer to express anger at the 'control freakery' exerted over the Prime Minister by scientific advisers such as Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty.

The 50-strong membership, which includes former Transport Minister Sir John Hayes and former Chancellor Lord Lamont, told No 10 that it was being too 'passive and reactive' in the crisis.

As one former chief whip says: 'My advice to Boris and No 10 is to treat the views of the chairman of the 1922 Committee with at least the same level of respect as they accord to those of any scientist, medic or special adviser on this matter. They need to reverse-ferret as soon as possible.'

The Common Sense group have also complained about the lack of legislation to tackle the problem of Channel migrants, and urged Ministers to be more 'anti-woke' on issues such as the ban on Rule, Britannia! at the Last Night of the Proms and 'unconscious bias training'. Some Tory MPs fear that the combination of political and personal problems could even lead to Mr Johnson quitting before the next election.

As one MP, who was alarmed by the pictures of Ms Symonds holidaying alone, says: 'Would even Churchill have been able to cope without Clementine?'

Some MPs also make unsubstantiated claims that Ms Symonds, an environmental campaigner, 'interferes' in the running of the country by marching into ministerial meetings to thrust Wilfred into his arms and being 'more interested in badgers than Brexit'.

But her friends paint a picture of a young woman adapting to life in an intense public gaze, who needs to escape the pressures of No 10 by relaxing with trusted friends.

She was joined on her Italian holiday by feminist campaigner Nimco Ali, who has been at her side throughout her time in Downing Street, and Aline Nassif, a former colleague from Ms Symonds' time working as a media adviser to John Whittingdale when he was Culture Secretary.

Ms Nassif is now the global head of communications for Bechtel, the American construction giant responsible for UK infrastructure projects such as Crossrail.

One friend said: 'All of these whispering campaigns are just plain nasty. Carrie is a young woman and a relatively new mum. It seems to all be being done to upset Carrie, which in turn upsets Boris. It's baffling that anyone would do this to her.'

They argue that becoming 'First Lady' has been a shock to her. The friend added: 'She might have been involved in politics for some time but finding yourself in the limelight isn't easy for anyone.

'This time two years ago nobody knew who she was. Being caught taking her holiday is something Carrie took on the chin but there is a certain mystery surrounding how she and her friends were found.

'She clearly had no idea that there were any members of the paparazzi around. Women tend to do their hair if they know they will be seen.'

After arriving home from Lake Como last Thursday, the couple spent Friday together in their No 10 flat, and were planning to spend this weekend together with Wilfred and dog Dilyn.

The friend concluded: 'She and Boris are very happy together. The only time they're not really together is when he is off working as the Prime Minister.'
Spelling out the next challenge for India in fighting the coronavirus pandemic, Serum Institute of India (SII) CEO Adar Poonawalla on Saturday asked if the central government has Rs 80,000 crore to spend over the next one year on purchase and distribution of Covid-19 vaccines.

Quick question; will the government of India have 80,000 crores available, over the next one year? Because thats what @MoHFW_INDIA needs, to buy and distribute the vaccine to everyone in India. This is the next concerning challenge we need to tackle, Poonawalla tweeted, tagging the Prime Ministers Office (PMO) as well.

Quick question; will the government of India have 80,000 crores available, over the next one year? Because that's what @MoHFW_INDIA needs, to buy and distribute the vaccine to everyone in India. This is the next concerning challenge we need to tackle. @PMOIndia Adar Poonawalla (@adarpoonawalla) September 26, 2020

The Pune-based Serum Institute of India, the worlds largest vaccine maker by number of doses produced, is working on several vaccine candidates for the novel coronavirus, including potentially mass-producing the one from AstraZeneca-Oxford University that has garnered global headlines, as well as developing its own.

The firm is also doing the clinical trials of AstraZenecas vaccine candidate in India. It received approval from the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) to resume local clinical trials of the vaccine candidate on September 16, after a weeks halt following serious side effect in a trial participant in the UK.

The Serum Institute had entered into a manufacturing partnership with AstraZeneca to produce and supply 1 billion doses of the Covid-19 vaccine. In August, it had signed a deal with US drug developer Novavax to produce a minimum of one billion doses of its vaccine candidate, when approved, for low- and middle-income countries and India. The deal was recently doubled to two billion doses annually.

Health minister Harsh Vardhan had told the recently concluded Monsoon Session of Parliament that nearly 30 Covid vaccine candidates in pre-clinical and clinical stages are under development in India. Three of them are in advanced stage of Phase I/II/III trials and 4 are in advanced pre-clinical development stage, he had said, adding that distribution of the Covid-19 vaccines, when available, would be done as per the protocols under Universal Immunization Program (UIP).

The government had in May allocated Rs 100 crore to support vaccine development from the PM Cares corpus set up in March to raise funds for a prolonged battle against the coronavirus.

Indias Covid-19 outbreak is the fastest growing in the world, with the tally sprinting past 59 lakh on Saturday and the death toll mounting to 93,379.
The Union government has ordered early procurement of paddy in Punjab and Haryana at minimum support prices, a move widely seen as being aimed at reassuring agitating farmers about the sanctity of the procurement system through notified market yards run by agricultural produce market committees (APMC).

Harvests of paddy, the key summer-sown staple, have begun arriving at mandis, or APMC markets in Punjab and Haryana, prompting the government to start the procurement process through the Food Corporation of India, a government order said on Saturday. In other states, procurement of paddy will begin on October 1, it added.

Interestingly, protests against the recently passed farm reform bills have been the most intense in these two states.

Agencies including the Food Corporation of India are in a state of readiness for smoothly undertaking procurement operations, a government notification said.

Also read| MSP not most preferred mode for farmers in Uttar Pradesh: NITI Aayog study

In view of early arrival of paddy in the mandis of Haryana and Punjab, Government of India has approved the commencement of procurement operations for paddy/rice immediately in both these states from today i.e. with effect from 26th September, 2020 to ensure that farmers are facilitated in selling their produce at Minimum Support Price (MSP) expeditiously, the notification added.

The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has pushed three farm bills through Parliament to deregulate the trade in agricultural commodities. The Opposition has accused the government of passing the controversial farm reforms in a haste without scrutiny of a parliamentary select panel.

Also read: Heres why farm protests have been loudest in Punjab, Haryana

Farmers on Friday blocked roads and rail lines in protest against the bills. The reforms will replace a socialist-era regime that required farmers to sell their crops to licensed middlemen at state-run APMC market yards.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has called the bills historic, insisting that freer trade will benefit farmers by allowing better price discovery in newer tax-free markets, where they will be able to engage with buyers outside the APMC system.

Also read: Paddy procurement to commence in Haryana from Sept 27

The reforms have stoked anxieties among farmers  particularly in the food-bowl states of Punjab and Haryana  about whether the state-owned Food Corporation of India will continue to buy agricultural products at minimum support prices set by the government.

The government has targeted to procure 31% of total paddy from Haryana and Punjab. It has targeted to procure 113 lakh tonnes of rice from Punjab and 44 lakh tonnes from Haryana during the kharif procurement season. Total rice procurement target has been set at 495.37 lakh tonnes for the whole country for the 2020-21 kharif season.

This is the second procurement-related move taken by the government to reassure protesting farmers in recent days. On September 21, it made an advance announcement of MSPs for several winter-grown crops.

Economists have said liberalising farm trade is critical to boosting productivity and bring private investment in post-harvest infrastructure to increase rural incomes.

The broader reforms are aimed at corporatisation of the agriculture sector, which need not be a bad word. Ultimately, there has to be a market clearing mechanism for agricultural trade. The government clearly wants to send out a message that, despite the reforms, MSPs and the procurement mechanism will remain intact, said R Mani of the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 18:00:07|Editor: huaxia

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Peerzada Arshad Hamid

NEW DELHI, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Tens of thousands of farmers in several Indian states took to roads and railway tracks Saturday for the third day of their protests against the government's recently passed farm bills.

They have threatened to intensify the protests if the government does not repeal the bills.

Nationwide protests were called for by a group of farmers' organizations. Opposition parties including the Indian National Congress party as well as central trade unions have voiced their support for the farmers.

Three farm bills were passed by both houses of the Indian parliament during the recently concluded Monsoon session and will become law soon after the President's approval, a formality.

According to the federal government, the move will open up the tightly-controlled agriculture sector to free-market forces and will make easier for farmers to sell their products directly to private buyers and to enter into the contract with private companies anywhere in the country.

The government hopes private sector investments will stimulate growth. However, farmers fear that the new bills will lead to the entry of private players and corporates, with small farmers being pushed to the wall.

"The new bills will eventually end the role of Mandis (wholesale markets) and assured prices," said Kulwinder Singh, a farmer in Punjab.

To subdue the vociferous nationwide protests, Prime Minister Narendra Modi hailed the farm bills as "historic" and hit out at the opposition for misleading the farmers for political gain.

Massive protests against the farm bills broke out in Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal as well as Karnataka on Friday.

More than 265 farmers' groups affiliated with the All India Kisan Sangharsh Coordination Committee (AIKSCC) took part in the protests, alongside with about 100 non-affiliated groups, AIKSCC General Secretary Avik Saha said.

"I have received inputs from organizing secretaries that protests were held at around 20,000 spots nationwide," he added.

On Saturday a group of bare-chested protesters in Punjab sat on the railway track and chanted slogans against the federal government, demanding withdrawal of farm bills.

The railway authorities have cancelled over two dozen trains in Punjab amid the farmers' protests in three days.

Reports said farmers also gathered in Uttar Pradesh's Noida, which borders the national capital New Delhi on Friday, prompting the deployment of police in riot gear to keep them from crossing the border. In parts of Uttar Pradesh protesters also led to the blockade of several roads.

On Sunday the upper house of the Indian parliament passed two of the controversial bills amid stiff opposition. The lawmakers from opposition parties accused the government of flouting the parliamentary procedure by passing the bills hurriedly and not listening to their demand of sending the bills to a parliamentary committee for further deliberations.

The stand-off led to the suspension of eight opposition members who staged a sit-in outside the parliament through Monday night.

Meanwhile, the Congress party on Saturday launched a "Speak up for farmers" campaign on social media protesting the farm bills. Enditem
A rainbow of tents and fresh, seasonal vegetables returned Saturday morning to Marion Square for the first time this year but without the usual accompanying jump castles, food trucks and live music.

The Charleston Farmers Market was back at the central downtown location from 8 a.m. to noon in an essentials-only format driven by the coronavirus pandemic, which diluted the typically bustling event.

Instead of stretching kitty-corner from the fountain on King Street to the bicycle rack on Meeting Street and featuring a variety of 85 to 115 vendors, the market included just seven farm vendors and a limited capacity to 250 browsers at a time along Tobacco Street.

The brick avenue that stretches perpendicular to Meeting and King streets housed hand sanitizer stations on either end, with one-way traffic and mask mandates being enforced. In its limited format, a steady flow of approximately 1,200 attendees still made their way through during the four hours of operation, according to Farmers Market Coordinator Harrison Chapman.

Chapman found himself in an unprecedented situation while navigating the new farmers market format these past few months.

"The way we have things set up right now is designed for people to come pick up their produce and leave," he said. "It's the absolute opposite of what I've been doing over the last eight years, where I was always trying to keep people longer."

He's worked with a special safety task force and the city of Charleston to plan out the configuration.

Mayor John Tecklenburg and his wife, Sandy, purchased seven red potatoes from Joseph Fields Farms around 9 a.m.

"The produce looks delicious, it looks great," said the mayor, who was carrying a bag full of fresh finds. "I mean did you see those vegetables? Everything looks so good."

He said that the city would continue to expand the market and get it back to where it was before.

"We've just got to do it safely," he added.

For some of the featured farmers, this wasn't their first time selling at the Charleston Farmers Market this year. A few participated in an even smaller essentials-only market on Wednesday evenings in the Joe Riley Jr. Stadium parking lot.

Those markets were mostly a bust because of the new location with less foot traffic, time of week and stormy weather.

"It rained almost every single Wednesday except the last one," Chapman said. "The weather was not doing us any favors."

Joseph Fields was already itching for a longer stint at Marion Square as the gates opened at 8 a.m. Saturday.

"We need six hours, at least, and traffic going both ways, not just one," said Fields, who was selling baskets of tomatoes, squash, okra and collards, among other fresh finds.

Chapman said the one-way route was developed to ensure 6-foot social distancing between parties and to control crowds.

Maria Denaro of Tiverton Farms in Moncks Corner, known for their unique herb and spice blends, said she missed not only the business that the market generates but also the camaraderie with other vendors who have become her family.

Luckily for Denaro, who is on voluntary leave as a flight attendant and only a part-time grower and seller, refurbishing an in-progress brick-and-mortar store has been her focus during the pandemic. The farm's online sales of non-perishables have also been plentiful; her customers are often tourists who first discovered her booth in Marion Square while visiting and then later made repeat purchases.

Rebecca Bills of R&R Acres in the Francis Marion National Forest was selling honey and fresh shrimp, though the attraction of the day at her booth was her daughter Trinity's bearded dragon, Lemon, who was receiving plenty of pets between hand sanitizer pumps.

Bills said though the smaller setup might not be what people were used to, it was vital to the independent business owners like her who are trying to support their families.

"I'm really missing the crafters and artisans," Bills said. "There are a lot of small businesses not being supported by the city right now that I hope will be soon."

Chapman said that prepared food vendors and artisans would be assessed for future markets but were not considered essential currently. A holiday market for those vendors is being planned.

Farrah Ibraham, who was staying at The Dewberry hotel across the street while visiting from Alabama, said she usually tries to find a farmers market wherever she travels and this one was a delight with its variety of fresh fruits. She bought some blackberries and peaches to snack on during her roadtrip to Asheville later in the day.

Market frequenters like Charleston resident Lee Tawes were ready for the Marion Square return. Tawes said he felt safe in the spaced-out outdoor location "as long as everybody follows the rules."

"It's much safer and more practical than any Walmart will ever be," Bills of R&R Acres said.
Reliance Group Chairman Anil Ambani, while appearing before a high court in London, said he sold all his jewellery to pay legal fees and that his expenses are being borne by his wife and family. He appeared via videolink in a case perused by three Chinese banks against the businessman in London.

Anil Ambani, who's the younger brother of Asia's richest man Mukesh Ambani, said that the reports about him driving expensive cars were "speculations" by media. Ambani said during his hearing that he has even taken loans from his mother and son.

Ambani was asked various questions about his assets, expenses and total liabilities for more than three hours. Though Anil Ambani had sought that the matter should be held in private, the request was declined by the court.

He had appeared under Rule 71, which necessitates the judgement debtor to be resent in the court hearing. The judge even went on to say during the proceedings that Ambani had requested a private hearing to save himself from "embarrassment".

Notably, the three Chinese banks -- Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Ltd Mumbai Branch, China Development Bank and Exim Bank of China -- have so far got judgement debt worth $717 million in the $900 million loan case.

Also read: RCom loan default case: Anil Ambani tells London court his net worth is 'zero'

The UK court in May had directed Ambani to pay nearly $717 million to three Chinese banks as part of a loan agreement in 21 days. These three banks had given loans worth $925 million to Anil Ambani's Reliance Communications in 2012 on his personal guarantee.

When Anil Ambani failed to pay the said amount, the UK court asked information regarding all witnesses and his personal assets worth over $100,000. To know his actual expenses, the court also sought details about his two-year credit card statements.

Bankim Thanki, who represented the three Chinese banks, said the list of his witnesses and assets was incomplete. He even pointed out to shopping done by Ambani using his credit card from luxurious stores like Harrods, Dolce and Gabbana and Harvey Nichols, reported Times of India. Notably, there was no recent shopping done using the credit card. Anil Ambani denied that he used his credit card, and said that his mother had done the shopping.

Also read: UK court directs Anil Ambani to pay $717 million to Chinese banks

Rejecting claims that he lives a lavish lifestyle and had gifted a yacht to his wife Tina Ambani, he claimed that he is seasick and has not used it for years. These reports are based on media speculations only, he said. "I am 61-year-old man, I lead a very disciplined life. I do not drink or smoke," he said.

Thanki also told the court that Ambani received a loan worth Rs 500 crore from his mother and his son Anmol, to which he said he was not aware of its actual "terms" and conditions.

Ambani was also asked about his love of expensive art and exhibition he and his wife conducted with Christie's. Anil Ambani replied saying he only owns one piece of art and that the event with Christie's was a part of his wife Tina Ambani's involvement with the Harmony Foundation.

Thanki also asked him about the help he receives from his brother Mukesh Ambani. He even said that the size of his legal team and lifestyle point towards the fact that he must have other sources of income, to which Ambani said: "Everything has been disclosed".

The Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Ltd, Mumbai Branch, on behalf of the three Chinese banks, had earlier sought the summary judgment against Ambani over an alleged breach of a personal guarantee on a debt refinancing loan of around $925 million in February 2012.

Ambani denied providing authority for any such guarantee, resulting in the High Court action in the UK.

Also read: RCom, Reliance Infra resolution will help settle SBI, Chinese banks' debt, says Anil Ambani
By Laman Ismayilova

Azerbaijan has been successfully represented at Kiev's Ethno Cultural Festival. The event gathered representatives of various nationalities living in Ukraine.

National pavilion featured traditional carpets, clothes, books, musical instruments and colorful paintings, the State Committee on Work with Diaspora reported.

The pavilion was organized with the support of the United Diaspora of Ukraine Azerbaijanis (UDUA).

The design of the pavilion, samples of national music, dance and delicious Azerbaijani cuisine left no one indifferent.

At the festival, the ensemble "Caucasus" led by Nijat Mirzayev thrilled the audience with national dances. Moreover, Azerbaijani artist Asgar Javadov gave a master class as part of the festival.

The head of UDUA Hikmet Javadov said that the artist has done a great job in the design of ancient and modern images of Baku.

"We thank everyone who contributed this event, especially Askar Javadov and Nijat Mirzayev. In our opinion, the Azerbaijani Diaspora was represented in this festival at a high level," Javadov said.

--

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 20:52:18|Editor: huaxia

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HARARE, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- The University of Zimbabwe is playing a vital role in helping to respond to a shortage of hand sanitizers and Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) needed to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

Production of hand sanitizers by Zimbabwe's premier and oldest university kicked off at the onset of the pandemic in March in response to government's call for local institutions of higher learning to create solutions to the country's challenges.

The government made available an initial 1.3 million U.S. dollars in seed capital to institutions with engineering and technical capacity to make PPEs needed to address a national shortage.

Bringing together technical expertise across a broad range of disciplines, the university is now producing about 60,000 liters of hand sanitizer a day, with the number expected to increase as new measures to rump up production are being put in place.

Obert Jiri, the Coordinator in the Sanitizer and PPE production, said the university has made a significant contribution in plugging the shortage of anti COVID-19 materials in the country.

"We have contributed quite a bit to the fight against COVID-19, I think we move at least two truckloads of sanitizers and disinfectants, we move quite a bit of masks and also the hospital gowns and other PPEs that are used," he said.

The university produces a minimum of 5,000 masks a day and has also utilized its students to contribute in terms of technical expertise and in the production of PPEs.

The initiative dovetails with government efforts to shift focus from producing employment seeking university graduates into producing entrepreneurs that can help improve industrial production and create employment.

Previously, the education system in Zimbabwe, which was rated as Higher and Tertiary Education 3.0, focused more on teaching, research and community service. A newly adopted model, HTE 5.0 focuses on problem solving and value creation.

Jiri said in line with HTE 5.0, the university has moved from teaching, community service and writing papers into innovation and industrialization.

"So what you have seen here and what we produce are really products of our intellectual prowess within the university, the formulations that we have of the sanitizers, of the detergents, the designs that we have of the masks, of various PPEs, so these were things that were generally there in terms of intellectual knowledge and prowess, but now we have moved from just having knowledge in books and textbooks and papers into tangible goods and services which you will see here and which we now produce," he said.

Jiri said early fruits of the shift in focus was the technical expertise that the university has made towards mitigating against the COVID-19 pandemic.

Besides providing desperately needed materials for the prevention of the coronavirus, the initiative has now fully gone commercial.

"So we are not going to stop here, we are not going to stop with COVID-19. That's why you find that our products range is not only based on sanitizers, disinfectants and PPEs, but we have moved into hand washing, into liquid soaps, including work suits and so forth so that we are an industry that produces various goods and services," he said.

Jiri said the commercialization of education to make the institution self-sustainable was already in the cards long before the pandemic.

Mavis Rufaro Chikoore, a lecturer in the Department of Textiles Engineering and also a project manager, said the production for PPEs started as a way of plugging a shortage gap in the advent of the pandemic.

"We started off with face masks, we could not produce the disposable ones because we don't have the machinery, but with the knowledge of textiles engineering, we started off producing the reusable ones, and we found these of great importance to our nation in that they were not just used once and thrown away, they can be used several times, and they are washable and they are affordable as compared to the imported disposable ones," she said.

Chikoore said the local demand of PPEs remain high, and currently, the university is making 23 different types of PPEs which include face masks, theater caps, theater gowns, gloves and overshoes.

To date the university has produced over 400,000 face masks, about a million theater caps, and tens of thousands of theater gowns.

Chikoore said the major take-away from the efforts being done by the university is that it is possible for local industries to produce goods and services instead of entirely relying on imports.

The government believes institutions of higher learning play a pivotal role in building a knowledge-based economy required to spearhead its efforts to transform Zimbabwe into an upper-middle-income society by 2030.

The country has already made giant strides in line with that vision by setting up innovation hubs across the country's major tertiary institutions which will support research and development of concepts that can then be put into use in resuscitating the country's industry. Enditem




A reservoir dam near North Korea's Yongbyon nuclear complex has been breached, a U.S. think tank has said, citing recent satellite imagery.







The reduced water level has left the two pump houses servicing the reactors "high and dry," with the water level above the dam down significantly and the intake cisterns exposed, said 38 North, which specializes in North Korea.







"The inability to maintain a stable reservoir level ... poses a potential problem for continuous reactor operations" if the 5-megawatt nuclear reactor is restarted or the Experimental Light Water Reactor is brought online, 38 North said, citing satellite imagery of Yongbyon complex on Sept. 21.







The complex is home to the 5-megawatt nuclear reactor that was the source of weapons-grade plutonium for North Korea. Pyongyang can harvest one nuclear bomb worth of plutonium by reprocessing spent fuel rods from the reactor.







The U.S. website said there are no observable indications that the 5-megawatt nuclear reactor is operating or that the Experimental Light Water Reactor has been started. (Yonhap)


With the Election Commission of India set to take a call on the programme for by-elections in different states on September 29, political activities have gathered momentum in Uttar Pradesh.

Chief minister Yogi Adityanath on Saturday sounded the BJPs poll bugle and visited two of the eight assembly seats where the by-polls are due.

As this will be like a mini-assembly election in the state, the stakes are high for both the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Opposition. The BJP had earlier bagged six of eight assembly seats that are now likely to go to polls. The remaining two seats were with the Samajwadi Party. The Bahujan Samaj Partys decision to contest the by-elections will make the fight interesting on all the seats.

As a political party, we are consistently in touch with the people. We have the governments achievements to take to the people. We are sure to perform well in the by-poll, said UP BJP general secretary Vijay Pathak.

Also read: Congress steps up attack on govt on labour codes, says it has removed security net for workers

Pathaks assertions are, however, strongly countered by the SP and the Congress. While Yogi reached Malhani assembly constituency of Jaunpur and addressed BJP workers there at a meeting in a local school and reviewed preparations for the by-polls, the Samajwadi Party accused him of making attempts to mislead the people by misusing his office.

The chief minister may be only trying to mislead the people by misuse of power. The Samajwadi Party has been preparing for the by-poll for some time and SP national president Akhilesh Yadav will soon announce the partys candidates for the by-polls, said SP spokesman Rajendra Chaudhary.

The BJP governments announcements have no meaning. The party has failed on the promise of giving jobs to the youth and the dues of sugarcane growers are yet to be cleared. If the chief minister is serious about the cause of farmers, he should start the Betalpur sugar mill of Deoria that has been lying closed, Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee president Ajay Kumar Lallu said.

For his part, Yogi Adityanath called upon the party workers to focus on the booth level.

Focus on strengthening each and every booth. If we win the booth, we will win the election, he said.

Jaunpur has been the karmbhoomi of Pt Deendayal Upadhyay. The previous governments ignored this district and the desired development did not take place here. The BJP government is committed to ensuring development. This is the government of all. Our aim is to develop and respect all, he said in Jaunpur before proceeding to Deoria on Saturday.

On Friday, the chief minister had laid foundation stones of a number of development projects in a video conference from Lucknow.

Out of the eight seats likely to go for by-polls, five fell vacant following the death of the assemblys sitting members, including two ministers Kamal Rani Varun (Ghatampur in Kanpur Nagar district) and Chetan Chauhan (Naugawan Sadat in Amroha district), BJPs Janmejaya Singh (Deoria Sadar), Veerendra Singh Sirohi (Bulandshahar) and Samajwadi Partys Paras Nath Yadav (Malhani in Jaunpur). The other seats include the one held by BJP member Kuldeep Singh Sengar (Bangarmau in Unnao). Sengar was disqualified after he was sentenced to a life imprisonment in a rape case.

The Swar seat was declared vacant after the Allahabad High Court declared the election of SPs Mohammad Abdullah Azam invalid. The Tundla assembly seat of Firozabad was declared vacant on June 4, 2019, following the resignation of UP minister SP Singh Baghel when he was elected to the Lok Sabha from the Agra seat. The by-election to the Tundla seat could not be held so far because of a pending petition.
Actor Anupam Kher has taken a break from social media. He shared a post on Instagram saying that he is undergoing spiritual maintenance and will not be available for a while.

He wrote on Instagram: I am observing #SocialMediaDetox for the next few days ! :) The text on the accompanying picture read: Temporarily closed for spiritual maintenance.

Anupam is otherwise very active on social media platforms including Instagram and Twitter. On September 24, he had posted a video of himself on a scooter and written: One day before we start the shoot of our film #TheLastShow my director @vivekagnihotri at the rehearsal, asks me what am I feeling! Here is my answer! We start tomorrow early morning! Your best wishes will help. By the way this is my 517th film!! Grimacing face. Folded hands. Smiling face with heart-shaped eyes #MagicOfCinema #ActorLife.

In the video, he was asked how he felt as the team visited a place in Bhopal for location familiarity. Anupam suggested he had butterflies (in his stomach) and that he was nervous to face the camera after a gap of seven months. He also said how mobile cameras are nothing compared to cameras used on film sets. The voice on the other side joked about how an actors nervousness is a directors asset, to which Anupam agreed and added you directors thrive on it. Anupam then added how it was a new genre of cinema that they would be working on in The Last Show. He ended it by saying that it was beginning of a new era as an actor for him.

Also read: Rakul Preet Singh explains to NCB what doob reference in WhatsApp chats with Rhea Chakraborty meant: report

Before he left for Bhopal, he shared two pictures with his old friend, Anil Kapoor and wrote: Thank you my friend @AnilKapoor for blessing me before I left for Bhopal for the shoot of #TheLastShow. Will follow your tips. Hope you dont share same acting tips with our other friend @satishkaushik2!! You need to be biased in this case. Please. You are the BESTEST!!

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Seven crew members on board a ship anchored off Western Australia's northwest coast have tested positive to Covid-19.

The cases follow those of two men taken off the bulk carrier on Friday, which has been anchored nine nautical miles off Port Hedland since September 16.

In total, 20 Filipino nationals and the captain were on board the Patricia Oldendorff and it is expected more may yet test positive.

The seven new cases have to remain on board as they are part of a skeleton crew of nine to keep it operational.

WA Health Minister Roger Cook said on Saturday their symptoms were minor or non-existent and would be monitored.

Nine crew on board the Patricia Oldendorff have tested positive with 20 crew members still on board anchored nine nautical miles off Port Hedland

However, he warned there was a risk of a massive new outbreak if the ship was not contained, as cases numbers were expected to grow.

'If it gets out into the community it will create a disaster, worse than what we've seen in Melbourne,' he said.

The evacuated crew members, including the two positive cases identified on Friday, are in hotel quarantine in Port Hedland.

Mr Cook said 'every safety measure is being put in place' so the local community should not be concerned.

'These crew do not currently need medical treatment but should it be required, every precaution is in place to protect healthcare workers and members of the public,' he said.

Private security guards are being used in hotel quarantine in Port Hedland, as in Perth, which prompted questions in light of the failures of private security in Victoria.

Mr Cook told reporters there was a 'world of difference' between WA and Victoria.

'All our security guards are trained in infection control otherwise they cannot be on site,' he said.

'We have our own people on the sites making sure that they can supervise the security guards.'

Infected crew are taken off the ship to hospital in Port Hedland

It is expected the two skeleton crew who have tested negative for the virus may well contract it in due course or have already had it, so serology tests are being done.

Arrangements are being made for a replacement skeleton crew to be available to allow for a deep clean of the ship.

A rapid response team is being led by experienced doctor Tudor Codreanu, who also managed COVID-19 outbreaks on board the Artania cruise liner and Al-Kuwait livestock ship earlier this year.

The ship left the Philippines on September 5 with a fresh crew, indicating the virus came from that country, Mr Cook said.

The seven new cases have not been attributed to WA's Saturday case-count but will be included in Sunday's numbers.

One case was recorded in WA on Saturday - an Australian traveller in hotel quarantine.
B order Force is planning to buy two jet skis to help agents patrol the channel after migrant crossings spiked this month, according to reports.

The new jet skis have to be "powerful enough to tow if required," an official tender document seen by the Times said.

The Yamaha jet skis under Home Office consideration typically cost between 15,000 and 20,000.

Officials reportedly want the vessels to be significantly adapted for use in the English Channel, including adding GPS systems, cruise control and an 18,000cc engine.

Record number of migrants cross the Channel - In pictures 1 /20 Record number of migrants cross the Channel - In pictures A Border Force vessel brings a group of men thought to be migrants into Dover PA A Border Force officer escorts a young family thought to be migrants from a Border Force vessel PA A Border Force officer escorts a family thought to be migrants from a Border Force vessel PA A Border Force officer escorts a young family thought to be migrants from a Border Force vessel PA Border Force officers escort a group of men thought to be migrants onto a waiting bus after they were brought into Dover. PA Border Force officers escort a group of men thought to be migrants onto a waiting bus after they were brought into Dover. PA A Border Force vessel brings a group of men thought to be migrants into Dover PA A Border Force vessel brings a group of men thought to be migrants into Dover PA Border Force officers escort a group of men thought to be migrants onto a waiting bus PA A Border Force vessel brings a group of men thought to be migrants into Dover PA A Border Force vessel brings a group of men thought to be migrants into Dover PA A Border Force vessel brings a group of men thought to be migrants into Dover PA A Border Force vessel brings a group of men thought to be migrants into Dover PA A Border Force officer escorts a young family thought to be migrants from a Border Force vessel PA A young girl is escorted by a Border Force officer as groups of people thought to be migrants are brought into Dover PA

It comes after the number of migrants making the treacherous crossing from France reached record levels, with 416 people arriving in one day.

Many of the migrants cross in small dinghies that make the journey even more dangerous.

Sudanese man Abdulfatah Hamdallah drowned while trying to make the crossing in August. He was in a small inflatable boat, using shovels for oars.

Home Secretary Priti Patel has pledged to cut the number of people arriving in the UK via this route, making former Royal Marine Dan OMahoney the Clandestine Channel Threat Commander.

A group of people thought to be migrants being brought into Dover, Kent, by Border Force officers following a small boat incident in the Channel / PA

Tony Smith, the former head of Border Force, said: "I hope that common sense will prevail, and that the French and British governments will be able to reach agreement on a joint intervention and returns strategy which would both save lives and prevent others from taking similar risks in future.

"This will become even more relevant with the onset of winter and rough seas, whereupon I fear we will see many more drownings if this practice continues unchecked," he told the Times.

Judith Dennis, policy manager at the Refugee Council, said: People who cross the Channel for the purpose of seeking protection in the UK are breaking no laws  quite the opposite, in fact, they are exercising their rights under the Refugee Convention to seek asylum.
Former SKY News CEO Angelos Frangopoulos has been appointed CEO of a new UK news channel, GB News, to launch in early 2021.

Veteran UK political reporter Andrew Neil will be the face and chairman of GB News, signalling the end of his relationship with the BBC.

The channel will rival current UK channels Sky News and BBC News.

GB News is the most exciting thing to happen in British television news for more than 20 years, Neil said.

We will champion robust, balanced debate and a range of perspectives on the issues that affect everyone in the UK, not just those living in the London area.

GB News said it hopes to create at least 120 positions, with more than 100 journalists in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Frangopoulos departed SKY News Australia in 2018 to a role with SKY in Abu Dhabi.

Source: Seven News
Religious organizations contribute $67 billion to Canada's economy: study

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Religious organizations contribute around $67 billion annually to Canada's economy, according to recently released research by an independent Christian think tank.

The report, titled The Hidden Economy: How Faith Helps Fuel Canadas GDP, was authored by Brian Grim and Melissa Grim of Cardus, and released on Monday.

The researchers concluded that faith-based revenues and businesses contribute an estimated $67.48 billion to the Canadian economy.

This number was reached by factoring in an estimate of the value of goods and services provided by religious groups, by including food businesses that are faith-related, and also by including a valuation of church-sponsored substance-abuse recovery groups.

The $67 billion estimate was the mid-range number for the study, with the conservative estimate being $30 billion and drawn from just revenues of faith-based organizations and the liberal estimate being $689.5 billion, which factored all economic activity by religiously-affiliated Canadians.

This mid-range estimate puts the value of religion to Canadian society at more than $67 billion annually. By way of comparison, this would make religion the countrys ninth-largest enterprise, just behind TC Energy and ahead of Bank of Montreal, wrote the researchers.

Or in terms of national economies, it would make Canadian religion the worlds seventy-second-largest economy, putting it ahead of more than 110 countries.

Grim and Grim believed their lowest estimate was problematic because it focuses on revenues rather than on the value of the goods and services provided by religious organizations.

We believe that our second estimate of $67.48 billion is a more reasonable estimate, because it takes into account both the value of the services provided by religious organizations and the impact of faith-related business, they continued.

We offer the third estimate of some $689.5 billion not as a preferred estimate but rather as an upper-end estimate that takes into account religiously affiliated Canadians overall contribution to the Canadian economy.

The researchers acknowledged that there were some limitations to their findings, including the lack of factoring negative impacts like the occasional financial scandal among a ministry.

They also acknowledged that their work presumes that certain studies they cite on local religious financial impact can be extrapolated to apply to a national scale.

Despite these limitations, we believe that the data and estimates discussed in this paper will be a useful starting point for further studies of the socioeconomic contributions of religion to Canada and perhaps other countries as well, concluded Grim and Grim.

The data are clear. Religion is a highly significant sector of Canadas economy. Religion provides purpose-driven institutional and economic contributions to health, education, social cohesion, social services, media, food, and business itself.

This is not the first time that Grim and Grim have analyzed the economic impact of religious organizations to a national economy.

In 2016, they had a study published by the Interdisciplinary Journal of Research on Religion which concluded that religion annually contributed $1.2 trillion to the United States economy.

Like the Canadian study, the researchers put forth a conservative estimate, which in this case totaled $378 billion annually, and a third, more liberal estimate of $4.8 trillion annually.

"For the first time, we have been able to quantify what religious institutions, faith-based charities, and even businesses inspired by faith contribute to our country," explained Brian Grim at a National Press Club event in Washington, D.C., in 2016.

" in an age where there's a growing belief that religion is not a positive for American society, adding up the numbers is a tangible reminder of the impact of religion."
By Express News Service

PUDUKKOTTAI: Amid the perennial debates over government school teachers admitting their wards in private schools, a science teacher at a government school in Annavaasal has received praise from education department officials as well as villagers for admitting her son and daughter in government schools.

R Selvamaheshwari, who teaches at the Government Girls Higher Secondary School, Annavaasal, pulled out her children from private schools and enrolled them in government institutions, after she was transferred to Annavaasal eight months ago.

I was not happy with the teaching in private schools where my son and daughter were admitted. When I relocated, the villagers suggested that I enrol my son in the Annavaasal Panchayat Union Primary School. They said it would be the best choice for my son, Selvamaheshwari said, adding that her son P Danvanth Rishi is a Class 4 student of the school now.

For her daughter, P Sivadhejashwini, the teacher chose the same school where she teaches. I was very impressed with my school and enrolled my daughter in Class 6, she said. I believe the quality of teaching at government schools is improving. The Block Education Officer, Senguttuvan, learning about the teacher, felicitated her family during an event at her school.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 15:20:38|Editor: huaxia

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A woman waits to vote during the in-person early voting for U.S. president in Alexandria, Virginia, the United States, on Sept. 18, 2020. (Xinhua/Liu Jie)

- By far, the United States remains the world's worst-hit nation, with the most cases and deaths, making up more than one fifth of the global caseload and death toll, respectively.

- "All the world's leaders took the same test, and some have succeeded and some have failed," Dr. Cedric Dark, an emergency physician at Baylor College of Medicine told the Associated Press. "In the case of our country, we failed miserably."

NEW YORK, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- The total number of COVID-19 cases in the United States surpassed 7 million Friday, and its related death toll crossed the 200,000 threshold Tuesday, showing the country's battle against COVID-19 is a miserable failure, U.S. experts have told the media.

U.S. COVID-19 case count rose to 7,005,746, with the national death toll reaching 203,240, as of 2:23 p.m. local time (1823 GMT), according to the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University.

California reported 801,006 cases, the highest among all states. Texas registered 747,491 cases, followed by Florida with 695,887 cases. The caseload of New York State exceeded 450,000. Other states with over 200,000 cases include Georgia, Illinois, Arizona, North Carolina and New Jersey, according to the CSSE.

U.S. COVID-19 cases topped 5 million on Aug. 9, and hit 6 million on Aug. 31.

By far, the United States remains the world's worst-hit nation, with the most cases and deaths, making up more than one fifth of the global caseload and death toll, respectively.

U.S. national flags representing the 200,000 lives lost to COVID-19 in the United States are placed on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., the United States, on Sept. 22, 2020. (Xinhua/Liu Jie)

"It is completely unfathomable that we've reached this point," Jennifer Nuzzo, a public health researcher of Maryland-based Johns Hopkins University, was quoted by the Associated Press as saying eight months after the epidemic broke out in the world's largest economy.

"We have from the very beginning lacked a national testing strategy," Nuzzo said. "For reasons I can't truly fathom, we've refused to develop one."

The number of deaths is still increasing at a rate of nearly 770 daily on average, according to Johns Hopkins University.

"We're on track to have a quarter-million dead Americans by the end of the year with absolutely no reason it had to happen," Jeremy Konyndyk, a senior policy fellow at the Center for Global Development, was quoted by The Guardian as saying.

"It was all preventable. So yes, this is a leadership failure of astounding proportions," Konyndyk said.

Back in March, Konyndyk told The Guardian that Washington's response to COVID-19 was "one of the greatest failures of basic governance in modern times." With an astonishing death toll of over 200,000, Konyndyk said his previous judgement "has borne out extremely well."

The arrival of the fall semester combined with the flu season has sparked great concern over an uptick in new cases around the United States.

Robert Redfield, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), told the Senate Health Committee in a hearing Wednesday that more than 90 percent of the U.S. population is susceptible to COVID-19, citing a study conducted by the agency.

In addition, an ensemble forecast released Thursday by the CDC predicted that the virus may have caused a total of 214,000 to 226,000 deaths in the United States by Oct. 17.

"All the world's leaders took the same test, and some have succeeded and some have failed," Dr. Cedric Dark, an emergency physician at Baylor College of Medicine in hard-hit Houston, was quoted as saying by the Associated Press. "In the case of our country, we failed miserably." 
Ahmed's remarks at the UNGA's 75th session were made after Ethiopia had completed the first filling of the GERD's reservoir despite the lack of agreement on the filling and operation of the dam with Egypt and Sudan

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed said on Friday his country has "no intention of harming" Egypt and Sudan with its $4.8 billion near-complete dam on the Blue Nile.

Ahmed's remarks came during his address to the 75th Session of the United Nations General Assembly held online due to the coronavirus pandemic.

"I want to make it abundantly clear that we have no intention to harm these countries," Reuters reported Ahmed as saying.

Egypt and Sudan are downstream from the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) which Ethiopia began to build in 2011. The first filling of the dam's reservoir was completed this summer, despite the lack of agreement on the filling and operation of the dam between Ethiopia and its downstream neighbours.

"We are steadfast in our commitment to address the concerns of the downstream countries and to reach a mutually beneficial outcome in the context of the ongoing African Union- (AU) led process," Ahmed said.

Ahmed released these statements despite the fact the last round of AU-brokered trilateral talks on the GERD concluded in August without reaching an integrated draft agreement on the operation and filling of the dam, which is 70 per cent complete.

The last round of AU-sponsored talks between Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia was launched in July after negotiations between the three countries reached deadlock last year, as did negotiations sponsored by the US and World Bank in February.

The recent AU-mediated talks witnessed a hiatus between 27 July and 3 August after Ethiopia had announced it had completed the first phase of filling the GERD reservoir, as the two downstream countries denounced the unilateral move. The talks were further halted when Sudan called for a suspension of meetings to allow for consultations after Addis Ababa had proposed a package of non-binding guidelines for the filling and operation of the mega-dam.

Egypt and Sudan have been in talks with Ethiopia for years now to reach a legally binding agreement on the filling and operation of the mega-dam.

"Continuing the talks in their current form will not achieve practical results," said the Sudanese irrigation minister Yasser Abbas on 28 August, the same day the last round of talks was held and eventually stalled.

Ahmed was quoted by Reuters as saying in his speech to world leaders that the project contributes to the conservation of water resources, "which would otherwise have been lost to evaporation in downstream countries."

The GERD, built 15 kilometres from the Ethiopian border with Sudan, has been a source of contention between the three countries. Cairo that has more than 85 percent of its Nile water flow from Ethiopian highlands fears the massive hydropower project will significantly diminish its crucial water supplies, which is already below scarcity level, from the River Nile, while Sudan fears it could endanger the safety of its own dams.

"What we are essentially doing is to meet our electricity demands from one of the cleanest sources of energy. We cannot afford to continue keeping more than 65 million of our people in the dark," he said.

Ethiopia stated the 6,000-megawatt dam is key to its development and hopes to become Africas biggest electricity exporter with the GERD, which is set to be the continents largest dam.

Egypt's President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi stressed while addressing the 75th Session of the UN General Assembly on Wednesday that the GERD negotiation period "should not be extended indefinitely" lest it imposes a status quo.

"We've spent almost a decade in painstaking negotiations with our brothers in Sudan and Ethiopia, in an endeavour to reach an agreement regulating the filling and operation of the dam and strike the required balance between achieving the development requirements of the friendly Ethiopian people and safeguarding Egypt's water interests and ensuring its right to life," El-Sisi stated.

"Over the course of this year, we have gone through successive rounds of intensive negotiations in which the US made invaluable efforts to bring the three countries' positions closer through the talks that it backed with the assistance of the World Bank over several months. We also entered, wholeheartedly, into discussions initiated by my brother, the prime minister of Sudan. Then, we entered into rounds of negotiations that South Africa, the current AU chair, called for," El-Sisi said, adding that these efforts, however, did not yield the desired results.

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An Army Major accused of drowning an Iraqi teenager has spoken of how he thought the investigations would never end as he was exonerated after 17 years.

Major Robert Campbell was cleared of any wrongdoing after the latest official inquiry into the death of 19-year-old Saeed Radhi Shabram Wawi Al-Bazooni in Basra in May 2003.

Eyewitnesses claimed Maj Campbell and colleagues from the 32 Royal Engineer Regiment forced the victim, known as Saeed Shabram, and friend Munem Auda into a river at gunpoint having suspected them of looting near the former marine base in Basra.

On Thursday, former appeal court judge Baroness Hallett decided there was "no reliable evidence upon which it would be proper to conclude that (Maj Campbell) or any other British soldier pushed or forced Auda and Shabram into the water".

Maj Campbell was scrutinised in eight investigations into the teenager's death, including one for possible manslaughter, before he was ultimately cleared.

Recommended Disabled Iraq War veteran faces five years in prison for marijuana possession after judge denies release

He told Forces News: "It has been very exhausting, it's been pretty horrible and everywhere that I and my two soldiers turned for help we were turned away.

"No one would help us within the Army or the MoD, none of the ministers would help us, it's been pretty desperate at some stages."

Baroness Hallett's report found that a number of civilian witnesses came forward to give evidence against Maj Campbell, claiming they had seen British soldiers push Mr Shabram into the water.

But Baroness Hallett said most of the accounts by Iraqi witnesses had been deemed "inherently unreliable" in a previous judicial inquiry into the case.

The decorated Major ultimately sent his campaign medals back to the Queen "in disgust" as investigations into his conduct - including by the discredited and now defunct Iraq Historic Allegations Team (IHAT) - continued.

Maj Campbell said: "We just got to a stage where it was just so repetitive that we just thought it would never end, and even though it appears that it has now, I've still got a kind of fear in the back of my mind that in some way it could get resurrected again in the future."

He said the experience had been a "black cave of uncertainty".

Maj Campbell continued: "I didn't deal with it very well, I tried to block it out. It's no secret and I'm not remotely embarrassed by the fact that I went to a lot of mental health therapy.

"On top of everything that happened in Iraq and Afghanistan, later on in my career, I haven't lived with it, I've been dragged through it. It's my wife that kept me together."

In her report, Baroness Hallett acknowledged the weight of the investigation into the British military.

She said: "The soldiers have been investigated twice on suspicion of manslaughter and the events of May 23 2003 have now been hanging over them for 17 years."

Additional reporting by PA Media
The worldview of the radical left offers many dizzying contradictions and fantasies. One of the strangest is the extent of indifference and even hostility with which radical leftists treat those who deliver on the very vision they so tirelessly advocate.

There are myriad examples, some so obvious that articulating them seems like shaking the foundation of the postmodern reality (or anti-reality) in which we live.

The most diverse societies in the word are those most often condemned for lack of diversity.

The cultures and groups who've been most welcoming to outsiders  perhaps the most welcoming in all of human history  are also condemned as the most hateful and intolerant.

Environmentalism, a noble cause that often rubs elbows with the radical left, will elevate to celebrity status a sixteen-year-old sophist for criticizing and denouncing but give almost no attention to successful initiatives and projects to clean oceans or conserve nature. When zoologist Susan Crockford found that polar bears were in fact thriving, and not vanishing from global warming, she lost her job at the University of Victoria.

This is what radical leftists do to messiahs who have the gall to actually arrive and ruin their fanatical churches. They crucify them.

The most flagrant example is at the center of Marxism. It bears repeating that the original goal of Marxism was the creation of wealth and elimination of poverty. The early Marxists all believed that communism created more wealth that capitalism and was therefore superior to it. Over a hundred million people died in pursuit of this goal. Writers, artists, priests, university professors, entire families, entire villages, entire nations were annihilated.

They tried to make it true by pretending it was true, resulting in countless absurdities, the "Ryazan miracle" being one of the most outrageous. And if you didn't pretend then, as they say today, "silence was violence." You were either killed or relegated to poverty for not participating in the collective illusion.

By the mid-1950s, the poverty and deprivation of communism were impossible to ignore. So what did they do, these people who had slaughtered scores of millions in pursuit of a better wealth-generating socio-economic system when they saw that in fact capitalism created more wealth and ended more poverty? They abandoned their raison d'etre as if it had never existed and doubled down on their condemnation of capitalism by rewriting the script (again). Forget wealth. Forget ending poverty. Capitalism was evil because it created inequality.

Equality is perhaps a better messiah for the left, because it's the kind that will never show up and spoil all the radical, civilization-destroying fun.

Remember the words of Bolshevik Yurii Piatakov from 1928: "ordinary people in general, cannot make an instant change, a turn, amputating their own convictions. ... We are not like other people. We are a party who make the impossible possible. ... And if the party demands it, if it is necessary or important for the party, we will be able by an act of will to expel from our brains in twenty-four hours ideas we have held for years. ... Yes, I will see black where I thought I saw white, or may still see it, because for me there is no life outside the party or apart from agreement with it."

At the far left fringes, which have grown frighteningly influential, it seems they are not interested in solution, but in power, and for that, problems are infinitely superior to solutions.

When communists win and get the policies they scream for, or seize control of the institutions they covet, there never seems to be a period when they just get on with life and demonstrate the superiority (much less the viability) of their system. Faced with the consequences of their policies, they seem to revert to their core competency: revolution and liquidation of heretics.

Before the Communist Revolution, tsarist minister of internal affairs Pyotr Arkadyevich Stolypin was assassinated in the Kiev Opera House. As described in The Soviet Tragedy, he was a reformer who would have instituted at least some of the policies for which the communists agitated. For that, they killed him. They did not want their demands met. They wanted revolution.

After the disaster of what Lenin's generation of Bolsheviks called "communism" (full stop), they renamed it "war communism," and establish the NEP, which resembled an oligarchic market economy. Trotsky then attempted to focus the party on a policy of "Permanent Revolution," exporting the revolution (and mass murder) to other countries. Stalin, by contrast, focused on identifying and liquidating internal enemies, saboteurs, and ideological "deviationists," and for all its history, the Soviet Union was grinding poverty and successive "revolutions from above," each promising the final redemption and paradise of communism.

The Kronstadt rebellion was an insurrection at a naval base in the Bolshevik government in 1921, carried out by loyal communists who had fought with the Red Army during the revolution. Their demands included democratic appointment of local officials, freedom of speech, the right to use one's own land, and some semblance of equality  all promises of communist propaganda. The Red Army, led by Trotsky, crushed the uprising, negotiated a surrender, and then betrayed the terms and executed hundreds of sailors. The term "Kronstadt moment" is still used to describe the moment of someone's disillusionment with a leftist cause.

One the most fascinating stories of the early Soviet Union is that of anarcho-communist Nestor Makhno and his "Black Army." Makhno was a loyal and fanatical communist who'd been imprisoned from an early age for violent communist agitation, barely escaping the death penalty. He fought an effective and creative asymmetric war against the forces of the Russian tsar.

Lenin is rumored, albeit by Makhno's own account, to have said that he'd rather the tsarist white forces take all of Ukraine than let Makhno expand his territory by a single step. Makhno ideologically subverted Bolshevik efforts by being a truer to Marxism and actually delivering on some of their promises, like local, democratically elected "Soviets."

Many of the Bolshevik soldiers sent to crush Makhno would instead convert to his cause. Later, under the guise of negotiating cooperation against tsarist forces, Leon Trotsky invited Makhno's forces to a planning session, and there, on the 25th or 26th of November 1920, all of Makhno's commanders were arrested and executed. Nestor escaped. Trotsky then ordered the assassinations of thousands of Ukrainian villagers who were loyal to the "Makhnovists" and mustered overwhelming force  a force of 350,000 men equipped with heavy artillery to crush the remaining Makhnovists, whose numbers had dwindled to only 10,000. There is no live and let live among communists, nor can there be.

Lenin is rumored to have said that if they tried their revolution in a small country, it would have been over in months. They have to build the Tower of Babel to keep their illusion going. They fear the contrast of side-by-side societies.

And this seems to be one of several good strategies for dealing with the radical left. Keep things decentralized and local. Let contrasts emerge between their society and ours. The arrival of their messiah will completely spoil their fanaticism.
Five Commonwealth organisations concerned over impact of 20A on independence of judiciary View(s):

Five Commonwealth organisations collectively expressed deep concerns about the impact the 20th Amendment Bill would have on the independence and impartiality of the judiciary, if adopted. Of particular concern are the amendments proposed relating to the Judiciary and to the Judicial Services Commission.

Issuing a joint statement this week, the Commonwealth Magistrates and Judges Association (CMJA), the Commonwealth Legal Education Association (CLEA), Commonwealth Lawyers Association (CLA), the Commonwealth Journalists Association (CJA) and Rechters voor Rechters (Judges for Judges) said: An independent, impartial, honest and competent judiciary is integral to upholding the rule of law, engendering public confidence and dispensing justice. Judicial appointments to all levels must be made on merit on the basis of clearly defined criteria and by a publicly declared process.

Noting that the present Constitution also provides for any removal of members of the Judicial Appointments Commission to be approved by the Constitutional Council, the organisations noted that the proposed 20th Amendment aims to abolish these provisions and would, in effect relegate the Judiciary to a position inferior to that of the Executive and Legislature in Sri Lanka. This is contrary to the rule of law and the basic tenets of the principles of separation of powers,

The five organisations urged the Executive and Legislature of Sri Lanka to ensure that the proposed constitutional changes are consistent with the Commonwealths fundamental values and international standards relating to the independence of the judiciary and the separation of powers.
It is not every day that a project you are a part of gets an International Emmy nominations, well for Sayani Gupta it has happened twice. The actor, whose web series Inside Edge received a nomination at the ceremony in 2018, this year it is her female-led web series Four More Shots Please! which has received a nod.

People are more excited than I am, exclaims Gupta. But the actor acknowledges the timing of it all. It has come at a nice time, things are so bleak everywhere, for everyone, so it is a nice happy news. We havent had a happy news in a long time. I am very glad, she adds.

While this may be the second time for her, this time around the actor hopes she can attend the ceremony with the shows teams, including actors Kirti Kulhari, Bani J and Maanvi Gagroo.

For Inside Edge we didnt go, it was only Karan (Anshuman, director) and his family and Ritesh (Sidhwani, producer) and all. This time we all hope that if they let us we will all love to travel to New York and attend the show. I dont know with the Covid situation. Lets see, she points out.

While it is a huge deal to get an international recognition such as this one even if it may be just a nomination, the 34-year-old says it does not make a huge difference career-wise.

I dont think it makes a huge difference in our country. It is cool, it is like a cool celebration kind of thing but in terms of career, I dont think it is a big thing. It does not matter. It is not that people will start paying you more for being nominated for the Emmys. I dont think it happens in the country, adds Gupta.

However, the actor is happy to see how actors, writers and makers of OTT shows are getting international recognition. Now OTT is not a way forward but the only way forward. It has shifted, it has revolutionized and I think it is going to stay for eternity now. Not to say that we do away with theatres, we all love the big screen but I do believe that especially with the lockdown now, the audience is extremely receptive to good content, you no longer need a star to pull them to content. Consuming and critiquing everything, she concludes.
Victorians sat down in front of a screen on Friday afternoon like Romans at the Colosseum. Usually the last weekend of September is for a different sporting contest. This year it was the Premier appearing as the final witness at the inquiry into the mess of hotel quarantine.

Daniel Andrews taking the oath at the hotel quarantine inquiry.

The positives? Only one. The government gets credit for releasing "Cabinet In Confidence" documents, in stark contrast to previous federal and state, Liberal and Labor administrations. The default setting is to hide anything damning behind the impenetrable screen of "Cabinet in Confidence".

The negatives? A shambolic failure of governance. No one admits to being in charge. No one knows who was supposed to be in charge. No one admits to being responsible for the crucial and terrible decision to use private security guards in what would become the weakest link in the chain.
Syracuse, N.Y.  Syracuse councilors asked the city auditor to investigate a police policy to pay patrol officers to stay home, according to a letter provided to Syracuse.com | The Post-Standard.

The letter was sent to Auditor Nader Maroun by members of the Common Councils finance committee.

Maroun has not responded to repeated phone calls and email requests for comment by Syracuse.com | The Post-Standard about the policy and whether his office would conduct an audit.

At least two councilors said they want to know more about whether the police department paid overtime to officers at the same time officers were sent home with pay and why. They also questioned the procedure for putting the policy in place.

It raised some questions. Was there still overtime? How much overtime? I think it warrants an audit, said Joseph Carni, the councils only Republican and one of the councilors who requested the audit. ... There may not be anything actually wrong with it on face value. Maybe the way it was handled maybe wasnt the best use of taxpayer dollars.

The policy was first reported by Syracuse.com | The Post-Standard a week ago: Syracuse taxpayers paid police officers to stay home while city faced financial disaster

Police officers were paid for as many as 800 unworked shifts that cost taxpayers up to $226,750 over two months, according to estimates by Syracuse.com. (City officials declined to provide an estimate of the cost.) Mayor Ben Walsh was informed of the policy, according to Police Chief Kenton Buckner.

At the same time, the department paid more than $850,000 in overtime, documents show.

While the policy was in place, more than 100 other city employees were furloughed because of the budget crisis caused by the coronavirus shutdown. Walsh recently announced more than $18 million more in budget cuts and 400 more furloughs because of the pandemic. None of the furloughs have included police officers. Sworn officers cant be furloughed because of the departments union contract, department officials said.

Councilor Pat Hogan, one of the lawmakers who requested the audit, said, I think the most frustrating thing was paying $200,000 for police officers to stay home and then having $800,000 paid in overtime. Thats pretty galling.

From April 1 through May 27, officers in the police departments patrol division were sent home and allowed to be on call for a shift once every two work weeks. Officers were still paid for those shifts whether they worked or not.

Police department officials have said the policy was designed to try to stop the spread of the coronavirus. It was possible to send officers home because call volume dropped 18% year over year.

Walsh declined through a spokesman to be interviewed about the policy. His office provided a statement supporting the chiefs decision, saying Buckner made smart decisions to limit the risk of exposure to Covid-19.

The practice likely provided minimal benefit in stopping the spread of the coronavirus, according to Brooks Gump, a Syracuse University public health professor.

Police department officials told Syracuse.com | The Post-Standard they were unable to say how many shifts officers were sent home, how many times officers were called back or how much city taxpayers paid for unworked shifts.

These records were not kept, said Deputy Chief Richard Trudell in an email. He heads the departments patrol division.

Trudell did say he could remember at least a couple times officers were called back to work.

While the department put the policy in place, councilors were not notified. Councilor Tim Rudd, who Walsh appointed Friday to be the citys budget director, earlier panned the policy for its secretiveness and its wastefulness.

Rudd was the only councilor of the four on the finance committee to not sign the letter. Carni, Hogan and Councilor Khalid Bey signed the letter.

Hogan said Friday the policy was indicative of prior issues the council has had with the police departments management of money. In the last 10 years, the department has twice been audited for its overtime spending.

Weve been on this path for a long time and our feeling was to prevent things like this," Hogan said. Unfortunately, this is a serious instance of not being able to manage the time or the money.

Got a tip, comment or story idea? Contact Chris Libonati via the Signal app for encrypted messaging at 585-290-0718, by phone at the same number, by email or on Twitter.
(Photo : Addison Rae/Youtube) Meet Addison Rae: The TikTok Influencer Spoofed in Recent Dhar Mann film (Photo : Addison Rae/Instagram) Meet Addison Rae: The TikTok Influencer Spoofed in Recent Dhar Mann film (Photo : Addison Rae/Instagram) Addison Rae with Kylie Jenner

A "TikTok star" Allison Day appeared in a viral series of TikTok short clips produced by Dhar Mann Studios. The short movie, which is titled "TikTok famous teen kicked out of designer store, owner lives in regret," was split into six 60-second clips.

In the film, Allison who was wearing s sweat shirt and jeans entered a high-end store and she wanted to try on a designer dress. However, the store owner looked at her thinking that she cannot afford the dress, and instead asked her to check out the nearby Forever 21 store.

Soon, her fans came to the store to take pictures of her which intrigued the store owner. Fans told the owner Allison is a multimillionaire who has 25 million TikTok followers, which changed the owner's perception of her. She asked Allison if she is still interested with the dress, but she said she would just go to the Forever 21 store instead.

But who is Allyson Day?

Well, it appears that Allison Day is a spoof of the TikTok's superstar Addison Rae. The TikTok series does not intend to attack the social media influencer as it was actually a message of support to her, crashing stigmas and stereotypes around TikTok stars.

The series became viral instantly with millions of views on each clip within a day since they were posted.

Who is TikTok's Addison Rae?

Addison Rae has more than 50 million TikTok followers since she joined the video sharing app in July 2019. She is the second most followed person in the entire world, next Charli D'Amelio who has 89 million followers worldwide.

She was once a member of the TikTok collective Hype House since December 2019, but she left the group due to various rumors within the group.

The 19-year-old Lafayette, Louisiana born star began dancing competitively at the six. Her real name is Addison Rae Easterling, but she dropped her last name from her social media accounts. Her parents are Monty Lopez and Sheri Easterling and they are both TikTokers.

Addison Rae's net worth

Aside from her 50 million following in TikTok, Addison Rae has 28.4 million followers on Instagram and 3.89 million subscribers on her YouTube channel.

At her young age, Addison is reported to have a net worth of around $2 million as she is reported to earn about $14,000 for promoting products on Instagram while she gets paid for advertisements on her YouTube videos.

Meanwhile, Addison also started her own line of merchandise, which she sells in her online shop. Most of her products are joggers, shirts, crewneck top, and hoodies, which make netizens believe that the viral series is a spoof of her.

Addison Rae's friendship with Charli D'Amelio

Not all seconds are bitter of the first. This is the case of Addison Rae and Charli D'Amelio who are actually friends with each other. In fact, Addison has also close relationship with Charli's sister, Dixie D'Amelio.

The two still follow each other on Instagram, despite rumors that they gotten into physical fight a after Charli and Dixie left the Hype House. Well, rumors remained just rumors as no proof surfaced about their alleged fight.

Who is Addison dating?

Addison is rumored to have romantic relationship with another TikTok star Bryce Hall since 2019 and the TikTok pair continued to intrigue their fans with romantic duets. Their respective fans coined a name for the pair, Braddison.

While the two said that they were just friends in January, Addison later opened up about having an on-and-off relationship with Bryce. The couple was recently spotted having dinner in July with Addison's parents.

While they have not confirmed their current status, perhaps they are both enjoying the attention.

Read also: Marques Brownlee is YouTube's Biggest in Solo Tech Reviews with Almost $2M Net Worth This 2020

This is owned by Tech Times

Written by CJ Robels

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Canadian Prime Minister on Friday announced that his government has entered into an agreement with British pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca to procure 20 million doses of its vaccine.

The number of COVID-19 cases in Canada has surpassed 150,000 with 9,250 deaths reported, the Canadian government data revealed on Friday.

"I can announce that we have reached an agreement with AstraZeneca for the vaccine they are developing with the University of Oxford. This agreement secures up to 20 million doses for Canadians, should the vaccine trials be successful," Trudeau said at a press conference.

The US put a pause on AstraZeneca vaccine trials a couple weeks ago due to side effects.

A combined 1,046 new cases in Ontario and Quebec pushed Canada's tally to 150,140, according to data released by provincial health agencies. There are 11,138 active cases throughout the country, Canada's public health agency says.

With the announcement, Canada now has tentative deals for at least 12 vaccine candidates, Minister of Public Services and Procurement Anita Anand said. According to reports, the deals do not preclude refunds, even in the event that the vaccine candidate is never approved. The Canadian government has committed over $800 million toward vaccine procurement development.

Trudeau also announced that Canada will contribute USD 328.32 million to COVAX, a global vaccine distribution system backed by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance. The Prime Minister expressed his disappointment with "a few large countries" that did not join the effort - presumably referring to the US, China and Russia, which are focusing on domestic vaccine production.

On Wednesday, Trudeau said that the second wave of the pandemic is "already underway" in Canada and urged vigilance. This was partially contradicted on Friday by Alberta's chief medical officer of health Dr Deena Hinshaw, who said that the second wave of COVID-19 has not hit the province.

Since the beginning of September, Canadian authorities have recorded over 20,000 new infections, including more than 8,000 in the last week alone.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Coronavirus Updates:Maharashtra recorded 18,056 new coronavirus positive cases on Sunday, which pushed the state's overall tally to 13,39,232, the state health department said. With the death of 380 patients during the day, the toll reached 35,571, it said.

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The caseload of coronavirus cases in India crossed 59 lakh on Saturday with 85,362 new cases, however, the number of recoveries was higher with 93,420 people recuperating in the last 24 hours, the Union health ministry said. The total number of recoveries stands at 48.49 lakh.

"I am quarantined at Vande Mataram Kunj, that lies between Haridwar and Rishikesh. I will get another Covid test done again after four days and if the situation remains the same, will consult doctors," Uma Bharti said in a tweet.

Uma Bharti said that she was down with mild fever for the past three days and that despite following all the COVID norms, she has tested positive.

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Uma Bharti has tested positive for the novel coronavirus. In a late night post on Twitter, Uma Bharti informed that she has tested Covid positive and appealed to those who had come in contact with her, to get a COVID-19 test done.

In a bid to return to 'normalcy', West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee yesterday said the state government will allow "jatras, plays, OATs, cinemas and all musical, dance, recital and magic shows" to resume with up to 50 participants from 1 October.

Wearing a black mask, Maestri said the race was a beautiful initiative uniting the two hard-hit cities, and that he was thrilled to be even alive to participate. I feel very lucky, he said at the starting line.

Mattia Maestri was suited up Saturday for the start of the two-day race between Italy's first two virus hotspots. It began in Codogno, where Maestri tested positive 21 February, and was ending Sunday in Vo'Euganeo, where Italy's first official COVID death was recorded the same day.

Italy's coronavirus Patient No 1, whose case confirmed one of the world's deadliest outbreaks was underway, is taking part in a 180-kilometer (112-mile) relay race in memory of COVID-19 victims and as a sign of hope after he himself recovered from weeks in intensive care.

India on Sunday reported a single-day spike of 88,600 new COVID19 cases and 1,124 deaths reported in India, in the last 24 hours. As per Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, COVID-19 case tally in the country stands at 59,92,533 including 9,56,402 active cases, 49,41,628 cured/discharged/migrated & 94,503 deaths.

From late July through the start of September, the state had an average of around 660 people test positive per day. In the seven-day period that ended Friday, it averaged 817 positive tests per day.

Governor Andrew Cuomo announced Saturday there were 1,005 positive cases tallied on Friday out of 99,953 tests, for a 1 percent positive rate.

The number of positive tests reported daily in the state has been steadily inching up in recent weeks, possibly because more businesses have been reopening and students have been returning to schools and college campuses.

More than 1,000 New Yorkers have tested positive for COVID-19 in a single day for the first time since June 5 the state has seen a daily number that high.

Globally, the coronavirus has infected more than 3.27 crore people and killed almost 1 million - the toll is currently at 9,92,984, according to Johns Hopkins University.

He said that even during these very difficult times of the raging pandemic, the pharmaceutical industry of India has sent essential medicines to more than 150 countries.

In his address to the 75th session of the UN General Assembly on Saturday, Modi said that as the largest vaccine producing country of the world, I want to give one more assurance to the global community today. India's vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis.

World Health Organization (WHO) chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has lauded Prime Minister Narendra Modi's assurance that India will use its vaccine production capacity in helping nations fight COVID-19, saying the pandemic can be defeated only by mobilising resources for common good.

The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has said that 7,12,57,836 samples were tested for COVID-19 in the country till yesterday (September 26). Of these, 9,87,861 were tested yesterday

The cumulative recovered cases stood at 1,54,499, while 30,234 are under treatment across the state. As many as 50,108 samples were tested on September 26, taking the total number examined so far to 28,50,869. The samples tested per million population was 76,788, the bulletin said.

The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation accounted for the highest number of cases with 297, followed by Karimnagar (152), Rangareddy (147), Medchal Malkajgiri (137), Nalgonda (105) and other districts, a state government bulletin said on Sunday, providing data as of 8 pm on 16 September.

Telangana reported 1,967 new COVID-19 cases, taking the total infection count to 1,85,833, while the death toll rose to 1,100 with nine more fatalities.

As of now, there are 17,940 active COVID-19 cases in the district while 1,46,359 patients have recovered. The recovery rate in the district was 86.79 per cent, while the mortality rate was 2.57 percent, the official said

The maximum fresh cases were reported from Thane city at 428, followed by Kalyan-376, and Navi Mumbai-309, he said, adding that the remaining cases were detected in other parts of the district. Out of the total cases so far, Kalyan has reported over 41,000 cases, while Thane city and Navi Mumbai have recorded more than 35,000 cases each, the official said.

The number of COVID-19 cases in Thane has gone up to 1,68,634 with 1,621 fresh infections in the Maharashtra district, an official said on Sunday. Besides, 33 more patients succumbed to the disease on Saturday, taking the COVID-19 death toll in the district to 4,335, he said.

Jharkhand currently has 12,426 active coronavirus cases, while 65,839 people have recovered so far. As many as 30,152 samples were tested for COVID-19 on Saturday, the official added.

Nine more people succumbed to COVID-19 in Jharkhand, raising the death toll to 670, while 1,226 new cases pushed the tally in the state 78,935, a senior health department official said on Sunday.

The total recoveries have surged to 49,41,627, and there are 9,56,402 active cases of coronavirus infection in the country which comprises 15.96 percent of the total caseload, the data stated. The COVID-19 case fatality rate was recorded at 1.58 percent.

The total coronavirus cases mounted to 59,92,532, while the death toll climbed to 94,503 with 1,124 people succumbing to the disease in a span of 24 hours, data updated at 8 am showed.

India's COVID-19 caseload neared 60 lakh with 88,600 fresh infections being reported on Sunday, while the number of people having recuperated from the disease crossed 49 lakh pushing the national recovery rate to 82.46 percent, according to the Union Health Ministry.

A total of 68 people tested positive for COVID-19 on Saturday, the bulletin said, adding the fresh cases include 54 in Leh district and 14 in Kargil district.

It said a patient, who had recently tested positive for coronavirus, breathed his last in Leh on Saturday. His death was the 24th in Leh district, while rest of the 33 COVID-related deaths had taken place in Kargil district.

With 47 more patients cured of the disease, the number of active cases in the region dropped to 1018  615 in Leh district and 403 in Kargil district, the bulletin released by the directorate of health services Ladakh said.

The Union Territory of Ladakh reported 68 new coronavirus cases and one more death, taking the virus tally to 4093 and death toll to 57, an official bulletin said on Sunday.

The number of active COVID-19 patients has been below 10 lakh for several successive days. The active caseload is 15.96 percent of the total positive cases and is consistently declining.

On an average, single-day recoveries have been more than 90,000 in the last few days. The overall recovery rate stands at 82.46 percent.

The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has said that new recoveries in the country have exceeded the new COVID-19 cases for several successive days during the period of the past nine days.

Paul, who is also a well-known fashion designer, had been touring districts regularly to lead street protests and undertake campaigns against the ruling TMC. She attended party programmes at state BJP headquarters here earlier this week.

BJP women's wing president in West Bengal Agnimitra Paul said on Sunday she has been diagnosed with COVID-19, and requested people who came in touch with her recently to get themselves tested.

He said that 443 patients recovered and were discharged during the last twenty four hours from hospitals. The fatality rate and recovery rate was 1.94 per cent 78.21 percent respectively.

A total of 4,623 samples were tested, taking the total number of specimens examined so far to 1,71,561, Director of Health and Family Welfare S Mohan Kumar said. The overall COVID-19 cases in the union territory stood at 26,400 (after transfer of four cases to Tamil Nadu), he said.

A total of 372 fresh COVID-19 cases and 13 deaths in the union territory took the infection count to 26,400 and the toll to 513 on Sunday, the government said. The deceased included four women and were in the age group of 31 to 80 and most of them had comorbidities, a release from the health department said.

Serum Institute of India (SII) CEO Adar Poonawalla applauds PM Narendra Modi's vision on providing vaccines to the global community. It is a proud moment for India, you for your leadership and support. It is clear that all your arrangements for India will take care of all needs for the people, says Poonawalla.

As per the latest data accessed by PTI, these forces have recorded over 36,000 COVID-19 cases till now, out of which, 6,646 are active while rest of the personnel have recovered. The maximum cases at 10,636 have been recorded in the BSF, the country's largest border guarding force with about 2.5 lakh personnel. This is followed by 10,602 cases in the largest paramilitary force CRPF and 6,466 cases in the CISF. The BSF guards Indian fronts with Pakistan and Bangladesh, while CISF is the national civil aviation security force.

The total number of coronavirus cases in central police forces under the Ministry of Home Affairs have gone over 36,000 with 128 personnel succumbing to the pandemic, according to a latest data. The cases pertain to the seven forces of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), Border Security Force (BSF), Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP), Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB), National Security Guard (NSG) and the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF).

The 28-year-old singer requested those who came in contact with her to also get tested for coronavirus.

Punjabi singer and former "Bigg Boss" contestant Himanshi Khurana on Sunday said she has tested positive for COVID-19 after she participated in a protest against the farm bills passed by Parliament recently.

The new cases were reported from all the 30 districts of the state, he said. At least 2,309 cases were registered in quarantine centres, while 1,613 people tested positive for the infection during contact tracing.

Odisha's COVID-19 tally rose to 2,09,374 on Sunday as 3,922 more people tested positive for the disease, while 14 fresh fatalities pushed the state's coronavirus death toll to 797, a health department official said.

Rao had taken part in the proceedings of the monsoon session of the Karnataka assembly till late last night. He was recently appointed as AICC in-charge of Tamil Nadu, Goa and Puducherry.

Karnataka Congress leader and MLA Dinesh Gundu Rao on Sunday said he has tested positive for COVID-19. The former state Congress President said he was asymptomatic and will recover soon because of the good wishes from every one.

Delhi health minister Satyendar Jain on Sunday said, "We were testing around 20,000 samples earlier which have been increased to 60,000 now."

They have been accused of violating Covid protocol by amassing a large number of people at the airport on Saturday when some party leaders were arriving in the Bihar capital to strategise for the upcoming assembly elections.

An FIR has been registered against Bihar Congress president Madan Mohan Jha and several other senior party leaders for violating Covid norms at Patna airport, officials said on Sunday.

The Maharashtra Police on Sunday said that 169 police personnel have tested positive for COVID-19 and two have died in the last 24 hours, taking total cases to 22,629 in the force.

The total number of COVID-19 cases in Andaman and Nicobar Islands rose to 3,774 on Sunday as 15 more people tested positive for the infection, a health official said. Six new patients have travel history, while nine fresh infections were detected during contact tracing, he said.

In reference to the vaccine being worked on by the University of Oxford, Johnson stressed the importance of equitable access of any successful vaccine because the health of every country depends on the whole world having access to a safe and effective vaccine, wherever a breakthrough might occur.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson made a special reference to India's role in the manufacture and access to one of the most promising coronavirus vaccine candidates currently undergoing trials during his address to the United Nations (UN) General Assembly.

ICMR is actively investigating & researching reports of Covid-19 reinfection & although the number of reinfection cases is negligible at this moment, the government is fully seized of the importance of the matter: Union health minister Harsh Vardhan

Tamil Nadu reported 5,791 new COVID-19 cases, 5,706 recoveries and 80 deaths on Sunday, taking total positive cases to 5,80,808, including 5,25,154 recoveries, 9,313 deaths and 46,341 active cases, the state government said.

Gujarat in 24 hours recorded 1,411 positive cases in 24 hours, taking the total to 1.33 lakh. The state also recorded deaths of 10 positive patients, taking the death toll to 3,419.

Delhi reported 3,292 new cases of coronavirus on Sunday, taking the total number of cases in the state to 2,71,114; and the toll rose to 5,235 with 42 more fatalities, The Times of India reported.

In reference to the vaccine being worked on by the University of Oxford, Johnson stressed the importance of equitable access of any successful vaccine because the health of every country depends on the whole world having access to a safe and effective vaccine, wherever a breakthrough might occur.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson made a special reference to India's role in the manufacture and access to one of the most promising coronavirus vaccine candidates currently undergoing trials during his address to the United Nations (UN) General Assembly.

The overall case fatality rate is 1.94 percent. The occupancy of beds in Delhi hospitals has declined in the last four-five days and 55 percent of the total beds are unoccupied currently, the minister added.

About 46 deaths reported during the same period, which has been the highest in nearly 70 days, Jain said, "We do not look at the figures for a single day. The average fatality rate of the last 10 days has been 0.94 percent. The patients who have succumbed are not those who tested positive in a day. These are people who tested positive 15-20 days back. That is why we take the average of 10 days."

He said Delhi recorded 3,372 fresh cases on Saturday and 4,476 patients recovered within 24 hours.

Delhi health minister Satyendar Jain said on Sunday the COVID-19 fatality rate in the national capital was less than one percent in the last 10 days, and asserted that a massive increase in testing for detection of coronavirus infection has led to the rise in cases.

ICMR is actively investigating & researching reports of Covid-19 reinfection & although the number of reinfection cases is negligible at this moment, the government is fully seized of the importance of the matter: Union health minister Harsh Vardhan

Tamil Nadu reported 5,791 new COVID-19 cases, 5,706 recoveries and 80 deaths on Sunday, taking total positive cases to 5,80,808, including 5,25,154 recoveries, 9,313 deaths and 46,341 active cases, the state government said.

Gujarat in 24 hours recorded 1,411 positive cases in 24 hours, taking the total to 1.33 lakh. The state also recorded deaths of 10 positive patients, taking the death toll to 3,419.

Delhi reported 3,292 new cases of coronavirus on Sunday, taking the total number of cases in the state to 2,71,114; and the toll rose to 5,235 with 42 more fatalities, The Times of India reported.

Maharashtra recorded 18,056 new coronavirus positive cases on Sunday, which pushed the state's overall tally to 13,39,232, the state health department said. With the death of 380 patients during the day, the toll reached 35,571, it said. A total of 13,565 patients were discharged on Sunday. With this, the state's recovery count stands at 10,30,015, the department said in a statement.

Fifty more fatalities pushed the toll due to COVID-19 to 3,238 in Punjab while 1,458 more cases took the infection tally to 1,10,106 on Sunday. A total of 2,299 coronavirus patients were discharged after recovering from the infection, taking the number of cured people to 88,312 in the state. There are 18,556 active COVID-19 cases in the state as of now, according to the bulletin.

To keep the COVID-19 positivity rate below five per cent and the death rate below one per cent in Uttar Pradesh, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Sunday directed officials to intensify surveillance and contact tracing.He also said that testing among high-risk groups should be intensified. These combined endeavours are the only way to keep the COVID-19 death rate low and prevent spread of the infection, Adityanath said. The chief minister issued the directions while reviewing the COVID-19 situation in the state, especially in 16 districts where more than 100 cases are reported within a week, a statement issued by the state government said. He said that testing should be focussed and one-third of testing should be through RT-PCR and the rest by the rapid-antigen method.

Odisha Assembly Speaker SN Patro and Parliamentary Affairs Minister BK Arukha on Sunday tested negative for COVID-19 while Government Chief Whip Pramila Mallick and another ruling BJD MLA tested positive for the infection, official sources said.The two lawmakers were among the 757 persons comprising MLAs, journalists and Assembly employees who had come forward for COVID-19 test on Saturday ahead of the monsoon session of the Assembly on 29 September, the sources said.

Coronavirus Updates: Maharashtra recorded 18,056 new coronavirus positive cases on Sunday, which pushed the state's overall case count to 13,39,232, the state health department said. With the death of 380 patients during the day, the toll reached 35,571, it said.

Union health minister Harsh Vardhan on Sunday said that the ICMRs nationwide serological survey showed that "the Indian population still far from achieving herd immunity".

"An ICMR expert panel is examining reinfection cases. Remdesivir and plasma therapies are not to be encouraged. Aatmanirbhar Bharat gets a major impetus in the health sector. The country is poised for major exports now. The governments commitment to the North East evident from its plans to massively upgrade medical colleges and other infrastructure in a phased manner," News18 quoted him as saying.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson made a special reference to India's role in the manufacture and access to one of the most promising coronavirus vaccine candidates currently undergoing trials during his address to the United Nations (UN) General Assembly.

In reference to the vaccine being worked on by the University of Oxford, Johnson stressed the importance of equitable access of any successful vaccine because the health of every country depends on the whole world having access to a safe and effective vaccine, wherever a breakthrough might occur.

Karnataka Congress leader and MLA Dinesh Gundu Rao on Sunday said he has tested positive for COVID-19. The former state Congress President said he was asymptomatic and will recover soon because of the good wishes from every one.

Rao had taken part in the proceedings of the monsoon session of the Karnataka assembly till late last night. He was recently appointed as AICC in-charge of Tamil Nadu, Goa and Puducherry.

BJP women's wing president in West Bengal Agnimitra Paul said on Sunday she has been diagnosed with COVID-19, and requested people who came in touch with her recently to get themselves tested.

The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has said that new recoveries in the country have exceeded the new COVID-19 cases 'for several successive days during the period of the past nine days'

The total recoveries have surged to 49,41,627, and there are 9,56,402 active cases of coronavirus infection in the country which comprises 15.96 percent of the total caseload, the data stated.

India on Sunday reported a single-day spike of 88,600 new COVID19 cases and 1,124 deaths reported in India, in the last 24 hours.

The caseload of coronavirus cases in India crossed 59 lakh on Saturday with 85,362 new cases, however, the number of recoveries was higher with 93,420 people recuperating in the last 24 hours, the Union health ministry said. The total number of recoveries stands at 48.49 lakh.

The data updated at 8 am on Saturday showed that the coronavirus caseload has risen to 59,03,932, while the toll rose to 93,379 after 1,089 people succumbed to the disease in 24 hours.

With a total of 48,49,584 recoveries, the country's recovery rate rose to 82.14 percent. Meanwhile, the COVID-19 case fatality rate was recorded at 1.58 percent.

There are 9,60,969 active cases in the country which comprise 16.28 percent of the total caseload, the ministry's data showed.

India's COVID-19 tally had crossed 20 lakh on 7 August, 30 lakh on 23 August, 40 lakh on 5 September, and it went past 50 lakh on 16 September.

On Saturday, the ministry said that of the 85,362 new coronavirus cases reported in the last 24 hours, 75 percent are found concentrated in 10 states and Union Territories.

It also said that the country's testing capacity has crossed 14 lakh tests daily. According to the ICMR, a total of 7,02,69,975 samples have been tested up to 25 September, with 13,41,535 being tested on Friday.

The 10 states and Union Territories from where 75 percent of the new cases have been reported are Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Odisha, Delhi, West Bengal and Chhattisgarh.

Maharashtra continues to top this list by accounting for more than 17,000 cases. Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh reported more than 8,000 and 7,000 cases respectively, the ministry said.

Also, Maharashtra, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Delhi and Chhattisgarh account for 83 percent of the 1,089 deaths due to COVID-19 registered in a day.

On the other hand, the ministry added that seventeen states and UTs "have cases per million lower than the national average (4,278) while 23 are reporting deaths per million lower than the national average (68)".

Meanwhile, the Union health ministry said that 24 states and UTs are reporting a higher number of new recoveries than new cases.

"As India records more recoveries than new cases, the gap between recovered and active cases is continuously widening. The recoveries are more than five times the active cases of coronavirus infection," it said.

The recovered cases exceed active cases (9,60,969) by nearly 39 lakh.

The ministry added that 10 states and UTs account for nearly 73 percent of the new recovered cases. Maharashtra has maintained this lead with 19,592 new recoveries.

"These sustained encouraging results have been made possible with the Centre-led proactive and calibrated strategy of 'test, track and treat' with a sharp focus on 'Chase the Virus' approach," the ministry said.

Will Centre have Rs 80,000 cr for distribution of vaccine, asks Serum Institute CEO

Adar Poonawalla, Chief Executive Officer of Serum Institute of India (SII) which is producing the potential coronavirus vaccine developed by Oxford University, asked on Saturday if the government will have Rs 80,000 crore available to buy and distribute the vaccine.

"Quick question; will the government of India have 80,000 crores available, over the next one year? Because that's what @MoHFW_INDIAneeds, to buy and distribute the vaccine to everyone in India," he tweeted.

This is the next "challenge" we need to tackle, he said, also tagging the prime minister's office.

"I ask this question because we need to plan and guide, vaccine manufacturers both in India and overseas to service the needs of our country in terms of procurement and distribution," Poonawalla added.

SII has signed an agreement to manufacture the potential vaccine developed by Jenner Institute of Oxford University in collaboration with British-Swedish pharma company AstraZeneca.

Earlier, SII had announced that it will make the Oxford vaccine available at $3 for low- and middle-income countries including India.

Meanwhile, PTI reported that clinical trials of the Oxford University vaccine  named 'Covishield'  were set to begin at the State-run KEM hospital in Mumbai from Saturday.

The report quoted KEM dean Dr Hemant Deshmukh as saying that three people will receive a shot of the vaccine on the first day.

"We have screened 13 persons so far including 10 today, of which three will get the first shot of Oxford University-AstraZeneca developed Covishield vaccine on Saturday," he said.

Another person will get placebo as part of the standard testing procedure, he added. KEM is the first hospital in Mumbai where human trials of the vaccine, being manufactured in the country by Serum Institute of India, will begin on Saturday.

Where is UN's effective response against COVID-19, asks Modi at UNGA

Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed the UNGA on Saturday and raised questions on the response of the United Nations in combating the COVID-19 pandemic and assured the global community that India will use its production and delivery capacity to help all humanity in fighting the deadly disease.

"Over the last 8 to 9 months, the whole world has been battling the pandemic of the coronavirus. Where is the United Nations in this joint fight against the pandemic? Where is its effective response?" Modi said as he asserted that reform in the responses, in the processes, and in the very character of the United Nations is the need of the hour.

In his pre-recorded video statement to the landmark General Debate of the 75th session of the UN General Assembly, Prime Minister Modi said that even during these very difficult times of the raging pandemic, India's pharmaceutical industry has sent essential medicines to over 150 countries.

"As the largest vaccine producing country in the world, I want to give one more assurance to the global community today. India's vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis," Modi said in a strong assurance to the international community that is battling the devastating coronavirus pandemic.

Uddhav Thackeray warns against 'second coronavirus wave' as people move out of homes

Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray on Saturday expressed apprehensions of a "second wave" of coronavirus transmission in the state as more people are moving out for work and called for stricter compliance with norms.

Speaking at a virtual meeting with ministers and officials of Marathwada and Nashik divisions on the COVID-19 situation, the chief minister expressed concerns over asymptomatic patients, allowed to remain at home, stepping out without proper precautions and infecting others, PTI reported.

He said the focus should be on reducing the mortality rate. Thackeray directed officials to ensure that people follow health norms like wearing masks and that violators be fined.

"In Britain, asymptomatic positive patients are treated at home, but they are checked every day. They are shifted to hospitals if needed. We are allowing asymptomatic patients to remain under home quarantine, but they are moving out and infecting others," the chief minister said.

"There is the fear of a second wave (of coronavirus transmission) since more people are now moving out for work. There is a danger of senior citizens getting infected in their homes," he said.

During his interaction with officials, Thackeray stressed the need to increase mass awareness and tracing and testing. He added that proper protocol should be followed in treating COVID-19 patients, "and only medical prescription should be followed".

He asked district-level task force comprising medical experts to remain in regular touch with the state-level task force.

Similarly, in Tamil Nadu, Chief Secretary K Shanmugam directed the state's District Collectors to ascertain the reasons for the increase in COVID-19 cases in the state recently. Tamil Nadu has seen a spike of cases in at least 15 districts, PTI reported.

State-wise deaths

The new fatalities include 416 from Maharashtra, 86 from Karnataka, 84 from Uttar Pradesh, 72 from Tamil Nadu, 68 from Punjab, 59 from West Bengal, 48 from Andhra Pradesh, 30 from Madhya Pradesh, 25 from Chhattisgarh and 24 from Delhi.

Total 93,379 deaths reported so far in the country includes 34,761 from Maharashtra followed by 9,148 from Tamil Nadu, 8,417 from Karnataka, 5,606 from Andhra Pradesh, 5,450 from Uttar Pradesh, 5,147 from Delhi, 4,665 from West Bengal, 3,393 from Gujarat, 3,134 from Punjab and 2,152 from Madhya Pradesh.

With inputs from agencies
The Williams College-owned building at 84 Spring St. will be the new home of the Stockbridge-Munsee Communitys Tribal Historic Preservation Extension Office.

Stockbridge-Munsee Community Reclaims Some of Its History



A World War II-era mural of Ephraim Wiliams and Mohawk leader Theyanoguin is being removed from the Log to Special Collections as part of the college's examination of its history and relationship with the area and community. WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass.  More than two centuries after they were displaced from lands now known as Berkshire County, the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohican Indians are coming back to the Berkshires.

Last week, the president of Williams College announced to the school community that the college will provide office space to the Stockbridge-Munsee Community's Tribal Historic Preservation Extension Office.

The community's director of cultural affairs said this week that the group is relocating its current regional office from Troy, N.Y., east to Williamstown as part of a plan to create a stronger partnership with the liberal arts college.

"The goal is to help form a relationship with the college, not just through historic preservation, but there are programs at Williams like Native American studies and archaeology programs that we'd love to be a part of," Heather Bruegl said from her office in Bowler, Wis., site of the headquarters for the Stockbridge-Munsee Band.

"It's not just an office space. We're looking to form a relationship with the college."

She said it is just one of many partnerships with cultural and educational institutions that the Stockbridge-Munsee Community is looking to build in the years ahead.

The new office will be located at 84 Spring St., in the heart of Williamstown's commercial district. Bruegl said the move from Troy is scheduled to be completed by mid-October.

"Our Historic Preservation program now consists of two people, a historic preservation manager and a tribal historic preservation officer," Bruegl said. "Historic Preservation is a small program tasked with such important programs to get done.

"We're hoping -- obviously not right now due to the pandemic -- that the program can become larger and encompass hopefully more staff, interns, anything that we can. We want to grow a successful Cultural Affairs department and successful Historic Preservation program."

The move to the North Berkshire location is coincidental with a recent grant from the South County town of Stockbridge for an archaeological dig in the town. The Stockbridge-Munsee Community is seeking qualified archaeological firms to help unearth the site of a 1783 ox roast feast sponsored by George Washington "to honor the Tribe for service in the Revolutionary War," according to a request for proposals issued by the community.

"Berkshire County is part of our ancestral homelands, and Stockbridge plays a significant part in our history," Bruegl said. "We're so excited we were awarded these grants. We may be able to find some architectural sites that might have been lost.  We have significant history there in Stockbridge, and it's something we're constantly trying to bring to light."

The Mohican people once occupied land from what is now Lake Champlain south to what is now Manhattan Island and west from the Schoharie Creek in modern New York State east into Vermont, Massachusetts and Connecticut, according to the Stockbridge-Munsee website. After the American Revolution, the Mohican people were driven west into central New York State and, eventually, farther west to Indiana and ultimately Wisconsin by the expansion of the United States.

Williams College's Mandel announced the new partnership with the Stockbridge-Munsee Community as part of a longer message titled "Toward Racial Justice and Inclusion," that discusses how the college plans to continue addressing inequity, both in society and within its walls.

"During this academic year, the Committee on Diversity and Community will, as part of their charge, consider how the college can create a communally accountable institutional history that addresses our relationship to slavery, to the native populations who lived or live in this region, and to other aspects of our institutional past, and to recommend ways we can document, acknowledge and engage in restorative actions to address that legacy," Mandel wrote.

As part of that effort, the college plans to remove from the Log, a popular eatery and gathering spot for the college community, a World War II-era mural depicting Ephraim Williams and "Mohawk leader Theyanoguin." The mural will be removed to the college library's Special Collections facility, so it can, "be preserved as artifacts for scholarly study, rather than displayed as decorative objects in our alumni and community gathering-space," Mandel wrote.

The Log is located next door to 84 Spring St., new home of the Stockbridge-Munsee Community's Tribal Historic Preservation Extension Office.

Bruegl said the community's home in Williamstown, a place named for an officer who battled indigenous people in the 18th-century's French and Indian War, is "extremely significant."

"It's our way of reclaiming something, I would say," Bruegl said. "I'm a historian by training. I think with everything that's happening in society today, it's only fitting that we're able to go back to a place that we called home, that we might have lost through not the best of means.

"But the institution there now is working extremely hard to right past wrongs. I think that's so significant and goes to show it doesn't matter what the institution is, if you understand your history and understand that there was some wrong committed and reach out to correct that, really powerful things can happen."
UK government applies winter labour-market sticking plaster with Job Support Scheme, unemployment still set to increase, Brexit developments dominate

On Thursday, Chancellor Sunak introduced the Winter Economic package for the economy. The scheme will provide support to the labour market and economy, but there is still a high degree of uncertainty.

There will be relief that the potentially sharp unemployment increase at the end of the furlough scheme will be blunted. Uncertainty will, however, remain extremely high and unemployment will still increase, especially if there are further adverse coronavirus developments.

Brexit developments are likely to dominate the pound Sterling over the next few weeks.

Watch Full Video:

UK Job Support Scheme to replace furlough

The main element was the Job Support Scheme which will run for six months from the beginning of November. There will be direct wage subsidy support for employees, enabling them to work reduced hours. Employees must work at least a third of their hours with top-ups from employers and the government.

An employee working 33% of their normal hours would receive 77% of their former gross income.

The support will be targeted at small and medium-term businesses with large companies only eligible if turnover has declined during the pandemic. Companies will be eligible even if they have not used the furlough scheme.

The new grant will be to a maximum of 698 per month.

There will be another grant for the self-employed which will cover 20% of profits up to a maximum of 1,875.

As well as the job support scheme, there will be further support for corporate cash flows.

Bounce back business loans can be repaid over 10 years rather than 6 years, easing short-term payments and there will be extended government guarantees on business support loans. All loan schemes will also be extended until the end of this year.

The lower 5% VAT rate in the tourism and hospitality sector will be extended from the end of this year until March 31st 2021.

Business community generally supportive

Federation of Small Businesses National Chair Mike Cherry commented; "Today's support package is the flipside of the coin to Tuesday's COVID-19 business restrictions. We welcome that the Chancellor is ensuring that decisions to protect public health are informed by the need to protect the economy, people's jobs and prospects for young people in our schools and workplaces."

CBI Director General, Dame Carolyn Fairbairn said: "These bold steps from the Treasury will save hundreds of thousands of viable jobs this winter."

TUC General Secretary Frances Grady also expressed cautious support.

but important reservations continue

There were still concerns that several sectors of the economy would lose out, especially in the leisure sector. The overall government contribution will decline to 22% from 80% at the beginning of the furlough scheme and is inevitably less generous.

BNP Paribas noted that the scheme is less generous than the furlough scheme and expressed two further concerns; Second, the support schemes have not been accompanied by training measures that will be necessary to reduce structural unemployment after the crisis. Third, the measures remain temporary, rather than open-ended, which still creates a potential cliff edge later down the line.

Saxo Markets noted; This will mean that many employers will be unable to keep many workers on their payrolls, with unemployment set to possibly rise sharply in coming months.

Torsten Bell, chief executive of the Resolution Foundation, said the higher contribution required from firms, compared to the furlough scheme, meant the new Job Support Scheme "will not live up to its promise to significantly reduce the rise in unemployment.

Mark Serwotka, general secretary of the Public and Commercial Services union, said any support is welcome; "However, the chancellor's measures are akin to using a plaster to cover a gaping wound.

No support for the most vulnerable sectors

The Chancellors scheme is aimed to underpin sectors that are viable, but there will be concerns over sectors which are currently extremely vulnerable or closed. In this context, there will inevitably be substantial job losses in the hospitality sector.

Rob Paterson, chief executive of Best Western Hotels GB, said the new scheme would make the situation worse; "The hourly rate for people will increase by keeping them for 33% of the time and paying them 55% of their wages. We feel that pushes us closer to actually making mass redundancies at the end of October. We've already lost several hotels to this virus and there is now a very real risk we will lose many more."

According to ING, the scheme; should help head-off some of the redundancies that may have otherwise occurred with the closure of existing Job Retention scheme in October.

However, inevitably this leaves some concerns about what will happen in sectors still effectively closed (e.g. events), where labour demand may insufficient for firms to justify bringing staff back on a part-time basis, and where the jobs will eventually be viable again once restrictions ease.

Coronavirus developments will also be crucial

JP Morgan strategist Karen Ward added; "Some have argued that these support schemes merely delay a necessary reallocation of resource. But it is far too early to judge what lasting effect COVID-19 will have on behaviours. A viable vaccine  news of which could arrive any day  would facilitate a return to life much as we knew in 2019. The Chancellor is thus right to ensure that businesses and their employees remain supported until it is clear whether, or not, that medical solution is forthcoming."

Berenberg Senior economist Kallum Pickering commented; "While the wage subsidy scheme should help to reduce a likely spike in redundancies as the current employment subsidy scheme ends on Oct 31, it will only work if the economy avoids a second lockdown.

"In case of a new lockdown, or a serious further tightening of restrictions, the Chancellor may yet need to step up the emergency support, including more generous measures to support jobs."

Pressure will be intense if there is no vaccine breakthrough by early 2021.

Budget pressures still intense

The UK government recorded a budget deficit of 173.7bn for the first five months of the fiscal year from 26.8bn the previous year.

AJ Bell Senior Analyst Tom Selby looked at the fiscal angle; "Given borrowing was already forecast to be around 300 billion pounds higher in 2020/21 than anticipated before COVID-19 hit  and that is before this new support package was accounted for  it is inevitable that at some point the Government will have to address the question of how all this will be paid for."

Jefferies analysts noted; "We know this is not the end of the story, we retain our view that the UK is relatively well placed to announce additional fiscal measures".

The Job Support Scheme will take some of the heat out of the labour-market debate and ensure that Brexit developments will remain a key drier for Sterling direction in the short term.

ING added; As far as the currency is concerned, GBPs downside risk still looks quite material as chances of no-deal remain relatively high.

As far as JP Morgan is concerned; Meanwhile the Chancellor announced additional fiscal measures yesterday but JPM only see them worth 0.2% of GDP and unlikely to stop a jump in unemployment  this should not come as much of a surprise to anyone.
When the news broke Friday afternoon Winnipeg and surrounding areas had been upgraded to a "code orange" COVID-19 threat assessment, with all of the added restrictions it implies, there was one question left hanging in the air.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 25/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

When the news broke Friday afternoon Winnipeg and surrounding areas had been upgraded to a "code orange" COVID-19 threat assessment, with all of the added restrictions it implies, there was one question left hanging in the air.

If we had done more  just a wee bit more  in the lead-up, could we have avoided the designation altogether?

Although code orange is not nearly as restrictive as code red  which requires a near-complete shutdown of public spaces and non-essential businesses  it still has an impact on the city and its bedroom communities.

Starting Monday, and for the next month, face masks are now mandatory in all indoor public places, and gatherings (indoors and outdoors) are limited to 10 people. Existing capacity limits for schools, child care, retail, museums, bars/restaurants, theatres and casinos remain the same, but could be curtailed under this level of threat assessment.

Face masks are mandatory on Winnipeg Transit. (Mikaela MacKenzie / Winnipeg Free Press files)

While nothing is being closed, the cap on gatherings will certainly disappoint people who might have planned get-togethers around Thanksgiving weekend in October, or momentous events such as funerals and weddings. Further restrictions, which might impact non-essential businesses, are possible under code orange.

In other words, it's not nearly as painful as it was in the spring  but it's still going to sting.

Meanwhile, it wasn't clear Friday why Manitoba hadn't done more the past few weeks to avoid such restrictions.

Premier Brian Pallister's government has consistently refused to issue a broad order mandating the use of face masks indoors  a strategy infectious disease experts believe is the single most effective tool to control the spread of the novel coronavirus.

The reluctance is even more curious when you consider so many places already unofficially require mask use, including City of Winnipeg facilities and Winnipeg Transit. Ikea and Walmart are among a long list of private retail businesses that ask customers to wear masks.

Lamentably, there are many others that don't, and can't really ensure social distancing.

Well before the code orange came to the Winnipeg area, public health officials had expressed concern bars, restaurants and large social gatherings were prime sources for community transmission.

Premier Brian Pallister has refused to issue a broad order mandating the use of face masks indoors. (Ruth Bonneville / Winnipeg Free Press)

In July, the province fined nearly 20 bars and restaurants for violating COVID-19 public health orders.

Official and unofficial accounts suggest many businesses in the hospitality industry continue to flout social-distancing requirements. That concern was confirmed this week, when chief provincial public health officer Dr. Brent Roussin identified a single person who visited several crowded bars in a single evening and was in contact with 36 different people.

Officials are likely aware large social gatherings of younger people, in defiance of social-distancing limits, have been blamed for a spike in new infections in countries all over the world. In the United States, the resumption of in-person classes at many colleges and universities have been restricted or even cancelled because of clusters of COVID-19 cases tied to large parties.

Despite knowing all this, public health officials have resisted imposing limits on the number of patrons who can sit together at a bar or restaurant. As it stands, a group of patrons that arrives together can be seated together, regardless of size. It is clearly contrary to the principles of social distancing.

Roussin said his office was to begin a consultation with the local food and beverage industry to discuss additional safety measures. The concern everyone should have, particularly those in the industry, is whether the delay that comes with consultation pushes Winnipeg ever closer to the dreaded code red and closing time for bars all over the region.

That is still a ways off. However, as Manitobans enter the second half of the first year under pandemic restrictions, there is real concern people are growing bored and impatient with what Roussin calls "the basics" of virus control.

TRIBUNE MEDIA TNS Large social gatherings have been blamed for a spike in new infections in countries all over the world. (Michael Ciaglo / Getty Images files)

It is one of the risks when human nature collides with a public health emergency. The longer we live with a pandemic, the more likely we are to minimize the threat it poses  right up until we find out we are sick with a virus.

Manitoba is not alone in this laissez-faire approach to pandemic responses. However, Roussin's oft-repeated script about employing a "targeted approach" that seeks "a proper balance" seems to ignore the value of more aggressive preventative measures.

If you were to ask Winnipeggers now forced to cancel a wedding, funeral or Thanksgiving feast, you would likely find they were willing to do just a bit more prior to the arrival of a code orange so they could have continued on with important events.

The question prompted by that answer is: why aren't we doing just a little bit more?

dan.lett@freepress.mb.ca

Dan Lett | Not for Attribution A weekly look at politics close to home and around the world that is sent every Tuesday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.
MORE MIDLANDS NEWS

Dozens of students in Iowa schools were quarantined after both staff and students tested positive for the coronavirus, while a high school switched to online classes after some students were absent as cases surged Thursday by more than 1,300 across the state in the last 24 hours.

Officials at the Hartwick-Ladora-Victor Community School District quarantined 130 kindergarten through sixth grade students beginning Wednesday after a staff member tested positive for the virus a day earlier, Superintendent Brad Hohensee said.

The district has no mask requirement, though it has posted a notice on its website that it began requiring masks at indoor athletic events on Sept. 20. The district is based in Victor, nearly 76 miles east of Des Moines.

North Scott High School, which is quarantining more than 200 students due to positive tests, went to all-online instruction last Friday, according to a Sept. 17 letter the school sent to the Iowa Department of Education.

The district, based in Eldridge in eastern Iowa, said its absentee rate has spiked since school started Sept. 1 and was 23% at the high school as of Sept. 18.
Thousands of churches across the US to gather for Repentance Sunday

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Thousands of churches across the United States will pray for repentance and revival on Sunday in response to calls by the leaders of more than 50 churches and ministries to observe Repentance Sunday as the country is going through division, destruction and degradation.

Inspired by Old Testament calls to sacred assemblies, this special day (September 27) marks the beginning of Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, in the historic Church calendar, say the organizers on the events website.

This is one of the most sacred days of the year for the Jewish community and an opportunity as the Christian church to practice what Revelation 2 and 3 require, a return to our first love, seeking forgiveness of our personal and corporate sins, explain the organizers, including Matt Chandler from The Village Church in Flower Mound, Texas; Gabe Lyons from Q Ideas in Nashville, Tennessee; John Stonestreet of Colson Center in Colorado Springs; and Francis Chan of Crazy Love Ministries, among others.

During worship services or special evening services on Sunday, churches will pray for repentance in response to the continued division, destruction and degradation taking place throughout our land.

When theres division, when theres confusion, when were experiencing calamity, the role of the Church is to do what only we can do. And thats to turn to God to confess our sins, to repent of our personal sins, our corporate sins, and to ask God to turn toward us, says Lyons in a video message on his ministrys website.

The idea here is, of course, the dependence creatures have, by definition, on their Creator, said Stonestreet on the BreakPoint ministry website. And, another aspect of our creatureliness spoken of in Scripture is not only that we exist, but when and where we exist.

He continued, God has, according to Pauls teaching found in Acts 17, placed each and every one of us in particular times and particular places. The chaos of the cultural moment is all the reason we need to pray that we could possibly need.

Stonestreet noted that Lyons, who has been, the driving force organizing Repentance Day, told many of us recently, Something is surely afoot. God is on the move. Ive sensed that too.

Repentance Sunday is part of larger calls being made for prayer and repentance in America.

On Saturday, Christian leaders are gathering together for The Return: Global Day of Repentance and Prayer on The Washington Mall in Washington, D.C.

Without repentance, we have nothing else. That is the foundation of the order of God in Scripture and in all things, Kevin Jessip, president of Global Strategic Alliance, told The Christian Post in an interview earlier this month.

Known as The Return, a national and global movement of prayer and repentance, the 10-day event began with the Feast of Trumpets (Sept. 18) and will end with the Day of Atonement (Sept. 28). This is also known as the Days of Awe between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.

As part of the revival, leaders from over 150 nations will be participating in a day of prayer on Saturday. The broadcast will be hosted in over 90 languages in real-time translation. Christian media outlets including CBN, TBN, Daystar, TCT, and GOD TV will also be broadcasting the event. Featured speakers will include HUD Secretary Dr. Ben Carson, evangelist Anne Graham Lotz, Messianic Jewish Rabbi Jonathan Cahn, pro-life evangelist Alveda King, Dr. James Dobson, Bishop Harry Jackson and several others.

Lotz, the 72-year-old daughter of famed evangelist Billy Graham, has also issued an urgent call to repentance, warning that America has a small window of opportunity to return to God, that, if not taken, will incite severe judgment.

In an interview with The Christian Post this week, Lotz, founder and president of Angel Ministries, said the U.S. has repeatedly shaken its fist in Gods face, removing His name everywhere from schools to the government. When you do that, God just backs away, she said, citing Romans 1, which speaks of the retributive judgment of God.

God gives us over to ourselves, and I believe that is where we are right now; it really is the judgment of God, Lotz said. America has a window of opportunity to return to the Lord, but its just a window, and its going to close. Were going to find our nation without God, and without Him, we dont have His protection, we dont have His wisdom.
Ukraine leader praises crash survivor as toll climbs to 26 The security service, citing preliminary information, said the pilot reported an engine failure

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Saturday praised the only survivor of a military plane crash as the death toll climbed to 26, after another cadet died and three more bodies were found.

Zelensky went to the scene of the tragedy near the northeastern city of Kharkiv where an Antonov An-26 transport plane carrying 20 air force cadets and seven officers crashed during a training flight on Friday evening.

"Ukraine has lost 26 worthy sons," Zelensky said on Facebook, referring to the cadets and officers of the Kharkiv National Air Force University.

"It is difficult to find words to express the pain of this loss," he said, declaring Saturday a day of mourning.

The plane burst into flames on landing near a highway around two kilometres (more than one mile) from the Chuguiv military air base.

On Saturday, the death toll rose after three more bodies were found under the charred remains of the plane and one of the two survivors died in hospital from extensive burns.

Zelensky visited the only remaining survivor in a military hospital in Kharkiv, posting a picture of the 20-year-old cadet lying in bed with a bandaged head and right arm.

He said the cadet, Vyacheslav Zolochevsky, "came to his senses near the wreckage of the An-26."

"The plane was destroyed, there was fire, darkness and bodies all around. One of the guys was burning," he said on Facebook, adding that Zolochevsky rushed to try and save him.

The second cadet died in hospital, the Ukrainian president said as he praised Zolochevsky for his "heroism."

"Ukraine is proud of you!" he said.

Doctors said that Zolochevsky suffered a concussion but his life was not in danger.

Most cadets onboard were believed to be between the ages of 19 and 22.

One other cadet was not allowed on the flight.

Zelensky said the cause of the crash should be quickly established and called for an "objective" investigation.

Story continues

- Flights suspended -

Investigators were looking at several possible causes of the crash including technical malfunction, human error and poor aircraft maintenance.

The SBU security service said the plane was performing a training flight but the cadets were not involved in piloting it.

The security service, citing preliminary information, said the pilot reported an engine failure and seven minutes later the plane hit the ground.

Defence Minister Andriy Taran said "the plane likely caught the ground with its wing" and then burst into flames.

Citing preliminary information, the defence minister said that one of the sensors in the left engine had failed. He said the final conclusion would be made after authorities analyse the plane's black boxes.

"Everything went according to plan: the plane was performing a training flight for cadets," he said.

He said the instructor was at the controls and cadets took turns to sit next to the pilot.

Taran said the aircraft was made in 1977 but could be operated for three more years without undergoing repairs.

On Friday, the plane made six take-offs and five landings, he said.

Officials said all flights by An-26 aircraft would for now be suspended.

A number of foreign leaders including Polish President Andrzej Duda, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the EU's top diplomat Josep Borrell expressed their condolences.

"We send our heartfelt condolences to the families and loved ones of the cadets, officers, and crew killed and injured in the An-26 plane crash," said the US embassy in Ukraine.

The town of Chuguiv, with a population of more than 30,000 people, is located around 30 kilometres southeast of Kharkiv.

Chuguiv also lies some 100 kilometres west of the front line where government forces are fighting pro-Russian separatists.

About 24 meters long and with a wingspan of 29 metres, the Antonov An-26 was designed in Soviet-era Ukraine.

Several military planes have crashed during training flights in Ukraine in recent years.

dg-as/tgb
The Seychelles Tourism Board (STB) launched the second phase of its digital campaign Experience Seychelles on September 22 during a press conference at the STB Headquarters at Botanical House.

This new phase of the online campaign, dubbed Experience Seychelles; our home, your sanctuary, was presented to the press by the STB Chief Executive Sherin Francis and Digital Marketing Director Chris Matombe in the presence of STB Deputy Chief Executive Jenifer Sinon and Seychelles Hospitality and Tourism Association Chairperson Sybille Cardon.

Experience Seychelles; our home, your sanctuary, which follows the STB digital campaign Dream now, Experience Seychelles Later launched in April 2020 and will run across all Seychelles destination platforms managed by STBs Digital Marketing Team, puts forward the tourism boards effort to increase the destination collective digital presence.

Amidst times of uncertainty, the Experience Seychelles; our home, your sanctuary campaign gives travellers worldwide hope and prospect to escape harsh realities they are currently facing by calling them to submerge themselves in the natural allure of this pristine paradise.

Francis stated that the timing for the release of the campaign, which invites potential visitors to the beautiful destination, has been chosen purposely as it is focusing on a long-term visibility strategy to reboot travel in our small destination.

Experience Seychelles; our home, your sanctuary is paving the way for the destination to present our various markets and segments with other marketing initiatives to come. We are aware that in these uncertain times and in a competitive environment, the conversion of this campaign to actual sales of holidays will not be immediate this is why we feel it is important for us to remain visible to our potential clients, said the STB Chief Executive.

Additionally, the campaign is actively engaging the tourism trade to join STB in the campaign in promoting the destination to potential visitors through content creation and using the #ExperienceSeychelles to share exclusive stories and experiences of visitors who have used their services.

After intensive preparations, the Seychelles Islands have been welcoming tourists back on its shores since June 1, 2020, through chartered and private flights and officially reopened to scheduled flights as of August 1, 2020, which resulted in the restart of tourism. -- TradeArabia News Service
The World Socialist Web Site is publishing more messages of support for Dr. Joseph Scalice from students, teachers, academics and others from around the world. Dr. Scalice has come under attack from the Philippine Stalinists for his powerful lecture, First as Tragedy, Second as Farce: Marcos, Duterte and the Communist Parties of the Philippines, which examined the support given by the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), and the various organizations that follow its political line, to authoritarian Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte in 2016.

Acutely sensitive to the criticism of the CPP, its founder Jose Maria Sison, without a shred of evidence, has denounced Dr. Scalice as a paid CIA agent and an informer for Duterte. Dr. Scalice, through the establishment of the historical record about the betrayals of the CPP, has done a service to the working class in the Philippines and internationally.

We urge our readers to come to the defence of Dr. Scalice, including by sending statements of support to the WSWS opposing the slanderous attack on him by the CPP and sharing his lecture widely.

Dr. Joseph Scalice delivering a lecture on the Chinese revolution.

Thomas Mackaman, Associate Professor of History, Kings College, Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania:

I write this letter in support of Dr. Joseph Scalice against the slanders and threats made against him by the Filipino Stalinist, Joma Sison.

Dr. Scalices dissertation, Crisis of Revolutionary Leadership: Martial Law and the Communist Parties of the Philippines, 19571974, defended in committee at the University of Berkeley in 2017, is an extraordinary achievement of historical research. The first-ever study of the Sino-Soviet rift as it impacted the communist movement in the Philippines, the nearly 900-page volume is supported by impeccable research drawn from Scalices voluminous archival work, newspaper analysis, and interviews.

The impact of this important study is made clear by Sisons own desperate intervention. Scalices work is the best sort of history. Its objectivity is derived precisely in its dedication to its subject, the Filipino working class. Sison is desperate to prevent Filipino workers from learning their own history.

Sison is free to disagree with Scalices findings. To do so, however, would require him to confront the evidence that Scalice presents. Of course, Sison knows better than to try. There is no honest approach to this history that allows him to slither away from his own record and the history of betrayal of the Stalinist movement he represents. Understanding this, Sison turns to slander and threats. Always the last refuge of a defeated argument!

It seems to not have occurred to Sison that his attacks only provide Dr. Scalice with one more powerful piece of evidence in his historical indictment of Filipino Stalinism. I eagerly await Scalices book. I only hope that this episode will find its way into its epilogue.

Sebastian, a UC Berkeley student:

I know Joseph Scalice from his student outreach work at UC Berkeley. The labeling of Scalice as a CIA agent by Sison is a ridiculous and superficial slander perpetrated by an obvious charlatan caught in a lie. Those who know Scalice know he is deeply critical of the US government and opposed to all the CIA stands for. Scalice is deeply committed to the truth and exposing lies where he sees them. Jose Maria Sison would have a hard time finding anyone at UC Berkeley whom would agree with his characterization of Joseph Scalice.

John, a student at the University of the Philippines Baguio:

I believe in the honest works of Dr. Joseph Scalice. His words are of an academic historian adhering to proper academic procedures and of historical truth. This is the sad reality of politics in the Philippines, the ugly historical truth of parties will always be denied as slander, whether from an authoritarian right or a radical left party. As historians, we must always stand to present an unfiltered and unbiased truth, and I praise Dr. Scalice for his bravery in speaking these truths despite the heavy risks implied by it.

Karol, a teacher from the Philippines:

As a Social Studies teacher, I find it confusing for Joma Sison to accuse Dr. Scalice with scandalous labels when he seems to better fit the description he is talking about. It is indeed important for scholars and teachers alike to defend each other in times of bitter defenses from these people who try to distort the truth in our very eyes. The evidence is there and can be read by any literate person but we can see that like any troll he resorted to lowly name-calling. This is a bigger challenge for us in academe to take our job seriously and inspire young people to be vigilant against people who try to benefit from their own lies.

Antonio, Philippine anthropologist, academic, writer:

I was in the underground left. At the height of the internal debates, I was a Reaffirmistthe faction of Joma Sison. Later I went back to school, earned a PhD, and taught in academe. As an anthropologist, I was in touch with progressive sources in Davao city. I was astounded by the field data. The NPAs in the citys Paquibato district would deliver votes for Duterte for his numerous elections as city mayor. I asked why. The information given was that the NPA-generated votes were crucial to offset Dutertes minimal votes in the citys first district. In the 2016 elections, even the above-ground progressive left of the city voted for Duterte. They only turned around when Duterte manipulated the Marcos burial at the Libingan. These field data are for heights of incredulitythe left of Davao city supported the rise to fascism of Rodrigo Duterte. What happened to class analysis? It is an academic question that begs an answer for the death of Philippine democracy today under Duterte. I do not know and have never met Joseph Scalice. But as an academic myself, I see that his study is corroborated. In academe, what is fundamental is truth in research, borne by data on the ground. To deny the truth that the left supported Duterte fascism is grave dishonesty. All that Sison needs to do is a mea culpa. Thats all!

Ave Maria, Philippines:

Im a graduate school student taking up Linguistics, and in my field, historical evidence sets our research output apart from mere guesswork. Ive been attending many national situation-ers or natsit in the progressive groups lingo, and it is noticeable that the majority of citations come from Mr. Jose Ma. Sison. However, I have yet to see journal articles, newspaper clippings, or any archival source that supports Sisons statements. This is the primary reason for my fascination with Dr. Joseph Scalices scholarship. He has evidence to prove any claim he declares in public. His body of work creates an avenue for public discourse which is the ultimate goal of any scholar with a genuine quest for knowledge and truth.

Kristian Boehringer, PhD student, Western Sydney University:

The attack on Dr. Scalice by Joma Sison, is an attack on academic freedom. Political parties have no business attacking academics for their opinions. This is a very worrying and dangerous turn of events. To my mind Dr. Scalice has exposed the CPPs enthusiastic support for Duterte and provides a thought provoking explanation for that support: the Stalinist-Maoist doctrine of two-stage revolution. Instead of openly debating Dr. Scalice and his opinions, Joma Sison has taken refuge in dangerous name calling: methinks he doth protest too much!

Richard, former teacher:

Joseph Scalice has presented a rigorous, in-depth investigation into the support (and the ideological and social basis for that support) that Jose Maria Sison and his Maoist Philippines Communist Party has put behind the fascistic Rodrigo Duterte and how this is consistent with that partys historical support for authoritarian bourgeois politicians and the betrayal of working class interests.

I recommend watching that highly illuminating lecture, supported by a scaffold of investigation into the contemporary written records. Scalice defends academic and historical truth in a skillful and devastating way.

Scalice has been met by a series of outrageous slanders and falsifications from Jose Maria Sison, building consistently vile and outrageous falsifications of Scalice and his work. These slanders only deepen the evidence that Scalice presents and reveal the brazen lies of Sison and his party and their mendacious methods.

Martin, retired school teacher, Melbourne, Australia:

I write to express my opposition to the threats and slanders levelled at Dr. Joseph Scalice by the leader of the Stalinist Communist Party of Philippines.

Dr. Scalices lecture exposed the shameful role that the CPP played in the electoral victory of current President Duterte whose murderous attacks on workers and poor in the Philippines has rightly shocked workers the world over. In particular, he exposed the filthy role played by the Leader of the CPP Jose Maria Sison.

From its counter revolutionary betrayal of the first workers state in the former USSR to the betrayals of the Chinese Revolution and the restitution of capitalism by the Maoist bureaucracy in China, Stalinism in all its forms is a synonym for treachery and bloody repression of the workers and peasants everywhere that are striving to put an end to capitalist exploitation and oppression.

The lies and threats levelled by Sison against Dr. Scalice are typical of Stalinism and Stalinists throughout their sordid history. Lies and violence are their stock in trade as the world Trotskyist movement has powerfully exposed time and time again! The CPP and its spokesman Sison should know that conscious workers, students and youth the world over demand an end to any and all attempts at slander and threats of violence against Dr. Scalice and his honest scholarship!

Sathish, a WSWS reader in India:

I am sending this letter in defense of Dr. Joseph Scalice taking inspiration from the letters sent by all the scholars, intellectuals and youths around the world. This principled objective exposure of historical facts is of prime importance against the thuggish Stalinist and Maoist variants, who are not ready to accept their defeat and failed two stage Menshevik theory and want to influence the working class and youths with their nationalistic orientation. Sisons support for Duterte is a crime against the international working class and Scalice was correct in calling it a farce, referring to famous Marxs quote.

I watched a movie called Ordinary People from Netflix, which is in Tagalog and quite a strong movie about the urban poor of Manila. The working class of the Philippines should join hands with their international class brothers and not have any illusion or faith in the outdated Menshevik and Maoist bloc of four classes to fight the imperialist attack. As Trotsky said, imperialism in fact sharpens the class boundaries between bourgeoisie and working class and does not weld them. So, Scalice you are a great comrade and your work is really phenomenal, and monumental. I wish such post mortem works to be done soon on Indian Stalinists and the Maoists, which is a long due work.

Shanta, a retired technician of Sri Lankan background residing in Melbourne, Australia:

I wish to condemn the unsubstantiated slanders from the founder of the Communist Party of the Philippines, Jose Maria Sison denouncing Dr. Scalice as a CIA agent.

In his lecture, Dr. Scalice provides a highly factual account of betrayals committed by the CPP, exposing the misconceptions of Stalinist and Maoist politics. When listening to Dr. Scalice I noticed the amazing political similarity of the modus operandi of the CPP and the Sri Lankan Stalinists, the Communist Party of Sri Lanka and the JVP, a Sri Lankan political party originating from a Maoist right-wing tendency from the China-aligned wing of the CP Sri Lanka in the late 1960s. The Sri Lankan Stalinists promotion of progressive patriots, socialism in one country, village to city revolution and the more recent progressive technocrats & intellectuals, is just part and parcel of this Stalinist methodology which disoriented and misled the Sri Lankan working class movement and the radicalised youth into a series of betrayals and blunders since the 1950s. I am especially thankful to Dr. Scalice for enlightening me on how the politics based on Stalinist/Maoist ideology can betray the working-class internationally.
President Donald Trump told supporters he was eager for a smooth, beautiful transition of power but at the same time insisted the only way he would lose the election in November is if Democrats cheat. Were not going to stand for it, he told a largely maskless crowd in Newport News, Virginia, where he held and outdoor rally Friday night. After sparking widespread outrage for refusing to decisively commit to a peaceful transition of power if Joe Biden wins the election, Trump seemed to try to tone down that concern while at the same time continuing to claim the election could be rife with fraud. I want a smooth, beautiful transition, the president said. But they dont add the other part: But its got to be an honest vote. He later added: This is a disaster waiting to happen  Were not going to lose this except if they cheat, thats the way I look at it.

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"We're not gonna lose this, expect if they cheat ... that's the only way we're gonna lose" -- Trump pic.twitter.com/RING2wOctz  Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) September 26, 2020

Trump called on his supporters to become de facto election observers. We cant let them cheat, he said. Our country is at stake. The president told supporters that If you see anything, you just have to report it. He went on to reiterate that the only way were going to lose is if theres mischief  and itll have to be on a big scale. The widespread use of mail-in ballots means some states may not be able to report a decisive result on the night of the election and that would ruin it for those like him who like the dramatic effect of television coverage. I like watching television, and have, The winner is  he said. Right? You might not hear it for months because this is a mess.

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"We've gotta watch this ballot scam, because they're scamming us. And then they say, 'he doesn't want to turn over [power].' Of course I do. But it's gotta be a fair election." -- Trump pic.twitter.com/4DCQEKKszc  Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) September 26, 2020

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Although Trump said his team wants a very friendly transition he also assured that we dont want to be cheated and be stupid and say, oh, lets transit  well go and well do a transition and we know that there were thousands and thousands of ballots that made the difference through cheating, he said. At one point on Friday he called it this ballot scam. It marked at least the third time this week Trump has seemed to put conditions on a transition of power. Some key Republican leaders have tried to dismiss any concerns as baseless but many have also raised questions about the validity of mail-in ballots.
Madeline Odent posted messages to her 5,000 followers in the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement outlining how household items could permanently damage monuments

A museum curator who sparked outrage after tweeting a guide about vandalising racist statues has left her job.

Madeline Odent posted messages to her 5,000 followers in the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement outlining how household items could permanently damage monuments.

Her comments led to calls for her to be sacked from her taxpayer-funded job at Royston and District Museum in Hertfordshire. Royston Town Council discussed the row earlier this month.

It has now emerged that Mrs Odent is no longer employed but the council has refused to say if she has been sacked or quit  despite previously saying it condemns all criminal acts including damage to statues and monuments and incitement to commit unlawful acts.

American-born Mrs Odent (pictured) was appointed to the job in 2018. She also refused to clarify what had happened.

She added: They are not commenting because they cant and neither can I.

Anyways, I dont work for them anymore.

Mrs Odent appears to have stopped working for the council at the end of August. She revealed she had a new job but declined to comment further.

The furore began in June when the Oxford-educated curator, who comes from a wealthy family in Georgia and is married to banker Pascal Odent, tweeted her comments days after protesters in Bristol toppled a statue of slave trader Edward Colston.

She wrote: From an art perspective, its honestly fine to throw paint on memorials of genocidal racists! Paint is pretty easy to clean off.

What would be an absolute shame is if people threw certain household items that cause irreversible bronze disease. Of course then the artefact cant really be on display... Because, like, if somebody were to throw a ton of tomatoes at a bust of a genocidal racist, nobody would probably notice the chemical reaction until it was too late to save the artefact.

The thread ended with an image of graffiti referring to Winston Churchill as a racist.

Critics messaged the council, with one saying: Your museum manager appears to be very clearly inciting the criminal damage of monuments.

A petition calling for Mrs Odents removal was also signed by more than 800 people.

Hertfordshire Police later revealed they had given strong words of advice following the tweets but no further action was taken her.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 06:00:59|Editor: huaxia

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UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- President of the Federated States of Micronesia David W. Panuelo said on Friday that climate change is his country's single greatest long-term security threat, calling on the international community to transition to sustainable and renewable energy.

"For our nation, climate change is our single greatest long-term security threat. Rising waters threaten to make life in remote atolls impossible. Higher temperatures threaten crops, livestock, and fish," said the president of Micronesia, a subregion of Oceania, composed of thousands of small islands in the western Pacific Ocean.

"All countries and peoples are in a global war against climate change. We have witnessed deadly fires in the U.S., typhoons in the Caribbean and in the Pacific, and floods in Asia. It is a war that we can win, but we must be much more aggressive in combatting it," he said.

"The world must transition to sustainable and renewable energy. Coal and natural gas are unsustainable solutions for the environment and are harmful to both economic growth and equality of opportunity. If our world is to fulfill its commitments under the Paris Agreement, all nations must make a unified and global effort," he added.

"We have seen, through the Montreal Protocol, that 98 percent of ozone depleting substances have been phased out by the global community. We can succeed if we work together. It is both possible and essential to improve our quality of life while also being responsible stewards of our planet," said Panuelo.

The president also urged the international community to embrace the spirit of solidarity.

"We stand in solidarity with our brothers and sisters across the world. All human life is priceless and valuable. Empathy is not weakness. Empathy is courage, and empathy is strength. Through empathy, our global community can overcome any challenge, from COVID-19 to climate change," said the president. Enditem
MERIDEN  Two men and a woman face charges after police said they fled from officers Monday and were found in Cromwell with drugs, a gun and stun gun.

Juwan Morales, 22, of 668 Jamaica Ave., Brooklyn, New York, was charged with theft of a firearm, carrying a pistol without a permit, weapons in a motor vehicle, possession of narcotics, possession with intent to sell, conspiracy, interfering with police, first-degree reckless endangerment and reckless driving.

Darwin Galarza, 20, no address listed, was charged with no pistol permit, weapons in a motor vehicle, theft of a firearm, and conspiracy.

Antoinique Bass-Davis, 20, of 208 Westwood Dr., Waterbury, was charged with possession of narcotics, possession with intent to sell, conspiracy and weapon in a motor vehicle.

Around 2 p.m. Monday members of the Meriden crime suppression unit were conducting patrols downtown when police saw a car run a red light at East Main and Pratt streets, the report said. Police followed the car and noted the driver, later identified as Morales, made several turns and ignored officers attempts to stop the car. While near Lewis Avenue, in a school zone during school dismissal time, police noted the car drove around vehicles into traffic.

According to the report, Morales drove onto I-691 East, then onto I-91 North. Police followed the car at a distance to where Morales exited onto Route 372 in Cromwell. The car stopped in a parking lot. Police called Cromwell police for backup and approached the car. The car fled onto a dead end road. When police approached the car again they noted the two men were gone and the woman, identified as Bass-Davis, was still inside the car. Police tracked the men on foot and both were taken into custody and identified as Morales and Galarza, the report noted.

Police found a Colt Model Trooper Mark III .357 magnum in the parking area, the report noted. Police found a total of 3.9 grams of crack cocaine in Bass-Davis pants and a stun gun inside a purse.

Morales and Galarza were each held on $500,000 bond. Bass-Davis was held on $25,000 bond. They are due in Meriden Superior Court on Oct. 16.

lsellew@record-journal.com203-317-2225Twitter: @LaurenSellewRJ
China calls for global 'green revolution' as Trump goes solo on climate People's Republic of China President Xi Jinping speaks during the 75th annual U.N. General Assembly

By Valerie Volcovici

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Chinese President Xi Jinping announced plans to boost his country's Paris climate accord target on Tuesday and called for a green revolution, just minutes after U.S. President Donald Trump blasted China for "rampant pollution."

Addressing the U.N. General Assembly, Xi said China would achieve a peak in carbon dioxide emissions before 2030 and carbon neutrality before 2060, the first time the world's biggest emitter of carbon dioxide has pledged to end its net contribution to climate change.

"China will scale up its intended Nationally Determined Contributions (to the Paris agreement) by adopting more vigorous policies and measures," Xi said, urging all countries to pursue a "green recovery of the world economy in the post-COVID era."

Xi used the lectern to call for multilateral action on climate change after Trump called the Paris climate agreement - with nearly 200 signatories - a one-sided deal and criticized China for being the worlds largest source of carbon emissions.

Todd Stern, U.S. climate envoy under the Obama administration who worked on brokering a bilateral climate agreement with China in 2014, said the announcement was an "encouraging" step.

"Todays announcement by President Xi Jinping that China intends to reach carbon neutrality before 2060 is big and important news  the closer to 2050 the better," he said, but said the 2030 goal "won't be enough" to get it on track for the longer-term target.

The United States and China have been hit this year by extreme weather of the kind predicted with climate change. In China, heavy rains over the summer unleashed the most punishing flood season in three decades, while the United States is facing one of its busiest hurricane seasons at the same time that record wildfires ravage Western states.

Trump has referred to climate change as a "hoax," and in 2017 pulled the United States out of the Paris accords laying out an international approach to the problem. Joe Biden, his Democratic presidential challenger and a former vice president, has included climate change on his list of major crises facing the United States.

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Trump, who has rolled back or pared down hundreds of environmental regulations, said the United States had reduced its carbon emissions by more than any country in the agreement.

"Those who attack Americas exceptional environmental record while ignoring Chinas rampant pollution are not interested in the environment. They only want to punish America. And I will not stand for it," Trump said.

Li Shuo, a climate diplomacy expert at Greenpeace, said Xis climate pledge, minutes after Trumps speech, was "clearly a bold and well calculated move."

"It demonstrates Xis consistent interest in leveraging the climate agenda for geopolitical purposes," he said.

Although many analysts have predicted that China was already on track to achieve peak emissions by 2030, the formal announcement was welcomed by the European Union, which has been negotiating with China to set a target for carbon neutrality and to announce a peak date. The EU had been urging Beijing to bring the date forward to 2025.

"I welcome the announcement by President Xi that China has set a date for its CO2 emissions to peak and will become carbon neutral before 2060," said Frans Timmermans, vice president for the European Green Deal, while adding that every country needs to ramp up its climate targets.

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, like Trump, used his U.N. speech to push back on international criticism of his country's handling of the environment, as the number of fires in the Amazon is at a 10-year high, while blazes in the Pantanal wetlands are the worst on record.

Environmental advocates blame Bolsonaro for emboldening illegal ranchers and land speculators who set fire to land to increase its value for agricultural use, but he said Brazilian agriculture feeds 1 billion people in the world and has strong environmental protections.

And yet we are the victims of one of the most brutal campaign of misinformation about the Amazon and the Pantanal, he said, without specifying what information was false.

(Reporting by Valerie Volcovici; Additional reporting by Kate Abnett in Brussels and Jake Spring in Brasilia; Editing by Jonathan Oatis, Nick Macfie and Steve Orlofsky)
Rs 22,100 crore demand dismissed in global court

In this 2012 file photo, a visitor walks into a Vodafone store in Bangalore. British telecom giant Vodafone Group plc on Sept. 25, 2020 won an arbitration against the Indian government over a demand for Rs 22,100 crore in taxes using retrospective legislation. (PTI)

New Delhi: British telecom giant Vodafone Group plc on Friday won an arbitration against the Indian government over a demand for `22,100 crore in taxes using retrospective legislation.

An international arbitration tribunal ruled that Indias demand in past taxes were in breach of fair treatment under a bilateral investment protection pact.

The award is confidential, but Vodafone can confirm that the tribunal has found (it) in Vodafone's favour, Vodafone Group said in a statement. We are studying the lengthy documents and can make no further comment at this time.

It was not immediately known if the Indian government will abide by the arbitration award. Sources said the tax demand was on the UK-listed company and Vodafones India venture faced no liability. Vodafone India was later on merged with Aditya Birla Groups telecom company Idea.

Sources with direct knowledge of the matter said the government of Indias liability will be restricted to about `75 crore.

Before the arbitration tribunal, Vodafone had challenged Indias usage of a 2012 legislation that gave it powers to retrospectively tax deals like Vodafones $11-billion acquisition of 67 per cent stake in the mobile phone business owned by Hutchison Whampoa in 2007. It challenged the demand of `7,990 crore in capital gains taxes (`22,100 crore after including interest and penalty) under the Netherlands-India Bilateral Investment Treaty (BIT).

Tax authorities had in September 2007 served notice to Vodafone Interna-tional Holdings BV (VIH-BV) for its alleged failure to deduct withholding tax from consideration paid to the Hutchison Telecomm-unications International Ltd. However, Vodafone challenged this in the Supreme Court, which set it aside tax notice in January 2012, saying that the transaction was not taxable in India and so the company had no obligation to withhold tax. In May that year, Parliament passed the Finance Act 2012 that amended various provisions of the Income-Tax Act, 1961, with retrospective effect to tax any gain on transfer of shares in a non-Indian company which derives substantial value from underlying Indian assets. In January 2013, the company was served a tax notice of `14,200 crore after including interest on the principal amount. A year later, Vodafone challenged the tax demand.

Sources said the company in April 2014 served the notice of arbitration after out-of-court dispute resolution talks failed. Vodafone has always maintained that there is no liability and that it will vigorously defend any allegation that it is liable to pay tax.
New Delhi, Sep 26 : After the new team of BJP President J.P. Nadda was announced, Union Home Minister and Nadda's predecessor Amit Shah said that "BJP is not a party but an idea" while congratulating the new team members.

Meanwhile, many of those who were replaced today posted customary "thank you" notes on social media but others remained mum.

"Best wishes to all newly-appointed national officials. BJP is not just a party but an idea, which is constantly moving for the welfare of every class. I believe this new team under the guidance of Narendra Modi and Nadda's leadership will strengthen this idea even further," Shah tweeted.

After being replaced, former BJP General Secretary Ram Madhav put out a small message on Twitter: "Congratulations to the newly-appointed office-bearers of BJP. Grateful to the party leadership for providing me the opportunity to serve for one term as Gen Sec." Saroj Pandey too thanked the party. However, many like Uma Bharti or Rahul Sinha have maintained a stoic silence so far on them being replaced.

The much anticipated Team Nadda was released where there has been a major overhaul with big names like Ram Madhav, Muralidhar Rao, Uma Bharti, Om Mathur being dropped while giving a chance to new faces like C.T. Ravi, and Tejasvi Surya. Even turncoats like Mukul Roy, Anupam Hazra and Tom Vadakkan have found a place in his team.
Allegations mount in 2017 Ravi Zacharias illicit online relationship scandal

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New information has been publicly released regarding the late apologist Ravi Zacharias and an alleged online sexual relationship that was first reported in 2017.

In a three-part installment last week from The Roys Report, the website of independent investigative journalist Julie Roys, new testimonies and emails were released suggesting an alternative version of events than those that were represented nearly three years ago when allegations emerged that Zacharias had been involved in an illicit online sexual relationship with a Canadian woman. Around this same time, the famed apologist's academic credentials and resume were also scrutinized amid questions he had inflated and misrepresented them.

Zacharias, who died in May after a battle with cancer, said in a Christianity Today article published in December 2017 that the woman had sent him unwanted, racy photos of herself and that it was part of a plot to extract millions of dollars from him and his ministry.

Some have maintained that his words to the magazine were in violation of the settlement agreement he reached with the Canadian woman, Lori Anne, and her husband, Brad Thompson, which included a nondisclosure agreement forbidding both parties from speaking about it.

According to Boz Tchividjian, an attorney and founder of Godly Response to Abuse in a Christian Environment (G.R.A.C.E), who represented the Thompsons, his clients "made the very difficult decision to abide by the legally binding agreement even though Zacharias had apparently decided to do otherwise.

Christian counselors Jerry and Denise Basel, who helped Thompson in October 2016, spoke to Roys about the emails exchanged between Zacharias and Lori Anne. They believe the online communication reveals an abusive power dynamic given the 30-year age difference between the two and that it was tantamount to grooming.

In many ways, she was kind of like a child in regard to him because of his age, Jerry Basel told The Roys Report in part 1 of her series, which was published on Sept. 14.

It just followed a pattern that we are familiar with in regard to abuse.

Denise Basel added, It was just this slowly drawing Lori into something deeper. It seemed more innocent at the beginning, but it kept increasing.

The Christian Post reached out to RZIM on Monday for comment on The Roys Report article, specifically to inquire about Basel's words and other issues raised in Roys' investigative report. In a letter sent to CP Friday night, the RZIM Board of Directors said:

"In April 2017, Ravi Zacharias received a letter from an attorney representing Bradley and Lori Anne Thompson of Ontario, Canada, presenting allegations and threatening litigation by the Thompsons against Mr. Zacharias. The letter threatened that litigation was forthcoming, or, 'in the alternative of protracted and public litigation, the Thompsons will sign a release of you and your church and ministry in exchange for a certified check in the amount of $5 million dollars made payable to the Bryant Law Center, Lori Anne Thompson and Bradley Thompson within thirty days of todays date and mailed to the above address.' "In response to this demand letter, Ravi notified the board of the Ravi Zacharias International Ministries and personally filed a lawsuit under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act in August 2017. The Thompsons, through their attorneys, then requested to enter into mediation

to resolve the matter without going to trial. In November 2017, Ravi consented to resolve his lawsuit and the matter through mediationa process that resulted in a resolution agreed to by both parties. "In addition to these legal proceedings and the investigations underlying them, this matter was independently and rigorously investigated in 2018 at the initiative of the denomination that issued Ravis ministerial credentials, the Christian & Missionary Alliance. That investigation included multiple

interviews with the parties and a review of all available documents and records. The denomination concluded, 'the available evidence does not provide a basis for formal discipline' "As is widely known, Ravi Zacharias died May 19, 2020. Subsequently, some have called on his family and/or ministry to release the Thompsons from the confidentiality agreement they entered into with Ravi some two-and-a-half years prior to his death. Since RZIM was not a party to the agreement, it is unable to alter it, and his family does not feel it proper to alter it without Ravis knowledge or consent. Before he died, however, Ravi addressed allegations that he solicited inappropriate photos from Lori Anne Thompson or otherwise engaged in communications of a sexual nature with her in an 800-word public statement in December 2017. In that statement, he denied any sexually or romantically inappropriate conduct. He stood by that statement until his death. His denial is consistent with the character of the man we knew and worked alongside for years. "Also since his death in May, allegations by Mrs. Thompson against Ravi have resurfaced in the public domain. This prompted calls for RZIM and/or the Zacharias family to conduct further investigation into this matter. In light of these developments, we, the Board of RZIM have reviewed the matter again and conclude the following: 1) Ravi Zacharias was never physically alone with Mrs. Thompson nor did he send her photos of himself. 2) There is no evidence that he solicited photos of heran allegation Ravi vehemently denied in his public statement in December 2017. Furthermore, no evidence to the contrary has ever been presented. 3) Ravi addressed his communication with Mrs. Thompson in his December 2017 statement and we agree with him that it was wrong to have engaged in ongoing communication of a personal nature with a woman other than his wife. 4) We believe Ravi should have immediately disclosed the fact that Mrs. Thompson sent inappropriate photographs to him. 5) We have long had policies regarding physical safeguards to protect both our team members and leaders as well as those they come in contact with to prevent interactions that could ever prove harmful to either party. In 2018, we implemented electronic communication safeguards and policies for that purpose as well. We regret not having put the electronic communication safeguards in place sooner. "We respect that there are those who disagree with us about this process and our current disposition. Finally, we reaffirm our commitment to the mission and work of RZIMto reach and challenge those who shape the ideas of culture with the credibility of the Gospel of Jesus Christ."

The online relationship began after the Thompsons met Zacharias at a 2014 luncheon in Canada he was speaking at. Brad had been invited to sponsor a table there as he had sponsored the airtime for Zacharias radio program on UCB Canada, according to The Roys Report.

According to letters that Lori Anne wrote and sent to third parties before the NDA, Zacharias was the one who suggested that the couple keep in touch with him though the apologist has said that Lori Anne made the suggestion. They began emailing each other and while Brad did not follow through, Lori Anne and Zacharias continued to communicate online. She shared details about her past, including stories about abuse by her father, and grew to trust the apologist as a fatherly figure.

Their communication turned sexual in 2016 after Zacharias professed his love to her, Lori Anne wrote.

It wasn't until her sister, Tamara Batiste, and later her counselors called the relationship "grooming" that Lori Anne said she realized he engaged in "predatory" behavior.

When Thompson told Zacharias that she could no longer continue their relationship as she had come to believe it was a sin against God and told him that she had to tell her husband about their online activities, the apologist implored her not to do so and appeared to threaten suicide.

"You promised you wouldnt Lori Anne. If. You betray me here I will have no option but to bid this world goodbye I promise," he wrote.

The Basels then sent an email to Zacharias that same evening, informing him that they were counseling Thompson and that she only intended to share what had transpired between them with her husband and no one else.

"We need some assurance from you that you will not harm yourself. Otherwise, we will find it necessary to contact 911 in your location. We await your prompt response. Thank you," the counselors wrote to Zacharias.

He replied moments later: "I am fine Thank you. I am just concerned about her. Thank you please tell her I am praying for her. She is very much in my prayers."

The Roys Report also obtained documents, invoices of gifts from Zacharias to Thompson, and phone records appearing to show their conversations, all of which substantiated Lori Anne's version of events. Roys obtained these from her sister, who had received them before the Thompsons signed the nondisclosure agreement that forbade them from speaking publicly.

Batiste shared the documents with Roys because she wanted to see her sister "freed from the shame and the torment of being painted as the perpetrator in this scenario."

Lori Anne has maintained that they signed the NDA under great duress and there is nothing she and her husband have that they do not wish to be disclosed. On May 21, she released a video two days after Zacharias died, asking Zacharias' family to release her from the NDA.

In 2017 when the allegations first surfaced, the apologist released a statement, saying he did not elicit any photos or messages and "clearly instructed her to stop contacting me in any form; I blocked her messages." He maintained that he never engaged in "any inappropriate behavior of any kind" during his marriage to his wife, Margie.

In Zacharias' lawsuit against the Thompsons, he claimed that Lori Anne had coaxed him into an illicit online affair and that the Canadian couple was attempting to extort money.

This particular claim was bolstered by a previous lawsuit Brad filed against Maranatha Christian Reformed Church, his former church in Belleville, Ontario, several years earlier, asking for $1 million in damages. Brad alleged in that dispute that Pastor John Visser had abused his position of influence in a counseling relationship in order to advance his and his family's business interests through obtaining loans and investments from him.

When reporting on the allegations against Zacharias in 2017, Christianity Today reported that Visser "was temporarily suspended, but his church and denomination ultimately stood by him.

While Visser was permitted to return to pastoring after a 90-day suspension, it was only after he agreed to find outside oversight for his counseling ministry.

The governing body of the denomination said in its conclusion of an investigation it had conducted in 2012 that Visser was guilty of abuse of the office of a minister and had, regarding the Thompsons, "abused his office for inappropriate ends and/or self-interest by soliciting and/or allowing a counselee ... to invest in companies that (Visser) and his family owned.

Brad loaned approximately $355,000 to Vissers two companies over the course of several years and one of those companies reportedly went bankrupt, according to The Roys Report, which verified the financial transactions. Upon realizing he was not going to be paid back, Brad filed a lawsuit against Visser and the church to try and recoup his money, asking for $1 million, at his attorney's suggestion.

Contrary to what was alleged in Zacharias' lawsuit, Brad and Visser never arrived at a settlement agreement. Brad told Roys he ultimately scrapped the lawsuit since Visser went bankrupt.

In the legal dispute against Zacharias, the Thompsons sent a demand letter  convinced that was the only way to be taken seriously  for $5 million to RZIM, allegedly at the recommendation of their lawyer.

Though Brad is reportedly a successful businessman and had no financial need for the money, his attorneys thought that the higher amount was reasonable since Zacharias' ministry had so much money that he could likely find a donor who could pay $1 million. At the time, the #MeToo movement was exploding and prominent mass media figures and Hollywood moguls were paying out especially large sums to alleged victims.

As Lori Anne and I found out more about predation and grooming and the amount of victims that predators have ... we knew we had a moral responsibility, or a godly responsibility, before the Lord, not to do nothing, Brad told Roys, explaining his reasons for sending the letter demanding a $5 million settlement.

We both felt a burden. We knew it could possibly kill us to come forward. But it could possibly kill someone else if we stayed silent.

In 2018, after reviewing the accusations regarding his credentials and relationship with Lori Anne, the Christian & Missionary Alliance (which ordained Zacharias) decided not to discipline him, saying "available evidence does not provide a basis for formal discipline under the C&MA policy."
This report is part of "Turning Point," a groundbreaking month-long series by ABC News examining the racial reckoning sweeping the United States and exploring whether it can lead to lasting reconciliation.

It took 233 years, but for the first time in its history, the New Jersey Supreme Court has a Black female justice.

Fabiana Pierre-Louis's recent confirmation to the state's highest court comes at a critical point in time as new leaders across the country work to combat centuries of systemic racism and structural inequality.

As the daughter of Haitian immigrants, Pierre-Louis said she grew up with a unique perspective on the world. She learned to speak Creole before she learned English and grew up in Irvington, one of the state's poorest cities. It's a perspective, she said, that will inform the way she approaches cases.

Having a perspective and understanding of what it is like to live in Irvington, or other places ... informs how you experience many things in life," she said in a speech after her confirmation last month.

[As] I stand here today, I know I have lived and continue to live the American Dream that my parents came here in search of, she added.

Pierre-Louis is among a number of recent "firsts" -- Black people who have ascended to positions traditionally unfilled by members of underrepresented groups -- as more institutions ramp up diversity, equity and inclusion efforts. The moves come amid pressure from ongoing protests in the wake of George Floyd's death at the hands of Minneapolis police, an encounter that sparked a broad reexamination of how people of color are treated.

PHOTO: Fabiana Pierre-Louis is nominated to the New Jersey Supreme Court by Gov. Phil Murphy during a during a news conference in Trenton, N.J., June 5, 2020. (Chris Pedota/Pool via AP, FILE)

There are other recent Black firsts. Steven Reed became the first Black mayor of Montgomery, Alabama, late last year. London Breed is now the first Black female mayor of San Francisco. There's also Daniel Cameron -- who took office this year as Kentucky's first Black attorney general - and Juliana Stratton, who last year became the first Black woman to serve as lieutenant governor of Illinois.

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While there is no hard data broadly tracking diversity and inclusion efforts, several experts told ABC News that they had observed a noticeable recent uptick in efforts aimed at cultivating and promoting more Black leaders.

America has made some progress in eliminating some forms of systemic racism -- which is rooted in years of institutional and legalized racial discrimination. But civil rights advocates say the consequences of slavery and nearly 100 years of Jim Crow laws, which promoted segregation, separate but equal in schools, and prohibited Black people from voting and owning land  are still felt today.

Faith Morris, who oversees partnerships and external affairs for the National Civil Rights Museum, said she has also noticed an increased interest in diversity and inclusion in light of the ongoing protest movement.

"Leaders are finally trying to understand what the heck is happening with regards to race in this country and they want to make some systemic moves to change it," she said. "Systemic racism has been pretty prevalent for a while and it shows its ugly head in many ways, but now we've got systemic protests to combat it and they are really battling it out right now."

Yet there are those who say diversifying and even protesting aren't enough, and that protesters and activists need to continue the pressure and hold firsts accountable once they've achieved their moment in history, to ensure the progress of more Black and marginalized people.

First action, then accountability

Lionel Kimble is the vice president for programs at the Association for the Study of African American Life and History, a non-profit founded by historian Carter G. Woodson, frequently referred to as the "Father of Black History." He said he's noticed a major shift when it comes to companies diversifying leadership and acknowledging past acts of racism and discrimination. While he said there has been slight progress over the past few years, efforts have ramped since protesters took to the streets earlier this year to speak out against anti-Black racism and police brutality in the wake of Floyd's death, he said.

PHOTO: Fabiana Pierre-Louis stands alongside her two sons as she is nominated to the New Jersey Supreme Court during a news conference where she nominated in Trenton, N.J., June 5, 2020. (Chris Pedota/Pool via AP)

In addition to Floyd, the deaths of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, Rayshard Brooks and others helped galvanize a movement that swept across the U.S. urging police reforms, a reexamination of the justice system and a wholesale rethinking of the place of Black and other marginalized people in American society.

"When you think about the history of African Americans in this country, a lot of things that we've achieved have been gradual and incremental. But we have always taken advantage of changing political climates to demand change," Kimble, who is also a professor at Chicago State University, told ABC News. "I think the important thing now is to hold both corporate America and these politicians accountable to the changes they're committing to now. But we must continue to be active and build on these incremental changes."

Angela Garretson, a Union County, New Jersey, freeholder, said Pierre-Louis nomination comes as New Jersey works to acknowledge and rectify past acts of racism -- which includes the very title of freeholder.

Freeholder is a term unique to the state of New Jersey and has been criticized as an outdated and racist term for lawmaker. It originally referred to free white men who were free to own land and vote.

"Every single African American or Black freeholder I spoke to was not in support of the term. We understood the history, we understood what it meant, and we understood that we were also evolving as newer members of a level of government that had not had as much diversity before us," Garretson said.

The state approved the change last month, becoming the last state to abolish the outdated term. It will now refer to its county lawmakers as "commissioners" effective January 2021.

MORE: Death of George Floyd prompts reckoning over struggle to build trust

Garretson was a big part of the push to get rid of the term, which Gov. Phil Murphy referred to as "a title that is an outgrowth of a time when people of color and women were excluded from public office."

She pointed to that successful fight coupled with the news of Pierre-Louis' historic confirmation as proof of what happen when protesters, local officials and the government work together.

And, it points to the change that Black firsts and onlys or few ofs can affect when they achieve positions of power that can help uplift other Black people.

'Don't settle for the crumbs'

Kimble said the most obvious signs of progress are evident when you look at the number of "firsts" that have recently emerged in the government at the local and congressional levels.

As a labor historian, Kimble said many of his lectures focus on grassroots organizing and its historic influence on Chicago's Black political scene.

Historically, activists have taken a "two-pronged attack" approach when it comes to protesting for equal rights, he said. The first part involves "holding people's feet to the fire" as leaders act on the community's demands through relentless protests. The second part, Kimble said, is holding leaders accountable to the promises they've made.

PHOTO: Rep. Juliana Stratton joins Democratic candidate J.B. Pritzker as his running mate seeking the office of governor of Illinois during a press conference in Chicago, Aug. 10, 2017. (Max Herman/AP, FILE)

He said the sudden influx of Black firsts in various levels of government in major cities is encouraging, but he urged protesters to "keep fighting hard."

"When we settle for just having 'a first' and not a second, third and fourth, then that's when we lose the fight," he said. "Don't just settle for the lip service without action. Continue to hold their feet to the fire."

"Don't settle for the crumbs and don't let them forget the promises they made to us. Our leaders need to know that we're watching and that we're going to remain vigilant," he added.

MORE: Department of Education sends mixed messages on transgender student protections

Still, "the share of nonwhites in the United States is nearly double that of the countrys legislative body (39% vs. 22%)," Pew Research reported.

Congress also continues to be a white-dominated workplace from the top to the bottom with people of color representing just 11% of top staff members in senators Washington offices, according to a recent study by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies.

The center said this is extremely problematic because top aides are the ones who draft legislation, coordinate public communications and vet nominees for executive branch posts and lifetime judgeships.

Learn from past movements

Black Americans and allies across the globe have joined together this year in the fight against systemic racism and police brutality and were aided, in larger quantities than the past, by white allies, who helped push the Black Lives Matter movement into overdrive.

In addition to helping to push forward more Black firsts, the current generation of protesters have made it cool to be intellectually aware, or "woke" about, systemic racism and how it affects their daily lives, advocates said.

PHOTO: San Francisco Mayor London Breed smiles while delivering her state of the city address in San Francisco, Jan. 30, 2019. (Jeff Chiu/AP, FILE)

"The current movement has helped young people realize the importance of holding leaders to their promises on diversity and inclusion," Garretson said. "This movement has forced everyday people to realize the importance of government and people are making their voices heard. That's what feels different this time."

Garretson, who is one of just a handful of Black woman freeholders in New Jersey, said the "trendiness" is helpful, but she urged everyday people to be realistic about their protest commitments and to promote change in whatever small way possible.

She said the easiest and simplest form of protest is voting faithfully across all branches of government and getting involved with so-called affinity groups to support minority groups and their interests.

But it all hinges on promoting diverse groups of leaders and making sure they open the door for the next generations, Garretson said.

"In the past, the silent majority has been able to change the outcome of pivotal elections. And now, with the ongoing social and political situation, our silent majority is once again being awakened, and they're becoming more aware and informed about the very issues that have suppressed Black people for way too long," she said.

More Black 'firsts' emerge amid nation's racial reckoning but pressure must continue, some say originally appeared on abcnews.go.com
One of the biggest pitfalls of looking for undervalued stocks is finding yourself knee-deep in a value trap. Finding the right undervalued stock requires a lot of analysis and time.

So as important it is to carry out a comprehensive analysis to pick the right undervalued stocks, identifying value traps when you see them is equally important to avoid potential losses.

Value Trap and the Current Pandemic:

Whether you are a value or a growth investor, a stock selling below its expected value is usually alluring. Imagine a stock trading between Rs.1000-1200 suddenly dropping to Rs.600-700.

The instinctive reaction is to buy it, provided the company is doing fine, right?

However, when a situation like the current pandemic occurs that disrupts the entire economy, investors tend to believe that once the economy recovers, all stocks will rally.

While this might be true for all good-quality stocks, such times are breeding grounds for value traps too.

When the markets crash due to major macroeconomic events, all stocks get impacted. This is because the market sentiment is pessimistic.

If you look at the way the markets moved in March this year, you will find the best stocks losing ground too. And, so many investors tried to take advantage of the situation and invested in undervalued quality stocks.

However, there is a thin line that separates valued investing from bottom fishing during such market crashes. Hence, it is important to ensure that you analyze the fundamentals of the company thoroughly before investing.

Points to help identify value traps:

1. Underperforming sector2. Poor management quality3. Shares of a company that is experiencing a constant decline in market share4. Inefficiency in allocating capital for the growth of the company5. Companies that dont deliver as promised6. Unsustainable debts7. Overdependence on a particular product8. Stocks trading at low multiples of the companys earnings, cash flow, book value, etc.9. Stocks that institutional investors are staying away from

10. A high percentage of insider ownership

Best Way To Avoid A Value Trap:

Analyse a company comprehensively:

Identifying a value trap requires the investor to gain a comprehensive understanding of the company and its financials. Focusing only on one or two aspects can be counterproductive. Also, the investment horizon and risk tolerance of the investor plays an important role in determining if a stock will turn out to be a value trap or not.

Here is an example:

Lets turn back the clock to 2015 when Maggi Noodles were banned by the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI).

On April 08, 2015, Nestle India was trading at Rs.7146 per share. At this point, the company was doing fine and its stock was performing well too.

After the company declared the financial results on March 31, 2015, its trailing twelve-month earnings-per-share (EPS) was 132. Also, its P/E ratio was 54.14 (7146/132).

Considering the FMCG industry, this was a healthy P/E ratio (not high).

While things were looking bright for Nestle India, on May 31, 2015, there was a criminal complaint filed against the company for having high levels of lead in Maggi Noodles  one of its main products.

Subsequently, the FSSAI banned Maggi. This led to a major impact on the stock price of Nestle India. By June 08, 2015, the stock was trading at Rs.5850 per share. Hence, the P/E ratio fell to 44.32 (5850/132) from 54.14.

While the ban on Maggi resulted in the drop in the stock price of Nestle India, it also impacted the future prospects of the company.

In its next quarterly results, Nestle India reported a loss of Rs.64 crore. This was the first time the company had reported a quarterly loss in over 15 years! Since the earnings reduced, the P/E ratio climbed above 65 and investors started looking at the stock differently since it no longer looked undervalued.

While some investors found Nestle India to be a good-quality and undervalued stock, others chose to stay away from it. Although Nestle India re-launched Maggi in November 2015, over the next two years, the companys stock price remained highly volatile and investors with a short-term investment horizon booked losses too.

And therefore, before choosing a stock, a holistic analysis of a company is crucial.

The best way to avoid a value trap is to ensure that you gain a comprehensive understanding of the company. Dont look at financial ratios alone.

Try to understand how the company works and if it has the wherewithal to get through the bad situation that has caused its stock price to collapse.

In the example above, since Nestle India had strong fundamentals, it recovered from this bad phase and the stock price increased from around 7000 in 2017 to around 17000 in 2020.

However, if its fundamentals were not strong enough, it would have gone the other way causing huge losses to investors, and individuals who may have invested in it based on just a price drop would have suffered.

The bottom line is, if you spot an undervalued stock that you feel has massive potential, analyse it holistically on various parameters, check for the red flags in the fundamentals, make sure the company has the tenacity to survive competition, has good crisis handling ability and enjoys a wide economic moat.

(The author is Harsh Jain, Co-founder and COO, Groww)

: The views and investment tips expressed by experts on Moneycontrol.com are their own and not those of the website or its management. Moneycontrol.com advises users to check with certified experts before taking any investment decisions.
KYIV, Ukraine: Hundreds of women calling for the authoritarian president to step down protested in Belarus capital on Saturday, continuing the large demonstrations that have rocked the country since early August.

Police blocked off the center of Minsk and arrested more than 60 demonstrators, according to the Viasna human rights organization. Some of those arrested were chased down by police in building courtyards where they were trying to take refuge, Viasna said.

Protests, by far the largest and most persistent in Belarus since independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, began Aug. 9 after an election that officials said gave President Alexander Lukashenko a sixth term in office.

Opponents and some poll workers say the results, in which Lukashenko was tallied with 80% support, were manipulated.

Despite wide-scale detentions of demonstrators and the arrest of many prominent opposition figures, the protests havent shown signs of abating. Lukashenko further angered opponents this week by taking the oath of office for a new term in an unexpected ceremony.

Protesters on Saturday carried placards denouncing him as the secret president.

Lukashenko is to give a video address to the U.N. General Assembly later Saturday. His statements are likely to fuel protests on Sunday, which have typically been the largest of the week, attracting crowds estimated at as many as 200,000.

Lukashenko, a former collective farm manager, has been in office since 1994. During that time he has repressed opposition and independent news media and kept most of the countrys economy under Soviet-style state control.

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According to our research of New York and other state lists, there were 7 registered sex offenders living in zip code 13750 as of January 22, 2022.

The ratio of all residents to sex offenders in zip code 13750 is 122 to 1.


A prolific charity campaigner suffered a fatal fall from his electric scooter in what is believed to be the second such death in the UK.

Barrie Howes was killed in a freak accident as he travelled home from work after heeding the Governments call to avoid public transport in the early days of the pandemic.

The 57-year-old engineering instructors death is expected to raise questions about the ability of the e-scooters to navigate Britains roads at high speeds.

Barrie Howes was killed in a freak accident as he travelled home from work after heeding the Governments call to avoid public transport in the early days of the pandemic

In July, TV presenter Emily Hartridge, 35, was killed when her e-scooter collided with a lorry in London.

An inquest last week heard Mr Howes lost control as he travelled down Brompton Hill, a steep residential road in Chatham, Kent. He flew off and, despite wearing a helmet, was found by a passer-by suffering from traumatic brain injuries.

Mr Howes was airlifted to hospital in London where his condition deteriorated and he died nine days later on July 3.

Detective Sergeant Michael Champion, of Kent Police, said the scooter had a speed of 10 to 30mph but on a steep incline, it would have increased by going downhill.

He would have been going at quite a speed when he lost control and crashed, he added.

The inquest heard Mr Howes was unable to drive because of eye problems and was on medication that meant he was more likely to bleed in an accident.

His wife of 32 years, Claire, said he had been catching the bus to work but it was really when lockdown started that the Government said avoid public transport if you can and he decided to get the e-scooter.

In July, TV presenter Emily Hartridge, 35, was killed when her e-scooter collided with a lorry in London

I want to thank the bystanders [who helped], especially at the moment when people dont want to get too close.

Mr Howes underwent heart surgery in 2006 and met Princess Anne through his fundraising efforts for the British Heart Foundation.

As he undertook a charity trek of Perus Machu Picchu, he said: Its an opportunity to make the most of the second chance in life Ive been given.

In a public tribute, friend Karen Wood described him as an outstanding pillar of society.

Even in death, Mr Howes helped others and his wife told The Mail on Sunday: Some good has come out of the bad. Three of his organs have helped people to live on, his liver and two kidneys have been transplanted.

A verdict of accidental death was recorded.

Terror of the e-scooters: Owners post guides showing how to override speed-limiting software to hit 40mph

Dozens of shocking video tutorials encourage riders to manipulate e-scooters

In one clip a British rider promises viewers that their scooter will go like a rocket

Owners can hack into the software and increase the top speed in just a few taps

By Holly Bancroft for the Mail on Sunday

Electric scooter owners are offering online guides showing users how to override the devices speed-limiting software to reach up to 40mph.

A Mail on Sunday investigation has unearthed dozens of shocking video tutorials encouraging riders to manipulate the battery-powered vehicles and break the law.

In one clip, a British rider promises viewers that their scooter will go like a rocket. I dont think you would feel safe going any faster but its so much fun, he adds.

Rental e-scooters were made legal on some roads in Britain this summer with their speed capped at 15.5mph.

Electric scooter owners are offering online guides showing users how to override the devices speed-limiting software to reach up to 40mph. An e-scooter user is seen riding through the pedestrianised town centre of Middlesbrough

But our investigation has revealed how, with just a few taps of the device, owners can easily hack into the software and increase the top speed of some of the most popular scooters sold in the UK.

One British e-scooter owner, Dave Samuel, released a video showing viewers how to unlock the Inokim OXO Electric Scooter, a popular model on sale in the UK for 1,300.

Im making this video on how to derestrict the scooter from its factory setting of 15mph to full blown 40mph, he says, before giving detailed, step-by-step instructions about how to remove the limiter.

In a separate video, another Briton, Duncan Smith, reveals how to hack the top speeds for the Xiaomi M365 scooter, another popular model available for 469 in Halfords.

By unlocking the scooter, by which I mean the speed limit thats on it, you can go a little bit faster. I say a little bit faster but I mean this scooter will go like a rocket, he says.

Rental e-scooters were made legal on some roads in Britain this summer with their speed capped at 15.5mph [File photo]

In the clip, which sees Smith whizzing along public pavements  which is illegal  and weaving between young children, he explains how users can remove the software that limits the speed to 15mph and reach top speeds of 22mph.

In my opinion, this is the hack that makes buying the Xiaomi Pro an absolute no-brainer compared to other more expensive e-scooters. Once you release the speed limiter on this thing it feels like a proper little rocket. I dont even think you would feel safe going any faster but its so much fun.

In a third video, a user explains how a Kaabo Electric Scooter, which sell in the UK for about 500, can be hacked so it reaches speeds of 25mph. In the comments sections of the video, one person wrote: Just hacked my scooter! It really worked! Im going rocket speed now.

Last night, campaigners warned that the hacks would lead to even more accidents and injuries on the roads.

Luke Griggs, Deputy Chief Executive of brain injury association Headway, said: It is extremely concerning to see online tutorials explaining how to remove the speed limiters on e-scooters. The production of such videos is irresponsible and is likely to lead to severe injuries and possibly fatalities. Tragically, it is not just the riders that will be placed in danger, it is innocent members of the public.

We are already seeing repeated reports of e-scooters being ridden on pavements at excessive speeds, with the most vulnerable in society being placed in harms way.

Last night, Mr Smith said: There are speed limits in public, so anything over 15mph would be for private use on private land. If you choose to break the law and go dangerously fast in public that is not my doing.
Victoria has just 16 new cases of coronavirus amid hopes lockdown will be eased as case numbers fall fasted than expected.

The state's 'roadmap' out of lockdown announced in early September is expected to be tweaked on Sunday following better-than-expected progress in fighting the spread of the virus.

Many will, once more, be hanging on Premier Daniel Andrews' words at what has become a sombre tradition of weighty Sunday press conferences.

Victoria also suffered another two deaths in the 24 hours to Sunday morning, taking its total to 784.

The number of new cases and deaths is up from Saturday's total of 14 cases and one death.

Premier Daniel Andrews is expected to tweak lockdown restrictions on Sunday following better-than-expected progress in fighting the spread of coronavirus

The two-week rolling daily case average of 23.6 is well under the 30-50 case average health authorities were aiming for.

Under the original plans to take effect from Monday, the 9pm curfew would remain, as well as the 5km travel limit and takeaway-only for restaurants and cafes.

Restrictions around public gatherings would ease to allow up to five people from a maximum of two households to meet outside for social interaction.

Childcare and kindergarten would reopen and some school students would return to classrooms in term 4.

The Victorian opposition is calling for rules to be loosened well beyond this, saying the curfew should go, all school students should return and restaurants, retail and offices should re-open.

It has been a dramatic few days in Victorian politics culminating in the resignation of Jenny Mikakos as health minister on Saturday morning.

Police outnumber citizens in Melbourne as they are still only allowed outside for two hours of exercise and the curfew remains in place

By the afternoon, Daniel Andrews had announced mental health minister Martin Foley as her replacement and he was sworn in.

Ms Mikakos' resignation came a day after she heard her boss tell the hotel quarantine inquiry board she was responsible for the Department of Health and Human Services, which was ultimately responsible for running the quarantine scheme.

The hotel quarantine program in Victoria failed because private security guards breached infection control, causing the spread of the virus into the community and a devastating second wave.

To date, 782 Victorians have died of the virus and the entire state has been subject to strict lockdowns, workforce and school closures and prolonged social isolation.

'I have never wanted to leave a job unfinished but in light of the premier's statement... and the fact there are elements in it that I strongly disagree with... I cannot continue to serve in his cabinet,' Ms Mikakos wrote.

'I am disappointed that my integrity has sought to be undermined. I am deeply sorry for the situation that Victorians find themselves in.

'In good conscience, I do not believe that my action led to them.'

Ms Mikakos will also be resigning from the Victorian parliament.

The premier, like all leaders who came before the $3 million inquiry, told the board on Friday he did not know who made the decision to use private security guards.

He pushed back on suggestions from reporters on Saturday that he should also resign, saying he would not run from a challenge and remained focused on fighting the pandemic and repairing the state's economy.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed an executive order banning the sale of gas-powered cars by 2035, on the hood of a Ford Mustang Mach-E. Daniel Kim/The Sacramento Bee via AP, Pool

Tesla is ideally positioned to take advantage of California's move to ban internal-combustion vehicle sales by 2035.

But Gov. Gavin Newsom's executive order could also be seen as a potential distraction from a much bigger opportunity for Tesla to grow outside of California and the US.

The challenge is that US vehicle market growth  for gas cars and EVs  is capped, while the total China market could double in the next two decades.

For Tesla, the dilemma is whether to stay big at home or go bigger in China.

Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

When California Gov. Gavin Newsom announced last week that the state would ban new sales of internal-combustion engines after 2035, the obvious and immediate reaction was, "This has to be great news for Tesla!"

And it is great news for America's dominant electric-vehicle manufacturer, which currently makes almost all its cars in the Golden State. Prior to the coronavirus pandemic, Tesla was on track to sell nearly 50,000 vehicles in California through the second quarter. A combination of heavily taxed gasoline and perks for zero-emission vehicles has given Left Coasters ample reason to go electric.

California accounts for about 11% of all new vehicle sales in the US, so even though the 2035 ICE ban is a long way off  and might not be politically feasible, long term, as it was formulated as an executive order, not legislation  it has the attention of the auto industry.

"Ford is proud to be the only American automaker to stand with California for reduced greenhouse gas emissions," Jim Farley, Ford's soon-to-be-new CEO, said in a tweet. "We want to leave a better world to the next generation." (Ford, Volkswagen, BMW, and Honda joined California is a 2019 dispute with the Trump administration EPA over fuel-economy standards.)

For Tesla, an ideal position isn't actually ideal for capturing future market growth outside the US

Story continues

At Tesla's recent Battery Day, Musk recently said the company needs to sell 20 million vehicles annually to displace enough ICE vehicles from the global fleet to mitigate global warming. Tesla/Youtube

But Tesla has a big lead already, which will only get bigger as the company pushes toward selling a million vehicles a year. That milestone would secure fully half of the California market  not a terribly far-fetched development, as Tesla wants to build a new factory in Texas to cover the US east of the Mississippi and a new plant in Germany, freeing up its California facility to supply the US western region by itself.

In a research note published after Newsom's announcement, Morgan Stanley analysis Adam Jonas noted that Tesla is the automaker best-positioned to benefit from an ICE ban. However, the next decade-and-a-half could be tricky for Tesla to negotiate in its home state.

For starters, the overall new-vehicle market in the US isn't going to grow. In fact, it isn't clear that Tesla's considerable sales have displaced sales of gas-powered vehicles, or whether the company has simply created a sort of parallel market in EV sales  in effect creating new market share that it can dominate.

And depending on what happens with urban development and auto ownership in California, vehicle sales there could instead decline. Meanwhile, Tesla's Fremont factory lacks the capacity to continue to dominate demand in California, as that demand shifts to electric. (Fremont can build around 400,000 vehicles every year, but about two million new cars and trucks are sold in the state annually.)

This presents a dilemma for CEO Elon Musk and his 17-year-old company: build a second car plant in the West to capture more of California, or expand instead in the market where major-league growth is more likely to happen. That would be China.

Tesla is already operating the sole remaining vehicle assembly plant in California. Adding another facility in the heavily regulated state would be expensive and time-consuming, a contrast with Tesla's new plant in China, which went from a hole in the ground to rolling out vehicles in 15 months.

Musk recently said that Tesla needs to sell 20 million vehicles annually to displace enough ICE vehicles from the global fleet to mitigate global warming, so the options are to either take over huge chunks of the US and European markets, or to go after lower-hanging growth in China.

More competition in California than Tesla has ever faced before

Ford hopes the Mustang Mach-E will improve its California sales. Mark Ralston/AFP via Getty Images

Mind you, Tesla stands to grow a more profitable business if a state as big as California helps to create a semi-captive market for the company's vehicles. Many of Tesla's most affluent customers live in the Golden State, and they should be important long-term as the automaker works to generate consistent, double-digit margins.

But then again, 15 years isn't tomorrow, and if Tesla is distracted by picking up market share in California, it could fall off the pace in China. Tesla has more money in the bank than ever before, but the extra billions aren't enough to expand on two continents simultaneously.

That's the risk. Fortunately, Tesla is no longer going it alone. Both Ford and GM are moving aggressively to introduce EVs, and both carmakers see California as a growth opportunity for them, given their historic sales weakness in the Golden State. The top two US automakers control 30% of the total US market, but in California, their Japanese competitors own almost half the yearly sales.

But GM, in particular, is ahead of the Japanese carmakers on an EV master plan, aiming to launch 22 new vehicles by 2023 (and forming an alliance in the US with Honda to share costs). So Tesla doesn't have to take needless risks because other major automakers are taking aim at California. Tesla has already done its work in the state and can shift to attacking new opportunities (and it already is, by building a Cybertruck plant in Texas and going after GM and Ford's bread-and-butter, pickups).

In the end, if California follows through on its 2035 mandate, Tesla could be looking at a discipline challenge. It would be hard to pass up California, given that much of the value of Tesla's brand  and its $395-billion market capitalization  is thanks to many happy Californians buying Teslas and broadcasting their zero-emissions ethos to the world. That's the main reason that Tesla gets away with spending almost nothing on advertising.

But as tempting as California is, it isn't where the serious growth is. And competition in the state could be ferocious. These are good challenges to have, but before we argue that Newsom's initiative is the best thing that ever happened to Tesla, we have to consider that Tesla now belongs to more than just one US state.

Read the original article on Business Insider
President Trumps promise to name a woman to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died on Sept. 18 at 87, was cynical and insulting to the millions of women who view the late Supreme Court justice as a feminist icon. Senator John Barrasso, a Wyoming Republican, praised the decision as a powerful positive statement to young women, who would embrace the presidents nominee as a role model. The message to women is clear: Nothing to see here, ladies! One of you is as good as any other.

But Mr. Trumps pick, Amy Coney Barrett, is no Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Women arent gym socks, purchased in bulk so that a replacement can be seamlessly substituted into the rotation when one goes missing in the washing machine. The next Supreme Court justice will cast crucial votes that affect womens fundamental rights, including the right to control their own bodies and to gain access to affordable health care for themselves and their families. The fact that President Trumps nominee is a woman matters less if she does not support the causes at the heart of the long, continuing march for gender equality that Justice Ginsburg championed.

The Democratic presidential nominee, Joe Biden, has also vowed to pick a Black woman as his first nominee to the Supreme Court. But hes not going to gaslight us by choosing someone who will share the judicial philosophy of the courts conservative wing, just as no one believed that Mr. Bidens vice-presidential pick  whom he also promised would be female  would be a Republican who repudiated every plank of his platform. (Indeed, Bidens running mate, Kamala Harris  fairly or not  has been denounced by the Trump campaign as the most liberal member of the U.S. Senate.)

Judge Barrett, who is on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, has impeccable intellectual credentials  and a record that stands in stark contrast to Justice Ginsburgs. She has written that abortion is always immoral, and joined two dissents against decisions supporting the right to choose. One decision stopped the enforcement of a state law that would have required a minor  regardless of her maturity or family situation  to notify her parents of her decision to have an abortion, giving them veto power, unless a judge found this was not in her best interests.
The 17th annual Mystic Irish Parade, postponed last March to Oct. 25, is now canceled, organizers announced.

The annual parade, which had never been postponed or canceled before, typically has more than 2,000 participants and is seen by more than 30,000 spectators.

The decision to postpone and then cancel this years annual parade was made out of an abundance of caution because of the COVID-19 virus, organizers said.

We are sorry to say were going to have to cancel the October parade. We had hoped for the best. However the reality of the situation dictates the unfortunate cancellation. We will look forward to the parade on March 21st, Neil Ryan, vice president of the Mystic Irish Parade Foundation said on a Facebook post.

The parade board will be working hard to focus on our 2021 parade. Alexis Ann will still preside as Grand Marshal, and all businesses that signed up as sponsors will be automatically signed up for the 2021 parade, the post reads.

All 2020 applicants will receive an email in January 2021 to apply for the 2021 parade.

The Mystic Irish Parade Foundation will hold a raffle at 1 p.m. Nov. 1 at Harp and Hound, 4 Pearl St., in Mystic, for a trip for two to Ireland.

Tickets are $5 each and can be purchased in advance of the drawing at Irish Eyes in Olde Mistick Village, Harp and Hound, Pizzeta, Friar Tucks, Chapter One Food and Drink, The Whaler's Inn, Angie's Pizza and Pier 27 Lounge and from Ryan's Pub in Groton.

For more information, visit www.mysticirishparade.org and its Facebook page, @mysticirishparade.
(Natural News) Academic scholar Marc-Andre Argentino of the Global Network on Extremism & Technology is attempting to get social media accounts that are raising awareness of child sex trafficking thrown off of social media by tying them to the controversial QAnon movement.

(Article by Shane Trejo republished from BigLeaguePolitics.com)

Argentino is demonizing 114 groups that are raising awareness of child sex trafficking that he wants thrown off of social media because he claims they are affiliated with QAnon:

2/ Using @crowdtangle aggregate membership on September 16 was ~330K and a week later it is at 505k this represents growth of 3,028.66% since July 2020. The spike in the community started the week of July 26th pic.twitter.com/boh36dw3XD  Marc-Andre Argentino (@_MAArgentino) September 23, 2020

4/ A similar trend can be seen with interaction rates as there have been 9.22M interaction since Janurary 2020, though 8.95M of these (663k per week) have occured since July 2020. pic.twitter.com/DXcqmveth5  Marc-Andre Argentino (@_MAArgentino) September 23, 2020

6/ It is very likely that the "save the/our children" narratives are not going to be sustained long term without some injection of content to feed the communities here. It is hard to determine if this has anything to do with measures put in place by Facebook at this time.  Marc-Andre Argentino (@_MAArgentino) September 23, 2020

8/ These groups have driven a fair amount of traffic to these QAnon/ QAnon adjacent videos in July and August. Traffic to most of this content had died down prior to the save our/the children takeover. pic.twitter.com/PuF76Gy6Xk  Marc-Andre Argentino (@_MAArgentino) September 23, 2020

Argentino made it clear that he is concerned with protecting potential pedophiles from repercussions from their predatory actions against children:

10/ Some of these communities have some concerning patterns of behaviors: there is some doxxing of people that "look like pedophiles", or who people claim are pedophiles without evidence, there are calls to harass them on social media and at home.  Marc-Andre Argentino (@_MAArgentino) September 23, 2020

12/ However, there are some groups that provide the information for the proper channels and ask members in these groups to flood the hotlines and email boxes with requests. Again with QAnon's poor research skills this is draining resources away from real and important tips  Marc-Andre Argentino (@_MAArgentino) September 23, 2020

He posted that he will be working on demonizing Christian, pro-life groups that are focused on stopping child sex trafficking next:

16/ there is a possibility that part of this community may shift away from QAnon and into more of the christian/pro-life communities or a symbiosis of QAnon with christian/pro-life communities. This is something to keep an eye on as I am seeing hints of it.  Marc-Andre Argentino (@_MAArgentino) September 23, 2020

Darren Beattie of Revolver pointed out the agenda behind Argentinos work. Argentino is aggressively demonizing activists who are raising awareness about the exploitation of children.

https://twitter.com/DarrenJBeattie/status/1309182740177313792

Big League Politics has reported on how establishment politicians from both major political parties have demonized the QAnon movement in an attempt to deflect from the depravity that they are engaging in behind the scenes:

Several Congressmen are going to war with the QAnon conspiracy theory. On August 25, 2020, Republican Congressman Denver Riggleman and Democrat Congressman Tom Malinowski introduce a resolution to condemn the conspiracy movement and demand that law enforcement crack down on criminal activity that its supporters carry out. Riggleman tweeted QAnon and the conspiracy theories it promotes are a danger and a threat that has no place in our countrys politics. I condemn this movement and urge all Americans to join me in taking this step to exclude them and other extreme conspiracy theories from the national discourse. The resolution describes QAnon as one of the fringe political conspiracy theories that authorities believe is likely to incite violence. With several Republican candidates who have allegedly supported QAnon in the past now potentially making their way to Congress, establishment gatekeepers in both parties are becoming jittery. Whether or not such conspiracies have validity is for curious Americans to decide through their own investigation. The real question we should be asking is why a Republican like Riggleman is wasting his time trying to introduce a resolution with a Democrat? After all, this is a time when theres an existential threat of radical leftists tearing up the streets across the nation. This merits a full-fledged response from the GOP. Focusing on anything else is a complete waste of time and political capital.

Read more at: BigLeaguePolitics.com
San Andreas, CA  Avery father sentenced to 15 years in prison for the shooting death of his son.

On Thursday, Judge Timothy S. Healy handed down that sentenced against 50-year-old David Bilderback. The father had pleaded guilty in July to voluntary manslaughter with an additional enhancement for the use of a firearm for the killing of his 19-year-old son, Cole Bilderback. That charge carried a possible sentence ranged from 6-16 years. The probation department had recommended a 9-year sentence, while the defense requested a lesser sentence of 6 years.

As earlier reported here, the shooting took place in September of 2017 at the fathers automotive repair shop, Daves Pit Stop in Avery. At the sentencing, prosecutors detailed that after Cole called his father a drunk, Bilderback armed with a 12-gauge shotgun, then shot his son in the chest.

In arguing for the maximum sentence of 16 years, Deputy District Attorney Bradley T. Jones, stated, The Defendant acted with malice when he chose to drink heavily and then start an argument with his son while he was carrying a loaded shotgun, with the safety off, with a round in the chamber, and with his finger on the trigger.

The D.A.s office recounted that Coles mother, Tyana Ladouceur, gave an impassioned plea for justice for her son, emphasizing the ludicrous nature of Bilderbacks claim that the shooting was an accident. They add that Canyon Bilderback, Coles younger brother, stated in a letter to the Judge, Even if by some miracle it was an accident, which I find impossible to believehe has yet to even apologize for taking my brothers life and still shows that he cares only for himself.

While imposing the sentence, prosecutors relay that Judge Healy called the defendant beyond callous and had displayed little remorse over the 3-year period in which he had been coming to court on this matter. DDA Jones added, There is just a profound feeling of senseless loss. The Defendants lifelong struggles with alcohol, and his failures to control his addiction, killed his son.

Calaveras County District Attorney Barbara M. Yook released this statement regarding the cases, We are grateful for Judge Healys ruling and the enormous level of compassion and respect he demonstrated in court to all those who were there on Coles behalf.

The total time Bilderback will serve in state prison is about ten years with credit for time served.
Navies of India and Japan on Saturday carried out a range of complex drills in the North Arabian Sea on the first day of their three-day military exercise aimed at further bolstering operational convergence, officials said.

It is the first military exercise between the two strategic partners after they signed a landmark agreement on September 9 that allows their militaries to access each other's bases for logistics support.

The fourth edition of the India-Japan maritime exercise, JIMEX, is taking place in the backdrop of growing concerns over China's military assertiveness in the Indian Ocean Region and Indo-Pacific.

The JIMEX series of exercises commenced in January 2012 with a special focus on maritime security cooperation. The last edition was conducted in October 2018 off the Visakhapatnam coast.

Indigenously-built stealth destroyer Chennai, Teg Class stealth frigate Tarkash and fleet tanker Deepak represented the Indian Navy in the exercise, an Indian Navy spokesperson said.

The Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force was represented by ships Kaga, an Izumo class helicopter destroyer and Ikazuchi, a guided-missile destroyer, he said.

In addition to ships, a fleet of long-range maritime patrol aircraft, helicopters and fighter aircraft are also participating in the exercise.

This week, the Indian and Australian navies too carried out a two-day mega exercise in the Indian Ocean Region that featured a range of complex naval manoeuvres, anti-aircraft drills and helicopter operations.

In July, the Indian Navy carried out a military exercise with a US Navy carrier strike group led by the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Nimitz off the coast of Andaman and Nicobar Islands. The USS Nimitz is the world's largest warship.

In the exercise with the US Navy, four frontline warships of the Indian Navy participated. The US carrier strike group was transiting through the Indian Ocean Region on its way from the South China Sea.

The Indian Navy carried out a similar exercise with the Japanese navy in June.

India has significantly expanded its deployment in the Indian Ocean Region with a plethora of warships and submarines following the border row to send across a message to Beijing.

The maritime space around the Malacca Strait is very critical for China's supply chain through sea routes. PTI MPB RT
Lord Alan Sugar certainly negotiated a sweet deal when it came to his 14-day quarantine period, to be spent in private luxury ('' British billionaire allowed to quarantine privately '', September 20). His tweet, stating he is isolating under the same rules as us "tossers", is a bit of an affront. Do we really need "personalities" of his type coming to Australia to front TV shows? Stewart Smith, Tea Gardens

Scott Morrisons latest brainwave is a gas-led recovery, now that coal has become unfashionable (" Our coal-fondling PM switches prop to gas, but whats changed? ", September 20). Of course, it is more of an idea than a road map for a post-COVID-19 recovery. As Jacqueline Maley suggests, it is a plan for a plan, but the PM didnt need detailed policies to win the last election. However, I expect he would like to know how many people plan to vote for his plan for a plan. He could hold an inquiry, followed by a survey, then a referendum or a plebiscite. By then, the election will be upon us and he will have avoided dealing with that pesky climate change thingy again. Hows that for a plan? G raham Lum, North Rocks

One cant help but feel for young people, who have been shut out first from coronavirus-affected job markets and now university places in the wake of staff cutbacks and a woefully ineffective job-ready policy (A study in missed opportunity, September 20). But theres plenty of blame to go around, starting with governments who have steadfastly refused to properly fund the public good generated by the sector but also the short-sightedness of universities who enthusiastically bought into a pervasive private good model to create monolithic institutions propped up by foreign fee-paying students. Little wonder universities are now between a rock and a hard place where neither the public nor private good they create is being adequately remunerated. David Beins, Cooks Hill

Numbers reality

Your editorial offers a timely comparison of Australia's response to COVID-19 with that of such heavily populated countries as the United States and France (''Hard cases should look to us for answers'', September 20). My guess is that we are a more compliant breed of people who thankfully lack the chauvinism of those older nations. The answer may have to be left to historians who will have the luxury of time and subsequent events to provide the answer. One thing  even at this time  is abundantly clear. We are indeed the lucky country. Garth Clarke, North Sydney

Experiential opportunity

As an older bloke, and with the benefit of hindsight, I endorse those recommending students take a gap year spent, wholly or partly, working in rural Australia (''School-leavers urged to fill gaps in bush jobs'', September 20). At age 17, I set off from suburban Sydney to hitchhike to Adelaide, a fairly safe thing to do in those days. For the first time in my life I became broke and hungry and took work picking grapes. My workmates included a young bloke from one of the less affluent parts of Melbourne, a rather mysterious migrant from somewhere in Europe, and a couple of farmer's sons whose farm was in a slack period. It was  by and large  fun, as well as hard work, and started me on the way to properly growing up. I can recommend it. Norman Carter, Roseville Chase
But a key plank going forward could be the wastewater monitoring program. Queenslands Chief Health Officer, Dr Jeannette Young, said this week wastewater testing would provide an "early warning system" for contact tracers. Queensland's Chief Health Officer, Dr Jeannette Young. "Thats been a very useful strategy  because we cant test everyone in the community, but we can test the sewage, which tells us whether there is a virus in the community," Dr Young said. "It doesnt tell us how much, so its not useful where we have cases, but where you believe you dont have any cases it then gives you that information."

Testing wastewater for SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, can tell health authorities there could be cases they have missed, which is exactly the warning it gave a few weeks ago. Health authorities revealed on September 3 the system returned a positive result from samples taken in Airlie Beach, where there had not been a positive case recorded for weeks. Where sewage testing is happening in Queensland Brisbane

Ipswich

Logan

Gold Coast

Sunshine Coast

Hervey Bay

Mackay

Cannonvale-Airlie Beach

Townsville

Cairns

Warwick

Stanthorpe

Bundaberg Queensland Healths full effort was directed at the small community, with extra staff sent and fever clinics stood up. One of the lead researchers on the project, Professor Kevin Thomas from the University of Queensland, said there were no positive cases but the incident showed the system working as designed.

"If we detect fragments of the virus in an area where there are no known positive cases then there is someone in that catchment who is shedding the virus, were confident in the technology," Professor Thomas said. Loading "There are a range of different reasons the virus could be there: it could have been from a person who has recovered from the virus but is still shedding virus particles, it could be an undetected case. "It really is an opportunity for wastewater testing to work as a true early warning system, because we have a low level of infection and when it does pop up we can actually detect it." The system uses a specially designed process to "amplify" any tiny fragments of the virus, with the samples then tested using the PCR tests which are also used to test swabs taken from people.

Researchers from UQ and CSIRO developed the process also used in some other states, including NSW and Victoria. Loading In addition to the positive test at Airlie Beach, a positive result was recorded from a sample taken at Hervey Bay this month. No cases were detected in that region and no new cluster, which Professor Thomas said showed that while the early warning system was doing its job, simple measures such as social distancing would ensure any flare-ups of COVID-19 were contained. "What its telling us when we see these signals in these catchments is that these precautions that communities are being recommended to do in the fight against COVID are working, because there arent flare-ups in these areas," he said.
Mercedes AMG Petronas Motorsport driver Lewis Hamilton (44) of Great Britain celebrates clinching the 2019 FIA Formula 1 World Championship following the F1 - U.S. Grand Prix race at Circuit of The Americas on November 3, 2019 in Austin, Texas.

Formula One has the fan base, its revenue has recovered following losses, and it has a racing star in Lewis Hamilton that can grow its minority consumers.

The mission now is to further expand in the U.S., and the Liberty Media-owned property will have a new voice to help it achieve this mission.

On Friday, F1 announced it will move CEO Chase Carey "to the role of non-executive Chairman," replacing him with Stefano Domenicali, the former Ferrari team principal.

It was a move approved by officials throughout F1.

Hamilton called Domenicali's hire "amazing." "I don't think they could have really chosen someone better, to be honest, to replace some big shoes with Chase, who's done an amazing job, and who's always had such a great approach," Hamilton is quoted as saying on Formula1.com.

Carey, who had been CEO of F1 since 2017, helped negotiate a new Concorde Agreement with racing teams, including a new $175 million cap that limits the amount teams can spend per calendar year.

Due to Covid-19, the new cap was decreased to $145 million for the 2021 season. The new agreement is set to expire in 2025. Carey also helped finalize a new three-year media rights deal with ESPN in November 2019.

Liberty Media President and CEO, Greg Maffei, joined CNBC's "Squawk Box" on Thursday but did not say anything about the CEO change at F1.

In a statement, Maffei praised Carey for "a phenomenal job," crediting him for assembling "a first-class commercial and sporting organization that has a long list of achievements, including broadening the appeal of the sport, growing its digital presence, establishing new technical regulations, securing a cost cap for the first time and reaching a new more equitable Concorde agreement with the teams."

Carey's exit isn't seen as a surprise to those in racing circles, though.

Although F1 made roughly $2 billion in 2019 after suffering losses in previous seasons, its expansion strategy in the U.S. and China are uncertain after Carey said the territories were a part of F1's plans in 2017.

The Chinese Grand Prix was canceled due to Covid-19, but rumors have surfaced that F1 was close to a new five-year deal to keep the event at Shanghai International Circuit. Still, it's unclear if current relations between the U.S. and China, and featuring the TikTok saga, would impact F1's future in the country.
The search for the flight recorder is continuing on the crash site of an Antonov An-26 aircraft in Kharkiv region; according to preliminary information, the military students did not pilot the plane directly, the press service for the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) said.

"According to available information, the An-26 aircraft's training flights started at 6:50 p.m. and were to end at 10:50 p.m. The study plan envisages training of both student pilots and navigators," the press service said.

According to preliminary information, "the students did not pilot the plane directly," all fights were performed by the crew commander, the SBU said. "After performing part of the route at 8:38 p.m. he reported an engine failure to the aircraft controller, requested a landing approach at 8:40 p.m. [...] the crash happened at 8:45," it said.

"The in-flight recording device ('black box') has not been found," the SBU said.

According to latest information, 27 people, including 20 students of the Kharkiv Air Force University of the Ukrainian Armed Forces and seven crewmembers, were on board the plane. Twenty-five people died. Two injured were rushed to hospitals in grave condition.
OTTAWA  The Canadian government does not feel pressure from the United States to lift border restrictions despite comments by President Donald Trump that he expects the border to reopen soon, says Public Safety Minister Bill Blair.

In an interview with the Star, Blair said he is aware of Trumps remarks after the two countries agreed to extend restrictions on cross-border traffic for another month, to Oct. 21, but suggested there is no appetite in Canada to reopen the border soon.

Asked how much pressure the Trump administration is exerting on Canadian officials to relax controls and resume the flow of non-essential traffic, Blair said, None, none.

Other than that one comment he made, and I saw it too, that was the first Ive heard from the federal government of the United States any suggestion they wanted to change the existing practice at the border, Blair said.

Blair said hes heard complaints by state governors and other officials that the closure is hard on border communities, but the minister responsible for the border agency said there is a consensus among the provinces that the border should remain locked down to all but essential traffic, and Ottawa agrees for now.

Premier Doug Ford is lobbying Ottawa for the restrictions to continue, fearing an influx of COVID-19 just as cases in Canada are beginning to spike again.

Blair noted that in Atlantic Canada, where rules require all travellers  including Canadians  to quarantine for 14 days, there are almost no active cases. (Newfoundland and Labradors ban is even tougher, barring all non-essential travel.) Health Canada is reporting a total of nine active cases in the four provinces.

Blair said only three per cent of COVID-19 transmission in Canada is related to travel, and not all those cases are from international travel. Health Canada reports that in Canadian cases of COVID-19, one per cent came from contact with a traveller, and in 3.9 per cent of cases, the patient had travelled outside of Canada.

He doesnt think the low percentage of infections related to foreign travel means it is OK to reopen the border, but rather that it argues for the effectiveness of the measures weve taken.

Asked if it then makes sense to keep the restrictions in place for a long time, Blair replied, Forever? No  but while the threat remains from this pandemic and while there is, I think, very legitimate concerns about increasing number of cases.

On Sept. 18, Trump told reporters at the White House that, we're looking at the border with Canada. Canada would like it open, and, you know, we want to get back to normal business.

But Blair denied that Canada is seeking to reopen the border, noting that the restrictions are still allowing essential goods and workers to cross, he said.

There have not been shortages on grocery shelves or any significant impact on pharmaceuticals or other goods that Canadians need, he said, and essential cross-border truck traffic is almost back to 2019 levels after a 30 per cent reduction last spring, largely because the auto manufacturing sector has resumed operations.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau signalled Friday that essential trade includes U.S. imports from Canada of low-cost prescription drugs. He said any moves by the United States to increase those imports will be taken into account as we develop our capacity to first and foremost help Canadians and cover Canadians' needs here at home, but also be there to help other countries in need as well as we always will.

In mid-March, more than two months after the coronavirus began to spread outside Chinas borders and around the world, Canada and the United States struck a deal to limit all but non-essential traffic in goods and workers crossing the border.

Each month they have agreed to extend it for 30 days. It is now due to expire Oct. 21, and while Blair would not say how long that might continue, he said Canadian premiers overwhelmingly support maintaining current limits and remain concerned by the risk posed if people come in from other jurisdictions.

The picture south of the border remains grim.

America has led the world in COVID-19 infections and deaths, with cases Friday topping the 7 million mark, and more than 203,000 COVID-19 deaths, according to updated figures published Friday by Johns Hopkins University. That same tracker reported Canada has had 152,004 confirmed cases and 9,304 deaths  a slightly higher tally than Health Canadas report, which tallies day-old data.

Blair acknowledged there have been significant economic and social impacts of the border shutdown, not just on border towns but on individuals who are separated from those they love, and they are tough cases.

He said he is working with B.C. officials to deal with concerns in Point Roberts, Washington, a peninsula town of 1,000 whose American residents have been cut off from the rest of their country because they must pass through Canadian territory to get there. Blair said the challenge is children want to go to school on the Canadian side, but theres a real concern that in going back and forth, their parents will go shopping in Vancouver.

Were not indifferent to the difficulty that community is facing but our priority has to be the safety of Canadians, he said.

Public polling research has shown a majority of Canadians do not want to see the border reopened soon.

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By ANI

MUMBAI: Actor Rakul Preet Singh's statement was recorded by the Special Investigative Team (SIT) of the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) in connection with a drug case related to the death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput.

"Rakul Preet Singh's statement was recorded by the SIT today. It will be analysed and produced before the court," Mutha Ashok Jain, Director General, NCB told reporters here.

NCB said that Karishma Prakash, actor Deepika Padukone's manager joined the investigation and she has been called again tomorrow.

The NCB on Wednesday had also summoned actors Deepika Padukone, Sara Ali Khan, Shraddha Kapoor, Simone Khambatta and celebrity manager Shruti Modi for the ongoing case.

ALSO READ | Drugs case: Dharma Productions' executive producer Kshitij Ravi brought to NCB office for questioning

Actor Rhea Chakraborty, who was arrested in the drug case, is in judicial custody has been extended till October 6.

The NCB had launched an investigation after it received official communication from the Enforcement Directorate (ED), in which there were various chats related to drug consumption, procurement, usage and transportation.

The ED had on July 31 registered an Enforcement Case Information Report in the late actor's death case after a First Information Report was filed by Rajput's father KK Singh against Rhea Chakraborty in Bihar on July 28. Rajput was found dead at his Mumbai residence on June 14.
FILE PHOTO: A view of the Johan Sverdrup oilfield in the North Sea

By Nerijus Adomaitis

OSLO (Reuters) - Norwegian oil firms plan to close down 22% of the country's oil and gas output, or 900,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day, if workers go on strike next week, the Norwegian Oil and Gas Association (NOG) said on Friday.

Some 324 out of 7,300 employees on offshore platforms plan to strike from Sept. 30 if annual pay negotiations with employers fail, trade unions Safe, Industri Energi and Lederne said on Wednesday.

If Norway's state-appointed mediator is unable to broker a deal, union members will be eligible to go on strike and the dispute will escalate.

Norway pumps just over 4 million barrels of oil equivalent per day (boepd), half in the form of crude and other liquids and half from natural gas, making it a major global energy supplier.

Fields and platforms that could be forced to shut are Equinor's <EQNR.OL> Johan Sverdrup, Snorre B, Kvitebjoern, Aasta Hansteen, Kristin, Tyrihans and Valemon, the NOG said.

Wintershall Dea's Maria field would also have to shut, it added.

At the Johan Sverdrup field, the largest oil-producing field in Western Europe, 88 workers from Safe and 43 from Lederne would strike, including some control-room operators, officials at the two unions said on Wednesday.

Sverdrup's technical production capacity was increased to 470,000 barrels of oil per day (bpd) in April from an original 440,000 bpd.

The field's output is currently capped, however, at 415,500 bpd as part of Norway's agreement with OPEC and other producing nations to curb output until the end of 2020.

Several other facilities will also be affected by a strike, unions have said, but were not on NOG's list of planned shutdowns.

Some 25 workers will strike at ConocoPhillips's <COP.N> Ekofisk Lima platform, Safe said, while 39 service workers employed by ESS at Aker BP's <AKERBP.OL> Ula and ConocoPhillips's Eldfisk Bravo also plan to join.

Unions have not published details of their demands.

In 2012, the government invoked emergency powers to end a conflict after 16 days when employers threatened a lockout of workers that would have shut down Norway's entire oil and gas output.

(Writing by Terje Solsvik; editing by Gwladys Fouche and Barbara Lewis)




Haiti - Insecurity : Magistrate Wendelle Coq threatened with death





Judge Jean Wilner Morin, President of the National Association of Haitian Magistrates (ANAMAH) condemns in a note the acts of intimidation and death threats against Magistrate Wendelle Coq, founding member of ANAMAH, who brings him his unwavering support support.



"The Magistrate Coq is one of that category of Magistrates whose reputation is capable of rising to the traditional and mythical dimension of the Court of Cassation [..] that hot heads are hiding behind anonymous or unregistered telephone numbers for to overwhelm her with threatening threats to her life does not in any way surprise the Nation [...] the assassination of the President of the Bar of Port-au-Prince Me Monferier Dorval says a lot.



[...] The bloody route taken by these unscrupulous individuals leaves the shadow of a doubt as to their desire to eradicate the truth and replace it with their own. They are not joking [...]



No Magistrate should be threatened or intimidated when he performs acts of his conviction under the law and the Constitution. In this regard, it is the responsibility of the national police, as an auxiliary of justice or the public authorities, to guarantee the security of the Magistrate."



The ANAMAH invites the Magistrates in their rank, level and quality not to lower their guard and to remain faithful to the Constitution and the law.



HL/ HaitiLibre


















Malaysia Election Voters wearing face masks to help curb the spread of the coronavirus wait for their turn at a polling station during a state election on the outskirts of Kota Kinabalu, in Malaysia's Sabah state on Borneo island, Saturday, Sept. 26, 2020. Polls opened Saturday in Malaysia's eastern Sabah state in a vote seen as a referendum for embattled Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin's 7-month-old unelected government. (AP Photo)

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP)  Malaysia's 7-month-old ruling alliance triumphed Saturday in its first electoral test in eastern Sabah state, a major victory for embattled Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin amid challenges to his leadership.

Sabah was ruled by the opposition and the state poll was seen as a referendum for Muhyiddin's unelected government. Analysts said the victory could push Muhyiddin to call for early national elections to bolster his coalition that has a thin two-seat majority in Parliament.

The win could also help Muhyiddin thwart a challenge from opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, who declared Wednesday he has secured majority support in the national Parliament to oust Muhyiddin and form a new government.

Muhyiddin said in a brief televised speech that his camp has won 38 out of the 73 state seats, enough to form a new state government, and thanked Sabah voters for their trust.

Muhyiddin has secured enough of a strong performance to strengthen his legitimacy," said Bridget Welsh, honorary research associate at the University of Nottingham in Malaysia.

Sabah and neighboring Sarawak on Borneo island hold about a quarter of the seats in Parliament and are seen as crucial for political leverage. The two states are rich in oil and timber, but are among the poorest in Malaysia. They have a greater level of autonomy in administration, immigration and judiciary.

The leader of Sabah dissolved the state assembly on July 30 to seek early elections and block attempts by Muhyiddins ruling alliance to wrest power in Sabah through lawmakers defections.

The attempted takeover of Sabah was reminiscent of how Muhyiddin took power in March after defecting from the reformist government to form a new Malay-centric administration.

Muhyiddins alliance has since taken control of many states after lawmakers defected. After losing Sabah, the opposition now controls only two of the countrys richest states, Selangor and Penang.

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But Muhyiddin has been struggling to maintain support amid infighting in his coalition. His leadership was thrown into further doubt after Anwar claimed to have won majority support, including from lawmakers in Muhyiddin's camp.

Anwar hasn't revealed details, as he is waiting to meet with Malaysia's king, who is in a hospital for treatment. The king has power to appoint a new prime minister or dissolve Parliament for an early general election, which is not due until 2023. Muhyiddin has said Anwar's declaration was a mere allegation until he provides evidence.

The Sabah victory took wind away from Anwars sail," said Oh Ei Sun, a senior fellow at the Singapore Institute of International Affairs.

Muhyiddin's heavy campaigning in Sabah with pledge for development has worked well in interior seats, Oh said. Billboards of Muhyiddin's smiling face dubbed Abah," or father, are prominent in many constituencies.

Muhyiddin's allies in his ruling alliance are likely to increase calls for early national polls after the Sabah win. Situation remains uncertain, with pressures toward an election real," Welsh said.

His government is propped up by the United Malays National Organization, that lost power in 2018 elections to an alliance that involves Anwar's party. Muhyiddin's party is dwarfed by UMNO and that puts him in a weak position.

The Sabah election has been held with enhanced health measures amid rising coronavirus cases in the state in recent weeks.

Hours after voting began, a candidate from Muhyiddin's alliance announced on social media that he had tested positive for the virus and urged those who have come into close contact with him to go for screening. Malaysia has recorded just over 10,000 cases.

The number of infections is thought to be far higher because many people have not been tested, and studies suggest people can be infected with the virus without feeling sick.

For most people, the new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough that clear up in two to three weeks. For some  especially older adults and people with existing health problems  it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia, and death. The vast majority recover.
A Chinese health official stated on Friday that the nation's yearly production capability for COVID-19 vaccines will top one billion doses in 2021. This is following an assertive government support program for building of new factories.

610 Million Doses by the End of 2020

According to Zheng Zhongwei from the National Health Commission, the capacity is slated to reach 610 million novel coronavirus vaccine doses by the conclusion of 2020.

Blessing from the WHO

The World Health Organization (WHO) approved China's campaign to vaccinate particular people against the coronavirus in July while clinical trials are being undertaken, according to a Chinese health official. A number of experts have expressed concern regarding the decision.

Zhongwei added that China initiated its emergency program in July, having communicated with the WHO in late June.

The Chinese health official was also negotiating with organizations involved in Covax, a program to ensure equal access to COVID-19 vaccines, for distribution to developing countries.

Zheng stated that the health commission proposed emergency usage of the COVID-19 vaccines in mid-June to shield people with high-risk work including as frontline health workers, overseas workers, and border officials.

Experimental Vaccine

The CEO of SinoVac, Yin Weidong, stated that he personally has been provided the experimental COVID-19 vaccine.

Upon China's announcement of the one billion COVID-19 vaccines, according to Yin, "At the very beginning, our strategy was designed for China and for Wuhan. Soon after that in June and July we adjusted our strategy, that is to face the world. Our goal is to provide the vaccine to the world including the U.S., EU and others," reported Euronews.

Also Read: Experts Discover Marine Protists That May Be Dubbed as 'Virus-Eaters'

China has been disemminating experimental COVID-19 vaccines to hundreds of thousands of people since July under an emergency use program approved by the government of China prior to their safety and efficacy being entirely backed by clinical trials.

A number of health experts and vaccine creators in the West have cautioned against the premature permission of COVID-19 vaccines before last-stage trials are concluded.

According to Zheng, "Next year, our annual capacity will reach more than 1 billion doses," reported The Tribune.

The United States pharmaceutical giants Pfizer and Moderna also prioritize to manufacture one billion doses each in 2021.

According to Zheng, "At end-June, China's State Council approved a plan of COVID-19 vaccine emergency use program," Zheng told a news conference, reported VN Explorer.

Phase 3 of Clinical Trials

The COVID-19 vaccines still had to complete the 3rd phase of clinical trials but the State Council supported the proposal on June 24th.

Rigid regulations in the United States, Japan, European Union, and Australia have historically barred the sale of Chinese vaccines but Yin stated that could change.

SinoVac is creating one of China's top four COVID-19 vaccine candidates alongside state-owned SinoPharm with two in development and CanSino, a military-affiliated private firm upon China's announcement of the one billion COVID-19 vaccines.

Related Article: How Could COVID-19 Affect Global Road Deaths?

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Frances Academy of Cinema Arts and Techniques is undergoing a major reform drive following an outcry regarding its gender inequality and lack of diversity

Director Roman Polanski will not be participating in an upcoming general assembly for Frances Academy of Cinema Arts and Techniques. The decision, which was announced on Friday, comes in the backdrop of the controversy over moves to invite him back as an unelected member.

A statement sent to news agency AFP by Polanski's representatives stated that despite holding a deep respect for the work of the Cesar Academy, "Roman Polanski has never participated in the general assembly meetings and has no intention of doing so in the future."

The statement added that Polanski had never intervened in any manner in the decisions of the academy. Frances Academy of Cinema Arts and Techniques is undergoing a major reform drive following an outcry regarding its gender inequality and lack of diversity.

The body recently saw its first-ever democratic election by 4,313 members of a gender-balanced general assembly for the Association for the Promotion of Cinema (APC). When the results were announced, the new members were surprised to see that they were to be joined by 18 "historic members" who had exercised their right to remain under the old statutes of the APC, which are yet to be reformed.

Two-thirds of the new members put out an open letter condemning the move.

The reforms being sought by the academy, included signatories like Bertrand Tavernier, Berenice Bejo, Leila Bekhti, and Michel Hazanavicius, who all complained of the lack of democracy in the institution and had said that the founding statutes of the Cesar had not changed for a long time.
"I am not going to sign off on this aircraft until I fly it myself and am satisfied that I would put my own family on it without a second thought," FAA chief Steve Dickson said in November 2019. Reuters

The chief of the Federal Aviation Administration plans to pilot a Boeing 737 Max, a major symbolic step before the agency clears the plane to fly passengers again.

Administrator Steve Dickson will take the controls of the plane to test Boeing's fixes on September 30, the FAA said in a notification to several Congressional committees. Dickson, a former pilot and executive at Delta Air Lines, flew several plane types, including an older version of the 737, before joining the FAA.

Dickson has previously said that the agency would not lift its order grounding the plane until he flew the plane personally.

"I am not going to sign off on this aircraft until I fly it myself and am satisfied that I would put my own family on it without a second thought," he said in November 2019.

The test flight will take place at Boeing's facilities in Seattle, Washington. Dickson will first undergo new training which Boeing and the FAA have proposed for Max pilots.

The 737 Max has been grounded worldwide since March, 2019, after the second of two fatal crashes that killed a combined 346 people.

A new automated flight control system on the Max, the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), was quickly found to be a primary culprit behind the crashes.

MCAS was designed to compensate for the 737 Max having larger engines than previous 737 generations. The larger engines could cause the plane's nose to tip upward, potentially leading to a stall  MCAS could automatically point the nose down to neutralize the problem.

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However, the system could be activated by a faulty reading from a single angle-of-attack sensor, without any redundancies or backups. In both crashes, the sensors are thought to have failed, sending erroneous data to the flight computer and, without a redundant check in place, triggering the automated system.

Although the grounding was initially expected to last a few weeks, Boeing and the FAA found additional safety hazards, eventually requiring Boeing to redesign the jet's entire flight computer rather than just the MCAS software.

Boeing previously said it expected the jet to return to service in the second half of this year. Although airlines have eagerly awaited the jet's return, the collapse of travel demand due to the coronavirus pandemic has dulled the need for the added capacity.

While a scathing report from House Democrats on the Transportation committee condemned Boeing and FAA missteps that led to the crashes in the first place, the plane has undergone virtually unprecedented scrutiny since it was grounded, and is nearing the final steps before it can be cleared to fly again.

Based on the remaining steps and Dickson's planned test flight, the FAA could lift the grounding order as soon as early October.

Read the original article on Business Insider
Vice Presidential nominee Kamala Harris has come in for criticism after saying that protests against racial injustice, including those by the Black Lives Matter group are 'essential for the evolution of our country' - with some online branding her 'ignorant'.

Senator Harris D-Calif. made the comments during the NAACP's national convention in which she was interviewed for more than one hour and come just three days after two police officers were shot and injured during rioting in Louisville.

The shooting came after a grand jury's decision not to charge the officers who shot and killed Breonna Taylor. One of the officers involved was charged with wanton endangerment for shooting into a neighboring apartment.

'Nothing that we have achieved that has been about progress, in particular around civil rights, has come without a fight, and so I always am going to interpret these protests as an essential component of evolution in our country - as an essential component or mark of a real democracy.

Vice presidential candidate Kamala Harris has praised recent Black Lives Matter protests saying they are 'essential' for change in the country

Speaking at the NAACP convention, Harris praised the 'brilliance' and 'impact' of BLM

One Twitter user appeared shocked at the vice presidential candidate's take on recent events

Robby Starbuck, a Cuban-American director and producer also attempted to place Harris' quotes into relevant context

Plenty of other users on Twitter were unimpressed by the California Senator's remarks

'The people's voices must be heard, and it is often the people who must speak to get their government to do what it is supposed to do, but may not do naturally unless the people speak loudly - and obviously peacefully.'

Harris went on to praise the 'brilliance' and 'impact' of the Black Lives Matter movement.

'I actually believe that Black Lives Matter has been the most significant agent for change within the criminal justice system,' she said.

'I think, a community and the country speaking out, understanding that nothing that we have achieved that has been about progress in this country has come without a fight. Nothing that we have achieved in our country that has been about progress, and in particular around civil rights has come without a fight.'

A demonstrator holds a smoke bomb as he marches to protest the lack of criminal charges in the police killing of Breonna Taylor, in downtown Louisville, Kentucky on Thursday. More than 1,000 people defied a second night of curfew

Black Lives Matter protestors march as they protest the lack of criminal charges in the police killing of Breonna Taylor, in downtown Louisville

The comments came thick and fast with many seemingly shocked at the vice presidential candidate's take on recent events.

'Unmoved by the violence in our streets and the brutal attacks on our police officers, Kamala Harris says the 'protests' are essential for our 'evolution' as a country,' wrote Arthur Schwarz as he used the senators own words against her.

It was a view shared by Steve Guest, Rapid Response Director of the GOP.

'After months of left-wing violence, Democrat Sen. Kamala Harris says these protests are an essential part of our 'evolution' as a country,' encouraging others to see fault with Harris' words.

Twitter user, Philip Camp, called the senator 'stupid' for her remarks regarding BLM

Twitter user Arthur Schwarz used the senators own words against her.

Christian author Daniel Bobinski was far from impressed by what he had heard

Robby Starbuck, a Cuban-American director and producer also attempted to place Harris' quotes into relevant context.

''Nothing we've achieved... has come without a fight and so I'm always going to interpret these protests as an essential component of evolution in our country... and as necessary.' - Kamala Harris Remember this when you see cities on fire & people attacked', Starbuck added.

Another Twitter user, Philip Camp, called the senator 'stupid': 'Kamala Harris praises BLM, says ongoing protests are 'essential' for change in US. Just shows how stupid Kamala Harris is. The country is going to pot with people like her in leadership roles.'

Christian author Daniel Bobinski was also far from impressed by what he had heard.

'I'd like to publicly thank Kamala Harris for telling Americans that the protests (aka riots) need to continue ... and hold her personally responsible for the violence and the medical bills ... and yes, the deaths, too. I lay this at the feet of Congressional Democrats,' he tweeted.

It's not the first time Harris has defended the cause of protestors taking to city streets across the country.

'We must always defend peaceful protest and peaceful protesters. We should not confuse them with those looting and committing acts of violence, including the shooter who was arrested for murder. Make no mistake, we will not let these vigilantes and extremists derail the path to justice,' Harris said last month.

Harris' comments come at the end of another week of mass protests over the death of Black Americans including Breonna Taylor, whose case prompted a series of demonstrations earlier this week.

Two officers, Louisville Metro Police Department, LMPD officer Robinson Desroches, left, and LMPD Maj. Aubrey Gregory were shot during clashes in Louisville on Wednesday, after authorities announced a grand jury had decided not to charge anyone in connection with the death of Taylor

Hundreds of demonstrators chanted Taylor's name and marched in cities including New York, Washington, Philadelphia, Las Vegas and Portland.

People gathered in Millennium Park, Chicago, chanting demands for justice as drivers in Michigan Avenue honked their horns.

Police in Atlanta unleashed chemical agents and made arrests after some protesters tried to climb on a SWAT vehicle.

In Wisconsin, peaceful marchers blocked traffic on an interstate and spoke about Ms Taylor on the steps of the state Capitol.

Supporters pose for a photo on the steps of the Louisville Metro Hall as they raise their fists in protest of the lack of criminal charges in the police killing of Breonna Taylor

A cyclist waves a Black Lives Matter flag as he cycled through downtown Louisville

Larynzo D Johnson, 26, was charged with two counts of assault on a police officer

In Louisville, police said they arrested 127 people after what began as peaceful protests.

Officers declared an unlawful assembly after they said fires were set in bins and several vehicles were damaged.

A police statement also described the 'looting' of several stores.

Footage emerged showing buildings vandalized and burned in Louisville

Interim Police Chief Robert Schroeder said a suspect was detained in the shooting of two officers, who are expected to recover from their wounds.

Jail records later confirmed Larynzo D Johnson, 26, was charged with two counts of assault on a police officer and multiple charges of wanton endangerment of police officers.
In a rare move, Bangladesh police have transferred the entire 1,400-strong force out of Coxs Bazar to bring new personnel into the southern border district that hosts about a million Rohingya refugees, officials said Friday.



The districts police force has been strongly criticized for shooting dead a retired army major on July 31, as well as for more than a hundred alleged extrajudicial killings of Rohingya refugees and a deteriorating law and order situation that has led to a dozen recent refugee abductions from what is a hotspot for cross-border drug smuggling. One former kidnap victim told BenarNews that his family had to sell off gold and raise money to pay a ransom of nearly U.S. $6,000.



The police headquarters issued an order on Thursday regarding the transfer of more than one thousand constables  the transferred police constables are from eight different police stations, different check posts, the detective branch and traffic department, Mohammad Iqbal Hossain, an additional superintendent of police in Coxs Bazar who was also transferred, told BenarNews.



As many as 1,141 constables were transferred in a fell swoop on Friday. The remaining members of the Coxs Bazar district police force had already been transferred in three separate phases starting Sept. 16, Hossain said, noting he couldnt recall that there had ever been a mass transfer of this kind from a single district.



Sohel Rana, a spokesman at police headquarters in Dhaka, declined to comment on the transfers and sought more time to respond to BenarNews.

But Md. Anwar Hossain, the Deputy Inspector General for the Chittagong Range, which encompasses Coxs Bazar, told reporters that the transfers were part of a reorganization of the force.

When Hossain was asked whether the reasons for the en masse transfer were the former majors killing, the alleged extrajudicial killings and the alleged involvement of police in the drug trade, he denied it.



The performance of those [transferred] personnel was satisfactory, the new set will do better, he said.



Crossfire incidents



Bangladeshi government officials have justified heavy security measures in the district that borders Myanmar, such as numerous police checkpoints, claiming they are in place to guard against potential militant attacks and to check the illegal drug trade in what is a narcotics smuggling hotspot.

It was at one such checkpoint that police on July 31 stopped former Maj. Sinha Md. Rashed Khan and then shot and killed him without asking him to identify himself, a news agency of the armed forces said in a statement Aug. 1.

Shooting instead of arresting a person with his hands up is unlawful, the statement said.

Police in the district have also been criticized by global human rights group Amnesty International, which claimed this month that more than 100 Rohingya refugees were victims of extrajudicial killings in Bangladesh since 2017.

The rights group said it had spoken to family members of five Rohingya refugees who were victims of extrajudicial executions in Coxs Bazar.

Every incident has a strikingly similar narrative where the victims were killed during a gunfight with members of law enforcement agencies who claimed that they only opened fire in retaliation, Amnesty said.

A senior government official however said that all Rohingya slain in crossfire incidents were drug traffickers.

None of the Rohingya killed in the crossfire with the border guards and law enforcement agencies were the victims of extrajudicial killings. They were armed narcotics smugglers coming from the Myanmar side of the border, Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal told BenarNews when asked about Amnesty Internationals allegations.

Kidnap victim: My family members sold their gold



Meanwhile, at least two dozen Rohingya refugees have been abducted for ransom from the camps in the last month, police acknowledged, attributing the crime to Rohingya criminals, but denying that they have any connection with Arakan Rohingya Salavation Army (ARSA) rebels, like many refugees allege.



Two commanders of the Armed Police Battalion (ABPn) told BenarNews that in the last month, there had been 15 abductions for ransom from 21 refugee camps in Ukhia in Coxs Bazar, and nine such incidents from the Teknaf camps there.



Many Rohingya refugees allege that members of ARSA are the ones taking their compatriots captive for ransom.



Md. Younus, 35, a resident of a camp in Teknaf who was abducted in August, was one of those released after his family paid a ransom.



The members of al-Yaqin whisked me away from my house blindfolded, muzzled and with my hands tied. They took me to a nearby hill, and beat me up with iron rods and sticks, Younus told BenarNews, referring to the short form of ARSAs former name, Harakah al-Yaqin.



They called my relatives from my cell phone, asking for one million taka [U.S. $11,700] as ransom and warned that I would die if they disclosed the incidents to anyone. My family members sold their gold and borrowed money and paid 500,000 taka to my captors who then released me.



In a December 2016 report, International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based conflict prevention and resolution group, said that ARSA had recruited several hundred young Rohingya men from Bangladesh in October that year.



Bangladesh officially denies the presence of ARSA rebels in the refugee camps, but government and police sources in February privately acknowledged to BenarNews that they had arrested several of the insurgents in the previous months.



ARSA carried out attacks on police and army posts in Myanmars Rakhine state in August 2017.

In response to those attacks, Myanmars security forces launched a brutal crackdown that forced 740,000 Rohingya Muslims to flee their homes and cross into neighboring Bangladesh.

Hossain, the Coxs Bazar additional superintendent of police, said they had arrested eight alleged abductors who are not associated with ARSA.



ARSA has no presence in Bangladesh. Many petty criminals use the ARSA tag to create panic in the camps, Hossain said.



The police have always been aware of these petty criminals.



According to a criminologist at the University of Dhaka, the district police need to take steps to ensure there are no kidnappings from the camps.



If such incidents continue to happen, the condition of the camps would deteriorate and a dangerous criminal culture will set in, Zia Rahman, chairman of the department of criminology at the university, told BenarNews.



Abductions at the camps must stop.
and blocked the official release of a report by UN experts on that accused its warring parties and their backers -- including -- of violating a UN arms embargo on the conflict-wracked country, UN diplomats said Friday.

Germany's deputy UN ambassador, Gnter Sautter, said he brought the issue to the Security Council after the two countries blocked the report's release by the committee monitoring sanctions on Libya, which Germany heads. Many delegations have asked for the publication of the panel of experts' interim report, he said.

This would create much needed transparency. It would contribute to naming and shaming those who continue to blatantly violate the arms embargo in spite of agreements that have been made.

But diplomats, speaking on condition of anonymity because Friday's council consultations were closed, said and close ally again blocked the report's publication.

Sautter said before the meeting, when asked what Germany could do if Russia and blocked the report's release again: Let me assure you I will continue to use every tool at hand in order to make sure that we have the necessary transparency.

The report, seen by The Associated Press earlier this month, said the arms embargo was being violated by Libya's UN-supported government in the west, which is backed by Turkey and Qatar, and by rival east-based forces under commander Khalifa Hifter, backed by the United Arab Emirates, Russia and Jordan.

The panel said the embargo remains totally ineffective. The experts said 11 companies also violated the arms embargo, including the Wagner Group, a private Russian security company that the panel said in May provided between 800 and 1,200 mercenaries to Hifter.

In addition, the experts said the warring parties and their backers, along with Egypt and Syria, failed to inspect aircraft or vessels if they have reasonable grounds to believe the cargo contains military weapons and ammunition, as required by a 2015 Security Council resolution.

Anwar Gargash, the United Arab Emirates' minister of state for foreign affairs, told a group of reporters at a virtual briefing Friday that he wouldn't comment on a report he hadn't seen. But he said that we categorically deny many of the wild allegations that we've been hearing in the press.

In the years after the 2011 uprising that toppled longtime autocrat Moammar Gadhafi, has sunk further into turmoil and is now divided between two rival administrations based in the country's east and west, with an array of fighters and militias backed by various foreign powers allied with each side.

Tensions in oil-rich escalated further when east-based forces Hifter launched an offensive in April 2019 trying to capture the capital, Tripoli. But Hifter's campaign collapsed in June when militias backing the U.N.-supported government in Tripoli, with Turkish support, gained the upper hand, driving his forces from the outskirts of the capital and other western towns.

The Security Council adopted a resolution on Sept. 15 demanding that all countries enforce the widely violated U.N. arms embargo on Libya and withdraw all mercenaries from the North African nation. It also extended the U.N. political mission in Libya and called for political talks and a cease-fire in the war, which the U.N. has been pursuing.

One glaring gap for the U.N. has been the failure to replace its former top envoy, Ghassan Salame, who resigned in March, mainly as the result of a U.S. demand to split his job in two. The resolution adopted last week did split it, putting a special envoy in charge of the U.N. mission to focus on mediating with Libyan and parties to end the conflict and providing for a coordinator to be in charge of day-to-day operations.

But finding a replacement acceptable to all Security Council diplomats has proven exceedingly difficult.

One possibility is the UN's current top Mideast envoy, Nikolay Mladenov, a former Bulgarian foreign minister, UN diplomats said, speaking on condition of anonymity because discussions have been private. But the diplomats said the three African members of the council South Arica, Niger and Tunisia oppose him because they want an African in the job.

Germany's Sautter said the Security Council has agreed that there will be a special envoy and we need an agreement urgently on who that is going to be.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Volta Regional Minister Dr Archibald Letsa has denied claims he is supporting the secessionist groups in the Volta Region.

This comes after one of which recently attempted taking over the region by blocking all entry and exit points and taking some police officers hostage while engaging the others in a gunfight on Friday, 25 September.

That is ridiculous, Dr Letsa said of the claim re-echoed by lawmaker Kobina Mensah Woyome.

Valentina, I dont want to answer that question because its ridiculous. Weve been dealing with these groups since we came into office in 2017. How do I know them? How do I support them? Were they able to provide any evidence?

For Gods sake, Im the Chairman of the regional security council and Ive to be dealing with this group since 2017, Dr Letsa said on Class91.3FM's 505 news programme on Friday, 25 September 2020.

The MP for South Tongu had claimed that one of the secessionists told him on the phone that they had the support of Dr Letsa.

Mr Woyome said he had called the Tongu divisional police commander's phone, who had apparently been taken hostage by the militants and one of them answered it and mentioned the regional minister's name as supporting the group.

Speaking in an interview with Class News Volta regional correspondent Albert Kuzor, the South Tongu MP said: What is happening now, looking at the scheme in which it has occurred, the coordinated nature of the whole activity here, Mepe, Atimpoku, I hear Afiefe and several other places at a go, at the same time, and the attacks on the police in this manner, it baffles me a bit.

I dont think the security will go to sleep and just relax and not be able to be on top and ahead of anything like this.

Because, the way it happened, it means they might have sat, planned or deliberately, people who ought to act, didnt act; people who must be acting and preventing them from happening simply just didnt want to do and, so, for big names to be coming up like this, whether true or not true, which calls for some investigation anyway, it leaves so much to be desired and too many question marks.

The South Tongu MP condemned the action of the group and the people behind its actions.

Does it have some political undertone? Is it because the hearsay is that this is the stronghold of the opposition party and, so, lets cause some confusion and disaffection so, maybe, people dont go to the polls? Is that the plan? Its just unfortunate, Mr Woyome said.

Now, people are hurt, but Im aware that even a woman was shot at and, so, theyve picked up her belongings including her ID card to chase her to the hospital to go and look out for her and see how shes faring.

You can see bloodstains on the ground and all that; that for me is uncalled for, it must not be happening.

Were in a country that I know that we have a very good security system in place but unfortunately, the way its going, its leaving too many question marks on our minds. The government must sit up, he noted.

Mr Woyome further called for investigations into the matter.

Should we say that we cannot trust in our security system anymore? That we should be here and somebody comes to attack us and goes free without picking intelligence and preventing it from happening. It leaves too many questions unanswered on our minds and I think that is a serious matter, its not like the group is not known

There are better ways to go about this thing, not necessarily the blocking of roads, even if you should block the roads, I dont think you should go to the extent of attacking police stations to the extent of shooting law enforcement agents, and then hurting them, and as a result, being attacked in response.

All these things are needless, we need to get into this matter, he said.

---classfm
The Nokia 7 Plus was announced all the way back in February 2018 and went on sale in April of that year. According to the Nokia official updates tracker, it's gotten 40 software updates as of this September 2. A new one's just gone live, though it hasn't made it to the tracker yet.

The build number is 00WW_4_16B and it's a Maintenance release - so it's not just the latest security patch, but also bug fixes and such. A security patch is, of course, included - dated September 1. Don't get your hopes up though - the new build is still based on Android 10.

Nokia 7 Plus running Oreo at review time in 2018

The Nokia 7 Plus was released in 2018 with Android 8.1 Oreo and as part of the Android One program has been continuously up to date in terms of software. It got Android Pie in late September of 2018 while Android 10 came in January 2020. We doubt Android 11 is at all on the nearly three-year-old phone's timeline, though, judging by this official tweet.

Source | Via
Mark Wilson/Getty Images

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg lies in state today at the U.S. Capitol, making history as the first woman and Jewish American to do so. Ginsburg died last Friday at age 87.

"Nobody in our country did more for women's equality than Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said before the ceremony began. "Her passing is an incalculable loss for our democracy and for all who sacrifice and strive to build a better future for our children."
MONTPELIER, Vt. - An international organization that is studying flooding in Lake Champlain in Vermont and upstate New York and along the Richelieu River that drains the lake into Quebec will be holding public hearings on their work.

The International Lake Champlain-Richelieu River Study Board will hold four virtual public meetings in the last week of September. The meetings will be held in both English and French.

The study board was appointed in 2017 by the U.S. and Canadian governments to more fully explore the causes, impacts, risks and solutions to mitigate flooding in the Lake Champlain-Richelieu River basin. A final report is expected in 2022.

The meetings will be held Sept. 29 and 30. People who would like to participate in the virtual meetings must register in advance.
In order to increase the resilience of societies, it is necessary to reconsolidate democratic values, as well as the rules-based international order, on Friday said the Foreign Affairs minister Bogdan Aurescu, at the ministerial meeting of the Alliance for Multilateralism, a release by the Foreign Affairs Ministry (MAE) informs Saturday.

According to MAE, Aurescu had an intervention on behalf of Romania at the ministerial meeting of the Alliance for Multilateralism, which took place on the margins of the 75th session of the General Assembly of the United Nations, in a videoconference system. The event was dedicated to expressing commitment and collective contribution to a better reconstruction following the crisis generated by the COVID-19 pandemic.In his message, the head of diplomacy pointed out that the serious effects of the COVID-19 pandemic in political, economic and social terms have imposed unprecedented challenges on multilateralism, international law, rule-based order and democratic values.As part of the solutions to overcome the current crisis, Aurescu stressed the importance of strengthening the resilience of all members of the international community, including by stepping up cooperation in areas such as health, economy, digitalisation, climate change and sustainable development goals.The Minister noted that Romania joined the initiative of "The Coronavirus Global Response", refocusing several projects from official development assistance to the health emergencies of some partner states, especially from the eastern neighbourhood of Romania and sub-Saharan Africa, and more than half of the national funds for international development cooperation have been redirected to respond to pandemic challenges generated by the novel coronavirus.At the same time, minister Aurescu stressed that in order to increase the resilience of societies, it is necessary to reconsolidate democratic values - fundamental freedoms, democracy, human rights, gender equality and the protection of the most vulnerable - as well as the rules-based international order.The head of the Romanian diplomacy announced at the meeting that Romania had endorsed the Declaration on the Principles of the Alliance for Multilateralism, and was actively involved in this network. Romania's approach is based both on the belief that an urgent reform of the multilateral system is needed to make it more efficient, pragmatic and more connected to the needs of citizens, and the multilateral vocation of our country which, in December, will celebrate 65 years since it became a full member of the UN, the release adds
Mobile Phone Accessories Market Research Report by Product (Battery, Battery Cases, Chargers, Headphones, and Memory Card), by Distribution Mode (Offline and Online) - Global Forecast to 2025 - Cumulative Impact of COVID-19

New York, Sept. 26, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "Mobile Phone Accessories Market Research Report by Product, by Distribution Mode - Global Forecast to 2025 - Cumulative Impact of COVID-19" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p05941340/?utm_source=GNW



The Global Mobile Phone Accessories Market is expected to grow from USD 25,285.88 Million in 2019 to USD 37,071.56 Million by the end of 2025 at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 6.58%.



Market Segmentation & Coverage:

This research report categorizes the Mobile Phone Accessories to forecast the revenues and analyze the trends in each of the following sub-markets:



"The Power Bank is projected to witness the highest growth during the forecast period"



Based on Product, the Mobile Phone Accessories Market studied across Battery, Battery Cases, Chargers, Headphones, Memory Card, Portable Speaker, Power Bank, and Protective Case. The Headphones commanded the largest size in the Mobile Phone Accessories Market in 2019. On the other hand, the Power Bank is expected to grow at the fastest CAGR during the forecast period.



"The Online is projected to witness the highest growth during the forecast period"



Based on Distribution Mode, the Mobile Phone Accessories Market studied across Offline and Online. The Offline commanded the largest size in the Mobile Phone Accessories Market in 2019. On the other hand, the Online is expected to grow at the fastest CAGR during the forecast period.



"The Asia-Pacific is projected to witness the highest growth during the forecast period"



Based on Geography, the Mobile Phone Accessories Market studied across Americas, Asia-Pacific, and Europe, Middle East & Africa. The Americas region surveyed across Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Mexico, and United States. The Asia-Pacific region surveyed across Australia, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Philippines, South Korea, and Thailand. The Europe, Middle East & Africa region surveyed across France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Spain, United Arab Emirates, and United Kingdom. The Asia-Pacific commanded the largest size in the Mobile Phone Accessories Market in 2019, and it is expected to grow at the fastest CAGR during the forecast period.



Company Usability Profiles:

The report deeply explores the recent significant developments by the leading vendors and innovation profiles in the Global Mobile Phone Accessories Market including Anker Innovations Limited, Apple Inc., Belkin International, Inc., Bose Corporation, Energizer Holdings, Inc., Incipio, LLC, JVC Kenwood Corporation, Otter Products, LLC, Plantronics, Inc., Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., Sennheiser Electronic GmbH & Co. KG, Sony Corporation, and Xiaomi Corporation.



FPNV Positioning Matrix:

The FPNV Positioning Matrix evaluates and categorizes the vendors in the Mobile Phone Accessories Market on the basis of Business Strategy (Business Growth, Industry Coverage, Financial Viability, and Channel Support) and Product Satisfaction (Value for Money, Ease of Use, Product Features, and Customer Support) that aids businesses in better decision making and understanding the competitive landscape.



Competitive Strategic Window:

The Competitive Strategic Window analyses the competitive landscape in terms of markets, applications, and geographies. The Competitive Strategic Window helps the vendor define an alignment or fit between their capabilities and opportunities for future growth prospects. During a forecast period, it defines the optimal or favorable fit for the vendors to adopt successive merger and acquisition strategies, geography expansion, research & development, and new product introduction strategies to execute further business expansion and growth.



Cumulative Impact of COVID-19:

COVID-19 is an incomparable global public health emergency that has affected almost every industry, so for and, the long-term effects projected to impact the industry growth during the forecast period. Our ongoing research amplifies our research framework to ensure the inclusion of underlaying COVID-19 issues and potential paths forward. The report is delivering insights on COVID-19 considering the changes in consumer behavior and demand, purchasing patterns, re-routing of the supply chain, dynamics of current market forces, and the significant interventions of governments. The updated study provides insights, analysis, estimations, and forecast, considering the COVID-19 impact on the market.



The report provides insights on the following pointers:

1. Market Penetration: Provides comprehensive information on the market offered by the key players

2. Market Development: Provides in-depth information about lucrative emerging markets and analyzes the markets

3. Market Diversification: Provides detailed information about new product launches, untapped geographies, recent developments, and investments

4. Competitive Assessment & Intelligence: Provides an exhaustive assessment of market shares, strategies, products, and manufacturing capabilities of the leading players

5. Product Development & Innovation: Provides intelligent insights on future technologies, R&D activities, and new product developments



The report answers questions such as:

1. What is the market size and forecast of the Global Mobile Phone Accessories Market?

2. What are the inhibiting factors and impact of COVID-19 shaping the Global Mobile Phone Accessories Market during the forecast period?

3. Which are the products/segments/applications/areas to invest in over the forecast period in the Global Mobile Phone Accessories Market?

4. What is the competitive strategic window for opportunities in the Global Mobile Phone Accessories Market?

5. What are the technology trends and regulatory frameworks in the Global Mobile Phone Accessories Market?

6. What are the modes and strategic moves considered suitable for entering the Global Mobile Phone Accessories Market?

Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p05941340/?utm_source=GNW



About Reportlinker

ReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place.



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CONTACT: Clare: clare@reportlinker.com US: (339)-368-6001 Intl: +1 339-368-6001




But the orders have not made it through the regulatory process and are unlikely to take effect before the Nov. 3 election, experts said. Details of how they would work and be implemented also remain unclear, because the executive orders did not contain significant detail. They are also certain to be challenged in court by the pharmaceutical industry, which has tried to beat back the proposal.
Amaravati, Sep 26 : At a time when religious politics are raging in Andhra Pradesh, the government has ordered the police department to secure all places of worship to avoid any untoward incident, especially in the light of Antarvedi Sri Lakshmi Narasimha Swamy temple chariot blaze.

The state police department has already initiated the process of calling priests and religious heads across the state to be vigilant and fix surveillance cameras in churches, temples, mosques and others.

In Prakasam and West Godavari districts, like all others, the policemen personally visited temples, churches and mosques, suggesting safety measures to the clergy as well as locals.

A Prakasam police official said the department is keeping 24x7 vigil at all places of worship across the district.

A couple of policemen were seen securing a Lord Hanuman temple at Parchur village, another temple at Komarole, a mosque in Kandukur town and a Telugu Baptist Church in Pamuru.

Similar scenes were also seen in Epurupalem, PC Palli, Kanigi and others in the district.

Meanwhile, Prakasam Superintendent of Police (SP), Siddharth Kaushal, has warned hate mongers that the police are keeping a strict vigil to thwart any opportunity for vested interested to exploit the situation.

"We are taking it very seriously on the ground. We are ensuring that no opportunity is given and everything is attended to promptly on ground, responded to promptly and no opportunity is given to exploit this situation," Kaushal told IANS, who is recovering from Coronavirus.

He said police are also monitoring social media to look for trouble makers.

"We are drawing a list of suspects who might want to capitalise on a provocation. We are keeping a close watch, taking everything very seriously on the ground," he asserted.

Besides vigilance, the police department is also engaging in community activities to foster brotherhood among people, mitigate negative atmosphere.

"We are trying to sort of bring together communities, mitigate the negative atmosphere. We will build it up," he said about Sadhbhavana, a programme for peace and harmony.

Currently, Sadhbhavana is taking place at the grassroots level for community spirit.

As part of Sadhbavana, police interacted with Imams in Chirala town and people associated with a temple at TV Palli and other places.
Some members of the group agitating for the restoration of the Western Togoland as an independent state from Ghana arrested for Friday morning disturbances have been transported to Accra.



They were received at the Airforce base in Accra for onward transport to the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) headquarters of the Ghana Police.



UBA Loans



Some of the exhibits picked up from them were flags which had inscriptions of the separatist group, Homeland Study Group Foundation (HSGF) on them.



The suspects blocked various roads in the Volta Region Friday dawn which resulted in a heavy vehicular traffic in various areas.\

Background



The HSGF, a group championing the secession of parts of Ghana along the border with Togo, declared independence for the territory they call 'Western Togoland' on November 16, last year.



Mega Clear

The leader of Western Togoland independence, Charles Kormi Kudzodzi, announced the separation of Western Togoland from Ghana after a meeting in the Volta Regional capital, Ho.



After that announcement, some members of the group were arrested after they were alleged to have engaged in activities to champion the cause of the group.



On December 30, 2019, the Northern Regional Police arrested 18 people suspected to be part of the separatist group.



The arrest followed intelligence that some members of the alleged separatist group from Kpassa were holding a meeting in a primary school in Bimbila, with the aim of recruiting some youth to assist in their secessionist activities.



A joint military and police team was then deployed to the scene to arrest them.



On December 1, last year, the police in the Upper East Region also arrested 10 people said to be connected to the secessionist group.



The suspects were rounded up in an operation in Tumu in the Sissala East District.



https://www.facebook.com/dailygraphicghana/posts/3181713198608109





Source: graphic.com.gh









Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority.

Featured Video
Every year, during winters, Delhi is engulfed in smog with air quality dropping to the poorest levels in the world, all because farmers in North India commence burning of stubble and crop residue to quickly clear the ground for the next season of farming.

Wikimedia Commons

However, now researchers have developed a new way to clear out the stubble that would not only eliminate the mess without pollution but at the same time would also add to the fertility of the ground.



Reported first by Vigyan Prasar, Scientists at the Indian Agricultural Research Institute have developed a novel PUSA Decomposer, which accelerates the decomposition of the dead stubble with the help of fungi. Researchers have put strains of amylolytic and ligninolytic fungi in capsules that produce necessary enzymes that speed up the degradation process.

Making the decomposer solution

The application isnt the most instant. Capsules have to be scaled to 25 litres of the formulation. To make this degrading formula, farmers will have to boil 150 grams of old jaggery. With the scum removed and the mixture cooled, the jaggery is mixed with five litres of water. After this an addition of 50 grams of gram flour followed by 4 of the aforementioned capsules. Once developed, the mixture should be kept in a warm area for the fungi to activate. This takes around 5 days.

Dr K Annapurna: IARI

Dr K. Annapurna, Head, Microbiology Department, IARI while speaking with India Science Wire, explains, Once the scaling up is done the formulation has to be diluted using another 200 liters of water for one acre of paddy straw. Every acre of paddy generates about 4-5 tons of straw so in every acre, there would be around 4-5 tons of straw.

Normally, it could take at least 45 days for the decomposition to commence, however, with this formula, this can be completed in 25 to 30 days.

Reuters

Benefits farmers and citizens

Dr AK Singh, Director, IARI further added how this method can be beneficial not just for people who are affected with poor air quality but also farmers, Based on our experiments, the cost of employing this method will come to about Rs 300 per acre, including the cost of labour. That is not the only benefit though. When organic matter decomposes in the sand, it improves the quality of soil in a way that inorganic fertilizers cannot. As the fungi only impact dead straw, the wheat crop is not in danger.
Ruby Wax has never been afraid to swim against the tide, finding fame as a comedian and showcasing her sharp one-liners on Nineties TV series like Ruby Wax Meets.

She's been open about her struggles with depression, and in more recent years has become an acclaimed campaigner for mental health awareness.

Even so, her latest cause - trying to persuade us that there is some 'good news' and hope to be found, at a time when the world seems beset with gloom and fear - seems a challenge.

"I know what you're thinking, is it some kind of macabre joke? Has she been in a coma? How can Ruby Wax write a book about good news when the world is facing the worst disaster since the plague?" says Wax, whose book is chirpily titled And Now For The Good News...To The Future With Love.

It's the result of three years of research by Wax (67) who visited a huge array of organisations, businesses and communities trying to work in different, kinder ways and promote more people and planet-friendly attitudes.

The pandemic has actually made the book all too timely, she believes, because "we need hope so that we can overcome the fear and the bad news agenda that is besetting us all the time and makes us so stressed. We need to know even more that there are positive things out there," says Wax, "and what's possible if we look at the world differently."

Her quest for "green shoots of hope" took her all over the world. "I figured there must be innovators that are creating a new paradise, and I'm going to find them."

In Finland, she visited progressive schools where empathy and wellbeing are taught. She was particularly impressed by outdoor clothing company Patagonia, based in California, where there's an on-site creche for emplyees' children: "I'd work there tomorrow - there's such an air of joy and you can hear the children laughing and people work harder as a result."

While she feared she'd be "out of my mind with anxiety" joining volunteers at a refugee camp on the Greek island of Samos, the opposite happened. "You're facing people who really need you and the minute you turn on that kindness and compassion thing, your whole body feels good, and people return that goodness," she confides.

Her most emotional moment came at a school in Hertfordshire, where children, many from disadvantaged backgrounds, learn about emotions as well as academic topics. "They practise mindfulness and how deal with issues like bullying in a thoughtful way. At the end of my visit, they gave me a card and 600 of them sang to me. I don't cry, but that brought me to my knees in tears," she recalls.

It's a far cry from the glamour of those days in television as an award-winning chat show host and presenter, which she left without regret. Wax studied psychotherapy and in 2013 graduated from Oxford with a master's degree in mindfulness-based cognitive therapy.

"It would be tough for someone to take my job now, whereas in TV, you're replaced all the time. There's always a blonde coming up the track behind you. Nobody can take away from me what I do now, because I studied and can switch it into comedy," says Wax, who's written three books on mental health which she transformed into hugely successful stage shows. She delivers speeches and advice on mindfulness in the workplace to major organisations, from Facebook and Apple to Google, and in 2017 launched her Frazzled Cafe charity, where people can meet at designated cafes and share their stories and struggles.

Wax safeguards her own mental health with "mindfulness and medication" and is adept at recognising warning signs of a depressive attack. "I cut off from social media, leave town, and don't socialise... now I know it's a disease and when it's coming, I take care," she says.

She says her parents - she's previously described growing up in an emotionally abusive family - would have been astonished at the girl they called a 'loser' achieving so much.

"When I explored my family history through TV's Who Do You Think You Are?, I understood more about them escaping Nazi-controlled Austria and that so many of my relatives were mentally ill. My mother, I realise, was mentally ill rather than mean. I sort of forgive them now," she says.

Her husband of 32 years, television and film producer Ed Bye, has been unwavering in his support, and accommodates her long absences to write and travel.

"He's very important to my happiness - whatever I do, like this book, he's got my back and is behind me. He knows I can never stop trying stuff and experimenting," Wax says fondly. "I never thought my marriage would last this long, but he's such a nice guy, and 'nice' isn't really something that's included in my gene pool. He brings the niceness, I bring the humour."

They have three children, and Wax adds with a smile: "I chose my husband for his seeds of sanity. I think I come from a long line of madness but his family were military and could deal with life in the trenches, so I thought with that background, he could probably deal with me. My kids are totally normal, so it obviously worked!"

She will soon set off to live in Findhorn Ecovillage in Scotland, for a new book about "finding meaning in a world without any. I want to find where I can have a better life and know what makes me happy."

It will mean another stint away from her home and family, but she's as focused as ever on experiencing and writing about different ways of living. "I'd like to have 'she tried' written on my gravestone," Wax says simply.

And Now For The Good News... To The Future With Love by Ruby Wax, Penguin, 14.99
- The first daughter of former President Goodluck Jonathan, Faith Edward, has given birth to a bouncing baby boy

- Faith's husband, Prince Godswill, was very excited as he made the news known on his Instagram page

- The photos he shared showed the newborn and the mother still at the hospital as social media users congratulated them

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Faith Edward, the first daughter to a former president of Nigeria, Goodluck Jonathan, and her husband have welcomed another child on Thursday, September 17th.

The happy father, Prince Godswill, shared the photos of the newborn on his Instagram page. One of them showed the mother still on the hospital bed as she wore a smile.

He called the baby boy a new addition to the P7 dynasty as he appreciated God for the awesome gift.

I give God almighty the praise, for the awesome gift of a bouncing baby boy. Help me welcome the new Prince of the P7 dynasty," his post read.

See photos of the newborn below:

READ ALSO: Nana Aba Anamoah: Treats 2 hawkers to lunch; promises to take one to school

Since his post went live, it has generated reactions from people as congratulatory messages poured in from many.

Below are the ways people reacted to the news:

lovediadem said: "Congratulations. Welcome Prince."

ernestosim907 said: "Congratulations. Welcome prince"

tinaidim said: "Congratulations welcome our prince i pray for you you will be light unto your family amen"

ify4real1 said: "Wao! God be praised! Congratulations for the new addition in your family Good's blessings rain on him!!!!"

officialstelladimokokorkus said: "Haaaaaa!!!! Old boy u don shoot another one? My guuuuuy"

freddynaz said: "Congratulations bro. May God bless the new arrival"

esthy77 said: "Congratulations to you and your lovely wife"

oyo_effiom said: "Congratulations boss, the baby is welcome to into the tribe of pace settlers."

A collage showing the couple on their wedding and the photos of the newborn. Photo source: Instagram/Prince

Source: UGC

READ ALSO: Fella Makafui spotted in new video driving with police escort in town

Also, a view to resolving the worsening socio-political situation in Mali, the former president was appointed as a special envoy for the West African nation.

The high-profile appointment was given to Jonathan on Tuesday, July 14, by the Economic Community of West African States.

As part of his duties, the former Nigerian leader is to convene a series of talks with now-ousted president Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, opposition bigwigs, civil society as well as religious bodies.

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Source: YEN.com.gh
by Biju Veticad

For decades, the two Orthodox communities have been fighting for ownership of churches and property. The Jacobites are excluded because they are followers of a "foreign" rite (the Antiochene one). The dispute over the Church properties involves 1700 sacred buildings. After clashes, demonstrations and hunger strikes, the Keralan government has now opened a negotiation table to resolve the situation. The Catholic Church has opened its churches to the Jacobites.

Kochi (AsiaNews) - For the first time in the history of Christian Churches, a government led by the Communist Party - in Kerala  is attempting to bring peace between two Eastern Churches: the Syriac Orthodox Church and the Jacobite Syriac Orthodox Church.

On 22 September, the Chief Minister of Kerala, Pinarayi Vijayan, called the respective heads of the Churches to open a discussion and resolve disputes that have lasted for decades.

The Syriac Orthodox Church and the Jacobite Church were one Orthodox Church until 1912, when they split; the first declaring autocephaly and following the Chaldean rite; the other remaining under the authority of the Patriarchate of Antioch and following the western Syriac rite.

For several years, after the division, there was collaboration and friendship between the two communities, which at the moment each gather around 500,000 faithful. But gradually a problem emerged related to the properties of the ecclesiastical buildings and other properties.

The Syriac Orthodox Church states that being linked to a "foreign" Patriarchate like that of Antioch, the Jacobites have no right to any property in India and for this reason many ancient churches, once used by the Jacobites, have been expropriated.

Because of this, in many places Jacobite Christians, priests and faithful, have tried to occupy churches, demonstrating in the streets and carrying out sit-ins. Some of them were arrested by the police for disturbing public order (photo 2). Later groups of the faithful resorted to hunger striking as a means of demonstration. The dispute between the Orthodox and the Jacobites over the Church properties involves 1700 sacred buildings.

Following many episodes of conflict, the Supreme Court has asked the government to take control of the churches and find an agreement. After the meeting on 22 September, the two sides decided to meet again on 5 October.

To meet the needs of the Jacobite communities, Card. Isaac Cleemis, Major Archbishop of the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church, has established that all Catholic churches be open to host the rites of the Jacobite communities.

The Syro-Malankara Catholic Church draws its origins from the "Christians of St. Thomas" who resisted the Latinization imposed by the Portuguese colonists in the 16th century, being part of the Orthodox Church. In 1930, a group of faithful and religious, led by Gee Varghese Mar Ivanios, reunited with the Catholic Church. The faithful of this Church number around half a million faithful.

On 21 September, the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church, which follows the Antiochian rite like the Jacobites, celebrated its 90th anniversary of its reunion with the universal Catholic Church.

Fr Abhilash, who works in the diocese of Mavelikkara, told AsiaNews: The Catholic churches of Kerala have already expressed their solidarity with the Jacobite faithful. They are brothers and sisters of the Syro-Malankara Church. They too have the right to preserve their faith in a secular country like India. The decision to open our churches to the Jacobites is a way to express unity and fraternity".
India has offered a Line of Credit worth USD 100 million to Sri Lanka for three solar projects in the country, according to an official statement.



India's High Commissioner to Sri Lanka Gopal Baglay called on Minister of Power Dullas Alahapperuma and reiterated India's commitment towards a strong and multi-faceted bilateral partnership including in the power sector, the Indian mission said in a statement.

AFP/ Representational Image

They discussed various issues of mutual interest including ways to expedite progress on bilateral power projects currently under discussion between the two sides.

India handed over a letter of offer To Sri Lanka

The Indian envoy also handed over a copy of a letter conveying an offer from India to Sri Lanka for a Line of Credit (LoC) worth USD 100 million for three solar projects announced during the International Solar Alliance Founding Conference held in March, 2018 in New Delhi, the statement said.

The LoC will cover financing for rooftop solar systems meant for 20,000 households and 1,000 government buildings all across the island. The combined generation capacity of these rooftop systems will be about 60 MW, it said.

AFP/Representational Image

The LoC will also provide financing for a floating solar power plant. The implementation of the LoC will begin with the conclusion of an LoC agreement between the two sides, it said.



The Indian High Commissioner conveyed that the USD 100 million LoC is in line with the national priorities of India and Sri Lanka to enhance the share of solar and renewable energy in overall energy generation, the statement added.
Askia Asmar has filled out request after request - roughly 15 in all - asking officials at Virginia's Deerfield Corrections Center for proper care for health problems including lung and liver cancer, diabetes and hepatitis C, according to a sworn statement.

Not only does Asmar say his treatment has been scattershot, but the 67-year-old prisoner, who is in a high-risk category for covid-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, claims in the statement provided to the ACLU that he was left in a unit where there was a coronavirus outbreak earlier this month.

Asmar soon tested positive for the coronavirus, adding yet another life-threatening condition to a laundry list of issues. He's been suffering from sweats, diahrrea and body aches.

"I can only pray," Asmar said. "That is all I have."

Asmar is part of a massive coronavirus outbreak at the southeastern Virginia facility that houses many of Virginia's geriatric prisoners. The Virginia Department of Corrections (VADOC) reports 723 have contracted covid-19 and 12 have died - a staggering toll that is higher than the count of cases in a number of states' prison systems.

The ACLU of Virginia highlighted the plight of Deerfield in a notice to the state this week, claiming the VADOC has violated for a second time a May settlement of a lawsuit by inmates in the state over conditions related to the coronavirus at prisons.

They claim the corrections department has failed to provide basic safeguards against the coronavirus like water to wash hands and social distancing at a number of facilities, and is continuing to move too slowly to release inmates to stem the spread of covid-19.

The ACLU is calling for an independent expert to oversee the prison system's response to the coronavirus because of what they see as repeated failings. The number of active coronavirus cases in Virginia's prison system has doubled since June. Since the start of the pandemic, there have been 3,600 cases. A total of 26 prisoners have died.

"The numbers themselves show Virginia's ability to manage the infection's spread right now is pretty dismal," said Eden Heilman, the legal director of the ACLU of Virginia.

Virginia corrections officials declined to discuss Asmar's case, but wrote in a news release this week they were moving aggressively to combat the coronavirus at Deerfield, which houses 925 inmates. Officials said they performed mass testing on inmates and staff, and distributed thousands of bars of soap and masks since mid-March among other measures.

"The department's pandemic response plan consists of more than 900 pages of documents addressing every situation we have faced during this pandemic," said VADOC Director Harold Clarke. "We responded to the outbreak at Deerfield with months of knowledge and best practices that we've developed since the beginning of the pandemic."

VADOC spokeswoman Lisa Kinney wrote in an email the department had "worked overtime" to try to release inmates eligible for early release, but the cases are complicated since officials have to weigh public safety concerns, investigate a prisoner's record and ensure inmates have an after-release plan. The VADOC has approved 1,094 prisoners for early release and 816 have been released.

But the ACLU says the corrections department should do much more.

The ACLU points to a Marshall Project analysis from July that found at the time Virginia had only released 2% of its nearly 28,600 prisoners, a lower percentage than any other state in the country.

The ACLU's first notice of noncompliance with the settlement in June also accused the VADOC of reviewing cases for early release too slowly and failing to accurately inform prisoners of their eligibility for early release. VADOC disputed those claims, but agreed to begin reviewing at least 60 petitions for early release each week.

The ACLU claims approval is still too slow, leaving medically vulnerable people who are eligible for early release lingering behind bars during a deadly pandemic.

Asmar wrote in his filing that he submitted a request for information about early release in June, but the Deerfield warden replied by telling him he had already been given the information in April. The ACLU says Asmar has not been given the information since his request.

The ACLU has also been critical of Virginia Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam, saying he should be aggressively using conditional pardons to release inmates during the health crisis. Heilman said Northam has declined to release any information about whether his office has approved any conditional pardons related to the coronavirus, citing executive privilege.

Northam's office did not respond to requests for comment, but in an April radio interview Secretary of Public Safety and Homeland Security Brian Moran was cool to the idea of conditional pardons.

"They don't have any place to go," Moran said of inmates after a conditional pardon. "So what are you going to do about that? That really kind of reinforces the position we have taken that we're not going to irresponsibly release people without a successful home plan, someplace to go."

Meanwhile, the ACLU says inmates like Asmar are being forced to contend with life-threatening conditions. Asmar said in his sworn statement it is difficult to remain socially distant in the dormitory-style, geriatric unit.

"I do my best to stay away from people," Asmar said.

Asmar said prison officials have failed to inform him about medical appointments at a local hospital and he was not given care despite complaining of severe pain in an area where he had surgery for his liver cancer, according to his statement.

Asmar, who said in his statement he is serving a six-year sentence for a nonviolent offense, is eligible to be released in December. Court records could not be located listing his specific crime or crimes.

In sworn statements, other inmates at Deerfield have complained their covid-19-like symptoms have been dismissed as allergies and inmates have to beg for hand sanitizer to be replaced.

A private attorney filed the lawsuit against the VADOC in April on behalf of 27 inmates and the ACLU later joined the suit. The suit accused VADOC of violating the Constitution by failing to protect inmates from the coronavirus and freeing the medically vulnerable.

Heilman said the VADOC is expected to respond to the notice of noncompliance with the settlement on Monday.
When Black physician Tina Carroll-Scott started working at South Miami Children's Clinic, she said none of her Black patients would consider getting a flu shot.

A complicated history with forced vaccinations and experiments had undercut trust of medical procedures and immunization within Black communities. For more than a decade, Carroll-Scott, the clinic's medical director, toiled to build a relationship with those in the diverse South Florida neighborhood, where the majority of residents are Hispanic and nearly 14 percent Black and African American, according to U.S. Census data.

"After being at the clinic for 13 years and educating patients about the flu vaccine and dispelling any myths they had about it," Carroll-Scott said, "I've now gotten my patients to a point where they talk to me, and they're willing to take it."

But now, as the Food and Drug Administration and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention repeatedly assure the public that the vaccine for the novel coronavirus will be safe, indications that the review process may be undercut by politics has turned off people in minority communities to getting the vaccine when it becomes available - worrying physicians that communities disproportionately devastated by the covid-19 pandemic are most at risk of being left out of immunization efforts.

To assuage fears within minority communities, a panel of Black doctors will vet the federal review of companies' vaccines, said Leon McDougle, president of the National Medical Association, the largest and oldest group of Black physicians in the country.

"We have concerns," McDougle told MSNBC Thursday about the vaccine's review process. "There's been a cloud of political influence dating back to hydroxychloroquine . . . following that, convalescent plasma," he said, referring to the various treatment options promoted by President Donald Trump and other government officials. "We want to be that nonpartisan, independent voice, speaking to the African American community and our physicians of the National Medical Association."

When asked what would happen if the panel does not approve a vaccine vetted by the FDA, McDougle said that Black doctors are trusted within their communities and if they don't believe in the safety and efficacy of the vaccine, "it's not going to move forward."

McDougle told NPR that he spoke to members of Operation Warp Speed, the project working on a vaccine for the virus, to make the trial data on it publicly available.

The FDA referred The Washington Post to its past statements about the review process when asked about the panel, including testimony by Commissioner Stephen Hahn on Wednesday that its investigations into coronavirus vaccine candidates would be thorough.

"I want to assure you and emphasize every one of the decisions we have reached has been made by career FDA scientists based on science and data, not politics," Hahn said. Hours later, Trump hinted in his news briefing that he may not sign off on stricter review guidelines recommended by the FDA, calling the change "a political move more than anything else."

The National Medical Association is not the only group vetting the oversight of vaccines, as New York will also conduct a review, Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced Thursday.

Additional checks by outside organizations can further the scientific process, according to Richard J. Baron, the president and CEO of the American Board of Internal Medicine, which is based in Philadelphia. Baron said any disagreements between the NMA and New York on the one side and the FDA and CDC on the other should raise concerns about the federal agencies.

"I would not lay the blame at the feet of the organizations that are trying to maintain a scientific approach," he said in an interview. "I would lay it down at the feet of the federal organizations that are chartered to oversee a scientific approach and don't seem to be demonstrating a public commitment to that."

Polls show Americans have increasingly expressed concern about a vaccine that is available within the year. Three-quarters of U.S. adults surveyed by Pew Research Center in September said it is at least somewhat likely that a coronavirus vaccine will be approved before it's fully known whether it is safe and effective.

The trust of a first-generation covid-19 vaccine is significantly less among Black Americans compared to White or Hispanic people: Less than 30% of Black people said they would be willing to take the vaccine, as opposed to 51% of White and 56% of Hispanic people, an Axios-Ipsos survey in August found. The gap waned when those surveyed were asked about getting a flu shot.

Suma Vupputuri, an epidemiologist and research scientist for Kaiser Permanente, who studied the rates of flu vaccination across races, said oversight over the safety of a vaccine may be a more effective way to recruit Black patients and garnering trust than a blind effort to disseminate a vaccine in Black communities that is not safe.

"You almost go the other direction if you're trying to push a vaccine that may not be safe at a Black community, and if something does go wrong, and there are ill effects, then all of a sudden, all those good intentions went exactly in the opposite direction," Vupputuri told The Washington Post.

More Black voices are needed in science, argued Kevin M. Ileka in the Harvard Business Review, citing a recent racist suggestion by two French scientists that trials to determine the effectiveness of a tuberculosis vaccine against the coronavirus should take place in Africa.

Ileka, an analytical chemist at pharmaceutical company Bristol Myers Squibb, compared the proposal's apathy to Black lives to the infamous Tuskegee Syphilis Study, where doctors beginning in the 1930s left hundreds of Black men untreated with syphilis for four decades to evaluate how the disease ravaged their body even after penicillin was developed.

In South Miami, Carroll-Scott informally surveyed her own patients about their likelihood of getting a coronavirus vaccine and found "a lot of the patients were concerned about the speed."

"Overwhelmingly the answer was no. I would say that that was the consensus. I don't think I had one patient who said that they would be willing to take this vaccine," she said.

Trump's rhetoric calling for the speedy arrival of a vaccine has concerned patients, Carroll-Scott said, as some worry that Trump's priority is "reelection rather than a safe and effective vaccine."

"I think just the name, 'Operation Warp Speed,' invokes a lot of fear and suspicion," Carroll-Scott said of the name given to the White House's efforts to scale up vaccination. "The education is paramount, and, unfortunately, this whole conversation with the vaccine and the pandemic, there's a sense of urgency, and I feel like we are behind the 8-Ball in terms of educating the community."

Carroll-Scott said she welcomes the news of the NMA panel because the oversight may help to assure those most at risk of the virus's life-threatening symptoms.

"We are the trusted messengers in these communities," she said of Black doctors. "And so if we're questioning things and not fully confident in this process, there's no way that we're going to be able to get our patients on board."
In the early hours of Sunday, Oct. 24, 1943, 22-year-old Patricia Burton Lonergan from a wealthy New York German-Jewish American family was murdered at her residence on East 51st Street in the upscale Manhattan neighbourhood of Turtle Bay-Beekman Place, where she lived with her infant son. Her estranged husband, Wayne Lonergan, a 26-year-old Canadian from Toronto who had enlisted in the Royal Canadian Air Force but had been visiting New York City on the weekend in question, was charged with the crime.

As a young man, Lonergan grew up during the twenties and thirties with his middle-class family in a home near Bathurst and Bloor. He attended Catholic as well as public schools, dropping out when he turned 16. As a teenager, he had several run-ins with police, was arrested for petty crimes, and spent time at the Langstaff Jail Farm in Richmond Hill. He attended a business college and worked at a variety of jobs, including as a lifeguard at the Simcoe Beach Park in the citys east end.

There were stories, which were later included in a January 1944 Toronto Police Department report, that Lonergan bragged to his friends that he made easy money through male perverts [homosexuals]. Lonergans sexual orientation became a key focus in the investigation of Patricia Burton Lonergans murder and to understanding the many complexities of Lonergan himself. During Lonergans trial, the subject also attracted a great deal of newspaper coverage, much of it salacious. Though Wayne frequently  but not always  publicly denied that he was bisexual or gay, the evidence strongly suggests otherwise.

In 1939, Lonergan landed a job as a dispatcher for Greyhound Bus Lines based at the companys headquarters at the New York Worlds Fair  one of the largest and most exciting events then being held. In New York, he soon met the wealthy William O. Burton and his daughter, Patricia.

Lonergan was ultimately convicted of murder in the second degree in a sensational trial that for a time pushed the Second World War off the front pages of New Yorks newspapers. He spent 22 years in state prisons. Upon his release, he was deported to Canada and mainly resided in Toronto until his death in 1986.

Details are Unprintable: Wayne Lonergan and the Sensational Cafe Society Murder traces the story of Patricia and Waynes turbulent lives  a story set against New York Citys cafe society nightclub culture that examines the eras intolerant and fear-mongering attitudes about homosexuality, which contributed to the harsh portrayal of Lonergan in the press. In this adapted excerpt, Lonergans first encounter with the Toronto and New York police and district attorneys office is chronicled.

The perception that Wayne Lonergan was involved in his wifes death was quickly reinforced. The detectives in New York had found Patricias address book in her bedroom where her body had been discovered, and in it was information on where Lonergan was staying in Toronto, along with his phone number.

Before the sun came up on the morning of Monday, Oct. 25, 1943, Insp. Patrick Kenny, having apprised Manhattan Assistant District Attorney (ADA) Jacob Grumet in charge of the homicide branch  who had been out of the city until about 10 oclock on Sunday evening  of the details of the case, wired the police in Toronto with a request that Lonergan be detained. The telegram from the NYPD indicated that he could be located at the Belvidere Manor at 342 Bloor St. W., in the room rented by Sidney Capel Dixon, a program director at the CBC and a Lonergan family friend.

Shortly after 8 oclock in the morning there was a loud thump on the door of the boarding house on Bloor Street West in Toronto, where Lonergan was staying. The proprietor, Mrs. Miller, who immediately responded to the noise, ushered in two officers of the Toronto Police Department, Det. Sgt. Arthur Harris and Det. Alex Deans.

They inquired whether Wayne Lonergan was staying in the room rented by Sidney Capel Dixon. Miller hesitated for a moment and then told them that Lonergan had arrived late the preceding evening. She escorted them to Dixons room and they knocked. Seconds later, Lonergan opened the door. He was dressed in a dark blue suit.

Harris asked him if his name was Wayne Lonergan and he said it was. Harris then formally identified himself and told Lonergan that they were making inquiries about a homicide that had occurred in New York City. Lonergan said that he had just returned from there last night. Harris confirmed that Lonergan was in the RCAF and asked him why he was not dressed in his uniform. Lonergan explained that it had been stolen while he had been visiting New York.

The detective then showed Lonergan the telegram they had received from the NYPD and verified that he was the person the telegram referred to. He nodded that he was. Harris asked him if he had anything to say about it; Lonergan said he did not. Harris noticed the scratches on Lonergans chin and neck and asked him if he had been in a fight recently. Lonergan offered a vague explanation that he had received the scratches after he had returned to Toronto last night.

Harris explained that he had an extradition warrant issued by the State of New York and said Lonergan was required to come with them to police headquarters on College Street for questioning about a New York murder investigation. Lonergan was not surprised by this order; he had already seen a brief story on page two of that mornings Toronto Globe and Mail, Guest Finds Hostess Murdered, with the news that the nude body of Mrs. Patricia Burton Lonergan, the 22-year-old wife of member of the R.C.A.F., was found tonight in an East 51st Street triplex apartment.

The detectives first drove Lonergan to the nearby office for the RCAF #23 PAED [Pre-Aircrew Education Detachment] at the University of Toronto. Harris informed the commanding officer about the homicide, Lonergans connection to the victim, and that Lonergan was to be detained for questioning. The CO had no objection, though asked that Harris keep him informed of any developments. Harris promised that he would.

In later reports, it was alleged that the Toronto police had failed to communicate with the RCAF about Lonergan. Yet, according to Harriss memorandum of Oct. 25, 1943, this was not the case.

Back in the car, Harris asked Lonergan  who was curiously permitted to bring with him a paper bag containing three small bottles of brandy that he had purchased in New York  once more about what had happened to his uniform. This time, Lonergan offered a version of his encounter in New York City with a U.S. soldier named Maurice Worcester, but without any mention  for the moment, at least  of sexual intimacy that allegedly took place between them late on Saturday night, Oct. 23.

It was, Lonergan said, simply a robbery in which his uniform and watch had been taken and he had been attacked. To Harris this immediately sounded suspicious. The New York police and DAs office had the same reaction after Harris notified them about it. We want that uniform, Jacob Grumet was quoted as saying in the next days newspapers. It might tell an interesting story.

Lonergan, as cool and carefree as could be, asked to stop for breakfast before going to the station, and Harris consented. No doubt Harris believed that if Lonergan was relaxed and fed, he would be more co-operative and tell the police what they wanted to know.

Harris and every other Toronto detective, constable and physician who interacted with Lonergan during the next 24 hours found him obliging, though it was also true that the police in Toronto did not officially interrogate him, opting to wait until deputy ADA John Loehr had arrived to take charge.

For most of the day, Lonergan was left alone in a room where he slept off and on. He had been provided with a pack of cigarettes and smoked those. The bag with the brandy bottles was not allowed in the room and was stored away for him.

Earlier that afternoon, Grumet had instructed Deputy ADA John Loehr to take the 3:45 p.m. Trans-Canada flight from LaGuardia to Toronto. His plane was scheduled to arrive at 6 p.m. but was delayed for several hours. Meanwhile, NYPD detectives William Prendergast and Nicholas Looram had boarded New York Central Railways Empire Express passenger train for the 12-hour trip north to Ontario.

It was close to 10 p.m. before Loehr finally made it to Toronto police headquarters. Prendergast and Looram did not arrive until 8 a.m. the next morning, Oct. 26, and they did not see Lonergan until later that day.

There were questions raised about the Toronto polices treatment of Lonergan and the alleged violation of his legal rights.

Michael Doyle, a Toronto lawyer and a childhood friend of Lonergan, testified many years later that he had been asked by Lonergans uncle, Joseph Lonergan, to represent Wayne. Doyle stated that he had telephoned Police Chief John Chisholm and informed him of this. Yet when Doyle showed up at the station, the constables at the desk claimed they did not know who he was and inexplicably had no information about Lonergan.

Doyle contacted Chisholm again, who apologized and told the lawyer to come back the next day. When he returned on Tuesday, Oct. 26, the chief advised him that he could not see Lonergan because the New York police were officially in charge of the case and of Lonergan.

Twenty years later, Doyle argued that if he had been allowed to speak with Lonergan, he might have prevented him from signing an extradition waiver permitting the New York authorities to bring him back to Manhattan.

Another Toronto lawyer, Lionel Davis, wrote a scathing letter about Lonergans treatment to the Globe and Mail, which was referenced in the New York Times on Oct. 26. Davis was equally outraged by how Lonergans rights had been ostensibly trampled. He said the procedure followed by the Toronto police was most astonishing.

It was alleged that Lonergan was questioned nearly nonstop for two days  which was not quite accurate  by Toronto and New York detectives, yet was never brought before a magistrate. As Davis asserted, the police are not allowed to hold someone for the inquisitorial process euphemistically called questioning. It seems to me the procedure adopted by the police with the acquiescence of the local Crown officials required the attention of the Attorney General.

Frederick Malone, an assistant Ontario Crown attorney, refuted Daviss criticisms and stated that owing to the extradition warrant, Toronto police could have detained Lonergan indefinitely. Davis disagreed with that assertion as well.

How can anyone pretend that (Lonergans treatment) is a legal or proper procedure in Canada, or that it was otherwise than disgraceful? he asked. The Globe and Mail s editors, too, found the actions of the citys police in this matter troubling, arguing that there is no basis in law or justice, when a man is involved in a violation of the Criminal Code, for his being subjected to all sorts of examination before appearing in court.

John Loehr did not address the legalities of the Toronto polices conduct or the extradition warrant, yet he later denied that Lonergan had asked to consult with a lawyer. By 10 p.m. on Monday night, Lonergan was tired and hungry, though he had been given sandwiches and had water to drink. Chain-smoking cigarettes, he was fairly calm as Loehr began interrogating him. In the room, too, was Det. Harris.

I suppose you want to know why youre being held, said Loehr as he sat down at a table opposite Lonergan. Is there anything you want to tell us?

I cannot think of anything to say, stated Lonergan, who decades later described Loehr as a pretty convincing guy (with a) real honest face.

Do you want to answer my questions? Loehr asked.

I dont know, replied Lonergan.

Are you willing to tell me the truth about this murder of your wife Patricia?

Yes, but I dont know whether I should or not. I have been sitting around all day.

Loehr asked Lonergan if he had been treated fairly by the Toronto police, and he said he had been. Lonergan wanted to know if Loehr planned to charge him with Patricias murder.

Is that the idea? he asked.

That is about it, said Loehr. You are going to have a chance to make a clean breast of it.

For a few more minutes, the two men went back and forth as Lonergan contemplated whether or not it would be smart for him to co-operate.

He feared that he might say something stupid. Loehr assured him, as any prosecutor would have, that he did not believe he was a stupid young man, and was certain Lonergan would be able to avoid stupid answers. He did, however, warn Lonergan that anything he did tell him could be used against him in a future legal proceeding. Lonergan said he understood this and would answer his questions.

Excerpted from Details are Unprintable: Wayne Lonergan and the Sensational Cafe Society Murder. Allan Levine,  2020. Reprinted courtesy of Lyons Press.
Warren County on Saturday continued its tradition of honoring residents who have served their country during wartime.

The coronavirus pandemic twice forced the postponement of the 17th Veterans Recognition Ceremony, held at the Warren County War Memorial dedicated in 1998 beside the courthouse at Second and Mansfield streets in Belvidere.

But with participants asked to wear face coverings and chairs spaced apart, the outdoor ceremony was finally held.

Freeholder Director Richard Gardner, in the final months of his sixth term and not seeking re-election, remarked about the importance of honoring the past amid crazy times, where everyone has to have a face mask while out in public and amid social strife.

We owe so much to the military, Gardner said. "We have the greatest country on the face of this Earth. And some of the pure craziness that seems to be pervasive in our country, some extent of that, just boggles the mind, and its not a Republican or a Democrat issue. To me its a common sense issue, and I think some of these protesters may not even be old enough to understand what theyre protesting about.

"You know what this country offers. Why do you want to tear down its history? It doesnt make sense to me.

We have an obligation to protect that history and move forward and make it a more perfect future, understand the critical plights of people in our country and try to make things better, but you dont tear down the past.

Freeholder Deputy Director James Kern III and Freeholder Jason Sarnoski also spoke, as did Assemblyman John DiMaio, a Republican representing local residents in New Jerseys 23rd Legislative District.

Right now we have a voluntary military, and for those serving to take that oath and to take that risk I think really speaks to the volume of the character of these individuals, Kern said. I thank you for taking that oath for protecting whats the greatest country on Earth and this is a small gesture that Warren County can do every year and we will continue to do as long as theres veterans that earned this award.

Dennis L. Smith, president of the Warren County War Memorial Corp., served as master of ceremonies. He dedicated Saturdays event to Leo Becker, a trustee on the war memorial board and chairman at the time the war memorial was founded.

It was his idea, Smith said of the 94-year-old U.S. Navy veteran of World War II, who missed the countys annual war era recognition ceremony on Saturday for the first time.

Gardner, toward the end of the ceremony, was presented with a plaque honoring his years of service to the county and to the veterans recognition effort. Two candidates are on the ballot Nov. 3 running to succeed him on the board, Republican Lori Ciesla and Democrat Theresa Bender Chapman.

Saturdays ceremony recognized 21 veterans -- 11 posthumously.

All received the Warren County Distinguished Military Service Medal, a replica lapel pin and certificate of recognition.

About 50 people were in attendance, as Saturdays ceremony brought to 2,218 the number of war era veterans recognized since the program began in 2003. The first veteran the county honored back then was 108-year-old Julius Hausold, then Warren Countys last-surviving World War I veteran.

The veterans honored Saturday come throughout Warren County, and four live out of state.

Recognized, with their branch of the military and war era in which they served, were:

Elizabeth J. Ancey, Army, World War II

Walter Ancey, Army, World War II

James Ancypowic, Army, World War II

Paul L. Avery, Army, Vietnam War

Robert C. Brennan, Navy, Vietnam War

John D. Bronico, Coast Guard, Vietnam War

Donald J. Butler, Air Force, Korean War

Don DeBacco, Army, World War II

Gregory K. Goble, Marines, Vietnam War

Robert D. Grosinski, Army, Vietnam War

Lewis Kenneth Hann, Army, World War II

Albert W. Kieselmann, Air Force, Vietnam War

Curtis Landsberger, Army, Operation Iraqi Freedom

Allan G. Melillo, Army, Vietnam War

Gilbert S. Mitchell, Army, World War I

Edward Howard Richline, Navy, World War II

Herbert William Saunders, Navy, World War II

Paul N. Tremper, Air Force, Vietnam War

Orlando Vega, Army, Vietnam War

Carl F. Woronowicz, Navy, Vietnam War

Carl L. Woronowicz, Marines, World War II

Thank you for relying on us to provide the journalism you can trust. Please consider supporting lehighvalleylive.com with a subscription.

Kurt Bresswein may be reached at kbresswein@lehighvalleylive.com.
India has dismissed Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khans reference to Kashmir and criticism of the Indian government in his address to the UN General Assembly, saying the neighbouring countrys unrelenting support to terrorism poses a threat to global security.

In his pre-recorded video statement to the UN General Assembly on Friday, Khan made repeated references to India and the Kashmir issue and called on the world community to prosecute Indian personnel allegedly involved in state terrorism and crimes against humanity in Jammu and Kashmir.

The Indian delegate present in the General Assembly, Mijito Vinito, first secretary at the Indian mission to the UN, had walked out as Khans video statement was being played on a large overhead screen.

India subsequently exercised its right of reply to respond to Khans speech, and the response was delivered by Vinito, who said: Let me assert here loud and clear: The union territory of Jammu and Kashmir is an integral and inalienable part of India. The rules and legislations brought in the union territory of Jammu and Kashmir are strictly internal affairs of India.

Also Read: PM Modi to address UNGA today, expected to urge global action against terrorism

The only dispute left in Kashmir relates to that part of Kashmir that is still under illegal occupation of Pakistan. We call upon Pakistan to vacate all those areas that it is in illegal occupation of.

Vinito, a diplomat from the 2010 batch of the Indian Foreign Service who hails from Nagaland, also referred to Pakistans track record in failing to effectively counter terrorism.

What should rather be on the agenda of the UN is Pakistans deep state and its unrelenting political and financial support to terrorist organisations and mercenaries, which are a threat to global peace and security, he said.

The only way for Pakistan to become a normal country is to abjure its moral, financial and material support to terrorism, turn its attention to the problems faced by its own population, including its minorities, and stop misusing UN platforms to further its nefarious agenda.

Khans address, Vinito said, marked a new low on the 75th anniversary of the UN. The leader of Pakistan today called for those who incite hate and violence to be outlawed. But, as he went on, we were left wondering, was he referring to himself? he added.

The General Assembly had heard the incessant rant of someone who had nothing to show for himself, who had no achievements to speak of, and no reasonable suggestion to offer to the world, and instead Khan offered lies, misinformation, war mongering and malice, the Indian delegate said.

Also Read: Indian diplomat walks out after Imran Khan raises Kashmir issue at UN

For a nation that is deeply buried in medievalism, it is understandable that the tenets of a modern civilised society such as peace, dialogue and diplomacy are farfetched, Vinito said.

The Indian response pointed out that Pakistan had brought genocide to South Asia 39 years back when it killed its own people, and the country is shameless enough not to offer a sincere apology for the horrors it perpetrated even after so many years.

Vinito added, This is the same country that provides pensions for dreaded and listed terrorists out of state funds. This is the same country that has the dubious distinction of hosting the largest number of terrorists proscribed by the UN.

He noted that Khan had once referred to slain al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden as a martyr in Pakistans Parliament, and admitted in the US in 2019 that Pakistan still has 30,000 to 40,000 trained terrorists who have fought in Afghanistan and Jammu and Kashmir.

This is the country that has systematically cleansed its minorities including Hindus, Christians, Sikhs and others, through the abuse of its blasphemy laws and through forced religious conversions. For someone who professes to be a champion of Islam, this is also a country that has encouraged killing of fellow Muslims merely because they belonged to a different sect, or to a different region in Pakistan, and through sponsoring terrorist attacks against its neighbours, Vinito said.

The only crowning glory that this country has to show to the world for the last 70 years is terrorism, ethnic cleansing, majoritarian fundamentalism, and clandestine nuclear trade, he added.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is set to address the UN General Assembly through a video statement on Saturday.
Ireland could be on course for a city lockdown if the spike in Covid-19 is not brought under control.

Taoiseach Micheal Martin issued the warning amid ongoing concern about the spread of the virus in Cork, Limerick, Waterford and Galway.

Mr Martin said the Government will now consider city-wide lockdowns which spare rural areas if recommended by the National Public Health Emergency Team (Nphet).

"The numbers are particularly growing in the cities and urbanised parts of those counties," he said.

"That will ultimately be a matter for Nphet as it advises Government. But our objective is to say to people living in these locations - we can avoid having to go to Level 3. We can keep the numbers down," he added,

Virus-hit county Donegal began its first weekend of restrictions as the chief medical officers in the Republic and the North appealed to people not to make unnecessary journeys across the Border.

It emerged yesterday that patients and staff on a ward at Regional Hospital Mullingar had to be tested for the virus. The hospital shut down a ward to new admissions.

Acting chief medical officer Dr Ronan Glynn said while there is every chance that other areas will face Level 3 restrictions, "there is nothing inevitable about it".

"I am asking people everywhere, but particularly in Donegal and Dublin, to pay special attention to the public health advice.

"I ask every individual to take personal responsibility to prioritise who you need to see, limit the size of your social network, and reduce your social contacts over the coming days and weeks.

"Because while there is every chance that other areas will have to move to Level 3, there is nothing inevitable about it.

"We have seen previously how people working together can turn the tide on this virus and bring increasing trajectories back under control.

"Know how valuable your individual actions are.

"Your choices and your actions are part of how we will succeed."

Deadline

There was a reported rush for communion and baptism ceremonies in parts of Donegal yesterday to beat the lockdown deadline.

Another 326 cases of Covid-19 were confirmed yesterday with no new deaths from the virus.

There were 152 cases in Dublin, 32 in Cork, 22 in Donegal, 21 in Galway, 15 in Meath, 11 in Kildare, nine in Kerry, eight in Louth, eight in Westmeath, six in Limerick, six in Mayo, six in Tipperary and five in Wexford, with the remaining 25 cases in eight counties.

The chief medical officers in the Republic and the North issued a joint appeal to people to avoid unnecessary travel across the Border because of the Covid-19 spread.

Dr Glynn and his Northern Irish counterpart, Dr Michael McBride, appealed in a joint statement to people to try to curb the virus spread.

They said: "Given the current number of new cases in Donegal and neighbouring areas of Northern Ireland in Derry, Strabane and Fermanagh, we would appeal to everyone to avoid all but necessary travel across the Border.

"It is also recommended that employers on both sides of the Border make every effort to facilitate employees to work from home in so far as is possible.

"We realise that for those living in Border areas this will not be welcome news but we must prevent further spread of this virus and we can only do so by working together to protect each other."

The two men met yesterday morning and discussed the growing prevalence of the virus in both jurisdictions and underlined the need for ongoing co-operation between North and the Republic and respective public health teams under the existing Memorandum of Understanding.

Trend

They said that close collaboration between the relevant authorities will continue and be strengthened in the coming days to address the concerning trend in case numbers on both sides of the Border.

This did not apply only in Donegal and Derry, but also in other areas along the Border where the profile of the disease "continues to evolve".

They jointly appealed to the public across the island to continue to follow public health advice to keep themselves and others safe.

A significant proportion of cases in young people have emerged in both Donegal and Derry. They asked teenagers and those in their twenties and thirties in particular to reduce their social contacts.
Nepals yarn industry has recently witnessed a surge in demands that has increased the business operations for the local handloom producers up to 60 percent, news agency ANIs report confirmed. Producers have attributed the business bloom to the increasing orders coming from India after the phased reopening and resumption of economic activities post coronavirus lockdown.

The Government of India, under the India-Nepal Foreign Treaty of Trade Agreement imports woven handicrafts and home textile products essential to Nepals Textile And Garment Cloth Industries. Nepals GDP and livelihood of the small scale textile weaving businesses largely depend on these handicrafts exports.

"We are now exporting the yarns to India. My company, in particular, is running at 70 percent of the capacity, other companies also are following the same steps," ANI quoted a Nepali proprietor Bishnu Neupane of Jagdamba Spinning as saying. "We are receiving high demands and orders from India," he stressed.

Indian states of Punjab and Assam, and Siliguri, Guhawati, Gorakhpur, and New Delhi have been among the largest importers of Nepals yarn industry products for over several years. These states place bulk orders that comprise nearly 60 percent of Nepals total yarn manufactured goods export.

Read: Nepal Landslide: Police And Security Forces Start Search Operation, 11 Killed

Read: Nepal Urges SAARC Nations To Convene 19th Summit Soon; To Collectively Fight Coronavirus Pandemic

"We had to halt production due to the lockdown in India and Nepal, but now we are back to business employing 17 hundred workers with food and accommodation provided by the company," a proprietor of Reliance Spinning, Shashikanta Agrawal, was quoted by ANI. "As we are receiving the orders, our business is slowly getting back on track, he added.

Turkey had suspended GSP benefit

After India, Turkey is the second-largest importer of yarn from Nepal. Turkey, however, suspended the generalized system of preferences (GSP) benefit on Nepal's yarn handicraft products in 2018 in the wake of allegations that Nepal was using the Chinese yarn material to manufacture the exported goods.

Later, representatives from Turkey's Yarn Producers Association ended the import barriers after Nepal provided information on the production units, the production capacity of the spinning mills, employment, and taxes to the directorate general of customs enforcement in Turkey, according to Nepals state-run media sources.

India, meanwhile, imported Nepali yarns worth close to one billion Nepali rupees pushing some of the key players like Reliance Spinning, Triveni Spinning, and Jagdamba Spinning to operate over 60 percent capacity.

Read: Nepal Citizens Protest At China's Kathmandu Embassy After Spotting Land-grab Backstabbing

Read: Nepal PM Oli Pushes India-proposed Convention On International Terrorism (CCIT) At UNGA
Cal Fire air tankers help stop the spread of a brush fire in Larkfield Calif, Thursday, Sept. 24, 2020. (Kent Porter/The Press Democrat via AP)

Firefighters and officials at California's largest utility company braced for hot, dry and windy weather in northern and central areas of the state this weekend that may fan the flames of several major wildfires or ignite new ones.

Pacific Gas & Electric warned Friday it may cut power from Sunday morning to Monday, potentially affecting 97,000 customers in 16 counties, during which forecasters said a ridge of high pressure will raise temperatures and generate gusts flowing from the interior to the coast.

PG&E initially warned that approximately 21,000 customers in three counties would lose power beginning Saturday evening but expanded the potential shutoff when the forecast changed.

The utility is tracking the weather to determine if it would be necessary to shut off power to areas where gusts could damage the company's equipment or hurl debris into lines that can ignite flammable vegetation.

When heavy winds were predicted earlier this month, PG&E cut power to about 167,000 homes and businesses in central and Northern California in a more targeted approach after being criticized last year for acting too broadly when it blacked out 2 million customers to prevent fires.

PG&E equipment has sparked past large wildfires, including the 2018 fire that destroyed much of the Sierra foothills town of Paradise and killed 85 people.

Cal Fire's Boggs helitack crew from Cobb Mountain, Calif., assist in putting out a 12 acre brush fire in Larkfield Calif., Thursday, Sept. 24, 2020 (Kent Porter/The Press Democrat via AP)

Firefighters battling the state's largest wildfire braced for the change in weather by constructing fuel breaks on Friday to keep the flames from reaching a marijuana-growing enclave where authorities said many of the locals have refused to evacuate and abandon their maturing crops.

The wildfire called the August Complex is nearing the small communities of Post Mountain and Trinity Pines, about 200 miles (322 kilometers) northwest of Sacramento, the Los Angeles Times reported.

Law enforcement officers went door to door warning of the encroaching fire danger but could not force residents to evacuate, Trinity County Sheriff's Department Deputy Nate Trujillo said.

"It's mainly growers," Trujillo said. "And a lot of them, they don't want to leave because that is their livelihood."

As many as 1,000 people remained in Post Mountain and Trinity Pines, authorities and local residents estimated Thursday.

Numerous studies in recent years have linked bigger U.S. wildfires to global warming from the burning of coal, oil and gas, especially because climate change has made California much drier. A drier California means plants are more flammable.

Cal Fire's Boggs helitack assist in putting out a 12 acre brush fire in Larkfield Calif., Thursday, Sept. 24, 2020. (Kent Porter/The Press Democrat via AP)

The U.S. Forest Service's Pacific Southwest Region announced Friday that it is extending the closure of all nine national forests in California due to concerns including fire conditions and critical limitations on firefighting resources.

The threatened marijuana growing area is in the Emerald Triangle, a three-county corner of Northern California that by some estimates is the nation's largest cannabis-producing region.

People familiar with Trinity Pines said the community has up to 40 legal farms, with more than 10 times that number in hidden, illegal growing areas.

Growers are wary of leaving the plants vulnerable to flames or thieves. Each farm has crops worth half a million dollars or more and many are within days or weeks of harvest.

One estimate put the value of the area's legal marijuana crop at about $20 million.

"There (are) millions of dollars, millions and millions of dollars of marijuana out there," Trujillo said. "Some of those plants are 16 feet (5 meters) tall, and they are all in the budding stages of growth right now."

In this Sept. 11, 2020, file photo, firefighters light a controlled burn along Nacimiento-Fergusson Road to help contain the Dolan Fire near Big Sur, Calif. Rain showers fell Thursday, Sept. 24, 2020, on the northwestern edges of fire-ravaged California but forecasters warned residents to not be fooled: a new round of hot, dry and windy weather is expected by the weekend. (AP Photo/Nic Coury, File)

Gunfire in the region is common. A recent night brought what locals dubbed the "roll call" of cannabis cultivators shooting rounds from pistols and automatic weapons as warnings to outsiders, said Post Mountain volunteer Fire Chief Astrid Dobo, who also manages legal cannabis farms.

Hundreds of migrant workers typically pour into the area this time of year to help trim and harvest the plants, but it's uncertain whether that population dwindled due to the coronavirus pandemic, said Julia Rubinic, a member of the Trinity County Agriculture Alliance, which represents licensed cannabis growers.

Mike McMillan, spokesman for the federal incident command team managing the northern section of the August Complex, said fire officials plan to deliver a clear message that "we are not going to die to save people. That is not our job."

"We are going to knock door to door and tell them once again," McMillan said. "However, if they choose to stay and if the fire situation becomes, as we say, very dynamic and very dangerous  we are not going to risk our lives."

A firefighter was killed and another was injured on Aug. 31 while working on the fire. Diana Jones, a volunteer firefighter from Texas, was among 26 people who have died since more than two dozen major wildfires broke out across the state last month.

A memorial service was held Friday for a veteran firefighter, Charles Morton, 39, a squad boss with the Big Bear Interagency Hotshot Crew who died Sept. 17 while battling the El Dorado Fire in the San Bernardino National Forest east of Los Angeles.

In this Sept. 17, 2020, file photo, an air tanker prepares to drop retardant while battling the August Complex Fire in the Mendocino National Forest, Calif. Rain showers fell Thursday, Sept. 24, 2020, on the northwestern edges of fire-ravaged California but forecasters warned residents to not be fooled: a new round of hot, dry and windy weather is expected by the weekend. (AP Photo/Noah Berger, File)

"I know that Charlie was a very skilled, in fact extraordinary, firefighter and a fire leader," U.S. Forest Service Chief Vicki Christiansen told the gathering at The Rock Church in San Bernardino.

"He committed himself, often for weeks and months on end, to protecting lives, communities and natural resources all around this country in service to fellow Americans."

The Butte County Sheriff's Office on Friday released the identity of another of the 15 people killed in a rampaging forest fire earlier this month. The remains of Linda Longenbach, 71, of Berry Creek, were found on Sept. 10 in a roadway about 10 feet from an ATV, close to the body of a man previously identified as Paul Winer, 68.

A relative told investigators the victims were aware of the fire and chose not to evacuate.

Explore further California fires bring more chopper rescues, power shutoffs

 2020 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
They were the pictures which ratcheted up an already febrile atmosphere on the Tory backbenches  Boris Johnsons girlfriend Carrie Symonds enjoying a holiday in Italy without the Prime Minister.

We thought  uh-oh, trouble at tmill, said one Tory MP. Hes got enough to worry about without a break-up as well.

Rumours of a split are dismissed by the couples friends, who blame Boriss growing legion of political enemies for spreading the claims to destabilise him. It comes at a time when Tory MPs  and even his own Chancellor  are in revolt over the economic devastation caused by Covid laws, as mutterings grow louder about the state of the Prime Ministers mental, physical and financial health.

For Gods sake, she is surely allowed to go on holiday? says one. And he is quite busy, you know. Imagine what they would have said if he had taken the time off to be with her.

The pictures of 32-year-old Ms Symonds relaxing at the 600-a-night Grand Hotel Tremezzo on Lake Como carried uncomfortable echoes for some MPs of Princess Diana posing in front of the Taj Mahal in 1992, sending a signal to the world about her doomed marriage to Prince Charles.

Boris Johnsons girlfriend Carrie Symonds was pictured enjoying a holiday in Italy without the Prime Minister

But while Diana engineered the situation to her own advantage, insiders say that Ms Symonds  who was pictured with their four-month-old son, Wilfred, strapped to her front  was just enjoying a private break with friends after a gruelling few months.

Even Boriss closest allies do not, however, dispute that the Prime Minister is caught in a vortex of professional and personal problems which are without precedent in recent political history.

So far this year, he has endured a ruinously expensive divorce, a brush with death and then fatherhood at the age of 56  all while battling the lingering after effects of coronavirus, trying to limit the damage inflicted by the pandemic and preparing for a possible No Deal Brexit at the end of December.

No 10 was furious over a briefing last weekend which described Mr Johnson as having misery etched on his face because he was weighed down by the financial burden of supporting six children and missing his ex-wife, Marina Wheeler.

A former adviser to Mr Johnson, who has remained close to Ms Wheeler, is being blamed for the brutal and personal attack, with one source claiming they had already confessed and apologised.

While the claim that the Prime Minister was struggling to get by on his 150,000 salary was greeted with scepticism, there is no doubt that he has paid an emotional price for his divorce, with his four children with Ms Wheeler struggling to varying degrees to accept his relationship with Ms Symonds.

Tory MPs are in revolt over the economic devastation caused by Covid laws, as mutterings grow louder about the state of the Prime Ministers mental, physical and financial health

One source said: It must be painful for Boris to have finally made it to No 10 without his children being around. The contrast with Tony Blair, who was always posing with his kids on the steps of No 10, is stark. It is deeply unfair, because he has worked so hard to provide for them.

Shortly after Mr Johnson became Conservative leader last year, he caused mystification in the Commons after he was seen sprinting from the Despatch Box at 12.45pm and running straight out of Parliament. It later emerged that he was frantic because he was late for lunch with his daughter.

The private angst comes as he faces the extraordinarily complex challenges of the Covid pandemic, with tribes of rebellious Tory MPs managing to make the Governments 80-strong majority look uncomfortably slim.

Sir Graham Brady, chairman of the backbench 1922 Committee, has led the opposition to Ministers ruling by decree over Covid regulations, while Chancellor Rishi Sunak is making increasingly muscular objections from within the Cabinet to the restrictions.

In the run-up to his decision last week to impose a 10pm curfew on pubs and restaurants, Mr Johnson was forced to mediate between Mr Sunak, who fears the restrictions are causing irreparable damage to the economy, and the pro-lockdown lobby led by Health Secretary Matt Hancock and Cabinet Office Minister Michael Gove.

At a Covid quad meeting on Friday, September 18  Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab is the other member  Mr Sunak effectively blocked Mr Johnson when he proposed a two-week circuit-breaking lockdown.

While No 10 and No 11 both deny the Chancellor implied that the issue was a resignation matter, his opposition was sufficient to force, at a subsequent meeting last Sunday, the idea of a 10pm curfew as a compromise measure. When the issue was put to the full Cabinet on Tuesday, resistance flared again when Business Secretary Alok Sharma and Environment Secretary George Eustice suggested that it would be safer to taper the curfew with last orders at 10pm, rather than force everyone on to the streets at the same time.

Aline Nassif, a former colleague from Ms Symonds time working as a media adviser to John Whittingdale when he was Culture Secretary, joined Ms Symonds in Italy

But Mr Gove insisted that there should be a strict 10pm guillotine.

Complicating Mr Johnsons decisions are the different tribes of increasingly fearless Tory backbenchers, who  despite being unable to bitch and plot in now-shuttered Commons bars  are using private messaging sites to share their frustrations.

One tribe, which calls itself the Common Sense group, has held meetings with Chief Whip Mark Spencer to express anger at the control freakery exerted over the Prime Minister by scientific advisers such as Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty.

The 50-strong membership, which includes former Transport Minister Sir John Hayes and former Chancellor Lord Lamont, told No 10 that it was being too passive and reactive in the crisis.

As one former chief whip says: My advice to Boris and No 10 is to treat the views of the chairman of the 1922 Committee with at least the same level of respect as they accord to those of any scientist, medic or special adviser on this matter. They need to reverse-ferret as soon as possible.

The Common Sense group have also complained about the lack of legislation to tackle the problem of Channel migrants, and urged Ministers to be more anti-woke on issues such as the ban on Rule, Britannia! at the Last Night of the Proms and unconscious bias training. Some Tory MPs fear that the combination of political and personal problems could even lead to Mr Johnson quitting before the next election.

As one MP, who was alarmed by the pictures of Ms Symonds holidaying alone, says: Would even Churchill have been able to cope without Clementine?

Some MPs also make unsubstantiated claims that Ms Symonds, an environmental campaigner, interferes in the running of the country by marching into ministerial meetings to thrust Wilfred into his arms and being more interested in badgers than Brexit.

But her friends paint a picture of a young woman adapting to life in an intense public gaze, who needs to escape the pressures of No 10 by relaxing with trusted friends.

She was joined on her Italian holiday by feminist campaigner Nimco Ali, who has been at her side throughout her time in Downing Street, and Aline Nassif, a former colleague from Ms Symonds time working as a media adviser to John Whittingdale when he was Culture Secretary.

Ms Nassif is now the global head of communications for Bechtel, the American construction giant responsible for UK infrastructure projects such as Crossrail. One friend said: All of these whispering campaigns are just plain nasty. Carrie is a young woman and a relatively new mum. It seems to all be being done to upset Carrie, which in turn upsets Boris. Its baffling that anyone would do this to her.

They argue that becoming First Lady has been a shock to her. The friend added: She might have been involved in politics for some time but finding yourself in the limelight isnt easy for anyone.

This time two years ago nobody knew who she was. Being caught taking her holiday is something Carrie took on the chin but there is a certain mystery surrounding how she and her friends were found.

She clearly had no idea that there were any members of the paparazzi around. Women tend to do their hair if they know they will be seen.

After arriving home from Lake Como last Thursday, the couple spent Friday together in their No 10 flat, and were planning to spend this weekend together with Wilfred and dog Dilyn.

The friend concluded: She and Boris are very happy together. The only time theyre not really together is when he is off working as the Prime Minister.
The UK has reported 6,178 new cases in 24 hours, the highest single-day spike since May 1, taking the total tally to 409,729, official data revealed.

Besides the new cases, 37 new fatalities were also reported on Wednesday due to which the overall death toll increased 41,862, reports Xinhua news agency citing the data as saying.

The spikes came a day after Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced new restriction measures to tackle a the recent surge in the country's cases.

Johnson confirmed that from Thursday, all pubs, bars and restaurants in England must operate a table service only -- except for takeaways -- and will be forced to close at 10.

Among other measures, people have been advised to work from home if they can despite advice earlier this month to head back to their workplaces.

The new restrictions, which may last for the next six months, raised concerns that more jobs were at risk as the government's furlough scheme will expire by the end of October.

The UK government's Job Retention Scheme offered furloughed workers 80 per cent of their salary, up to 2,500 pounds per month.

From August 1, the level of grant was reduced each month.

Chancellor Rishi Sunak is understood to be looking at options including a salary top-up scheme, which is similar to those already operating in France and Germany, according to the BBC.

Possible ideas are thought to include allowing firms to reduce employees' hours while keeping them in a job, with the government paying part of the lost wages.

During Prime Minister's Questions at Parliament, Johnson said Sunak was working on "creative and imaginative" solutions to avoid what an MP described as a "tsunami of job losses".

--IANS

ksk/

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
A handful of airports are implementing trials of quick-fire coronavirus tests, working with airlines to push technologies still being developed as a way to revive stunted international air travel.

The tests, which can be carried out in 30 minutes, are seen as the best hope for the aviation industry to overcome new travel curbs that have brought a modest traffic rebound over summer to a shuddering halt. Other initiatives include a Finnish experiment with dogs that can sniff out the virus.

Rome's Fiumicino was first to introduce rapid screening on Sept. 16, to be followed next month by United Airlines flights from San Francisco to Hawaii, while London Heathrow, Europe's busiest airport, has trialled three rival technologies. The International Air Transport Association is backing mandatory checks on departure to unlock flights before the arrival of a Covid vaccine, and Deutsche Lufthansa AG wants to use tests to reopen the trans-Atlantic market.

The aviation industry is turning to a do-it-yourself approach after earlier efforts to rally global authorities around a united plan fell flat. A recent surge in virus cases triggered a haphazard set of fresh restrictions, upending a recovery in air traffic. Now carriers are working to get pre-flight testing under way in a handful of markets in the expectation that other locations will follow.

"Testing is ready, probably governments are ready to listen, and we know that passengers are ready to be tested," IATA Director General Alexandre de Juniac said Thursday at the World Aviation Festival. "We need the system to work and work quickly. Otherwise this industry will not survive."

Universal checks will present logistical challenges and impact how people travel, but are vital to the removal of quarantine measures that are "killing the industry's recovery," he said.

The latest global traffic figures show long-haul markets are still largely grounded and that a recovery in domestic and regional operations has leveled off. Restrictions have been especially fluid in Europe, making it impossible for travelers to know whether they'll need to self-isolate when they return home.

United Airlines Chief Executive Officer Scott Kirby said Tuesday at a Skift travel conference that "everyone agrees it's a good idea" to have airport testing and air corridors to restart international travel, but that the industry has struggled to navigate such proposals past government bureaucracy.

United said Thursday it will launch a pilot program on the Hawaii route starting Oct. 15, adding that it's working with officials in the state to ensure that customers who test negative can skip a 14-day quarantine requirement.

The new efforts focus on rapid antigen checks, which look for the presence of the virus's proteins, making them quicker and cheaper but somewhat less accurate than established methods that detect its nucleic acids. The tests should be ready for deployment next month, according to De Juniac, who said all of the trade group's airline members backed their use.

The endorsement marks a switch away from better-known polymerase chain reaction tests, which have been regarded as the gold standard for Covid testing but which are relatively ill-suited to airport use, typically taking four or five hours to identify the virus's genetic markers in a laboratory.

Heathrow, which sought to introduce PCR tests costing 150 pounds ($191), had also proposed a second test five days later to allow for the virus's incubation period, during which time people would need to self-isolate. Britain declined to ratify the plan, saying it was unlikely to entice travelers put off by an existing 14-day quarantine period for arrivals from at-risk countries.

The airport is now pressing the case for rapid testing before departure, though CEO John Holland-Kaye cautioned Wednesday that it will be "more challenging" for the model to gain acceptance, since destination countries would need to take the accuracy of the checks on faith.

The month-long Italian trial being conducted by Aeroporti di Roma SpA so far involves domestic-only services operated by state-owned Alitalia SpA between the capital and Milan Linate airport. Passengers on certain flights must take a rapid antigen test, with the cost covered by the Lazio regional government.

The tests require would-be travelers to be sampled with a swab, with the results available in 30 minutes. People can also board the flights if they've been screened the day before at a drive-in center at the airport, or if they've undergone a PCR check in the previous 72 hours.

Anyone found to be infected is denied boarding and will have to return home to self-isolate, having previously completed a form in which they pledged to do so in the event of a positive outcome.

AdR said it's in talks with Lufthansa, Russia's Aeroflot and Dubai-based Emirates about introducing the tests for their flights from Fiumicino. It's also keen to offer the procedure for services to New York in a bid to restore a vital trans-Atlantic link that's currently closed to all but repatriating passengers.

Lufthansa said separately Tuesday that it's planning to buy test kits from manufacturers Abbott Laboratories -- which will also be used in the United trial -- and Roche Holding AG. Roche said the day before that its rapid antigen scan was available in Europe and that it would be filing for emergency authorization in the U.S. The German carrier said it's working with partners to use the tests to open up American routes.

De Juniac said mass antigen tests would cost only about $10 once universally available and that he'd expect governments to fund them. Airport employees could carry out the screening without specialist medical training and results would be available within 15 minutes, with a 97% sensitivity, he said.

The IATA head said that the rapid tests could be deployed alongside PCR checks, which could remain available for passengers wanting to be screened ahead of travel.

Heathrow conducted field trials of three different types of rapid coronavirus test last month.

One, devised by GeneMe of Poland, can detect the virus in nose or throat swabs in about 30 minutes, while another, from U.K.-based Mologic, uses a saliva sample to identify viral antibodies in about 10 minutes.

The hub also tested the less conventional Virolens system from British startup iAbra, which deploys a digital camera and microscope to produce a highly magnified hologram-style image of a sample in just 20 seconds. That can then be scanned for the distinctly shaped virus using artificial intelligence software.

Faster even than the optical scan, Finland is deploying dogs at Helsinki airport that have been trained to home in on people carrying the virus in just 10 seconds by sniffing a skin wipe. The service is voluntary and targeted at arriving passengers.

Virgin Atlantic Airways Ltd. CEO Shai Weiss said in an interview that rapid testing holds out hope of a near-term revival for long-haul specialists such as his own, which usually deploys 70% of capacity across the North Atlantic.

"If we knew that there'd be a quarantine by March we might be able to hunker down, but there's no guarantee of that," he said. "Testing is the only way of getting aviation moving and allowing the economy to take off."

- - -

Bloomberg's Tim Loh and Justin Bachman contributed to this report.
Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) arrives for a ceremony before Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg lies in state in Statuary Hall of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Sept. 25, 2020. (Erin Schaff/Pool via Reuters)

Kamala Harris Praises Black Lives Matter, Calls Protests Essential

Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) on Friday praised the Black Lives Matter movement.

I actually believe, as a former prosecutor, that Black Lives Matter has been the most significant agent for change within the criminal justice system, because it has been a counterforce to the force within the system that is so grounded in status quo and in its own traditions, many of which have been harmful and have been discriminatory in the way that theyve been enforced, Harris, the Democratic vice presidential nominee, told the virtual audience at a National Association for the Advancement of Colored People convention.

Harris said the people behind the movement were brilliant and history would show the conception as an inflection point in the ongoing fight for justice.

Im going to interpret these protests as an essential component of evolution in our country, as an essential component, a mark of a real democracy and as necessary, as necessary, she added.

The peoples voices must be heard. It is often the people who must speak to get their government to do what it is supposed to do, but may not do naturally unless the people speak loudly, and obviously peacefully, but speak loudly.

Harris was criticized by some for her comments, including Steve Guest, a rapid response director for the GOP.

After months of left-wing violence, Democrat Sen. Kamala Harris says these protests are an essential part of our evolution as a country, he wrote on Twitter.

Harriss praise of Black Lives Matter stands in stark contrast with President Donald Trump and other top Republicans, who have repeatedly criticized the movement, pointing to its anti-police messaging and bouts of violence.

Trump said in one interview that the first time he heard of the group was when he heard them chanting pigs in a blanket, fry em like bacon, a reference to killing police officers.

That was the first time I ever heard of Black Lives Matter. I said, thats a terrible name. Its so discriminatory, its bad for black people, its bad for everybody, he said.

A man holds a Black Lives Matter sign as a police car burns in front of him during a protest outside CNN Center in Atlanta, Georgia, on May 29, 2020. (Elijah Nouvelage/Getty Images)

Attorney General William Barr charged earlier this month that Black Lives Matter is pushing a political agenda.

As a proposition, who can quarrel with the proposition, black lives matter? But theyre not interested in black lives, theyre interested in props, he said.

A small number of blacks that are killed by police during conflict with police, usually less than a dozen a year, who they can use as props to achieve a much broader political agenda.

The Black Lives Matter Global Network hasnt responded to requests for comment about criticism of the movement.

Patrisse Cullors, one of its founders, who has described herself as a Marxist, said in a recent statement that the movement was working to connect black people from all over the world who have a shared desire for justice to act together in their respective communities.

We believe those of all religious views and backgrounds, or disbelief; all genders as equal; black lives not being eradicated using guns and knees in our necks; the elimination of the constant betrayal of our poor and oppressed communities; and, certainly, continuing to foster a united country that works for everyone despite their actual or perceived sexual identity, gender identity, gender expression, economic status, disability, immigration status, or intergenerational way of life, she added.

The group says its mission is to eradicate white supremacy and build local power to intervene in violence inflicted on black communities by the state and vigilantes. It listed other goals, like disrupting the family structure, but quietly removed those from its website.
Furious MPs yesterday demanded the resignation of Boohoo's bosses after an explosive report blasted the appalling treatment of workers in its Leicester clothes factories.

Investigators led by Alison Levitt QC revealed 'excessive' hours, life-threatening conditions and illegally low pay across much of the fast fashion giant's supply chain.

Boohoo knew how bad the situation was in December 2019, the report found, but its billionaire founder Mahmud Kamani dismissed those allegations as 'another lot of b******s'.

Investigators looking in to working conditions at Boohoo revealed 'excessive' hours, life-threatening conditions and illegally low pay across much of the fashion giant's supply chain

The board did not report possible criminal activity, uncovered in a series of spot checks last year, to police.

Bosses were told that one factory had 'the worst working conditions that I have seen in the UK and is not safe for the workers'.

Levitt said it was 'inexcusable' that Boohoo capitalised on a jump in demand from the pandemic, without assessing whether its Leicester workforce could cope.

She added: 'By December 2019, at the latest, senior members of the board knew for a fact that there were some serious examples of unacceptable conditions and poor treatment of workers, including illegally low pay.'

Defiant: Boohoo's billionaire founder Mahmud Kamani dismissed the allegations as 'another lot of b******s'

Cheap labour and rock bottom prices have led to booming sales for the online retailer in recent years, boosting the wealth of Boohoo's billionaire founding family, the Kamanis.

Following the report, MPs yesterday called for Mahmud Kamani and chief executive John Lyttle to resign.

Tory MP Andrew Bridgen said: 'Kamani has to go.

'On his watch, this appalling situation has been allowed to continue to grow and fester, and Boohoo has profited through unlawful commercial practice in its supply chain.'

The three MPs for Leicester  Claudia Webbe, Liz Kendall and Jonathan Ashworth  said in a joint statement: 'This damning report shows Boohoo has known about unacceptable working conditions in its Leicester factories for years, but has failed to take the necessary action anywhere quickly enough. The chief executive of Boohoo is ultimately responsible for these failings and should now resign.'

Cliff Weight, the director of ShareSoc, said: 'It is undoubtedly shocking that these kind of third world factories exist in the UK. Mahmud Kamani needs to step aside whilst the board reviews his position.'

Incredibly the share price soared 15.4 per cent, or 50.1p, to 374.5p yesterday because investors were relieved Boohoo was implementing the report's recommendations.

The jump boosted the Kamani family's fortune by 126million. Kamani and his co-founder Carol Kane are in line for a share of a 150million award if the company's stock price hits a 600p target.

The row over sweatshop conditions first erupted in July after reports in this newspaper and the Sunday Times alleged Boohoo's factories were failing to follow social distancing and paying staff as little as 3.50. The minimum wage for workers aged 25 and over is 8.72 an hour.

In a bid to halt its collapsing share price, Boohoo ordered the independent investigation, which was published yesterday.

It found that Kamani had 'a social and family relationship' with the owners of the two companies at the centre of the sweatshop factory allegations in July.

He also 'covertly owns or controls many of the factories [in Leicester] through a complex web of directorships', the report found. In internal emails, which reveal his unrelenting pressure to drive down prices, he told staff: 'We're paying too much... again I do not want prices going up.'

In another he said: 'We are in a mess and it needs fixing... We're gonna trade faster, harder and quicker.. If it doesn't suit anyone... Boohoo is not the place for you.'

Peter Williams, chairman between 2014 and 2019, said that buyers felt they had to 'almost screw these people to the floor' to please Kamani.

The 234-page report paints a nightmarish picture of the working conditions in the Leicester factories.

One auditor, referring to a factory in its supply chain, told Boohoo in December 2019: 'The factory has the worst working conditions that I have seen in the UK and is not safe.' Another did not provide water for employees, while a third had 'too many health and safety issues to report'.

It led one Boohoo director, Tom Kershaw, to admit in a private email the conditions 'made me feel horrendous... it was heart-breaking really'.

Some factories had no working fire escapes leading Levitt to say that 'were a fire to break out in some of the buildings it is likely that there would be loss of life'.

Factories also made flagrant attempts to avoid being properly audited including hiding staff during audits and destroying staff time sheet records.

Boohoo has accepted all of the report's recommendations, including reducing the number of suppliers. Boss Lyttle said these 'further steps' will 'drive long-lasting and meaningful change'.
Panaji, Sep 26 : Goa BJP President Sadanand Shet Tanavade on Saturday said that the fact that dozens of BJP workers, including Chief Minister Pramod Sawant, tested coronavirus positive only showed that the cadres were out in the field during the pandemic.

"Sixty eight BJP workers throughout Goa tested positive during the pandemic. They tested positive precisely because they were out in the field, in the service of people, unlike Congress leaders who stayed indoors and only issued statements," Tanavade said.

Speaking at the inaugural session of the state Bharatiya Janata Party executive meeting held in Mapusa town, located a short distance from Panaji, Tanavade said that the BJP was already actively preparing for a host of elections, including zilla panchayats and municipalities, ahead of the 2022 Assembly polls.

In all, one fifth of Goa's 40 legislators have tested positive, including Sawant, former Deputy Chief Minister Sudin Dhavalikar, former Chief Ministers Churchill Alemao and Ravi Naik, MLAs Antonio Fernandes, Nilkanth Halarnkar, Dayanand Sopte and Clafasio Dias.

Union Minister of State for Defence and AYUSH Shripad Naik, who is a Lok Sabha MP from Goa, had also tested positive.

Tanavade said that the BJP in Goa was gearing up for the upcoming polls delayed due to the Covid-19 spread. "The BJP will return to power with an absolute majority in Goa in 2022," he said.
A SHOPLIFTER who dropped a box of stolen vodka bottles and crisps as he fled security guards has been jailed for 10 months.

Dean Martin (25) also stole bicycles from outside fast-food restaurants and resisted an off-duty garda who stopped him.

Martin, of Coultry Drive, Ballymun, pleaded guilty to theft, unauthorised taking of bicycles and garda obstruction.

A garda sergeant told Dublin District Court the accused went to Aldi in Santry Avenue last September 28 and took seven bottles of vodka and a multi-pack of crisps worth a total of 143.

He placed them in a cardboard box and left.

Security went to stop him, but he fled and dropped the box, smashing the bottles.

Martin had addiction problems at the time, but was now in prison serving a sentence and was "off everything", his lawyer said.

He took bicycles parked outside McDonald's, Gulliver's Retail Park, Ballymun, on August 9 last year and McDonald's, Omni Shopping Centre, Santry, last October 7.

Judge Flann Brennan said Martin's record of 74 previous convictions was "appalling".
(Newser)  He had a good, but apparently illegal, run. William Perry Pendley got some bad news Friday via a federal judge, who ordered the 75-year-old to be removed as the head of the Bureau of Land Management, a role he'd held for 424 days without Senate confirmation. "Pendley has served and continues to serve unlawfully as the acting BLM director," Chief District Judge Brian Morris of Montana said in his ruling, noting Pendley "did not follow any of the permissible paths" to getting his job, which he was appointed to by Department of Interior chief David Bernhardt in July 2019, per CNN. Morris also ruled that Bernhardt can't just choose someone else to fill Pendley's slot, as the new BLM leader needs to be appointed by President Trump and confirmed by the Senate. The ruling came in response to a lawsuit filed by the Democratic governor of Montana, Steve Bullock, and the state's Department of Natural Resources and Conservation.

story continues below

In June, Trump formally nominated Pendley to lead the BLM, but in August he withdrew the nomination after pressure from Democrats and even some GOPers, per NPR. A spokesman for the Department of the Interior decried the ruling and said the department would be appealing, calling it an "outrageous" decision that ignores a "long-standing practice" of the department used by other administrations as well. But Bullock and conservation groups are applauding, with the governor calling the ruling a "win for the Constitution." "Montanans can rest easy knowing that National Public Lands Day will begin with William Perry Pendley packing his desk and vacating the director's office at the Bureau of Land Management," Bullock said in a statement, per the Hill. (Read more Bureau of Land Management stories.)
After 22 years of being set on fire, doused in water and set on fire again, time has taken its toll on the Manitoba Emergency Services College burn house.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 26/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

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After 22 years of being set on fire, doused in water and set on fire again, time has taken its toll on the Manitoba Emergency Services College "burn house."

The province announced Friday it would be putting out a request for proposals to replace the battered building, which lies just west of the Brandon Municipal Airport. The structure is used by students at the college to simulate live fires and rescue operations in a safe environment.

After 22 years of repeated fires and and being used as a live training site, its neared its end of life cycle, Municipal Relations Minister Rochelle Squire said.

The four-storey metal building has visible scorch marks all over it and the inside is burned black. While the college can replace certain parts, Squires said the goal is to have a training site on par with other facilities in Canada.

A firefighter student learns to work with a ladder on Friday morning. (Drew May/The Brandon Sun)

"We just want to be able to offer a live fire training experience so that when firefighters leave the college theyre well prepared to go into a situation," she said.

"That situation may come on day one of their new jobs or day 300 after theyre had on the job training, but they need to be able to hit the ground running."

While the structure is at the Brandon college, fire departments around the province also use it for training.

Squires wouldnt say how much the budget for the new building is but said the province wants the best site possible. Students will learn how to deal with fire in different building environments and practice a variety of rescue techniques in the new building.

A new burn house is the top priority at the college, but Squires said the province may also replace other training equipment on the campus.

A firefighter student learns to work with a ladder on Friday morning.

The building is still safe to use, but the new structure will be more modern and use technology that wasnt around when it was first built in 1997, said acting fire commissioner Ryan Schenk.

"Were going to be able to change configurations so our scenarios are unpredictable. Were going to be training firefighters on different techniques, on modernized techniques," he said.

"The way of fighting fires has changed because of construction materials that are out there  fires burn hotter and they burn faster. We need to modernize the way we simulate and deliver that training."

Mayor Rick Chrest said he was pleased with the announcement of a new training structure at the college and said many firefighter/paramedics who work for Brandon Fire and Emergency Services went through the Manitoba Emergency Services College program.

The province is expecting to get materials by the spring and have the building completed by next fall. The existing burn house will still be used in the interim for aspiring firefighters to train on.

The request for proposal issued Friday closes on Oct. 26. According to the listing, three companies had requested documents; one in Winnipeg, one in Ontario and one in Wisconsin.

 dmay@brandonsun.com

 Twitter: @DrewMay_
New Delhi: Indian and Japanese navies to begin their three-day-long maritime military exercise beginning from Saturday (September 26). The naval exercise will take place in the North Arabian Sea. This is the fourth edition of Japan Maritime bilateral exercise (JIMEX).

The naval exercise will continue till September 28 and it is is being conducted in a `non-contact at-sea-only format`, in view of COVID-19 restrictions.

The exercise is taking place in the backdrop of growing concerns over China's military activity in the Indian Ocean Region as well as in the Indo-Pacific.

The officials said the fourth edition of the India-Japan maritime exercise JIMEX will feature a multitude of advanced exercises across the spectrum of maritime operations, in reflection of high degree of inter-operability and joint operational skills.

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JIMEX-20 will see some advanced level of operations and exercises which is indicative of the continued upswing in Indo-Japanese defence relations and continued efforts by both Governments to work closely for a more secure, open and inclusive global commons, in accordance with international regulations.

Notably, this will be the first military exercise after the two countries signed a landmark agreement on September 9 that will allow their militaries to access each other's bases for logistics support.

The JIMEX series of exercises commenced in January 2012 with a special focus on maritime security cooperation. The last edition of JIMEX was conducted in October 2018 off Visakhapatnam coast.

JIMEX will showcase a high degree of inter-operability and joint operational skills through the conduct of a multitude of advanced exercises, across the spectrum of maritime operations.

Multi-faceted tactical exercises involving weapon firings, cross deck helicopter operations and complex surface, anti-submarine and air warfare drills will consolidate coordination developed by the two navies.


Nivin Pauly, the young crowd puller of Malayalam cinema has backed out from the upcoming Major Ravi project. The director himself revealed that Nivin Pauly is no more a part of his next directorial venture, in a recent interview given to a leading Malayalam media. The Padavettu actor decided to walk out of the project, after one and a half years of the announcement.

Even though Major Ravi has not revealed the exact reason behind Nivin Pauly's exit from the project, the sources suggest that the actor walked out due to creative differences. Even though the filmmaker later approached Dileep for the project, the actor too decided to pass the offer without citing any reasons. The team is now planning to cast another actor for the project, which is said to be a love story that is set in Punjab.

Coming to Nivin Pauly, the rumour mills suggest that the actor is planning to go for a complete track change in his career, and is no longer interested in playing boy-next-door characters. If the reports are to be true, Nivin has decided to walk out of a few projects, which he has signed earlier, due to the same reason.

However, the sources suggest that the actor is still open to playing romantic roles. Bismi Special, one of his most awaited upcoming projects, is said to be a breezy love story. But apart from its project, all the other upcoming films in Nivin Pauly's career are experimental projects based on unique concepts.

The actor will be next seen in Sunny Wayne's debut production venture Padavettu, which is directed by newcomer Liju Krishna. He is also joining hands with Rajeev Ravi for the first time, for the upcoming period-political thriller Thuramukham. Nivin Pauly has also signed a few promising projects including Bismi Special, Gangs Of Mundanmala, Dhyan Sreenivasan's next directorial venture, and so on.

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President Donald Trump's potential Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett left her home in Indiana with her husband and children on Saturday afternoon just hours before the president is expected to formally announce his decision.

Six of Barrett's children were with her, including the son and daughter she adopted from Haiti, as they got into their family car and left their home.

Trump is expected to announce the 48-year-old, mother of seven as his pick to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg during a ceremony at the White House starting at 5pm.

President Donald Trump 's potential Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett left her home in Indiana with her husband and children on Saturday afternoon just hours before the president is expected to formally announce his decision

While the president has not confirmed any name, on Friday Barrett emerged as the favorite.

One of Barrett's daughters held her hand as the family left the house together. All were wearing formal attire with the boys dressed in suits.

Another son held the hand of her youngest child who has Down Syndrome.

According to the New York Times, a Special Air Mission military aircraft landed in South Bend from Maryland suggesting the administration sent a military jet to pick up the family.

Aides say the president did not interview another candidate this week.

President Trump is due to unveil his pick in the Rose Garden before heading to a campaign rally in Pennsylvania to celebrate the announcement.

Fans began to arrive at Harrisburg International Airport on Saturday afternoon and lined up for hours ahead of the event.

Six of Barrett's children were with her, including the son and daughter she adopted from Haiti, as they got into their family car and left their home

Trump's announcement will come before Ginsburg is buried beside her husband next week at Arlington National Cemetery.

On Friday, she was the first woman to lie in state at the Capitol, and mourners flocked to the Supreme Court for two days before that to pay respects.

Republican senators are already lining up for a swift confirmation of Barrett ahead of the November 3 election, as they aim to lock in conservative gains in the federal judiciary before a potential transition of power.

Trump, meanwhile, is hoping the nomination will serve to galvanize his supporters as he looks to fend off Democrat Joe Biden. He believes Barrett to be the type of Supreme Court candidate who will secure the support of his conservative base.

He had initially released two shortlists naming 45 people who he would consider for a Supreme Court vacancy but last week committed to choosing a woman.

There still remained the chance the president would go in a different direction with hours before his planned announcement  with the pick having not only a long-term impact on the nation's laws but also political impact on the presidential elections and control of Congress.

The announcement will kick off a flurry of activity that must take place before the final confirmation vote, including public hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

White House staff prepare the Rose Garden before US President Donald Trump announces his Supreme Court nominee

The Rose Garden of the White House is decorated in US flags before President Trump announces his Supreme Court nominee

A White House source indicated the process will start right away, with the nominee on Tuesday beginning the traditional courtesy calls on individual senators in their offices, with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell up first. White House Counsel Pat Cipollone is expected to shepherd the nomination.

Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, who mounted an angry defense of Kavanaugh during tense confirmation hearings in 2018, has signaled he expects to have Barrett confirmed by the election.

Barrett would become the fifth woman ever to serve on the top U.S. judicial body and push its conservative majority to a commanding 6-3.

Her appointment would mean that Roman Catholics hold six of the Supreme Court's nine seats despite only accounting for 20 percent of the population.

With Trump's fellow Republicans controlling the Senate, confirmation appears certain, though Democrats may try to make the process as difficult as possible.

Republicans hold a 53-47 Senate majority and only two Republican senators have opposed proceeding with the confirmation process.

Supporters of Trump arrive for a campaign rally at Harrisburg International Airport in Pennsylvania on Saturday evening

Volunteer Terri Hinckley, left, of Loganville, Pennsylvania, takes the temperatures of attendees before a campaign rally for President Donald Trump on Saturday

Supporters lined up for hours ahead of the tally in Pennsylvania

Supporters decked out their cars with Trump flags as they waited for his campaign rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday

Jacqueline Faught, a supporter of Trump, holds an umbrella before a campaign rally at Harrisburg International Airport

Barrett and her husband, Jesse Barrett, a former federal prosecutor, both graduated from Notre Dame Law School.

She would be the only justice on the current court not to have received her law degree from an Ivy League school. The eight current justices all attended either Harvard or Yale.

How her religious beliefs might guide her legal views became a focus for some Democrats during bruising confirmation hearings after Barrett's nomination for the 7th Circuit.

That prompted Republicans to accuse Democrats of seeking to impose a religious test on Barrett's fitness for the job.

The judge wowed social conservatives during the confirmation hearings to serve on the court, however.

She defended her Catholic face when getting grilled by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who still serves at the top Democrat on the panel, in 2017.

After looking at her speeches, 'the conclusion one draws is that the dogma lives loudly within you. And that's of concern when you come to big issues that large numbers of people have fought for years in this country,' Feinstein said, in comments that became a rallying cry for Catholic conservatives who compared it as a religious test.

Trump's potential Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett is expected to be confirmed on Saturday

Judge Barrett is a devout Catholic who teaches at Notre Dame law school professor.

She is a member of a South Bend chapter of charismatic Christian community People of Praise that critics have compared to a cult.

The presumptive appointment has sparked criticism among civil rights groups. Alphonso David, president of the Human Rights Campaign - and LGBT advocacy group - said that if Barrett is confirmed she would 'dismantle all that Ruth Bader Ginsburg fought for'.

'An appointment of this magnitude must be made by the president inaugurated in January. The Human Rights Campaign fervently opposes Coney Barret's nomination and this sham process,' he said.

But other groups have supported the presumptive nomination, with Mat Staver, founder of Liberty Counsel - a Christian ministry - calling Barrett the 'right choice'.

'She applies the intent and text of the Constitution to the statutes she reviews. A judge should be a neutral interpreter of the Constitution who knows what it means to interpret and apply the law rather than an activist legislator who tries to create the law,' he said.

At Notre Dame, where Barrett began teaching at 30, she often invoked God in articles and speeches. In a 2006 address, she encouraged graduating law students to see their careers as a means to 'building the kingdom of God.'

She was considered a finalist in 2018 for the high court before Trump nominated Brett Kavanaugh for the seat that opened when Justice Anthony Kennedy retired.

As it turns out, Trump and Barrett didn't see eye-to-eye during their first meeting  because she was wearing sunglasses.

The 48-year-old 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has become the leading contender to be Trump's nominee to succeed Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, whose body will lie in state at the Capitol Friday  a first for any woman in the nation's history.

But Barrett, a conservative who Trump installed on the Appeals court, lost out to now Justice Brett Kavanaugh when she met with Trump one-on-one in 2018.

Their meeting did not go 'particularly well,' sources close to the process told NPR. The judge had conjunctivitis, which prompted her to wear dark glasses during her interview with the president. She was 'not at hear best,' reported Nina Totenberg, who wrote about her close friendship with Ginsburg after the 87-year-old's passing.

When Trump went with Kavanaugh instead, he told Barrett-backers he was 'saving' her for the Ginsburg seat, they recounted.

Even some conservatives worried her sparse judicial record made it too hard to predict how she might rule, concerned she could end up like other seemingly conservatives who wound up more moderate.

Three years on, her record now includes around 100 opinions and dissents, in which she often illustrated Scali's influence by delving deep into historical minutiae to glean the meaning of original texts.

A 2019 dissent in a gun-rights case argued a person convicted of a nonviolent felony shouldnt be automatically barred from owning a gun.

All but a few pages of her 37-page dissent were devoted to the history of gun rules for convicted criminals in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Barrett has twice joined dissenting opinions asking for abortion-related decisions to be thrown out and reheard by the full appeals court.

Last year, after a three-judge panel blocked an Indiana law that would make it harder for a minor to have an abortion without her parents being notified, Barrett voted to have the case reheard by the full court.

She wrote a unanimous three-judge panel decision in 2019 making it easier for men alleged to have committed sexual assaults on campus to challenge the proceedings against them.

And she was in dissent in June when her two colleagues on a 7th Circuit panel put on hold, just in Chicago, the Trump administration policy that could jeopardize permanent resident status for immigrants who use food stamps, Medicaid and housing vouchers.

Barrett and her husband Jesse are members of People of Praise, a small religious group where members have to agree to a covenant to each other. The group has been criticized by some for its strict practices

Amy Coney Barrett, United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit judge, speaks during the University of Notre Dame's Law School commencement ceremony. She has taught at the university since she was 30 years old

Amy Coney Barrett teaching a class at Notre Dame Law School in South Bend, Indiana, in 2013

Barrett is pictured second from right with her parents and her siblings

Barrett would assume the court seat with already substantial wealth, and her financial disclosures show close ties to a number of conservative groups. Barrett and her husband have investments worth between $845,000 and $2.8 million, according to her 2019 financial disclosure report.

Judges report the value of their investments in ranges. Their money is invested mostly in mutual funds, some of which are for retirement and their childrens education.

When she was nominated to the appeals court in 2017, Barrett reported assets of just over $2 million, including her home in Indiana worth nearly $425,000, and a mortgage on the property with a balance of $175,000.

In the two previous years, Barrett received $4,200 in two equal payments from Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative Christian law firm, her financial report shows.

In 2018 and 2019, she participated in 10 events sponsored by the Federalist Society, which paid for her transportation, meals and lodging in New York, New Orleans, Washington and other cities. Several events took place at leading law schools.

Barrett was raised in New Orleans and was the eldest child of a lawyer for Shell Oil Co. She earned her undergraduate degree in English literature in 1994 at Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee.

She also served as a law clerk for Laurence Silberman for a year at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Between clerkships and entering academia, she worked from 1999 to 2001 at a law firm in Washington, Miller, Cassidy, Larroca & Lewin.

Like Trump's two other appointees, Neil Gorsuch in 2017 and Brett Kavanaugh in 2018, Barrett is young enough that she could serve for decades.

Barrett would be the youngest Supreme Court nominee since conservative Clarence Thomas was 43 in 1991.

Trump has said he wants his nominee confirmed before the election so she would be able participate in any election-related cases that reach the justices, potentially casting a key vote in his favor.

A U.S. presidential election's outcome only once has been determined by the Supreme Court, in 2000 when it clinched Republican George W. Bush's victory over Democrat Al Gore.

Trump has repeatedly without evidence said voting by mail, a regular feature of American elections, will lead to voter fraud. He also has refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power should he lose the election.

This marks the first time since 1956 that a U.S. president has moved to fill a Supreme Court vacancy so close to an election.

In that year, President Dwight Eisenhower three weeks before winning re-election placed William Brennan on the court using a procedure called a 'recess appointment' that bypassed the Senate, a tactic no longer available for installing justices.

An emboldened Supreme Court conservative majority could shift the United States to the right on hot-button issues by, among other things, curbing abortion rights, expanding religious rights, striking down gun control laws, and endorsing new restrictions on voting rights.

Another top pick, Judge Barbara Lagoa, remains as a finalist on Trump's list, although Trump planned no meeting with her this week.

He confirmed they didn't meet when he landed at Joint Base Andrews Friday night before a planned campaign fundraiser at his Washington Trump hotel.

Trump spent the night at his Doral golf club, where he held a 'Latinos for Trump' event Friday morning.

Lagoa is Cuban American, and was confirmed to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on a bipartisan vote after Trump nominated her. Trump loyalist Ron DeSantis put her on the Florida Supreme Court in 2019. Lagoa, 52, represented relatives of Elian Gonzalez during the emotional standoff over his immigration status in 1999.

According to the Times, Trump ignored advice on making Lagoa his choice.

The daughter of Cuban exiles would appeal to the Latino voters the president needs and she was previously confirmed with a bi partisan vote.

Newly sworn-in Gov. Ron DeSantis stands behind Barbara Lagoa as she speaks after he named her to the Florida Supreme Court on January 09, 2019 in Miami, Florida. She was among the finalists for Trump's Supreme Court pick
Chief Minister on Saturday said his government would make water supply in as good as in developed countries and it is hiring a consultant for this purpose.

He also dismissed allegations that water supply in was being privatised.

"Some opposition leaders are saying water supply in is being privatised. It can never happen and I assure you this," the chief minister said.

"We are hiring a consultant to tell us how to improve water supply management and ensure that not even a drop of water is wasted," Kejriwal said during a digital press conference.

He said that in the capital cities of developed nations, water is available round-the-clock with proper pressure and there is no need for a submersible pump.

"We will make it happen in Delhi. The city's water supply will be as good as in developed nations," Kejriwal said, adding that accountability should be fixed for each drop of water and there should not be any wastage.

The chief minister also informed the press briefing the was in talks with Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh for increasing water availability in the capital.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
London, Sep 26 : London Mayor Sadiq Khan has urged UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson to ban household visits immediately, claiming the Covid-19 situation in the capital city was much worse than first believed, the media reported on Saturday.

Speaking to the Guardian, Khan warned that a 43 per cent fall in testing across the city has masked the severity of the second Covid-19 wave, saying the real infection rate was not far behind hotspots in the north-east, reports the Metro newspaper.

He accused the government of "pointing the finger at the public" for the spike in new cases and "not learning lessons" from when the virus initially hit the country earlier this year.

Khan further said that Johnson was "surprised" when he requested additional measures in London, including a ban on household visits, in their first conversation on Tuesday since May.

"We all knew that in September there would be a greater need for testing. I'm really angry. It's another example of lessons not being learned.

"You can explain the delay, incompetence in March. There's no excuse now," the Mayor was quoted as saying.

Khan's remarks come as London is placed on the national coronavirus watch list, with the capital city reported 620 new Covid-19 cases on Friday, more than double the number at the start of the week.

On Friday, the UK registered another single-day case record.

With 6,874 new cases, the overall tally has increased to 425,766, while the death toll stood at 42,025.
The number of COVID cases in the Houston region is rising and was approaching 200,000 total cases as of Friday, according to the Houston Chronicle.

Just Thursday, Peter Hotez, a vaccine expert, said at the Texas Tribune Festival Texas could see another spike in COVID-19 cases, and that a vaccine for the virus may not be available for another year, the Tribune reported.

Combatting COVID: Montgomery County to install COVID-19 thermal cameras at courthouses

We could have a resurgencea third peakthats potentially worse than the one we just went through, Hotez said.

The Houston Chronicle reported a total of 192,864 cases throughout the Houston region as of Thursday, and a total of 3,366 people in the area who have died from COVID-19.

Cy-Fair isnt unique from the rest of Houston, as they continue to see an increase in cases after more than a month of the number going down. There is a total of 736 active cases in the Cy-Fair area as of Friday afternoon, nearly 100 more cases than last week, according to data from Harris County Public Health.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Hotez warns of third peak for Houston, Texas schools reporting cases

Three more people in Cy-Fair died in the last week from the virus as well, raising the total number of deaths to 77.

The total number of cases was compiled using ZIP codes in the Cypress Creek Mirrors coverage area: 77040, 77041, 77065, 77070, 77086, 77095, 77429 and 77433. 77040 still has the highest number of cases at 187, and the highest number of deaths at 22. Two more ZIP codes have entered the triple digits for active cases, 77070 with 102 and 77086 at 124.

Testing is still being offered around Cy-Fair. Pridgeon Stadium, 11355 Falcon Road A, offers testing from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays, and from 7 a.m. to noon and 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Walmart is providing tests at three locations: 11425 Barker Cypress Road, 8208 Barker Cypress Road and 12353 FM 1960 W. Appointments are required and can be made at www.doineedacovid19test.com.

CVS Pharmacy provides tests at 6089 S. Hwy. 6 N., 11600 FM 1960 W. and 19715 Tomball Parkway. Anyone wanting to get tested must make an appointment at www.cvs.com/minuteclinic/covid-19-testing.

paul.wedding@hcnonline.com
By Express News Service

BHUBANESWAR: The Opposition BJP and Congress mounted an attack on the State Government for effecting hike in power tariff amid Covid pandemic situation and threatened to launch a massive protest if the order of the Odisha Electricity Regulatory Commission (OERC) is not reversed forthwith.

The BJP on Friday said the State Government is penalising the consumers who are struggling for survival due to economic disruption. The Government decided to further burden the consumers by increasing the power tariff when the Centre provided much needed relief to the discoms to overcome the financial crisis due to the pandemic situation, State BJP spokesperson Golak Mohapatra said.

Without mentioning the power tariff hike, Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan tweeted, A rebate of Rs 84.93 crore offered by PSUs of @MinOfPower (NHPC 3.78 crore + NTPC 56.8 crore + PGCIL 24.35 crore) to DISCOMS in Odisha for power purchase during the lockdown period will provide much-needed relief to the distressed power utility sector in the state.

He said, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is committed to provide continuous supply of power to Odisha and also fulfil additional power demand by industrial, commercial and domestic consumers as a result of uptick in economic activities post lifting of the lockdown.The BJP asked the BJD Government to justify the power tariff hike when Gridco has an outstanding of Rs 5963.21 crore on the four discoms with CESU (now TPCODL) being the major defaulter with Rs 2,660 crore.

The imposition of enhanced energy charge on consumers came at a time when 26 big industries have arrears of Rs 2949.66 crore. These defaulters have succeeded to obtain a stay order from the courts with the help of the State government, Mohapatra said.

In a scathing attack on the BJD Government, president of OPCC Niranjan Patnaik said the consumers are penalised for the inefficiency of the discoms.

Patnaik said Odisha after pioneering power sector reforms in the late 90s is still incurring highest technical and commercial loss of over 35 per cent while loss level in Delhi is in the range of 8 to10 per cent.However, Energy Minister D S Mishra said the power tariff has been increased by only four per cent after seven years.
Jordyn Woods was spotted celebrating her 23rd birthday in a style on a yacht in Cabo. She was joined by a bevy of friends, including Minnesota Timberwolves superstar Karl Anthony-Towns.

Jordyn Woods and Karl Anthony Towns are cute asf idc idc idc  pic.twitter.com/seyHCSNuMR  dage . (@Aestheticaldage) September 24, 2020

TMZ reports that Towns gifted Woods two Birkin bags, one of which retails for $35,000 on eBay, while the other goes for $9,600 on resale site ReBag, according to the New York Post. Towns also gifted Woods with a Chanel clutch, which the Post reports sells for $11,000. But the piece de resistance was an autographed Michael Jordan jersey, which the Post reports sells for up to $8,500. Since Woods turned 23 on the 23rd, the whole birthday celebration appeared to have a MJ theme of sorts. In fact, she reportedly had a cake in the shape of the iconic Air Jordan 1. At one point, the duo appeared to be dressed in matching Chicago Bulls jerseys.

Energy!!  Karl-Anthony Towns went all out for Jordyn Woods 23rd birthday!! pic.twitter.com/o2DW4fiFmB  The Shade Room (@TheShadeRoomEnt) September 24, 2020

On both Woods' and Towns' Instagram Stories, the pair posted numerous pictures of them hanging out, as well as the series of gifts. Towns also shared a photo of him posing with Woods, writing, "Happy Bday Queen."

Karl Anthony Towns and Jordyn Woods are cuffed ??!?!? pic.twitter.com/zEi7gA3oJ3  deka  (@dekaliketen) September 24, 2020

Naturally, their latest outing fueled speculation that Woods and Towns are indeed dating.

Story continues

karl anthony towns dating jordyn woods now so as far as im concerned he's already clinched all-nba 1st team for next season  Morris Chestnot (@WhoSFlyyTV) September 24, 2020

Karl Anthony Towns with Jordyn Woods pic.twitter.com/vVbcWiRy68  DatBoyJB  (@_KamariJ_) September 24, 2020

I love Jordyn Woods and Karl Towns together  he looks like such a nice young man lmao  MING LEE. (@dgaf_Deja) September 24, 2020

While the duo have been spotted spending time together in the past, neither have confirmed a romantic relationship. In fact, Woods denied the rumors last year.

"Yall gone make me not be able to have any friends and ruin relationships! Lol Karl is like a brother to me," she commented on an Instagram post from The Shade Room. "Have a blessed Friday."

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The Mind of a Conservative Woman by Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) is an insightful commentary for all women regardless of their political affiliation. Blackburn delves into maintaining the traditions of family, freedom, faith, a free market, and respecting those with differing opinions.

She exclaimed, "Nearly a decade ago, I wrote the book, Life Equity. My literary agent told me I should write a second book. I laid out the premise of the new book. I thought how women in the public eye elevated to office told me that conservative women are treated differently than liberal women. The mainstream media will elevate liberal women yet mock and diminish conservative women."

Fairness is not always prevalent. What the senator wants is an even playing field. "In my book, there is a chapter where I discuss how the liberals want everybody to spout their talking points even if someone is not in complete agreement. Some of the liberal women's organizations sent an open letter to all of the newsrooms. It explained how people should talk to a female vice presidential candidate  basically, what could and could not be said and how to approach them. I fired off a letter to all of the signatories and all of the newsrooms, stating that this treatment should apply to all women. Of course, I got zero response on my letter."

The book encourages women to believe in themselves, think for themselves, and strive to be the best they can to succeed. "When I would speak to groups of women, they would always tell me during a Q&A how they considered themselves independent, neither a Democrat or Republican. They want to make up their minds about an issue by doing research. I would ask them to consider the Constitution, rule of law, justice, equality, equal treatment, and to have government get off people's backs. I emphasized how I want to make decisions on education and health care for my children, not the government. As I say in my book, no one should think that an American woman is too weak and stupid to handle their own life."

Sometimes, people must stand their ground in what they believe, in a logical and non-combative manner. "To many liberals, everyone is merely an economic unit, and every principle is one size fits all. In one of my chapters, I discuss how mainstream media has misrepresented conservative women. They, as with all women, are smart, focused, and want the best for everyone. Yet the press says conservative women's voices do not deserve to be heard because they are pro-life, pro-military, pro-business, and pro-faith."

Women have certain issues that are important to them that include wanting to feel safe, law and order, a good economy, and school choice. The senator noted, "I fight for family, faith, freedom, hope, and opportunity. If people get policy correct for these big five, then they can get policy right for everything. As I said in the book, 'family is not only at the center of my heart; it is also at the center of my reason for public service. It should be easier for families to function and be self-sufficient and to keep the money they earned.'"

Women must find the power to stick up for themselves and their principles in a gracious and kind way, an art that someone must master, especially when constantly being put on the defensive. "Sometimes I let pettiness and harsh words get past me. Instead, I stay focused on my goals. This is why I have a chapter on being a 'Happy Warrior.' People should be able to make their point and ask questions of those they speak with."

Unfortunately, this is not what Taylor Swift did. She called Senator Blackburn "Trump in a Wig," a "racist," a "fascist," and a "homophobe" because she voted once against the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act. But the reason behind that vote was never even considered. The senator explained, "There are some things Taylor and I would agree on. I would look forward to talking to her about them. In fact, let me state right here that I'd be delighted to have Taylor up to my house in Nashville. Very few people in American politics, male or female, have worked as hard as I have on behalf of equal pay for women, protection of women from violence, or from stalking. This is why I was honored, during the years I was in the Tennessee state Senate, to receive the Voice of the Victims award."

She further states, "The Violence Against Women Act was first placed into law in 1994. It was a good act. It had bipartisan support. It provided almost $2 billion to fund prosecution of crimes against women, to require restitution from those convicted of crimes against women, and to ensure that violence against women that prosecutors overlooked could still be tried in civil court. It also established the Office on Violence Against Women in the Department of Justice. Yet, each time the Act was renewed  in 2000, 2005, and 2013  it was reworked and larded up with other agendas so that it ceased to resemble anything it was originally designed to do. Let me be clear. I want violence against women stopped. I want the perpetrators punished. I want law enforcement to have all the tools to hunt down the lowlifes who abuse women and end their abuse. I want prosecutors to have the same. I also want abused women to be able to seek redress in civil court, to defend themselves, and to generally have what they need to get healthy and get on with their lives."

In 2018, the bills language was watered down. "Clearly, the law was being made weaker. For example, the definition of a 'crime of violence' used in the law from the beginning meant the actual, attempted, or threatened use of 'physical force.' Now, that's language that will stop a woman from being beaten and help severely punish the perpetrator. Yet now, as we've seen, this clear definition has been dissolved into 'coercive behavior committed, enabled, or solicited to gain or maintain power and control over a victim.' Coercive behavior? Maintain power? No one knows what these mean in this context."

"Besides being watered down, the new bill had a lot of other pieces of legislation that took away from protecting abused women. Going through the legislation process often takes away specifics of the bill. Many politicians put what they want on a piece of moving legislation instead of having a clean bill."

Anyone who reads this book realizes that the senator is a great role model for all women, with wisdom and insight that make this book a valuable resource and a great read!

The author writes for American Thinker. She has done book reviews and author interviews and has written a number of national security, political, and foreign policy articles.

Image: Gage Skidmore via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0.
San Franciscos program to house the homeless in hotels is stretching its already strapped budget, with monthly costs topping $18 million, although the federal government is expected to pay for 75% of it.

On Friday, Abigail Stewart-Kahn, interim director of the homeless services department, said people will gradually start transitioning out of rooms immediately, and some hotels will stop accepting new guests at some point in November. She said all the hotel residents will move to other places by June. While some might end up in permanent supportive housing, others might go to temporary shelter beds or sanctioned tent encampments.

The hotel program, which began in April in response to the pandemic, was always meant to be temporary.

The goal is to move everyone into housing, the department said. But the exact path toward a permanent home is unclear for many of the 2,340 hotel residents, and the next steps in San Franciscos tight housing market for each person are expected to vary.

The city cannot afford to keep the shelter-in-place hotels open indefinitely, Stewart-Kahn told The Chronicle in an interview. San Francisco has not yet been reimbursed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and its not clear when it will be.

At about $260 a night per room, the city is spending nearly $8,000 per person per month  more than twice the median rent of a one-bedroom apartment in San Francisco.

Jessica Christian / The Chronicle

Over the next several months, Stewart-Kahn said, hotel residents will gradually be connected to other options: shelter beds, empty lots sanctioned for tent encampments, housing vouchers, permanent supportive housing or a city-funded bus ticket to anywhere in the country where they have a place to stay.

We will pull every single lever that is available to us, Stewart-Kahn said.

The city has leased 28 entire hotels over the past few months. It procured its last hotel last week and has no plans to pursue more, according to the department.

San Francisco has 2,487 shelter-in-place hotel rooms, 2,340 of which are being used by people who would otherwise be out on the streets or in shelters. The number of hotel rooms is far short of a mandate passed by the Board of Supervisors this summer, which said the city must have more than 8,000 hotel rooms by now.

Pre-pandemic, the city counted more than 8,000 homeless people  though that number is expected to increase as more people are pushed toward poverty due to the economic woes caused by the virus.

Mayor London Breed said that she and her departments were moving as fast as logistically  and financially  possible to move people indoors.

Its far cheaper to house people in shelters than hotel rooms. For comparison, it costs about $70 to $100 for a Navigation Center bed. But during the COVID-19 crisis, the city had to move quickly and find places where people could have their own space and social distance.

As the department lays out its tentative timeline for moving people out of the hotels, COVID-19 still poses a major threat to the citys homeless who do not have a safe place to distance from others.

The decision to stop leasing hotel rooms will likely rankle some members of the Board of Supervisors, who have been sparring with the mayors office and the homeless department for months over the fact that the mayor did not lease more hotel rooms.

Supervisor Matt Haney, who oversees a district with many of these shelter-in-place hotels, said the department is phasing out the hotels without good reason.

They are making the assumption that the federal government is going to stop the reimbursements, he said. If they phase out the hotels, they are going to guarantee that large numbers of people are going to be on our streets and the sidewalks with no options.

Breed announced the homelessness recovery plan in July, which promised to buy or lease 1,500 units of permanent supportive housing over the next two years  the citys largest increase in 20 years.

But right now, Stewart-Kahn said there are only about 500 vacant permanent supportive housing units, most of which already have someone ready to move in or are unavailable for other reasons.

Unfortunately, we are doing this with some challenges in the mix, Stewart-Kahn said of the plan to move people out of the hotels. Today there is not enough permanent supportive housing for how many people we feel should go into it.

But, she said, she is hopeful that over the next few months, the city will be able to work with the residents in the hotels  and those still out on the streets  to find a solution.

It is an incredibly high bar that weve set for ourselves as a city, at the speed that it needs to happen and the amount of people that we need to serve, she said. But its the only path that makes sense in front of us.

Trisha Thadani is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: tthadani@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @TrishaThadani
Participants in unsanctioned rally being detained in Minsk

The police started detaining participants in an unsanctioned rally near the Komarovsky market in Minsk.

"People were detained for participating in the unsanctioned rally," Minsk city police department spokesperson Natalya Ganusevich told Interfax. "Several people were detained," she said.
And just like that, it's 2001 again.

Actress Drew Barrymore reunited with ex-husband Tom Green on her talk show Friday after not speaking to him face to face for about 15 years.

"I have always been attracted to visionaries, comedians and people who make me laugh," Barrymore said, introducing the comedian. "I was so attracted to our next guest I even married him!"

The former celebrity couple, who were wed from 2001 to 2002, shared a socially distanced stage on "The Drew Barrymore Show" to take a trip down memory lane.

Niceties abounded and Green relayed a "hello" and well wishes from his parents while repeatedly plugging Barrymore's new talk show, which premiered earlier this month. Maybe it was the breakup, maybe it was the huge physical gap between them, but things felt awkward as the two figured out how to break the ice again.

"When you say it's 20 years, sometimes its the blink of an eye and sometimes youre like, 'Oh my God, weve lived so much in these last 20 years,'" an emotional Barrymore said, her voice breaking. "Youve had a whole life, and Ive had a whole life, and its just really nice to come together and check in and talk about it. It thrills me to no end. I think the world of you. I celebrate you and I always have and I always will."

The rom-com sweetheart reached out to the comedian for the 2000 film "Charlie's Angels." At the time, Green was at the height of his success for getting into all sorts of hijinks in MTV's outrageous prank comedy "The Tom Green Show." She said she and Green hit it off right away and had lots of laughs together (that did not immediately seem to be the case Friday, though). On their first date, the animal lovers bought two lobsters and released them into the ocean, he said.

Comedian Tom Green and actress Drew Barrymore at the Oscars in 2000. (WireImage)

Barrymore, 45, also thanked the comic, 49, who now hosts "The Tom Green Podcast," for inspiring her to pick up a camera and take pictures and credited him for allowing her to realize her "real Annie Hall" phase. The interview finally felt more relaxed when Green joked about his "Charlie's Angels" character, the "Chad," when talking about the dog sitting in his lap during the interview.

Story continues

After the show, Green tweeted that reuniting with Barrymore "was such a nice experience today."

"It felt good to chat with Drew again for the first time in 15 years. And on national TV! Life is strange sometimes but in this case it was also quite sweet," he wrote.

This was such a nice experience today. It felt good to chat with Drew again for the first time in 15 years. And on national TV! Life is strange sometimes but in this case it was also quite sweet. Best of luck with the show Drew! You deserve it.  https://t.co/REd5bg0MSv  Tom Green (@tomgreenlive) September 25, 2020

The frenetic comic filed for divorce from Barrymore in 2002 after about nine months of marriage, citing "irreconcilable differences." The two infamously teased their wedding when he hosted "Saturday Night Live" in 2001 but ended up eloping in March 2001. It was his first marriage and Barrymore's second.

Neither has spoken much publicly about their split. Back in a 2014 appearance on Oprah Winfrey's "Where Are They Now?" Green described their romance as part of a "crazy whirlwind of a time.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 25)  The House Committee on Appropriations approved the proposed 4.5-trillion national budget for 2021, chairman Eric Yap said on Friday.

The ACT-CIS party list representative said plenary debates will begin next week.

"More work needs to be done and it is my hope that the entire budget process will not be delayed by whatever issue that the Congress may face in the coming days," he said in a statement.

The spending plan sets aside 1.66 trillion for social services, including over 200 billion for universal healthcare. Spending for COVID-19 response include 16.6 billion for healthcare workers, 4.8 billion to upgrade medical facilities, 2.7 billion for additional protective gear and 2.5 billion to buy vaccines.

However, during committee deliberations, lawmakers questioned budget cuts to the Department of Health. The agency's initial proposal was to get 12.5 billion to procure potential vaccines.

They also raised concerns about lower budgets for a number of agencies and offices such as the Tourism department, Vice President, Agriculture department and Commission on Elections.

The Education sector will get the lion's share with 754.4 billion, but officials said this will not be enough under the blended learning program.

Meanwhile, infrastructure projects under the "Build, Build, Build" program will have 1.107 trillion. Public Works Secretary Mark Villar said in an interview a number projects will be completed in the next six months and they will generate more jobs.

The Public Works department will have a budget of 667 billion, a 52 percent increase, amid questions on lump sum appropriations. Villar, however, said spending items have been identified.
Companies would find it easier to classify workers as independent contractors rather than employees under proposed rules from the U.S. Department of Labor, published in the Federal Register on Friday.

Thats the exact opposite of the direction California took with AB5, the states new gig-work law. In fact, Labor Secretary Eugene Scalia took aim at AB5s radical changes in a Fox Business opinion piece promoting the proposed rules.

Even if the proposal becomes a rule, it will not change Californias approach, the Labor Department and legal experts said. AB5, which makes it harder to say workers are independent contractors, would take precedence.

Still, for the gig companies based here that are fighting to keep workers as independent contractors, both in court and via Proposition 22, a ballot measure that would exempt them from AB5, the proposed rules could prove welcome for their operations elsewhere.

It gives a lot more flexibility to Uber and Lyft and other gig companies outside of California and other states with similar tests, said Sandy Rappaport, a management-side employment lawyer and partner at Hanson Bridgett in San Francisco.

Uber and Lyft did not respond to requests for comment.

Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press 2019

Other types of businesses that prefer to keep workers as contractors might also embrace the guidelines.

The rule seems like its tailor-made for the gig companies, but it has implications far beyond that, said Rebecca Smith, director of work structures at the National Employment Law Project. It could affect home care, janitorial, delivery, construction and other sectors. It gives employers and corporations a lot more leeway in calling workers independent contractors. She said that would be detrimental to workers, who would not be covered by laws about minimum wage, overtime and even child labor.

Camille Olson of law firm Seyfarth, which represents corporations, including some gig-economy companies she declined to name, said the proposal provides a streamlined way to determine status.

In her view, both businesses and workers should find that helpful. It clarifies what the rules are and finally embraces that independent contractors are here to stay, she said. It supports the significant changes in the economy that have resulted from technology that provided consumers with access to new services and goods.

The rules, part of the Fair Labor Standards Act, cover laws like minimum wage and overtime. They would not supersede laws in states such as California that enacted their own legislation. But they could still sway judges nationwide, in states that dont have different regulations.

The Department of Labor interpretation of facts is given deference by a lot of courts, Olson said.

The practical effect would be to favor businesses over workers substantially, said William Gould, an emeritus law professor at Stanford and former chair of the National Labor Relations Board, noting that companies would save substantially by avoiding the costs of employment. These guidelines favor independent contractor status.

Another impact, Gould said, might be to create a sharper divide between states like California that have their own tougher laws regulating contractor status, and those that rely on federal guidelines. Many of the so-called blue states may scramble to adopt something akin to what weve done here in California, while red states would double down and take advantage of the easier path to contractor status, he said.

For gig companies, the rules would reduce the likelihood of their being sued over employer status in other states and increase the chance that they would prevail in such cases.

Andrew Harnik / Associated Press

It even could allow companies like Uber and Lyft to provide more training and benefits in other states without fearing that that would jeopardize drivers independent contractor status.

Providing non-employee workers with training, information, and guidance in compliance with applicable rules, would be feasible, Olson said. In addition, providing a benefit would not be seen as an indicia of employment status under this formulation of the economic realities test.

The federal guidelines look at just two factors. The first is a workers control over their work, such as the ability to choose assignments, pick hours, do tasks without supervision and work for a rival. The second is the workers control over their earnings based on their personal initiative  if they can make more money by how they manage their time, assets, equipment or other workers, for instance.

If the worker controls those key aspects of their job and has some control over how much money they make, then they are independent contractors, said John Polson, partner at Fisher & Phillips, which represents management.

If need be, there are three tie-breaking considerations: how much skill is needed, how permanent is the relationship and whether the worker is integrated into the workforce.

By contrast, Californias AB5 says workers are employees unless they meet all the criteria of an ABC test: A, they work free from a companys control; B, they do work outside the companys regular business; and C, they have an independent enterprise doing that type of work.

Smith said the Labor Department guidelines flip some of those criteria. A business could control workers to minute details, but if workers have a second job or choose their hours, it could be argued that the workers have control and are therefore independent contractors, she said.

Air Quality Tracker Check levels down to the neighborhood Ratings for the Bay Area and California, updated every 10 minutes

Independent contractor status has become a hot-button issue in D.C. as well as California.

Corporations prefer classifying workers as freelancers, because it gives them more flexibility and allows them to avoid costs such as minimum wage, overtime and benefits. Unions prefer that workers become employees, saying that status would prevent their exploitation, while also eyeing the possibility to organize those employees.

The Trump administration has issued other opinions seeking to make it easier for companies to say that workers are independent contractors.

The Democratic ticket of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris supports the ABC test used in California. Elizabeth Warren, Harris and other Democratic senators, as well as the independent Bernie Sanders, support the Protecting Right to Organize (PRO) Act, which would implement the ABC test nationally.

Experts said it appears the Labor Department is rushing to make the proposal a rule before a potential new administration would take office. A 30-day comment period started Friday. After that, Labor would publish a revised version that would become regulation.

Once that happens, it would be harder for a new administration to unwind it, Polson said.

A new Department of Labor appointed by Biden could start new rule-making, but it could not just say never mind and reverse it, he said. It could take longer than it took to pump out this rule because theyd actually be changing an existing regulation, which is a lot more difficult than issuing initial regulations.

However, theres another option that he and other lawyers expect to happen if the proposal goes forward: State attorney generals could sue to block it.

That happened this year with a similarly corporate-friendly regulation on joint employers, which absolved companies such as fast-food giants of responsibility for employment policies at individual franchises. California Attorney General Xavier Becerra joined the attorneys general of 16 other states to sue in March.

Early this month a New York Federal District Court ruled that a key part of that rule was invalid.

Carolyn Said is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: csaid@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @csaid
WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump has told people around him that on Saturday he plans to nominate federal appeals court judge Amy Coney Barrett to fill the Supreme Court vacancy left by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, putting forth a nominee who, if confirmed, would ensure a solid conservative majority on the high court for years to come, according to people familiar with the matter.

Democrats have little chance to block the nominee, but a bitter Senate battle looms in the weeks ahead of the Nov. 3 election, the results of which Trump has said may end up before the high court.

Barrett's confirmation would replace a liberal icon with a deeply conservative jurist whose views suggest she might vote to further limit abortion rights, an issue that animates conservative Republicans and evangelical voters.

EXCLUSIVE: Ted Cruz explains how Supreme Court vacancy led him to endorse Trump in 2016

Barrett, 48, could hold the lifetime seat for decades. She would join two other relatively young, deeply conservative jurists chosen for the high court by Trump. Trump's first two appointments, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, are in their 50s. The trio would represent one-third of the body and form a new 6-3 conservative majority.

The people familiar with the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the decision has not been announced, cautioned that Trump could always change his mind ahead of the announcement but said he is telling others that Barrett is his pick. She is the only candidate he is known to have met with about the vacancy. Administration officials and campaign advisers were preparing for a Barrett announcement, and remarks for the president disclosing her as his choice have already been written, according to these people.

The White House declined to comment.

Trump spoke to reporters briefly upon his return to Washington on Friday. He said he had made a decision but would not confirm that the choice was Barrett.

"I'll be announcing it tomorrow, my decision," he said. "In my own mind, I have, and I'll be announcing the decision tomorrow. It's very exciting."

Trump gave a knowing smile as reporters asked about Barrett, whom he called "outstanding."

On HoustonChronicle.com: Ted Cruz blocks resolution honoring Ruth Bader Ginsburg, objects to mention of her dying wish

"You'll find out tomorrow," he said.

Trump said he did not meet with Judge Barbara Lagoa of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit during his overnight stay in Miami, where she lives. Lagoa was considered the other top choice.

Trump has urged the Senate to act swiftly in hope that his nominee will be confirmed before Election Day, an extraordinarily fast timeline and a mark of how Trump plans to use the prospect of an ironclad conservative majority as an election issue.

Barrett is a favorite of religious conservatives and is already battle-tested after going through a ferocious confirmation fight in 2017 for her seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit. She was confirmed on a 55-to-43 vote.

Republicans also hope that for moderates such as Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, her gender will make her a more palatable replacement for Ginsburg, a feminist icon who devoted her legal career to gender equality. Trump had said he would consider only women to fill the seat and quickly narrowed the list to Barrett and a handful of others.

Trump considered Barrett in 2018 to replace Justice Anthony Kennedy, who was retiring. This time, she was the favorite among several Trump advisers, including White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and Vice President Mike Pence.

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Barrett is a devout Catholic who faced questions about the role of her religion in her legal philosophy during her appeals court confirmation hearing. She said then that as an appellate judge she would "follow all Supreme Court precedent without fail" and would regard decisions such as Roe v. Wade as binding precedent.

"I would never impose my own personal convictions upon the law," she added.

Democrats pointed to comments she had made years before about a legal career being a means to an end, "and that end is building the Kingdom of God."

She had also previously written that judges shouldn't be held to upholding Supreme Court precedents.

Other candidates for the high court vacancy included Judge Allison Jones Rushing of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit and Deputy White House Counsel Kate Comerford Todd.

Trump's reelection rallies have featured chants of "Fill that seat," an echo of his 2016 campaign slogan "Build that wall," and his campaign offered T-shirts with the Supreme Court-themed slogan to donors days after Ginsburg's death.

Democrats have complained about the fairness of making such a replacement when voting in the presidential election already has begun. They call Republicans hypocrites for refusing to hold a confirmation vote in 2016 when President Barack Obama sought to fill the seat of Justice Antonin Scalia upon his death in that election year.

Democrats are hoping to use the pick to mobilize liberal and swing voters by focusing on the implications of a more conservative court for issues such as health care. The high court is set to hear oral arguments on the latest bid to strike down the Affordable Care Act - a suit brought by 18 Republican states that is backed by the Trump administration - on Nov. 10, one week after the election. Republicans have offered no plan for replacing the law, which extended health insurance to some 20 million Americans.

They also hope to convince voters that the pick is being rushed and that whoever wins the presidential election should pick Ginsburg's replacement.

A majority of Americans oppose efforts by Trump and the Republican-led Senate to fill the vacancy before the election, with most supporters of Democratic nominee Joe Biden saying the issue has raised the stakes of the election, according to a Washington Post-ABC News poll released Friday. The poll, conducted Monday to Thursday, found that 38 percent of Americans say the replacement for Ginsburg, who died last week, should be nominated by Trump and confirmed by the current Senate, while 57 percent say it should be left to the winner of the presidential election and a Senate vote next year.

Republicans plan to move to confirm Trump's pick as quickly as possible.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., began mobilizing his ranks last week to confirm whomever Trump chose. Only two GOP senators - Collins and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska - have said they oppose voting on Trump's pick before Nov. 3, while GOP support has only grown for Trump's public demand for Senate Republicans to hold a vote by then.

Democrats have argued that the Senate has never confirmed a nominee to the Supreme Court between July and Election Day in a presidential year, but they currently lack the votes to stop hearings and a vote in the Republican-led Senate.

Trump appeared to have secured the votes needed to confirm his nominee days before he even named a candidate, and the White House predicts Republicans will stick together.

Abortion, access to health care, gun rights and the death penalty are all issues that are or may again soon be before the high court.

Ginsburg's sudden death jolted the presidential race, making a theoretical question about Trump's second-term options an issue in his reelection fight. Trump trails Biden in national and some swing-state polls with fewer than 40 days until Election Day.

Trump has directly tied the confirmation of a Supreme Court justice to the presidential election, predicting Wednesday that cases challenging the results would end up before the nation's high court.

"I think this will end up in the Supreme Court. And I think it's very important that we have nine justices," Trump said when asked if he felt an urgency to fill the seat before the election because of the possibility of lawsuits around voting.

The court's term begins Oct. 5. The court can meet with only eight justices, but the even number raises the possibility of a tie if emergency election-related challenges come to the court.

The current eight include three liberals, who with Ginsburg could sometimes prevail over the four-member deeply conservative wing with the help of Chief Justice John Roberts Jr., a more moderate conservative. Roberts's improbable role of swing vote would likely end with this confirmation, court observers expect.

Trump, who has warned baselessly of voter fraud and corruption in the upcoming election, said he wants his nominee confirmed so she can rule on any legal challenges to the presidential election results.

"It's better if you go before the election, because I think this, this scam that the Democrats are pulling - it's a scam - the scam will be before the United States Supreme Court," he said. "And I think having a 4-4 situation is not a good situation."

The "scam" Trump claims is happening refers to the decision by states to allow most Americans the option to vote by mail in the face of the coronavirus pandemic, when people might be scared to vote in person. There is no evidence that mailing in ballots will lead to the kind of widespread corruption Trump has suggested.

Trump said an election case that goes before the Supreme Court should get a vote of "eight-nothing or nine-nothing."

"But just in case it would be more political than it should be, I think it's very important to have a ninth justice," he said.

Trump has told advisers that he relishes a fight over the seat because it changes the topic of the campaign from the pandemic and shows voters he is fighting for them, and that he believes Democrats will overplay their hand.

Ginsburg served 27 years on the high court before her death last week at 87, of complications from cancer.

As a lawyer in the 1970s, Ginsburg argued six cases before the Supreme Court, helping to chip away and eventually topple the legal wall of gender inequality. At a commemoration at the high court on Wednesday, Roberts noted that she wrote 483 opinions and dissents in her tenure, a legacy that will "steer the court for decades."

Ginsburg's body lay in repose at the court Wednesday and Thursday and lay in state at the Capitol on Friday. She is to be buried Sunday at Arlington National Cemetery, alongside her husband, Martin Ginsburg, who died in 2010.
Ambulances line up outside Maimonides Medical Center, as the spread of the CCP virus continues, in the Borough Park area of Brooklyn, N.Y., on Sept. 25, 2020. (Brendan McDermid/Reuters)

New Yorks Daily CCP Virus Cases Top 1,000 for First Time in Months

New York state officials on Saturday reported 1,005 new CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus cases in 24 hours, the sharpest increase in nearly four months.

The new cases represented about 1 percent of the 99,953 tests conducted on Friday, Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, said in a statement.

The state has 527 COVID-19 patients in hospitals. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the CCP virus.

New York health officials recorded 908 positive cases on Thursday and 955 on Wednesday.

The increase in cases was happening as officials continued loosening restrictions, allowing many New York City schools to open for in-person instruction next week. Officials have also let more businesses reopen in recent weeks.

New York was hit the hardest of any state by COVID-19, which kills a small percentage of patients, primarily those with comorbidities. Over 25,000 patients have died with COVID-19, according to the state Health Department, including over 13,000 with hypertension.

Officials in New York were telling people to continue going out until March and Cuomo imposed an order on nursing homes that critics said led to more deaths than would have happened otherwise. The Department of Justice is probing that matter, which the governor has said is spurred by politics. Hes pointed to an internal report that claimed infected nursing home staffers, not patients, spread the virus.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo speaks during a daily media briefing at the Office of the Governor of the State of New York in New York City on July 23, 2020. (Jeenah Moon/Getty Images)

Alarming rises in case counts have prompted several other state leaders to take action this week.

Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers, a Democrat, declared a new public health emergency over the spread of the CCP virus at colleges.

We need folks to start taking this seriously, and young people especiallyplease stay home as much as you are able, skip heading to the bars, and wear a mask whenever you go out. We need your help to stop the spread of this virus, and we all have to do this together, he said in a statement.

According to a Johns Hopkins University tracker, the number of daily cases in the United States increased to over 55,000 on Friday, after dipping to under 25,000 on Sept. 7. The number had been above 50,000 every day for most of July and several days in August.

Other leaders are joining Cuomo in relaxing restrictions.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, lifted all restrictions on restaurants, which can now operate as they would pre-pandemic.

I think that this will be very very important to the industry and it also will be a recognition that they have worked as hard as anybody to create safe environments, DeSantis told a news conference.

In fact, the idea that government dictating this is better than them making these decisions so that their customers have confidence I think is misplaced.
The Permanent Court of Arbitration's ruling is the key for ASEAN countries in the fight for a law-based order with the central role of ASEAN to achieve the goal of peace, stability and dynamism.

VietNamNet would like to introduce the second part of Ambassador Nguyen Hong Thao's article.

After four years, the impact of the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA)s ruling has divided countries into two groups. The ASEAN countries that directly or indirectly involve in the East Sea disputes, all adjusted their positions according to the ruling and all agree in common that UNCLOS is the only legal basis for the settlement of maritime disputes.

The 36th ASEAN Summit on June 26, 2020 affirmed that the UNCLOS is the basis for defining maritime titles, sovereignty rights, jurisdiction and legitimate interests in the seas and the UNCLOS defines the legal framework for the conduct of all ocean and marine operations.

The ruling encourages and serves as a fulcrum for ASEAN countries in their struggle for a law-based order with the central role of ASEAN to achieve the goal of peace, stability and dynamism.

China tries to interpret the UNCLOS in a way that benefits itself

Chinese militia fishing vessel escorting Hai Duong 8 geological survey ship operated illegally in Vietnams Tu Chinh (Vanguard bank)

China is alone in its arguments on historic rights and requirements that all entities, regardless of whether they are land features or semi-submersible, submerged entities, have sovereignty and territorial waters, which go against the provisions of international law, including UNCLOS. While the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson at a press conference on July 17, 2020 said that Okinotori in the East China Sea is a rock, not an island, and does not have the right to have exclusive economic zones and continental shelf.

So what's the difference between Okinotori and land features in the East Sea? Is it a double standard that interpretes UNCLOS in its favor, not derived from the common perception of the international community?

China increases threats and oppression

The rulings increasing presence in the political and legal life of the region is partly in part due to an increase in Chinese activities of intimidation and repulsion of fishing boats and fishermen of other countries in the East Sea. In 2019, Chinese vessels abandoned 22 Filipino fishermen who were sunk in the sea. Chinese geological research vessel Haiyang Dizhi 8 entered Vietnams block 06.01. In 2020, China regularly used repressive power, with higher frequencies covering all of the seas within the 9-dash line.

Vietnamese fishing vessels were hit to sunken, Filipino ships were locked by Chinese vessels, Indonesia discovered Chinese ships around Natura and West Capella was harassed in the Malaysian continental shelf, Noble Clyde Boudreaux terminated its exploration and evaluation contract and Repsol withdrew from lots near Tu Chinh (Vanguard bank) all showed signs of intimidation from China.

The peak is that China defiantly announced the establishment of two administrative districts of Nansha and Xisha in April 2020. That is not to mention the activities of naming submerged entities on the Vietnamese continental shelf, setting up scientific research stations on artificial islands, sending fighter jets to Truong Sa and Hoang Sa, increasing exercises in the East Sea, maintaining a fishing ban and a ban on seabed activities under the Blue Sea Code campaign launched in April 2020.

Legal solution

The ruling sets the precedent for countries to pursue a legal solution when one party insists on having "undisputed sovereignty", "have been governing the islands and the sea for thousands of year" without convincing evidence and just want to use force.

However, a legal solution is only the last resort when negotiation comes to a deadlock and war is close. A good ruling if not being implemented will not lead to the desired results. The more countries support it, the more likely the ruling will become the coercive customary rules of international law.

The principle of "Land dominates the sea" from the 1969 North Sea continental shelf ruling has become a recognized customary rule. The power of justice and international public opinion will bring the full enforcement of the ruling.

There are precedents such as the nuclear weapons trials of New Zealand and Australias lawsuit against France in 1974; Nicaragua suing the US in 1985; or the Netherlands suing Russia in 2013 in case of the Arctic Sunrise ship of the Green Peace Organization ... were initially rejected, but after decades the rulings were quietly implemented.

Not only the governments but people all over the world, especially the Chinese people, need to know the ruling, to the "non-negotiable" conclusion of the ruling. Any attempt to put its own rules on top of the UNCLOS cannot go against the wheel of history.

Nguyen Hong Thao
Eagles defensive tackle Fletcher Cox will be a game-time decision prior to Sundays Week 3 matchup against the Cincinnati Bengals.

The Pro Bowl lineman was given a questionable tag on Friday.

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Cox was a limited participant in practice to end the week after missing the first two workouts on Wednesday and Thursday respectively.

If Cox cant play against the Bengals, the Eagles will rely on high-priced players like Javon Hargrave and Malik Jackson at the defensive tackle position. The team will also use Hassan Ridgeway in the defensive tackle rotation.

The Eagles could also choose to elevate veteran defensive tackle T.Y. McGill, who was active for the teams Week 1 loss to Washington. McGill has been on the practice squad for the past three weeks and knows the system through three stints in Philadelphia.

Safety Rudy Ford (groin) and wide receivers Jalen Reagor (thumb) and Alshon Jeffery (foot), as expected, were all ruled out for the Week 3 matchup.

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Here is the full Eagles injury report for Week 3:

OUT: WR Alshon Jeffery (foot), S Rudy Ford (groin), WR Jalen Reagor (thumb)

Questionable: DT Fletcher Cox (abdomen)

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Mike Kaye may be reached at mkaye@njadvancemedia.com. Tell us your coronavirus story or send a tip here.
An SAS soldier who received a bravery medal after single-handedly defeating jihadis during a Nairobi hotel siege has quit the elite regiment after he was shunned by colleagues, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.

Footage of the Special Forces heros solo mission in the Kenyan capital in January 2018 was seen around the world, and he was awarded the Conspicuous Gallantry Cross (CGC), the UKs second-highest military award.

But the crack soldier was so shaken by his treatment from SAS colleagues that he has walked out of the regiments Hereford base and, to the dismay of his former bosses, is disclosing details about his mission on social media.

Using the pseudonym Chris Craighead on Instagram, the veteran has uploaded photos of his Special Forces career, including the picture of him masked and studying last-minute plans before entering the hotel.

A photo of him bursting through a hotel door clutching an assault rifle has the caption: There are events in our lives which remind us that, as always, Who Dares Wins  the motto of the SAS.

An SAS soldier, who was awarded the Conspicuous Gallantry Cross (CGC), has quit the elite regiment after he was shunned by colleagues

Last night senior defence officials said they were deeply concerned about the former soldiers Instagram profile, which could force military chiefs to take legal action. Under strict rules, Special Forces troops must not discuss their missions in public or seek to cash in on operations.

The rules were introduced following the furore over books by ex-troopers Chris Ryan and Andy McNab which dramatically raised the SASs public profile and led to concerns over Special Forces troops leaking sensitive information which could compromise future operations.

The SAS veteran, who is engaged to official White House photographer Shealah Craighead and recently dined with US President Donald Trump, uses Instagram to promote equipment and weapons favoured by SAS troops  though it is unclear whether he is paid for the endorsements.

A source said: We are worried about his actions online and we want to avoid any legal dispute with him.

He is vulnerable, having only recently left the regiment where he felt undervalued by colleagues.

Senior officials said they wanted to speak to him urgently in case he reveals his identity or any sensitive information about Special Forces operations.

Top brass are also alarmed at apparent plans for a book and a film about the Africa mission and the mans friendship with Ryan, who launched a literary and film career after the Bravo Two Zero mission in the 1991 Gulf War in Iraq.

But friends of the disgruntled veteran say the blame lies with SAS officers and troops who denied him credit for his action. One said: There was a very bitchy response inside the SAS camp to him getting a CGC.

The shunned veteran was stationed in Kenya to help train the nations soldiers when heavily armed jihadis from the al-Shabaab terror group seized the Dusit D2 luxury hotel complex

At the time, other blokes had been fighting Islamic State in Iraq and Syria for months without any official recognition.

Nobody outside the regiment will ever learn what they did. So they turned their back on him, which was really harsh.

He deserved several pats on the back and it is such a shame his SAS career has ended like this.

The shunned veteran was stationed in Kenya to help train the nations soldiers when heavily armed jihadis from the al-Shabaab terror group seized the Dusit D2 luxury hotel complex, setting fire to vehicles, detonating explosions and embarking on a mass shooting.

The 19-hour siege left 21 dead, including British charity worker Luke Potter.

The SAS veteran did not respond to messages sent to him on Instagram, asking for a comment.

A spokesman for the Ministry of Defence said it did not comment on Special Forces.
Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khanled Cabinet has failed to take up the serious issue of deadly attacks on journalists and media persons in the country in any of its first 62 meetings held between September 1, 2018 and January 30, 2020, a media report said on Saturday.

In a statement issued on Friday by Freedom Network --a local media and development sector watchdog -- said it got the information from the government after it filed a request to know if the Cabinet had ever discussed the issue of attacks on journalists in its meeting, the Dawn newspaper reported.

Despite multiple attacks targeting journalists and media persons, the federal cabinet did not take up the issue in any of its first 62 meetings that were held between September 1, 2018 and January 30, 2020, the report said.

The media watchdog said that between September 1, 2018 and January 30, 2020, seven journalists and a blogger were murdered, six media persons were kidnapped and 15 were nominated in different legal cases.

Additionally, the Freedom Network said, 135 "violations" against media persons were reported.

Freedom Network had filed a request with the government in February of this year "to seek official information on how many times the issue of the growing number of murders, attacks and intimidation of journalists was taken up by the Cabinet".

The government provided the information last month.

A total of 62 meetings of the federal cabinet were held during the period of 1 September 2018 to 30 January 2020. The subject issues of safety of journalists and impunity of crimes against the media was not on the agenda during the time-interval under discussion, Cabinet Divisions Section Officer Jamil Ahmed informed the Freedom Network through the Federal Information Commission.

Iqbal Khattak , the media watchdog's Executive Director, while commenting on the information, said it was "alarming that the highest governance forum in the country remained oblivious to the aggravated levels of violence against journalists and other information practitioners, including murders and attacks".

This official disregard to violence against the media and its practitioners is a direct contributor to the high levels of impunity that attackers and intimidators enjoy in Pakistan, putting the country in the list of top 10 most dangerous places in the world to practice journalism, the media watchdog said.

He urged Prime Minister Khan to "urgently materialise his promise" to table a bill ensuring the safety of journalists and information practitioners.

The press statement mentioned that the bill has been drafted by the government but has been "pending for a long time now".

The watchdog recalled that Pakistan had endorsed the United Nations Plan of Action on the Safety of Journalists and Issues of Impunity in October 2013, when the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz was in power.

"This plan includes a commitment to introduce a special law on safety of journalists," the statement said.

The statement by the Freedom Network comes on the same day when Human Rights Minister Shireen Mazari refuted reports that the Federal Investigation Agency had registered cases against journalists and rights activists under the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act (PECA), 2016.

"FIA examines all complaints but no FIR has been registered and FIA can't register a report under PECA without following the specified legal procedure," the minister said in a tweet, adding that if anyone had "contrary evidence in terms of FIRs", they should inform her so that she can follow up.

Mazari was responding to a tweet posted on Thursday by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) which said it was "alarmed" by reports that cases against "49 journalists and social media activists" had been registered by the FIA under PECA, the report said.
Rabih Abdulrahman (pictured), 37, has been jailed after running over and killing a 12-year-old boy in Sydney last year

The heartbroken mother of a 12-year-old boy who was tragically killed by a drug driver on his way to school still makes her son's bed every morning.

Rabih Abdulrahman, 37, had a potentially fatal amount of ice in his system when he ran over the Year 7 student who had been walking to school in Hurstville, in Sydney's south-west, in September last year.

The 12-year-old, who can't be named for legal reasons, had been crossing at a green walk signal before he was struck by Abdulrahman's white Toyota Corolla.

As onlookers tried desperately to save the young boys life, Abdulrahman lit a cigarette and began deleting messages on his phone.

The 37-year-old pleaded guilty to manslaughter and driving while disqualified, and on Friday was jailed for six years and ten months, the Daily Telegraph reported.

The little boy's father described his final moments with his 'happy' child before he passed away in hospital.

The young boy, 12, (pictured) - who can not be named for legal reasons - was rushed to hospital but died soon after

Abdulrahman was unlicensed and had been serving a community sentence since last October when he ran a red light and hit the 12-year-old boy at Hurstville, in Sydney's south

'I could only touch his cold forehead and gently hold his hand. I knew he would never be able to call me dad again,' he said in the Downing Centre court on Friday.

The father said his wife was unable to cope with the 'endless missing' of her son in her life, asking for his killer to be given the harshest of penalties.

'(She) prepares (his) bed in perfect order and places his once favourite things on top of it, as if still with us,' he said.

The 12-year-old's father said it made their 'hearts chill' to think their son's killer 'did not rescue him'.

Abdulrahman said he'd been drug-free since the accident and begged the child's family to forgive him for his 'stupid mistake', adding he was 'deeply sorry'.

'I have a son that is the same age as the boy and all I think is if it was his life that was taken,' Abdulrahman said.

Before the 12-year-old was killed, Abdulrahman had been speeding and had driven through a red light.

He was also under the influence of other drugs including MDMA, diazepam, and methadone.

Abdulrahman said he'd been drug-free since the accident and begged the child's family to forgive him for his 'stupid mistake', adding he was 'deeply sorry'

Flowers are seen outside Bexleys Sydney Technical High School where the Year 7 student had been hit

The young student was rushed to hospital but died from his injuries hours later

The student suffered severe injuries to his head and shoulders which sent him into cardiac arrest.

According to court documents, the level of methylamphetamine in Abdulrahman's blood was 'well within the reported toxic to potentially fatal range'.

When police arrived at the scene of the crash, Abdulrahman was 'uncooperative and agitated', while offering no help to those giving first aid. Officers later found a syringe in his car.

He told police he had taken it three days earlier. He also said he takes morphine every day for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

'I've got f***ing PTSD. I need my medication,' he said.

Abdulrahman initially lied to police, telling them: 'I got hit by a car, it's not my fault.'

While being interviewed at a police station he said: 'go look for the car that hit me! I didn't mean to kill anyone, give me f***ing bail'.

Abdulrahman previously served jail time for being an accessory to manslaughter after a drug deal went wrong.

Documents showed that in May 2005, Abdulrahman had been at a unit at Bexley, near Hurstville, when a man was shot dead during a dispute over a drug deal.

Police arrested and charged the shooter, before later intercepting phone calls where Abdulrahman told his mother he knew the identity of the gunman.

Abdulrahman initially lied to police, telling them: 'I got hit by a car, it's not my fault.'

Abdulrahman (pictured following his arrest) had a toxic amount of ice in his system at the time of the crash

Agreed facts state that in the days after the shooting, Abdulrahman also helped 'to hinder (in the shooter's) apprehension, trial and punishment'.

Abdulrahman initially denied being at the unit, but eventually entered a guilty plea.

He was sentenced to a minimum two years imprisonment which was allowed to be served as weekend detention.

Since being released from jail, Abdulrahman was then convicted of assaulting a policeman, driving under the influence of drugs , carrying a weapon in a public place and resisting arrest.

He was serving a corrections order in the community but was banned from driving.

The court heard he had also had substance abuse issues for the last 13 years.

Abdulrahman will be eligible for parole on April 5, 2024.
Amid protracted India-China stand-off in eastern Ladakh, 131 young soldiers joined the prestigious Ladakh Scouts regiment in Leh on Saturday.

Attestation Parade was held on Saturday at the Ladakh Scouts Regimental Centre, Leh to mark the entry of 131 well-trained recruits into the Ladakh Scouts Regiment as young soldiers. Due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, the profound ceremony was conducted without the parents of the recruits following all the norms and advisories. The attestation parade was conducted in the highest traditions of the Indian Army and reviewed by Brigadier Arun CG, deputy general officer commanding, Leh Sub Area, said a defence spokesperson.

The soldiers, hailing from all across Ladakh, took oath in unison to serve the nation.

Also read: India and Japan to tie-up for 5G technologies, QUAD to pitch in

Arun CG congratulated them and urged them to devote their lives in the service to the nation as proud soldiers of the Indian Army.

He exhorted the young soldiers to continue to strive hard in pursuit of excellence in all spheres of the profession and take a solemn vow to uphold the sovereignty of the nation against all odds in the true spirit signified by the ethos of the Indian Army, said the spokesperson.

The young riflemen were awarded medals for their outstanding performance during the training.

It was indeed a proud moment for the recruits who hail from far-flung areas of Ladakh to join the Ladakh Scouts Regiment as soldiers.

On June 15 at least 20 Indian soldiers laid down their lives in the line of duty while combating Chinese troops at the Galwan valley.

Week after the incident Prime Minister Narendra Modi had visited Leh to review the ongoing border conflict.
Former Kaduna lawmaker, Shehu Sani has condemned the attack on Governor of Borno States convoy by Boko Haram. It was gathered that the gove...

Former Kaduna lawmaker, Shehu Sani has condemned the attack on Governor of Borno States convoy by Boko Haram.

It was gathered that the governors convoy was ambushed shortly after leaving Monguno by suspected Boko Haram fighters at Kekano village.

According to reports, 12 policemen, 13 civilians and 5 soldiers were confirmed dead from the attack.

The incident occurred around 2pm while the convoy was heading to Baga town ahead of governments plan to return internally displaced persons (IDPs) from Maiduguri to Baga

The terrorists also seized and carted away one police armoured car, one gun truck belonging to the military and six government vehicles.

Reacting to the attack, Sani advised Gov. Zulum to exercise great caution in areas still under control by Boko Haram and be well protected.

He condoled with the families of security agencies who died in the process.

Sani on his Twitter page wrote: The attacks on the convoy of Governor Zulum by the Insurgents again is condemnable.

The Governor must be well protected. In view of this, he should exercise greater caution in areas still controlled by the terror group.

My condolences to the families of the policemen lost.
Claiming Indias rightful space in the United Nations, Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his 21-minute address to the 75th session of United Nations General Assembly, said that there was a serious need for introspection for the United Nations". Modi said that the need of the hour was reform in the responses, in the processes, and in the very character of the United Nations".

The prime minister said the people of India have been waiting for a long time for the process for the reforms of the United Nations to get completed". He added, Today, people of India are concerned whether this reform-process will ever reach its logical conclusion. For how long will India be kept out of the decision-making structures of the United Nations?"

India had in its limited capacity done so much over the years, Prime Minister Modi said, from building international solar alliance, sending its troops to over 50 international peacekeeping missions to distributing essential medicines and supplies during the outbreak of Coronavirus epidemic.

Even during these very difficult times of the raging pandemic, the pharmaceutical industry of India has sent essential medicines to more than 150 countries. As the largest vaccine producing country of the world, I want to give one more assurance to the global community today. Indias vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis," Modi assured the world through his address.

He said that India was moving ahead with phase 3 clinical trials. India will also help all the countries in enhancing their cold chain and storage capacities for the delivery of the vaccines," Modi said.

For the last eight months, Modi asked, when the world has been struggling with Coronavirus, where is the United Nations in this joint fight against the pandemic? Where is its effective response?"

While the UN has done so much, Modi said, in avoiding a third world war, for instance, but he added that the world has since seen so many wars and civil wars. Therefore, the international community today is faced with a very important question: Whether the character of the institution, constituted in the prevailing circumstances of 1945, is relevant even today?" Modi asked.

When we were strong," Modi said in his address to the UNGA, we were never a threat to the world, when we were weak, we never become a burden on the worldYour Excellency, How long would a country have to wait particularly when the transformational changes happening in that country affect a large part of the world?"

In what may be read as reference to some strategic alliances India has struck after the violent face-off with China in Ladakh, Modi said, Any gesture of friendship by India towards one country is not directed against any third country. When India strengthens its development partnership, it is not with any malafide intent of making the partner country dependent or hapless."
Chinese state developer Poly Developments and Holdings will cut jobs at its Australian real estate arm as it moves to slow capital investments in Australia amid a coronavirus pandemic-led downturn and souring relations between the two countries.

On Thursday afternoon, Poly Australia told more than 100 employees across its offices in Sydney and Melbourne that a "substantial" number of staff will be cut by the end of the year as the company restructures to cope with the impact of Covid-19 and Australia's first recession in nearly 30 years, according to people briefed on the decision.

The specific number of job cuts at Poly Australia, which is ultimately owned by state-owned China Poly Group, is unknown, but follows on from news that Huawei Technologies will cut jobs from its Australia operations amid growing tensions between Beijing and Canberra.

Get the latest insights and analysis from our Global Impact newsletter on the big stories originating in China.

Poly Australia denied rumours that it had been tapped by Beijing to leave the Australian market entirely, saying it will instead scale down its investments and exercise caution with regard to future projects.

"The global economic challenges flowing from Covid-19 have been felt across all parts of the Australian economy. These challenges place a responsibility on the management of companies such as Poly Global to ensure that we survive the downturn so we can thrive if conditions improve," a company spokesman said.

The company burst onto the Australian property scene in 2016 as a housing developer buying up numerous pieces of land, spending heavily on projects and expanding quickly into commercial property investment, funds management and private debt lending as the property market boomed.

The spokesman added that the company would now take a more passive business approach, focusing on asset management as opposed to the more frantic housing development scene.

Story continues

According to the latest top 100 real estate company rankings by China Real Estate Information Corporation, China's leading real estate data research firm, Poly is the 10th largest property company in China.

The Australian property market peaked in 2018, and as it has continued to decline during the pandemic, it is understood many apartment projects, including those by Poly, have struggled to sell.

Last week, Australian press reported Poly had ditched negotiations on a land deal with major local property group Lendlease following months of tensions between the two countries and new concerns the conflict could spill over into Chinese investments and businesses in Australia.

Last week, Australian press reported Poly had ditched negotiations on a land deal with major local property group Lendlease following months of tensions between the two countries. New concerns were also raised by the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs last week that the conflict could spill over into Chinese investments and businesses operating in Australia.

The China-Australian relationship has been on the decline since Australia announced it would coordinate an investigation into the origins of the coronavirus in April, and aside from trade sanctions, journalists from both countries have been targeted in recent weeks.

On Thursday, two Australians, Clive Hamilton, who wrote a book on Chinese influence in Australia, and Alex Joske, an analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, a think tank partially funded by the Australian Department of Defence, were banned from entering China.

China's foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said on Thursday that China had the sovereign right to decide which foreigners to allow into the country.

Australia relies heavily on foreign investments, with the United States with A$983.7 billion (US$699 billion) and Britain with A$686 billion worth of investments at the end of 2019, its biggest foreign investors.

Despite being Australia's biggest trading partner with two-way trade between China and Australia worth around A$240 billion (US$171 billion) per year, China is only the ninth biggest foreign investor with A$78 billion.

But aside from Huawei and Poly, there are no signs of a mass exodus of Chinese companies from Australia, with the number of Chinese businesses in Australia having grown substantially since the onset of Australia's east coast property boom in 2013.

Helen Sawczak, the recently departed chief executive of the largest China-Australia business club, the Australia China Business Council, said a sudden decoupling would be unlikely as Chinese investors in Australia take a long-term view with their overseas ventures.

"The current tensions are temporary. Business remains confident," she said.

More broadly, China's "going out policy", referring to companies expanding abroad that was launched around 2000, is a long-term strategy for China, according to Hongying Wang, a Chinese politics professor at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada.

"It is a necessity based on China's need for overseas markets, resources and technology. The current pushback against Chinese investment makes the situation difficult for Chinese companies seeking to go out, as does the economic slowdown that began before the pandemic ... but in the long run, Chinese companies will likely continue their expansion abroad," she said.

Chinese companies told the South China Morning Post that they were committed to staying in Australia, but some said they would be watching the US presidential election closely, indicating a win for incumbent Donald Trump could cast a further shadow on the China-Australian relationship.

Foreign affairs experts said China's end game with trade sanctions against Australia, such as anti-dumping duties on the Australian barley sector, was to encourage Australia not to side with Washington in its agenda to contain China.

This article originally appeared in the South China Morning Post (SCMP), the most authoritative voice reporting on China and Asia for more than a century. For more SCMP stories, please explore the SCMP app or visit the SCMP's Facebook and Twitter pages. Copyright  2020 South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

Copyright (c) 2020. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.
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Linkedin Inforial (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta, Indonesia  Sat, September 26, 2020 06:00 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c4755bf0 4 Inforial Free

We have been spending more time at home, and one of the most popular spaces at home to spend quality time together with our family is the kitchen.

With many now taking the form of the now-trending welcoming, open floor-plan design, a kitchen is not merely a place to cook and eat, but also a place to study, work and entertain.

To be able to serve several purposes, an open-floor kitchen design ideally juxtaposes functionality with aesthetics. The ideal design should also apply to the sink, which is one of the most important parts of the kitchen.

A great choice for an open floor-plan kitchen  which blends harmoniously into the living environment  is hansgrohes new SilicaTec granite range of kitchen sinks. hansgrohe offers a comprehensive range for the kitchen centerpiece, including under mount and top mount single bowl sinks, double bowl sinks and single bowl sinks with a draining board.

Even during the liveliest moments that involve red wine, coffee, tea and even hot pots and pans, owners of SilicaTec kitchen sinks will never need to worry about stains.

SilicaTec features quartz and acrylic resins, providing natural look that is also pleasing to the touch. And that is not all it has to offer, as only rounded quartz particles from quartz sand, the hardest constituent of granite, are processed to make the sink. The result is a smooth, hard and non-porous surface, easy to clean and dirt repellent.

Moreover, SilicaTec is odorless, UV-stable, heat resistant, food safe and impact resistant as well as stain resistant, which explains its durability, even when withstanding the most hectic of kitchen routines.

Simple and sleek: Single bowl sinks make for small, efficient kitchens. (./.)

The fact that the award-winning Phoenix Design Studio is behind the minimalist, linear look of the sinks explains their superiority.

The design is distinguished by a broad rim surface, showcasing the material and providing room for additional features. This wider rim is the connecting element for the innovative two-hole mixer used in hansgrohe sink combination units, including the SilicaTec granite range.

Meanwhile, the overflow is positioned on the right side of the bowl, giving the sink a clean, uncluttered look.

Functionality and aesthetic values aside, the SilicaTec granite range is also highly user-friendly.

All innovative hansgrohe sink combination models in graphite black can be requested with a choice of two intuitive controls.

The controls have been positioned at the front right-hand side of the sink rim for more ease of use.

The first model has a central control unit, which is a lever handle on the front right-hand side of the sink. It can be switched and turned to select precise water temperature and volume. Water flowing from the tap can then be turned on or off by simply pressing the Select button strategically positioned on the spout.

As for the second model, the Select button, which turns water from the multi-spray kitchen tap on and off, is located on the right sink rim.

The bigger, the better: A large sink bowl is available to choose for the homes of daily big feasts. (./.)

Both models allow you to control the flow of water using the back of your hand or elbow, for instance, when your hands are dirty.

Furthermore, to improve the experience of using SilicaTec granite sinks, hansgrohe sBox stows away the hose of the pull-out spray tap in a flat casing that keeps the base cabinet tidy.

The hansgrohe sBox protects the hose from being bumped into by drawers and waste bins, while ensuring comfortable, smooth and quiet functioning. In addition, the sBox enables the use of hoses up to 76cm long, enabling a convenient operating range as well as making it easier to fill vessels near the sink.

Aside from providing users with an improved Kitchen experience, the collaboration between hansgrohe and Phoenix Design reflects the story of the harmonious blend of technology and design that dates back many decades.
I think this will end up in the Supreme Court. And I think its very important that we have nine justices, Trump said during the buildup to the nomination. Its better if you go before the election, because I think this scam that the Democrats are pulling  its a scam  the scam will be before the United States Supreme Court. And I think having a 4-to-4 situation is not a good situation.
Bihar will go to polls in three phases from October 28 to November 7. This will be the biggest election (so far) globally after the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (Covid-19). The campaign restrictions that the Election Commission (EC) has put in place are bound to have an effect on the poll process and campaigning. However, the coronavirus pandemic is not the only factor which could matter in these elections. There are four others which could shape the poll outcome in the state.

2020 is radically different and far less competitive than 2015.

The political situation in Bihar is radically different from the state of play before the 2015 polls. Back then, Nitish Kumar and Lalu Yadav, the two people who have dominated the states political scene since the 1990s, buried their animosity to forge a grand alliance against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The powerful coalition inflicted a crushing defeat on the BJP. The alliance was not to last, though, and Kumar came back to the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) fold in 2017.

The NDA swept the Lok Sabha polls in 2019. Today, Yadav is serving a sentence for corruption in a Ranchi prison. If the 2019 results are any indication, his sons are no match for their fathers political appeal and abilities to put the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) in pole position. Simply put, the probability of the NDA suffering a setback in the 2020 elections is far lower than what it was in 2015.

But tensions within the Bihar NDA remain.

The Janata Dal (United), with 16 Lok Sabha seats, is the second-largest constituent of the NDA. Yet, it does not have a minister in the Union Cabinet. Apparently, it wanted two Cabinet positions and was offered only one. The BJP sacrificed its sitting Members of Parliament (MPs) to contest an equal number of seats as the JD(U)  there was a 17-17-6 division between the BJP, JD(U) and the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP)  in the 2019 elections.

But the JD(U) used to contest a greater number of seats in the Bihar before 2015. This is the first assembly election where the LJP is a part of the NDA. It will be interesting to see the final distribution of seats within the NDA. In at least two assembly elections after the 2019 Lok Sabha, Maharashtra and Jharkhand, the BJP has paid a heavy price for having failed to sort out matters with its alliance partners. While Jharkhand saw a pre-poll fallout between the BJP and the All Jharkhand Students Union, in Maharashtra, the Shiv Sena walked out of the NDA after the results. The 2020 assembly elections will be an important milestone as far as the realignment of the NDA in Bihar is concerned.

What will the Muslim voter do?

Even though he contested as part of the NDA, Kumar enjoyed significant support from Muslims in the 2005 and 2010 assembly elections. That he parted ways with the BJP over Narendra Modis prime ministerial candidature is a testimony to this fact. Will parts of the Muslim vote bank return to a JD(U)-led NDA again? This cannot be ruled out, especially given the fact that the RJD is perhaps facing its biggest crisis in these elections.

Will Kumar be able to prevail upon the BJP to abandon its now established practice of deploying communally charged rhetoric in election campaigns? Any such exception by the present-day BJP will amount to a dilution of its core politics of Hindutva. Another factor worth watching out for would be the fortunes of the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul-Muslimeen (AIMIM), which managed to win a by-poll in the Muslim-dominated north-eastern region of the state. Any significant gains for the AIMIM could signify the beginning of loss of Muslim support for the RJD-led front in the state.

Will economic pain translate into anti-incumbency?

At least two factors must have made Bihars pandemic-inflicted pain worse than many other states. It has a very poor health infrastructure, which has affected the states response. Indeed, many opposition parties demanded that elections be postponed due to the health crisis.

The state has also suffered among the biggest shocks to remittances due to the high share of migrant workers in its population. A 2018 World Bank paper by Gaurav Nayyar and Kyoung Yang Kim found that migrant remittances had a share of 35% in Bihars gross state domestic product (GSDP) and positively affected consumption at the household level.

While the central government has made a host of pre-poll announcements, regarding development projects in the state, nothing radical was done on the welfare front. Will these factors generate tailwinds for anti-incumbency? We will only know the answer on November 10.

How will the pandemic affect voter turnout?

The EC has announced a slew of guidelines on social distancing during the campaign and voting process.

Whether these are followed or the elections increase the spread of the virus, is something we will know only in November. The single-most important metric related to the pandemic, which might affect the election is voter turnout. It is reasonable to say that the pandemic has created two sets of people in society; those who avoid getting out (and risking exposure) at all costs and those who are not worried about it.

Ones ability to stay in the first set can also be a function of socio-economic privilege. Only those who have either a white collar job (which can be done remotely) or enough money to stay indoors without running into financial difficulties can practise social distancing.

Large parts of the socio-economic elite in Bihar are NDA supporters. So, a significant drop in turnout among these sections could actually adversely affect its chances.

letters@hindustantimes.com

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Tired of watching pandemic updates on CNN, a couple of captive rhinoceroses took advantage of last weeks autumnal weather to stroll around their enclosure and talk about Sen. Mitt Romney.

Theyd just seen a tweet saying that not committing to a peaceful transition of power after the national election was unthinkable and unacceptable.

Hes right. Ive always liked him. Although when he announced hed support a Senate confirmation of a Supreme Court nominee before the November election, I didnt know what to do, one said, shaking her head in disbelief as the pair slowly moved about the enclosure. I really figured hed hold out on this.

I dont know why you would think that, the other rhinoceros snorted. Hes a Republican senator from Utah. You dont think he wants a conservative majority Supreme Court?

Well, yes. Its understandable. But, the female countered, swatting at a pesky bird with her tail, hes not afraid of Trump. Quite the opposite. I just figured hed do the right thing and move to push the selection after the ballots have been counted.

The bull rolled his eyes.

The right thing, he said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. Ask the people who voted for him, and theyll tell you hes absolutely doing the right thing. Its the way it works: The voters elect representatives based on their political affiliations because thats the kind of representation we expect. Hes doing what he was elected to do. And when he doesnt  well, you know what they call him.

Oh, come on! she said with the bombastic outrage of Sean Hannity, her volume carefully calibrated to spark interest from the wildlife in neighboring pens. Nobody expected him to throw the president under the bus after the impeachment hearings  now that I think of it, he did seem a little bit afraid when he delivered that speech. It didnt really come out of left field, considering all the public shots he and Trump have taken at each other in the media. Remember when he called him a phony? When he said he wished we had better choices? You know, I voted for him before. He really should have been president.

On ExpressNews.com: In Texas, Cornyn v. Hegar is epicenter of battle over coverage for preexisting conditions

He didnt get elected, her mate growled. Obama did. People thought that Obama was a better choice. Even Trump did a better job of winning over voters. That tells you that this is just another millionaire in office, and because hes loaded he doesnt think he has to stick with the party line. Its Mike Bloomberg with a little more bite.

Thats bull, the other rhino said. I have to believe there are some politicians that dont trade their individuality and principles in exchange for the partys blessing. Hes also said hes willing to reach across party lines to get things done. Thats what Romneys about, which is why it seemed that there might be some hope that just maybe  

And what are you kicking up dirt about, anyway? the male rhinoceros interrupted. If you voted for him before, you should be happy that hes holding steadfast to his conservative values. Its not about the president, its about being a conservative.

I guess, she said, lowering her unusually long eyelashes. I guess I miss right-of-center moderates. I miss being able to look across the aisle and see faces that disagreed but understood. Now, it feels as if we have to make a choice we dont really want to make  because we dont have a better choice. Or better choices all the way down the card. Extremism leads the charge.

Dont overthink it, the male ungulate said as he caught a cool breeze, You vote for the party, because thats how our system works. You hold your nose and you vote for the party without telling everybody youre holding your nose.

On ExpressNews.com: U.S. judge reinstates straight-ticket voting in Texas, citing the pandemic

But that seems, she said, swatting away another bird, disingenuous.

Then change parties and go green with the donkeys, he said, settling down in the mud.

That seems disingenuous, too.

She sauntered off as the clouds began to gather.

Romneys a dying breed, she said. Moderates are more endangered than we are  especially here in Texas.

mariaanglinwrites@gmail.com
To the editor:

As a resident in Midland for three years, I have been impressed by the community values and the culture of life. Its a real joy to serve as a pastor to a community of faith in a city where families flourish and our political leaders value transparency. We have been given many advantages other communities of our size do not enjoy.

Many have written to express their support or frustration with elected officials and candidates. As a leader of a faith community, its my job to help form consciences; not offer endorsements. With that in mind, I would encourage every reader to ask tough questions and search his/her conscience when he/she votes for president, our federal and state representatives and city leaders.

Many candidates will tell you what they want you to hear, but few are telling the whole truth. Catchy slogans and unique sign colors do not always mean that a candidate supports what matters most here in Midland. Dont choose a candidate because of a slogan or a pleasing sign. Some slogans may come off the tongue easily but have serious policy implications. Putting people over politics demands telling the truth about which people you put first, and whose policies you really want to implement. Seek the whole story from each candidate and protect the families of our state and nation. Lives of the born and unborn; black, brown, yellow and white; rich and poor, sick and healthy matter!

I know Midland believes in choosing life; because of the great quality of life we enjoy and the many blessings we have to share. Want to know more? The Catholic Bishops of Michigan offer some conscience forming material at http://www.micatholic.org/advocacy/2020-election/ You might also search out family and pro-life endorsements from PACs such as Right to Life of Michigan. The point is vote with your conscience so your vote can defend life and provide opportunities for families to thrive as they have in the history of Midland.

Fr. ANDY BOOMS

Midland
The numbers of new COVID-19 infections in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania and Hungary are breaking previous records every day. Even though the ailing health care systems in these countries are already on the brink of being overburdened, the discredited right-wing governments in the region are neither willing nor able to halt the spike in cases.

In the Czech Republic, the number of registered cases per day went above the 3,000 mark on September 17 for the first time since the outbreak of the pandemic. The total number of those infected is over 60,000, and close to 600 people have died from COVID-19. Even though the country only has a population of 10.7 million, the number of daily infections was recently around 1.5 times the number in Germany, which has seven times the population.

Experts expect the number of infections to remain similarly high over the next few weeks. Health Minister Adam Vojtech had to admit that the epidemiological situation was not good and that infections continued to rise. He resigned on Monday.

Several nations, among them the neighboring states of Slovakia and Germany, have already imposed travel warnings for the country, or certain regions of it. The Czech Corona Traffic Light shows for more and more areas in the warning level yellow. That includes several border regions, such as the district of Cheb, which borders Bavaria.

After several protective measures were lifted earlier, there will be a slight tightening of such regulations once again. For example, students have had to wear masks covering their mouths and noses in schools since last week. Also, restaurants, bars and clubs will have to be closed between midnight and 6 a.m. Masks will be mandatory again indoors as well. The government said that it will not rule out further measures.

But these changes are purely cosmetic and will hardly halt the spike in cases. Since there are regional elections coming up in October, Prime Minister Andrej Babis wants to at least make it seem like his government is reacting to the situation. At the same time, he made it clear that there would not be a lockdown there was like this spring, when a temporary curfew as well as the closure of businesses prevented a mass spread of the coronavirus. The numbers were relatively low.

Babis, a businessman himself and one of the richest men of the country, saw the lockdown as an impermissible curtailment of the profits of those at the top. Especially the big car manufacturers that own large plants in the Czech Republic demanded quick relaxation of the safety measures and a return to work. For this reason, the regulations ended in May, as workers returned to their jobs and the opening of schools was prepared.

Babis is a prime example of the kind of unscrupulous politician who knows no bounds and has the audacity to blame the population for the soaring number of infections. He recently claimed that people complained that they were being muzzled by the government during the lockdown. Now those scream the loudest [about coronavirus], who used to push for a relaxation of the safety measures.

Last month, when hygiene experts were seeking a tightening of safety measures due to the upcoming opening of schools, Babis attacked them personally and kept the planned regulations from going into effect.

The coalition government, which consists of Babis right-wing populist ANO Party and the social democratic CSSD, supported by the Stalinist Communist Party (KSCM), prevents adequate testing.

According to a report by the Austrian Kurier, the capacity of the testing facilities is inadequate, with a wait of up to a week for an appointment, and then only to stand in line for hours. Those tested usually find out the result long after the required time of 48 hours.

Health Minister Vojtech even recommends not taking any voluntary COVID tests. The so-called travel traffic light system, which warns against trips into countries and regions with high infection rates, is clearly meant to give people a false sense of security. Currently only Spain is red on that list, while Romania was taken off it, despite its recent spike in cases.

The World Health Organization (WHO) voiced concerns early last week over Pragues handling of the pandemic. It criticized the decline in testing and contact tracing, despite the rapid rise in infections. Babis reacted by telling the WHO to be quiet via Twitter.

Hungary also saw a record spike in COVID-19 cases in the last few weeks. On Friday the total rose by 927 to over 22,000, one of the highest one-day totals since the outbreak of the pandemic. In the spring this figure rarely went above 100. With nine more deaths, the total rose to 718. Around 400 people are hospitalized, and dozens need ventilators.

In the last two weeks of August, the number of known cases has risen by a factor of ten. Government officials and political representatives of the ruling Fidesz Party have also contracted the virus. Viktor Orbans extreme right-wing government reacted to that by closing its borders in early September.

Orban had reacted to the pandemic with complete inaction from the beginning. The fact that Hungarys listed number of infections was extremely low is mainly connected to the almost nonexistent testing at that point. The number of unknown cases was high as a result. The only new protective measures now are that one must wear a mask in public and that restaurants and bars close at 11 p.m.

The week before last, Orban announced a war plan to stop the second wave. He assured the public that the health care system was ready for the growing number of patients. Both are simply lies. Orbans war plan is not aimed at the virus, but the population.

In a state media broadcast, he said that unlike during the first wave, people should not stay home, but keep living their lives. The country must function he added, while explicitly opposing measures that could impact business operations. To secure the profits at the top, Orban purposefully risks the infection of the population, consequences be damned.

The health care system, which has been systematically destroyed by austerity since the restoration of the capitalism by the Stalinist bureaucracy 30 years ago, is now on the brink of collapse. According to statistics of a health care authority, half of those who died from COVID-19 contracted it in hospitals. A study by the organization Human Rights Watch warned in early August that there were organizational deficiencies, that hygiene standards were still low and that testing possibilities were insufficient.

On Friday Orban visited the Koranyi National Pulmonological Institute. A video is going around on Facebook in which a doctor tells the prime minister that the hospital is already reaching its limits in terms of taking in COVID-19 patients, and that there are only twelve free beds left and a lack of trained personnel.

In Slovakia and Romania, the number of cases is also rising quickly. Slovakia reported 419 cases on Friday, which is a new daily record, while Romania reached its worst-ever day with 1,713 new cases Wednesday. According to the most recent predictions, the EU member state will be short about 1,000 ICU beds by November. The number of daily deaths would then rise from the current level, of around 40, to 300. So far, the official number of people who have died from the virus in the country is 4,633.
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The shock of a sudden new vacancy on the US supreme court has rippled out to some of the most contentious Senate races in the final weeks before the 3 November elections, throwing the vital issue of who might win control of the body into confusion.

The recent death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg while Republicans control the Senate and the White House virtually ensures that her replacement will be conservative, swinging the court into a 6-3 conservative majority.

Donald Trump and Republicans have indicated they plan to move swiftly to install a new justice, meaning the vetting period and confirmation battle will happen during the days when incumbent senators and their challengers are making their final pitches to voters.

Related: Republicans will replace RBG but Democrats hold the trump cards  no, really | David Litt

As a result, the dynamic in key races has shifted to varying degrees across the country, from Maine to Colorado. For Republicans, the battle for the Senate is an essential bid to cling to a hugely powerful body; for Democrats, wresting control of the chamber would be a hugely welcome  if previously unexpected  triumph.

In some races, the supreme court vacancy offers a chance for Democrats to rally their bases in states that increasingly lean left. In others, the vacancy gives Republican candidates the opportunity to remind voters who want the high court to tackle cases on abortion, deregulation, and overturning healthcare reform that senators can play a role.

It should help red-state enthusiasm in that itll remind people whats at stake in this election, said the Republican strategist Cam Savage. [But] there will be places in the country where it benefits the Democrats.

Strategists and officials for both parties stress the campaign landscape is not yet clear.

Trump has not announced a nominee and only in the past few days have swing senators indicated whether they support quickly going through the process of confirmation.

Story continues

In deciding whether to confirm a justice before the election or after, senators have signaled they are taking their own electoral prospects into account.

In Democratic-leaning Maine, where Senator Susan Collins is trailing her Democratic challenger, Sara Gideon, Collins has split with most of her Republican colleagues and said she would hold off on confirming a justice until after the November election.

In Republican-leaning South Carolina, Senator Lindsey Graham has said his chamber should move expeditiously to confirm a new justice. That is despite Graham saying in 2016 that if there were a vacancy this close to a presidential election, the vacancy should be filled after the election, regardless of which party is in power. The Democrat Jamie Harrison, who polls show is trailing Graham by single digits, has used Grahams about-face on confirming a justice as part of his overarching argument that Graham is a hypocrite.

In red-leaning states such as Kansas or Iowa, though, Republicans expect the vacancy to drive conservatives, even ones dissatisfied with Trump, to come out and vote. In Senate races where Democrats have the upper hand, top Senate Republicans think the vacancy will at least tighten the margins.

Some candidates have framed the vacancy in terms of specific issues such as healthcare  which Democrats see as one of the most effective policy points to discuss on the campaign trail.

This is a decision that will impact Arizonans, especially with an upcoming case about healthcare and protections for pre-existing conditions, the Democrat Mark Kelly, who is running for Senate in Arizona, said in a statement on Saturday. Arizonans will begin casting their ballots in a few weeks, and I believe the people elected to the presidency and Senate in November should fill this vacancy.

Related: Sanders issues stark warning on Trump and calls for election commission

In states like Arizona and North Carolina, a polarized fight helps tighten the margin down-ballot and ties it closer to the top of the ticket, a Senate Republican official said.

Some of the most endangered senators in the country, though, have stuck with their party on the supreme court fight.

In Democratic-leaning Colorado, Senator Cory Gardner joined with other Republicans to support confirming a Trump nominee. In conservative Alabama, Senator Doug Jones has echoed Democratic calls for the winner of the 3 November presidential election to pick the next justice.

Its still early, though, and some of the major national entities that usually work to boost Senate candidates are waiting for more polling on a new justice before diving into the fray.

Democrats concede that stopping Republicans from installing a new justice is almost impossible. But recent court battles have shown that it can still be a fundraising bonanza for them. Democrats have enjoyed competitive fundraising in statewide elections this cycle. The veteran Democratic ad-maker Martha McKenna suggested that the fundraising rush would only increase during a supreme court nomination fight.

The only thing you can do to help is money  because of Covid  and that is going to make a difference, I think, McKenna said. I really do think fully funded races in places like Kansas and South Carolina  its gonna matter.

The Democratic Ohio senator Sherrod Brown, who is not up for re-election, predicted that quickly confirming a new justice would drive key constituents away from the Republican party.

I think what [Senate majority leader Mitch] McConnells doing is especially gonna turn off young voters who care about a womans right to choose, who care about the environment, who care about climate and the future of this country, Brown said during a press gaggle.

Brown added: Young voters know that and I think thats why McConnells decision in the end is probably going to hurt his party.
Representative image

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will deliver a pre-recorded, virtual address to the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on September 26.

The prime minister is scheduled to speak at 6:30 pm IST, which is 9 am local time. He is scheduled as the first speaker in the forenoon, according to reports.

Here's a brief primer on what to expect from the address:

> Seeing as the address is coming against the backdrop of a standoff with China on the Line of Actual Control (LAC), PM Modi is likely to call for "inclusive and responsible solutions for international peace and security", a line directed at China, according to a report in The Indian Express.

> The prime minister will also call for an "effective response to international terrorism" in a nudge to Pakistan, according to the newspaper.

> Reports also suggest that India will pitch for more transparency in the process of listing and delisting of terror entities and individuals by the UN sanction committees.

> PM Modi is also expected to put forward a '5-S approach' during his address. This approach includes Samman (Respect), Samvad (Dialogue), Sahyog (Cooperation), Shanti (Peace) and Samriddhi (Prosperity), according to the newspaper.

> Continuing with active engagement on issues relating to sustainable development and climate change will be another priority for India, and PM Modi is expected to address that topic as well during his speech.

> India, sources said, will also highlight its role as a "pharmacy to the world" while elaborating on its contribution to global cooperation against Covid-19 by aiding more than 150 countries, according to the report.

India will take over the non-permanent member position at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) from January 2021 for a period of two years, and India's priorities in that regard will also be addressed during PM Modi's speech.
Mr. Barr has threatened legal action against Democratic leaders who sparred with the president over stay-at-home orders during the pandemic and echoed Mr. Trumps accusation that they were not tough enough on protesters during nationwide unrest over race and policing. He led federal agents who patrolled the streets of Washington against the wishes of the mayor. And this week, the Justice Department seemed to play into the presidents efforts to undermine voting by mail, making an unusual disclosure about an investigation into nine discarded military mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania.

In public comments, Mr. Barr has expounded on topics outside of what recent attorneys general publicly discussed during an election, particularly his sharp critiques of Democrats and his grim pronouncements that they could destroy democracy. In a recent interview with a Chicago journalist, after acknowledging that he is not supposed to wade into politics but narrowly defining that as campaign appearances, Mr. Barr declared that the country would go down a socialist path if it elects former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.

Under Mr. Barr, the Justice Department is as close as it has been to the White House in a half-century, historians said. Not since John N. Mitchell steered the Nixon re-election effort from the fifth floor of the Justice Department has an attorney general wielded the power of the office to so bluntly serve a presidential campaign, they said.

The norm has been that attorneys general try to keep the reputation of the department bright and shiny as a nonpartisan legitimate arm of the government that needs to be trusted by everyone, said Andrew Rudalevige, a history professor at Bowdoin College who studies the power of the presidency.

A Justice Department spokeswoman declined to comment. Mr. Barrs defenders said he was simply applying his own judgment and any benefit to Mr. Trumps campaign was incidental.
Former prime minister Manmohan Singh's birthday is being celebrated across the country. Singh turned 88 on September 26. Wishing the former Prime Minister, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said India feels the absence of a PM with the depth of Manmohan Singh. "India feels the absence of a PM with the depth of Dr Manmohan Singh. His honesty, decency and dedication are a source of inspiration for us all," Gandhi said.



India feels the absence of a PM with the depth of Dr Manmohan Singh. His honesty, decency and dedication are a source of inspiration for us all.

Wishing him a very happy birthday and a lovely year ahead.#HappyBirthdayDrMMSingh  Rahul Gandhi (@RahulGandhi) September 26, 2020

"Wishing him a very happy birthday and a lovely year ahead," the former Congress chief tweeted.

The Congress, on its official Twitter handle, said a dedicated leader's primary aim is always to eradicate the worst evils that plague the society in the soonest and surest possible way.

"Today, we celebrate former Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh's commitment towards the overall well-being of each Indian," the party said. Singh headed the UPA coalition government between 2004 and 2014.

In his journey towards greatness, he took a billion people along, Congress said in another tweet.

"One of the most competent world leaders, Dr Manmohan Singh's vision for our nation is uncompromising. India is forever indebted to this great son for leading her through highs & lows," the party tweeted along with a nearly 3-minute long video of Singh's career highlights.



In his journey towards greatness, he took a billion people along. One of the most competent world leaders, Dr. Manmohan Singh's vision for our Nation is uncompromising. India is forever indebted to this great son for leading her through highs & lows.#HappyBirthdayDrMMSingh pic.twitter.com/LdNIHVmkwc  Congress (@INCIndia) September 26, 2020



Taking to Twitter, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said, "Birthday greetings to Dr Manmohan Singh Ji. I pray to Almighty that he is blessed with a long and healthy life."

Birthday greetings to Dr. Manmohan Singh Ji. I pray to Almighty that he is blessed with a long and healthy life. Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) September 26, 2020

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee wished for Singh's good health. "Greetings to former Prime Minister and Economist Dr Manmohan Singh ji on his birthday. Wishing him good health and more productive years in public life," she tweeted.
Brittany Keech, a Michigan woman, recently received a postcard last week in her mailbox, dated Oct. 29, 1920. Read more

When Brittany Keech checked her mailbox one morning this month, it was flooded with the usual junk.

But atop the pile of miscellaneous fliers and bills sat something that caught her eye: a tattered and timeworn postcard.

At first, I didnt think much of it, other than that its old and interesting, said Keech, 30, a resident of Belding, Mich. But then I took a closer look.

Upon further inspection, she spotted a faded green one-cent George Washington stamp  postmarked Oct. 29, 1920.

I was shocked, said Keech, who received the 100-year-old piece of mail on Sept. 8.

 READ MORE: An anonymous donor gives $5,000 to a barbershop to fund free haircuts for essential workers

On the front of the postcard is a Halloween illustration, including a black cat, pumpkins, a witch, an owl, and a broomstick, plus a play on words: Witch would you rather be  a goose or a pumpkin-head?

As Keech deciphered the faded cursive on the postcard  which appeared to be addressed to a Mrs. Roy McQueen  she realized it was a letter from one family member to another.

Dear cousins, the letter starts. We are quite well but mother has awful lame knees. It is awful cold here.

The note ends with: Dont forget to write us, followed by a question as to whether Roy got his pants fixed yet.

The letter is signed by Flossie Burgess.

Keech decided she would try to reunite the long-lost postcard with the family to whom it was originally intended.

She started by posting to Positively Belding, a Facebook page dedicated to celebrating local positive news in the small city of just under 6,000 residents.

Keech quickly discovered that others were also interested in uncovering the origins of the mysterious memento, and how, a century later, it somehow appeared in her mailbox.

After seeing Keechs post, Robby Peters, who lives in Grand Rapids, Mich., and works at the public library there, began digging for answers.

 READ MORE: They may call themselves Satanic, but this group of rebels are feeding the homeless

I do some genealogy research as a hobby, said Peters, 33. I started helping my own family, and I kind of caught the bug after that.

While sifting through a 1920 census, Peters discovered a Roy McQueen who once lived at the same address where Keech now lives with her husband and two children.

He found that McQueen, who was originally from Canada and moved to the United States in 1887, was married to a Nora Murdock. At the time the letter was sent, he was working as the manager of a produce company.

The probable author of the postcard is Florence Flossie Burgess, the daughter of Nora Murdocks sister, Peters learned.

I found census records, death records, and marriage records, he explained. The postcard contained a couple of names and it had a destination, so I had an idea of where to start searching.

I built a family tree, Peters continued. It doesnt look like Roy and Nora had children, and Flossie seems to have remained unmarried, so there are no direct descendants.

 READ MORE: Domino's bought out the entire wedding registries of five couples

Sheryl Ackerman, who also lives in Grand Rapids, became fixated on finding the family, too.

Ive been interested in genealogy since 1976, said Ackerman, who immediately got in touch with Keech upon hearing about the postcard. I love trying to solve mysteries.

So, she got to work, and her findings aligned with Peters. Ackerman did, however, manage to track down one relative  the grandniece of Roy and Nora.

Ackerman reached out to the woman, who she then connected with Keech.

Ive been speaking with the possible relative and she is very interested in having the postcard, said Keech. Were talking about setting up a time to meet.

While the puzzle of who wrote the postcard, and who was intended to receive it, has been mostly solved, what remains in question is how it ended up in Keechs mailbox  nearly 100 years after it was written.

Lost letters from years past seldom reappear, one USPS mail carrier remarked.

But there are a few things that could have happened here, said Mindy Ponover, who works for the Postal Service in Michigan.

Her best guess is that the postcard got stuck in a baseboard, a crack in the floor, or a piece of machinery in an old post office that was recently renovated.

Theres a very good possibility of that, said Ponover.

She works in a small post office and estimates that on a weekly basis, there are at least 20 pieces of mail that go undelivered for various reasons, including that the address is illegible.

The letters will then go to what we call the Dead Letter Office, where they try to find family members and where the letter should go, Ponover explained.

But in most cases these incidents do not involve mail that had been lost in our network and later found, added Sara Martin, a USPS public relations representative. What we typically find is that old letters and postcards  sometimes purchased at flea markets, antique shops, and even online  are reentered into our system, she continued. The end result is what we do best  as long as there is a deliverable address and postage, the card or letter gets delivered.

Said Keech, Weve all seen mail get delayed for weeks, but 100 years, thats a piece of history. After all this time, its finally resurfacing.

Still, we may never know if Roy did, in fact, get his pants fixed.
Harpreet Bajwa By

Express News Service

CHANDIGARH: After being together for 23-long years, the oldest ally of BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) announced to leave over the newly passed Farm Bills.

Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) in 1969 was allied with the then Bharatiya Jana Sangh for the first time during the assembly elections and formed a coalition with the BJP in 1997.

It later joined the saffron party lead coalition in 1998 and had been with it since then.

The decision to this effect was taken on Saturday at the partys emergency core committee meeting which lasted for three hours. The party unanimously decided to pull out of the BJP-led NDA alliance because of the centre 'stubborn refusal to give statutory legislative guarantees to protect assured marketing of farmer crops at Minimum Support Price (MSP) and its continued insensitivity to Punjabi and Sikh issues like excluding the Punjabi language as an official language in Jammu and Kashmir.

''The government's decision on Farm Bills is deeply injurious to the interests not only of the farmers but also of Khet mazdoor, traders, arhtiyas and the Dalits who depend on the well being of agriculture,'' said SAD-chief Sukhbir Singh Badal.

ALSO READ: Punjab CM Amarinder Singh labels SAD quitting NDA as 'political compulsion'

The SAD is the third ally to break the alliance with NDA since the coalition came to power in 2014.

Shiv Sena broke withdrew from the alliance in 2019 after the Maharashtra assembly election, as it accused BJP of breaking its promise of giving equal division of power to the party in the state.

In 2018, the Telugu Desam Party ended its four-year alliance with the BJP over denial of special category status to Andhra Pradesh.

SAD-chief added that the party will continue to stand by its core principles of peace, communal harmony and of guarding the interests of Punjab, Punjabi and Sikhs, farmers in particular.

He said that the decision has been taken after deep deliberations with the people of Punjab. especially party workers and farmers, farm labour, traders, arhtiyas and other poor sections of society.

Badal said that the bills on agricultural marketing brought by the BJP government are 'lethal' and 'disastrous' for the already beleaguered farmers.

"These are Black Laws and the SAD had resigned in protest against these Bills. It could not be a party to a government or alliance which stands opposed to the farmers, farm labourers, arhtiyas and other poorer and toiling sections of society."

ALSO READ: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi urges people to raise voice in support of farmers

He said that even after quitting the union government, SAD had hoped that the centre would not press on with these 'murderous' assaults on the poor peasantry and other poor sections who depend on agriculture and trade.

But it seems the BJP is totally out of touch with ground realities.

"The successive decisions taken by the present government has shown its callous insensitivity to minority sentiments and been indifferent to the imperatives of peace and communal harmony in the country, especially in Punjab," Sukhbir said.

He further added that despite our best efforts, the BJP government did not listen to it on honouring farmer's sentiments.

He said that the farmers are the backbone of the national economy and it is in the national interest that the government should stand by them. But the policies of the present government are running against vital national interests.

Former MP Prem Singh Chandumajra said the SAD was forced to first leave the Union Cabinet and now the NDA as the BJP-led alliance was obstinate and stubborn over bringing the farm legislations despite protests by farmers opposition.

Sukhbir leads the Akali protest in Punjab as a few days back his wife and union minister Harshimrat Kaur Badal has resigned from the union cabinet over the passing of the ordinances in the parliament.

Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh termed the Akali's decision to quit NDA as nothing more than a ''desperate case of political compulsion for the Badals, who were effectively left with no other option after the BJPs public criticism of the SAD over the Farm Bills.''

Referring to his earlier statement, in which he had pointed out that the NDA would throw the Akalis out if the latter did not leave gracefully, Amarinder said there was no moral high ground involved in this decision of the Shiromani Akali Dal.

The Akalis had no choice before them, since the BJP had already made it clear that it held SAD responsible for failing to convince the farmers about the goodness of the Agriculture Bills.

ALSO WATCH:


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The global commodity plastics market size is anticipated to reach $651.8 billion by 2026, growing at a CAGR of 7% during the forecast period, according to a report published by Polaris Market Research. The report Commodity Plastics Market [By Product Type (PE, PP, PVC, PET, PS) By Application (Automotive, Consumer Goods, Electronics, Packaging, Pharmaceuticals, Textiles), By Regions & Segments Forecast, 2018  2026 provides an extensive analysis of present market dynamics and predicted future trends.

The market is anticipated to significantly witness a considerable growth during the forecast period on account of rapidly rising demand for high performance end-use products such as lightweight packaging materials. In addition, the improving economic parameters and improvised standards of living in emerging counties are likely to be the crucial drivers which have flourished the market growth.

Demand for commodity plastics has also grown on account of increase in the metal prices. The global plastic industry has been forced to focus on innovation concerning biodegradability of plastics as many nations have banned the use of plastics that is non-biodegradable. Also, light-weight electric vehicles have increasingly gained significance which in turn has further strengthened the demand for the electric vehicles.

Get sample copy of this report @ https://www.polarismarketresearch.com/industry-analysis/commodity-plastics-market/request-for-sample

Commodity plastics indicate higher scope of applications across numerous end-use industries as these are supplied in bulk and have excellent chemical properties. In addition, these can be utilized for numerous applications such as packaging, garbage containers, photography, clothing, and magnetic tapes among many. These are also applied in industries such as consumer goods, automotive, manufacturing, packaging, electronics, construction, textiles, and pharmaceutical.

Based on product-type the market is bifurcated into Polystyrene (PS), Polypropylene (PP), Polyethylene (PE), Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC), Poly (methyl methacrylate) (PMMA), and others. Among them, PE is the most extensively used and product-type with highest demand. This is due to its chemical & physical properties such as their simple structure, insensitivity to a majority of solvents, and high electrical resistance. Also, these bulk plastics are readily available and at lower costs.

On the basis of application, the market has been segmented into consumer goods, automotive, electronics, textiles, pharmaceuticals, packaging, and others. Among all the application segments, packaging sector holds highest market share and is anticipated to remain same during the forecast period. The most crucial reason behind such dominance is the rapidly growing demand for such bulk plastics by the manufacturing industry for the production of high-end packaging products and plastic goods.

The Asia Pacific is anticipated to be the largest and fastest-growing regional player for the market This is mainly due to the rapidly increasing living standards of the growing middle-class. The middle-class population in the developing countries of this region are increasingly seeking for even higher standards of living, and are likely to spend heavily on electronic appliances, packaged goods, clothing automobile, other goods that make use of commodity plastics in some or the other way.

Competitive Landscape and Key Vendors

The global commodity plastics market is characterized by presence of numerous multinational and domestic players. Th industry is fairly concentrated in nature. Some of the established market players in the industry include Exxon Mobil Corporation, The Dow Chemicals, BASF SE, SABIC, China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation (Sinopec), Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation, INEOS, LyondellBasell Industries N.V., Formosa Plastics Corporation, and LG Chem Ltd.

The established market players are actively involved in the increasing number of R&D activities in order to manufacture innovative plastic products. In addition, these players are also striving hard to enhance their existing product portfolio to stay equivalent to their level of competitors.

Browse for full research summary: https://www.polarismarketresearch.com/industry-analysis/commodity-plastics-market

Polaris Market Research has segmented the global commodity plastics market on the basis of product, application and region:

Commodity Plastics by Product Outlook (Volume, Kilo Tons; Revenue, USD Million, 2015  2026)

 Polyethylene (PE)

 Polypropylene (PP)

 Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC)

 Polystyrene (PS)

 Poly (methyl methacrylate) (PMMA)

 Others

Commodity Plastics by Application Outlook (Volume, Kilo Tons; Revenue, USD Million, 2015  2026)

 Automotive

 Consumer Goods

 Electronics

 Packaging

 Pharmaceuticals

 Textiles

 Others

Commodity Plastics by Regional Outlook (Volume, Kilo Tons; Revenue, USD Million, 2015  2026)

 North America

o U.S.

o Canada

o Mexico

 Europe

o Germany

o UK

o France

o Rest of Europe

 Asia-Pacific

o China

o India

o Japan

o Rest of Asia-Pacific

 Latin America

o Brazil

o Rest of Latin America

 Middle East and Africa

o Saudi Arabia

o UAE

Avail discount on this report @ https://www.polarismarketresearch.com/industry-analysis/commodity-plastics-market/request-for-discount-pricing

About Polaris Market Research

Polaris Market Research is a global market research and consulting company. We provide unmatched quality of offerings to our clients present globally. The company specializes in providing exceptional market intelligence and in-depth business research services for our clientele spread across different enterprises. We at Polaris are obliged to serve our diverse customer base present across the industries of healthcare, technology, semi-conductors and chemicals among various other industries present around the world. We strive to provide our customers with updated information on innovative technologies, high growth markets, emerging business environments and latest business-centric applications, thereby helping them always to make informed decisions and leverage new opportunities.

Contact us-

Polaris Market Research

Phone: 1-646-568-9980

Email: sales@polarismarketresearch.com

Web: www.polarismarketresearch.com
Comedian and podcaster Joe Rogan has been dealing with plenty of fan backlash since his transition to Spotify. Rogans massive deal with the streaming company saw several of his more controversial guests censored, and now some fans are getting upset. The move to Spotify was also accompanied by a move to Texas  a choice Rogan claimed he made because theres more freedom in the Lone Star State. However, Rogans move also included a hefty tax break, and now the controversial podcaster has purchased an incredibly expensive Texas property, solidifying his move.

Joe Rogan enjoys massive tax break

Joe Rogan | Michael S. Schwartz/Getty Images

RELATED: Joe Rogan Fans Angry Over Spotify Partnership, Rest of the Internet Laughs

When Joe Rogan decided it was time to move to Texas from California, he claimed it was a matter of open space and freedom. The podcaster was fed up with feeling claustrophobic in California.

Im going to go to Texas. I just want to go somewhere in the center of the country, somewhere where its easy to travel to both places and somewhere where you have a little bit more freedom, claimed Rogan during an episode of The Joe Rogan Experience.

Also, I think that where we live right here in Los Angeles is overcrowded. I think most of the time its not a problem. But I think its exposing the fact that its a real issue when you look at the number of people that are catching [COVID-19] because of this overpopulation issue, Rogan added, attributing most of the states issues to overpopulation.

However, there may have been another incentive that factoried into Rogans decision. Moving to Texas saved Rogan a hefty amount of cash in tax breaks on his $100 million Spotify deal.

As reported by Newsweek, the Texas move could result in Rogan saving upwards of $13 million.

Joe Rogan buys into Texas real estate

Joe Rogan | Michael S. Schwartz/Getty Images

Its become clear that Joe Rogan is committed to his Texas move. Rogan set up a new studio in the state for his podcast, the layout and design of which fans have criticized heavily. Rogan has also bought a prime piece of Texas real estate.

Rogan purchased a Texas lakefront mansion for $14.4 million in Austin  clearly the tax breaks he gained from moving have paid off. As reported by Variety, the deal was off-market, and the house is enormous.

His new abode includes 10,890 square feet, alongside eight bedrooms and a whopping ten bathrooms. However, this luxury is nothing new to Rogan. The self-styled everyman was previously living in a gated community, complete with guards, in Bell Canyon. Nothing to scoff at  though Rogan surely has more space now than he did in California.

Spotify withholds controversial episodes

Joe Rogan | Michael S. Schwartz/Getty Images

While Joe Rogan himself may be enjoying everything his new Spotify deal has to offer, his fans have been frustrated with the streaming platform for censoring controversial episodes of his podcast.

Spotify decided not to upload episodes starring individuals who espouse hateful ideologies or are particularly controversial. This includes Alex Jones, Milo Yiannopoulos, Gavin McInnes, and Chris DElia.

Alex Jones previously claimed that Joe Rogan told him its only a matter of time before those episodes get uploaded. However, this remains to be seen, as Spotify is currently dealing with pushback within the company from employees who wish to see some of Rogans transphobic episodes removed from the catalogue.
God has been very good to us. That we won the revolution was extraordinary. The Battle of Midway was extraordinary. I think one of the reasons God has been good to us is that we have done him honor. Unlike the other countries of the world that do not even invoke his name we do him honor. In presidential addresses, in Thanksgiving proclamations and in many other ways, Scalia said.
Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal on Saturday said the Delhi Jal Board (DJB), the citys unified water utility, has initiated the process of appointing a consultant that would give recommendations on 24x7 water supply to every household.

Addressing a digital press conference, Kejriwal said Delhi consumes 930 million gallons (MGD) of water every day, which translates into a consumption of 176 litre per person per day.

This is not a lot, but it is not less either. At present, there is no accountability of this 930 MGD water in the city. A lot of it either gets stolen or is wasted through leakages. We are appointing a consultant who would recommend us steps to not just ensure not a single litre of water is wasted, but it would also suggest us the latest technology available across the globe to put in place a hi-tech, automated and real-time water management system, he said.

Kejriwal also addressed the concerns raised by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which alleged that the decision of the Delhi government is a step towards privatising the DJB. The DJB is a state-run organisation in Delhi.

Also Read: Delhi court directs Delhi Police to file FIR over morphed video of CM Kejriwal

He also said the Delhi government is in talks with water-rich states such as Uttar Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana and Uttarakhand to explore the possibility of water-sharing pacts.

This comes after the DJB announced the approval of a One Zone-One Operator policy on Thursday for efficient management of water supply and sewerage network. Under this policy, the city will be divided into 7-8 zones and a private operator will be appointed to look into the works in each zone.

The decision was taken in a board meeting presided over by Delhi water minister and DJB chairman Satyendar Jain.

After extensive discussions and deliberations at various levels to improve the services and bring efficient management in the water supply and sewerage system, it was decided to award the contracts to private operators for operation, maintenance and management of water supply and sewerage networks in various zones of Delhi on the lines of One Zone-One Operator, said a statement issued by the DJB on Thursday.

The operators will be appointed for a period of 10 years under the scheme on a contract basis, it said.

Also Read: Delhi govt extends free meal plan till end of winters

Ankit Srivastava, DJB technical advisor, explained that the services are not being privatised and no layoffs will be done within the water utility. Senior officials said the powers of monitoring and supervision will rest with the DJB.
Dislocated shoulders, broken necks, broken collar bones and fractured vertebrae where to begin with Class Action Park?

An infamous US amusement / water park of the 1970s & 80s, Action Park was run by Eugene Mulvihill in Vernon, New Jersey. He was a man who like to live without rules, and the park he built -like Walt Disney- reflected the man. But thats where the similarities end.

Water slides were constructed with little engineering, young employees would serve as crash test dummies.

On the Cannonball Loop (pictured above), teens were catapulted down a pitch black tube at breakneck speed, suffering lacerations or losing teeth from its dangerous loop (actual dummies tested earlier had been decapitated). Too small or too big and the damages could be worse.

HBOs documentary, complete with old videotape and throbbing 80s music, is like a time capsule of killer rides -each more deadly than the one before. Cannonball Falls and Super Speed Slide are just two of the cheaply-constructed waterslides where riders were at risk of helplessly defying gravity before crashing down to earth. On Aqua Skoot they would collide at the badly-designed pool at the end, also built above a nest of bees.

On the Tarzan Swing brazen American teens would ignore instructions, with arms flailing as they plummeted into ice cold water, some emerging with dislocated limbs -only to be called pu**ies by waiting onlookers convinced they could do better. Ahh the 80s.

There was the Kayak Experience where someone was electrocuted, a water ride built on a swamp where attendants spotted snakes, and a wave pool known as the death zone by lifesavers expected to spot trouble from the hundreds of unknowing swimmers.

Mulvihill ran by his own rule, fighting authorities, never settling lawsuits and even creating his own fake insurance company based in the Cayman Islands.

The doco also hears from the family of one young man who sadly lost his life at just 19 when he hit rocks after flying off one water slide.

Its hard not to feel that this family never got true justice.

Class Action Park at least goes part of the way to bring their story to light.

Class Action Park airs 8:30pm Wednesday on FOX Showcase and Binge.
Households have grown during the coronavirus pandemic and its economic fallout as generations, from seniors to young adults, have returned to the family home for cost-saving, safety and comfort reasons.

This is especially true for young adults who lost their jobs when businesses closed and college students were sent away as campuses shut down.

A majority of young adults  52% of 18- to 29-year-olds  now live with one or both of their parents, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of Julys Census Bureau data. That percentage passes the previous peak, which occurred during the Great Depression.

Real estate agents like Israel Hill, the office leader of John L. Scott Real Estates Portland Northeast office, are seeing multiple offers for well-priced residential properties in the $700,000 range and under with extra living space for family members and a large backyard.

Last week, we looked at homes with four or more bedrooms for sale under $400,000.

In this weeks real estate gallery, we look at a sampling of Portland homes with at least four bedrooms for sale from $400,000 to $700,000.

Click here to see residential properties for sale in Oregon with four or more bedrooms

421 S.E. 141st Ave. in Portland is listed by Augustin Peter of John L. Scott/PTL Metro.John L. Scott/PTL Metro

421 S.E. 141st Ave. in Portlands Hazelwood neighborhood is listed at $410,000.

The two-story farmhouse, built in 1947 on 0.35 acres, has four bedrooms, three bathrooms and 3,724 square feet of living space.

The detached garage can be used as additional storage space or a hobby area.

Great investment opportunity awaits the buyer with the vision to redevelop or restore, with potential for additional area in basement. Please do no not enter the property or disturb tenants, says listing agent Augustin Peter of John L. Scott /PTL Metro.

See other active listings in Southeast Portland

204 N.E. 83rd Ave. in Portland's Montavilla neighborhood is listed by Kristen Kohnstamm of Cascade Sothebys International Realty.Cascade Sothebys International Realty

204 N.E. 83rd Ave. in Portlands Montavilla neighborhood is listed at $465,000.

The restored bungalow, built in 1911 on a 4,791-square-foot lot, has four bedrooms, 2.5 bathrooms and 2,264 square feet of living space. The fourth bedroom does not have a closet.

New plumbing, electrical and a main water line were installed in 2019 and the kitchen and first-floor bathroom were upgraded, says listing agent Kristen Kohnstamm of Cascade Sothebys International Realty.

There is a covered front porch and composite deck.

Lot likely divisible or add an ADU [accessory dwelling unit]. Investors previously rented for $2,995 a month, says Kohnstamm.

See more active listings in Northeast Portland

1820 S.W. Logan St. in Portlands Hillsdale neighborhood is listed by Jeffrey Parker of Parker Realty Inc.Parker Realty Inc

1820 S.W. Logan St. in Portlands Hillsdale neighborhood is listed at $499,000.

The two-level house, built in 1970 on a 4,791-square-foot lot, has four bedrooms, 2.5 bathrooms and 2,270 square feet of living space.

There are hardwood floors on the main level, an open kitchen and living area and sliding doors to the 16-foot-by-10-foot deck that overlooks a low-maintenance landscape and patio.

The lower level of the house has a family room and a separate, self-contained apartment (ADU or accessory dwelling unit) with a private entrance, living area, kitchenette and full bathroom. There is also a large laundry room with a half bathroom.

Treetop living in Capitol Hill/Multnomah Village neighborhood. Close to Multnomah Village, Hillsdale and Burlingame, says listing agent Jeffrey Parker of Parker Realty Inc.

See more active listings in Southwest Portland

231 S. Gibbs St. in Portland's Lair Hill neighborhood is listed by Jeff Capen with John McClain of Keller Williams-PDX Central.Keller Williams-PDX Central

231 S. Gibbs St. in Portlands Lair Hill neighborhood is listed at $699,900.

The bungalow, built in 1920 on a 2,613-square-foot lot, has four bedrooms, four bathrooms and 2,580 square feet of living space.

Welcoming porch leads into the open living room with high ceilings, hardwood floors and built ins, says listing agent Jeff Capen with John McClain of Keller Williams-PDX Central.

The kitchen has stone counters and a subway-tile backsplash. The dining room opens to the backyard.

There is a bedroom, office and powder room on the main level and three bedrooms, including a master suite with a deck, on the second level. A family room, bathroom and studio are in the lower level.

The price was lowered by $50,000 on Sept. 18.

See more active listings in South Portland

2132 N.W. Aspen Ave. in Portland is listed by Steve Rosling with Darlene Van Kuren of Cascade Sothebys International Realty.Cascade Sothebys International Realty

2132 N.W. Aspen Ave. in Portland is listed at $699,900.

The multifamily house, built in 1926, has five bedrooms, five bathrooms and 3,850 square feet of living space.

The remodeled main house, with decks and river, city and mountain views, has a lower-level, separate guest quarters.

Also on the property is a detached unit with a living room, kitchen, bedroom, bathroom and laundry. A studio can be used for pottery, arts and crafts, or storage.

Fantastic location just minutes to shopping, dining, schools, parks and transportation, says listing agent Steve Rosling with Darlene Van Kuren of Cascade Sothebys International Realty.

See more active listings in Northwest Portland

5160 N. Amherst St. in Portlands University Park neighborhood is listed by Jason Watkins of Real Estate Performance Group.Real Estate Performance Group

5160 N. Amherst St. in Portlands University Park neighborhood is listed at $699,950.

The modern-style house, built in 2020, has four bedrooms, 2.5 bathrooms and 2,163 square feet of living space.

High-end finishes, open floor plan, gourmet kitchen with large island, says listing agent Jason Watkins of Real Estate Performance Group.

See more active listings in North Portland

 Janet Eastman | 503-294-4072

jeastman@oregonian.com | @janeteastman

Want to search Oregon real estate listings and use local resources? Click here.
Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on Saturday decided to drop proceedings against Vodafone Idea Ltd (VIL) in priority plan matter after the telecom operator modified its offering. VIL has withdrawn the contentious claims on faster speed for premium customers. With this, the controversy surrounding the priority plan issue now ceases to exist.

Last month, the regulator had slapped a show-cause notice on VIL over its priority mobile plan, saying the tariff offer lacked transparency and was "misleading" and not in compliance with the regulatory framework.

Faced with regulatory heat, VIL recently dropped the faster data speed claims which formed a prominent part of its pay-more-for-priority-treatment offering and filed a revised plan with Trai.

The regulator has now informed VIL that "the authority has decided not to proceed with the investigation/ further inquiry".

Trai letter, seen by PTI, noted that the operator has informed that the earlier RedX plan has been discontinued and that a new tariff plan of RedX, without the claim of priority 4G network feature with faster speed, has been filed.

"It has been further stated that VIL believes the same would address the concerns of the authority and based on the same, VIL requested the authority to grant closure to the pending enquiry," the regulator said.

(With PTI inputs)

Also read: Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea have to pay 10% of AGR dues by March 31: Govt tells Parliament
The number of British entrepreneurs looking to buy citizenship from countries offering visa-free access to the European Union has risen sharply, investment migration firms say, as prospects of a post-Brexit trade deal between Britain and the bloc darken.

Investment immigration firm Astons said it had seen a 50 percent and 30 percent year-on-year increase in interest from clients seeking Cypriot or Greek citizenship respectively this quarter, less than four months before UK passport-holders are likely to lose their rights to freedom of movement across the EU.

Henley & Partners also reported a rise in requests for advice on investment migration applications to Malta, Portugal, Austria and several Caribbean islands, which offer a range of residency rights, visa-free travel to the EU and citizenship to investors in local business or property.

Citizens of certain Caribbean sovereign states including St. Lucia and St Kitts & Nevis also enjoy preferred access to the EU, thanks to close ties with EU members as a result of historic, diplomatic and modern trade agreements.

This isnt about tourists. This is the UK high net worth community that have a constant need to travel to and spend significant time in the EU, said Henley & Partners director Paddy Blewer.

This is investment migration as a volatility hedge and a component in a high net worth portfolio value defence strategy, he said, adding that volumes of client engagement were higher now than immediately after the 2016 Brexit vote.

Interest in additional citizenships is rising even as the European Commission examines possible steps to curb EU states selling passports and visas to wealthy foreigners, due to concerns it can help organised crime groups.

Cypriot residency can be secured in two months with a 300,000 euro ($351,870) property purchase. Securing citizenship takes six months and requires a minimum property investment of 2 million euros.

Reuters reported in December how some donors to Britains ruling Conservative Party had sought Cypriot citizenship including hedge fund manager Alan Howard.

Both Cypriot and Caribbean investments are proving very popular ... primarily driven by high-net-worth individuals (HNWIs) from the UK who have an eye on the future and life after Brexit, said Astons spokesman Konstantin Kaminskiy.

CARIBBEAN DREAM

Henley & Partners said its volume of engagement with clients seeking alternative citizenship or residence by investment climbed 40 percent in the first quarter of 2020 versus Q1 2019, before flattening during the COVID-19 lockdown in Q2.

But interest has rallied since July 1, with a 15 percent year-on-year increase in engagement to Sept. 10, as the end of the Brexit transition phase nears.

Henley & Partners Blewer said clients were increasingly drawn to Caribbean citizenship applications - which is likely to give them better travel access to the EU than Britain - but which have a lower minimum investment and a quicker approval process.

Saint Lucia citizenship, offering visa-free travel to 146 countries, can be obtained in around four months for a minimum investment of 76,152 pounds, data supplied by Astons showed.

For less than 40,000 pounds more, investors can obtain citizenship of St. Kitts & Nevis - and visa-free travel to 156 countries - in around 60 days.

In contrast, Malta offers citizenship in exchange for around 1 million pounds of investment, but the process takes up to 14 months.

Portugal, meanwhile, typically processes investment migration applications in three months but only grants EU residency to investors and visa-fee travel to just 26 countries.

With HNWIs, time is often more important than what is essentially a small fluctuation in cost and many are looking to secure additional citizenship as fast as possible in the pandemic landscape, Arthur Sarkisian, managing director of Astons, said.

EU authorities are under pressure to clamp down on investment migration programmes by member states.

Sven Giegold, a member of the European Parliament from Germanys Green party, said these kind of citizenship sales posed a serious threat to EU security and the fight against corruption in the bloc.

EU passports and visas are not a commodity. Money must not be the criterion for citizenship and residence rights in the EU, he said.
Taking cognizance of forced conversion of a Sikh girl in Pakistan's Punjab province, the Ministry of External Affairs summoned a senior Pakistan High Commission official on Monday. The official was summoned to register India's formal protest agaisnt the act. India has reportedly told Pakistan that this violation of Human Rights is not acceptable.

Sikh girl missing in Pakistan's Punjab province; police file case against 'unknown abductor'

22-year-old Sikh 'forcibly converted'

A 22-year-old Sikh girl is missing in Pakistan's Punjab province and police have launched a case against an "unknown abductor", according to a media report on Sunday. The incident occurred recently in Attock district's Hassanabdal city, which is home to the famous Gurdwara Panja Sahib -- one of the most sacred sites in Sikhism. According to a report published in Dawn newspaper, the girl stepped out of her house to throw away trash, but never returned.

A case had been registered by Hassanabdal police against an unknown abductor on the complaint of the girls father under Section 365-B of the Pakistan Penal Code for kidnapping, abducting or inducing a woman to marry, the report said, quoting Raja Fayyaz-ul-Hassan, the sub-divisional police officer. Sub-Inspector Tahir Iqbal, the spokesman for district police, also said that a case was registered against an unknown abductor immediately after the girls father filed a complaint.

Pak releases Indian High Commission officials abducted in Islamabad post Indias demarche

Pak denies visa to Indian diplomat

On Sunday, Pakistan denied visa to senior diplomat Jayant Khobragade who was set to be appointed as acting head of Indian High Commission in Islamabad. Following India's decision to withdraw the special status of Jammu and Kashmir in August last year, Pakistan had downgraded diplomatic ties by expelling the Indian High Commissioner in Islamabad. Pakistan also decided not to send the new envoy it had named to head its mission in New Delhi following India's decision on Jammu and Kashmir.

Rajya Sabha cracks down on 8 'unruly' MPs, extends suspension till end of session

Pakistan releases Indian officials

Previously in June, two Indian High Commission staff members in Pakistan were reported to be missing since morning while on official work, as per sources at the Indian High Commission in Pakistan. Pakistan media had reported that the two junior officials have been arrested over the charge of hit-and-run in Islamabad, which had left a person injured, but the officials were allegedly'abducted' and taken into ISI custody. The officials were released after MEA issued a demarche to the Pakistan CDA stating that the responsibility for the safety and security of the concerned diplomatic personnel lay squarely with the Pakistani authorities.

Rajya Sabha ruckus: Six videos accessed capturing 'unruly' behaviour of suspended MPs
Ant Group, a leading provider in the development of open platforms for technology-driven inclusive financial services, and the parent company of Chinas largest digital payment platform Alipay, today unveiled Trusple, an international trade and financial service platform powered by AntChain, the companys blockchain-based technology solutions. Trusple aims to make it easier and less costly for all participants  especially Small-to-Medium Enterprises (SMEs)  to sell their products and services to customers around the world. It also reduces costs for financial institutions so they can better serve SMEs in need.

This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200925005110/en/

(Photo: Business Wire)

Based on the concept of Trust Made Simple, Trusple works by generating a smart contract once a buyer and a seller upload a trading order on the platform. As the order is executed, the smart contract is automatically updated with key information, such as order placements, logistics, and tax refund options. Using AntChain, the buyers and sellers banks will automatically process the payment settlements through the smart contract. This automated process not only mitigates the intensive and time-consuming processes that banks traditionally conduct to track and verify trading orders, but also ensures information is tamper-proof. Further, successful transactions on Trusple enable SMEs to build their creditworthiness on AntChain, making it easier for them to obtain financing services from financial institutions.

Trusple was designed to solve problems for SMEs and financial institutions involved in cross-border trading, said Guofei Jiang, President of Advanced Technology Business Group, Ant Group. Just like when Alipay was introduced in 2004 as the online escrow payment solution to build trust between buyers and sellers, with the launch of AntChain-powered Trusple, we look forward to making cross-border trading safer, more reliable, and more efficient for buyers and sellers, as well as for the financial institutions that serve them.

A lack of trust among global trading partners has traditionally made it difficult for many SMEs to do business. For buyers and sellers alike, this lack of trust can lead to delays in shipments and payment settlements, in turn placing pressure on SMEs financial position and cashflow. Banks that support global trading by SMEs have also faced a longstanding challenge of verifying the authenticity of orders, which has increased banking costs. To tackle these challenges in global trade, Trusple leverages AntChains key technologies, including AI, Internet of Things (IoT), and secure computation, to build trust among multiple parties.

During the pre-launch testing period conducted this month, Ms. Jing Yuan, whose company sells glass crystal ornaments to customers around the world, completed the first transaction on the Trusple platform, sending a consignment of goods headed to Mexico. With Trusple, the same transaction that would have previously required at least a week to process, Ms. Yuan was able to receive payment the next day. With the help of Trusple, the same amount of operating capital can now support more trading orders, said Ms. Yuan. Im now aiming to grow my business by 30 percent next year.

To help optimize cross-border processes, Trusple has partnered with various leading international financial institutions, including BNP Paribas, Citibank, DBS Bank, Deutsche Bank and Standard Chartered Bank.

Trusple was launched at the Blockchain Industry Summit of the INCLUSION Fintech Conference. Organized by Ant Group and Alipay, the conference aims to foster a global discussion on how digital technology can help build a more inclusive, green, and sustainable world.

About AntChain

AntChain is Ant Groups blockchain business. According to IPR Daily and patent database IncoPat, Ant Group holds the greatest number of published blockchain-related patent applications from 2017 to the six months ended June 30, 2020. Since the launch of Ant Groups blockchain business in 2016, the company pioneered the use of AntChain in over 50 blockchain commercial applications and use cases including supply chain finance, cross-border remittance, charitable donations and product provenience.

AntChain platform consists of three layers including the underlying Blockchain-as-a-Service open platform, digitalization of assets, and circulation of digitalized assets. By enabling businesses to digitalize their assets and transactions, we establish trust in multi-party collaborations. The AntChain platform generated over 100 million daily active items such as patents, vouchers, and warehouse receipts, for the twelve months ended June 30, 2020.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200925005110/en/
By Michelle Nichols

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Syria's foreign minister accused U.S. President Donald Trump's administration on Saturday of attempting to suffocate Syrians with sanctions "just like George Floyd and others were cruelly suffocated in the United States."

New U.S. sanctions that took effect in June under the so-called Caesar Act have further crippled the war-torn country's already crumbling economy by prohibiting foreign companies trading with Damascus.

Addressing the United Nations General Assembly via a pre-recorded video on Saturday, Syria's Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Walid Al-Moualem likened the effect of the sanctions to the death of Floyd, a Black American who died in May after a white police officer knelt on his neck.

"The real purpose of the Act is to put pressure on Syrians, their livelihoods, and their daily lives. It is an inhumane attempt to suffocate Syrians, just like George Floyd and others were cruelly suffocated in the United States," Al-Moualem said.

The U.S. mission to the United Nations did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In June, Russia also made a veiled reference to Floyd's death, which sparked protests across the United States and around the world, when it slammed U.S. policy toward Iran as like "putting a knee" to the country's neck.

Washington says the sanctions aim to cut revenue for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's government and push him back into U.N.-led talks to end the more than eight-year-long conflict.

A crackdown by Assad on pro-democracy protesters in 2011 led to civil war, with Moscow backing Assad and Washington supporting the opposition. Millions of people have fled Syria and millions are internally displaced.

(Reporting by Michelle Nichols; Editing by Sandra Maler)
Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 26/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

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A fourth candidate for the upcoming Brandon School Division board of trustees byelection has entered the contest.

Stay-at-home mom and red seal carpenter Breeanna Sieklicki filed her paperwork on Thursday, joining Jason Gobeil, Brock McEwing and Jason Splett in the race.

A mother of two girls, Sieklickis kids arent in elementary school yet but she told the Sun on Friday that shes looking to leave her mark on the local division ahead of them entering the school system. Its her first time running for public office.

"That way I can understand what the schools are doing and how to improve them and stuff," Sieklicki said. "Im very strong on primary and secondary education, being a red seal carpenter myself. I feel like the opportunities for children in many areas, be it college or university, starting in primary and secondary schools is a good start like (Crocus Plains Regional Secondary School) does."

She said she thinks that kids who dont go to schools like Crocus, which have vocational classes, sometimes miss out on opportunities to learn valuable skills. If elected, she would see about expanding that kind of programming to other schools in the division.

Another issue shed like to address is the lunch programs offered by the divisions elementary schools. She wonders if theres a way to expand the lunch programs to make sure that every student who wants it has access to it.

Shed also like the lottery system that determines who goes to Ecole Harrison and St. Augustine School looked it.

"I know they have a large amount of students that try to get in every year," she said. "Class sizes being small is great, so we dont want to change that, but maybe we could figure out a way to expand programming there because I know a lot of students and families want their children to go to a French immersion school or they want them to have that little bit of faith-based education."

With the COVID-19 pandemic going on, she praised the school division for coming up with an unprecedented plan to deliver education safely but said that its the perfect time to look at how remote learning options can be expanded and made available to more students.

"I feel like a few of the parents Ive talked to while campaigning have said that remote learning would have been a great option for them because they dont feel comfortable sending their kids to school. Right now, it feels like theres either homeschooling or (sending) their kids to school. Manitobas kinda lost that in-between ground."

Because of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, she said shed look into using platforms like newspapers and social media to get out her platform in a safe way.

 cslark@brandonsun.com

 Twitter: @ColinSlark
NEW DELHI: Delhi University (DU) has released the schedule for the undergraduate and postgraduate admissions on the basis of merit as well as entrance examination.

DU's First Cut off List 2020 for admissions to merit-based UG programs would be released on October 12, 2020. Students will be able to check the cut-offs at du.ac.in as well as at the websites of respective colleges.

Going by the official notice, there will be five cut-off lists this year. In case any seat is left vacant after these lists, more cut-off lists will be announced.

A record 3,53,919 students had applied for 64,000 undergraduate seats across colleges in DU this year, which is about a lakh more than that of last year and the highest in the past three years. Also

Due to such a high number of applicants, the cut-offs are also expected to go higher this year. Further, St Stephens, which is affiliated to the DU but conducts its own admission process, has already set a tone for the rest of colleges as well.

Students would have about two days to complete the admission process and an additional 2 days to complete the payment of the fee. As per the official schedule, the admission process in the colleges would be open from 10:00 am in the morning and would close at 5:00 pm in the evening. The students who have filled the form would be required to complete the process as detailed by the university.

Live TV

List of Documents for Reporting at DU Admissions 2020:

Pass Certificate for Class 10 issued by the Board

Class 10 Mark-Sheet

Class 12 Mark-Sheet

Original or Provisional Pass Certificate for Class 12 Board Exams

SC/ST/OBC Certificate (for candidates who seek admission through reserved seats)

EWS Certificate, if applicable

Latest Transfer Certificate

Two passport-size photographs (self-attested)

Sports Certificate for the last three years (if applicable)

Admission to all DU undergraduate courses for the 2020-21 session will be on the basis of cut-offs barring a few.
A federal judge ruled Friday that President Donald Trump's leading steward of public lands has been serving unlawfully, blocking him from continuing in the position in the latest pushback against the administration's practice of filling key positions without U.S. Senate approval.

U.S. Interior Department Bureau of Land Management acting director William Perry Pendley served unlawfully for 424 days without being confirmed to the post by the Senate as required under the Constitution, U.S. District Judge Brian Morris determined.

Judge Morris was appointed to the District Court for the District of Montana by Barack Obama in 2013.

The ruling came after Montanas Democratic governor in July sued to remove Pendley, saying the former oil industry attorney was illegally overseeing an agency that manages almost a quarter-billion acres of land, primarily in the U.S. West.

'Todays ruling is a win for the Constitution, the rule of law, and our public lands,' Gov. Steve Bullock said Friday. Environmental groups and Democratic lawmakers from Western states also cheered the judge's move after urging for months that Pendley be removed.

The ruling will be immediately appealed, according to Interior Department spokesman Conner Swanson. He called it 'an outrageous decision that is well outside the bounds of the law,' and he said the Obama administration had similarly filled key posts at the agency with temporary authorizations.

The agency will abide by the judge's order while the appeal is pending, officials said. It will also have to confront questions over the legitimacy of all decisions Pendley had made, including his approval of land use plans in Montana that Morris said Pendley was not authorized to make.

U.S. Interior Department Bureau of Land Management acting director William Perry Pendley served unlawfully for 424 days without being confirmed to the post by the Senate as required under the Constitution

Judge Brian Morris was appointed to the District Court for the District of Montana by Barack Obama in 2013

The land bureau regulates activities ranging from mining and oil extraction to livestock grazing and recreation. Under Trump, it has been at the forefront in the administration's drive to loosen environmental restrictions for oil and gas drilling and other development on public lands.

Pendley has been one of several senior officials in the Trump administration running federal agencies and departments despite not having gone before the Senate for the confirmation hearings that are required for top posts.

Last month, the Government Accountability Office, a bipartisan congressional watchdog, said acting Department of Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf and his acting deputy, Ken Cuccinelli, were improperly serving and ineligible to run the agency under the Vacancies Reform Act. The two have been at the forefront of administration initiatives on immigration and law enforcement.

Trump agencies have defended the skipped deadlines for Senate hearings for administration nominees, saying that the senior officials involved were carrying out the duties of their acting position but were not actually filling that position, and thus did not require a hearing and votes before the Senate.

Pendley had been formally nominated by Trump to direct the land bureau in July, after being given temporary authorizations to the acting position several times by Interior Secretary David Bernhardt.

But the nomination was withdrawn earlier this month after the confirmation process threatened to become contentious, potentially disrupting key U.S. senate races in Montana, where Bullock is seeking to unseat incumbent Republican Steve Daines, and Colorado, where Republican Sen. Cory Gardner is being challenged by former Gov. John Hickenlooper.

Pendley continued to hang on to the post despite the withdrawal, under an arrangement that Pendley himself set up months ago. In a May 22 order, Pendley made his own position, deputy director, the bureau's top post while the director's office is vacant.

After establishing that succession order, Pendleys actions included approval of two sweeping land resource management plans in Montana that would open 95% of federal land in the state to oil and gas development, attorneys for Bullock contended in court filings.

Administration officials had insisted in public statements and court filings that Pendley was not in fact the acting director, but rather 'exercising the authority of the director.'

Montanas Democratic governor Steve Bullock (pictured) sued to remove Pendley, saying the former oil industry attorney was illegally overseeing an agency that manages almost a quarter-billion acres of land

Morris rejected the administration's argument, saying they were 'evasive and undermine the constitutional system of checks and balances.'

'Under the federal defendant's theory, a president could ignore their constitutional appointment responsibility indefinitely and instead delegate authority directly or through cabinet secretaries to unconfirmed appointed officials. Such an arrangement could last for an entire presidential administration. In fact, the case before the Court presents that scenario,' he wrote.

The bureaus holdings are sweeping, with nearly 1 out of every 10 acres nationally under its dominion, mostly across the U.S. West.

Pendley was a longtime industry attorney and property rights advocate from Wyoming who had called for the government to sell its public lands before joining the Trump administration.

After joining the government, he declared that his past support for selling public lands was irrelevant because his boss, Bernhardt, opposes the wholesale sale of public lands.

Trumps actions to bypass the confirmation process has raised serious questions about the legitimacy of people in acting roles.

The GOP-led Senate typically is falling short of the votes needed from its ranks to confirm some of Trumps choices. But as Trump bypassed the chamber, chipping away at its advise-and-consent role, the Republican leadership has also allowed the acting positions to stand.

Shortly after the GAO questioned the DHS officials, Trump formally nominated Wolf to the secretary post. A hearing was held last week in the Senate on his nomination, but it's unlikely Wolf will be confirmed before the election.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 18:07:37|Editor: huaxia

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SEOUL, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) sent a notice to South Korea Friday to explain the deadly shooting of a South Korean civilian by DPRK soldiers in the DPRK territorial waters, according to the South Korean presidential Blue House.

The United Front Department (UFD) of the Central Committee of the ruling Workers' Party of Korea of the DPRK sent a formal notice to the Blue House, saying that an unidentified man aboard a floating material, who illegally intruded into the western territorial waters of the DPRK, was shot dead on Tuesday evening, according to the Blue House.

The UFD notice informed that the man, who crossed the inter-Korean sea boundary without approval, equivocated to verbal security checks by DPRK soldiers, according to the Blue House.

The DPRK soldiers shot two blanks before approaching the man and firing at him about 40-50 meters away, the Blue House quoted the UFD notice as saying.

The soldiers searched the floating material after the gunshots, only finding plenty of blood on it, without the man's body, so the DPRK military asserted that the man was dead, the Blue House said.

The floating material was burned according to the country's emergency quarantine guidelines, the Blue House quoted the UFD notice as saying.

The UFD also expressed regret over the South Korean military's blasphemous, confrontational expression related to the incident.

It said the DPRK leadership saw what should not happen occur, instructing the military to set up a system recording the entire process of sea guard activities in order to prevent any minor mistake or big misunderstanding during a crackdown process.

The UFD said the DPRK side delivers its apology to the South Korean side for the incident that may not have positive effect on the DPRK-South Korea relations, according to the Blue House.

Kim Jong Un, chairman of the State Affairs Commission of the DPRK, expressed his apology to South Korean President Moon Jae-in and South Korean people for disappointing them with the unsavory case, the Blue House said, citing the UFD notice.

So far, the DPRK side has not reported the shooting incident publicly, nor commented on South Korea's unveiling of the UFD notice. Enditem
The woman on the phone is in pieces. Ive been in lockdown in my care home since March, and they wont release me, she sobs. My husband lives here, too, but they wont let me see him. Hes in another room, on a different floor. He is 100 and he has dementia. He needs me. Its wicked. Just wicked.

Her name is Margaret and she is almost 92 years old. She has lived through a world war. She can remember times when scarlet fever, typhoid and polio killed thousands every year.

But this is so much worse, because of what theyre doing to us, she continues.

Before the pandemic struck and residents were confined to the home, shed visit the local gym twice a week  and even made the local news for doing so.

After we speak, I find the interview. In it, shes quoted saying: My advice to you all, whatever age you are, is to keep active. Avoid getting bored and fill your lives with things that can keep your mind and body healthy. You are never too old.

A nurse in PPE speaks to a resident at the Wren Hall care home in Nottingham

The Margaret I spoke to couldnt have been more different. Crushed. Angry. Afraid.

Staying fit also helped her control the symptoms of chronic lung disease. Having been cooped up since March, her condition has now worsened considerably.

She told me: They say Im being shielded for my health but no one has asked us, and they dont think about how what theyre doing is making us suffer.

Im not scared of this virus. Not a bit. And I understand the risk. But my husband and I are in our last years and I am frightened I wont see him again if this goes on for much longer.

Over the past three weeks, The Mail on Sunday has reported on a new crisis engulfing Britains care homes: thousands of residents who have been kept in almost complete lockdown since March.

Visits are barred, or drastically limited. Families have been torn apart  blocked from seeing loved ones. Residents held captive in their rooms.

Weve now received hundreds of emails, letters and calls like Margarets, each telling a similarly harrowing story.

A husband who once spent hours every evening with his wife, reduced to gazing at her through a locked glass window once a week for 15 minutes. Children, forced to watch as their once-happy parents wither and waste away, starved of any contact, comfort or love.

Parents seeing their young disabled children forcibly held down by care home staff, simply for trying to give their mum or dad a hug.

George had a visit from a loved one through a window at Digby Manor Residential Care Home, Birmingham

It goes on and on. A sea of misery. This newspaper raised the alarm earlier this month, as dementia charity Johns Campaign launched a legal bid to try to force the Department of Health and Social Care to revise guidance that it says has led to this situation.

The instructions, published by the Government in July, make limiting infections a priority above all else. But the lack of any other clear directive has led to many care homes implementing blanket bans. And these are, arguably, in breach of human rights.

Last week, the Government responded. Or rather, they emailed the Johns Campaign legal team, Leigh Day, to say they couldnt respond yet because they were extremely busy dealing with the pandemic. But this is the pandemic.

Now the Joint Committee on Human Rights has warned that it, too, believes emergency corona legislation  passed without the scrutiny of Parliament  risks infringing human rights.

In its report, published last week, chairman Harriet Harman singled out the blanket bans on care home visits for being unjustifiable. Another word that came up a lot was disproportionate.

Having spoken to scores of families, Im simply left wondering how, in a supposedly civilised society, is this happening at all. Johns Campaign lawyers Leigh Day say that if the Government doesnt stop fobbing them off, and respond fully, at end of the month they will go to the High Court regardless. Because, make no mistake, this kind of treatment is also lethal.

Alzheimers and other forms of dementia already kill hundreds of people each day  but numbers have risen by a disturbing 52 per cent since these measures began. And no one should be surprised when numbers continue to climb, as the detrimental effect of sensory deprivation, seclusion and long-term solitary confinement are well known.

Government decision-making is, they say, being led by the science. But clearly they missed the decades of research in to how such torturous conditions can cause rapid mental and physical deterioration even in young, fit people.

Dementia charity Johns Campaign launched a legal bid to try to force the Department of Health and Social Care to revise guidance that it says has led to this situation

Interestingly, many of these studies were done in high-security prisons. And thats just how the current care home situation is described, over and over, in the emails and letters and calls: its like being in prison. Worse, in fact  as there is no end in sight. How can this be allowed to go on?

The situation for those in care, if anything, has worsened over the past weeks. With Covid cases rising across the country, local lockdowns mean further tightening of rules.

In Scotland, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has banned people from going into each others homes, plunging elderly people still living at home into further isolation. And this is intended to go on for six months.

Of course, those most vulnerable to corona shouldnt be exposed unnecessarily. But many will die as a direct result of these measures.

And it will be a horrible, drawn-out and lonely death.

One that leaves only lingering guilt for those left behind, who have told us time and time again that they will never forgive themselves for not fighting harder.

Of course they feel like that. But really, there was nothing they could have done.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock has often spoken about the protective ring he promised to throw around the elderly in care. Is this really what he meant?

Its a complex situation, without doubt. But the risk posed by a handful of consistent visitors is low, so there must be another way.

Mr Hancock, who was too busy with the pandemic to respond to the care homes crisis did, last week, seem to have time to do an interview with Sky News on the sex lives of students.

But soon, with a looming judicial review, ever more angry MPs, and as calls for a full public inquiry continue to grow, he will have nowhere to hide.

Meanwhile, Margaret lives in terror of her eye check-up at the local hospital  because, when she gets back, she will be put into the solitary confinement of quarantine for two weeks.

Locked in her room. Alone.

I dont know how much longer I can go on, she says. I just want my life back.
Regular readers will know that we love our dividends at Simply Wall St, which is why it's exciting to see Fletcher King Plc (LON:FLK) is about to trade ex-dividend in the next 4 days. Investors can purchase shares before the 1st of October in order to be eligible for this dividend, which will be paid on the 30th of October.

Fletcher King's next dividend payment will be UK0.005 per share. Last year, in total, the company distributed UK0.018 to shareholders. Last year's total dividend payments show that Fletcher King has a trailing yield of 5.3% on the current share price of 0.33. If you buy this business for its dividend, you should have an idea of whether Fletcher King's dividend is reliable and sustainable. So we need to check whether the dividend payments are covered, and if earnings are growing.

View our latest analysis for Fletcher King

Dividends are typically paid from company earnings. If a company pays more in dividends than it earned in profit, then the dividend could be unsustainable. An unusually high payout ratio of 353% of its profit suggests something is happening other than the usual distribution of profits to shareholders. That said, even highly profitable companies sometimes might not generate enough cash to pay the dividend, which is why we should always check if the dividend is covered by cash flow. It paid out 18% of its free cash flow as dividends last year, which is conservatively low.

It's good to see that while Fletcher King's dividends were not covered by profits, at least they are affordable from a cash perspective. If executives were to continue paying more in dividends than the company reported in profits, we'd view this as a warning sign. Very few companies are able to sustainably pay dividends larger than their reported earnings.

Click here to see how much of its profit Fletcher King paid out over the last 12 months.

Have Earnings And Dividends Been Growing?

Companies with falling earnings are riskier for dividend shareholders. Investors love dividends, so if earnings fall and the dividend is reduced, expect a stock to be sold off heavily at the same time. Fletcher King's earnings per share have plummeted approximately 37% a year over the previous five years.

Story continues

Many investors will assess a company's dividend performance by evaluating how much the dividend payments have changed over time. Fletcher King has delivered 1.6% dividend growth per year on average over the past 10 years.

The Bottom Line

Is Fletcher King an attractive dividend stock, or better left on the shelf? It's never great to see earnings per share declining, especially when a company is paying out 353% of its profit as dividends, which we feel is uncomfortably high. Yet cashflow was much stronger, which makes us wonder if there are some large timing issues in Fletcher King's cash flows, or perhaps the company has written down some assets aggressively, reducing its income. It's not an attractive combination from a dividend perspective, and we're inclined to pass on this one for the time being.

So if you're still interested in Fletcher King despite it's poor dividend qualities, you should be well informed on some of the risks facing this stock. For example, we've found 5 warning signs for Fletcher King (2 are a bit unpleasant!) that deserve your attention before investing in the shares.

A common investment mistake is buying the first interesting stock you see. Here you can find a list of promising dividend stocks with a greater than 2% yield and an upcoming dividend.

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.



Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com.
By Rajiv Singh

Ankita Sehgal is candid about her disastrous professional debut in 2013. The eldest daughter of Rajeev Sehgal, the first generation entrepreneur who started an apple juice-based fizzy masala drink Jeeru in 2008, initially wanted to become a print journalist. Joining the family business was not even a remote possibility for the 24-year-old, who didnt find Jeeru cool as a brand name. What took the fizz out of her determination to become a scribe, though, was a reality check by her father. An incisive questionhow many women occupy top positions in print journalismturned out to be an eye-opener. Joining dad and his world of jeera masala drinks made more sense.

In April, when Ankita joined the family-owned Xotik Frujus, a sultry Mumbai and a pint-sized office welcomed her. The office space was so tiny that barely six people could fit into it, she recalls. Conducting sales meetings with 30 to 40 people was a tough task. The business too was of modest scalesome 10-12 crorelargely unorganised, and had its own share of the blues. Galvanising a sales team to sell Jeeru, and making a brand out of it was not easy. A jeera masala drink was an alien product for modern retail stores, and the product lacked swag.

The young entrepreneur persisted. Attending office every day for a couple of hours was giving her a good hang of the business. Growth in confidencewhich stemmed from a successful, and modest, incentive programme rolled out for the sales team, which included daily grocery items such as sugar and cooking oilmade her bold enough to make daring moves. And she dared big time quite early in her stint by inking a costly deal with one of the big modern retail chains. Though the idea was to find a shelf for Jeeru and take it to the right place to grab eyeballs and sales, it did prove costly. My first deal in modern retail was the most disastrous one, she recalls.

What helped Ankita bounce back was the way her father handled the entire issue. He didnt make it look like a failure, she says. He portrayed it as Jeerus first valiant move to make inroads into modern retail. Within two years, she points out, Jeeru was contributing over 11 percent of beverage sales for Future Retail. My dad always gave us a free hand and the courage to make mistakes and learn, she says. A year after Ankita joined the business, her younger sister Vishaka followed suit, and handled the general trade. Brother Dishank was the last one to join and diversified the business by launching Xotik cafes.

Sehgals confidence in his children has paid off. From undertaking sales force automation to roping in marketing professionals, from charting out aggressive growth plans to fanning out across the country, and from ending jugaad marketing and earmarking a decent amount for marketing and sales, the Sehgals have made a brand out of a commodity.

While the organised market for jeera masala drink stands at 700 crore, the Sehgals claim to be the biggest player. Xotik Frujus gets over 80 percent of revenue from flagship Jeeru which comes in six stock keeping units (SKUs) ranging from 10 to 90.From 10 crore in 2010-11, Xotik Frujus posted a revenue of 72.95 crore in the March-ended fiscal 2019-20. A little over a fifth of sales come from modern retail chains such as Walmart, Big Bazaar, and DMart. From being a Mumbai- and Surat-centric product, Jeeru is now a pan-India brand, and has a presence at airports with a premimum variant of the drink priced at 100. Recently, it roped in 82.5 Communications, a sister agency of Ogilvy, as its advertising agency.

The Sehgals, reckon food and beverage experts, have done a splendid job in building a brand out of jeera masala drinks. It is usually observed that ethnic beverages sell well in artisanal form and that is why it is rare to see a single brand-single variant combination to grow to a decent scale, says Jaspal Sabharwal, a private equity veteran and CEO of TagTaste, a sensory analytics and product development platform for food and beverages. Jeeru, he adds, has defied this trend, and the reasons are not hard to fathom. First, the Sehgals spotted a trend that was too simple for MNCs to spot. Normal is always boring for legacy businesses but making normal special is where the scale is and Jeerus founders were quick to spot that, says Sabharwal.

Second, it is not easy to develop a formulation for products where the core ingredient has a massive familiarity with consumers, and that makes acceptability of the product extremely complex. Third, the company did the right thing by initially focusing on limited geography clusters. It enabled them to control their burn and at the same time they kept improving their product, says Sabharwal. Taking the next leapfrom a revenue of 70 crore-something to 200 crorewill likely happen over the next three to four years.

The journey for the first-generation entrepreneur was not easy. Sehgal, whose father worked in the railways, never wanted a 9 to 5 job after completing his masters in sales and marketing. Circumstances forced him to work for over seven years. The idea was to save money to start his own venture. And it did happen in 1998, when Sehgal started a packaged drinking water brand Macblue in Mumbai.

Over the next decade, he kept struggling with his brand. Reason: Apart from the big boys of packaged waterBisleri, Aquafina and Kinleythere was a sea of local brands that played on price. It was not possible to make a brand out of Macblue, recalls Sehgal, who decided to diversify by entering into contract manufacturing for Bisleri and Orangina, a carbonated beverage brand made by French firm Orangina Schweppes, which was later acquired by Suntory Holdings of Japan. In 2008, Sehgal also rolled out his jeera masala offering Jeeru.

Why a jeera masala drink? Sehgal explains. Colas, mango and orange drinks were highly competitive, and the space was crowded. Sehgal was looking for a beverage category that was huge but without any leader brand. Jeera masala, which was a large cottage, unorganised industry with thousands of sellers across the country in variant forms, was virgin territory offering massive headroom for growth. Though the decision to enter uncharted territory was easy, the resistance was massive.

The first major challenge came from local players who played price warriors. Most of them didnt pay tax, compromised on quality, rolled out unhygienic products, and prospered on retail push by offering heavy margins. So a 12 bottle of Jeeru was fighting against a 4 bottle of a local player. What was interesting was that all local players bought Bacardi Breezer glass bottles from scrap dealers and sold jeera masala in them. Realising that doing too many things was not yielding results, Sehgal decided to play a focussed game.

From 2011, he stopped contract manufacturing, shifted to Daman and opened a manufacturing plant with imported machinery, and invested in product development.The next big challenge was to find distributors. Despite having a quality product, there were no takers. Reason: Sehgal didnt want to push sales via the margin route. The idea was to create a brand and not to sell a commodity, he recalls. What he did next was innovative marketing: Selling Jeeru in cans.

The gambit paid off. As Jeeru started grabbing eyeballs and sales, distributors started showing interest. There has been no looking back since then. While Eastern and Western India are its two big marketsincluding Maharashtra, Gujarat and Rajasthan, it rolled out some cola and juice products to enter into Northern and Southern India where jeera masala was not popular. In fact, the brand now gets exported to the UK, Middle East and Africa.Back home, the sales have continued their impressive march despite Covid-19.

While in March, Jeeru numbers were down by 80 percent compared to the same period last year, in April, they were down by 40 percent. After two months there has been a remarkable uptick, as June saw a jump of 35 percent, and in August, the company has doubled what it did last year during the same month. When beverage makers were left out in the cold, we invested in marketing, says Sehgal. Jeeru, he underlines, being positioned as a digestive drink came as a blessing in disguise. We continue to maintain our pole position, says Sehgal.The challenge for the leader now is the Cola Big Boys. With Coke and Pepsi pushing jeera masala and local variants of drinks under their respective brands RimZim and DukesSehgal might find the going tough. Sabharwal of TagTaste reckons the MNC biggies wont pose any fight.

Reason: They are so used to 80 percent-plus gross margins at concentrate level that they just cant realign their cost structures to make a success out of such categories. Jeerus big ask, he contends, would be to stay nimble and not do things in a hurry. There will be an urge to expand the product portfolio and if they do, it will be a huge mistake, he says. Keeping on making normal more exciting and relevant in terms of product improvisation, packaging, and consumer connect should be the mantra for the Sehgals, he adds.Sehgal is keeping his focus intact.

For us, jeera masala is everything. For cola majors, it is one of many things, he says, adding that the belligerence from MNCs gets blunted due to their vast product offerings. Though venture capitalists and private equities have tried to invest in the company, Sehgal has not taken the bait. With outside money, he says, comes interference. Our cash flow is good and we do things at our own pace, he says. This is the right approach. Ankita, too, has found the right space. During her stint, while pursuing an MBA in family business, she noticed something jarring: Only 15 girls in a class of 120.

At that time, it made me wonder if I was at the right place, she recalls. After seven years in the family business, she has found the answer. I am among the very few in the right place.

(This article first appeared in Forbes India, here
Laredo City Council resolved to urge federal authorities, the president, Texas senators and Laredos representative on Monday to reopen more northbound lanes at Laredos international bridges so that people can cross more safely.

Off and on throughout the pandemic, Mayor Pete Saenz has spoken about the need to reopen the bridges to tourists from Mexico in order to support Laredos business community.

In March, the Department of Homeland Security closed ports of entry on the U.S.-Mexico border to all but essential travel. This meant that most of the Nuevo Laredoans who usually cross over to shop on a tourist visa could not travel to Laredo.

The Trump administration has extended these restrictions for every month since, most recently last week.

Saenz said that now finally feels like the right time to open the bridges to non-essential travel again. After experiencing weeks of extremely elevated hospitalization and positivity rates over the summer, Laredo is now on a downward trend.

Its now worth taking the risk of eliminating these travel restrictions, Saenz told council, so the local business community can begin to recover.

We can coexist. If we follow these preventative guidelines, it works. We can have health and we can have commerce as well. Its worth the attempt and its worth the risk, the mayor said.

READ MORE: Appeals court affirms conviction in murder of 16-year-old Laredo girl

Laredo Health Director Dr. Victor Trevino said if these restrictions are lifted, the bridges can be monitored and the city can conduct voluntary testing.

But people are already crossing the bridge, at times, thousands per day, Trevino said. The cross-border infections have always existed since the very beginning because Nuevo Laredo and Laredo are intertwined communities, with or without the pandemic.

However, council did not make a motion to petition the federal government to end the travel restrictions. Instead, Councilman Mercurio Martinez noted that when the government restricted the number of northbound lanes at the bridges, it clumped travelers  especially pedestrians  together. Most of these people are essential workers.

Councilman Alberto Torres noted that wait times in the pedestrian lane can be two hours long right now. These travelers are crowded, breathing on top of each other, and then coming into Laredo.

Opening up more northbound lanes would go a long way in helping to curb the virus, Martinez said. So he made the motion for council to ask federal authorities to allow for this.

Councilwoman Nelly Vielma asked that they accompany the letter with a video that shows the conditions at the bridges and in their downtown, where so many businesses have closed.

The people making these decisions at the federal level have no earthly idea how its affecting us at the bridge, she said.

Julia Wallace may be reached at 956-728-2543 or jwallace@lmtonline.com
File photo

Sarafa Ayuba, a 22-year-old commercial motorcyclist, has committed suicide by hanging in an uncompleted building beside his uncles house at Amuloko area of Olorunsogo in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital.

According to Daily Post, it was gathered that Ayuba is the only son of his late father.

His mother, Nike, who travelled to Ibadan from Owu in Ogun State, where she remarried, wept uncontrollably, claiming that her son was wasted by some evil forces.

His uncle, Mr. Kazeem Tijani said since Ayuba went to work on Thursday morning, he didnt see him till he went to sleep at night.

Tijani noted that the whereabouts of Ayuba was not known until yesterday when his phone was being called to ascertain his condition but the ringing tone was being heard close by.

After listening, a woman was said to have traced the tone to the uncompleted building where he was found hanging. The phone was in his pocket.

Two black plastic bags were seen on the ground with his pair of sandals also flung there.

According to some residents, items found in the bags included: a white garment (Jalamia), two types of perfume, a new white singlet, chin chin, biscuits and other personal effects. He used a white handkerchief as a face mask.

Asked what he felt could have caused Ayubas death, his uncle, a native of Apomu in the Isokan Local Government Area of Osun State, whose business is sale of scraps, said: Ayuba got the motorcycle on hire purchase basis and he was paying adequately. He was my brothers son.

He was not indebted to anyone and he was not starving at all. He was not married. He has been living with me for the past two to three years. He was working with me before he got Okada. He was initially a tailor and he was doing fine.



We have searched his room but we could not find any note that he could have left, though we could not search his body. I have called our relations in Apomu; they are on their way.

Chairman of the Okada Riders Association at Amuloko where Ayuba was a member, Mr. Oluwatosin James confirmed the incident.

James described Ayuba as a very cool and easy-going rider.



The news of Ayubas death came to us as a rude shock. It is this morning that we heard of the news at the Park. He was very reticent and would not fight anybody.

Once he did his okada business in the morning, he would go and park and go to his uncles shop to assist him. Out of N390,000 that he got the Okada on instalment, has paid up to N77,000 that is remaining. There was no issue of threat to him from the person who gave him the okada. In fact, the person is like a brother to him. So, we are confounded over this incident.

As of the time of filing this report, the body of Ayuba was still dangling as traditional worshippers were making arrangements to bring it down for sacrifice to be performed lest the death turns a pestilence in the community.
In the past 15 years considerable effort has been made to ensure Australias banks operate at the highest standards of prudential, legal and ethical accountability.

A wide range of laws now govern directors duties, reporting requirements, anti-money laundering, fraud and due diligence checks on lending to customers. Those laws are buttressed by suitably tough penalties for lapses or deliberate breaches, including criminal sanctions.

To that end, the $1.3 billion fine levied against Westpac for an astonishing 23 million breaches of the anti-money laundering laws is welcome, necessary and in line with national and international expectations.

If the penalty is sanctioned by the Federal Court, it will be the single biggest civil penalty imposed on any entity in Australia.

That Westpac could have been fined as much as $20 million for each breach of the anti-money laundering laws demonstrates just how seriously regulators here and around the world view the need to stamp out cross-border criminal activity, including financing of terrorism, child exploitation and drug-trafficking.
Oregon Governor Kate Brown on Friday declared a state of emergency in Portland over the weekend due to risks of violence as thousands of members of what she called 'white supremacist groups' are expected to hold a rally.

Leaders of the self-described 'Western chauvinist' Proud Boys called Saturday's rally to 'end domestic terrorism' after four months of near daily demonstrations against police violence and racism in Oregon's largest city that have often ended in violence.

Many out-of-state demonstrators, some armed, were expected to attend the Proud Boys event in a park about six miles north of downtown, state officials said, with organizers expecting a crowd of up to 20,000, according to local television station KGW8.

Oregon Governor Kate Brown (in 2019) declared a state of emergency in Portland over fears of violence between BLM protesters and Proud Boys during a right-wing rally Saturday

Members of the 'Western chauvinist' Proud Boys group are expected to rally in a Portland park Saturday. Proud Boys are seen here at a rally in Vancouver, Oregon, on September 5

Police hope to keep right-wing groups apart from left-wing counter protesters set to gather in another park about two miles away.

'I am incredibly concerned about the increased risk of violence in Portland this weekend,' Brown told reporters.

Proud Boys chairman Enrique Tarrio said 'they will be peaceful unless provoked'

Brown also noted, 'The Proud Boys and Patriot Prayer groups have come to Portland time and time again from out of state looking for a fight and the results are always tragic.

She then added a warning to the group.

'Let me be perfectly clear: We will not tolerate any kind of violence this weekend. Those stoking the flames of violence, those coming to Portland looking for a fight will be held accountable,' Brown said according to Fox News.

Under her emergency declaration, state troopers and the Multnomah County Sheriff's Office will lead a law enforcement taskforce authorized to use 'proportional force' including tear gas to keep the peace, said Oregon State Police Superintendent Travis Hampton.

Police are seen rushing towards BLM protesters after a petrol bomb was thrown at the Portland Police Bureau on September 23, following the Breonna Taylor grand jury decision

Local and federal police are seen heading towards protesters on September 23 in Portland

Portland protesters are seen taking cover from smoke during the September 23 demonstration

Portland's Mayor Ted Wheeler banned the city's police officers from using tear gas on September 10, following criticism that it was being overused as a crowd control method during the months of BLM protests in the city.

Proud Boys chairman Enrique Tarrio said his group did not intend to cause violence.

'We will be peaceful unless provoked. I encourage people to protest us,' Tarrio wrote on Twitter on Thursday. 'What we won't condone or tolerate is violence towards attendees.'

The men-only Proud Boys group describes itself as a fraternal organization that is 'anti-racism' and 'anti-political correctness.'

Civil rights group The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) classifies the Proud Boys as a hate group, citing its members' anti-Muslim and misogynist rhetoric.

'Saturday's rally is the latest in a long series of sustained provocations that the Proud Boys have held in Portland,' SPLC research analyst Cassie Miller said in a statement on Friday.

President Donald Trump, who has made law and order a principal theme of his bid for re-election on November 3, has singled out Portland as one of several Democratic-led cities he calls 'anarchist jurisdictions.'

His Democratic challenger, former Vice President Joe Biden, says Trump's rhetoric is stoking the violence.
By AFP

CHUGUIV: One of the two survivors of a Ukrainian military plane crash died in hospital as the death toll climbed to 26 on Saturday after three more bodies were found. President Volodymyr Zelensky arrived at the scene of the tragedy near the eastern city of Kharkiv where an Antonov-26 transport plane carrying 20 young cadets and seven crew members crashed on Friday evening.

The plane burst into flames on landing around two kilometres (more than one mile) from Chuguiv military air base. Firefighters extinguished the blaze after an hour. Twenty-two were confirmed dead and two people survived. On Saturday three more bodies were found and one of the two survivors died in hospital.

"Ukraine has lost 26 worthy sons," Zelensky posted on Facebook, declaring Saturday a day of mourning. "Twenty five died on the spot. It is difficult to find words to express the pain of this loss," he said, adding one more cadet died in hospital from extensive burns.

Zelensky said the cause of the crash should be quickly established and called for an "objective" investigation. Ukraine's SBU security service said the plane was performing a training flight but the cadets of the Kharkiv National Air Force University were not involved in piloting it.

The security service, citing preliminary information, said the pilot reported an engine failure and seven minutes later the plane hit the ground. Defence Minister Andriy Taran said "the plane likely caught the ground with its wing" and then caught fire.

"Everything went according to plan: the plane was performing a training flight for cadets," he was quoted as saying by the defence ministry. He said that the instructor was at the wheel and cadets took turns to sit next to the pilot.

Taran said the plane was made in 1977 but was in a good condition. A number of foreign leaders including Polish President Andrzej Duda, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the EU's top diplomat Josep Borrell expressed their condolences.

"We send our heartfelt condolences to the families and loved ones of the cadets, officers, and crew killed and injured in the An-26 plane crash," the US embassy in Ukraine said on Facebook.
Epa, Oney: Shouting match erupts as 20A is tossed around By Sandun Jayawardana, our Lobby Correspondent View(s): View(s):

The battle over the 20th Amendment to the Constitution began amid chaotic scenes in Parliament this week when the Government presented it to the House even as Opposition MPs staged a protest inside.

As soon as Justice Minister Ali Sabry rose to present the motion on Tuesday , MPs from the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB), wearing black armbands and carrying placards, started shouting slogans against 20A. The MPs, who also wore vinashakari 20 epa (No to Destructive 20) badges, marched to the Well of the House, shouting vissa epa (we dont want 20). Government MPs then came down too, shouting vissa oney (we want 20). The rival groups then tried to drown each other out with slogans for and against the amendment. A standoff lasting over half an hour ensued, though, there were no heated exchanges or physical confrontations.

MPs from the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) led National Peoples Power (NPP) and the Tamil political parties in the Opposition however, did not join the SJB MPs in the Well of the House.

As Government and Opposition MPs continued to protest, Serjeant-at-Arms Narendra Fernando and his Deputy Kushan Jayaratne stood beside the Mace.

The draft Bill on 20A wasnt even up for debate on that day. Amidst the chaos, Trade Minister Bandula Gunawardena moved 43 orders and regulations related to levies and taxes, commencing the debate that was scheduled. Yet, most MPs barely spoke on the topic for the day. Opposition MPs used the time to bash the 20th Amendment and praise the 19th Amendment, which the former will abolish. Government MPs by contrast, did the exact opposite.

Registering the SJBs and the Oppositions strong protest over the controversial Amendment being presented to the House, Opposition Leader Sajith Premadasa called it a dark day for Parliamentary democracy in the country.

Despite their vocal protests, the SJB has only 54 MPs in Parliament; its numbers dwarfed by the near  majority of the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) led Government. Yet, the Government insisted that even a sizable section of these MPs were waiting to vote for the Amendment. Agriculture Minister Mahindananda Aluthgamage claimed that 17 Opposition MPs were currently in talks to vote for the Amendment. We will take 20 MPs from the Opposition to support the 20th Amendment. We will pass the Bill with 170 votes, he told Parliament.

The 20th Amendment continued to figure prominently even in subsequent debates in the House. The adjournment debate on the performance report of the Election Commission (EC) on Wednesday (23) saw Government MPs take aim at the conduct of the commission and its members, making the case for both the President to appoint members of the independent commissions and to increase the number of EC members.

Opening the debate, SLPP National List MP Sagara Kariyawasam praised the EC for conducting a free and fair election in a peaceful atmosphere, and for ensuring that the poll did not result in the spread of COVID-19 in the country. Nevertheless, he noted that the gazetting of the candidates preference numbers had been delayed due to disagreements between Commission members. While the commission has three members, its quorum has also been stipulated as three. As such, it is clear that increasing the number of members of the commission to five should be more productive and meaningful, he remarked.

Leader of the House Dinesh Gunawardena meanwhile, claimed that certain actions of the EC had undermined public confidence in the commission. Some EC members even filed petitions in the Supreme Court without the consent of other members. Such actions have subjected the commission to criticism by the public.

The 20th Amendment will destroy the independence of the EC, warned SJB Matale district MP Rohini Kaviratne. I am a mother who was a victim of election violence, said, recalling an incident in March, 1992 when she was pregnant with her daughter. Supporters of brothers Nandimithra and Sarath Ekanayake viciously assaulted me. I was not allowed to be admitted to a Government hospital. The police even refused to record my complaint. I had to admit myself to a private hospital to give birth. I had to have two surgeries on my spine. They are trying to go take the country back to that age by abolishing the 19th Amendment, she alleged.

This weeks battles in Parliament over 20A marked the beginning of more battles to come over the Amendment that the Government hopes to pass in Parliament as a matter of priority before Novembers budget.

Under the Constitution, interested parties are granted the right to invoke the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court to determine if any Bill or any of its provisions are inconsistent with the Constitution within seven days of its presentation in Parliament.

Over a dozen petitions had been filed in the Supreme Court challenging the Bill by the end of the week, including by the SJB and the Tamil National Alliance (TNA). Since the Bill has been challenged, the SC will have 21 days to deliver its determination from the date of the petitions. A five-judge bench of the Supreme Court will consider the petitions on September 29.

Parliament meanwhile, will next reconvene on October 6.
The recently launched first look poster of Radhe Shyam has indeed raised the expectations of the movie buffs. The mesmerizing yet romantic poster of the film featuring Pooja Hegde and Prabhas was also highly appreciated by the netizens.

Well now, we have a super exciting news to share with you about the highly awaited film. If reports are to be believed, south diva Pooja Hegde will be essaying a double role in Radhe Shyam. It is said that the talented actress will be playing a village belle and also a modern-day woman in the film. However, there is no confirmation about the same and one will have to wait until the film hits the theatres or a poster releases suggesting the same.

Touted to be a romantic thriller, the film directed by Radha Krishna Kumar is set in the backdrop of Europe. Prabhas will reportedly essay the role of a palm reader in Radhe Shyam. As per reports, the team including Prabhas and Pooja Hegde will soon fly to Italy to resume the filming, which was kept on hold owing to the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent travel restrictions. Earlier, the team was filming in Georgia ahead of the lockdown.

Well, the romantic-thriller also features an ensemble cast including Bhagyashree, Murli Sharma, Priyadarshi Pulikonda, Sachin Khedekar, Kunaal Roy Kapur, and Sasha Chettri. Bankrolled by Gopikrishna Movies and UV Creations, the makers of the pan-India project will have multiple music composers from different industries including Bollywood. If speculations are true, music maestro AR Rahman is also approached by the makers.

Radhe Shyam will have a massive simultaneous release in Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam and Hindi in 2021.

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During Alert Level 1, the Restaurant Association reported that the hospitality industry was struggling to recruit skilled labour and saw no increase in Kiwis applying for junior roles.

The organisation, which represents cafe and restaurant owners throughout New Zealand, put worker shortages down to border closure.

It raised the question: why arent Kiwis keen to work in hospitality?

The answer is no mystery to almost 30 current and former hospitality workers in the Bay Of Plenty, who responded to The Weekend Sun for comment.

Missing family

Hospitality becomes your life  you are expected to work long hours for little pay, says one respondent.

If you need to take time off you are made to feel like you are letting the team down. Theres no gratitude for surrendering family time for things like Christmas or birthdays.

I missed 10 years of those precious memories to help someone's business grow. Ive been out of the industry for two years now and my relationship with my spouse and family has enhanced.

This was echoed by several other long-serving hospitality workers.

I have been in the hospo Industry for about 12 years and I love the the atmosphere and the fast-paced nature of it, says another.

What Ive found is that most places arent very flexible with weekend days. Ive been a single parent most of my sons life, and jobs turn you away if you cant be there both weekend days, or even if you can only make it every second weekend when the kids are at the other parents place.

You work your fingers to the bone for minimal pay  its not very appealing.

Toxic environment

While some reported having great experiences with fellow staff and their employers, six respondents say they left the industry due to workplace bullying.

I worked in a kitchen while I was studying culinary arts. They treated me so badly and made me feel so awful that I quit the job and gave up on the course, says one.

I loved my job, but I was bullied by the chef, says another.

Nothing was done about it, so I left.

One says hospitality businesses supporting their staff would make other challenging parts of the job, like dealing with difficult customers, more manageable.

Customers, like in any job, can be good and bad, but when a company doesn't give their employees the tools to do the best job they can but expect high standards, it becomes a joke.

And then theres COVID

After all of that, theres COVID-19 complications to add into the mix  which saw many hospitality workers lose their jobs.

My hospitality job was awesome, because I got to work with a great team. But after losing my job due to COVID, Im having to look for work in other industries, says Scott Jones, a former kitchen hand.

Its a shame, but its a pretty uncertain time to go back into the industry.

Others say that rosters have become even more of an issue during COVID-19.

Due to COVID, my partners employer says she has to work both weekend days, even though her contract is Monday to Friday. I work weekends already, so she looks after the kids on weekends.

Even after trying to meet her employer half-way with alternatives, like working one weekend day, she was given an ultimatum to either work weekends or pretty much be fired. People in higher up positions dont work all weekend, but they expect their workers to  its a joke.

Times are tough for the hospitality industry, but thats no excuse for hospitality workers to be left out of the conversation, says hospitality rights organisation, Raise the Bar, founder Chloe Ann-King.

We desperately need to hear from Kiwi hospitality workers about what its actually like working the industry, says Chloe.

It's unsurprising that highly skilled hospo workers like myself no longer want to work in the industry.

Restaurant Association responds

Restaurant Association CEO Marisa Bidois says that most of their members would empathise with the issues raised by Bay Of Plenty hospitality workers.

However, she says the concerns arent unique to the hospitality industry.

Its never nice to miss special occasions with family and most of our members will empathise with this.

Work-life balance is not a unique challenge to hospitality either  its a challenge in many professions and industries.

We dont believe that the hospitality industry is more toxic than any others. We are a workplace and we operate under the same rules that govern all workplaces.

Whilst small businesses do not have HR departments, we hear from many of our members that colleagues often become like extended family which makes our workplaces more communal and caring than many others. This is a culture that many larger workplaces can struggle to replicate. There will of course always be exceptions as there is in any industry.

Marisa says COVID-19 has been a time for employers and employees to ensure they have really robust communication processes.

The COVID-19 pandemic has been tough for everyone.

Ive heard numerous stories about business owners moving out of their homes to rent or sell them so they can continue to keep everyone on the team employed.

We hear more stories about owners working longer hours and picking up more shifts in the business to ensure that they can remain viable.

As an association we work very hard to ensure hospitality businesses are sustainable, healthy businesses in all senses.

Our members are those who take their employment responsibilities seriously and we are continually thanked for the resources and training materials we put together to help our members be the best they can be.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 20:42:34|Editor: huaxia

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TEHRAN, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Iran's President Hassan Rouhani on Saturday accused the U.S. administration of committing the "greatest savagery" with its economic siege on Iran, official news agency IRNA reported.

"Americans recently said that they have inflicted tens of billions of U.S. dollars in damage to Iran. In the past three years, they have caused at least a damage of 150 billion U.S. dollars," Rouhani said at a meeting of the National Headquarters for Managing and Fighting the Coronavirus in Tehran.

Iranians resentful of shortages and economic pressure should direct their "curses, maledictions and hate" towards the White House, the Iranian president said. Enditem
Searchers combing the area where a Ukrainian military aircraft crashed found two more bodies on September 26, bringing the death toll to 26. One person survived.

The plane, a twin-turboprop Antonov-26 belonging to the Ukrainian Air Force, was carrying a crew of seven and 20 cadets of a military aviation school when it crashed and burst into flames in the evening on September 25 while coming in for landing at the airport in Chuhuyiv, about 400 kilometers east of the capital Kyiv.

Two people initially survived the crash, but one later died in a hospital. No cause for the crash has been determined.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy declared September 26 to be a day of mourning for the crash victims and ordered that flights of An-26 planes be halted pending investigation into the cause of the crash.

Zelenskiy, who visited the crash area on September 26, called for a full assessment of the condition of the countrys military equipment. Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal called for an official report on the crash by October 25.

Yesterday we lost young cadets and experienced military men, who had their whole lives and, I am sure, more than one military feat ahead of them," Zelenskiy said in a statement released by his office. The whole country will mourn today with their families.

The An-26 is a transport plane used by both military and civilian operators. Nearly 1,400 of the planes were manufactured from 1969 to 1986, according to the company's website. Defense Minister Andriy Taran said the plane that crashed was built in 1977.

With reporting by AP, Interfax, and TASS
Northern Ireland has detected a record number of Covid-19 cases for the second day in a row.

319 people have tested positive in the past 24 hours, while one more death has been reported.

In the past two days alone, in the North there have been 592 cases detected.

In total, the number of people who have tested positive for the disease there is now 10,542.

There is particular concern for Belfast and the areas around Derry City and Strabane in Tyrone.

In the past seven days Belfast has had an incidence rate of 107 cases per 100,000, while the situation is more worrying in Derry City and Strabane with a seven-day incidence rate of almost 196.

While the Northern Ireland Department of Health's statistical dashboard provides updates on the number of positive test results over the weekend, it does not relay up-to-date information on coronavirus fatalities on Saturdays and Sundays.

The latest death toll reported by the department on Friday stood at 578.

Yesterday, the Chief Medical Officers from the North and the Republic issued an appeal for people not to travel across the border.

Acting Chief Medical Officer Ronan Glynn and Chief Medical Officer for Northern Ireland, Dr Michael McBride, also said that closer collaboration was needed between the Republic and the North.
New Delhi, Sep 26 : Amid protests by farmers across the country over the three agriculture-related Bills passed by Parliament, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Saturday slammed the proposed legislations as "big blunders" and demanded their immediate withdrawal.

In a video message under the party's campaign titled 'Speak up for Farmers' against the Bills, Rahul Gandhi said: "Attacks on you have started -- first it was demonetisation, then GST and then during the Covid-19 pandemic not a single rupee was shared with you all. The government is trying to make you slaves, slaves of corporates. And now these three controversial Bills are an attempt to finish you." "We are standing with you and we will stop these Bills altogether," he said.

The Congress leader added: "I want to tell the government that it is one of the biggest blunders. If the farmers came out on the streets, then a huge loss is going to happen. Withdraw these Bills immediately without taking much time and give guarantee of the MSPs to farmers," he added.

The Congress is protesting against the farm Bills along with other opposition parties. These are The Farmer's Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020, The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020, and The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020.
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This past Wednesday morning, Donny Deutsch, a frequent guest on MSNBC and a former program host, claimed that there was no difference between President Donald Trumps rhetoric and what Adolf Hitler preached in Germany in the 1930s. He added, And were here and what is the difference between Adolph Hitler and Donald Trump? Im not saying there is a Holocaust but when you look at the tactics, that is where we are right now.

This is as outrageous as it is ignorant, and Deutsch needs to be called on the carpet for his ugly and inflammatory comments. As stated by the National Council of Young Israel, To in any way liken President Trump to Adolf Hitler, who is arguably the most heinous anti-Semite in world history, is unequivocally repugnant, and trivializing the Holocaust to make a cheap political point on television is a tremendous insult to the victims and their progeny.

Joe Scarborough, who hosted the interview with Deutsch, is also to be faulted for going along with Deutsch rather than stopping him in his tracks. It is also inexcusable that Deutsch, himself Jewish, called out Jews who support Trump.

What was Deutschs fundamental argument? He said, But what was going on in the early '30s Germany? Basically you had a destruction of belief in the free press, you had blurring between the executive branch and the Justice Department, you have creating an other, whether its Muslims, whether its Mexicans, whether its congressmen who werent born in this country, and then you have the destruction of free elections.

But Deutsch is hardly the first to make the Trump-Hitler comparison. In fact, I devoted an entire chapter of my book Evangelicals at the Crossroads: Will We Pass the Trump Test? to a major statement by the International Bonhoeffer Society (IBS) which made comparisons between Nazi Germany and America today, mentioning Trump by name but not Hitler. The statement explicitly called for ending Donald Trumps presidency.

Obviously, I cant duplicate here everything laid out in the book, but lets put aside inflammatory rhetoric and look at the simple facts. Can a valid comparison be made between Trump and Hitler and between America today and pre-World War II Nazi Germany? Absolutely, categorically not.

Trump has been our president for the last four years. During this time he has not imprisoned his political opponents, not overruled the Supreme Court or Congress, not launched aggressive new wars in other parts of the world, and not shut down the dissenting press (although he has certainly sought to expose fake news).

In stark contrast, within months of Hitler coming into power in 1933, the Dachau concentration camp was opened for political dissenters, Hitler announced some of his conquest and expansion plans, and the first boycott of Jewish businesses was implemented.

As for targeting the Jews, the Yad Vashem website explains, In September 1935 the Nuremberg Laws were passed, stripping the Jews of their citizenship and forbidding intermarriage between Jews and non-Jews. Jews were banned from universities; Jewish actors were dismissed from theaters; Jewish authors works were rejected by publishers; and Jewish journalists were hard-pressed to find newspapers that would publish their writings. Famous artists and scientists played an important role in this campaign of dispossession and party labeling of literature, art, and science. Some scientists and physicians were involved in the theoretical underpinnings of the racial doctrine.

How do we even contrast that with Trumps pro-Israel actions, including moving our embassy to Jerusalem, seeking to broker a peace plan with the Palestinians that was strongly pro-Israel, and forging historic peace treaties with the UAE and Bahrain? And what of the fact that Ivanka and Jared are practicing Jews, meaning that Trumps own grandchildren are Jewish?

When it comes to the treatment of the Christian community, Trump has fought tirelessly to defend religious liberties, both at home and abroad. Again, in stark contrast, already in 1933, Nazi church leaders were calling for all pastors to make a personal oath of loyalty to Hitler while demanding that all baptized Jews be expelled from the churches.

For those who claim that Trumps Christian supporters will follow him no matter what, those same supporters challenged him when he pulled our troops from Syria, with Pat Robertson even issuing a public warning. Can you imagine what would happen if Trump changed his stance on abortion or religious liberty?

Speaking of abortion, rather than starting a campaign to put to death the least of these (as Hitler did in 1939, euthanizing the mentally ill and disabled), Trump has been a courageous opponent of abortion, thereby fighting for the life of the least of these.

As for Trumps alleged racism, the corollary of his purported white nationalism, why is it that he has been steadily growing in popularity in the Black community? And why were so many Black voices heard at the recent RNC?

As I noted in Evangelicals at the Crossroads, a March 4, 2020 op-ed piece in the New York Times discussing a major survey of 40,000 black voters (from March-December, 2019) indicated that Trumps favorability rating among black voters overall increased from 7 percent in 2016 to 18 percent in 2019. . . .

Think back to the viral video of an Ethiopian immigrant leading in prayer at a 2019 Young Black Leadership Summit at the White House following the president addressing the packed room of young Black leaders. Could you imagine a world in which Hitler held a Young Jewish Leadership Summit?

And what of Trumps actions in prison reform, funding of historic Black colleges, and helping drop the unemployment rates for all Americans, including Blacks and other minorities? How can this possibly be compared to the actions of a murderous madman like Hitler?

I have no desire to deny Trumps many flaws or to downplay the divisive nature of his rhetoric. But to compare him to Adolph Hitler, also comparing his followers to Hitlers Nazis, is simply obscene, not to mention a terrible slight on Hitlers victims. Deutsch should be ashamed of himself.

(For all who want to defend Deutschs words, including Deutsch himself, my phone lines are open. Id be more than happy to debate this with you on the radio. The light will quickly dispel the darkness. For my relevant video commentary, see here.)
Trump vows to sign executive order protecting all babies born alive, including survivors of abortion

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President Donald Trump vowed Wednesday to sign an executive order to protect all babies born alive, including those who survive abortion.

In a pre-recorded address to the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast, held online this year due to the coronavirus pandemic lockdowns, the president said protecting life "is our sacrosanct moral duty."

"Today, I am announcing that I will be signing the born alive executive order to ensure that all precious babies born alive, no matter their circumstances, receive the medical care that they deserve. This is our sacrosanct moral duty," said Trump.

The president also noted that his administration is increasing federal funding for neonatal research to ensure that every child has the very best chance to thrive and to grow.

Further details on the executive order were not available from the White House as of Thursday morning but the announcement quickly drew praise from members of the pro-life community.

President Trumps executive order protects the youngest of patients and ensures that their right to life is defended to the greatest extent of the law, Carol Tobias, president of National Right to Life, said in a statement to The Christian Post. We thank President Trump for his dedication to the right to life and for working to protect all innocent human life. He is a champion for the most vulnerable among us and committed to guarding the right to life of all babiesborn and unborn.

In his comments prefacing the announcement Wednesday, President Trump took the time to highlight the valuable contribution of Catholics and all people of faith to American society.

Today, President @realDonaldTrump addressed the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast by video and announced he will be "signing the Born-Alive Executive Order to ensure that all precious babies born aliveno matter their circumstancereceive the medical care that they deserve." pic.twitter.com/087ZqZcGtL  The White House (@WhiteHouse) September 23, 2020

I grew up next to a Catholic church in Queens, New York, and I saw how much incredible work the Catholic Church did for our community. These are amazing people. These are great, great people. Catholic schools give many underserved children the chance to reach their God-given potential. Catholics of all backgrounds share the love of Christ with the most vulnerable as they care for the elderly, the homeless and neighbors in need, Trump said.

Our nation is strong because of Catholics and all people of faith. We believe in the joy of family, the blessing of freedom and the dignity of work and the eternal truth that every child born and unborn, is made the holy image of God. I will always protect the vital role of religion and prayer in American society and I will always defend the sacred right to life, the president added.

Leonard Leo, president of the NCPB board of directors who introduced Trump before his speech, praised him as a champion of the Churchs values.

There is a longstanding tradition of the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast to invite and host presidents of the United States who embrace the Catholic Churchs teachings on the sanctity of human life. President Donald Trump has fiercely defended the culture of life in this way more than any other president in my own lifetime, Leo said.

Hes done so much more to embraces policies that reflect the morals, teachings and objective of our faith. He has breathed new life into the First Amendments guarantees of religious liberty by protecting the conscience rights of healthcare professionals, ending discrimination against believers of all backgrounds when it comes to education, and fighting back against the movement to remove religious symbols from public spaces.

President Trump has recognized the principle of equal opportunity and justice by pressing for educational choice and reform that would benefit the least fortunate in our society. And through his efforts at judicial selection, President Trump has helped secured human dignity by appointing jurists who bolster the rule of law by enforcing constitutional limits on the power of the state, he said.

The National Catholic Prayer Breakfast was established in 2004 in response to Saint John Paul IIs call for a New Evangelization. Each year, over 1,500 people gather in Washington, D.C., for the nonpartisan event to pray for the nation.
A House investigation of circumstances predating the two Boeing 737-Max crashes two years ago underscores what goes wrong  tragically so  when government regulators shrug off what should be an arms-length relationship with the industries they oversee and regulate. The Federal Aviation Administration ceded its regulatory authority to Boeing. Boeings own oversight personnel ceded their authority to the engineers and line technicians who detected but failed to correct the flawed avionics system behind the two 737 crashes. Hundreds died as a result.

This is a case of criminal negligence up and down the oversight chain that offers a lesson for anyone thinking of embracing President Donald Trumps pro-business philosophy of deregulating industry and throwing caution to the wind. When regulation of banks was relaxed, abuses led to financial catastrophe. When the petroleum industry was left to police itself, the 2010 Deepwater Horizon runaway oil spill resulted. When federal inspections of food plants werent rigorous, salmonella, listeria or e-coli outbreaks caused widespread deaths.

Whatever Trump and industry lobbyists might argue, the reality is that regulation is good. Regulation is necessary. Regulation is pro-life.

The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee issued a scathing report on Sept. 16 outlining a series of catastrophic safety failures by the Federal Aviation Administration and Boeing that contributed to two crashes, 346 deaths, and grounding of the entire worldwide 737-Max fleet. Boeing is now pleading for public sympathy, citing the pandemic for its serious financial woes. But its hard to be sympathetic knowing the string of pre-pandemic management failures in the 737-Maxs design and construction.

Boeing got in a hurry to get the plane into service as its primary rival, Airbus, was introducing a competing model, the House report says. Safety took a back seat to meeting production quotas and cutting costs. A software system, designed to force the planes nose downward under certain aerodynamic circumstances, clearly had major glitches that took pilots by surprise and forced emergency cockpit procedures to manually override controls and avert crashes. Rather than fix the glitches, Boeing sent out almost-worthless advisories.

Federal Aviation Administration regulators relied on Boeing engineers to keep them informed of problems rather than perform their own rigorous, independent inspections. Boeing engineers withheld information that federal regulators needed to know in order to make objective judgments about the aircrafts suitability for flight. When some federal inspectors raised red flags, their bosses sided with Boeing.

Corporations like Boeing are in business to make money and maximize shareholder profits. Federal regulation helps weaken profits and reduce attractiveness for investors. Its in the nature of corporations to protect their bottom line first, but that must never be governments goal.

In Trumps America, the public still needs to be reminded of why government and regulation exist: to protect consumers first instead of helping corporate America kill people for the sake of boosting profits.
GRAND RAPIDS, MI -- State police are looking for a person who fired at another vehicle on U.S. 131 in Wyoming following a road-rage incident.

State police said the incident happened about 1:50 a.m. Thursday, Sept. 24 on U.S. 131 near 36th Street.

Police said there was some type of road rage that happened. Following that, a black Audi similar to an A4 pulled up next to another vehicle and a passenger fired two shots.

The shots struck the other vehicles driver door. No one was injured.

The victims vehicle exited at 28th Street and the other vehicle continued north on the freeway.

Police said they do not believe the shooting is related to other recent U.S. 131 freeway shootings.

The car believed to be an Audi had black rims and dark window tint.

Anyone with information about the incident or the car can call the state police Rockford post at 616-866-4411 or the state police regional dispatch at 989-732-5141.

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Illustrative image (Photo: Vietnam Airlines)

Hanoi - Operated by national flag carrier Vietnam Airlines, a return commercial flight from Seoul, the Republic of Korea (RoK), landed at Hanois Noi Bai International Airport on September 25 noon, marking a milestone in the restoration of the countrys air transport after months of disruption due to the COVID-19 pandemic.



Using the long-range wide-body airliner Airbus A350, flight No VN417 took off from Incheon International Airport in the RoK, bringing back about 100 passengers, mostly returning Vietnamese and Korean investors and experts.



Earlier in the morning, the outbound flight carried 164 passengers from Hanoi to Seoul.



The RoK is among the six destinations in Asia with which the Vietnamese Government has decided to resume international flights since the country sealed off its borders on March 22, in addition to Japan, China, Taiwan (China), Laos and Cambodia, which have the COVID-19 situation under control.



Vo Huy Cuong, Deputy Director of the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam (CAAV), said the flight is a trial to see the air transport sectors operation and capacity in receiving international passengers.



This marks a milestone in Vietnams air link resumption, as part of the Governments dual goals of developing the economy while safely managing the risks of COVID-19 in the new normal.



The resumption of flights received a warm welcome from Vietnamese citizens in the RoK as well as Korean people, particularly business people and investors.



The flight is operated under strict health protocols to prevent the spread of coronavirus, and its success highlights the effective coordination between the airline, the airport, and health agencies.



Before boarding, passengers must obtain proof of negative SARS-CoV-2 tests (using PCR diagnostics) from certified health authorities three days prior to departure, confirmation of quarantine accommodation in Vietnam, and mandatory installation of Vietnams contact tracing app Bluezone and self-completing health status app Vietnam Health Declaration on their mobile devices.



After the flight, the passengers will be tested for COVID-19 in Vietnam. If the results return positive, they will be transported to a local health facility to be isolated and treated. If the results come back negative, they could continue to quarantine in registered hotels or other accommodations and they would be tested again on the sixth day after entry or when suspect symptoms manifest.



With a negative result on their second test, they would be allowed to travel to their residence to self-isolate to complete the 14-day quarantine and follow the anti-pandemic measures.



The aircrew underwent health examination and would also be quarantined for 14 days.



The aircrafts passenger sections and cockpit will be sterilised.



Vietnam Airlines is working to resume international flights in line with the Governments directions and approval from foreign authorities.



Meanwhile, the Korean Government announced on September 24 that air routes between Incheon and Vietnams Hanoi and HCM City will be reopened this month, with two flights a week.
Winnipeg police say social media posts lauding the police-in-schools program on its Instagram are not part of an organized campaign, but rather an effort to address misconceptions about an initiative that has been questioned recently.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 25/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Winnipeg police say social media posts lauding the police-in-schools program on its Instagram are not part of an organized campaign, but rather an effort to address misconceptions about an initiative that has been questioned recently.

On Wednesday, the account @wpgpoliceofficial posted white tiles that display quotes from anonymous parents in the River East Transcona School Division who participated in a survey about the divisions school resource officer program in the spring.

The tiles mirror posts on the Police-Free Schools Winnipeg website  except they contain quotes that praise the program rather than call for its end.

One parent called a police presentation in school about internet safety "invaluable" to their child. Some parents reported their children saying police presence limits incidents, bullying included, at school. Multiple guardians cited the program as a way police build positive relationships.

"I have been receiving, as I oversee the school engagement section, specific questions about what the (officers) do and dont do, so its clear that theres some misunderstanding," said Insp. Bonnie Emerson of the community support division at the Winnipeg Police Service.

Citing accountability as a key tenet of the service, Emerson said police are presenting information about the program and what it is intended for, as well as survey results compiled by River East Transcona; the division received positive feedback during the first year (2019-20) an officer visited area schools, prompting the administration to request more officers this year.

The police-in-schools program  a countrywide initiative introduced to Winnipeg in 2002  currently includes 19 uniformed officers who work in six city school divisions. Officer duties range from giving presentations about drugs to "participation in a threat assessment."

Since its inception, supporters have insisted the program builds understanding between officers, students and communities.

Cam Scott with Police-Free Schools Winnipeg says that isnt always the case. He argues a spotlight must be put on the negative experiences faced by students and staff from low-income and racialised communities.

In recent months, community members in Vancouver and Edmonton have mobilized to call for an end to police programs in their respective cities. The movements argue hosting police affects the well-being, success and safety of Black, Indigenous and other students of colour who have had negative experiences with authorities.

Similar movements in Toronto and Hamilton have been successful. In 2017, the Toronto District School Board voted to remove police from its schools after a six-week community review.

The Winnipeg campaign is calling for "an equity-based, community-led evaluation" that breaks down respondents racial identities.

"If youre privileged enough to feel at ease around police, we think its really important to hear and believe the voices of people harmed by policing rather than drown them out," Scott said, adding that's exactly what the @wpgpoliceofficial posts do: "contradict or shout over those voices."

The posts are a stark contrast to those on the @policefreeschoolswpg page, which details accounts of police presence intimidating students and staff from marginalized communities and concerns about the glorification of violence in schools because police have guns and batons.

As far as Seven Oaks School Division superintendent Brian OLeary is concerned, the officers  who are on a first-name basis with staff and students  devote time to problem-solving and proactive policing.

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These officers work in interdisciplinary teams with school counsellors and other staff, OLeary said. Without their de-escalation tactics, he said there would be more interactions with police who are called for emergency situations.

"Its not a question of having police in schools or not," OLeary said. "Its what kind of police we have in schools."

The Manitoba Teachers' Society declined to comment.

maggie.macintosh@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @macintoshmaggie

 with files from Joyanne Pursaga
With QUAD pitch in, India-Japan to tie up for 5G technologies

India

oi-Vicky Nanjappa

New Delhi, Sep 26: India and Japan will join hands in technical development of 5G and 5G plus technologies. This would be done with the help of other QUAD strategic members-US, Australia and Israel. The discussion of the QUAD foreign ministers will in Japan next month.

India and Japan have decided to pitch for 5G and plus technologies. India will also eye the 3GPP, umbrella mobile telecommunications standard organisation to accept the first Indian rural standard for telecommunication. This would be important as most of the 3GPP standards have been set by the Chinese telecommunication development companies.

South Korea launches 5G networks early to secure world first

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Japanese counterpart Yoshihide Suga on Friday held a telephonic conversation, touching upon a range of issues including the Mumbai-Ahmedabad high-speed rail project and ways to deepen cooperation for a free and open Indo-Pacific region.

In a tweet, Modi said it was agreed in the talks that stronger India-Japan ties would help meet the challenges of the current regional and global situation.

The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said the two leaders emphasised that the economic architecture of a "free, open and inclusive" Indo-Pacific region must be premised on resilient supply chains, and in this context, welcomed cooperation between India, Japan and other like-minded countries.

"Had a very good conversation with PM Suga Yoshihide. We exchanged views on the tremendous progress in our relationship in the last few years, and the future direction of our Special Strategic and Global Partnership. @sugawitter," Modi tweeted.

He added, "We agreed that stronger India-Japan ties would help meet the challenges of the current regional and global situation. I look forward to working with PM Suga to further strengthen our all-round partnership."

In a statement, the Japanese foreign ministry said Suga expressed his intention to promote bilateral cooperation in the fields of security and economy, and to work with India towards achieving a "free and open Indo-Pacific".

Suga succeeded Shinzo Abe as Japanese prime minister. The India-Japan relationship witnessed major expansion under Abe's leadership.

The Japanese foreign ministry said Suga also stated that he would like to promote cooperation with India under multilateral frameworks such as the Japan-Australia-India-US coalition.

It said the two prime ministers affirmed their intention to steadily advance the high-speed rail project.

"The two prime ministers also welcomed that the Memorandum of Cooperation on specified skilled workers would be signed in the near future, and affirmed their intention to facilitate people-to-people exchanges," it added.

In a statement, the MEA said Modi congratulated Suga on his appointment as prime minister of Japan and wished him success in achieving his goals.

"The two leaders agreed that the India-Japan Special Strategic and Global Partnership has made great advances over the last few years and expressed their intention to further strengthen this relationship based upon mutual trust and shared values," it said on the Modi-Suga telephonic talks.

The MEA said the two leaders concurred that the partnership between the two countries is even more relevant in today's times given the global challenges, including that of the COVID-19 pandemic.

It said the two leaders appreciated the progress made in the economic partnership between the two countries, and in this context, welcomed the finalisation of the text of the agreement pertaining to specialized skilled workers.

Deepika Padukone questioned in drug probe | India tears into Pakistan | Oneindia News

"The Prime Minister extended an invitation to Prime Minister Suga to visit India for the annual bilateral summit, after improvement of the situation caused by the global COVID-19 pandemic," the MEA added.
Shirley Dixon-Mosley had never sent a ballot through the mail She always treasured casting her ballot in person. But for November's election, she voted early and by mail because she didn't want to take any chances.

I want to make sure my vote got in and it counted, said the 75-year-old retired teacher's aide in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Black voters are among the least likely to vote by mail nationally, but there are early signs they are changing their behavior as the shadow of the coronavirus hangs over the presidential race. The evidence is clearest in North Carolina, the first state in the nation to send out mail-in ballots and where voting has been underway for almost three weeks. But there are hints in other battleground states like Georgia and Pennsylvania.

The signal are good news for Democrats, who will need a robust turnout by Black voters in these states to win both the White House and control of the U.S. Senate. With coronavirus increasing the risk of in-person voting, African American mail voting rates are one indicator of whether that key part of the Democratic coalition will participate at its regular clip.

In North Carolina, Black voters cast 16.7% of the more than 173,000 ballots returned so far, a jump from the 9% of mail votes cast by Black voters in 2016. They are 21% of North Carolina's registered voters.

They're changing their dynamics, said Michael Bitzer, a political scientist at Catawba College in North Carolina who tracks state elections. It seems like there's a shift going on which will certainly help Democrats.

But the numbers also come with a warning sign. North Carolinas Black voters are four times more likely than whites to have their ballots not yet accepted due to missing witness information. Just under 5% of absentee ballots returned by Black voters either still have missing witness information or are in the process of having ballot requirements corrected, compared with just 1.3% of ballots returned by white voters.

It is, of course, very early  the votes so far in North Carolina translate to only about 5% of those cast in the entire 2016 presidential election. It's unclear how much Black voters' early embrace of the new method will increase overall turnout and whether issues will persist as more votes roll in.

Alarmed by the not-accepted figures, Democratic-leaning groups are already shifting their messaging to help Black voters resolve the witness requirements. North Carolina made this process easier on Tuesday, settling a lawsuit from the North Carolina Alliance for Retired Americans seeking to ease absentee guidelines on the state's witness component. County boards of elections now mail an affidavit for a voter to return to resolve ballot problems. Both Republicans on the state's five-person Board of Elections resigned after the settlement.

There's been a big push to get Black voters to use the option of vote-by-mail, said Adrianne Shropshire of VoteBlackPac, one of several groups trying to boost the use of mail-in ballots among Black voters. The group sent absentee ballot applications to 400,000 North Carolina voters. The problems that people are having is related to the fact that this is new to people.

Jeffrey Brooks, a 49-year-old Democrat from Durham, said he's previously voted in person. But when he sent in his mail-in ballot earlier this month, he failed to have a family member sign it as a witness.

I didnt know that, Brooks said. I thought it was just for young people. I didnt get them to sign it because I did it at home. I didnt know you had to have a witness.

Voters like Brooks have until Nov. 12 to correct their ballots and get them received by their local county elections board.

The North Carolina Democratic Party and Democratic nominee Joe Biden's campaign have established hotlines for confused voters. Both groups also have volunteers working on the ground to help people remedy witness issues.

Tonya Foreman, an activist whose group CAREE has been registering people to vote in barbershops and a pop-up registration tent in the eastern part of the state, worries that some of these Black voters, already deeply suspicious of a system they see as rigged against them, will just decide I knew it and not fix their ballots.

Foreman has seen shifts in Black voters' interest and trust in voting by mail, saying it seemed high last spring but then tapered off after controversy over mail delays due to changes at the United States Postal Service.

Black voters have traditionally preferred to vote in-person and see their ballot being accepted, a certainty sought after generations of voter suppression, discrimination and fighting to win the right to vote. In 2018, only 11% of African American voters cast their ballots by mail compared with 24% of white voters, according to the U.S. Census.

But Black people have been disproportionately killed by the coronavirus, and many older Black Americans are now trying to balance safety with their rights, said Marcus Bass, an activist with the group Advance Carolina.

The most faithful bloc of voters are older Black voters, Bass said.

Still, Bass' group has acquired 250,000 pieces of protective gear because he thinks many Black voters will want to vote in-person again.

There are hints of the shift in other data on mail voting. In Georgia, about one-third of all absentee ballot requests so far have come from African Americans, slightly higher than their share of registered voters, said Tom Bonier, a Democratic data analyst. In Pennsylvania, 7.38% have  which is also precisely the Black share of that state's electorate.

Bonier said the early data suggests that Democratic investments in educating Black voters about mail-in ballots may be paying off. The rates, he added, are also "an early indicator of very high engagement by Black voters.

Dixon-Mosley is one of those engaged voters. She was happy to have the option to vote by mail, but she added she would cast her ballot in person if she had to.

Our parents and forefathers fought too hard to get the vote, she said. To not do it is to dishonor them.

___

Follow Anderson on Twitter at https://twitter.com/BryanRAnderson and Riccardi at https://twitter.com/NickRiccardi.

___

Anderson is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 26)  Twenty barangays in Iloilo City are placed under lockdown due to an increase in the number of COVID-19 cases, as the city extends its modified enhanced community quarantine status for 15 more days.

Iloilo City Mayor Jerry Trenas told CNN Philippines on Saturday that there are almost 600 active COVID-19 cases in the city as of Friday.

Early on Friday, the city was advised by the Inter-Agency Task Force on Emerging Infectious Diseases (ATF) to ease to a general community quarantine, but the report of a high number of cases forced authorities to change their mind.

Six barangays were initially placed under lockdown on Friday until Monday, 5:59 p.m., but Trenas confirmed that the list now includes 20 barangays.

Lahat ng naka-lockdown na barangay (all the barangays that are under lockdown), there are about 20 of them now, he said.

Trenas reiterated that residents are not allowed to go outside of their homes in these barangays except for essential workers, including medical frontliners and those working at city hall.

Lahat ng barangay na lockdown, may mga PNP tayo tsaka army na andoon aside from the barangay officials and the barangay tanods, making sure na walang lalabas sa mga locked down barangays.

[Translation: In all the barangays that are under lockdown, there are PNP and army there, aside from barangay officials and the barangay tanods to make sure that no one is going out.]

Iloilo City will remain under MECQ until October 9.
When he turned 42, Ram Gajavelli made himself a promise: he would take better care of his health.

But in August 2017, a few months after the software engineer began exercising regularly, his left ankle grew swollen and painful, even though he didn't remember injuring it.

Over the next 18 months, the pain spread to his back, shoulders and feet. Meanwhile several teeth, which had looked normal six months earlier, became riddled with decay.

Gajavelli's doctors - among them an internist, rheumatologist, podiatrist, neurologist and two orthopedists - were puzzled after tests failed to reveal an underlying cause. A physical therapist suggested the problem might be in his head.

Frustrated, Gajavelli, who lives near Philadelphia, turned to experts more than 8,000 miles away in his native India. During a week-long visit to see relatives, he consulted two specialists, one of whom ordered a scan that proved to be pivotal.

"There was something odd about his presentation" early on, said Mona Al Mukaddam, the University of Pennsylvania endocrinologist who made the diagnosis a few weeks after he returned from India. "If someone had really taken his history and looked at all the factors [in his case], it might not have taken so long."

- - -

The pain in his left ankle was slight at first. Gajavelli said he continued walking regularly for exercise and experimented with home remedies, including stretching and heat, for relief. But in October, after a short hike with his son caused his ankle to swell, he saw an orthopedist. An X-ray revealed nothing but an MRI showed a possible stress fracture.

The doctor suggested Gajavelli wear a walking boot. Eight weeks later, his ankle still hurt. A second X-ray showed no change.

"Why would I get a stress fracture?" Gajavelli remembered wondering. "The doctor told me the only good thing is that it's not getting worse."

Gajavelli waited two months, then consulted a second orthopedist who is an ankle specialist. "He didn't see anything and had no explanation other than 'Maybe you're just one of those where it is taking time to heal,' " Gajavelli recalled. After a blood test showed the level of bone-building vitamin D was normal, he was given an order for physical therapy.

The PT sessions relieved his ankle pain, but only temporarily. By May, the pain had migrated to his right knee and lower back. A month later his metatarsals - long bones in the feet that maintain balance and distribute body weight - began to hurt. The pain then moved to his shoulders. Perhaps, Gajavelli thought, the problem was caused by the way he was climbing stairs at home. To take the weight off his sore ankle Gajavelli extended his arm to grab the railing and hoist himself up.

Soon, he found it painful to lie flat or get up from a seated position.

His internist suspected Lyme disease, but a test was negative. Blood tests ordered by a rheumatologist found nothing amiss. A neurologist ordered electromyography (EMG), a test that can identify neuromuscular problems. It, too, was normal.

The podiatrist Gajavelli consulted could find nothing wrong with his feet. He suggested Gajavelli wear a different brand of shoes with padding, which helped temporarily.

By November 2018, walking on tiptoes or standing on a hardwood floor were exquisitely painful. The ribs on his right side hurt so much that Gajavelli was sleeping in a recliner. He relied on prescription strength ibuprofen to get through the days - and nights.

During a routine appointment in December, his dentist was surprised to discover significant decay in two wisdom teeth; one was literally crumbling. Six months earlier his teeth had looked normal. He sent Gajavelli to an oral surgeon for an extraction. Like the other symptoms, the cause of his sudden dental deterioration was unexplained.

"I was frustrated," Gajavelli remembered. "But doctors couldn't find anything, so I was relieved by that."

In January 2019, he returned to the ankle specialist. The orthopedist, he recalled, saw no change and suggested he might benefit from more physical therapy.

At the time, Gajavelli was planning a brief trip to see relatives in southern India. After consulting with a cousin who is a physician in Atlantic City, he made an appointment with a rheumatologist and an orthopedist at a hospital in Hyderabad. He would have to pay out of pocket - the cost of tests and treatment would total about $1,000 - but he hoped one of them might be able to figure out what was wrong.

- - -

The orthopedist quizzed Gajavelli about his symptoms, then ordered several tests including a bone scan, his first. The nuclear medicine test uses a small amount of radioactive tracer that can help pinpoint the cause of bone pain.

The result was terrifying. It revealed multiple stress fractures that started at Gajavelli's metatarsals and extended to his jaw. The orthopedist told Gajavelli that he most likely had a widely metastasized cancer or some sort of metabolic bone disease. He advised Gajavelli to consult an endocrinologist as well as an oncologist when he returned to Philadelphia.

"I was so upset I couldn't talk," Gajavelli recalled.

Back in Philadelphia, he called his primary care physician and was told there was a four-week wait for an appointment. "I was really panicking," he said.

His physician-cousin suggested calling a specialist both men knew socially: Ravi K. Amaravadi, one of the leaders of the Cancer Therapeutics Program at Penn's Abramson Cancer Center.

Amaravadi ordered scans for cancer along with blood tests, including one to check the level of phosphorus, a mineral that is essential to the formation of bones and teeth. Gajavelli's level was low - a key clue to what might be wrong. None of the other doctors he had seen had ordered the simple phosphorus check, which is not part of a standard panel of blood tests.

After ruling out cancer, Amaravadi sent Gajavelli's records to Al Mukaddam, an assistant professor of clinical medicine and orthopedic surgery who directs the Penn Bone Center. The most likely culprit appeared to be a rare bone disease.

It was a disease with which Al Mukaddam, surprisingly, had recent experience. Several weeks earlier, she had seen the first case in her career.

Al Mukaddam told Gajavelli she thought he was suffering from tumor-induced osteomalacia (TIO), a bone-weakening disease caused by one or more typically benign, slow-growing tumors. These tumors produce high levels of a protein called fibroblast growth factor 23 (FGF23), which limits the ability of the kidneys to absorb phosphate. The first signs of the disease, also known as oncogenic osteomalacia, include fractures, bone pain and muscle weakness - all symptoms Gajavelli had reported.

Although it is almost certainly underdiagnosed, TIO is very rare: fewer than 1,000 cases have been reported worldwide.

"One of the most challenging components associated with TIO is thinking of the diagnosis and checking phosphorus," Al Mukaddam said. Subsequent tests confirmed that Gajavelli's FGF23 level was elevated and that he was losing phosphorus in his urine.

Diagnosing the problem was only the first challenge. Doctors then needed to find the tumor - a painstaking process because it is often tiny and can be anywhere in the body. Some patients have more than one tumor. Surgery to remove the tumor is usually the preferred treatment because it can cure the disease and prevent a recurrence, which is common.

Using a sophisticated gallium scan, a nuclear medicine test that can detect tumors, doctors found a pea-sized mass tucked behind Gajavelli's left hip joint. The next challenge for the orthopedic surgeon was figuring out the best way to remove all of it without having to perform a total hip replacement on a young patient.

For three months before surgery, Gajavelli took supplements to boost his phosphorus level and reduce muscle weakness. "They made me feel much better" almost immediately, he recalled.

In August 2019, he underwent a tricky 912 hour operation performed by Robert J. Wilson II at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. The orthopedic surgeon was able to remove the tumor in its entirety without replacing Gajavelli's hip.

A day after surgery Gajavelli's FGF23 was normal. A week later, his phosphorus level was too. Recovery took several months. On Christmas, he walked a mile without pain for the first time in more than two years.

Al Mukaddam said it is possible that Gajavelli's exercise regimen might have accelerated the development of symptoms, although the tiny tumor had probably been present for several years.

His case, she said, underscores the importance that doctors "not just go with what they know" but also think about what they "could be missing."

"It's OK if we don't know the answers to refer to someone" who might know, she said. "We're all humbled every day in medicine by learning new things."
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky has signed decree No. 410/2020 declaring September 26 the day of mourning in Ukraine.

"In connection with the tragedy that occurred as a result of the crash of the An-26 military aircraft during scheduled training flights on September 25, 2020 near the town of Chuhuiv, Kharkiv region, and led to the death of servicemen of the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, in order to commemorate the victims, I decide: to announce September 26, 2020 the day of mourning in Ukraine," the text of the document published on the president's website reads.
More than 100 people gathered at a Back the Blue Rally in Carlisle Saturday at the same time a smaller Black Lives Matters protest gathered across town.

Both events started at noon and remained peaceful, even after four BLM protesters walked over to the rally at the Carlisle Events parking lot in the 100 block of Clay Street.

The Back the Blue Rally, designed to show public support for police, consisted of a series of speeches by local politicians who formerly served in law enforcement or who were married to police officers. They shared personal stories of why they appreciate the work of police officers, why they think officers are unfairly getting a bad rap and how much officers sacrifice for their jobs.

The crowd was nearly all-white, mostly older citizens with only a few wearing masks. They brought chairs and blankets and sat socially-distanced across a grassy lot to listen to the scheduled program.

Rep. Barbara Gleim, R-Carlisle, was among the first speakers and said her father was murdered and police did everything they could to identify his killer. They discovered the killer had killed someone else as well, she said.

There are millions of victims of crime, like myself, who support a vibrant, trained police department in their midst, she said. They keeps drugs off the street, help us at traffic crashes. If you love your hometown, eliminate injustices in a peaceful way while supporting the police department.

The Rev. Chuck Kish, said as a Carlisle police chaplain, he had participated in hundreds of police ride-alongs over 20 years and had never seen a gross violation because of a persons color.

I havent seen it, he said.

Rep. Sheryl Delozier, R-Camp Hill, said her husband worked for the Harrisburg Police Department for 23 years and said she worried about him every day, but not as much as families must worry today, amid the polarized political climate.

Family members are worried about officers being hurt just for doing their job, she said. They have stood for us. Its our time to stand for them.

Jim French, a retired Baltimore County police officer, said the work that officers perform would be hard for most people to fathom. He said they go places where they are not wanted, they must sometimes pick up human body parts and they can basically be on-call for 25 years.

The average resident may see one or two critical incidents over their lifetime. But the average officer witnesses 800, he said, and that can have an impact on them.

Many of the rally speakers bashed the media while at the same time asking people not to paint all police officers as bad when a small percentage make mistakes or commit abuse. The speakers rejected any notions of systemic racism within police departments and decried the many false narratives that they said now surround the profession.

Across town at noon, roughly a dozen people gathered at the Carlisle town square for the Black Lives Still Matter rally, organized by Carlisle for Justice Transparency. By 12:30, the number had grown to about 50, all of them masked and with individual groups spread out to keep a safe distance from one another.

9 A Black Lives Matter rally is held on the square in Carlisle is in response to to a "Back the Blue" Rally held just a mile away.

Mary Smith, one of the event organizers for the Black Lives Still Matter rally, said that Carlisle community members have been holding similar gatherings every Saturday for the past few months. This one, though, was scheduled specifically as a counter-protest in response to the Back the Blue rally.

We wanted to talk about the fact that police in the community have often been supported, Smith said, citing large budgets for the local police force, and despite claims of corruption or criminal charges among area law enforcement.

A flyer from protesters cited two specific examples of area law enforcement officers who had been charged with crimes, including Christopher Collare. Collare, a former member of the Carlisle Police Force and Cumberland County Drug Task Force, was charged with dealing heroin and using his position to get sex from two women in exchange for favors related to prosecutions.

One protester, Ben Smith, was born and raised in Carlisle. A Black man and former U.S. Marine, he said it was always a little tough living here, due to racism.

We knew that we were different, and would be treated differently, Smith said. And have been treated differently than others.

Smith said that while he now lives in Harrisburg, he still thinks of Carlisle as home. He continued to say that race-based discrimination is unfortunately never over, and that people first need to acknowledge the past persecutions if any progress is to be made in the present.

If you have no acknowledgement of what was done to certain people in the past, then you have no acceptance of what was done to certain people in the past, he said. And you might never acknowledge that theres a problem now. But when you live in that culture and know the past from your history, being passed on from generation to generation? Thats why Im out here and do things like this. I talk to people as long as they listen, so that they know the history, too.

Protesters knelt in silence for eight minutes and 46 seconds, the length of time that officer Derek Chauvin knelt on the neck of George Floyd while taking him into custody. Some drivers passing by made angry gestures or shouted things like back the blue or all lives matter, but far more drove past honking or shouting their support.

Four members of the BLM protest walked over to the Back the Blue Rally about 1 p.m. with large posters, but they stood mostly quietly across the street.

As the Back the Blue rally wrapped up, a bugler played Taps and the crowd joined in a moment of silence. The protesters remained silent too, something which impressed R.J. Harris, a WHP 580 morning personality, who helped to promote the police rally.

Harris said he was glad they could share that moment of respect together, even though the groups have opposing views.

Kirk Wilson, the former mayor of Carlisle, put together the pro-police rally because he thought it would be a good opportunity for the community.

Too many people say negative things about the police department and dont understand what a police officers role is, he said.

A woman named Kathy, who declined to provide her last name, said she always has had good interactions with Carlisle police, including after bullets damaged her house and after some of her mail was stolen.

She was apprehensive about attending the rally at first, worried that it could devolve into something unruly because of what shes seen on national news programs and some negative comments she had read on the Carlisle community Facebook page. But she said she was glad she attended and that it remained safe.

I appreciated the personal stories shared by the speakers, she said. My son is a Marine and I worry about him. I cant imagine how it would be for a police officers family, with them being out there every day on the line.

READ: Suspected killer shows up at Harrisburg police chiefs front door and other tales of surrenders

READ: Meet 3 protesters from Harrisburgs Truth to Power rally
A federal judge on Friday ordered that William Pendley be removed from his acting role as head of the Bureau of Land Management, saying he served unlawfully in the position for 424 days, per AP.

Driving the news: U.S. District Judge Brian Morris said the former oil industry attorney acted illegally in the role without Senate confirmation, as required.

Earlier this year, Montana Gov. Steve Bullock (D) sued to remove Pendley, arguing he was illegally overseeing the agency.

Though Pendley's nomination was withdrawn in early September, he continued to oversee the agency based on an "unusual arrangement" he orchestrated, AP writes.

The big picture: The Trump administration has tried to avoid the the confirmation process for multiple positions, instead filling the seats with temporary appointments.
By Express News Service

HYDERABAD: Terming the ordinances on Farmers Bills as the end of Minimum Support Price (MSP) regime, senior Congress MP Mallikarjun Kharge on Friday said that the Congress will continue its fight against the anti-farmer Bills. As part of the Congress nationwide campaign against the three Farm Bills, which were passed by Parliament, Kharge held a press conference along with senior Congress leaders of the State.

Congress leader Mallikarjun Kharge addressing a press

meet at Gandhi Bhavan in Hyderabad on Friday

| S Senbagapandiyan

Taking serious objection to the way the Bills were passed, Kharge said that his party would continue to fight against the Bills in the interest of small and marginal farmers of the country. Kharge said, In all three ordinances, the government excluded any dispute resolution between farmers and traders making farmers vulnerable in the case of contract farming. They cant go directly to court. Democracy has been dismantled by the Modi government.

Stating that farmers would be at the mercy of rich corporates, he said, Even when the price is high, he (farmer) has to sell whatever his produce as per the agreement made earlier. This is also a handicap for farmers. Criticising the Centre for violating the State governments rights, he said, Agriculture and marketing is a State subject. When every State was losing its revenues, employment and autonomy, the Central government didnt help out State governments. Instead, they suddenly brought in these ordinances.
Here are todays top news, analysis and opinion. Know all about the latest news and other news updates from Hindustan Times.

Bihar polls: Grand Alliances seat-sharing deal in final stages; RJD decides to contest 150

With the announcement of the three-phase assembly polls in Bihar, the Grand Alliance (GA) - comprising RJD, Congress, Left parties and smaller allies - is now inching closer to finalising a seat-sharing deal with talks now veering on seat-to-seat adjustment among the partners.

Read more.

Where is the UN in joint fight against Covid-19 pandemic?: PM Modi at UNGA

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday fervently pressed the UN general assembly to speed up reforms of its processes and organs to reflect contemporary realities and reiterated Indias case for a permanent membership of the Security Council demanding to know how long it would be kept out of the decision-making structures of the world body.

Read more.

Internet suspended, section 144 imposed in four Rajasthan districts after violent protests

Internet was suspended in four tribal districts of southern Rajasthan on Saturday and section 144 was imposed, prohibiting assembly of more than five people, following violent protests in Dungarpur district by tribal youth over teacher recruitment examination.

Read more.

Congress steps up attack on govt on labour codes, says it has removed security net for workers

The Congress on Saturday upped the ante against the government over the three labour codes passed by Parliament on Wednesday, alleging that the legislations have weakened trade unions and removed the security net for workers.

Read more.

Pakistan opens heavy fire in Rajouri sector of Jammu and Kashmir

Pakistani troops on Saturday violated the ceasefire agreement by resorting to firing and heavy shelling on forward areas along the Line of Control (LoC) in Rajouri district of Jammu and Kashmir, a defence spokesman said.

Read more.

CSK CEO reveals whether Suresh Raina will return to play IPL 2020 at some point this season

The absence of Suresh Raina has been felt as Chennai Super Kings slumped to their second defeat in two games. After getting their IPL 2020 campaign off on a promising note with a win against Mumbai Indians, CSK suffered back to back defeats to Rajasthan Royals and later Delhi Capitals on Friday.

Read more.

Google Pixel 5: Heres everything we know about Googles upcoming smartphone so far

Google will be hosting a special event on September 30. At its upcoming event, the company is expected to launch its next generation premium Pixel 5 smartphone alongside a Nest smartspeaker and a new Chromecast. Ahead of the launch, numerous reports have detailed what we should expect from the Pixel 4 successor when it launches later this month.

Read more.

Watch: Lilly Singhs relatable video on getting compared to cousins is too hilarious to miss

Making fans relate hands down with the frustrating moment, Sketchy Times host Lilly Singh shared a throwback video on getting compared to cousins which hilariously enough, still stands the test of time.

Read more.

Womans hoop and shuffle dance has netizens hooked. Watch

Every now and then, we come across such videos which capture people showcasing their amazing skills. This dance video is the perfect example of that. Posted on Instagram, the clip is something that will make you want to get up from your chair and shake a leg.

Read more.
Two Former Republican Congressmen Endorse Biden Over Trump

Two former GOP members of Congress have announced their endorsement of Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.

Former Reps. Charles Djou (R-Hawaii) and Mickey Edwards (R-Okla.) wrote in an op-ed that they dont support President Donald Trump because of his childish name-calling, crude behavior, and immature narcissism.

They also cited an anonymously-sourced report in the Atlantic that claimed Trump disparaged members of the military, despite the reporting being widely challenged by numerous on-the-record sources.

Our nations national security is best built by peace through strength. America is stronger when we stand together with the free democracies of the world against dictatorships. We are proud of our service members and humbled by those who made the ultimate sacrifice for the cause of liberty. That is why we were so troubled by reports that Trump called fallen American military heroes suckers and losers,' Djou and Edwards said.

It disappoints us that he has threatened to withdraw from the Western alliance of NATO and needlessly picks fights with international democracies. Yet Trump professes kinship with dictators such as Russias Vladimir Putin and even expressed love for North Korean despot Kim Jong Un.

Rep. Charles Djou (R-Hawaii) in Washington in a 2010 file photograph. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Civility is a trait of inner character and self-confidence. That is why we are so disturbed by Trumps name-calling and childish taunting, his penchant for conspiracy theories, and his embrace of conspiracy websites, all of which reflect a disturbing paranoia. Donald Trump may pretend to be heir to the great Republican tradition that appealed to us both but he is no Republican, they added, writing later, Joe Biden is not a perfect man, but he is a man of humble decency.

Djou left office in 2011. Edwards left office in 1993.

Other Republicans have endorsed Biden, including Cindy McCain, the widow of late Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), former Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), and Rick Snyder, the former Michigan governor.

Trump, on the other hand, has earned support from some Democrats, including Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-N.J.), who left the Democratic Party last year, and Georgia Rep. Vernon Jones.

Tim Murtaugh, communications director for Trumps campaign, said in a statement sent to The Epoch Times, Joe Biden has been a failure in the Washington Swamp for a half century, so no one should be surprised when Swamp creatures gather to protect one of their own.

President Trump has unprecedented supportover 95 percentamong real Republican voters and is also making strong inroads in Bidens core Democrat constituencies, like Black Americans, Latinos, and union members, he added. President Trumps record of success for all Americans will carry him to victory in November.
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Linkedin Editorial Board (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, September 26, 2020 08:12 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c4758044 1 Editorial #Editorial,COVID-19,pandemic,health-protocol,Jokowi-administration,government,mask,face-mask Free

Since the countrys first positive COVID-19 cases were announced in early March, a number of public officials have tested positive for the disease. This reminds us of loopholes in health protocols as the primary defense mechanism against the virus. Religious Affairs Minister Fachrul Razi is the latest minister to have contracted the virus, after Transportation Minister Budi Karya Sumadi was infected in March and Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Minister Edhy Prabowo tested positive earlier this month. Budi has been back at work since he recuperated from the disease, while Edhy, despite his recovery, did not turn up for a hearing with the House of Representatives on Sept. 22.

Two General Elections Commission (KPU) leaders, chairman Arief Budiman and deputy chairman Pramono Ubaid, tested positive at almost the same time last week. The two had worked in tandem and traveled together as part of KPU preparations for the Dec. 9 simultaneous regional elections before they were infected.

Earlier in August, Arief announced that 21 KPU staff members had tested positive ordered the temporary closure of the KPU office on Jl. Imam Bonjol, Central Jakarta, for sterilization measures.

Unlike Budi, Fachrul and KPU commissioners Arief and Pramono who let the public know about their health status, Edhy opted to remain silent. The public was only aware that he had contracted the disease after he had recovered. It was Edhys fellow Gerindra Party politician, Sufmi Dasco Ahmad, who confirmed on Sept. 17 that the minister had tested positive and once received intensive care at Gatot Soebroto Army Hospital.

It is true that the disease knows no social, economic and political boundaries. Both the poor and the rich, the weak and the powerful can get the virus, which has infected more than 266,800 people, killing over 10,200.

It is ironic, however, when government officials who lead the charge against COVID-19 have to take a tumble. Whether they fail to practice what they preach, public officials have sparked controversy after they were seen failing to uphold physical distancing rules and wear masks. It was reported that Edhy took off his mask when delivering a speech during his outings before he contracted the virus.

To add insult to injury, it has been revealed that the Health Ministry building in South Jakarta is the office cluster with the highest number of cases. As of Sept. 18, the building has recorded 252 infections. City Hall is another cluster and has seen 11 officials infected after the death of city secretary Saefullah due to COVID-19.

The disease is preventable and general rules prescribe that we only need to wear masks, keep a 1-meter distance from others, refrain from touching our faces, eyes and mouths, and frequently wash our hands with soap in order to avoid infection. In addition, enough sleep and consuming nutrition will improve our immune system in fending off the virus.

If the safety rules are lax among public officials and government institutions, we cannot expect the public to comply with them.
Japanese business-to-business ecommerce company MonotaRO is set to invest $15 million in a joint venture with Emtex Engineering, acquiring a majority stake in its SME ecommerce business Industrybuying.com.

While Emtexs SME business will enter into the JV, the large enterprise supply business will continue to be run under Emtex, the company said in a press note on September 25.

MonotaRO had first announced the deal at the Tokyo Stock Exchange on September 23.

TechCircle said in a report that through the deal, MonotaRO will pick up 51.6 per cent stake in the joint venture with Industrybuying.

In the press note, the Gurugram-based startup said the deal would help Industrybuying access global expertise and infrastructure.

With the expertise and catalogue of more than 10 million products, the agreement can propel the Indian business into a highly profitable growth trajectory, which could eventually lead to a successful IPO in a short time.

Industrybuying is backed by large VCs like Beenext, Saif Partners, Kalaari Capital and others.

Founded in 2013 by Swati Gupta and Rahul Gupta, the platform sells industrial products online for large businesses operating across 40 categories.
What is it?

Bluebird Merchant Ventures reopens old gold mines. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange's main market.

What's the latest?

It is in the process of buying 100 per cent of its projects in South Korea from joint venture partner Southern Gold. This week it said there is local support to restart a Philippines project.

Who backs it?

Management and other individuals own more than a third of the stock. Boss Colin Patterson is the largest shareholder with 17 per cent. Harwood Capital is also a backer.

Why should you invest?

John Meyer, mining analyst at SP Angel, says: 'Reopening old mines is generally seen as a lower-cost route into mining, so Bluebird should have relatively low capital costs and certainly have very low corporate costs.'

And why shouldn't you?

But, he adds: 'This is definitely a stock at the higher-risk end of the spectrum  if they do what they say they're going to do then it will be very good.

'There is also an element of risk for any company that needs to get permits for their work until they are secured.'
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The Smart Glass market is anticipated to reach around USD 8,223 million by 2026 according to a new study published by Polaris Market Research. In 2017, the automotive segment dominated the global smart glass market, in terms of revenue. North America is expected to be the leading contributor to the market revenue during the forecast period.

Several stringent energy consumption regulations passed by governments worldwide have boosted the adoption of smart glass. Growing concerns regarding environment, increasing need to reduce energy consumption, and growing demand from the automotive sector further support the growth of this market. Additionally, the increasing adoption of energy efficient buildings and reducing operation costs would boost market growth during the forecast period. Other factors supporting market growth include supportive government regulations, increasing awareness, and technological advancements. Increasing investments by vendors in technological advancements coupled with research and development further boost the market growth.

Request for a sample of this research report @ https://www.polarismarketresearch.com/industry-analysis/smart-glass-market/request-for-sample

The smart glass market is majorly driven by factors including increasing energy concerns, and environment consciousness across the globe. The decreasing cost of electrochromic materials has encouraged consumers to switch to smart glass. Limited awareness among consumers had restricted the adoption of smart glass in the past. However, with significant government initiatives and substantial investments, the development of smart glass market has accelerated significantly.

North America generated the highest revenue in the smart glass market in 2017. The increasing awareness among consumers, and rising awareness regarding energy efficient buildings drive the market growth in the region. Consumers are adopting smart glass owing to stringent government regulations regarding energy consumption, and the need to reduce operation costs. Numerous key players have adopted partnership and expansion strategies to increase their share in the North America smart glass market.

The different end-users of smart glass include automotive, architecture, consumer goods, and others. In 2017, the automotive segment accounted for the highest smart market share. The use of smart glass in windows, doors, and windshields in automotive reduces the heat accumulation in vehicles. The consumer electronics segment is expected to grow at the highest CAGR.

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The well-known companies profiled in the smart glass market report include Asahi Glass Co., DuPont, Gentex Corporation, SPD Control Systems, View, Inc., Corning Incorporated, Hitachi Chemical Co., Ltd., RavenBrick LLC, Switch Materials Inc., Scienstry, Inc., ChromoGenics AB, and Innovative Glass Corporation. These companies launch new products and collaborate with other market leaders to innovate and launch new products to meet the increasing needs and requirements of consumers.

Smart Glass Market Size and Forecast, 2017-2026 by Type Active Smart Glass Passive Smart Glass

Smart Glass Market Size and Forecast, 2017-2026 by Technology Suspended Particle Display Liquid Crystals Micro-Blinds Nanocrystals Others

Smart Glass Market Size and Forecast, 2017-2026 by End-User Automotive Architecture Consumer Goods Others

Smart Glass Market Size and Forecast, 2017-2026 by Region North America U.S. Canada Mexico Europe Germany UK France Italy Rest of Europe Asia-Pacific China India Japan Rest of Asia-Pacific Latin America Brazil Middle East & Africa



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NEW YORK (Reuters) - Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi pledged at the United Nations on Saturday that his country's vaccine production capacity would be made available globally to fight the COVID-19 crisis. "As the largest vaccine-producing country of the world, I want to give one more assurance to the global community today," Modi said in a pre-recorded speech to the U.N. General Assembly. "India's vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis." Modi said India was moving ahead with Phase 3 clinical ...
TEHRAN, Iran - Iraqs foreign minister arrived Saturday in Tehran for bilateral talks with senior Iranian officials, according to the state-run news agency.

IRNA reported that Fuad Hussein planned to meet his Iranian counterpart Mohammad Javad Zarif and President Hassan Rouhani, in what marked his first visit to the Iranian capital.

Zarif visited Baghdad in mid-July, when he met with Hussein and Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi. It was Zarifs first visit to Iraq since a U.S. airstrike in January killed a top Iranian general, Qassim Soleimani, outside Baghdads international airport. The strike catapulted Iraq to the brink of a U.S.-Iran proxy war that could have destabilized the Middle East.

After Zarifs trip, the Iraqi premier visited Iran in July.

The report did not elaborate on the main reasons behind the top Iraqi diplomats two-day trip to Tehran.

Iran sees neighbouring Iraq as a possible route to bypass U.S. sanctions that President Donald Trump re-imposed in 2018 after pulling the U.S. out of the 2015 nuclear deal between Tehran and world powers.

Last year, Irans exports to Iraq amounted to nearly $9 billion, the official IRNA news agency reported on Tuesday. It said the two nations will discuss increasing the amount to $20 billion.

Before the current global pandemic, some 5 million Iranian pilgrims annually brought in nearly $5 billion visiting Iraqs Shiite holy sites.

Iran has seen the worst outbreak in the region, with more than 443,000 thousand confirmed cases and at least 25,300 deaths.

A news website affiliated with Iranian state TV, yjc.ir, reported that Iran cancelled all its flights to Iraqi cities until the religious holiday of Arbaeen, due to concerns over the coronavirus outbreak. The holiday marks the end of the forty days of mourning that follow annually on the death anniversary of the seventh-century Muslim leader Hussein, who was killed at the Battle of Karbala during the tumultuous first century of Islams history.

Iran fought an eight-year war with Iraq that killed nearly 1 million people on both sides, after former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein invaded in the early 1980s.

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We tend to think of cider in one- dimensional terms here in Ireland: something to drink very cold on a hot day when you want a fortifying blast of sweet, fizzy booze. Personally, that kind of cloying sweet has never really done it for me, just like one-dimensional commercial lager never greatly appealed. I'm a fan of flavour, and I particularly enjoy a drink that encourages you to slow down and pay attention to what's in your glass. I'm not alone, as our recent revolution in Irish craft beer has demonstrated, introducing a vast range of diverse choices from microbreweries across the land.

Parallel to this, if more under the radar, a quieter revolution has been transforming Irish cider in terms of diversity of styles. Craft-focused cider producers have been following the adventurous lead of Irish craft brewers. They've also been taking inspiration from artisanal cider producers around the world, where many countries enjoy a proud and distinctly local cider culture.

In Europe, cider is traditionally drunk with food, whether the elegant and dry cidre brut served in Brittany's creperies or the wildly tangy sidra of northern Spain's Basque Country, shots of which are downed fresh from the barrel in sagardotegi (cider houses) in between sharing slabs of local beef and other hearty fare.

Elsewhere, it's less about food pairing and more about the unfettered imagination that can be applied to the versatile base of "hard cider", as it is known in North America. On a recent trip to Seattle and Vancouver, I was struck by the absolute craic local producers were clearly having in coming up with new ideas. A quick browse of Finnriver Farm & Cidery's website gives an idea of the herbs, spices, roots, leaves, flowers, fruits and even hops with which they infuse their ciders, as well as the traditional and heirloom varieties they base them on, and their experimental approach with everything from yeasts and barrels to levels of sweetness and alcohol.

As for Irish cider, if you thought it was still one-dimensional, it's high time to think again. There are many heartier styles worth exploring that are autumnal or wintry, both in appeal and in terms of the food pairings they suggest. Well-crafted cider is very food-friendly: after all, it's fermented like wine. The drier styles in particular can offer nuanced complexity as well as palate-cleansing acidity and refreshing carbonation.

Highlighted this week are a mere sampling of the diversity awaiting discovery from various corners of the country. I could equally have included Longueville House's robust Mor Cider, aged in apple brandy casks; or Craigies Ballyhook Flyer, a Breton-style beaut found in selected Dunnes Stores, Spar, Eurospar, Londis and Mace outlets; or Stonewell Tawny, a unique still cider that - at 15pc - is very much made for sipping.

The bottom line? Start looking and you'll be surprised by what you might find.

Bottle of the week: Dan Kelly's Whiskey Cask Cider, Co Louth

4.49 (500ml), 5.8pc, from Redmonds of Ranelagh in Dublin, Quintessential Wines, Drogheda, and independents

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Starting life in bourbon casks and finishing in Irish whiskey casks lends a distinctive savoury complexity to this moreish medium-dry cider: think cedar-scented forests, caramelised apple pie and bittersweet toffee apples balanced by drying tannins on the tangy finish. Pair with layered flavours like spiced beef broth with root veg, bacon and choucroute or blue cheese pear toasties.

Long Meadow Oak-Aged Cider, Co Armagh

4.50, 5.5pc, from Donnybrook Fair and kwmwine.com

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This family-farm, Bramley-based cider is aged in oak barrels over several seasons before blending and lightly carbonating. Rich and smoky, medium sweet with fresh acidity and a tannic texture, it is well matched by smoked meats or cheeses.

Viking 'Hop It' Cider, Co Waterford

4.49 (500ml), 5.5pc, from Ardkeen and selected independents

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David Dennison's refreshing farmhouse cider is juiced up with citrus and herbal character from Citra, Cascade and Amarillo hops. Pair with rustic stews or cold meats.

Killahora Pom'O 2018, Co Cork

25.95, 18pc, from Celtic Whiskey Shop, winesdirect.ie and killahoraorchards.ie

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An apple brandy aged with vibrant apple juice, this is gorgeously rich and raisiny, tangy and spiced with crunchy tannins. Try with aged jamon, spicy chorizo or nutty hard cheeses, or solo as an aperitif or post-walk pick-me-up.

The Cider Mill Lamhog Makers Reserve, Co Meath

4.49, 6pc, from Martins Off-Licence, Dublin, independents and brubrewery.ie

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Wild-fermented, slow-aged and unfiltered with creamy toffee aromas and spicy tannins; perfection with five-spice pork and crackling.









Grapevine

Kinsale Mead Co has upped its impressive game another notch with its latest limited-edition release. Based on forest honey fermented with blackcurrants and black cherries, the 2017 Merlot Barrel Aged Wild Red Mead is aged for two years, plus one in ex-Merlot barrels. At 12pc, with generous fruit character and a zingy off-dry finish, it can be enjoyed like a light red wine with charcuterie or salty cheese. 27.95, Celtic Whiskey Shop, Bubble Brothers, 1601 Kinsale.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 23:25:40|Editor: huaxia

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BEIRUT, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- The Association of Banks in Lebanon denied on Saturday some media reports that accused Lebanese banks of facilitating money laundering for Hezbollah, LBCI local TV channel reported.

"It is important for the association to emphasize that this news is totally fabricated and lacks any basis for validity and credibility. Lebanese banks adhere to all the rules of compliance, transparency while combating money laundering in Lebanon and abroad, with recognition from international and regional authorities specialized in this field," the association said.

The association noted that such misleading allegations have a very bad impact on the reputation of the Lebanese banking sector and this serves the interests of countries that are hostile to Lebanon and seek influence in this part of the world. Enditem
Russia has floated similar proposals before, including when Putin met with Trump in Helsinki, Finland, in 2018. Trump warmed to them at first, saying he would work with Russia to create "an impenetrable cyber security unit" designed to assure "that election hacking, and many other negative things, will be guarded and safe." Loading His declaration was mocked by many, including some of his staff, who asked how the US would jointly patrol cyberspace with one of the world's leaders in cyber espionage. Around the same time, the US was placing malware in the Russian electric grid and making no effort to hide it, in hopes of deterring Moscow from attacking the American grid. It was not clear if Putin was calling for the reset because of the intense focus on Russian activity around the 2020 election, or because firms like Microsoft have identified continued Russian attacks, some from groups linked to the military and Russian intelligence agencies. This time, Putin is calling for a reset less than six weeks before an American presidential election that could put an outspoken critic of the Kremlin  former Vice President Joe Biden  in the White House. The move appeared at least in part to be an attempt to present a friendlier face in response to American officials' recent statements that Russia had mounted clandestine efforts to weaken Biden in the presidential race.

Christopher Wray, the director of the FBI, warned last week that Russia was actively pursuing a disinformation campaign against Biden. That led to a rebuke of Wray from Trump. And a recent CIA analysis concluded that it was likely Putin was continuing to approve and direct interference operations aimed at raising Trump's reelection chances. "It's possible that in the Kremlin they understand that Biden is likely to win," said Andrei Kortunov, director general of the Russian International Affairs Council, a research organisation close to the Russian government. "They are preparing for a Democratic administration that could be even tougher toward Russia than a Republican one." Loading Both Russia and China have periodically proposed cybersecurity treaties, including requirements that everyone logging into the internet be required to use their true identity. While such proposals might limit illicit activity  if they could be enforced  they would also make it easier for the world's autocrats to hunt down dissidents. Most academic experts have concluded that the treaties that led to arms reductions from the 1960s forward were unlikely to work in cyberspace. Nuclear weapons were in the hands of a few states; cyber weapons are controlled by countries, criminal groups, activists and teenagers. Often, states conduct their cyber activities through proxies, including criminal groups. All those would make treaties fairly useless.

Nonetheless Putin seemed enthralled by the idea. "These measures are aimed at building up trust between our States, promoting security and prosperity of our peoples," Putin's statement said. "They will significantly contribute to ensuring global peace in the information space." Two Russian political analysts with ties to the Kremlin said in interviews Friday that even if Putin's proposal was a genuine attempt at improving the relationship with Washington, they did not expect it to go anywhere. Kortunov said Putin had not signalled that he was ready to give any substantial ground in the dispute over election interference. Loading "It's obvious that the Kremlin would, of course, prefer not to quarrel with Washington, no matter the election result," Kortunov said, noting the risk of a President Biden seeking to impose new sanctions on Russia. "But they would like to avoid these challenges without paying a serious price." For instance, Kortunov noted, the Kremlin has not made any public effort to rein in Yevgeny Prigozhin, the Russian business magnate indicted by the United States for helping spearhead interference in the 2016 election.
PEOPLE who dont often frequent Manitobas houses of worship might be surprised to know that before the pandemic, many such buildings were bustling busy throughout the week with visitors whose attendance was unrelated to the in-house brand of religion.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 26/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Opinion

PEOPLE who dont often frequent Manitobas houses of worship might be surprised to know that before the pandemic, many such buildings were bustling busy throughout the week with visitors whose attendance was unrelated to the in-house brand of religion.

A typical weeks schedule in a church, synagogue, temple or mosque might include meetings of a divorce recovery group, a language class for refugees, meetings of 12-step groups such as Alcoholics Anonymous, a pre-wedding shower for a bride-to-be and an envionmentalist lecturing on climate change.

Some of the weekday community outreach was organized by members of the faith family that owns the building, perhaps to distribute food to needy people, or run daily after-school activities for neighbourhood children.

But many of the activities were conducted by non-religious groups that only approached the faith facility because they needed a meeting place that is safe, clean and inexpensive  often, free. They werent allowed to use spaces that were sanctified as holy, but they were free to use adjoining rooms, the basement or attached halls.

The facilities kept their doors open because all major faiths priorize charity and compassion, which in practical terms means welcoming the community, including the non-religious community.

Such faith institutions provided an "invisible safety net" of community services, according to a report released last Monday by Cardus, a faith-based think-tank. The report, which uses figures compiled before the pandemic, says its the first in Canada to add up the economic value of religion to Canadian society. It says religious organizations account for about $67 billion of economic activity each year, and it divides that sum into two categories:

First, about $30 billion, is the direct revenue of faith-based organizations, including congregations and faith-based charities.

Second, about $37 billion, includes what is called "the halo effect," a term that tallies the value faith groups generate for the public good. It includes putting a price tag on outreach programs  for example, when a faith facility offers free space to a teen drop-in centre and adults volunteer to help out as councillors, the new study estimates how much it would cost if the group had to rent a facility and pay councillors.

An earlier study on this "halo effect" called faith institutions "de-facto community centres," and estimated the worth at about $150,000 per congregation per year. Sadly, the "halo effect" has been snuffed out, extinguished by the pandemic. The faith facilities closed their doors, by edict of the public-health office, leaving countless community groups without a place to go.

Faith groups are now trying to resume a semblance of worship with online streaming and sparse in-person services without singing and chanting, without embracing, without the powerful dynamics of full communal gatherings.

Like the rest of Manitoba, the faith groups are trying to defend against the pandemic, and a sensible  although dispiriting  precaution is to restrict outside groups from using the carefully sanitized facilities.

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The consequences can be dire for people who relied on the meetings for emotional and social health. This includes support groups for people with mental-health challenges or narcotic addictions, moms who met weekly with other moms who can relate to colicky babies and post-partum depression, or the widowed pensioners who live alone and depended on the weekly coffee hour for rare social connection.

Such people are the hidden casualties of lockdowns. Theyve lost their network of supportive activities at the same time as many have also lost their jobs, and may be struggling with increased anxiety, fear and suspicion of other people who may be virus carriers. Its during this dark time Manitobas faith groups are planning how they can mobilize and help lead the recovery.

Faith communities value marginalized and vulnerable people  thats their specialty. Their ancient rituals and fervent beliefs empower groups of people who are like-minded in putting the common good ahead of individualism. Desperate times reveal true character, and I believe Manitobas faith groups will rise to the occasion and  when allowed by the relaxing of public-health orders  will once again attend to the physical, emotional and social needs of their local communities.

The recovery from the pandemic will be like the aftermath of a hurricane that left the landscape strewn with wreakage and debris. As soon as its safe to go in, Manitobas faith groups will be there to pick up the pieces.

carl.degurse@freepress.mb.ca

Carl DeGurse is a member of the Free Press editorial board.
BEIJING, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- China has almost won its decades-long battle against poverty, accumulating experience for the global anti-poverty campaign.

This year marks the final year for China to achieve goals of eradicating poverty and building a moderately prosperous society in all respects.

Chinese President Xi Jinping said Tuesday via video link at the general debate of the 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly that the country has every confidence it will meet the poverty eradication target set out in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, and that it will achieve that target 10 years in advance.

He also noted that China will lift all rural residents living below the current poverty line out of poverty within the set time frame.

FINAL SPRINT

Over the last 70 years, China has been steadily marching forward on the path of reducing poverty.

A total of 850 million Chinese people have been lifted out of poverty, contributing over 70 percent to global poverty reduction.

The country's rural poor population was slashed from 98.99 million at the end of 2012 to 5.51 million at the end of 2019, with the poverty ratio in rural regions dropping from 10.2 percent to 0.6 percent.

People's livelihoods have also improved. The country's per capita disposable income climbed to 30,733 yuan (about 4,512 U.S. dollars) in 2019, representing an average annual increase of 9.2 percent from 2000. The per capita disposable income in real terms expanded 96.6 percent in the 2011-19 period.

In an interview with Xinhua last week, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres spoke highly of China's contributions to addressing global challenges and its success in poverty reduction, calling China's achievements in poverty reduction "very strong."

REAL ACTION

While China's experience in eliminating poverty has become an example for the world, the country has also undertaken its due responsibilities as a major country and lent a helping hand to other countries escaping poverty.

Since 2015, China has assisted other developing countries through 180 poverty reduction projects, 118 agricultural cooperation projects, 178 aid-for-trade projects, 103 projects concerning ecological conservation and climate change.

At the general debate of the 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday, Xi pledged to provide 50 million U.S. dollars to the China-FAO South-South Cooperation Trust Fund (Phase III).

The South-South Cooperation Trust Fund has already supported over 80 projects in more than 30 developing countries, injecting impetus into global sustainable development.

Other real actions such as proposing the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and setting up the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank have also led some underdeveloped countries to rise above poverty.

According to a research report published by the World Bank in October last year, the BRI is expected to lift 7.6 million people out of extreme poverty and 32 million out of moderate poverty across the world.
Diary Of An Apprentice Astronaut

Samantha Cristoforetti Allen Lane 25

Rating:

Thanks to Covid-19, many of us are dreaming of an escape from Earth at present  and Samantha Cristoforettis absorbing tale of becoming an astronaut and venturing into space offers just that.

The book begins with Cristoforetti strapped into a ball of fire in dizzying descent towards the planet, returning from the 200 days she spent at the International Space Station from late 2014.

But this is as much a chronicle of the journey to becoming an astronaut as it is of any thrilling jaunts heavenward, and after the introduction the narrative jumps back six years, to when shes a 32-year-old military pilot in her native Italy waiting to hear whether shes been accepted to train as an astronaut with the European Space Agency.

The book begins with Samantha Cristoforetti (above) strapped into a ball of fire in dizzying descent towards the planet'

She makes it through and embarks on a five-year training period spanning Houston, Japan and Russia. From underwater spacewalk simulations to adjusting a male-sized spacesuit to fit her female frame, Cristoforetti details every inch of the preparation required for a mission and soon youre feeling her anticipation as your own.

When departure day arrives, her declaration that I dont know what to do with my happiness smacks of genuine euphoria rather than hyperbole.

Such instances of emotional candour are rare. Her description of lift-off focuses on physical sensations  It feels like my body is sinking into the rocket  rather than the psychological experience of doing something potentially deadly.

But her pragmatism probably makes her a good astronaut  and shes a gifted writer too, capturing the majesty of life in space where she sees the Northern Lights as a green tongue of flame snaking along the horizon along with its absurdity, from astronaut nappies to weightless haircuts.

An enthralling book.

Ramble Book

Adam Buxton Mudlark 16.99

Rating:

Self-deprecation is Adam Buxtons business. He describes himself as a short, hairy man and (despite an outwardly impressive career as a comedian, TV presenter, DJ and podcaster) broods over misfires and perceived slights.

He has so many unrealised TV projects, he jokes, that hes been awarded a Failed TV Pilots Licence; his schoolfriends Joe Cornish (Buxtons long-time collaborator, now a Hollywood director) and documentary-maker Louis Theroux pop up here in warm tones, but Buxtons jabs about his own comparative lack of accomplishment point to a sincere feeling of deficiency.

So its typical of him to have given this memoir a self-deprecating title like Ramble Book.

Adam Buxton (above) describes himself as a short, hairy man and (despite an outwardly impressive career as a comedian, TV presenter, DJ and podcaster) broods over misfires

Its typical, too, that the book hes written is actually an extremely funny and insightful double coming-of-age story about his relationship with the two men in his life he most looked up to: his father (the travel journalist Nigel Buxton, known to followers of Buxtons television career as BaaadDad), and David Bowie.

Chapters alternate between Buxtons awkward 1980s adolescence, through which he is sustained by Bowies music; and the 21st Century, where Buxton cares for his father through the last months of his life.

Both died within weeks of each other, leading to the sense of reckoning that runs through this book.

Nigel Buxton was a man who wanted upward mobility for his children, but lived with his own abiding sense of failure when he couldnt maintain the life of private schools and privilege he intended for them (what Buxton calls some dank Death Of A Salesman s**t).

That sense of disappointment made him a distant and difficult father. It also left Buxton with a satirists sense of social class  some of his anecdotes have the sharpness of Reginald Perrin.

Theres no Hollywood reconciliation here, but a touching understanding is reached between father and son, which gives this book substance within the hilarity.

Sarah Ditum
ROCHESTER, N.Y.  It did not take long for President Trump to wade into the civil unrest that seized the city over the death of Daniel Prude, a Black man who died of suffocation after Rochester police officers placed a hood over his head.

Mr. Trump likened a peaceful march in Rochester to the clashes in Portland, Ore., saying earlier this month on Twitter that the two cities had bad nights. The next day, the president incorrectly asserted that most of the police in Rochester, N.Y., have resigned, blaming the Democrat Mayor and, of courses, Governor Cuomo.

The presidents incursions in Rochester have divided Republicans in Western New York, as candidates vying for Congress and local office weigh whether to embrace Mr. Trump or distance themselves from his characterization of the Black Lives Matter movement as a symbol of hate.

Nowhere is that dynamic more pronounced than in heavily Democratic districts like Monroe County, which includes Rochester, the states third-largest city, where Republicans running as moderates risk alienating voters by adopting the presidents antagonistic view of protesters.
In this article we take a look at the 25 countries with the highest life expectancy. Click to skip ahead and jump to the 10 countries with the highest life expectancy.

Our world has changed beyond imagination in the last century. Even that may be an unnecessarily long stretch as even in the past 3 decades, the world has changed exponentially and advancements which weren't thought possible some time ago have now been realized. After all, we are in an age where a private company has launched Nasa astronauts to space. We have self driving cars on our roads now, though you need to be careful that you don't watch TV while your car is in autopilot as you could be arrested for negligent homicide. Clearly, some kinks still need to be worked out but we are still living in extremely exciting times.

Because of these advancements, our life expectancy is increasing as well. In the last two centuries, our life expectancy hasn't just grown steadily, it has actually more than doubled. From less than 30 years, the average person can now expect to live up to 72 years old. This doesn't mean that if you were born in the 1800s or even the 1900s you could look at early death. Of course, there was a higher chance, but the truth is that so many people died during childhood and even soon after birth, that it reduced the average life expectancy significantly. If you were able to reach adulthood, you could reach old age as well, though of course, even that was not as common.

JCStudio/Shutterstock.com

In the 1800s, nearly everyone lived in extreme poverty, and there weren't many solutions to medical issues. Common illnesses such as the flu could cause a lot of deaths, and pandemics were much more common, while epidemics occurred at a startling pace. We've had seven pandemics of just cholera in the last 200 years, and in the 19th century, medical practitioners weren't licensed, nor were the necessary medical advancements made, causing a lot of deaths. The Spanish flu alone caused up to 50 million deaths! That is 50 times the death toll that we have right now for the coronavirus pandemic. Again, if social distancing and medical procedures used in the current pandemic were available then, perhaps a lot more lives could have been saved. After all, you only have to take a look at Philadelphia, where, even though social distancing measures were being called for, threw a massive parade for the soldiers returning from World War I. The effect was swift and brutal. Within 2 days, an epidemic had been declared, and within 3 days, every single hospital bed was filled. Within a week, 4,500 people in Philadelphia had died. An interesting fact about the Spanish flu, is that it didn't actually originate in Spain. It mostly emerged in the United States but the media did not report on it because of World War I and not wanting to hurt the morale of soldiers. However, Spain's media was free, and they reported on the pandemic, which is why it became known as the Spanish Flu and people actually thought it originated in Spain.

Story continues

This brings us to the current Covid 19 pandemic, which has so far seen nearly 32 million people infected and over 975,000 deaths. It may slightly affect the life expectancy in the coming years, since it has been particularly lethal and fatal for people over the age of 65. The concerning thing is, that you can't even be sure that this is at an end, since many places, including Europe are now facing a second wave which has seen even higher infections than the first wave. While deaths are decreasing slightly, logic dictates that with the cases increasing at this number, the deaths will soon follow.

Each country has a different life expectancy of course, because of different cultures, traditions and even susceptibility to disease. In some cultures, healthy eating and exercise is a very important part of tradition, which is why they live long lives. On the other hand, poorer countries may not have the same level of access to medication as the more advanced countries which is why they have lower life expectancy. This is why the vast majority of such countries are unfortunately located in Africa, as can be seen in 10 countries with shortest life expectancy. The gap between the country with the highest life expectancy and the country with the lowest life expectancy in 2020 is an astounding 30 years. For our rankings we have considered both the CIA Factbook as well as the World Health Organization. We gave slightly higher precedence to the CIA Factbook since the data was for 2017, while the data for WHO was from 2016, which is why the weightage was split 60:40 respectively. So without further ado let's take a look at the countries where your post retirement bliss won't be just a few years, starting with number 25:

25. Portugal

Life expectancy average score: 80.24

Expect to see a lot of European countries here, starting with Portugal, which has a life expectancy of over 80 years. In just the last decade, this number has increased by 2, signifying the advancements made in such a short period of time.

Pixabay/Public Domain

24. Germany

Life expectancy average score: 80.24

The Germans are famous for their efficiency and work ethic. Because of this, it is easy to see how they would indulge in healthy activities and refrain from more dangerous ones, thereby having a significantly higher life expectancy than most other countries.

Pixabay/Public Domain

23. Greece

Life expectancy average score: 80.9

While it may have been in an economical conundrum for a while now, Greece still has a high life expectancy, and if you visit the country, you can see many people of old age relaxing and enjoying life in the country.

Pixabay/Public Domain

22. Malta

Life expectancy average score: 80.9

Not only do the Maltese have a high life expectancy, they also spend around 90% of their total life in good health, the highest such rate in the entire European Union.

Pixabay/Public Domain

21. United Kingdom

Life expectancy average score: 81.04

We told you European countries will dominate our list of countries with the highest life expectancy and the UK is no exception, with a strong economy and a high quality National Health Service department ensuring a high life expectancy.

Pixabay/Public Domain

19. Belgium

Life expectancy average score: 81.14

The life expectancy has been increasing in Belgium for several decades now. The only exceptions to this statement are 2012 and 2015, when slightly lower numbers were noted. Currently standing at 81, the average life expectancy across the board is quite high, but mainly due to women who have a life expectancy of 83 years, while the men only get 79 years on average.

Pixabay/Public Domain

19. Ireland

Life expectancy average score: 81.14

The Irish have been able to fight off major diseases and lower death rates from diseases such as cancer have contributed to an ever increasing life expectancy rate, at 81.5. Ireland has also reduced deaths from another major course in suicides, which have reduced by around 40% in the last decade, which is a truly commendable achievement.

Pixabay/Public Domain

18. Finland

Life expectancy average score: 81.16

Scandinavian countries are famous for their high quality of life and high standards of living, which of course automatically translates to a higher life expectancy as well, which is why Finland has a life expectancy of around 81.5.

Pixabay/Public Domain

17. Netherlands

Life expectancy average score: 81.48

The Netherlands are another European country with a really high standard of living and socialized healthcare, which means that even though taxes in the country are high, healthcare is free allowing people to obtain treatments for any illnesses and diseases, and ensuring their life expectancy rate remains at the higher end.

Pixabay/Public Domain

16. New Zealand

Life expectancy average score: 81.66

Not only has New Zealand successfully combated the Covid 10 pandemic with minimal losses, it also has excellent healthcare facilities which are the secret to a high life expectancy.

Pixabay/Public Domain

15. Austria

Life expectancy average score: 81.72

In just the last decade, this number has increased by 3 years in Austria, thereby enabling it to earn a place on our list.

Pixabay/Public Domain

14. Norway

Life expectancy average score: 82.14

One of the most beautiful countries in the world, even the smallest villages in Norway have all the necessary facilities ensuring a high life expectancy across the country.

Least Racist Countries in Europe in 2017 with th

Pixabay/Public Domain

13. Sweden

Life expectancy average score: 82.22

A lack of pollutants and a strong sense of cleanliness are just a few of the reasons why country has such a high life expectancy. In a poll. 96% of the people were satisfied with the quality of water in the country. In the last hundred years, the life expectancy has increased by around 25 years.

Pixabay/Public Domain

12. Canada

Life expectancy average score: 82.26

Canada has managed to surpass its neighbors significantly in terms of life expectancy where in some cases, Canadians are actually outliving Americans by even a decade, due to their much superior healthcare.

Pixabay/Public Domain

11. France

Life expectancy average score: 82.3

If you're an advanced country you can easily manage a high life expectancy and France is no stranger to this rule, though somewhat strangely, they believe that a couple of glasses of wine a day is one of the secrets behind this success.

Pixabay/Public Domain Click to continue reading and see the 10 countries with the highest life expectancy. Disclosure: 25 countries with the highest life expectancy is originally published at Insider Monkey.
Emma Roberts has been the picture of maternal bliss since announcing her first pregnancy last month.

And the former child star is continuing to serve some gorgeous looks, as she masters the art of maternity fashion.

She wrapped her baby bump in blue stripes Friday, as she stepped out in a casual chic ensemble to make a matcha tea run in her Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles.

Baby bump: Emma Roberts wrapped her baby bump in blue stripes Friday, as she stepped out in a casual chic ensemble to make a matcha tea run in her Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles

The 29-year-old paired the striped t-shirt with a matching denim blue face mask, embroidered with 'wear it!', and a pair of flowy blue satin gaucho pants.

She finished the ensemble with a pair of round gold Ray-Ban sunglasses, beige snakeskin booties and an off-white leather crossbody handbag.

Roberts and partner Garrett Hedlund, 36, confirmed their first pregnancy last month on Instagram, while revealing that they're expecting a boy.

She captioned their adorable first family photos from home: 'Me...and my two favorite guys'

The blues: The 29-year-old paired the striped t-shirt with a matching denim blue face mask, embroidered with 'wear it!', and a pair of flowy blue satin gaucho pants

Big news: Roberts and partner Garrett Hedlund, 36, confirmed their first pregnancy last month on Instagram , while revealing that they're expecting a boy

Happy family: She captioned their adorable first family photos from home: 'Me...and my two favorite guys'

'Love you,' Aunt Julia Roberts, 52, commented, while Scream Queens costar (and fellow new mom) Lea Michele wrote: 'You will be the greatest mama. I love you Em! Boy moms together.'

Michele, 34, welcomed her firstborn son Ever Leo last month, and their Scream Queens costar Billie Lourd, 28, surprise welcomed her first child Thursday, a son named Kingston Fisher.

Roberts commented on Lourd's Instagram announcement: 'Screaming!!! Love you guys so much.'

A source recently told People that Roberts and Hedlund gotten 'very serious' in their relationship, and they are 'beyond excited to be having a boy.'

Boy moms: Her Scream Queens costar (and fellow new mom) Lea Michele wrote: 'You will be the greatest mama. I love you Em! Boy moms together'

Squad goals: Michele, 34, welcomed her firstborn son Ever Leo last month, and their Scream Queens costar Billie Lourd, 28, surprise welcomed her first child Thursday, a son named Kingston Fisher

The insider added of the parents-to-be: 'Garrett thinks Emma is amazing. They will be great parents.'

The American Horror Story star was first romantically linked to Hedlund back in March of 2019, shortly after calling off her engagement with Evan Peters, 33, after seven years together.

She recently celebrated some other big news, signing a first-look deal with Hulu, focusing on adapting books for television.

Inked through her production company Belletrist TV, her first project will be an adaptation of Carola Lovering's 2018 novel Tell Me Lies.

Making moves: Roberts recently celebrated some other big news, signing a first-look deal with Hulu, focusing on adapting books for television

Page to screen: Inked through her production company Belletrist TV, her first project will be an adaptation of Carola Lovering's 2018 novel Tell Me Lies (pictured in February, 2020)

Well-read: Since Belletrist was started by Roberts as a book club with pal Karah Preiss (who also serves as executive producer), they shouldn't have any trouble coming up with more content

Since Belletrist was started by Roberts as a book club with pal Karah Preiss (who also serves as executive producer), they shouldn't have any trouble coming up with more content.

Roberts told British Vogue last month: 'I always love the feeling of starting a new book that youve been excited to read. Especially lately, just diving into a new book and really getting to spend the day or the night reading has been such a luxury.

'It gets me so excited, because then I keep thinking of all the friends Im going to get a copy for, if theyre going to like it, and what were going to talk about. I just think a good book is just the best conversation starter.'

She also stars in the upcoming holiday romantic comedy Holidate, which premieres October 28 on Netflix.
This week Australian Story profiles farmer Charles Massy, who advocated for change in his industry.

For five generations, Charles Massys family rode on the sheeps back and nearly destroyed their land in the process.

Ive made most of the mistakes you can make in farming. I was belting the landscape. I knew it was wrong, but I was in this economic trap of trying to support a family, Charles Massy.

When drought in the 80s and 90s drove him into debt and almost sent him broke, the Cooma farmer switched to regenerative agriculture and watched his overgrazed land recover.

I wasnt working against nature. Life became a lot more simple and enjoyable, not fighting a debt, slowly watching your land regenerate, Charles Massy.

In his mid-50s, Charles Massy started a PhD, visiting 80 top regenerative farmers to see what they were doing differently.

That led to his ground-breaking book Call of the Reed Warbler, a controversial plea to farmers to start working with nature.

And along the way, hes picked up some powerful allies including the West Australian Minister for Agriculture.

Our consumers are deeply concerned about climate change; theyre deeply concerned about chemical residues. I think in 10 years time, a lot of this stuff will be pretty mainstream, Alannah MacTiernan.

Producer: Vanessa Gorman

8pm Monday on ABC.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 04:19:00|Editor: huaxia

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ROME, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- Italian antitrust officials on Friday broadened their probe into airline policies regarding trips canceled due to factors related to the global coronavirus outbreak.

The Italian Competition Authority said Friday it was investigating the operations of discount air carriers Blue Panorama, Easyjet, Ryanair, and Vueling. This builds on an earlier investigation involving Italy's flagship air carrier Alitalia and regional discount carrier Volotea.

The probes into the activities of the six airlines are based on consumer complaints that they would only issue flight vouchers for canceled flights rather than full refunds. Additionally, the companies are reported to offer inadequate customer service options to help resolve the issues. Three of the airlines are even reported to charge customers a fee for speaking to a customer service representative.

There is no formal timetable for the conclusion of the investigations.

The developments come as Europe's airline industry is reeling in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. Almost all European flights were grounded as countries issued national coronavirus lockdowns starting in March, and travel between Europe and major destinations such as the United States, China, and Brazil remain restricted.

Even within Europe, flights are usually run at less than half capacity, while demand for flights is reduced because of coronavirus fears. Airlines also deploy infrastructure for monitoring passengers for coronavirus symptoms while disinfecting aircraft between flights.

Earlier this week, Alitalia became the first major European airline to offer "COVID-19-free" flights. Passengers on selected flights between Alitalia hubs in Rome and Milan -- Italy's two largest cities -- are tested for the virus before being allowed to board the flights, with test results available before takeoff. If successful, the airline will reportedly consider expanding the program to other routes. Enditem
Security forces in Minsk detained dozens of protesters on September 26 during a womens march against Alyaksandr Lukashenka, who claimed victory in the Belarusian presidential election on August 9 amid reports of widespread fraud. The detentions began soon after the women, many dressed in white and carrying red and white flowers and waving red-and-white opposition flags, gathered to march through the capital. A group of women carried posters and chanted in support of opposition presidential candidate Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who they say won the vote and who has since taken refuge in neighboring Lithuania. Some women wore paper crowns in reaction to Lukashenkas surprise inauguration on September 23.
September 26 : As Deepika Padukone is being grilled by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) today in the Bollywood drugs nexus case, it is reported that the actress was the admin of the WhatsApp group where she chatted with her manager Karishma Prakash about procuring drugs, and which is now under the NCBs scanner. The agency will question the actress about the 2017 drug chats, along with the alleged payments that she made for them. It is also reported that Deepika will write down the answers while she is being questioned by the NCB.

Meanwhile, NCB DG Mutha Ashok Jain told the media that Rakul Preet Singh's statement was recorded by the SIT on Friday. It will be analysed and produced before the court, he confirmed. NCB recorded the statement of the actress in connection with the Bollywood drug nexus link to Sushant Singh Rajputs death. The actress was grilled by NCB for four hours and has reportedly confirmed the drug chats. However, she denied consuming or producing drugs or having any direct link with peddlers, it is reported.

According to a Mumbai Mirror report, Rakul reportedly explained that the doob in her chat was about hand-rolled cigarettes and not drugs. However, Rhea, had revealed during her round of grilling with the NCB that the doob was marijuana. Rakul also said that she doesnt consume or procure drugs. According to a Republic TV report, Rakul allegedly claimed that the drugs recovered from her residence belong to Rhea. She told the NCB that Rhea would get drugs delivered at her residence.

The NCB had also questioned Deepikas manager Karishma Prakash, and Dharma Productions executive producer Kshitij Ravi in the drugs probe. While Kshitij has been arrested by the NCB, Karishma will appear before it again on Saturday, when the agency would also record Deepikas statement.

Latest updates on Sushant Singh Rajput Death Mystery
For example, after the first phone call, word gets around pretty quickly that The Sun-Herald and Sunday Age are working on a piece about "the moderates under Morrison". Enthusiasm to participate varies. The left side of the Liberal Party has had a lot of monikers over the years. In the Hawke-Keating years they were generally known as the "wets", and supported a greater amount of economic intervention than the free market "dries". Treasurer Josh Frydenberg, Goldstein MP Tim Wilson and Mackellar MP Jason Falinski in Parliament in 2019. Credit:Dominic Lorrimer These days the moderates have embraced economic and social liberalism. They are less likely than their conservative cousins to support the government "picking winners", such as underwriting a new gas-fired power station in the event the market does not deliver. At the last election, a handful of progressive Liberals experimented with their branding, dubbing themselves "modern Liberals" on corflutes and other paraphernalia. Tim Wilson, Dave Sharma and Jason Falinski adopted the term.

It was a reflection of the party's image problem in progressive urban seats. After a term of tearing themselves apart over marriage equality and climate change, the MPs wanted to signal they were worlds apart from the conservative rump. But it's a different world now, and a different party room. The destructive era of Turnbull versus Tony Abbott is long gone. There are no towering, divisive social issues like marriage equality on the agenda. Climate change and energy remain challenging but the heat, so to speak, appears to have been taken out of the debate. Under Turnbull, every sign of discontent was a possible canary in the coalmine for a leadership showdown. The threats came mostly from the right, although a gang of up to half a dozen "rebel" moderate MPs tried to maintain the impression they might go feral if something wasn't done to legalise same-sex marriage. Morrison's majority in the lower house is barely bigger than Turnbull's, but politically there is more room for MPs to stick their necks out - within reason - on issues they care about. Senators Andrew Bragg and James Patterson, plus Wilson and Falinski, are leading a ginger group to try to stop the superannuation guarantee increasing to 12 per cent from 9.5 per cent. North Sydney MP Trent Zimmerman has backed a target of net zero emissions by 2050, and last week made a quiet intervention on media policy when he called for the government to compel streaming services such as Netflix to create Australian content. He told The Sun-Herald and Sunday Age those services should have to spend 10 to 15 per cent of the revenue they earn in Australia creating Australian productions.

Sharma, a former ambassador to Israel, has latitude to speak on China and has been critical of the government's travel ban during the COVID-19 pandemic, calling it a "pretty extraordinary restriction on people's liberty". Liberal MP Dave Sharma says Scott Morrison doesn't feel the need to enforce strict discipline on his MPs. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen The freedom to freelance is not absolute. Earlier in the year Morrison and Payne summoned a group of MPs including Sharma and Wilson, and conservatives Andrew Hastie and Craig Kelly among others, for a gentle reminder about the need for sensitivity when discussing China. "Even when he's had to sound a note of caution, it's always been in a respectful rather than a disciplinary sense," says Sharma. "He's quite secure enough in his own leadership not to feel the need to enforce strict discipline on people's views." That wasn't always the case. After Morrison won the 2019 election, he put his foot down. In July of that year he confronted party room unrest over superannuation and the Newstart payment, bluntly telling MPs to air their grievances through internal processes rather than in public.

"You go outside of those processes, it's showing disrespect to those you're sitting next to, it's showing disrespect to your other colleagues," Morrison warned. Politics has since mellowed. Wilson, the Liberal MP for Goldstein since 2016, says it's a different ball game to when he entered Parliament under Turnbull. "When I first arrived a lot of policy debates were proxies for leadership and personality," he says. "Now policy debates are about policy." Energy policy is the obvious example: Turnbull was ultimately rolled using the National Energy Guarantee as a precursor. Plenty of moderate Liberals still believe the NEG was great policy, even "perfect", but are happy to settle for Morrison's "good" alternative, including his "gas-led recovery". Some hate the PM's plan to build a gas-fired power station in the Hunter Valley if AGL does not replace its Liddell coal plant. But the detractors aren't jumping up and down because they don't think it will actually happen. One MP says gas is the perfect halfway house for Morrison, who is always going to look out of place on a solar farm. At least with gas, the MP says, "you can still turn up to industrial plants, wear high-vis vests and knock about with tradies".

Wilson says Morrison's strength is he "has respect for principled liberal policy, but understands how it is received by the punter, which makes for a more sustainable lens for progressing values to policy outcomes". "Every day I become happier I voted for him to be PM. There's no buyer's remorse," says Wilson. "We're given clearer parameters about the freedom to differ, which means we are free to debate issues so long as we understand the responsibility to keep the team united." In agreement: Senator Andrew Bragg and Liberal MP Tim Wilson. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen Moderate MPs who speak to The Sun-Herald and Sunday Age are keen to emphasise the policy leadership coming from their side of the fence. It is true they have been ferocious authors since the election; Bragg wrote a book on super, Bad Egg, and is working on another one outlining the conservative case for backing the Uluru Statement from the Heart. Wilson wrote a book on liberalism called The New Social Contract, for which Morrison penned a glowing foreword. Bragg believes his policy activism has been "valued and appreciated" by the PM. "I'm trying to make the boat go faster," he says. "Everything I'm advancing around getting a better super deal or getting a better deal for Indigenous affairs is consistent with our policies."

Loading And if the liberal side of the party is deliberately active, the conservative side is in something of a funk. Peter Dutton was bruised by his failed leadership tilt, as was Mathias Cormann, who will leave politics by year's end. "Cormann has been physically present but not mentally present," says one MP. "Dutton is not the force that he was. The people under him - [Michael] Sukkar, [Zed] Seselja and [Tony] Pasin - are not bringing the same political skills that Abbott brought. The fact [Alan] Jones is no longer on morning radio talking to large sections of NSW and Queensland is also having a huge impact." Whether all the books, opinion pieces and policy contributions amount to anything will be made clear come the inevitable reshuffle once Cormann departs. Other ministers have arguably under-performed and there would be plenty of scope to elevate new talent, should Morrison choose. Tom Harley, the Liberal moderate and former party vice-president who founded the Black Hand dinner with Brandis, says he has every confidence Morrison will maintain factional balance in a future frontbench.


The Croatian Minister for Sea, Transport and Infrastructure, Oleg Butkovic, has said the government will resume Croatia Airlines privatisation process once the coronavirus crisis stabilises, but noted the state would first financially assist the carrier. At the start of the year we had two parties interested in Croatia Airlines and that process was advancing quite well. We were about the enter the second phase of negotiations, which included finalising details. However, corona came, and everything was halted because the entire industry has been hard hit, Mr Butkovic said. He added, When the situation begins to improve and normalise, we will resume the search for a strategic partner. There was interest, its not as if no one was looking at Croatia Airlines, but we will have to wait a bit more. The Croatian Minister for Sea, Transport and Infrastructure, Oleg Butkovic, has said the government will resume Croatia Airlines privatisation process once the coronavirus crisis stabilises, but noted the state would first financially assist the carrier. At the start of the year we had two parties interested in Croatia Airlines and that process was advancing quite well. We were about the enter the second phase of negotiations, which included finalising details. However, corona came, and everything was halted because the entire industry has been hard hit, Mr Butkovic said. He added, When the situation begins to improve and normalise, we will resume the search for a strategic partner. There was interest, its not as if no one was looking at Croatia Airlines, but we will have to wait a bit more.





The Croatian government previously set a deadline to privatise or recapitalise the airline by June 2020. Greece's Aegean Airlines and Spanish regional carrier Air Nostrum had both expressed interest in acquiring shares in Croatia Airlines. In January, Aegean said, "Any significant decision on whether or not the company is likely to participate in the next phase of the privatisation process will be taken in the coming months, following the provision of information and discussions, in accordance with the procedure set by the Republic of Croatia". The next phase of the process was to involve the government announcing a tender for the submission of binding bids and setting out the number of shares it was willing to sell in the company. It previously noted it would offer a stake of up to 70%.





Mr Butkovic reiterated the state would provide aid for the flag carrier. We share the same faith as all other countries, where governments are saving their airlines. We will, jointly with the European Union and Commission, certainly provide assistance for Croatia Airlines, which will be in line with EU aid rules, the minister said. Croatia Airlines registered a net loss of 23.1 million euros during the first half of the year. The company has drafted three different scenarios as to how the ongoing pandemic may affect its business, with estimates ranging between a loss of thirty million to 73 million euros by years end. The airline has denied recent reports that it has leased an additional Dash 8 turboprop, which arrived in Zagreb last week, noting that the aircraft was just undergoing maintenance at its technical division before being returned to its owner.
Victims of flooding in Kogi State had cause to smile recently as the Future Assured team delivered relief items to them from the wife of the Nigerian president, Aisha Muhammadu Buhari.

A statement from her media aide, Aliyu Abdullahi, said for two days running, the team visited locations at Koton Karfe Local Government area and parts of Lokoja town, where homes were visibly submerged

Zainab Ikaz-Kassim, Special Assistant to the President on Domestic Affairs and Event Management, who led the team, delivered the goodwill message of Mrs Buhari, and expressed her solidarity with the victims at their time of need.

Wife of the Kogi State governor, Rashida Bello, who spoke on behalf of the victims, conveyed their appreciation and urged victims to use the items judiciously.

Items distributed include rice and other food commodities, toiletries, blankets and clothing materials.

The team also delivered hospital essentials to the Kogi State Specialist Hospital, for its own use and for distribution to Primary Health Care Centers.

The items, which were received by the Medical Director, Isa Shuaibu, include hand sanitisers, face masks, assorted drugs, cleaning agents, disinfectants and surgical gloves. The team used the occasion to visit and commiserate with patients at the hospital including those affected by the recent petrol tanker explosion, which claimed dozens of lives.

The team also distributed items to empower the people of Kogi State. Items distributed include hair dryers for women to help them in their hair styling business and water pumping machines for farmers, to help them boost dry season farming in the state.

Chairman of All Farmers Association of Nigeria, Kogi State Chapter, Mohammed Suleiman, commended the First Lady for the kind gesture.

ALSO READ: Yahaya Bello suspends Kogi revenue board

On the entourage were the Secretary to the State Government, Ayoade Folashade, Commissioner for Health, Saka Audu and Commissioner for Environment, Adewale Omofaiye.
A 49-year-old Pittsfield man has died after jumping out of a car on the Massachusetts Turnpike in Blandford and running into traffic, Massachusetts State Police said Saturday.

Around 10 p.m. Friday, a 2008 Lexus driven by a 36-year-old Becket woman pulled over on I-90 east near the 24.2 mile marker. Then, the womans passenger, Harry Young, got out of the car, state police said in a statement.

The Lexus pulled in the breakdown lane and Young jumped out of the vehicle and ran into the roadway for reasons still under investigation, state police said.

Young was struck by a 2013 Ford Explorer driven by a 26-year-old Brockton woman and a 2020 Kenworth tractor-trailer driven by a 33-year-old Little Falls, N.Y., man, the statement said.

State police said Young was pronounced dead at the scene. All drivers stayed at the crash site.

Why Young got out of the Lexus remains under investigation, state police said. No charges have been filed as of Saturday morning.

State police troopers were assisted at the scene by MassDOT. Traffic traveled in the breakdown lane during the investigation. The highway reopened at 2:17 a.m.
Realme has been doubling down on its smartphone offering in India to compete with the likes of Xiaomi and Samsung for a while now. The company has launched a number of smartphones this year expanding its portfolio and recently came up with an update to the Realme 6 series that was launched earlier this year. The new Realme 7 and Realme 7 Pro offer a nice mix of features with various configurations available from Rs 15,000 to Rs 22,000 which is substantially higher than the previous generation.

Talking specifically about the 7 Pro, it sounds like Realme has taken out certain features in favour of some new ones. But does that help in making this phone a valuable upgrade? Heres what we think

DESIGN

The Realme 7 Pro is quite a handy device compared to the variety of phones available in this segment. It feels fairly compact and the company has managed to keep the overall weight of the device lesser than the Realme 7 and even its predecessor, the Realme 6 Pro. There is a frosted finish at the back with a vertical-strip on one side that makes space for the company logo. Its a unique finish that Realme calls a Mirror Design but sadly there is no glass involved, rather it makes use of plastic. Despite that, it looks and feels good to use while the matte finish helps in reducing fingerprints and offering a decent grip. The rectangular camera module sitting on the top left has rounded corners and comes with four camera lenses and an LED flash.

The frame in the middle is made out of metal while the screen at the front sits slightly higher. Realme has used Gorilla Glass 3 and offers a pre-applied screen protector as well, which isnt very good in terms of quality, but it should last you for a while. The punch-hole for the front camera is placed on the top left of the display and while the bezels arent too big, there is a small chin at the bottom. The power button gets a nice golden accent and the volume buttons are on the other side that offers nice tactile feedback. Also, there is a headphone jack on this phone as well as stereo speakers. Nice touch.

I think Realme has put in a good effort even though there is no premium glass at the back. The phone feels comfortable to use and at the same time looks sharp.

DISPLAY

The Realme 7 Pro is one of the few phones that offers an AMOLED panel under the Rs 20,000 price segment. Now you may or may not like the higher saturation and contrast levels, but personally I think its a good choice. Of course, there is a slight trade-off as you get a standard 60Hz refresh rate. Personally I dont see this as a huge deal-breaker unless you prefer a faster and smoother experience. Notably, there is a special smooth scrolling option hidden under the Realme Lab options settings, although I didnt see a huge difference after enabling this. You can opt for the more affordable Realme 7 or the newly launched Narzo 20 Pro that makes use of a 90Hz LCD panel.

Now the panel on the Realme 7 Pro is nice and punchy when it comes to rendering colours. It isnt a high-grade AMOLED panel as was evident from the outdoor visibility which is above average. Its not a bad display by any means as I loved the high contrast and deep blacks. There are also some settings to fine-tune the display as per your liking. You can either choose the Brilliant profile which is a standard-setting or the Vivid profile that makes the colours a bit more vibrant. Of course, you also get options to fine-tune the colour temperature on the display.

There is also the option of an Always-on Display, although customisations are limited. The in-display fingerprint scanner is accurate, but it isnt as quick and responsive as the face unlock feature. Hence, it is better to use both to unlock your phone faster.

PERFORMANCE

Realme is offering the Snapdragon 720G processor on the phone and while there are other options on the market that offer the same chipset at a more affordable price, I think its a good choice. One has to consider the fact that smartphones are no longer cheaper in India thanks to the increased GST that was introduced earlier this year.

You can opt for either 6GB or 8GB of RAM while the internal storage is fixed at 128GB UFS 2.1. There is a dedicated slot in the SIM tray to expand the storage using a microSD card. I was sent the 8GB RAM variant and overall it performed quite well when it came to multitasking, while the SoC offered a good performance package. Day-to-day usage felt good and games ran fairly smoothly. It is notable that the phone struggles or is unable to render certain high-end gaming titles at the highest settings, although I was satisfied with the overall graphics performance.

The smartphone runs on Android 10 with Realme UI on top. I think Realme is finally heading in the right direction when it comes to its software offering though it is mostly making use of OPPOs ColorOS 7. I didnt notice any annoying pre-installed apps, and overall features and functionality offered with the user interface seems justified, especially the focus on certain Google apps. It isnt my favorite custom user interface for Android, but I think that the company is definitely making solid progress.

Other performance areas like network and connectivity seemed pretty much in order. For audio you get a dual-speaker system with one unit next to the earpiece and one at the bottom. The quality is decent, but it doesnt match up to some of the premium phones offering a similar system. You do get a headphone jack though, which is great if you appreciate wired headphones with the good old 3.5mm jack.

CAMERA

The Realme 7 Pro comes with four cameras at the back and a single unit on the front for taking selfies and making video calls. The rear camera comes with a 64-megapixel Sony IMX682 sensor with an f/1.8 lens, an 8-megapixel wide-angle camera with an f/2.3 lens, a 2-megapixel monochrome portrait camera, and a 2-megapixel macro camera. The front camera comes with a 32-megapixel camera that primarily produces an 8-megapixel photo and uses pixel-binning. Notably, Realme has dropped the telephoto camera on the back as well as the ultra-wide-angle selfie camera that were seen on the Realme 6 Pro. The 64-megapixel primary does however offer 2x zoom.

Like most smartphone cameras in this range, the primary sensor is the champion here as you get great-looking pictures in broad daylight. Colours mostly look natural with a wide dynamic range and contrast. You start losing details as you move indoors or in low light but there is a night mode that works well. As for the wide-angle camera, it isnt as impressive when it comes to picture quality and same is the case with the macro camera as well. The front 32-megapixel selfie camera can take decent pictures provided you have proper lighting. You get a bunch of modes and some interesting-looking filters to enhance your pictures but overall, I think Realme needs to work on the camera app itself as it feels a bit sluggish.

As for video recording, the rear camera can go up to 4K resolution at 30fps and offers electronic stabilisation. You get decent quality and while the stabilisation is just passable, you can further use the Ultra Steady mode which reduces shakes further but reduces quality and increases the crop factor.

BATTERY

The company has given a priority to the battery on the Realme 7 Pro. Now it comes with a 4,500mAh battery which doesnt match up to the large units on devices like the Redmi Note 9 Pro Max or Samsungs Galaxy M51. However, you get the companys 65W fast charging which is not available on any other phone at this price range. This is one of the best features on this phone as the battery can fully charge in just 35-minutes. Of course, you need the bundled charger and cable to get those speeds. In my testing, I was able to go from 10 to 60 percent in just 13 minutes. As for the battery backup itself, I was able to get almost an entire day but your mileage may differ depending on your usage patterns.

FINAL WORDS

As an overall package then, the Realme 7 Pro is a decent effort from the company. I think the highlights for me were the AMOLED display and the super-fast charging capabilities. Additionally, theres the use of stereo speakers which is not usually seen in this price segment, and I think the cameras are not bad, although there is some room for improvement that can be fixed with a software update. The handset is definitely recommended from our side but do note, there are a bunch of other options to look at like the recently launched Poco X3, the Samsung Galaxy M51 and even the companys own Narzo 20 Pro. The Realme 7 Pro is available for Rs 19,999 for the 6GB RAM variant and Rs 21,999 for the 8GB RAM model.
When Dr. Shereef Elnahal walked through his New Jersey hospital in April, he couldnt believe what he was seeing.

There were 300 patients being treated for Covid-19, filling hospital rooms and spilling out into the halls of the emergency room. The trauma center, once used for gunshot wounds and car crash victims, was now filled with people on ventilators.

It was really like nothing weve ever seen before, said Elnahal, president and CEO of University Hospital in Newark.

I have memories of walking around and I would look inside the rooms where that was possible. Almost every person was a person of color, he told NBC News.

Full coverage of the coronavirus outbreak

Elnahals hospital is one of the more than 100 major medical centers that treat Americas most vulnerable patients: communities of color who have been disproportionately harmed by Covid-19. Data has increasingly shown that Black and Hispanic patients are more likely to be hospitalized with the virus and, in many cases, more likely to die from it.

Were learning more and more that its these vulnerable communities being hit harder by the pandemic, said Beth Feldpush, senior vice president of policy and advocacy for Americas Essential Hospitals, a group representing the more than 300 hospitals that treat uninsured patients. Our hospitals are absolutely serving those hardest-hit communities.

A second surge of Covid-19 this fall and winter could be catastrophic for the U.S., and its not just more sick people that doctors worry about. The very hospitals that treat lower-income patients could be forced to shut down or cut crucial services.

Dr. Shereef Elnahal and staff at University Hospital in Newark, saying goodbye to the U.S. Army health care workers who helped with patient load during the peak of the pandemic in May. (University Hospital Newark)

We would absolutely be at risk of closing, Elnahal said. It would be a public health disaster for this community.

The pandemic hit all U.S. hospitals with a financial triple whammy, said Aaron Wesolowski, the American Hospital Associations vice president for policy research, analytics and strategy. Costs increased dramatically, while revenues plummeted.

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The hospitals were forced to cover the exorbitant costs of buying extra personal protective equipment like N95 masks, as well as convert wards to treat Covid-19 patients and more uninsured patients. At the same time, they had to stop performing revenue-generating procedures like elective surgeries.

By the end of 2020, hospitals across the U.S. will lose about $300 billion, according to the American Hospital Association. But for major medical centers like University Hospital in Newark, the financial hit of a second wave of Covid-19 would be especially devastating.

Where there are already cracks in the system, those cracks become earthquakes, said Dr. Chris Pernell, University Hospitals chief of strategic integration and health equity officer.

Thats because these safety net hospitals are nonprofit and promise care for all patients, regardless of insurance coverage. Even before the pandemic, they operated on shaky budgets. Jackson Health System in Miami, for example, only has enough cash on hand to operate for 50 days. Private hospitals typically have more than triple that amount of cash in reserve.

'Where else would they go?'

Mark Knight, chief financial officer for Jackson Health System, said if it wasnt for an injection of federal funds, the hospital system, which serves between 1,200 and 1,300 patients a day, could have been in a dire situation.

This year would have been a fiscal disaster, he said, adding that the local government serves as a backstop in case they reach a crisis point.

While most safety net hospitals, including Jackson Health and University Hospital, received federal funds this year to bail them out, others like Valleywise Health in Phoenix got nothing. Chief medical officer Dr. Michael White blamed a glitch in the formula used to calculate which safety net hospitals would receive money through the CARES Act Provider Relief Fund.

The health system, which serves more than 400,000 mostly Hispanic patients annually, is still trying to figure out the extent of the loss from the first Covid-19 wave. If a second one hits, White said, they may be forced to cut services.

Any time you see health care services decrease, theres diminished access to care for those that are the most vulnerable and who need it most, White said.

A recent study from the University of California, Berkeley, revealed that there may be racial bias in the formula the government used to distributeCARES funds to hospitals, leaving some predominantly Black and Hispanic communities shortchanged, even though they were hit harder by the pandemic.

Looking at how the funding went out the door, providers serving those vulnerable communities did not get as much of the funding, Feldpush said, adding that later distributions did target certain Covid-19 hotspot hospitals.

The hope is that if there is a resurgence, the federal government will step in again, but there is no guarantee. In fact, Feldpush said the Department of Health and Human Services still has another $50 billion allocated for providers that should have already been distributed. Even that wont be enough to cover the costs of a resurgence of Covid-19.

In the meantime, hospitals are preparing for the second wave, stocking up on PPE despite lingering shortages and implementing lessons learned from the first surges, especially when it comes to treatment.

However, for the patients who rely on these hospitals, their concerns arent about budgets and bottom lines.

The hospital means everything to the community, said 49-year-old Tawanda Sheard, a University Hospital employee who has lived in the neighborhood for 25 years and was hospitalized there with Covid-19 last spring. They might not have the best insurance, but they know they can come there. Where else would they go to get treated?
Us

Sunday, BBC1

Rating:

Schitts Creek

Netflix

Rating:

Us is an adaptation of the novel by David Nicholls about a middle-aged married couple who may or may not stay together, which doesnt sound especially compelling, but it is. It may even be one of those instances where the screen adaptation is better than the book, which I remember as so-so, even if it was long-listed for the Booker prize, whereas this is terrific. Its beautifully acted and beautifully scripted, funny as well as moving, and as the entire series was made available after the first episode was broadcast I watched all four, one after the other, bang, bang, bang, bang. Didnt intend to. Just had to. And, thankfully, it then meant I didnt have time for that other Sunday-night drama, ITVs The Singapore Grip. Charles Dance was wise to die  the rising sun, the rising sun!  at the end of the first episode although it must have rankled with the other cast members. (Cant I die at the end of the first episode? Cant I?).

Saskia Reeves, Tom Hollander and Tom Taylor in Us. Deborah Ross writes: 'Its beautifully acted and beautifully scripted, funny as well as moving'

Us stars Saskia Reeves and Tom Hollander, which gives you two reasons to watch, right there. They play Connie and Douglas, who have a 17-year-old son, Albie (Tom Taylor) and are due to embark on a three-week tour of Europe before Albie starts at art college. Douglas, a biochemist, has planned the trip with meticulous precision. But then, as theyre lying sleeplessly in bed, Connie says: Douglas, I need to say something. Douglas, Ive been thinking about leaving. I think our marriage might be over I want change. Douglas is baffled and thrown. He can change, he insists. No, youre great, she says, I just dont think I can spend the rest of my life with you. The two of us rattling around doesnt that frighten you? No, he says. The following morning he immediately heads to his fortress of solitude, the local dump, where he sobs and tears up cardboard to the music of Mozart. The dump is, of course, a metaphor for getting rid of stuff that is broken or doesnt work, but also its a pivotal scene in which we see that Douglas, who so often cant express himself, or will express himself wrongly, feels very deeply.

Somewhat inexplicably, I agree, they decide to go ahead with their trip, which now has an added goal for Douglas: can he win Connie back? Given Connie is so his opposite, you do wonder why the hell she married him in the first instance, but flashbacks  with Iain De Caestecker and Gina Bramhill playing their younger selves  show us that she was an artist before settling for marriage and motherhood, was on the rebound from someone unreliable, and was attracted to his steadying hand. I could buy that. So they set off with all their baggage, real and emotional, while much comedy is wrung from Douglass squareness. This is a man who organises sightseeing to beat the crowds and, when writing a list of ways he might change, includes his plan to be more spontaneous. Reeves is wonderful but Hollander owns this. He plays a boring man not boringly, and how you do that, I dont know. More, he can play a boring man sympathetically. I think we are meant to be on #teamconnie but actually I was on #teamdouglas throughout. I cant, in fact, think of another actor who can do this apart, perhaps, from Tom Hanks.

Meanwhile, if youve yet to watch it all, there are so many treats in store.

Sofie Grabol pops up. Youll warm to Albie and understand his initial hostility. Douglas makes a sartorial purchase in Venice thatll have you howling with laughter. And its not just Venice youll get to see. Also its Paris and Barcelona and Amsterdam and Siena and the one thing that (I realised) I most miss about travelling: the hotel buffet breakfast. And Im with Albies friend, Kat (Thaddea Graham): fill your pockets for later. Youd be a fool not to (#teamkat).

Schitts Creek is the Canadian comedy drama that recently won nine awards at the Emmys. There have been six seasons, all of which passed me by, for some reason, so I thought Id correct that.

Schitts Creek. 'The matriarch, Moira, a washed-up soap star, is played by Catherine OHara with a diction and lunacy that is wonderfully mesmerising,' writes Deborah Ross

The series follows the super-rich, super-spoilt Rose family who, after a financial calamity, are newly poor and have to decamp to a town (Schitts Creek) that the patriarch, Johnny (Eugene Levy) bought years earlier as a joke. The matriarch, Moira, a washed-up soap star, is played by Catherine OHara with a diction and lunacy that is wonderfully mesmerising.

There are some terrific jokes, as with the towns welcome sign  Its alright! Its his sister!  or when Moira and Johnny discuss whether theyve been good parents. Yes, concludes Johnny, because we sent them to the best boarding schools and hired the most expensive nannies. We did everything right.

The early episodes are writ large but Im now midway though series one and can see its becoming more nuanced as the grounds are laid for future character work. Ill stick with it but, as Ive so many episodes to watch, it may be that Ill never catch up with The Singapore Grip at all. Oh, well.
KEY HIGHLIGHTS

Mutations in Covid-19 virus traced

Genome sequencing of 4 Mumbai healthcare workers confirms re-infection

Healthcare workers face critical PPE shortage while dealing with the highest caseloads

India needs to strengthen protection for healthcare workers engaged in COVID-19 care

The threat of re-infection due to COVID-19 virus, though not common, is real and can also be more severe than the first one, shows a study published by Indian researchers. The pre-print paper has been written by researchers associated with Kasturba Hospital for Infectious Disease, Mumbai, and International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology and CSIR-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology (CSIR-IGIB), New Delhi.

The study analyses the cases of four Mumbai-based health care workers (HCWs) to conclude that in all four, the combination of the clinical findings, RT-PCR and whole-genome sequencing (WGS) analysis confirmed re-infection. "We identified four HCWs who had tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR in May or June 2020 and again tested positive by RT-PCR when they developed symptoms suggestive of COVID-19 in July," says the report.

Also read: Global death toll to reach 20 lakh before vaccine is widely used, says WHO

It adds that Kasturba Hospital was the diagnostic laboratory that tested three of the HCWs whereas the fourth was tested at PD Hinduja Hospital. "... (it) came to our attention when her attending physician requested us to verify her samples. Based on the RT-PCR results and clinical presentation of the HCWs, we suspected re-infection with SARS-CoV-2. Upon confirmation of the RT-PCR findings, whole-genome sequencing was performed on the stored paired samples," the report elaborates.

It added that the genomic variations observed through whole-genome sequencing, coupled with clinical presentation, confirmed COVID-19 re-infections in healthcare workers. The findings emphasise the need to provide additional protection to the HCWs as they are more vulnerable to re-infection. "HCWs can get re-infected with SARS-CoV-2 with increased clinical severity in the second episode. SARS-CoV-2 re-infection risk in convalescent health-care workers should be addressed in health-care policymaking," say the researchers.

Also read: Lancet warns against 'false optimism' around COVID-19 situation in India

The WGS analysis of the virus from the first and second episode also reveals that there are distinct mutations amongst the viruses collected at different time points. "Patient A and B were part of the same clinical team and it is expected that the virus strains may be similar. However, genome analysis reveals the viruses belonged to different subclades with a distinct set of variations detected in the first episode, thereby hinting they might have been infected through different sources," the report adds.

The study also says that their follow-up samples revealed different sets of mutations, indicating the second episode were fresh acute infections and not a carryover of the previous infections. "What can also be hypothesised is the source of infection about these two cases, specifically, is that most probably their infections occurred from the existing circulating virus pool within the same region/time point as opposed to the case of Patient D where the viruses clustered in different subclades and exhibited a larger set of different mutations, clearly emphasising reinfection of new SARS-CoV-2 strains," it revealed.

In case of Patient C, interestingly, despite the short period within the two episodes, the genetic variations were quite different, implying possible re-infection and not virus-shedding from the first infection, the report said. The researchers concluded the frontline HCWs have more than threefold higher risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection than the general community. They also face critical PPE shortage while dealing with the highest caseloads.

"There is an ever-pressing need to protect HCWs from exposure to infection with appropriate PPEs, and convalescence may not necessarily imply immunity," the researchers pointed out.

Jayanthi Shastri, Swapneil Parikh, Sachee Agrawal, Nirjhar Chatterjee, Manish Pathak, Chetan Sharma, Akshay Kanakan, Vivekanand, Janani Srinivasa Vasudevan, Ranjeet Maurya, Saman Fatihi, Lipi Thukral, Anurag Agrawal, Lancelot Pinto, Rajesh Pandey, and Sujatha Sunil contributed to the research paper.
If you really want to honour him, implement his inclusive ideology: SC Bose's grandnephew

Development trajectory: PM to interact with DMs of various districts today

At DMs meets, PM calls for direct, emotional connect between administration and public for good governance

PM greets former PM on his birthday

India

oi-Vicky Nanjappa

New Delhi, Sep 26: Prime Minister Narendra Modi greeted his predecessor Manmohan Singh on his birthday on Saturday, wishing him a long and healthy life.

Singh, who headed the UPA coalition government between 2004 and 2014, turned 88 on Saturday. He is credited with playing a key role in ushering in economic reforms as the finance minister in the P V Narasimha Rao government during 1991-96.

Manmohan Singh birthday: Veteran Congress leader turns 88

Deepika Padukone questioned in drug probe | India tears into Pakistan | Oneindia News

Wishing Singh, the Prime Minister tweeted, "Birthday greetings to Dr Manmohan Singh Ji. I pray to Almighty that he is blessed with a long and healthy life.
We live in an era where everything is shocking and nothing is surprising. Every major item of news over the last week or so  Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburgs passing, the inevitable Republican hustle to replace her on the eve of an extremely contentious election with the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett and the sectarian clashes over her faith  arrived as a jolt to a fragile, anxious nation. And yet all of it was long in the making  the conflict over Judge Barretts religion most of all.

In 2017, when Judge Barrett was appointed as a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, in Chicago, she faced a tense confirmation hearing in which Senator Dianne Feinstein infamously remarked that the dogma lives loudly within you, and thats of concern. A mother of seven and a devoted Roman Catholic, Judge Barrett has continued to field concerns about whether she will be able or willing to resist the expectations of her church when it comes to cases involving relevant moral issues, and whether she will cater to the wishes of People of Praise, a mostly Catholic ecumenical organization with a distinctly traditional bent, of which she is a member.

The scrutiny focused on Judge Barretts beliefs has provoked allegations of old-fashioned anti-Catholicism on behalf of her Democratic critics. A good amount of febrile nonsense has indeed been floated regarding Judge Barretts spiritual life, such as the notion that People of Praise inspired Margaret Atwoods dystopian novel The Handmaids Tale, a charge that is reminiscent of 19th-century myths of nuns kidnapping good Protestant girls to force the faith upon them.

But the animosity faced by Catholics in todays America has little in common with its direct predecessor. Real sex-abuse scandals have replaced the imaginary ones circulated in the lurid tracts of yesteryear. White Catholics are no longer subject to the religious bigotry that once animated vicious rumors and, occasionally, violent attacks on Catholics and their places of learning and worship. Rather than regenerating a long-vanquished prejudice, Judge Barretts nomination has merely renewed attention to a fundamental conflict, centuries underway, between Catholicism and the American ethos.
India has responded to Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan's address at the 75th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), saying J&K is an integral part of India. Exercising its right to reply in response to Khan's comments, India said all new rules brought in J&K are its "internal affair".

Mijito Vinito, the Indian delegate at the UNGA, presented India's stand on the issue. Tearing into Imran Khan, First secretary Vinito through the UNGA sought Pakistan to vacate all the illegally occupied areas of Kashmir.

This Hall heard incessant rant of someone who had nothing to show for himself, who had no achievements to speak of, & no reasonable suggestion to offer to world. Instead, we saw lies, misinformation, warmongering & malice spread through this Assembly:Mijito Vinito,First Secy(2/5) https://t.co/itmYe5yfuj ANI (@ANI) September 25, 2020

Notably, Imran Khan, in a pre-recorded statement played at the UNGA session on Friday, had said that Pakistan has always called for a "peaceful solution". "To this end, India must rescind the measures it has instituted since August 5 in 2019," he said.

The Indian representative said there's no dispute left in Kashmir and that the only dispute now is with regard to illegally occupied Kashmir by Pakistan.

Vinito said Imran Khan's "rant" at the UNGA was full of "lies, misinformation, warmongering and malice".

Also read: UN faces 'crisis of confidence' without comprehensive reforms: PM Modi

"This Hall heard the incessant rant of someone who had nothing to show for himself, who had no achievements to speak of, and no reasonable suggestion to offer to the world. Instead, we saw lies, misinformation, warmongering, and malice spread through this Assembly. The words used today at this great Assembly by the leader of Pakistan (Imran Khan) demean the very essence of the United Nations," he said.

After Imran Khan's speech, TS Tirumurti, India's permanent representative to the UN, had said the country would exercise its "Right to Reply". A country can exercise the right to reply if it wishes to respond to statements made by any other country against it. This week alone, India has exercised its right to reply to Pakistan thrice over the issue of J&K.

Slamming Pak PM for calling dreaded terrorist Osama Bin Laden a "martyr" in Pakistan's Parliament this year, Vinito said the tenets of modern civilised society like peace, dialogue and diplomacy are farfetched for a country like Pakistan.

"This is the country that brought genocide to South Asia 39 years ago when it killed its own people. This is also the country that is shameless enough not to offer a sincere apology for the horrors it perpetrated even after so many years. This is the same country that provides pensions for dreaded and listed terrorists out of State funds. This is the same country that has the dubious distinction of hosting the largest number of terrorists proscribed by the United Nations," he added.

Vinito said Khan had admitted in the US in 2019 that there were over 30,000-40,000 terrorists in the country who were trained against Afghanistan and India by the Pakistani army. He said Pakistan is the same country that has indulged in the ethnic cleansing of minority religions including Hindus, Sikhs, Christians and others.

Vinito said rather than discussing lies of Pakistan, the assembly should discuss Pakistan's unrelenting support to political and terrorist organisations and mercenaries. This is the only way it can become a normal society, the first secretary said.

Also read: UN 75th anniversary: Trump demands action against China over COVID-19; Xi Jinping calls for cooperation
A city councillor hopes removing the names from municipal job resumes will help the city increase the diversity of its workforce.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 25/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A city councillor hopes removing the names from municipal job resumes will help the city increase the diversity of its workforce.

Coun. Markus Chambers will raise a motion that aims to see Winnipeg consider hiring practices that would assess resumes without identifying features, such as an applicants name and the names of any educational institutions they attended.

Chambers (St. Norbert-Seine River) said the changes would help prevent any unconscious bias about a candidates gender, race or sexual orientation, since a name could trigger assumptions about those characteristics.

"We want to ensure the best candidate is hired and level the playing field so that people with unique names or cultural names are not weeded out of the process on the basis of the difficulty in pronouncing their names, which further identifies them as members of racialized communities," he said. "We need to focus more on the skills, qualifications and experience for the positions that are being advertised."

Chambers said hes heard from multiple Winnipeggers who believe their employment opportunities were compromised by judgments linked to their names, particularly when he worked with Manitobas Provincial Nominee Program.

While participants typically arrange their jobs before arriving in Canada, he said many of their family members believed biases made their own job searches more difficult.

"What Ive heard anecdotally is that individuals have not been called back for interviews despite the fact that they clearly meet the requirements of the job position that has been posted," said Chambers. "People are changing their names and anglicizing their names, just so they can get those calls for positions."

Chambers said the removal of identifying details would likely extend beyond naming, possibly removing other details that could indicate a candidates country of origin, such as where they attended post-secondary school.

"They will, at point of interview, provide all of the documentation necessary that demonstrates how they meet the qualifications of that position," he said.

Katherine Breward, who teaches human resource management at the University of Winnipeg, said nameless resumes, also known as blind or anonymous resumes, have proven to be clearly effective in increasing diversity.

"(It) absolutely helps lead to more diversity and more fair hiring outcomes. Theres just no question," said Breward. "What a lot of people dont realize is that a lot of bias and discrimination is based on stereotypes and actually operates on a completely non-conscious level."

She said recruiters may incorrectly assume males have more leadership traits than females, for example, or associate false stereotypes with Indigenous candidates or people of colour without realizing that they are doing so.

"The evidence is overwhelming that these unconscious biases occur," she said.

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For example, a 2009 National Bureau of Economic Research study of Toronto job applicants found the effect appeared to be present among applicants who differed only by their names. Those with English-sounding names received interview requests 40 per cent more often than applicants with Chinese, Indian or Pakistani names.

"This has the potential to actually meaningfully move the bar in terms of equity because I believe it will result in more hiring of Indigenous people. It will result in more hiring of women and people of various ethnic groups," said Breward.

Chambers' motion is scheduled to be debated at the Oct. 1 Riel community committee meeting.

Joyanne.pursaga@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @joyanne_pursaga

-30-
More than 20 firefighters battled an out of control bushfire northwest of Sydney, as it threatend to destroy houses on a suburban street.

Fire and Rescue NSW and the Rural Fire Service responded to reports of an out of control blaze in bushland off Surprise Court in Bligh Park, near Windsor, at about 2.30pm on Saturday.

Crews reported large amounts of smoke and called in more fire trucks from Sydney's western suburbs to help contain the blaze and protect nearby homes.

Aerial vision showed a water-bombing helicopter fighting the blaze and fire trucks stationed outside homes

More than 20 firefighters were on scene as the fire burnt across more than three hectares.

Aerial vision showed a water-bombing helicopter fighting the blaze and fire trucks stationed outside homes.

NSW RFS said fire activity eased just before 5pm.

'4:55pm Fire activity has eased. Fire is now at Advice. Firefighters will remain on scene into this evening,' they said.
ANKARA, Turkey - Turkeys foreign minister on Friday accused US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of blatant ignorance over her comments that questioned U.S. President Donald Trumps commitment to democracy and his alleged admiration of Turkeys President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and other leaders accused of authoritarian rule.

Pelosi criticized Trumps refusal to commit to a peaceful transfer of power if he loses elections in November, and called on the U.S. president to honour his oath of office and the U.S. Constitution.

We do know who he admires. He admires (Russian President Vladimir) Putin, he admires Kim Jong Un, he admires Erdogan in Turkey, Pelosi said.

She added: But I remind him, you are not in North Korea, you are not in Turkey, you are not in Russia, Mr. President.

Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu took to Twitter to admonish Pelosi over her remarks.

(Pelosis) rise to become Speaker of the House is what is truly worrisome for American democracy, given her blatant ignorance, Cavusoglu wrote. You will learn to respect the Turkish peoples will.

Trump has been fanning uncertainty as he floats theories the election may be rigged if he loses, echoing warnings he made ahead of the 2016 voting  even though past elections have not shown substantial evidence of fraud from mail-in voting.

Despite troubled relations between Turkey and the United States over a series of issues, Trump has frequently praised Erdogan and their bond has helped to keep ties between the NATO allies afloat.
Hyderabad, Sep 27 : Authorities have sounded flood alert in Musi river here as the water levels in the two reservoirs upstream have reached to the brim following heavy rains in catchment areas.

With huge inflows into Himayat Sagar and Osman Sagar, the authorities are likely to release the excess flood water into Musi, which passes through the city.

Officials said Saturday night that Osman Sagar is full and it is receiving an inflow of 20,000 cusecs. "Gates may be opened any time," they said.

Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) has asked all deputy commissioners and zonal commissioners of Golconda, Asif Nagar, Bahadurpura, Nampally, Charminar, AHimayath Nagar and Saidabad to be on high alert for inundation and evacuation if need arises.

Full Tank Level (FTL) of Osman Sagar is 1,753 feet. The iconic reservoir has been dead for the last few years.

Meanwhile, the gates of Himayat Sagar are also likely to be opened Saturday night as the reservoir is receiving huge inflows due to heavy rainfall in the catchment areas.

The water level at Himayat Sagar reached 1756 feet against its full tank level of 1763.50 feet. Flood gates will be opened once the water level reaches 1760 feet.

Hyderabad Police Commissioner Anjani Kumar advised people in areas on the banks of the river to be alert. "Due to heavy rains in the catchment areas of Musi River, flash floods may come after midnight. It is better to be alert in the low lying areas on Musi Bank like Kishanbagh, Ziaguda, Puranapul, MGBS, Chaderghat, Golnaka," he said.

Heavy rains have been pounding Hyderabad and surrounding districts since Friday. Several parts of Rangareddy district including catchment areas of Himayat Sagar and Osman Sagar received heavy rainfall since Friday night.
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Hong Kong: 2 fresh provision shops fined

Two shops were convicted and fined for selling chilled or frozen pork disguised as fresh pork, the Food & Environmental Hygiene Department said today.

The department has all along been committed to combating the sale of such pork and has taken stringent enforcement action against violations.

From January till now, it conducted 28 blitz operations against 64 fresh provision shops and public market stalls, and initiated prosecutions against a number of cases.

Among them, two shops were convicted and fined.

The fresh provision shop surrendered its licence, while the tenancy of the market stall was terminated by the department. Other prosecution cases are pending court trial.

During the same period, the department received a total of 147 complaints about the sale of chilled or frozen pork disguised as fresh pork and conducted 7,649 inspections of fresh provision shops and market stalls.

Thirty-five prosecutions were initiated against 33 fresh provision shops and market stalls for selling fresh pork and un-prepackaged chilled pork and/or restricted food in the same premises under the Food Business Regulation.

Among them, 10 cases were convicted and fined, and the remaining 25 cases are pending court trial.

The department said the live pig supply from the Mainland to Hong Kong has fallen compared to before the African swine fever epidemic.

It noted that as the price of live pigs remains high, some unscrupulous traders have sold chilled or frozen pork disguised as fresh pork for profit.

Apart from contravening the local legislation, it would cause food safety problems and be unfair to other shops which comply with the requirements, the department added.

In addition, since the number of live pigs supplied to Hong Kong from the Mainland has dropped in recent years, some fresh provision shops permitted to sell fresh pork only have applied to the department for conversion to sell chilled pork instead.

Since January, 23 relevant applications were received and all have been approved.

The department said it will process such applications as soon as possible to help the trade adapt to the changes in the business environment.

This story has been published on: 2020-09-26. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi held a virtual bilateral summit with his Sri Lankan counterpart Mahinda Rajapaksa on Saturday. During the summit, PM Modi told the Sri Lankan PM that under the countrys Neighbourhood First policy, India gives special priority to relations between the two countries.

The relations between India and Sri Lanka are thousands of years old. According to my governments neighbourhood first policy and SAGAR doctrine, we give special priority to relations between the two countries, said PM Modi.

Rajapaksa expressed gratitude for Indias work for other countries during the Covid-19 pandemic.

The operation to douse off the fire on MT New Diamond ship provided an opportunity for greater cooperation between the two countries, Rajapaksa said.

A Greek-owned oil tanker caught fire in Sri Lankas eastern coast on September 3. Indian navy and the coast guards helped in carrying out rescue efforts and sent firefighting chemicals to the neighbouring country.

The virtual bilateral summit is preceded by the state visits of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and PM Rajapaksa to India in November 2019 and February 2020, respectively. Since then, leaders have kept in close touch and spoken to each other on the telephone on several occasions including in the context of cooperation to tackle the health and economic impact of the prevailing Covid-19 pandemic.

In April this year, India sent 10-tonne consignment of essential medicines, including hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) and paracetamol to Sri Lanka.

On Friday, India offered a Line of Credit worth USD 100 million to Sri Lanka for three solar projects, according to an official statement by the Indian Mission.

This is PM Rajapaksas first diplomatic engagement with a leader of a foreign country after he was sworn in as the Prime Minister on August 9, 2020.
Courtesy photo /U.S. Border Patrol

A man has been arrested for transporting more than 30 immigrants, states an arrest affidavit filed on Thursday.

A commercial box truck driven by Alec Zamora arrived at the Interstate 35 checkpoint on Wednesday at about 5:30 p.m. A K-9 unit allegedly alerted to possible contraband in the vehicle during the immigration inspection of Zamora, a U.S. citizen.
London: The British judge hearing Julian Assange's arguments against extradition to the United States has agreed to a request by his lawyers to delay her decision until after the November presidential election.

The timing will bolster the hopes of Assange and his supporters for the extradition request to be dropped if Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden ousts President Donald Trump.

A truck with a billboard of Julian Assange arrives at the Old Bailey court in London during his extradition hearing. Credit:AP

The Trump administration wants Assange to be tried in the US on 18 spying charges over cables published by the Australian's WikiLeaks website a decade ago.

Earlier this week, Assange's fiancee Stella Moris, told this masthead that it if the Democrats were to win, it would be difficult for Biden to be seen to follow Trump's legacy and not that of his predecessor, Barack Obama.
Royal Womens Hospital psychiatrist Lia Laios said coronavirus had added complex layers of logistical and emotional stress to women who are expecting or have given birth. She is now treating a growing cohort of anxious, distressed and depressed women. Even if women havent had any pre-existing obsessive compulsive symptoms, we are certainly seeing more OCD symptoms in pregnancy or in the postnatal period," Dr Laios said. It is a really tough one to manage because on some level there is some normalising about that because we are all expected to be taking extra hygiene precautions. But there are some women where this is becoming quite a lot more entrenched and interfering with their ability to function." Celeste was born on September 19. Credit:Justin McManus Obsessive compulsive disorder is a condition characterised by recurring unwanted thoughts, impulses or repetitive acts. For some new mothers, it has manifested in repeatedly washing their babies or their child's clothing. Others are too afraid to leave home.

"It has been quite striking," Dr Laios said. They are quite terrified to leave the house while pregnant. Postnatally, women are also really reluctant to leave the house, but if they do leave the house there is a lot of excessive washing and stress around that." Loading Australia is also expected to suffer a population slowdown as the coronavirus crisis discourages women from having children, leading to a slump in the birth rate expected to drag down the economy. Jan Ireland, director of private midwifery centre MAMA in Kensington, said phone calls from pregnant women inquiring about home births had tripled this year. "People who never would have thought about having a homebirth, it hadn't even entered their consciousness, are now going down that path," Ms Ireland said.

Concern about putting themselves and their families at risk by attending hospital, bans on water births and visitors and a fear they will be denied the support of their partner during birth are the main drivers of the surge. But then, there is the grief that comes after birth. Loading "It's causing a lot of sadness about the expected fantasy or idea of what motherhood would be like," Dr Laios said. "There is grief about the loss of expectations about how pregnancy might be because it is a much more disconnected and isolating experience for women." Celeste was born in an inflatable pool in the middle of the loungeroom, with the help of two midwives, just before 11am, September 19.

It was amazing, we were in our home, it felt very safe," Ms Graham said. "It was just so serene and really beautiful. I picked her up out of the water and was holding her in my arms and thinking 'oh my goodness Ive just done this'." The last week has been been a blur of sleepless nights and precious moments with Celeste, but there is a lingering sadness. Ms Graham's family is interstate and her mother had planned to fly from Sydney to spend the first weeks with her before the borders closed. Her husband Lee Barlow's family live in the United Kingdom. Caitlin Graham with her daughter Celeste a week after the birth. Credit:Justin McManus Like many of the new generation of lockdown babies, Celeste has been introduced to the world through FaceTime.

"It has slowed everything down in a way, which I guess is what you want when youve just given birth," Ms Graham said. But there is nobody to come over and sit in the house with you and check youve had a cup of tea or a shower. All of thats gone and we dont really know when we will be able to see family or anyone again." With no physical mothers groups running due to COVID-19 restrictions, Dr Laios said women were having to be even more resourceful. Many were creating their own virtual mothers groups. Loading "This a really difficult time and pregnancy is probably the most vulnerable period of time for a woman to develop mental illness," she said. "Add to that a global pandemic. It is so important women are forthcoming about seeking support and that they recognise and know that there other women out there going through the exact same thing." Ms Graham's support network is a WhatsApp chat group she has with mothers she met through her two-year-old daughter Aude. Each day this week, home-cooked meals have been quietly left at her front door.
Japan's government is easing entry restrictions for travelers from Singapore on Friday to allow short-term visits by businesspeople between the two countries.

This is in line with the government's policy to allow travelers from countries and territories where the coronavirus pandemic is largely contained.

Japan has already eased travel restrictions for long-term residents, including foreign workers, from Taiwan and six countries, including Vietnam.

The latest move is Japan's first to ease entry restrictions for travelers planning to stay for short periods, such as businesspeople.

Short-term visitors from Singapore will be exempt from a 14-day quarantine period if they meet certain requirements, including submitting their itineraries in advance.

The government is looking to relax restrictions further for both short- and long-term visitors in a bid to shore up the economy. It plans to expand PCR testing capacity at airports and implement more measures against the coronavirus.
He's days away from celebrating two years of marriage to his model wife Hailey, after they tied the knot during a romantic ceremony on September 30, 2018.

And Justin Bieber was spotted enjoying some time with pals on Friday night, as he stepped out for dinner at Malibu celebrity haunt Nobu.

The 26-year-old pop star was hard to miss as he emerged from the upscale eatery in a colourful tie-dye hoodie, while donning a protective face mask.

Fine dining: Justin Bieber was spotted enjoying some time with pals on Friday night, as he stepped out for dinner at Malibu celebrity haunt Nobu

The Canadian-born superstar was seen chatting and laughing outside the restaurant as he waited for valets to return his car following his culinary outing.

Justin is just days away from hitting two years of marriage to Hailey, daughter of Hollywood actor Stephen Baldwin.

As their anniversary approaches, Hailey took to Instagram on Friday to reveal that she donned Kim Kardashian's SKIMS shapewear under her wedding dress.

Hard to miss: The 26-year-old pop star was hard to miss as he emerged from the upscale eatery in a colourful tie-dye hoodie, while donning a protective face mask

The star shared a pair of posts from SKIMS on her Stories, which showed her in her breathtaking wedding gown, as the items she donned underneath were revealed.

While their official anniversary is set to fall on Wednesday, they enjoyed an informal picnic on September 13 to mark the day they got their marriage license in New York.

The Christian couple, who met at Justin's 2009 concert meet-and-greet, are now moving into their newly purchased a $25.8million mansion in tony Beverly Park.

Last Friday, Justin debuted the wholesome music video for his new song Holy featuring Chance The Rapper, which references his whirlwind romance with Hailey.

Special day: He's days away from celebrating two years of marriage to his model wife Hailey, after they tied the knot during a romantic ceremony on September 30, 2018

'Running to the altar like a track star / Can't wait another second / 'Cause the way you hold me, hold me, hold me, hold me, hold me / Feels so holy,' Bieber sang.

'They say we're too young and / The pimps and the players say, "Don't go crushin" / Wise men say fools rush in / But I don't know.'

The lovebirds briefly dated from December 2015 to January 2016, before calling it quits, then revived their romance in May 2018.

Once back together, things moved at a rapid pace between the pair, with their engagement announced two months later in July.

By November, it was confirmed that the photogenic twosome had quietly tied the knot in a romantic ceremony.
Geneva: European Union has called on China to allow meaningful access to Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region for independent observers, including for the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.

In a statement at the 45th Human Rights Council on Friday (local time), German envoy Michael Freiherr von Ungern-Sternberg, on behalf of the EU said, "We reiterate our call on China to allow meaningful access to Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region for independent observers, including for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights."

"We also reiterate our call on China to uphold its national and international obligations, and to respect human rights, including the rights of persons belonging to minorities, especially in Xinjiang and Tibet," he said.

The German Ambassador added that the EU urges China to ensure the rule of law, establish fair trial guarantees and investigate thoroughly reported cases of arbitrary detentions, ill-treatment, and torture, and harassment of human rights defenders and their families.

"On China, the EU continues to be gravely concerned about the existence of a large network of political re-education camps, widespread surveillance, and systemic restrictions on freedom of religion or belief against Uighurs and other minorities in Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region," he said.

"Extensively researched reports alleging forced labour, and forced sterilisation and forced birth control in Xinjiang add to the gravity and magnitude of these concerns," he added.

Over the situation in Hong Kong, the German envoy said, "We are concerned about growing restrictions on freedom of expression, on access to information, and about intimidation and surveillance of journalists. The EU considers the national security legislation for Hong Kong adopted by the Standing Committee of China`s National People`s Congress on 30 June to be a matter of grave concern."
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday proposed a deal with the United States that would guarantee neither country interfere in the others elections weeks before the U.S. holds its general election.

Why it matters: Putin's proposal comes amid warnings from U.S. intelligence and cyber experts that Moscow is trying to influence the U.S. presidential election.

Context: FBI Director Chris Wray told Congress on Sept. 17 that the bureau has seen "very active efforts by the Russians to influence our election in 2020," primarily to "denigrate Vice President Biden and what the Russians see as kind of an anti-Russian establishment."

National Counterintelligence and Security Center Director William Evanina said in August that the Russian government is "using a range of measures" to "denigrate former Vice President Biden."

Evanina added that some Kremlin-linked actors are trying to support President Trumps candidacy on social media and Russian television, while others are spreading false claims about corruption to undermine Biden and the Democratic Party.

What they're saying: Putin said one of the main strategic challenges of our time is the risk of a large-scale confrontation in the digital sphere," in a statement published Friday by the Kremlin.

He pushed for measures to reboot our relations in information and communication security by exchanging guarantees of non-intervention into the others internal affairs.

The big picture: Increasing evidence shows that foreign actors, particularly Russia, are looking to exploit similar themes that were used in 2016 and in 2018 to divide the country ahead of this years' election, Axios' Sara Fischer reports.

Russian state media accounts have sought to divide Democrats between centrists and progressives by casting Biden as an establishment centrist who can't be trusted by progressives.

Microsoft said on Sept. 10 that cyberattacks organized in Russia have consistently targeted consultants from both parties, political advocacy groups and national party organizations affiliated with the 2020 election since September of last year.
"Everything happened like in a computer game," the air force cadet told the president who visited him at the hospital in Kharkiv.

The only survivor in yesterday's crash of the military An-26 plane of the Kharkiv Air Force University near the Chuhuiv airfield, Cadet Viacheslav Zolochevsky, 20, who has undergone surgery at a Kharkiv hospital, is now conscious and has spoken about the tragic accident.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has paid a visit to the military hospital and spoke with the cadet, who is reported to be in a "satisfactory" condition, the President's Office reports.

Zolochevsky told Zelensky that the accident unfolded very rapidly, and it was unclear what was happening. According to him, the cadets and university officers  crew members  had known each other well, having already flown together.

The cadet said he had found himself amid the wreckage after the plane hit the ground when he saw his comrade ablaze so he attempted to save him by putting out a fire.

On Facebook, President Zelensky elaborated on what the cadet had told him: "At night, Vyacheslav came to his senses amid the wreckage of the An-26 plane where his whole squad, his friends, brothers were flying. Fire, plane destroyed, darkness and bodies around. One of the guys was in flames, and Slava rushed to put out the fire. He managed to give another chance to a cadet, who, unfortunately, died of burns this morning. This is heroism amid the field of death."

Oleksiy Kucher, Head of the Kharkiv Regional State Administration, also listened to the survivor's story.

"The guy told us what had happened. We didn't bother him with questions, we just asked him what we could do to help. He said it was like in a computer game, that when he got back to his senses, he saw his friend burning and that he actually helped to put the fire out on this guy who got admitted to the hospital yesterday. Unfortunately, he died today," Kucher said.

According to updated data, the survivor did not jump out of the plane. He remained on board and was lucky to make it alive, writes Suspilne.UA.

"He doesn't remember everything, he lost consciousness at some point. After he regained consciousness, he got out of the plane wreckage, as far as we know, and began to put out the flames on his comrade. He survived while being on board the plane," Kucher said.

Read alsoMilitary plane carrying cadets crashes in Kharkiv region (Photo, video): UPDATEDAccording to doctors, the young man's health status is of "moderate severity".

"But physically, his state is even satisfactory. I think for some time, at least for a week, he will remain there [in the hospital]," Kucher said.

An-26 accident in Chuhuiv: Background

The plane crashed on approach to the Chuhuiv military airfield by the highway, on the night of September 25. Kharkiv's Air Force University's crew and cadets were on board  a total of 27 people.

According to updated information from the Office of the Prosecutor General, as a result of the accident, 25 people were killed in the tragic accident and two survived. The survivors were hospitalized in grave condition.

Volodymyr Zelensky came to the region on Saturday, declaring Day of Mourning across country.

Ukraine's Defense Minister Andriy Taran, citing aviation experts, said one of the sensors in the engine of the An26 transport military aircraft failed, as a result of which the plane's wing caught on the ground as it was approaching the airfield near Chuhuiv before plunging and setting ablaze.

The SBU security service elaborated on the last moments of the tragic flight as per ground control data.

At 20:38 the captain reported left engine failure to the tower.

At 20:40, he requested an approach to land, and at 20:43 the plane passed the outer marker.

At 20:45, the plane crashed.

Deputy Interior Minister Anton Geraschehnko added that the pilot reported he would be landing the plane with one operating engine.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson will pledge on Saturday a 30% increase in funding for the World Health Organization while urging reforms to the global health body and calling for a revival of cross-border cooperation to end "ugly rifts". Delivering a recorded speech to the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), Johnson will say the COVID-19 pandemic has increased barriers to trade.

He will also present a five-point plan to improve the international response to future pandemics. "After nine months of fighting COVID, the very notion of the international community looks tattered," he will say, according to advance extracts distributed by his office.

"Unless we unite and turn our fire against our common foe, we know that everyone will lose. Now is the time therefore ... for humanity to reach across borders and repair these ugly rifts." His plan includes a global network of research hubs, more vaccine manufacturing capacity, and an agreement to reduce export tariffs imposed at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

He will commit an initial 71 million pounds to the global vaccine partnership known as COVAX to secure purchase rights on 27 million doses, and 500 million to a separate COVAX initiative to help poorer countries access a vaccine. Johnson will also announce 340 million pounds ($433.23 million) in funding for the WHO spread across four years - a 30% increase on the previous four-year commitment - with around a third of the money dependent on reform to the organisation.

Britain, along with France and Germany, is expressing support for the WHO, albeit tied to reforms, when the body faces criticism over its pandemic response. The United States gave a year's notice in July that it is leaving the U.N. agency - which was created to improve health globally - after Trump accused it of being too close to China and having mishandled the COVID-19 pandemic.

Also read: Britain at COVID-19 tipping point; second lockdown likely, says Health Minister

Also read: US elections 2020: Wouldn't forget the virus from China, says Donald Trump

Also read: COVID-19 crisis: UK raises alert as cases surge 'exponentially'
A Queensland government anti-alcohol campaign image seen on a police vehicle has been labelled "victim blaming" after it was posted on Twitter.

Bridget Clinch and her five-year-old child were walking in the north Brisbane suburb of Alderley two weeks ago when she saw the vehicle in a compound on Pickering Street.

The Queensland government campaign image on a police vehicle at a depot in Alderley.

On a separate walk this week, when the 2007 campaign image was still in view at the depot, Ms Clinch took a photo of it to see what friends thought online.

"I was just in shock. It was very victim-blaming," she said.
The Rolling Stones gave the world a number of dark songs, some of which reflected the horrors of real life. For example, one of their classic tracks is about an actual serial killer who terrorized women in the early 1960s. Oddly enough, Mick Jagger and Keith Richards co-wrote one of the bands darkest tracks in what Jagger called a beautiful, sunny place.

The Rolling Stones | Robert Altman/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

How a very violent era led to a classic album by The Rolling Stones

One of The Rolling Stones most acclaimed albums is 1969s Let It Bleed. As the title suggests, Let It Bleed is a pretty dark album. It discusses topics like addiction, war, and murder. During a Rolling Stone interview, Jann S. Wenner asked Jagger what drove him to craft an album like that.

Well, its a very rough, very violent era, Jagger said. The Vietnam War. And Vietnam was not war as we knew it in the conventional sense. The thing about Vietnam was that it wasnt like World War II, and it wasnt like [the Korean War], and it wasnt like the Gulf War. It was a real nasty war, and people didnt like it.

RELATED: What Mick Jagger Thought of Britney Spears Rolling Stones Cover

The crimes that influenced Mick Jagger and Keith Richards to write a great song

After that question, Wenner discussed Midnight Rambler. According to Mental Floss, this track is about the Boston Strangler, the serial killer who murdered several women in the early 1960s and made many female Bostonians fear for their safety. Later, a man called Albert DeSalvo said he was The Boston Strangler, though some doubt his confession was true due to a lack of physical evidence.

Given how Midnight Rambler was released in 1969, memories of his crimes were still very fresh in the United States. The track must have seemed especially disturbing at the time. While Midnight Rambler is an upsetting song, Jagger revealed he and Richards wrote it in the most unlikely of circumstances.

Albert DeSalvo | Getty Images

RELATED: What Elvis Presley and Mick Jagger Did That John Lennon Called Bullsh*t

We were on a holiday in Italy. In this very beautiful hill town, Positano, for a few nights, Jagger recalled. Why we should write such a dark song in this beautiful, sunny place, I really dont know. We wrote everything there  the tempo changes, everything. And Im playing the harmonica in these little cafes, and theres Keith with the guitar.

How the public reacted to Midnight Rambler

Midnight Rambler did not become one of The Rolling Stones big hits. In fact, it did not chart on the Billboard Hot 100 at all. Perhaps this was because the Boston Stranglers crimes were so recent. On the other hand, Mental Floss reports The Rolling Stones never released Midnight Rambler as a single. This decision may have prevented the song from charting more than anything else.

Albert DeSalvo | Ollie Noonan, Jr./The Boston Globe via Getty Images

RELATED: The Beatles-Themed Message Hidden on a Rolling Stones Album Cover

Regardless, Midnight Rambler still remains one of the most well-known portrayals of the Boston Strangler. In addition, it showed how The Rolling Stones could work current events into their songs  no matter how grizzly.
A group of volunteers have paid $600 in parking fines after leaving their cars on an empty street while they went around feeding the homeless.

Brisbane River City Rotary Club members Will Bassett, Brooke Thomas and four others parked their vehicles on Qualtrough Street, in Woolloongabba, in late June.

They then walked around the city delivering warm meals to people living rough on the streets, before returning to find they had all been slapped with $100 fines.

Despite asking three times to be let off, Brisbane City Council refused to take back the fines.

The typical two hour parking limit on the street was reduced to 15 minutes because an AFL game was being played at the nearby Gabba Stadium.

A group of volunteers have paid $600 in parking fines for parking their cars on an empty street during a dinner run for the homeless (Brisbane River City Rotary Club members preparing food for the homeless)

Brisbane River City Rotary Club members Will Bassett, Brooke Thomas and four of their peers parked their vehicles on Qualtrough Street, in Woolloongabba (pictured), in late June

The time change occurs whenever an event is being held at the sporting venue and applies to all the streets that fall within the 'Gabba Traffic Area', 9 News reported.

Mr Bassett admitted he was unaware of the time change and had regularly parked his car on the street during a food run.

'We thought it was two-hour parking as has been for most of the other time - but just on that day it had moved down to 15 minutes,' he said.

Ms Thomas said it was a blow to the gut to be punished for helping other people.

'I had just given up my Sunday afternoon to organise and arrange these meals and to be hit with a fine was pretty disappointing,' Ms Thomas added.

Brisbane City Council said it was the responsibility of drivers to be aware of the time limits.

Daily Mail Australia contacted Brisbane City Council for comment.
The move has been expected since Wednesday, and the decision was made on Friday: Luxembourg is back on Germany's 'red list'.

A statement from Luxembourg's foreign ministry confirms that the Grand Duchy will once again be considered a high-risk country due to the increase in new coronavirus cases seen of late, which has put us over the German limit of 50 infections per 100,000 inhabitants.

In the week spanning 14 to 20 September 672 new cases were confirmed among Luxembourg residents, while the week prior saw just 282. Luxembourg thus has some 107.33 cases per 100,000 residents, with the figure for the previous reporting period at 45,04.

This reclassification means that Luxembourg residents can only cross the border with a negative coronavirus test which must not be more than 48 hours old. Also on the list of high-risk countries and regions are several French departments, and the Belgian region around Brussels.

However, rules regarding test- and quarantine requirements vary between German federal states.

Luxembourg's Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn is in contact with the federal German foreign minister, Heiko Maas. Asselborn noted that Luxembourg has seen a recent decline in new cases, and that the reproduction rate has fallen to 0.95. Luxembourg is therefore working with nearby regions in particular to limit the impact of the new classification.

This follows similar moves by Belgium and Switzerland this week.
A stoush over Pennsylvania's "naked ballots" is just one of the possible conflicts that could play out through the courts if the result between Trump and Democratic nominee Joe Biden is close on election night. Each state uses its own particular electoral rules, raising the chances of a variety of different legal challenges across the country. Trump set off a firestorm on Thursday (AEST) by saying he would not necessarily accept the peaceful transfer of power if he does not accept the election result. A widely-read article in The Atlantic this week said that Republicans have discussed taking the remarkable step of bypassing the will of the voters in crucial states if they are behind in the count. It is actually the 538 members of the Electoral College - the so-called "electors" - who decide the presidential outcome. This fact is rarely discussed and even the most plugged-in political insider would be unable to name any of the electors, who are appointed by state party members and officials. That's because, with only rare and usually inconsequential exceptions, the electors cast their ballots in accordance with the election result in their state. But that is not dictated by the US Constitution. "With a justification based on claims of rampant fraud, Trump would ask state legislators to set aside the popular vote and exercise their power to choose a slate of electors directly," The Atlantic article said.

Heightening the stakes even further is the Supreme Court seat left vacant following Ginsburg's death. It initially seemed unlikely that Republicans would be able to fill the progressive icon's seat before the election: the confirmation process for a Supreme Court justice typically takes around three months but there were just six weeks remaining until election day. But Republicans are moving with Usain Bolt-like speed to get a replacement justice onto the court. Trump is expected to confirm on Sunday (AEST) that his pick is conservative rising star Amy Coney Barrett, currently a circuit judge on the US Court of Appeals. On Saturday, several US media outlets reported Trump had made his decision. Confirmation hearings will follow soon after. Lindsey Graham, the Republican chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said this week: "We've got the votes to confirm Justice Ginsburg's replacement before the election."

Loading This raises the prospect that a Supreme Court justice appointed by Trump just weeks earlier could cast the crucial vote in cases about contested election results. Having a full complement of nine judges is important because, if the Supreme Court decision was to be tied, the ruling of the lower state courts would stand. "I think this will end up in the Supreme Court, and I think it's very important we have nine justices," Trump said on Thursday (AEST) when speaking about a possible legal battle over the legitimacy of mail-in ballots. "I think it should be eight-nothing or nine-nothing," he said of the potential verdict. "But just in case it would be more political than it should be, I think it's very important to have a ninth judge."

Before any election-related disputes reach the Supreme Court, the justices are set to begin tackling a separate case where the consequences could be just as dramatic and far-reaching. On November 10 - a week after the election - the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear oral arguments for California v Texas, a case that challenges the legality of the Affordable Care Act, also known as "Obamacare". As one of the courts staunch progressive voices, Ginsburg was certain to vote to uphold the law which has expanded health insurance for millions of Americans and banned insurance companies from rejecting customers because they have pre-existing health conditions. A court with a 6-3 conservative majority would be more likely to strike down Obamacare entirely or to weaken its protections. "Among other things, the Affordable Care Act now dangles from a thread," Nicholas Bagley, a healthcare law expert at the University of Michigan, tweeted soon after Ginsburg's death. In an appearance at the Texas Tribune Festival this week, Hillary Clinton, the Democrats' 2016 nominee, said she was most concerned about the potential implications for Obamacare following Ginsburg's death.

"What the Republicans are doing is rushing an appointment to the court to repeal the Affordable Care Act and strip away health care for many millions of Americans," she said. Loading "This could not be more diabolical. And I think that Democrats need to be absolutely clear that any vote for any Republican is literally a vote to cost you money to make your health care more expensive and maybe to eliminate the possibility youll be able to afford it at all." Then there is the holy grail for conservatives: overturning the 1973 Roe v Wade decision that found women have the right to a legal abortion. Trump has made a point of appointing anti-abortion justices to the Supreme Court, and Barrett is a Catholic conservative who has criticised the Roe decision. When Brett Kavanaugh was appointed to the Supreme Court in 2018, he appeared to lock in a 5-4 conservative majority on cultural issues like abortion. Many progressives feared that Roe would be quickly overturned after his appointment, but that's not how it has worked out.

The reason is the influence of Chief Justice John Roberts, who was appointed by George W. Bush. Although Roberts is a conservative, he has taken noticeable recent steps to protect the court's independence and to stop it from swinging dramatically to the right. Chief Justice John Roberts has disappointed Republicans with several recent rulings. Credit:AP When Trump denounced a judge who rejected his asylum seeker policy as an "Obama judge" in 2018, Roberts responded in a rare public comment: "We do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges. What we have is an extraordinary group of dedicated judges doing their level best to do equal right to those appearing before them." In June this year Roberts sided with the court's four progressive justices and cast the decisive vote to strike down moves to restrict abortion access in Louisiana. He also joined with the progressives to stop the Trump administration from proceeding with a plan to deport up to 700,000 young immigrants who arrived in the country illegally when they were children. He also ruled that the 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibits workplace discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.
Jemma Kidd may have split from her aristocratic husband  but she's not giving up the trappings of country life so easily.

I hear the model has told friends she intends to stay close to the family home on the Duke of Wellington's Hampshire estate, despite splitting from his son, Arthur Wellesley, the Earl of Mornington, after 15 years.

The Countess, 46, was never likely to return to Notting Hill where they previously lived. For despite the well-heeled neighbourhood being one of the most exclusive in London, when she lived there she complained about 'rubbish on the pavement and people everywhere' and once said: 'I'm not bringing my kids up here!'

Jemma Kidd may have split from her aristocratic husband  but she's not giving up the trappings of country life so easily

The model has told friends she intends to stay close to the family home on the Duke of Wellington's Hampshire estate, pictured, despite splitting from his son, Arthur Wellesley, the Earl of Mornington, after 15 years

It now sounds like Jemma won't be going far as I hear work is progressing on a new yoga retreat she plans to open at the estate.

I'm told Jemma is considering remaining with her twins, ten, and her four-year-old son within the grounds of Stratfield Saye House, although no firm decisions have been made. Any risk of awkward encounters with her in-laws is likely to be slight as the estate has 5,000 acres.

A close friend of the family tells me: 'Arthur has been spending time in his pad in London since the split. But Jemma desires to stay on the estate with their children. Nothing concrete has been decided on their future plans yet though.'

The couple tied the knot in 2005 in Barbados, where Jemma grew up. But, as I previously revealed, things soured to the point where they were barely speaking to each other during lockdown, so they decided to split.

In contrast to his wife, Lord Mornington, 42, has always embraced life in the capital. His family have apartments at Apsley House at Hyde Park Corner, facing the ceremonial arch dedicated to the first Duke of Wellington, topped with a statue of a horse-drawn chariot.

He has joked: 'Sometimes at night, I go out and ride it.'

Model Lottie Moss has revealed how to win the keys to her heart: ignore her! 'Every second a guy doesn't text me back I love him more,' the 22-year-old sister of supermodel Kate revealed as she posted this intimate selfie online.

Lottie previously dated Made In Chelsea star Alex Mytton and radio presenter Roman Kemp, but still hasn't managed to find Mr Right.

Model Lottie Moss, pictured, previously dated Made In Chelsea star Alex Mytton and radio presenter Roman Kemp, but still hasn't managed to find Mr Right

But she admits she can be fickle: 'In bed and literally just icked out about a guy I'm talking to,' she posted recently.

'Genuinely, my brain just turned myself off him.' Lottie, who has modelled for Calvin Klein, was recently linked to Love Island's Chris Hughes.
Have just returned from Greece and had to fill in a PLF on-line 48 hours before travel then wait until midnight before travel and then a QR code was then sent, this was then checked at both Gatwick and Kalamata.

I now have 2 forms forms for travel to Turkey, each slightly different. Think I'd best fill in both to be on the safe side. Am I right that now I've printed the forms off, I fill them in by hand 48 hours before I fly and take them with me?

Please advise me....... Thanks.
26.09.2020 LISTEN

Public and private basic and senior high schools (SHSs) in the Oti Region have benefited from the third phase of the on-going national disinfection and fumigation exercise.

The exercisea collaboration between the Ministry of Education, Ghana Education Service (GES) and Zoomlion Ghana Limitedwas in response to President Nana Addos Dankwa Akufo-Addos directive for basic and SHSs to be reopened on October 5 for Form Two students.

The exercise, which came off last Friday, was also aimed at protecting the schools environs from the highly infectious coronavirus disease (COVID-19).

Speaking to journalists during the exercise in his school, the Headmaster of Kadjebi Asato Senior High School, Reverend Daniel Kojo Semenhyia Lenwah SVD, commended the government on its measures so far in combating the virus.

He said, his school was poised to receive the Form Two students to enable them complete the academic calendar.

We have also put in place adequate measures including placing Veronica buckets and hand-based alcohol sanitisers at vantage points to enable the students to regular wash and sanitise their hands. More so, the school has enough classrooms to ensure social/physical distancing, Rev Lenwah indicated.

Furthermore, the headmaster said the school has designated some facilities to be used as isolation centres for suspected positive COVID-19 cases.

According to him, they were expecting about 1,994 second year students, when school resumes on October 5.

Earlier, speaking to the media, the Director of Communications and Corporate Affairs, Zoomlion Ghana Limited, Emma Achea Boakye, revealed that her outfit was expected to disinfect 129 SHSs and 2,654 in both the Volta and Oti Regions.

The Zoomlion disinfection team also fumigated and disinfect Kadjebi District Primary School A&B.
Japan will offer a visa lasting up to two years for graduating university students who plan to start a business in the country, in an effort to attract more ambitious and talented individuals.

To qualify for the transitional status, foreign students need to graduate from one of roughly 40 universities including the University of Tokyo and Kyoto University and receive a recommendation from their schools based on their resumes and business plans.

The qualifying schools are part of a government initiative to globalize Japan's universities and help foreign students find jobs. Applications will open shortly.

Foreign students wishing to start a business in Japan are typically required to obtain a new visa as a business manager immediately after graduation or go home. But that visa requires a business to have an office, employ at least two workers and possess at least 5 million yen ($47,800) in capital. This has deterred would-be entrepreneurs.

As a solution, Japan began offering a one-year transition period to foreign graduates in limited parts of Japan in fiscal 2018.

"The program is geographically limited, and one year is still too short a time to start a new business," one critic said.

The Justice Ministry said 560 people transitioned from a student visa to a business manager visa in 2018. Entrepreneurs likely made up only a small portion of that number.

Japanese universities hosted a record high of about 140,000 foreign students as of May 2019, the Japan Student Services Organization said.
Lashing out at the Pakistan government, Pakistan People's Party (PPP) chairman - Bilawal Bhutto Zardari on Saturday, said that his party will only interact with Gilgit-Baltistan's Election Commission in the upcoming elections in the Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir (PoK) territory. He opined that the interference of federal government - namely the Speaker and Federal ministers was condemnable. Zardari has confirmed that his party will contest for the elections based on its own 2018 manifesto.

Coronavirus LIVE Updates: Tally cross 59 lakh; PM touts India's vaccine production at UNGA

Bhutto: 'Will engage only with EC-GB'

The Speaker National Assembly & Federal ministers have nothing to do with elections in GB. We condemn the interference of federal government in the elections. My party will only be engageing with the Election Commission GB on our demands for fair elections. #gbkafaisla_gbwalonka  BilawalBhuttoZardari (@BBhuttoZardari) September 26, 2020

Pakistan to elevate Gilgit-Baltistan to full-fledged province: Report

Pakistan to hold elections in Gilgit-Baltistan

On Wednesday, Pakistan President Arif Alvi approved elections to be conducted for the Legislative Assembly of PoK's Gilgit Baltistan on November 15. Recently, government representatives and opposition leaders such as PML(N)'s Shehbaz Sharif, Khawaja Asif, Ahsan Iqbal and PPP's Bilawal Bhutto Zardari and Sherry Rehman participated in discussions with the military high command, including Pakistani Army chief General Qamar Bajwa and ISI DG Lt. Gen. Faiz Hameed at the Pakistan Army Headquarters (GHQ) in Rawalpindi. The Pakistan government has signed a Rs 442-billion contract with a joint venture formed by China Power and Pakistan Army for the construction of the Diamer-Bhasha dam in Gilgit-Baltistan.

As per local media reports, there was also a consensus in the meeting on making GB a full province of Pakistan with all constitutional rights. Reacting to the development, MEA official spokesperson Anurag Srivastava clarified that any such action by Pakistan had no legal basis. Maintaining that GB will continue to remain a part of India, he advised Pakistan not to interfere in the country's internal matters and demanded Pakistan should immediately vacate all areas under its illegal occupation.

Pakistan's moves on Gilgit Baltistan angers Maryam Nawaz; Army's locus standi questioned

Opposition slams military's interference

However, this latest move orchestrated by Pakistan's military establishment came in for criticism from key opposition leader Maryam Nawaz Sharif. Speaking to the media in Islamabad, the PML(N) vice president maintained that GB was a political issue that should be handled by elected representatives. Backing Maryam, Her father and former Pakistan PM Nawaz Sharif lamented that the sanctity of people's vote has been always trampled upon by the Pakistani Army.

MEA lambasts Pakistan's attempt to alter illegally occupied Gilgit-Baltistan's status

Launching a scathing attack on the military, Sharif highlighted that not a single PM has been allowed to complete the 5-year tenure in Pakistan's history. Alluding to the Pakistan Army, he said that it ran a "parallel government" which was more powerful than the democratically elected government. He described this phenomenon as a "state above the state". According to him, the root cause of Pakistan's problems was the military's refusal to accept the writ of the elected representatives and the existence of a parallel government.
Francis X. Acunzo, founder and CEO of Acara Partners Virtually, Aesthetic Next brought industry leaders from across the country together to educate attendees on the clinical, business and technology aspects of aesthetic medical practices. Acunzo led two webinars... The sessions had great turnout, with over 350 attendees at each.

Acara Partners founder and CEO, Francis X. Acunzo, had the privilege of presenting two virtual webinars on the state of the industry at the Aesthetic Next Conference which ran over the weekend of September 11.

Aesthetic Next was hosted by Aesthetic Record, an aesthetic-focused EMR and practice management software company. Virtually, Aesthetic Next brought industry leaders from across the country together to educate attendees on the clinical, business and technology aspects of aesthetic medical practices. Acunzo led two webinars: The State of the Industry and The Keys to Success for Opening a New Medspa. The sessions had great turnout, with over 350 attendees at each.

In the State of the Industry webinar, Acunzo detailed how practices have had to adjust to conducting business in the age of COVID-19. Included were the effects of the recent shutdowns, the new normal inside practices, demand theories, the government support available to businesses, and the possible factors impacting the industrys growth.

In partnership with PatientNOW, Acara Partners looked at the sales of 450 practices across the nation. Year over year sales for a specific set of procedures (injectables, non-invasive body contouring, surgery, clinical skin care, laser skin rejuvenation and retail products) were compared from August 2019 to August 2020 for both core and non-core practices. The results showed that core practices dropped 7.4% in August and non-core practices had a slight 1.6% increase in August. Both core and non-core had very strong increases in year over year sales in June and July.

The Keys to Success for Opening a New Medspa webinar detailed Acara Partners comprehensive process for launching medspas. As the team that founded the nations first medical spas, they have developed and launched over 150 practices. This includes concept development, market assessment, sales forecasting, architectural and interior design, financial planning, developing the business plan, branding, marketing and promotions planning, service development, equipping the practice, choosing management systems, hiring and training staff and finally, physically opening the practice.

Learn about the state of the aesthetic medical industry and Acara Partners process for launching medspas by visiting the Acara Partners blog page today.

Acara Partners is a full service consultancy and marketing agency dedicated to the aesthetic medical industry. Their team of expert consultants and communications professionals make Acara the industrys comprehensive business advisory, marketing, advertising and digital agency. Founded by husband and wife team Francis X. Acunzo and Colleen Acunzo in 2003, Acara has decades of experience in launching and developing aesthetic medical practices across the country. For further information about Acara Partners, go to https://acarapartners.com/.
It's been almost 15 years since Sebastien Simon beat and repeatedly stabbed 17-year-old Brigitte Serre at the gas station in Montreal's St-Leonard neighbourhood where she worked. And the feelings are still raw for her family.

"He stole something from us," said Darlene Ryan, Serre's stepmother. "He didn't steal a doll. He stole a person, with all the dreams that she has and we had for her."

Simon, who married while in prison in 2017, has applied to the Parole Board of Canada for supervised outings. His hearing is scheduled for next month.

But Ryan says she and family members will not be able to attend in person because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Instead they will have to listen to the hearing and deliver their victim impact statements over the telephone.

That's not good enough for Ryan.

"It's important for the commissioners to see our reaction. It's not the same when you're talking in person and you're just talking coldly over the phone, even though some emotions might come through." said Ryan.

"It doesn't have the same impact. And I'm truly afraid that if it's just by phone, it's giving him an unfair advantage in the decision making."

Submitted by Darlene Ryan

Parole Board adjusts to pandemic

On its website, the Parole Board of Canada says it has had to make adjustments because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

"[The Parole Board of Canada] has implemented technological and procedural enhancements in order to provide victims, as an interim measure during the COVID-19 pandemic, the ability to participate at PBC hearings via telephone," reads an entry on the board's site.

"Victims will be able to listen to the hearing and present their statement for Board members to consider in their decision-making."

In an email to CBC, the board says it has facilitated the participation of 230 victims and 66 victim-support persons at 110 hearings by teleconference since April 22.

Story continues

Violation of rights, Ryan says

Ryan says that not being able to attend in person violates her rights under the Canadian Victims Bill of Rights, which was enacted in 2015  specifically the sections on the right to participate and the right to information.

Senator Pierre-Hugues Boisvenu, has been a strong advocate for victims' rights since his daughter was kidnapped and murdered in 2002. He was one of the driving forces behind the Victims Bill of Rights.

Boisvenu says delivering a victim impact statement over the phone will not have the same effect as if it were delivered in person. He supports Ryan in her bid to be present at Simon's parole board hearing.

"Because when you had the person in front of you, there was a non-verbal communication that you can see, how hard it is for the victim to do those kind of a testimony," said Boisvenu.

"And it's very important to know who is that person. It's not just a voice."

CBC

Boisvenu said that if the courts can resume proceedings and still maintain safety precautions, then it should be possible for the parole board to do the same in its hearings.

He said that almost every sector of society has adapted to the pandemic.

"We all wear [a mask] when we go in the grocery," said Boisvenu. "We go to government services, we wear a mask."

"So they can put a plastic wall between the offender and the [parole board] commissioners and the victim."

"Every industry in Canada, every restaurant, they adjust the way they work with some kind of protection. Why can't the parole board do that?"

Ryan has filed a written complaint to the Parole Board of Canada, asking that she and her family members be allowed to be physically present or, failing that, that Simon's hearing be delayed until that is possible.

"If it is too dangerous for a victim to participate and defend their rights by being there in person  it is then logical to say it is too dangerous for the criminal to be allowed outside of prison wall," Ryan argued in her letter.
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That doesn't look great on a number of levels, and again, nobody is making any accusations here, but the way they tell the story of how it came to be the show we all know and tolerate sounds exactly like the kind of overly detailed explanation you give when you're covering for something.

As they tell it, the network rejected Grammer's weird fantasy and told them it had to be about Frasier, so they returned to an idea they just happened to have for an old episode of Cheers about Frasier sitting in for a Boston talk radio host that they just happened to have never used. They couldn't set it in Boston to avoid hacky crossover events, which never happened on Frasier, and they were totally going to set it in Denver before changing their minds and landing on Seattle for its cutting edge art scene. Frasier was, of course, a huge fan of grunge. The casting director happened to bring in videos of David Hyde Pierce in a totally different production, they were struck by his resemblance to Kelsey Grammer, and at no point did Pierce ever say "Weird, this is just like that movie I just did!"

Originally, Fraiser's dad had a pet Tom Hanks.

In other words, a series of very weird coincidences gave them a show that shared many strangely specific elements with one of the most successful movies of the year. Sometimes, life is just funny that way.

Top image: CBS Television, TriStar Pictures
Ambassador Le Thi Tuyet Mai, Head of the Permanent Mission of Vietnam to the UN, WTO, and other international organisations in Geneva, affirmed that as a member of the Buenos Aires Declaration, Vietnam supports the establishment of the working group, which is aimed at improving womens participation in international trade, especially amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

Vietnam always attaches great importance to incorporating gender equality into law building and enforcement, adopting inclusive development policies, facilitating womens participation in business activities and international trade, and encouraging the development of female entrepreneurs, she said, adding that it wants to learn from other countries experience in such matters and stands ready to join in the working groups activities.

Dorothy Tembo, Executive Director ad interim of the International Trade Centre and Co-Chair of the International Gender Champions Trade Impact Group, noted that the next step is how to expand the participation of WTO member states in the Buenos Aires Declaration, which now has 127 member nations.

Members of the Buenos Aires Declaration 2017 vowed to share their experience to encourage womens participation in national and international economies through the WTO, via information exchanges and voluntary reporting during the WTO trade policy review process.

They also pledged to share best practices for conducting gender-based analysis of trade policies and for the monitoring of their effects, share methods and procedures for the collection of data and analysis of gender-focused statistics related to trade, work together with the WTO to remove barriers for womens economic empowerment, and ensure that Aid for Trade supports tools and know-how for analysing, designing, and implementing more gender-responsive trade policies.
Former Bihar director general of police Gupteshwar Pandey met Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Saturday, lending credence to speculations that the IPS officers sudden move of taking VRS was propelled by the intention to join politics.

IMAGE: Former DGP Gupteshwar Pandey arrives at Janta Dal-United headquarters to attend a meeting with Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, in Patna. Photograph: PTI Photo

Pandey, who stepped down as the state police chief less than a week ago, however, insisted that he had walked down to the state headquarters of the Janata Dal-United, headed by the chief minister, to "thank" Kumar for the trust reposed in him by the latter.



"I discussed nothing political with the CM. I have worked with him for long and, after retirement, I just wanted to thank him for his support. If and when I decide to join any political party, I will make it known to all, Pandey told a posse of journalists waiting outside the JD-U office at Birchand Patel Marg.

Although the IPS officer, who took VRS less than half a year before he was scheduled to superannuate, has chosen to keep his cards close to the rest, the grapevine has it that he is all set to join the JD-U and get a ticket from one of the assembly segments in his native district of Buxar.



Reports in a section of the media also say that Pandey might be considered for the Valmiki Nagar Lok Sabha seat where a by-poll has been necessitated by the death of sitting JD-U MP Baidyanath Mahto.



The JD-U draws its support, largely, from among non-Yadav OBCs and Pasmanda Muslims. The party hopes that with the induction of Pandey it may be able to reach out to the Brahmins, traditionally supporters of the Congress who have gravitated towards the BJP of late.



Pandey had hit the headlines recently for his vocal condemnation of the non-cooperation meted out to the Bihar police team that had visited Mumbai to probe the death of Patna-born actor Sushant Singh Rajput.



With a candour that is usually not associated with bureaucrats, Pandey had lashed out at the municipal authourities in Mumbai when they had forcibly quarantined Vinay Tiwari, a young IPS officer from Patna who heading the investigating team until the probe was handed over to the CBI upon a request to the effect from the deceased actors father.



Pandey's comment, while he was still the DGP, that actress Rhea Chakraborty accused of abetment to suicide by Rajput's father did not have the aukaat (standing) to make any snide remarks against Nitish Kumar was also much talked about.



The Shiv Sena, which heads the ruling coalition in Maharashtra, had accused Pandey of acting as a political pawn of the ruling dispensation in Bihar ahead of the assembly elections.



Shiv Sena spokesman Sanjay Raut on the former DGP's VRS said,he was running a political agenda with his statements on the Mumbai case and now he is going to receive his award.



Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh Friday said that Pandey's quitting the job confirmed his

doubts that in Rajput's death case he was making comments not as a DGP but as a BJP leader.



Pandey has earlier brushed aside criticism from the Shiv Sena, saying "they keep saying many things, I don't give much credence to it."



Pandey had resigned from service in 2009 to contest the Lok Sabha elections held that year. His resignation letter was, however, intriguingly not forwarded and he was reinstated into service a few months later.



Earlier, on Tuesday, decks seemed to have been cleared for Pandey's future move as his application for VRS received an expeditious approval from Governor Fagu Chauhan and an exception was made in his case with the waiver of a mandatory three-montlong cooling off period for government servants.
Emily Ratajkowski recently dropped a bombshell on the fashion industry, as she recounted the alleged sexual assault she experienced during a photo shoot.

And the Inamorata founder is keeping her head held high, as her family, friends and fans rally around her in support.

She served boss babe vibes Saturday in an oversized androgynous chic brown pantsuit from one of her favorite retailers, Zara, as she walked her dog Colombo with husband Sebastian Bear-McClard after lunch at ATLA in their trendy NoHo neighborhood of New York City.

Boss babe: Emily Ratajkowski served boss babe vibes Saturday in an oversized androgynous chic brown pantsuit, as she walked her dog Colombo with husband Sebastian Bear-McClard after lunch at ATLA in their trendy NoHo neighborhood of New York City

The 29-year-old wore the sleeves of the buttoned Zara blazer rolled up below her elbow, layered over a brown bralette from Boody.

She completed the look with a pair of black wayfarer sunglasses, a matching face mask, gold hoop earrings and grey New Balance trainers.

Ratajkowski previously took to her Instagram Story to show off her ensemble in a mirror at their spacious apartment.

She put her sunglasses, as she struck a pose for the camera, wearing her face mask on her arm to show off her gorgeous pout.

Androgynous chic: The 29-year-old wore the sleeves of the buttoned Zara blazer rolled up below her elbow, layered over a brown bralette from Boody

Accessorizing: She completed the ensemble with a pair of black wayfarer sunglasses, a matching face mask, gold hoop earrings and grey New Balance trainers

OOTD: Ratajkowski previously took to her Instagram Story to show off her ensemble in a mirror at their spacious apartment. She put her sunglasses, as she struck a pose for the camera, wearing her face mask on her arm to show off her gorgeous pout

The Gone Girl actress carried a white shopping bag during the outing, as Bear-McClard, 39, waled their their Husky/German shepherd mix on a ran leather leash.

He kept it casual in a white t-shirt from his production company Elara Pictures, printed with teddy bears, and a navy blue baseball cap, also from the merch line.

It comes after Ratajkowski's recent sexual assault allegations against photographer Jonathan Leder were corroborated by actress Nola Palmer, who posted similar allegations Monday to Instagram.

She wrote: 'I have been carrying around the pain and trauma of Jonathan and his abuse for a decade now. I have gone so far as changing my name because in my mind he owned it and I could not look at that name without seeing him.'

The Titans actress added: 'But for the first time I am able to publicly say, Jonathan Leder was my abuser and that is thanks to Emily Ratajkowski and her bravery.'

Ratajkowski opened up last week in a personal essay for The Cut about being allegedly assaulted by Leder in 2012, during a shoot at his home in Woodstock, New York.

She detailed the lingerie he had her wear, before asking her to go nude, as he offered her one glass of red wine after another.

Multiple accusations: It comes after Ratajkowski's recent sexual assault allegations against photographer Jonathan Leder were corroborated by actress Nola Palmer

Bombshell essay: Ratajkowski opened up last week in a personal essay for The Cut about being allegedly assaulted by Leder in 2012, during a shoot at his home in Woodstock, New York (pictured in February, 2020)

Traumatic experience: The Gone Girl actress wrote: 'Most of what came next was a blur except for the feeling. I dont remember kissing, but I do remember his fingers suddenly being inside of me'

Later, after the makeup artist for the unpaid shoot went to bed, she and Leder sat on the couch, where she 'absentmindedly' began rubbing her feet against him for warmth.

The Gone Girl actress wrote: 'Most of what came next was a blur except for the feeling. I dont remember kissing, but I do remember his fingers suddenly being inside of me. Harder and harder and pushing and pushing like no one had touched me before or has touched me since.'

A few years later, she learned that he was selling a book of risque photographs from the unpaid shoot, which she originally only gave permission to use in a magazine.

Leder provided a copy of a release, which granted him the necessary rights, claiming it was signed by her agent at the time.

The photographer's representatives have since released a statement, denying her allegations: 'Mr. Leder completely denies her outrageous libelous allegations of being "assaulted." It is grotesque and sad that she is so vindictive about the publication of the photos.'

Ratajkowski took to Instagram after the essay was released, as she thanked her 26.8million followers for their support.

Surprise book: A few years later, she learned that he was selling a book of risque photographs from the unpaid shoot, which she originally only gave permission to use in a magazine

Denied allegations: The photographer's representatives have since released a statement, denying her allegations: 'It is grotesque and sad that she is so vindictive about the publication of the photos' (Leder pictured in October, 2010)

Supportive fans: Ratajkowski took to Instagram after the essay was released, as she thanked her 26.8million followers for their support

She wrote: 'Its been nothing short of life-changing to see how many women (and men!) this piece resonated with.

'Thank you to every single person who read, shared, commented and tagged me. I cant tell you what it feels like to see my words in print and to hear from each and everyone of you. Thank you.'

The I Feel Pretty actress later expanded on the issue with V Magazine, opening up about how she's evolved over the years as a model and entrepreneur in the fashion industry, as well as how she's approached fragile masculinity.

She told friend and photographer Inez Van Lamsweerde: 'In general, you have no control. When I was younger, I just kind of let things happen. And I struggled with that.

'Im so glad that I dont [have to do that] now. Im not this passive person who is not in control. Im 29, so Im kind of leaving [that] behind.'

Ratajkowski continued: 'I understand, with love, that mens experiences have been really limited. The way that men feel and process shame is so different.

'You have to teach them about experiences that you, as a woman in the world, [have had]. Expose them to that.'
Mr. Consovoy responded that he was not. He said he was asking that the ordinary rules of challenging a subpoena at least be extended to the president, and that he not be deprived of the basic protections that all other citizens receive.

All three members of the appeals panel were appointed by Democrats. Judge Leval and Judge Katzmann were appointed to the court by President Bill Clinton, and Judge Lohier by President Barack Obama.

The oral arguments before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit came more than a year after Mr. Trump first sued Mr. Vance, a Democrat, in September 2019, seeking to block the subpoena, which was issued to the presidents accounting firm, Mazars USA.

Mr. Vances office was known to be investigating hush-money payments made before the 2016 election to two women who had said they had affairs with the president. The office has since suggested in court filings that the inquiry is much broader and could focus on financial crimes like tax and insurance fraud.

But Mr. Trumps lawyers have continually claimed in court papers that the investigation was focused only on the 2016 payments, and so the subpoena for the tax returns and other financial records was excessive, they argued.

If you were to look up the definition of a fishing expedition, this is it, Mr. Consovoy told the appeals panel.

The presidents bitter legal battle with Mr. Vances office already has reached the Supreme Court, which in July rejected his initial argument: that as a sitting president, Mr. Trump had immunity from criminal investigation. But the justices said Mr. Trump could return to the lower court to argue that the subpoena was overbroad and or issued in bad faith, which he did.
HARRISBURG, Pa. - The news release from a U.S. attorney in Pennsylvania was provocative: Nine mailed-in military ballots had been discarded by the local election office in a swing county of one of the most important presidential battleground states.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 25/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

FILE - In this Oct. 19, 2018 file photo, U.S. Attorney David Freed speaks at a news conference at the Centre County Courthouse Annex in Bellefonte, Pa. Freed's office issued a statement on Thursday, Sept. 24, 2020, that nine mailed-in military ballots had been "discarded" by the local election office. The announcement was seized on by President Donald Trump and his supporters. The U.S. attorney's announcement of the investigation Thursday provided few details, but did mention the votes were for Trump. (Abby Drey/Centre Daily Times via AP, File)

HARRISBURG, Pa. - The news release from a U.S. attorney in Pennsylvania was provocative: Nine mailed-in military ballots had been discarded by the local election office in a swing county of one of the most important presidential battleground states.

All of them were marked for President Donald Trump, it said. Then came another news release with key details changed  the presidential choice was unknown on two of the ballots because they had been resealed  but still little explanation of what had happened and whether investigators believed a criminal act had occurred.

Despite the information vacuum, the White House press secretary told reporters ballots for the president had been cast aside. The Trump campaigns rapid response arm pushed out the release from Trumps own Justice Department under the headline Democrats are trying to steal the election  ignoring the fact that the local government, Luzerne County, is controlled by Republicans. Conservative voices used the news release as rocket fuel to amplify the investigation on social media.

Thursdays kerfuffle and accompanying internet outrage over a handful of ballots is likely a taste of whats to come in the month left before the presidential election, which is being held amid a global pandemic that has triggered a wave of absentee ballot requests as Trump continues to launch unsubstantiated attacks on mail voting.

It was Trump, after being briefed on the case by Attorney General William Barr, who first revealed publicly that the discarded ballots had been cast for him. He did so in an interview earlier Thursday with Fox News Radio in which he used the investigation to further sow doubt about mail-in voting. The radio interview was hours before the U.S. attorney's office in Pennsylvania issued its news release about the probe to reporters.

If past is prologue, we will see more, said Wendy Weiser, an elections expert and director of the democracy program at the Brennan Center for Justice. We are in an unprecedented situation where a sitting president of the United States and a candidate for reelection is and has long been actively seeking to undermine the election and discredit it.

Weiser said it was important that officials provide detailed information about any voting issues that arise, which happen every election cycle. For instance, officials with the U.S. Postal Service said this week they are investigating a report that an unknown number of ballots were among other mail found in a ditch near a highway intersection in Wisconsin, another presidential battleground state.

Officials have so far released little information in that case, including whether the ballots were blank and on their way to voters or if they had been completed and were being returned to the local election office.

Experts say the lack of information in these cases opens the door to speculation and conspiracy theories.

By Friday, more details had emerged in the Pennsylvania case. Federal officials were considering whether a recently hired, temporary election worker may have mishandled the ballots. Aside from the unknowns about the investigation itself, questions persist over how the Justice Department handled the matter.

The first word of a federal investigation into unspecified issues with a small number of mail-in ballots came in a statement Tuesday by the local district attorney in Luzerne County. There was no mention of Trump, and there was little attention to the case beyond local news reports.

That all changed when the office of U.S. Attorney Dave Freed issued Thursdays statement, an unusual step given U.S. Department of Justice guidance to refrain generally from commenting on any investigation  especially one involving an election in which voters already are casting ballots. In addition, the mention of which presidential candidate the ballots favoured raised concerns among election law experts and voter advocacy groups (ballots include races for all kinds of offices and issues, not just the race for president).

The U.S. attorneys office in Pennsylvania notified senior officials at Justice Department headquarters earlier this week about a small number of ballots that were found to be discarded, a person familiar with the matter told The Associated Press. Barr told Trump that the Justice Department was going to look into the matter before the department publicly confirmed the investigation, the person said.

The U.S. attorneys office had received inquiries from local reporters about the ballots, the person said, and released the statement  which included specific details about the ballots  after Trump revealed the existence of the investigation in the interview with Fox News Radio. The person could not discuss the investigation publicly and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity.

Justice Department policy imposes limitations on contacts with the White House so as to guard against the politicization of law enforcement matters, though different memos issued over time have permitted the department to advise the White House of pending investigations or cases under specific circumstances. The memos acknowledge that such communication may be more regular when it comes to matters of national security.

This is clear politicization of the Justice Departments work in the middle of an active general election, said Kristen Clarke, executive director of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. It seemed like a thinly veiled attempt to breathe life into President Trumps false claims about mail ballot fraud.

The number of public Facebook and Instagram posts mentioning the discarded ballots quickly skyrocketed, receiving nearly 900,000 interactions  likes or comments  in less than 24 hours, according to Facebooks CrowdTangle, which tracks public posts.

Many of the most popular posts about the discarded ballots were made by the Trump campaign, pro-Trump accounts or conservative news outlets and used to support the doubts Trump has cast on the mail-in voting process. Notably, the ballots involved were from military personnel, who are sent their ballots earlier than other voters in every election.

Freed, a Republican nominated by Trump, said in a letter sent late Thursday to the local elections office that the FBI had recovered nine military ballots from a trash bin. Seven of them were completed ballots without the envelopes voters had mailed them in, and all were cast for Trump. The two other ballots had already been put back into envelopes by unnamed elections workers, Freed said. Four other empty absentee ballot envelopes also were recovered.

Freed said Pennsylvania law prohibits elections offices from opening mail-in ballots before Election Day. Investigators were told that the military mail-in envelopes and absentee request envelopes were so similar that election workers believed that adhering to the protocol of preserving envelopes unopened would result in them missing ballot applications, so they opened them.

It still wasnt clear, however, how or why they ended up in the trash. A statement by the county manager on Friday characterized it as an error" discovered by a public servant and reported to law enforcement.

When asked why he disclosed information about which presidential candidate the voters supported, Freed said in an email to the AP that the ballot information was factual and it was vital that voters who have sent in military ballots are informed of the possibility that their ballot was opened and discarded.

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J.J. Abbott, executive director of Commonwealth Communications, a liberal advocacy group, said he was concerned that Freed provided information about the Trump ballots without much context about what had occurred.

I just think, given how highly charged the rhetoric, particularly from the president, has been about mail-in voting, its highly concerning given the lack of detail provided, Abbott said.

----

Cassidy reported from Atlanta. Associated Press writers Mike Balsamo and Eric Tucker in Washington; Scott Bauer in Madison, Wis.; Anthony Izaguirre in Lindenhurst, New York; and Amanda Seitz in Chicago contributed to this report.

__

APs Advance Voting guide brings you the facts about voting early, by mail or absentee from each state: https://interactives.ap.org/advance-voting-2020/
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Beirut: Syrian war planes carried out a series of air raids Tuesday on positions held by the Islamic State jihadist group in eastern Deir Ezzor province, an NGO and state media said.

"Syrian army forces targeted headquarters and warehouses storing weapons and ammunition belonging to the terrorist group known as the Islamic State... destroying them completely," Syria`s state news agency SANA reported.

The agency added that the army had also targeted groups of IS members, "killing large numbers of them."

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based monitoring group, said the Syrian army had carried out at least 12 strikes across the oil-rich province.

"It`s the first time since the Islamic State took control of most of Deir Ezzor that warplanes have carried out such intensive and pinpoint raids against Islamic State positions in the region," Observatory director Rami Abdul Rahman said.

At least seven civilians were killed in the raids, along with an unspecified number of jihadists, the monitoring group added.

Among the targets of the raids was a training camp in the west of the province, Abdul Rahman added.

The raids come a day after Syria said it was willing to cooperate with the international community to counter the threat posed by IS, which declared a "caliphate" in territory it holds in Syria and Iraq.

The jihadist group has raised international concern after lightning advances in Iraq and a slew of abuses including the murder of US journalist James Foley, who was kidnapped in Syria.

The United States is already carrying out air strikes against the group in Iraq and US officials have said they are ready to send spy planes into Syria to track IS jihadists.

Elsewhere in Syria, the Observatory said at least 33 people died in fighting between the army and Al-Nusra Front -- al-Qaeda`s Syrian affiliate -- in Zabadani northeast of the capital Damascus.

Al-Nusra has seized five army checkpoints in the region during three days of clashes that left 20 soldiers dead, along with 13 Nusra fighters, the Observatory said.

Zabadani is considered strategic because of its proximity to the Lebanese border and the mountainous border region where many rebels sought refuge after being routed from the Qalamun area earlier this year.
Earlier this week, at least three railway workers were accused of truly living their best lives (and every New Urbanist Memes For Transit-Oriented Teens fantasy), facing allegations of turning a storage room into a "man cave" underneath one of the platforms in New York City's Grand Central Station.

The cave, which the employees used to "hang out and get drunk and party," according to the report, came complete with a flat-screen TV, a refrigerator, a futon, and a microwave, making it arguably much nicer than not only the comparable Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle's sewer lair, but also my own basement apartment, if we're being really honest here. Despite these impressive specs, the MTA was not too happy with the renovation, suspending the three employees without pay until the disciplinary issue at hand is resolved.

"Many a New Yorker has fantasized about kicking back with a cold beer in a prime piece of Manhattan real estate - especially one this close to good transportation," the MTA Inspector General said. "But few would have the chutzpah to commandeer a secret room beneath Grand Central Terminal & make it their very own man-cave, sustained with MTA resources, and maintained at our riders' expense."

To make matters even more confusing, the station managers told investigators that they had no idea the locked room inside an even larger storage room (#storagroomeception) under Grand Central Stations track 114 even existed in the first place, despite receiving multiple complaints about the underground lair dating back to February 2019. Yet instead of taking the L, accepting the matter as yet another fun, on-brand quirk of the Notorious MTA, they've decided to take action, mapping every room (and how they're locked) inside of Grand Central Station, according to NBC New York. Yay! Progress!

Continue Reading Below Advertisement

Moral of the story, my dear readers? There is never a dull day when it comes to the beautiful disaster that is New York City transit -- especially if you're getting hammered in an underground man cave at work.
A Bergen County woman faces assault and other charges after she allegedly struck and seriously injured a bicyclist with her car while drinking and driving, authorities said.

Lisa M. Wieger, 45, of Ramsey, is charged with second-degree assault by auto and received court summonses for DWI, reckless driving, disregard of a stop sign, failure to yield and driving an uninsured vehicle, according to Bergen County Prosecutor Mark Musella.

Police were called about 6:18 p.m. on Thursday to a report of a bicyclist struck by a vehicle on Wyckoff Avenue near West Oak Street in Ramsey, the prosecutor said.

The bicyclist suffered serious bodily injuries, Musella said in a statement. The victim was taken to Hackensack University Medical Center and remained in stable condition on Friday, the prosecutor said.

After an investigation, Wieger was arrested and later released pending a first appearance in court on Oct. 9, Musella said.

Thank you for relying on us to provide the journalism you can trust. Please consider supporting NJ.com with a subscription.

Anthony G. Attrino may be reached at tattrino@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @TonyAttrino. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
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A US aviation chief is to conduct a test flight with a Boeing 737 Max next week as the American plane maker works to win approval to resume flights.

Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) boss Steve Dickson is set to fly the plane in a key milestone for the company.

The Boeing 737 Max has been grounded since March 2019 after two fatal crashes killed 346 people. Mr Dickson, who was previously a commercial airline pilot, plans to undergo simulator training before the flight and will then share his observations with FAA technical staff.

It is not typical for an FAA administrator to fly an airplane before it returns to service. Mr Dickson has repeatedly said he would not sign off until he flew it himself and was satisfied that I would put my own family on it without a second thought.

The FAA told US lawmakers in an email on Friday that Mr Dickson and FAA deputy administrator Dan Elwell will be in Seattle next week to take the recommended training. The flight by Mr Dickson will fulfil his promise to fly the aircraft before the FAA approves its return to service.

Boeing shares were up 6.7 per cent.

The FAA and regulators from Canada, Brazil, and the European Union Aviation Safety Agency earlier this week concluded a Joint Operations Evaluation Board (JOEB) review assessing Boeings proposed 737 MAX training.

A draft Flight Standardisation Board report including the JOEB findings will be released for public comment in the near future, the FAA said, and it must still finalise a directive outlining software upgrades and other changes that all 737 MAX planes must undergo before resuming flights.

Given required time for public comments, it appears the MAX could get final FAA approval to return to service sometime in November, sources briefed on the matter said.

Earlier on Friday, Europes chief aviation safety regulator said the MAX could receive regulatory approval to resume flying in November and enter service by the end of the year.

For the first time in a year and a half, I can say theres an end in sight to work on the MAX, said Patrick Ky, executive director of the European Union Aviation Safety Agency.

Mr Ky said Boeing had agreed to install the computerised third-sensor system on the next version of the plane, the 230-seat 737 MAX 10, followed by retrofits on the rest of the fleet later.

Reuters
We are excited to welcome you back to the beautiful island of Barbados!

Our already industry-leading practices have been enhanced to include several pre-emptive cleanliness measures set forth in our Sandals Platinum Protocols of Cleanliness, which you can find information about on the Sandals website. These are put in place to ensure that guests have peace of mind while on vacation.

Guests are able to enjoy and explore the resort and all the amenities available to them. As an added precaution, the Government of Barbados requires visitors to take a 2nd PCR test within 4 to 5 days after their first PCR test. Once guests receive their negative results they are able to explore the island of Barbados and all that it offers. To learn more about the Government protocols as it relates to your stay, please be sure to review the "Visit Barbados" website.

I hope this information is helpful!
Sir David Attenborough has given Prince George a fossilised giant shark's tooth to mark their meeting at Kensington Palace.

The young prince was photographed looking intrigued as he handled the fossilised tooth from an extinct Carcharocles megalodon  one of the most feared predators to have swum in the seas.

The giant shark tooth given to George was found by Sir David during a family holiday to Malta in the late 1960s.

Recommended Sir David Attenborough joins Instagram

It was embedded in the island's soft yellow limestone, which was laid down during the Miocene period some 23 million years ago.

Carcharocles megalodon is believed to have grown to 15 metres in length, which is about twice the length of the great white shark.

Sir David presented the seven-year-old with the gift on Thursday after he attended a private viewing of his new environmental documentary with the Duke of Cambridge.

Prince William and the veteran broadcaster watched A Life On Our Planet at a social distance and in the open air.

Sir David found the tooth during a family holiday to Malta in the late 1960s (PA)

The duke and Sir David were given directors' chairs with their names printed on the back, but they decided to sit in each other's seats.

The 94-year-old broadcaster chatted to William, Kate and their three children George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis after the screening.

William interviewed Sir David at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last year, and during the discussion the broadcaster warned that humanity needed to act so that they did not annihilate part of the natural world.

Sir David visited the palace for a private viewing of his new environmental documentary with the Duke of Cambridge (PA)

The two men continue to support each other in their mission to tackle some of the biggest environmental challenges the planet faces.

This includes working together on William's Earthshot Prize, an ambitious global environment project announced last December to combat climate issues.

David Attenborough: A Life On Our Planet premieres in cinemas on Monday and will launch on Netflix on 4 October. An accompanying book is published on 1 October.
KILLED! Nai Osipi Darko

26.09.2020 LISTEN

The Kasoa area has become notorious for lawlessness, criminality which is by and large traceable to land issues.

One of the stories in yesterday's edition was disturbing because it was about murder over land issues.

It is unnerving for somebody to lose his life over land under circumstances which are anything but sensible.

Even before the already commenced investigation into the latest Kasoa murder comes to an end the fact that it is about land issues which have dogged this part of the Central Region makes the subject even more disturbing and curious.

We have observed the efforts of the Police Administration in addressing the security lapses at Kasoa. It is regrettable, however, that these efforts have not registered the desired dividend of peace in the area.

There are instances where some law enforcement officers ironically fuel the trouble as they become active players in the wicked schemes.

The current response to the security challenges in the Kasoa area and indeed other parts of Accra over land are not effective and, therefore, call for a new approach.

A national policy fashioned out to address the challenge would be in order and we are all for that.

Such a policy should create a common platform, a committee of sorts made up of chiefs, owners of land, security agents and state agencies in charge of land matters with a view to considering appropriate regulation to manage and sell land.

Indeed, this template must be applied to other areas in Accra where the challenge remains for now intractable.

There is no doubt in our minds that this challenge can be addressed when an appropriate policy is not only adopted but also implemented to the letter.

Thorough investigations are hardly conducted in a manner that would assist in compiling enough data for future management of the land debacle in the country.

Such data is urgently needed in our national effort to stop the nonsense of murder over land.

The Property Fraud Unit at the Police Headquarters, we can bet, is overwhelmed by assortment of land-related issues, some of them ending up in court.

It is for this reason that we are calling for a new approach, away from the 'fire service' response which does not offer a permanent solution.

A way must be found to stop the double sale of land and to ensure that those who buy such lands pass through the proper channel so they are not duped as many are leading to such avoidable fatalities.

We must compel land guards to consider other breadwinning options away from their current criminal ways which provide impetus for more challenges over land ownership.
Long before the pandemic exacted a deadly toll in some long-term care homes, before the stark reports of military commanders jolted politicians into action, Toronto Star reporter Moira Welsh had been working to expose the crisis facing seniors living in these facilities.

Her 2003 series titled Bitter End gave disturbing insight into life within the homes.

They are left in feces-filled diapers or urine-soaked clothing. They suffer from untreated bedsores that eat down to the bone. They go hungry. They are injured. Some are abused, she wrote at the time.

That series spurred new legislation and provincial oversight.

The analysis basically showed that residents were being neglected and abused in nursing homes, Welsh told me. There were promises of change from that series but ultimately there was no real change.

In the 17 years since, Welsh has continued to write on the topic, revealing other stories of abuse and neglect that underscored systemic problems.

When the pandemic hit, it hit many homes especially hard. The military was dispatched to assist. After several weeks on the frontline, commanders wrote their own damning assessments.

When the military saw this, I was not surprised at all, said Welsh, author of a forthcoming book titled Happily Ever Older that examines seniors care in North America and Europe.

Anyone who has been involved in writing about this industry or working in it knew that a lot of homes . . . would be vulnerable, she said.

Indeed, of the 2,835 deaths attributed to COVID-19 in Ontario, 1,830 were long-term care residents and eight were staff.

Its hard to make a difference when you write about long-term care. For every change that you see, you still encounter these really tragic stories of people who are not living well, she said.

Thats why Welsh has remained on the story in recent months detailing, for example, how some doctors stayed away from homes and the isolation endured by residents.

Monday marks World News Day. Organizers say its a day to raise public awareness of the critical role that journalists play in providing credible and reliable news, to help people make sense of  and improve  the rapidly changing world around them.

The theme is how journalism spurs positive change. Real News Matters is the motto.

The pandemic has proven that. It has underscored two realities around journalism: the need for media as trusted sources of information, and the financial plight that threatens their very existence.

From the outset of the health crisis, Star reporters have explored how the pandemic has upended our health, finances and everyday living. They write on the latest public health advice and the daily caseload. They chronicle how some Toronto neighbourhoods have been disproportionately hit, the financial aid offered by governments, the challenges of students returning to class.

And in the theme of World News Day, I cant think of news that matters more than journalism that shines a light on conditions endured by the most vulnerable, as Welsh and other Star journalists have done writing about long-term care homes.

Residents in the Greater Toronto Area are served by a rich variety of news from radio and television stations, daily newspapers like the Star, Sun, National Post and the Globe and Mail, weekly newspapers, and online offerings.

That collective journalism educates and enlightens. It challenges authority and gives voice to the vulnerable. It fosters debate on issues of the day.

Sure, you may rage at the provoking views of a columnist, second-guess the editors picks for the front page or take issue with an editorial stance. But that debate and disagreement also contributes to the civil discourse.

In an era when misinformation and lies are just a mouse click away, trusted journalism is even more critical.

Dont take any of it for granted.

A tough financial situation for many media outlets has been made worse by the economic fallout of the pandemic. The media research website J-Source has tallied the impact across Canada. By mid-August, 48 community newspapers had temporarily or permanently closed, and another 45 outlets had scaled back editions and 106 outlets laid off staff.

Combined, that represents a lot of questions not being asked, town councils not being covered, communities not being informed.

For those who say they get their news off social media, Im reminded of the saying, I dont need farms. I get my food at the grocery store.

When it comes to journalism, were already losing the farms.

If you value journalism, I encourage you to subscribe. To the Star, the Globe, the Post or to some of the online news sites. To those that already do, thank you.

There are no fireworks or parades to mark World News Day. But I hope it prompts readers to think about the journalism they rely on and its contribution to the community, and on the value of being informed.

And perhaps reflect on the grim alternative  a community without the news.
BJP leader Jyotiraditya Scindia



on Saturday launched a frontal attack on his former Congress colleague and accused the Opposition party of "betraying" farmers by not waiving farm loans promised ahead of the 2018 assembly polls.

Addressing a gathering in Indore district, Scindia avoided taking name of then Congress chief Rahul Gandhi who had promised the waiver during electioneering.

He also said would become a "proxy chief minister again" if the Congress emerged victorious in the Assembly bypolls due on 28 seats.

"During the 2018 MP assembly elections, he (the then Congress chief Rahul Gandhi) had said that the crop loan of farmers would be waived within 10 days if the Congress forms government, but this promise was not kept," said Scindia, who had quit Congress in March this year.

He said the Congress had committed 'gaddari' (betrayal) with farmers by not keeping the loan waiver promise.

"You all (voters) must remember that a vote cast to Congress would come handy in making Digvijaya the proxy chief minister again," Scindia said.

Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan also attended the function.

Describing and former CM Kamal Nath as "elder and younger brothers", Scindia said, "Digvijaya Singh remains behind the curtains and had remote control of then chief minister Kamal Nath".

"Today, Digvijaya and Kamal Nath are calling me a gaddar (traitor) and Shivraj Singh Chouhan 'nalayak' (worthless). Butthe fact is that the Congress had betrayed 7.5 crore people of Madhya Pradesh in the last elections," he added.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
New Jersey on Saturday reported six more coronavirus deaths and 760 more positive tests  the most cases the state has announced in one day in nearly four months.

Meanwhile, the states rate of transmission dropped for the first time in about two weeks, to 1.12. But it remains above the critical benchmark of 1 indicating the outbreak here is growing.

The last time the Garden State reported more than 700 new cases was June 5, when officials announced 864 positive tests.

Saturday marks the third time in the last nine days the states number of new cases topped 600  though new deaths and hospitalizations have remained relatively stable in recent weeks.

Plus, the number of tests administered in the state has vastly increased. Saturdays results are from about 33,000 new tests performed, about 10,000 more than the states recent daily average.

Gov. Phil Murphy revealed the newest numbers on social media. He did not announce when the newly reported deaths occurred.

#COVID19 UPDATE: New Jersey has 760 new positive cases, pushing our cumulative total to 202,850.



Sadly, we are reporting six new confirmed COVID-19 deaths for a total of 14,312 lives lost.



Learn more: https://t.co/JW1q8awGh7 pic.twitter.com/99PXnAQIWp  Governor Phil Murphy (@GovMurphy) September 26, 2020

The update comes a day after Murphy extended the states public-health emergency for a seventh time and officials warned of rising COVID-19 cases in five counties  Bergen, Gloucester, Middlesex, Monmouth, and especially Ocean.

Ocean County added 250 cases Saturday alone  32% of the new positive tests across the state. Officials say Lakewood has been a particular hotspot of late.

Murphy on Friday once again stressed that while daily new deaths, hospitalizations, and cases have fallen drastically after more than six months of restrictions and social distancing, New Jersey is not out of the woods" yet.

New Jersey, an early coronavirus epicenter, has reported 202,850 COVID-19 cases out of more than 3.51 million tests administered in the nearly seven months since the outbreak here started in early March. Thats the eighth most cases among U.S. states.

The state of 9 million people has reported 16,103 deaths related to the virus  14,312 lab-confirmed and 1,791 considered probable. Thats the second-most in the U.S. after New York. New Jersey has the nations highest COVID-19 death rate per 100,000 residents.

More than 34,600 residents have recovered from the illness, according to Johns Hopkins University, though that number is likely much larger.

On Thursday, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the White Houses leading infectious disease expert, told Murphy during an interview that New Jersey is in good shape compared to other states and can continue to reopen its schools and economy gradually, prudently, and carefully despite America facing a possible second wave of COVID-19.

Indeed, the state is in better shape than the U.S. as a whole, recording 3.6 new cases per 10,000 residents this past week, compared to a national rate of 9.1 new cases per 10,000.

But 13 of New Jerseys 21 counties saw new infections rise over the past week.

Officials have said recent increases are partly because of the states large testing capacity, some community spread of the virus, and rising cases among younger residents.

Murphy said officials believes some amount" of the increases in Lakewood are in relationship to worship from the Jewish holiday of Rosh Hashanah, which was last weekend. Lakewood is home to a large Orthodox Jewish community. Another Jewish holiday, Yom Kippur, will run Sunday into Monday.

The governor warned people not to cast bias on the religious community in the area.

Every religion in this state has a right to practice and worship, Murphy said. I dont want a speck of anybody in this state, Hey, see, its because of them or whatever. Were working aggressively with faith leaders, with community leaders. But I want everybody to leave any prejudices or biases, to check them at the door. This is about public health, and were doing our very best.

Still, Murphy stressed: We need everybody to worship and observe holidays responsibly, including from a public health standpoint.

TRANSMISSION RATE

New Jerseys latest rate of transmission is 1.12, down from the 1.15 reported Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday  the highest the rate has been since hitting 1.15 on Aug. 7. The rate has been above 1 since Sept. 4 and increased incrementally since last week.

Any number above 1 means each newly infected person, on average, is spreading the virus to at least one other person. Any number below 1 means the virus is decreasing.

HOSPITALIZATIONS

There were 426 patients with confirmed or suspected COVID-19 cases across New Jerseys 71 hospitals Thursday night. Thats 21 more the night before.

The state did not break down how many of those patients tested positive for the virus, nor how many were under investigation while awaiting test results. Many of the people under investigation for the virus turn out to be negative, officials have said.

Fridays hospitalizations include 88 patients in critical or intensive care (the same as the day before), including 38 on ventilators (six more than the day before).

There were 39 coronavirus patients discharged Friday, according to the states coronavirus tracking website.

New Jerseys COVID-19 hospitalizations have dropped dramatically since the states peak in mid-April, when there were more than 8,000 patients.

COUNTY-BY-COUNTY CASES (sorted by most new cases)

Ocean County: 12,903 positive tests (240 new), 983 confirmed deaths (65 probable)

Essex County: 21,024 positive tests (61 new), 1,899 confirmed deaths (230 probable)

Middlesex County: 19,379 positive tests (56 new), 1,223 confirmed deaths (202 probable)

Monmouth County: 11,778 positive tests (52 new), 775 confirmed deaths (92 probable)

Bergen County: 22,363 positive tests (36 new), 1,82 confirmed deaths (243 probable)

Camden County: 9,860 positive tests (36 new), 556 confirmed deaths (53 probable)

Union County: 17,602 positive tests (35 new), 1,189 confirmed deaths (166 probable)

Burlington County: 7,098 positive tests (34 new), 457 confirmed deaths (39 probable)

Passaic County: 18,982 positive tests (32 new), 1,112 confirmed deaths (142 probable)

Gloucester County: 4,489 positive tests (29 new), 220 confirmed deaths (7 probable)

Morris County: 7,847 positive tests (29 new), 686 confirmed deaths (145 probable)

Hudson County: 20,621 positive tests (26 new), 1,355 confirmed deaths (160 probable)

Atlantic County: 4,055 positive tests (24 new), 245 confirmed deaths (11 probable)

Mercer County: 8,628 positive tests (12 new), 599 confirmed deaths (36 probable)

Salem County: 1,062 positive tests (9 new), 83 confirmed deaths (6 probable)

Somerset County: 5,786 positive tests (9 new), 499 confirmed deaths (74 probable)

Sussex County: 1,490 positive tests (9 new), 161 confirmed deaths (37 probable)

Cumberland County: 3,778 positive tests (7 new), 151 confirmed deaths (8 probable)

Hunterdon County: 1,311 positive tests (5 new), 71 confirmed deaths (54 probable)

Cape May County: 1,020 positive tests (5 new), 88 confirmed deaths (8 probable)

Warren County: 1,438 positive tests (3 new), 158 confirmed deaths (13 probable)

There are another 336 positive cases that remain under investigation, with the patients' home counties not confirmed.

AGE BREAKDOWN

Broken down by age, those 30 to 49 years old make up the largest percentage of New Jersey residents that have caught the virus (31%), followed by those 50-64 (26.6%), 18-29 (16.1%), 65-79 (13.3%), 80 and older (9.1%), 5-17 (3%), and 0-4 (0.6%).

On average, the virus has been more deadly for older residents, especially those with pre-existing conditions. Nearly half the states COVID-19 deaths have been of residents 80 and older (47.1%), followed by those 65-79 (32.2%), 50-64 (15.9%), 30-49 (4.3%), 18-25 (0.4%), 5-17 (0%), and 0-4 (0%).

At least 7,157 of the states COVID-19 deaths have been of residents and staff members at nursing homes and other long-term care facilities.

CORONAVIRUS RESOURCES: Live map tracker | Newsletter | Homepage

New Jersey is asking travelers from 35 U.S. states and territories considered COVID-19 hotspots to quarantine for 14 days after arriving here  including residents returning home.

The state has allowed some businesses listed in Stage 3 of its recovery plan to reopen with restrictions  including gyms, movie theaters, and indoor dining.

Murphy said this week the state have not seen specific examples of outbreaks linked to gyms and indoor dining reopening. But he said the state will need to see a sustained lack of outbreaks from those venues until officials can lift capacity limits. He said Friday he doesnt have a specific date for when that may happen.

Despite the new warnings Friday, Republican lawmakers pushed Murphy to ease restrictions further.

State Sen. Michael Testa, R-Cumberland, said the governors overbearing executive orders that have caused unimaginable disruption to the lives and livelihoods of our friends and neighbors.

It has to end, Testa said.

The pandemic and its aftermath have taken a major toll on the states economy. More than 1.6 million residents have filed for unemployment, businesses have lost untold revenue, and numerous businesses have closed permanently.

GLOBAL NUMBERS

As of early Saturday afternoon, there have been more than 32.63million positive COVID-19 tests across the world, according to a running tally by Johns Hopkins University. More than 990,200 people have died, while more than 22.52 million people have recovered.

The United States has the most positive tests in the world, at more than 7.04 million, and the most deaths, at more than 204,000.

Our journalism needs your support. Please subscribe today to NJ.com

Brent Johnson may be reached at bjohnson@njadvancemedia.com.
Kym Marsh is set to go up against Lorraine Kelly's eponymous show as she's teaming up with Gethin Jones to front a new breakfast show on BBC.

The former Coronation Street actress, 44, who hosted current affairs programme Your Money and Your Life on the network over the summer, and The One show star, 42, will present Morning Live from October.

The daytime series aims to be 'a lively and entertaining mix of topical content and expert advice' and will air from 9:15 until 10:00 on weekdays, going directly against broadcaster Lorraine's ITV hit.

Competition: Kym Marsh is set to go up against Lorraine Kelly's show as she's teaming up with Gethin Jones to front a new breakfast show on BBC (pictured on Your Money and Your Life)

It is commissioned to run for 40 episodes, taking viewers up to Christmas, with a view to extending into 2021.

The show is currently commissioned to run for 40 episodes to take fans up to Christmas, with hopes of bosses extending it into the next year if successful.

On her new role, Kym, who quit Corrie in 2019 following a 13-year run, told The Mirror: 'I've always enjoyed morning TV, it's a great way to start the day.

Shake-up: The daytime series will air from 9:15 until 10:00 on weekdays, going directly against broadcaster Lorraine's ITV hit (pictured on Thursday)

Exciting times ahead: The former Coronation Street star, 44, and The One show star (pictured R with Alex Scott and Katy Perry in July), 42, will present Morning Live from October

'I love nothing more than a good catch up, although this will be on a slightly different scale, more of a daily conversation with our viewers.'

Welsh broadcaster Gethin added: 'A presenting role on a morning show like this is a bit of a dream for me. What I'm most excited about is the opportunity to delve in to some of the biggest issues at the heart of our everyday lives.'

Morning Live was created by BBC's Head of Daytime and Early Peak, Carla-Maria Lawson and the team who produce The One Show.

Last year, Kym took a big leap by leaving her role as Michelle Connor on the ITV soap behind.

At the time, the media personality revealed it was an 'incredibly difficult decision' to bow out of the hit series, but admitted she felt it was the right time for her to seek out other roles.

She told The Sun: 'When I was lucky enough to be offered four episodes I could never in my wildest dreams have thought I'd be here 13 years later.

'I need to explore some other roles': Last year, the actress took a big leap by leaving her role as Michelle Connor on Corrie behind (pictured with Beverley Callard as Liz McDonald in 2016)

'It's been an incredibly difficult decision but it feels like the right time for me to explore some other roles.

The brunette found fame in the pop group Hear'Say which she joined after taking part in the TV series Popstars in 2001.

She made her on screen acting debut four years later in an episode of Doctors before joining Coronation Street in 2006.

During her time on the show, the musician has faced some heavy plots, including suffering a stillbirth, being drugged and kidnapped by her ex-partner Will Chatterton, and being involved in a car crash with her teenage son Ali.
BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept. 26

By Klavdiya Romakayeva - Trend:

Scientists from Uzbekistan are working to create the country's own vaccine against coronavirus, Trend reports with reference to the Ministry of Health in Uzbekistan.

According to the ministry, scientists are working in collaboration with the country's pharmaceutical companies.

The development of local vaccine will help the country not to depend on imports.The ministry further said the domestically made vaccine may be exported to other countries.

Earlier, Chief Sanitary Inspector in Uzbekistan Nurmat Otabekov said that the country is not working on creation of a vaccine. He emphasized that Uzbekistan will be purchasing vaccines according to WHO recommendations.

Meanwhile, head of the laboratory of the Agency for Sanitary and Epidemiological Welfare, Ibragim Mamatkulov, at a briefing at the Agency of Information and Mass Communications under the Administration of the President of Uzbekistan denied the widespread report in the Russian media that Russia would supply 35 million doses of 'Sputnik V' vaccine to Uzbekistan.

According to him, there were also proposals from Chinese companies to jointly conduct the third phase of clinical trials of vaccines in Uzbekistan. In particular, the Ministry of Innovative Development signed agreements with the authorized representative of the Chinese company Sinopharm - Yilin International Commerce LLC, as well as with Zhifei Longcom.

---

Follow the author on Twitter: @romakayeva


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Many of the recent COVID-19 infections in Winnipeg have been linked to bar-hopping and restaurant-going 20-somethings, yet Manitoba's new pandemic restrictions taking effect Monday dont specifically target drinking establishments and eateries.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 25/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Many of the recent COVID-19 infections in Winnipeg have been linked to bar-hopping and restaurant-going 20-somethings, yet Manitoba's new pandemic restrictions taking effect Monday dont specifically target drinking establishments and eateries.

Rather than ordering licensed establishments in Winnipeg and the surrounding communities to stop serving alcohol at an earlier time, as Quebec, Ontario and B.C. have done to slow the spread of the virus, Manitoba's chief public health officer said consultation with stakeholders is needed first.

"Government and public health officials will be consulting with the restaurant industry as well as bars, beverage rooms, brew pubs, microbreweries and distilleries on steps that could be further implemented to lower the risk of COVID transmission," Dr. Brent Roussin said Friday at an impromptu news conference. "Additional steps may be put in place following these consultations."

Roussin noted the mandatory mask rule for public places will apply to bars and restaurants.

"Staff and patrons will be expected to wear a mask except while seated at a table to eat and drink," he said.

Beyond that, nothing changes  for now.

Bars and restaurants will continue to follow current orders regarding capacity and tables being two metres apart. Additional steps, such as imposing an earlier last-call for alcohol or limiting capacity, will be on the agenda when public health consults with the industry, he said.

"We're going to immediately start engaging with these sectors because we need to change the way things are operating right now," Roussin said. "There's restaurants and bars that have done their part but we do see significant transmission in that sector. So we do need to engage with them and come up with a way to change the way things are happening right now."

A day earlier, at his regularly scheduled Thursday press briefing, Roussin sounded the alarm about bars and restaurants. He provided examples of how the virus is being spread in Winnipeg in recent weeks  mainly by people in their 20s, including one bar-hopper with COVID-19 symptoms who possibly infected multiple people after having 36 reported contacts.

On Friday, the public health chief announced Winnipeg and its neighbouring communities will have their status under the province's pandemic response system elevated to restricted (orange), with new restrictions taking effect Monday. However, pandemic rules for bars and restaurants will remain mostly untouched.

The mandatory mask rule for public places will apply to bars and restaurants. (Mikaela MacKenzie / Winnipeg Free Press files)

Other provinces have experienced similar increases in COVID-19 infection rates linked to bars, restaurants and young people  and they took more targeted measures.

On Friday, the rising rate of COVID-19 cases in Ontario over the past five weeks prompted it to announce that last call at bars and restaurants, including nightclubs, is 11 p.m., effective at 12:01 a.m. Saturday. All strip clubs will be closed until further notice.

"Private social gatherings continue to be a significant source of transmission in many local communities, along with outbreak clusters in restaurants, bars and other food and drink establishments, including strip clubs, with most cases in the 20-39 age group," the province of Ontario said in a news release.

All businesses and organizations have been ordered to start screening people who wish to enter their premises for COVID-19 symptoms.

In Quebec, health officials announced Sept. 20 that bars and restaurants in affected urban areas including Montreal had to stop serving alcohol at 11 p.m. and close at midnight. Private gatherings were also reduced to a maximum of six people from 10. At events like weddings, barbecues or religious services, a maximum of 25 people are allowed. In settings that involve sitting and little talking, such as movie theatres or concert halls, a 250-person limit remained in place.

Earlier this month in B.C., the province clamped down on nightlife, banquet hall and alcohol-serving establishments, with liquor sales at all venues and private events ending at 10 p.m., and all premises closing by 11 p.m. unless a full meal service is offered.

Most of Winnipeg's taprooms, including Sookram's (abvove), already have mandatory mask orders in place. (Mikaela MacKenzie / Winnipeg Free Press)

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Restrictions to tamp down the spread of the virus in Winnipeg may have come sooner if the provincial government wasn't pushing for economic restrictions to be eased, Manitoba Liberal Leader Dougald Lamont alleged Friday.

"On the one hand, we have cases that are up and a declaration of a code orange for Winnipeg but it looks like a whole bunch of things aren't going to change at all including where infections are taking place," Lamont told reporters at a press conference.

He referred to a copy of a letter from an assistant deputy minister of health dated Sept. 23 that said, "Manitoba is now in a position to ease some of the restrictions and support economic recovery by taking measures to restore some services." The letter sent this week  while Winnipeg infection rates continued to rise said consultation with key sectors will be held, and restrictions will be eased based on public health and safety.

"That really makes it sound like everything's OK," Lamont said. "It seems very clear to me there's a gap between the politics of the pandemic and the public health aspect."

The provincial government did not respond to a request for comment Friday afternoon.

carol.sanders@freepress.mb.ca
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 00:34:42|Editor: huaxia

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Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi lays a wreath at the Square of the Mozambican Heroes during the celebrations of the 56th anniversary of the launching of the armed struggle for liberation and the Day of the Armed Forces of Defense of Mozambique (FADM) in Maputo, Mozambique, Sept. 25, 2020. Mozambique is facing with multiple challenges and a different version of war from the past independence struggles, which requires the involvement of the whole society as defense issues are not exclusive to the military, Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi said Friday in Maputo. (Photo by Israel Zefanias/Xinhua)

MAPUTO, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- Mozambique is facing with multiple challenges and a different version of war from the past independence struggles, which requires the involvement of the whole society as defense issues are not exclusive to the military, Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi said Friday in Maputo.

The President made the remarks in his speech during the celebrations of the 56th anniversary of the launching of the armed struggle for liberation, and the Day of the Armed Forces of Defense of Mozambique (FADM).

"The terrorist attacks in some districts of the province of Cabo Delgado, as well as the attacks in the central area of the country led by the self-proclaimed Military Junta of Renamo, constitute a clear affront to national independence, territorial integrity and peace, which the Mozambican people achieved with a lot of sacrifice," said Nyusi.

Nyusi said that if in the past the FADM had the challenge of liberating the country, threats are diffuse and more unpredictable today with the advent of globalization, which requires a high level of flexibility and readiness from FADM.

Terrorism, transnational crime, piracy, cybercrime and humanitarian missions are some of the challenges for which the national forces must also be prepared to fight and win, said Nyusi.

For such a goal to be achieved, there is a need to design cooperative responses and integrated approaches, combining the military and civilian components, said the president, adding that consolidating independence is a task of all citizens, not only of the FADM.

This does not exempt the FADM from its role of defending the homeland, territorial integrity and the maintenance of peace, who deserve the society's solidarity and recognition for the mission they perform, said the Commander-in-Chief.

Mozambique achieved national independence on June 25, 1975, after a decade of liberation war against Portuguese colonial rule. Enditem
A large number of anti-lockdown protestors are gathering in London today, prompting a warning by the Metropolitan police to abide by coronavirus restrictions.

A coalition of groups has organised to protest social restrictions, six months after the Coronavirus Act 2020 was imposed by the government, giving them powers to enforce lockdown.

The umbrella movement rejects vaccines, masks and lockdowns and amongst those assembled are 5G conspiracy theorists, coronavirus sceptics and anti-vaxxers.

The We Do Not Consent! mass rally is protesting government implemented restrictions to combat covid and bills the slogan Human race, get off your knees.

Thousands of anti-lockdown protestors are currently chanting take off the mask while one spotted sign reads when tyranny becomes law resistance becomes duty.

Earlier, police reportedly searched a man and confiscated a makeshift riot shield that he was carrying.

Known member of the group Piers Corbyn, 73, brother of Jeremy Corbyn, was spotted in the crowd. Also present and speaking at the event is conspiracy theorist and former footballer David Icke, 68.

Ickes son, singer-songwriter Gareth Icke, 38, is also due to guest speak.

A further event, planned to take place in Hyde Park on Sunday, is billed as a peoples network and family picnic.

The Met have prepared for a significant policing operation to deal with the demonstrations in Trafalgar Square and Hyde Park today.

The poster bill for today's mass rally in Trafalgar Square by anti-lockdown protestors (Lizzie Dearden)

In a statement, they said violence will not be tolerated and throughout the week they have been engaging with organisers, reminding them of their legal obligations.

They added: However, if people fail to comply, and continue to put themselves at risk, officers will take enforcement action.

Protest is an exemption from the rule of six restriction but those attending the event have been told to remain socially distant.

Todays event follows a separate rally by anti-lockdown protestors last week in London which led to more than a dozen officers being injured and 32 arrests were made.

Commander Ade Adelekan, who is leading the Met operation today, said: Last weekend it was highly disappointing to see that a small minority of demonstrators targeted officers with violence.

He added: I will not tolerate a repeat of this behaviour this weekend and officers will respond quickly to any scenes of violence.

Last weeks event saw anti-vaxxers holding banners while chanting freedom, covid is a scam and save our rights. No mandated vaccines.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 15:42:27|Editor: huaxia

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BANGKOK, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Seven people were killed and 40 others injured in a collision between a tour bus and a trailer truck in northeastern Thailand on early Saturday.

They were aboard the bus when the accident occurred at an intersection on a bypass road in the capital district of the Nakhon Ratchasima province, said police officer Anuha Khammuang from the Pho Klang police station.

The seven deceased were killed on the scene of the bus collision with the 22-wheeled trailer truck. The injured were rushed to nearby hospitals for treatment.

The bus driver, unidentified, was apparently falling asleep when the bus crashed into the rear part of the cassava-laden truck, the police officer cited some passengers as saying. Enditem
By PTI

PATNA: Senior BJP leader Ravi Shankar Prasad said on Saturday that the constituents of the NDA will contest the Bihar assembly elections together, asserting that the problems within the coalition will be resolved.

Prasad, the Union Law Minister, exuded confidence that the Nitish Kumar-led alliance in Bihar will win the election with a decisive mandate because of the development work done by the Centre and state government.

"NDA is one...We will contest the elections together. If there is some problem, it will be solved," he said, replying to a question on the differences between the LJP and JD(U).

Nitish Kumar's JD(U) and Chirag Paswan-led LJP have been at loggerheads for some time.

The LJP has indicated that it would field candidates against the JD(U), leading to an uneasy situation within the NDA in Bihar.

ALSO READ | EC issues guidelines to hold free, fair, safe polls in Bihar

Even as Paswan swears by his loyalty towards Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in whose cabinet his father and LJP founder Ram Vilas Paswan is a minister, he has often criticised the Nitish Kumar government.

The elections will be held in the state in three phases from October 28 to November 7.

The votes will be counted on November 10.

Speaking to reporters at the party office here, Prasad said that discussions are underway on the seat-sharing "at levels where it should be" "This is the domain of the parliamentary board and central election committee. It is their job to decide. I can't enter their domain," he said, replying to a question on the seat-sharing formula.

Prasad, who represents the Patna Sahib seat in the Lok Sabha, said the Nitish Kumar-led government has done a lot of work for the state's overall development.



ALSO READ | Tejasvi Surya youth wing chief, Mukul Roy party V-P: Nadda names new BJP team ahead of Bihar polls

"I am confident that the people of Bihar will bless the NDA and help it return to power with a decisive mandate because of its development work. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's love for Bihar is evident from the fact that the announcements which he made have been translated into reality," the minister said.

In an apparent swipe at RJD leader Tejashwi Prasad Yadav, Prasad questioned why the photos of Lalu Prasad and Rabri Devi have been dropped from the party's hoardings.

"Out of sheer curiosity, I just want to know as to why one is ashamed of his or her heritage? Why there is a need to hide one's heritage? It is because they have nothing to show," he said.

The BJP leader said there is no clarity on who is the leader of the opposition Grand Alliance and it is in a state of disarray.

"The alliance is in disarray as people are leaving it. It will be interesting to know as to who stays in the alliance," Prasad said.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 12:27:04|Editor: huaxia

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Photo released by World Wildlife Fund (WWF)-Cambodia on Sept. 26, 2020 shows an Eld's deer captured by a camera in the Sambor Wildlife Sanctuary in Kratie, Cambodia. Four endangered Eld's deers were photographed for the first time in five years by cameras deployed in the Sambor Wildlife Sanctuary in Cambodia's Kratie province, according to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF)-Cambodia's press statement on Saturday. (WWF-Cambodia/Handout via Xinhua)

PHNOM PENH, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Four endangered Eld's deers were photographed for the first time in five years by cameras deployed in a wildlife sanctuary in Northeast Cambodia's Kratie province, according to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF)-Cambodia's press statement on Saturday.

The cameras were placed in the Sambor Wildlife Sanctuary located in the Mekong flooded forest landscape, the statement said, adding that the Eld's deer is listed as endangered in both Cambodia's Forestry Law and on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List.

Conservationists are thrilled to see the rare images of three adult females and one juvenile Eld's deer roaming the sanctuary, as they examined this week 1,710 photographs produced between August and September by the cameras that were deployed at different locations in the sanctuary with a total area of 50,093 hectares.

"We are very excited about this discovery," said Eam Sam Un, biodiversity research and monitoring manager with the WWF.

The camera trapping survey efforts were conducted jointly by researchers and rangers from the Kratie's Provincial Department of Environment, Community Forestry, and WWF staff, the statement said.

WWF's scientists described the camera trap event as a significant discovery for conservation in the Mekong landscape.

"The photographs provide evidence that our conservation efforts are paying off, raising hopes for the protection of the animal in the country and region," said Seng Teak, WWF country director.

Aside from the Eld's deers, the photographs also documented the presence of red muntjac, wild pig, small indian civet, common palm civet, as well as large bird species such as the endangered green peafowl and vulnerable lesser adjutant.

A report on threatened species published by IUCN in 2015 showed the population of the Eld's deer has scattered across the globe with an estimate of less than 700 individuals, and with a small subpopulation remaining in Cambodia's protected forests.

The WWF has been working closely with the Cambodian government at all levels to support the management of the Sambor Wildlife Sanctuary, where habitat loss and poaching for meat and trade are among major known threats to the species' survival, the statement said. Enditem
Bakersfield, CA (93308)

Today

Some clouds this morning will give way to generally sunny skies for the afternoon. High 63F. Winds light and variable..

Tonight

Clear skies. Low 39F. Winds light and variable.
Sorting and sowing machines adopted to assist hybrid rice plantation on China's undulating hill-formed farmlands are entering the industrial phase, Tang Wenbang, a professor from Hunan Agricultural University announced at a recent symposium.

Tang revealed the development to more than 30 agriculturists attending the symposium in Changsha, capital of Hunan province on Sept 22. The workshop focused on frontier crop-growing sciences.

To address the conundrum leading to labor-intensive farming on land separated by numerous hills, the new small-size machines can identify seeds before sorting them completely with great accuracy. In this way, seed wastage will be cut to less than 1% and productive efficiency will be raised by 36.3%.

"Those machines, adapted to different geographic conditions and scale of production, can provide solutions to long-existing technological problems on how to industrialize hybrid rice production at a much lower cost in terms of the use of seeds," Professor Tang said.

The symposium, coinciding with the Third Chinese Farmers' Harvest Festival established in 2018 to mark the Fall equinox under the Chinese Lunar Calendar, also received a congratulatory letter from Yuan Longping, the forerunner and top engineer of the country's hybrid-rice sciences.

"The development of crop sciences should be highly relevant to crop production and today's symposium well demonstrates this relationship," Yuan wrote.

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- Given Rapula is a young South African man who is following his dreams and achieving success

- At the age of just 24, Rapula already published two books and is set to release a third soon

- His second book was published in both London, UK, and California in the United States

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It is inspiring to see young South Africans being recognised for their talent abroad and Given Rapula is among them.

The 24-year-old, who goes by the pen name g. l. rapula, is set to publish his third book and one of his novels has been distributed in the UK and USA.

Speaking to Briefly.co.za, Rapula opened up about his remarkable journey and the struggles he had to overcome.

Rapula was born in Swartklipe, a town in Waterberg District Municipality in the Limpopo province of South Africa.

Given Rapula is making a name for himself as an author despite only being 24 years old. Photo: Supplied.

Source: UGC

He said:

"I was raised by my parents in Saulspoort. I have two siblings: a little brother and older sister. Saulspoort is a village at the northern foot of the Pilanesberg, about 65km north of Rustenburg."

In 2015, when he was still in high school, Rapula came up with the idea for his first book. It took him three years to complete the book but a second novel followed shortly afterwards.

However, even after writing his book, the young author discover how hard it is to get published.

Rapula recalled:

"I struggled to find publishers, find an agent to represent me from the beginning. I ended up publishing with a self publishing company. The major struggle I encountered was the moment I lost my management; I started struggling with marketing and advertising, especially in South Africa since then."

However, with his second book, Rapula's luck turned around and he got signed by a British management company.

The company opened doors for the young man in both the UK and USA. His book was distributed in London, UK, and California in the United States.

He revealed a big accomplishment was when he worked with British famous author management, Amanda Hofmann.

Now, the 24-year-old is set to publish his third book and he hopes to one day become a best seller in South Africa and the world.

As for other young aspiring writers, Rapula said:

"A road twice travelled is never too long. Don't give up on your dream because of you are passing through bad things; you only grow when you learn, not when you give up!"

Meanwhile, in other news, a young woman, Seluleko Qwabe, called on Mzansi for help to pay her tuition fees. On Thursday, Qwabe detailed how she might be financially excluded from continuing her medicine studies at Wits because of the money they owe the higher education institution.

She shared a photo of herself and another one of her family on Twitter. Qwabe made a desperate plea to anyone who is willing to help, even if they only donated R10 towards the R132 000 she owes.

South Africans have showed the future doctor tremendous support by not only donating the money she needs but by sharing her story and raising awareness for her cause.

Have national and human interest issues to discuss? Know someone who is extremely talented and needs recognition?

Your stories and photos are always welcome. Get interactive via our Facebook page

Source: YEN.com.gh
A federal judge in Manhattan on Friday ordered a new trial for Gigi Jordan, who was convicted of killing her 8-year-old autistic son after mounting a novel defense based on her belief that her first husband would murder her and her second would victimize the boy after her death.

Ms. Jordan was convicted in 2014 of manslaughter and sentenced in 2015 to 18 years in prison after a trial that became tabloid fodder. Now she may well go free because a prosecutor asked for, and a judge granted, a closed-door hearing during her trial.

The facts of Ms. Jordans case are not in dispute. She admitted poisoning her son, Jude Mirra, in 2010 by giving him a lethal dose of medication in a luxury hotel room in Midtown Manhattan.

But Ms. Jordan, a wealthy medical entrepreneur, said that she had done so only because she thought that her first husband would kill her and that her son would wind up in the custody of his father, her second husband, whom she suspected of sexually abusing him. Both men strongly denied the accusations.
United Nations, Sep 26 : With India set to become an elected member of the UN Security Council next year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi presented an upbeat and forward-looking agenda stressing India's contributions to the global good, while also pointing out the shortcomings of the UN.

Modi told the UN General Assembly's High-Level Meeting in a pre-recorded speech, "We treat the whole world as one family. It is part of our culture, character and thinking. In the United Nations too, India has always given priority to the welfare of the whole world." At the fractitious UN Security Council, he said, "As the world's largest democracy we will bring our years of rich developmental experience for the benefit of the whole world. Our way forward is to proceed from human welfare to the welfare of the world." But he asked, "The international community today is faced with a very important question: Whether the character of the institution, constituted in the prevailing circumstances of 1945, is relevant even today?"

Making the case for a permanent seat for India on the UN Security Council, he said, "Today, the people of India are concerned whether this reform-process will ever reach its logical conclusion. For how long will India be kept out of the decision-making structures of the United Nations?" Stressing on the need for UN reforms, he pointed out its failure on the COVID-19 pandemic front.

He said, "Over the last eight to nine months, the whole world has been battling the pandemic of the coronavirus. Where is the United Nations in this joint fight against the pandemic? Where is its effective response?" His statesman-like speech stayed off any contentious regional issues and did not mention any country or, unlike many, did not criticise others directly.

The threatened protests outside the UN failed to materialise on a grey day overshadowed by rain clouds in New York. His speech may have also been a disappointment to those who expected a sharp take on regional issues and were preparing to rage.

Setting out India's pharmadiplomacy, Modi took on the overwhelming concern of the world, the COVID-19 crisis that has been a running theme in the speech of every leader, and offered to put his country's vaccine-making capacity - the largest in the world - at the service of "all humanity".

"India's vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis," Modi said.

As many developing countries may not have the facilities to store and distribute vaccines, Modi added that India will help countries set up cold chain and storage capacities.

He noted that as the world's pharmacy, "even during these very difficult times of the raging pandemic, the pharmaceutical industry of India has sent essential medicines to more than 150 countries." At the UN Security Council, Modi said, "India will not hesitate in raising its voice against the enemies of humanity, human race and human values - these include terrorism, smuggling of illegal weapons, drugs and money-laundering." He added, "India's cultural heritage, tradition, thousands of years of experience will always stand in good stead for the developing countries." "It is a fact that the faith and respect that the United Nations enjoys among the 1.3 billion people in India is unparalleled," he said.

Turning to India's foreign policy, Modi restated his view of a post-polarisation, dynamic non-alignment.

"Any gesture of friendship by India towards one country is not directed against any third country," he said.

"When India strengthens its development partnership, it is not with any malafide intent of making the partner country dependent or hapless," he added.

On regional policy, he said, "From India's 'Neighbourhood First Policy' to our 'Act East Policy', as well as the idea of 'Security and Growth for All in the Region', or our views towards the Indo-Pacific region, we have always worked for the interests of humankind and not driven by our own self-interests. India's partnerships are always guided by this very principle." Modi spoke of his policy of Aatmanirbhar Bharat - or 'Self-reliant India' - in the post-COVID world.

He said, "In the changed circumstances of the post-pandemic era, we are moving forward with the vision of a Self-reliant India. A Self-reliant India will also be a force multiplier for the global economy." Modi showcased India's developmental efforts as a democracy of 1.3 billion people.

"Following the mantra of Reform-Perform-Transform, India has made great efforts to bring about transformation in the lives of millions of its citizens. These experiences are as useful for many countries of the world as they have been for us," he said.

But he added with a touch of humility, "In its journey towards progress, India wants to learn from the world as well as share its own experiences with the world." His development scorecard included bringing over 400 million people into the formal financial sector; giving 600 million people toilet facilities; providing free health care for 500 million people, and ensuring 26 weeks of maternity leave for women.

He said that women have been the biggest beneficiaries of entrepreneurship and micro-finance programmes.

The rights of transgender people have been legally secured, he said.

(Arul Louis can be reached at arul.l@ians.in and followed on Twitter at @arulouis)
By Steve Holland, Lawrence Hurley and Andrew Chung

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump on Saturday nominated Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, and she pledged to become a justice in the mold of the late staunch conservative Antonin Scalia, setting another milestone in Trump's rightward shift of the top U.S. judicial body.

Trump's announcement during a flag-festooned White House Rose Garden ceremony - with Barrett, 48, by his side and her seven children on hand - sets off a scramble by Senate Republicans to confirm her as the president has requested before Election Day in 5-1/2 weeks, when he will be seeking a second term in office.

If confirmed by the Senate to replace liberal icon Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died at age 87 on Sept. 18, Barrett would become the fifth woman ever to serve on the court and would push its conservative majority to a commanding 6-3.

Like Trump's two other appointees, Neil Gorsuch in 2017 and Brett Kavanaugh in 2018, Barrett is young enough that she could serve for decades in the lifetime job, leaving a lasting conservative imprint. Barrett is the youngest Supreme Court nominee since conservative Clarence Thomas was 43 in 1991.

Scalia, who died in 2016, was one of the most influential conservative justices in recent history. Barrett previously served as a clerk for Scalia on the high court and described him as her mentor, citing his "incalculable influence" on her life.

"His judicial philosophy is mine too: a judge must apply the law as written. Judges are not policymakers," Barrett said.

On the court, Scalia voted to curb abortion rights, dissented when the court legalized gay marriage - he called it a "judicial putsch" - and backed broad gun rights, among other positions.

With Trump's fellow Republicans holding a 53-47 Senate majority, confirmation appears certain, although Democrats may try to make it as difficult as possible.

An emboldened Supreme Court conservative majority could shift the United States to the right on hot-button issues by, among other things, curbing abortion rights, expanding religious rights, striking down gun control laws, halting the expansion of LGBT rights, and endorsing new restrictions on voting rights.

Story continues

Barrett, a devout Roman Catholic who earned her law degree and taught at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana, was appointed by Trump to the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2017 and is a favorite of religious conservatives, a key Trump voter bloc.

"Today it is my honor to nominate one of our nation's most brilliant and gifted legal minds to the Supreme Court," Trump said.

Trump said Barrett would be the first mother of school-age children ever on the court. Along with her lawyer husband, her children, two of whom were adopted from Haiti, were in the audience.

Later on Saturday evening, the president drew loud cheers from thousands of supporters at a campaign rally in Middletown, Pennsylvania, when he called Barrett "an extraordinary scholar" who would defend their "God-given rights and freedoms."

"She should be running for president," he said, comparing her academic record to that of his Democratic rival Joe Biden.

Barrett also praised Ginsburg, saying the late justice was "a woman of enormous talent and consequence" and mentioned Ginsburg's long friendship with Scalia.

MOVING AHEAD

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell issued a statement praising Barrett and pledging to move forward quickly with the confirmation process. But Biden repeated his call for the appointment to be made by the winner of the Nov. 3 election.

"The Senate should not act on this vacancy until after the American people select their next president and the next Congress," Biden said.

Democrats are still furious over McConnell's 2016 refusal to consider President Barack Obama's Supreme Court nomination of Merrick Garland because it came during an election year. This marks the first time since 1956 that a U.S. president has moved to fill a Supreme Court vacancy so close to an election.

Former presidential candidate and senator Bernie Sanders called Republican efforts to push through the nomination "an absolute outrage" and said Americans should fight "as hard as we can to ensure that this nominee is not confirmed."

Barrett is expected to begin traditional courtesy calls on individual senators on Tuesday. Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearings will begin Oct. 12, Trump said.

Democrats are set to make the fate of the Obamacare healthcare law a key part of the confirmation fight.

Barrett could be on the bench for the court's Nov. 10 oral arguments in a case in which Trump and fellow Republicans are seeking to invalidate the 2010 law, formally called the Affordable Care Act.

"Justice Ginsburg must be turning over in her grave up in heaven," top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer said, "to see that the person they chose seems to be intent on undoing all the things that Ginsburg did."

(Reporting by Lawrence Hurley, Andrew Chung and Steve Holland; Additional reporting by Mike Stone and Idrees Ali in Washington and Andrea Shalal in Middletown, Penn.; Editing by Will Dunham, Scott Malone and Raju Gopalakrishnan)
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-27 00:26:26|Editor: huaxia

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LONDON, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Another 6,042 people in Britain have tested positive for COVID-19, bringing the total number of coronavirus cases in the country to 429,277, according to official figures released Saturday.

The coronavirus-related death toll rose by 34 to 41,971, the latest official data showed.

Graham Medley, an infectious disease modelling expert, warned that daily coronavirus death toll could rise to 100 in three to four weeks' time.

Medley, who sits on the government's Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), said, "We need to make sure transmission comes down now to prevent the figure increasing further."

"The treatments (for COVID-19) have improved, the way the virus is transmitting is going to be different, but nonetheless it is a dangerous virus and inevitably it will lead to some deaths," Medley told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

The British government announced Friday that more cities, including Leeds, Blackpool, Wigan, Stockport, Cardiff, Swansea and Llanelli, will go into local lockdown as part of its efforts to curb the sharp rise in coronavirus cases. About a quarter of people in Britain are, or soon will be, living under extra lockdown restrictions, according to Sky News.

Meanwhile, countries, such as Britain, China, Russia and the United States, are racing against time to develop coronavirus vaccines.

The British government's Chief Scientific Adviser Patrick Vallance said Monday that it is possible that some vaccine could be available in small amounts later this year, but it is more likely that a vaccine will be available early next year, although that is not guaranteed. Enditem
This is Highly Recommend, a column dedicated to what people in the food industry are obsessed with eating, drinking, and buying right now.

I hesitate to write thisbecause the general public already thinks that the editors at Bon Appetit are all shriveled, sodium-obsessed freaksbut here it goes: I like my water salty. And no, Im not talking about pasta water, or blanching water, or water for storing freshly cut cruditesall of which I want to taste like the sea. Im talking about drinking water.

Okay, okay, not always; Im not a monster. I consume my daily recommended ration of plain ol unadulterated HO like a good boy. But when Im enjoying some Water Plusthat is to say, seltzer over ice, or some tap with a healthy squoze of citrus, the kind of NA bevvie that is more about recreation than hydrationIll add a tiny pinch of Diamond Crystal. Even the most conservative dose works the same magic on a beverage that it does for solid food, making the whole thing taste more: more savory, more quaffable, more craveable. Each swallow leaves my mouth watering, wanting more. This weird quirk of mine also makes me an anomaly in the bubbly water wars. You can keep your La Croix or Topo Chico or Polar. If Im spending money on sparkling water, I want a cold liter of salty, salty Vichy Catalan.

Let me tell you friends, this stuff is hot fire. Hailing fromyou guessed it!the Catalonia region of Spain, this wild-style mineral water contains, according to this water sommelier website that profiles boutique bottled water from around the world (LOL), a whopping 1 gram of sodium per liter. For context: The USDA recommends that adults consume no more than 2.3 grams of sodium per day. Yall, this water has about as much sodium in it as a MFing Big Mac! It is the mineral water equivalent of an aggressive scrub down at a bathhouse or a deep tissue massage: punishing, purgative, purifying. And I cannot get enough.

I remember my first taste of the stuff like it was yesterday. My dining companion and I decided to splash out for sparkling water at Frenchette, a tony modern French restaurant in Manhattan, and we were so engrossed in conversation that I didnt even notice our water glasses being filled from a frosty, elegant, stone-textured bottle. I took a big swig mid-sentence and gasped with pleasure. It was explosive, psychedelically refreshing, like a gripping glass of Gruner cooled with rocks from a pebble beach. Sultry, saline, crispy-but-not-too-fizzy, I knew I had found the water that I would judge all others by, a water that truly got me.

Story continues

I fully understand if nothing Ive said about my beloved Vichy Catalan makes it sound appealing to you. Different strokes! But just saying: If youve found yourself heeding any of BAs insistent salt-related advice and found it changed, say, your pasta or grilled meat game for the better, consider giving Vichy Catalan a shot. A person can have a little salty water. You know, as a treat.

Vichy Catalan Sparkling Mineral Water

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Originally Appeared on Bon Appetit
(Natural News) Several banana plantations are covered in a blanket of ash after Sangay volcano erupted on Sept. 20. The strong eruption sent massive ash clouds into the sky, temporarily darkening the skies above the province of Chimborazo in central Ecuador.

Ecuador is the top banana exporter in the world, and before the eruption, it was posting export increases compared to the same time last year. Authorities said that banana exportation from the affected farms would likely plummet for at least a month after the ashfall interrupted the proper ripening process of the crops.

Sangay volcano, one of Ecuadors most active volcanoes, has been registering high levels of volcanic activity since June. The latest eruption occurred on Sunday morning, with ash continuing to fall until Monday night.

Ashfall affects banana plantations, production

According to the Geophysical Institute of the National Polytechnic School of Ecuador, the Sangay volcano unleashed ash emissions that were stronger and more massive than previous emissions. A large ash cloud rose four to six miles above the volcanos crater, affecting nearby provinces.

Juan Jose Pons, the coordinator of a group of grower-exporter associations called the banana cluster, said that banana plantations in the province of Guayas and Los Rios are among the most affected. The ash shower interrupts the proper ripening process of the banana, Pons told El Comercio, so now the workers in the field will have to do a more meticulous job to avoid the loss of product.

Ecuador was the top banana exporter in 2019, and despite the pandemic, it had been posting export gains since the beginning of this year. According to Fruitnet, the country shipped more than 260 million boxes of bananas between January and August 2020, an increase of 8.45 percent compared to the same period last year. Shipments to the European Union were up by 12.47 percent while exports to Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa increased by about 33 percent, 28 percent and 19 percent, respectively.

But with the ashfall, the Banana Marketing and Export Association (ACORBANEC) said that output from 55,000 hectares of plantations will likely suffer a big blow. We estimate that this will lead to a 25 percent fall in the weekly exportable offer from the affected farms for at least a month, said Richard Salazar, the manager of ACORBANEC.

The ashfall also poses a health risk to the residents, especially as explosive activity continues to rattle at Sangay volcano. The Washington Volcanic Ash Advisory Center reported that the volcano has been spouting ash plumes intermittently, warning that an ash plume might rise up to 21,000 feet days after the Sept. 20 eruption.

The Red Cross already reached out to the victims and mobilized its local volunteers to provide assistance to more than 1,000 families. The organization said that it will be handing out health kits consisting of N95 masks and eye protection glasses, as well as cash aid and animal protection kits.

Notable volcanic eruptions in 2020

Notable volcanic activities this year include the eruption of Mt. Sinabung in Indonesia and Taal Volcano in the Philippines.

Mt. Sinabung had been inactive for more than a year when it exploded in August. It erupted twice in three days, belching a 16,000-foot column of smoke during its second upheaval and plunging nearby towns into darkness. Several residents were forced to abandon their homes due to ashfall, while remaining villagers were advised to keep a three-mile distance from the craters mouth. (Related: Undersea earthquakes strike Indonesia as Mt. Sinabung erupts again.)

Meanwhile, Taal volcano had been mostly quiet for about 43 years until it unleashed a steam-driven explosion in January. It issued a fountain of lava that continued for about an hour and a half and lofted ash nine miles to the sky. Intense thunder and lightning also rumbled above the summit while winds carried volcanic ashfall north across the island of Luzon.

Disaster.news has more on violent volcanic eruptions that disrupted food supply.

Sources include:

StrangeSounds.org

Reliefweb.int

WorldsTopExports.com

VolcanicDiscovery.com

EmergencyLive.com

NBCNews.com

EarthObservatory.NASA.gov
The minister of information and culture, Lai Mohammed, has appealed to Nigerians to be patient with the President Muhamadu Buhari-led administration saying better days are ahead.

During a meeting with online publishers in Lagos, Saturday, Mr Mohammed said the simultaneous increase in both the pump price of fuel and electricity tariff was a mere coincidence.

First, the deregulation of PMS prices was announced on 18 March 2020, and the price modulation that took place at the beginning of this month was just part of the on-going monthly adjustments to global crude oil prices, said Mr Mohammed.

Also, the review of service-based electricity tariffs was scheduled to start at the beginning of July 2020 but was put on hold so that further studies and proper arrangements can be made.

Like Mr President said at the opening of the last Ministerial Retreat, this government is not insensitive to the current economic difficulties our people are going through and the very tough economic situation we face as a nation. We certainly will not inflict hardship on our people. But we are convinced that if we stay focused on our plans, brighter and more prosperous days will come soon.

Mr Mohammed said in comparison to other countries in West and Central Africa, fuel prices and electricity tariff are cheapest in Nigeria.

The drastic fall in the revenues of the government explains why the government had to take certain tough decisions, even as it is acting to mitigate the effect of the economic slowdown by adopting an Economic Sustainability Plan. One of such difficult decisions, which we took at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic in March  when oil prices collapsed at the height of the global lockdown  was the deregulation of the prices of PMS, he said.

Recall that the benefit of lower prices at that time was passed to consumers. Everyone welcomed the lower fuel price then. Again, the effect of deregulation is that PMS prices will change with changes in global oil prices.

This means quite regrettably that as oil prices recover, there will be some increases in PMS prices. This is what has happened now. I am sure Nigerians will prefer to pay slightly higher for PMS than to queue for hours just to get the products at higher prices.

According to the minister, the effect of the changes in the international prices of crude oil on local fuel prices will not last forever.

Modular refineries are beginning to come on stream in the country, and this will help lower the cost of petroleum products, he continued.

Next month, the Waltersmith Modular Refinery in Ibigwe, Imo State, will be commissioned, starting with refining 5,000 barrels of crude per day and increasing rapidly to 50,000 barrels of crude. Many more modular refineries are also in different stages of completion across the country, in addition to the 650,000 barrels per day Dangote Refinery.

The deregulation will bring more investments into the sector, to the benefit of Nigerians.

For the increased tariff, Mr Mohammed said that due to the problems with the largely-privatized electricity industry, the government has been supporting it.

To keep the industry going, the government has so far spent almost 1.7 trillion Naira, especially by way of supplementing tariff shortfalls. The government does not have the

resources to continue along this path. To borrow just to subsidize generation and distribution, which are both privatized, will be grossly irresponsible.

But in order to protect the large majority of Nigerians who cannot afford to pay cost-reflective tariffs from increases, the industry regulator, Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), has approved that tariff adjustments had to be made but only on the basis of guaranteed improvement in service.

Under this new arrangement, only customers with guaranteed minimum of 12 hours of electricity can have their tariffs adjusted. Those who get less than 12 hours supply will experience no increase. This is the largest group of customers.

The minister said the government has noted the complaints about arbitrary estimated billing and that a mass metering programme is being undertaken to provide meters for over five million Nigerians, largely driven by preferred procurement from local manufacturers, and creating thousands of jobs in the process.

NERC will also strictly enforce the capping regulation to ensure that unmetered customers are not charged beyond the metered customers in their neighbourhood. In other words, there will be no more estimated billings.

The government is also taking steps to connect those Nigerians who are not even connected to electricity at all. As you are aware, under its Economic Sustainability Plan, the government is providing solar power to 5 million Nigerian households in the next 12 months. This alone will produce 250,000 jobs and impact up to 25 million beneficiaries through the installation, thus ensuring that more Nigerians will have access to electricity via a reliable and sustainable solar system.
Ah, fall. So welcome  newly arrived and already promising cooler days and nights. Maybe now we can forget the simmering cauldron we inhabited the last couple of months. Summer weather. So overrated.

And of course with the cooler days (and shorter nights) comes Mother Natures annual alchemy, when seemingly overnight, the woods and fields trade their warm-weather greens for a host of showier hues  bright yellows, oranges, reds.

Fall color is determined by a variety of factors: sunlight, precipitation, soil moisture and temperature. To see what fall color will be like in any county in the country, visit smokymountains.com/fall-foliage-map.

In Missouri, fall color is expected to peak this year in the north part of the state the week of Nov. 9, and a week later in the south part.

We are fortunate to have numerous byways where fall color can be savored. My favorite is 188-mile long Missouri Highway 21, most of it a designated scenic route. Weve driven it often.

The road actually begins at Route 30 at Tesson Ferry Road in South County. But the scenic designation begins at Highway 141, just south of the Meramec River. The road runs south through a mostly pastoral landscape, winding through a sublime countryside of thickly wooded hills and wide fields and a dozen or so quaint towns, to the Arkansas line just south of tiny Poynor.

Throughout, Highway 21, built in the 1920s but not fully paved until 1949, is blissfully free of billboards, thanks to former first lady, Lady Bird Johnsons Highway Beautification Campaign. The designated scenic route doesnt quite reach Arkansas, veering west at Doniphan to continue on U.S. Highway 160  but thats a story for another day.

Our first stop this trip was 18 miles south of the Meramec at Sandy Creek Covered Bridge State Historic Site (its well marked). The 76-foot long ruby red Howe-truss bridge was new in 1872 and originally carried Old Lemay Ferry Road, the 19th-century equivalent of todays Interstate 55.

The bridge was destroyed in a flood in 1886, and rebuilt. Placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1970, it was restored in 1984, and is open for foot traffic. Its a popular site for swimming and picnicking.

Between the 1820s and the end of the 19th century, Missouri had about 30 wooden covered bridges. Today, just four remain: the Sandy Creek; the Burfordville bridge in Cape Girardeau County; Locust Creek bridge in Linn County; and Union Bridge in Monroe County. All are now State Historic Sites.

Continue to Hillsboro and make a short detour to the Thomas C. Fletcher House, 400 Elm Street. Fletcher (1827-1899) was Missouris 18th governor (1865-1869), the first Republican. His home, in a lovely shaded glen, was built around 1850, as two log cabins, later sided with clapboard. It now belongs to the city, and for years has held a Ghost Walk in October and Festival of Trees in December. But because of the pandemic, visitors must wait till next year, says city clerk Beth Vreeland.

Nearby is a reliable spring, which may have been the reason the area was settled in the late 1770s, she said. The city was incorporated in 1873.

Ahead is DeSoto, aka Fountain City, nicknamed for its many artesian wells. It was platted in 1857, the same year the St. Louis-Iron Mountain Railroad ran a main line connecting the two (St. Louis and DeSoto). Downtown DeSoto is unusual for its several-dozen-blocks long one-sided historic Main Street; nearly all the shops and other buildings are on the west side. A 1910 picture postcard shows it virtually the same. DeSoto is the birthplace of former Missouri Attorney General and Governor Jay Nixon.

Washington State Park is ahead, a 2,147-acre world of stately oaks, burnished copper and bronze for fall, and beautifully crafted stone buildings. The park (currently with face coverings encouraged and social distancing measures in place) was built in the 1930s during the Great Depression by the Civilian Conservation Corps, a work-relief program. A company of African American stonemasons  Company 1743  built the parks 14 structures, which include hiking shelters, picnic pavilions and the 1000 Steps Trail.

The park, with stout hills, high-up views of the Big River arcing through, picnic areas with grills, and three fine hiking trails, is most famous for its petroglyphs, some 350 symbols carved by Middle Mississippians between 1000 and 1600 A.D. The images, of birds, arrows and geometric shapes among others, make up the largest group of petroglyphs found in Missouri.

Old Mines, the first white settlement in Missouri and an early major player in the lead mining industry, is ahead. French colonists arrived here in the early 18th century when this area was still part of Illinois Country of New France. Frenchman Philippe Renault came to head a mining operation in 1723.

Up till the 1980s, Paw Paw French or Missouri French could still be heard spoken here. In 1985, historic preservation group La Brigade a Renault rebuilt several early French log buildings to resemble a French village on the grounds of St. Joachim Catholic Church on Pat Daly Road just west of the highway. Then for the next 35 years, they held annual two-day La Fete a Renault there. Unfortunately, the event planned for this year had to be canceled due to the pandemic, said Dennis Boyer, secretary for La Brigade.

Starlite Drive-In, 15605 North Highway 21 in Cadet, harkens back to an earlier day when such theaters were common. The drive-in, which opened in the 1950s, can accommodate up to 500 cars, shows new releases on two screens and charges $15 per car, says manager Donna Valle. In fall, the Starlite is open only on weekends (Friday, Saturday and Sunday), and will likely stay open past December (the usual closing date) because of increased popularity, she said. Movies begin at 7:30 p.m.

Todays bustling Potosi, seat of Washington County, originally named Mine a Breton, was founded sometime between 1760 and 1780. Moses Austin, a wealthy businessman and pioneer originally from the East, largely responsible for establishing the American lead mining industry, had racked up huge debt, but in 1798 fled west from his creditors and came to Missouris lead belt to open a mine. He renamed the town Potosi for Cerro Rico de Potosi in Bolivia, the worlds largest silver mine, believing, mistakenly, that the Missouri mine might similarly yield vast amounts of silver.

Moses Austin also dreamed of leading a group of white settlers to Texas, then part of Mexico, which was still a Spanish colony, and had received permission from the Spanish Crown. He died in 1821, before his dream could be realized, but on his death bed, hed persuaded his son Stephen to proceed. Today, Stephen Austin is known as the Father of Texas.

Moses Austin and his wife, Mary, who died three years later, were buried at Hazel Run about 25 miles east of town, but were moved to Potosi Presbyterian Church Cemetery, after it was established in 1833. The simple but stately red brick church, built a year earlier, on Breton Street, still holds services.

Picturesque Caledonia, with only about 130 residents, has a short but impressive stretch of fine homes and intriguing-looking shops along the highway, most notably Old Village Mercantile, new in 1909, and now on the Register of Historic Places. On this occasion swarms of visitors were surging in and out of it and other shops, but with no masks in sight, the case nearly everywhere; we didnt stop.

Popular 120-acre Elephant Rocks State Park is a must-see. The dozens of elephants (more like gigantic beach balls) are weighty red granite boulders shaped a billion or so years ago, as the molten magna under the Earths crust cooled and the ground uplifted to shape the St. Francois Mountains, part of the Ozarks. The largest boulder, nicknamed Dumbo, is 27 feet high, 35 feet long, and weighs some 680 tons. Paths, including a Braille Trail, wind among the boulders and signs tell their story.

Arcadia Valley spreads wide ahead, and far to the east, west and south the massive, shadowy mountains loom. Just north of quaint Ironton, stop at the Battle of Pilot Knob State Historic Site, where the earthworks of Union Fort Davidson can be toured. Here, in September 1864, Confederate Maj. Gen. Sterling Price and a cavalry force of 8,000, many of them unarmed, attacked the fort as part of Prices failed effort to take St. Louis and its arsenal for the South. Exhibits at the visitor center detail the moment in Civil War history, and explain why the Battle of Pilot Knob is a lesson in defense.

Suggested short side trips in the area include Johnsons Shut-Ins State Park and Taum Sauk Mountain State Park.

The highway winds on south through the fall-tinted hills, skirting the Ozark National Scenic Riverways and three expanses of the Mark Twain National Forest. Among the infrequent towns is lovely Ellington, Gateway to Missouri Spring Country.

Last stop on this trip is popular Doniphan, seat of Ripley County, on the Current River, which draws thousands of visitors a year. Several outfitters offer raft, tube and canoe floats on the tap-water-clear sparkling river.

We recommend a visit to 4,000-square foot Current River Heritage Museum, 101 Washington Street, where exhibits chronicle the history of this logging region. Theres an extensive display of butterflies, moths, dragonflies and beetles, all native to Ripley County, says Julie Braschler, museum curator. Also part of the museum is the nearby Pioneer Heritage Homestead and Blacksmith Shop. Exhibits include a historic schoolhouse and a log cabin, which was built around 1865, and occupied by a succession of families till the late 1940s, says Braschler.

Local blacksmith Chris Miller (whos also the city attorney) provides demonstrations of his craft on Saturday mornings. Miller also appears to have a whimsical side: he has a personal collection of about a dozen stuffed bullfrogs, acquired from a taxidermy school in Mexico and on permanent loan to the museum. They are not your run-of-the-mill bullfrogs: these amphibians are shooting pool, playing a miniature piano, performing with a rock band and enjoying a chat at a bar. The museum, admission free, is open 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Monday-Friday and 9 a.m. to noon Saturday.

FOR MORE INFO
Within a day of releasing numbers of coronavirus cases for school district across Texas, a first since the pandemic began, the state health department pulled the data from its website after discovering issues.

Assistant City Manager Colleen Bridger said Friday that the city of San Antonio is relying on its own verified data to understand the viruss grip on area schools.

The Metropolitan Health District on Thursday reported 52 confirmed cases of the coronavirus in Bexar County schools  roughly 35 percent fewer cases than the Texas Department of State Health Services listed before pulling the numbers.

We just make sure that we know for a fact that this student did get a positive lab test result and that they are in the school so that what we are reporting is what we are most worried about, Bridger said.

The case numbers reported on the state website were supposed to be reported directly to the Texas Education Agency by school districts. The state health department did not return a request for comment about the discrepancies Friday evening.

In a statement on its website, it said that issues were identified with the school district data and that a new file would be posted once the problems were fixed. The statement did not say what the problems were.

On ExpressNews.com: Texas reports 6,300 COVID-19 cases in public schools since July

Bridger said the discrepancy is similar to differences between the state and local death counts: As of Friday, the state was reporting 1,271 deaths in Bexar County, while Metro Health had a total of just 1,073.

San Antonio officials have said the state overestimates the death count because death certificates can sometimes include an address for where the person died, not the county in which they lived, and sometimes lists COVID-19 as a cause of death when no test was administered. Metro Health is currently investigating 198 deaths counted by the state.

Bridger said the state doesnt verify data that it reports from other agencies, such as the TEA  it just serves as a warehouse for data, she said.

We verify that the student had a test; we look up the test to make sure that they did have a test; and that it was positive, Bridger said. We do make sure that the student is in school versus virtual learning... and on the staff side, we do the same thing.

San Antonio officials reported that the number of coronavirus cases countywide rose by 224 Friday, bringing the countys total since the start of the pandemic to 54,195.

Officials reported no new deaths during Fridays daily city-county briefing.

Everybody out there is still doing a great job, said County Judge Nelson Wolff. We just got to keep it up and make sure were doing the fundamentals: the masks, the social distancing, sanitation.

The strain on San Antonio-area hospitals remained relatively steady Friday, with 225 patients with COVID-19 hospitalized, down six from the day before. Twenty-six of the patients being treated were admitted within the past day.

Of those hospitalized, 83 were in intensive care units, and 34 needed ventilators to breathe. Thats down from 87 and 36, respectively, from the day before.

Officials are urging residents to get their flu shots so hospitals arent overwhelmed by COVID-19 and flu patients at the same time.

On Saturday Oct. 3, the city and the University of the Incarnate Word Cardinal Clinic are holding a drive-thru vaccination event at 7615 Kennedy Hill Drive, according to the city. Up to 200 people will be able to receive free flu shots, but they must register first by calling 210-643-3266 or visiting this website.

Marina Starleaf Riker is an investigative reporter for the San Antonio Express-News with extensive experience covering affordable housing, inequality and disaster recovery. To read more from Marina, become a subscriber. marina.riker@express-news.net | Twitter: @MarinaStarleaf
(Natural News) With historic wildfires blazing through the West Coast for more than a month now, thick smoke plumes and haze continue to choke much of California. But more than just painting the skies in eerie sepia tones, experts are almost certain that the smoke has killed far more people than the massive flames.

In a recent report, researchers from Stanford University estimated that the record-breaking concentrations of wildfire smoke that have persisted since last month were responsible for 1,200 to 3,000 deaths in California alone that wouldnt have occurred otherwise. The fatalities were among people aged 65 and older.

These are hidden deaths, said researcher Marshall Burke.

Burke and his colleagues also noted that the population sampled is susceptible to health conditions that compromise their heart and/or lungs. When exposed to particulate matter and toxic vapors from wildfire smoke, these people could get far sicker.

Indirect deaths from exposure to smoke

On top of the insurmountable damage that the wildfires have caused, large smoke plumes present a significant health hazard. Existing research shows that exposure to fine, inhalable air pollutants (PM2.5), which are abundant in wildfire smoke, can cause a range of serious health outcomes, including death.

With the recent wildfires in California, there has been a significant increase in PM2.5 concentrations. Without a doubt, this sudden increase is due to the wildfires, the researchers wrote, citing last months lower PM2.5 concentrations before the fires started.

The group also relied on data from a 2019 paper that looked at the impact of air pollution on deaths and emergency room (ER) visits among people aged 65 and older.

The papers findings showed that for each additional microgram per cubic meter of PM2.5, deaths among adults aged 65 and older rose by 0.7 per million people. There was also an additional 2.7 ER visits.

There are about six million people aged 65 and older in California. Using the papers estimates in light of this population size, the Stanford researchers arrived at some 1,200 excess deaths (deaths that would not have happened otherwise) and 4,800 ER visits that could have stemmed from exposure to wildfire smoke.

When the researchers accounted for the smokes possible effect on people over the following months, their estimate ballooned to 3,000 excess deaths. However, given the record-breaking wildfires blazing across Oregon and Washington, its possible that the hazardous smoke is affecting people across the board.

Moreover, there is some evidence that air pollution could worsen COVID-19-related outcomes, noted Burke. If this is the case, then their estimates could still be far too modest, he added. (Related: Could air pollution be causing the coronavirus to spread more rapidly?)

Hazardous small particles in smoke

While some groups do face a disproportionate risk of serious health outcomes from inhaling polluted air, this doesnt mean that those in good shape or health are exempt from some degree of risk.

Particles generated from burning trees and shrubs contain metals and organic compounds. Most of these are toxic and capable of damaging tissues of the lungs and heart, Michael Kleinman, a professor of occupational and environmental medicine at the University of California, Irvine, told Newsweek.

To make matters worse, some of the compounds hitching a ride on these particles are known carcinogens, such as benzene and free radicals. In fact, most of the toxic compounds found in tobacco smoke can also be found in wildfire smoke, added Kleinman. Exposure to these particles, then, could heighten the risk of cancer.

In addition, wildfire smoke is a cocktail of toxic and harmful emissions. Carbon monoxide, for instance, is known to cause headaches, dizziness and nausea when inhaled. Meanwhile, long-term exposure to high concentrations of carbon monoxide is associated with an increased risk of heart disease.

There are still a lot of fires burning, most of which are taking a long time to contain. Because of this, even areas with no wildfires face health hazards associated with exposure to wildfire smoke. Health experts advise that people living near affected areas take steps to protect themselves, like closing windows and staying indoors.

California has seen five of its six largest wildfires to date in the past two months, but total containment is still nowhere in sight. The states second-largest fire to date, called the SCU Lightning Complex, has now burned almost 400,000 acres across seven counties but is still just 98 percent contained.

The LNU Lightning Complex is not far behind, having decimated some 360,000 acres around the counties of Sonoma and Napa. It is also just 98 percent contained.

Visit ClimateScienceNews.com to keep up with the ongoing wildfire crisis in California.

Sources include:

Insider.com

G-FEED.com

Newsweek.com

NHS.uk

StrangeSounds.org
MUMBAI: Noted poet and veteran Bollywood scriptwriter Javed Akhtar has taken a dig at the media for ignoring the ongoing farmers protest and instead focussing on Dharma Productions owner Karan Johars house party held last year, which is now under scanner over alleged use of drugs.

The noted took to Twitter and sarcastically remarked that if Karan Johar had invited farmers to his party, life would have been easier for the channels, as they would not have to choose between Bollywood and the farmers protests.

If Karan johar had invited some farmers too for his party life would have been easier for our TV channels. They would not have had to choose between farmers' protest and Karans party!. it seems that Karans do is the second most favorite PARTY of our channels, he tweeted.

If Karan johar had invited some farmers too for his party life would have been easier for our TV channels.They would not have had to choose between farmers protest and Karans party!. it seems that Karans do is the second most favourite PARTY of our channels  Javed Akhtar (@Javedakhtarjadu) September 25, 2020

It may be recalled that more than 200 farmers groups across the country blocked roads and organised rallies on Friday in protest against three controversial farm bills passed in the monsoon session of the Parliament.

The farmers worry that the new laws could potentially dismantle the current Minimum Support Price (MSP) system and leave them vulnerable to exploitation by agribusinesses.

A video of Johars house party has gone viral on social media. Noted B-town celebs including Deepika Padukone, Ranbir Kapoor, Vicky Kaushal, Shahid Kapoor, Varun Dhawan, Malaika Arora, and Arjun Kapoor, besides filmmakers Zoya Akhtar and Ayan Mukerji were spotted at Johar's party.

It is being speculated that the celebrities seen in the old house party video were high on drugs.

The video, which surfaced for the first time last year, has resurfaced on news channels after the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) started summoning Bollywood celebrities including Deepika Padukone and her ex-manager Karishma Prakash for questioning for alleged drug links.
Anne Graham Lotz issues urgent call to repentance, warns US is 'being attacked invisibly'

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Evangelist Anne Graham Lotz is issuing an urgent call to repentance, warning that America has a small window of opportunity to return to God, that, if not taken, will incite severe judgment.

In an interview with The Christian Post, Lotz, founder and president of Angel Ministries, said the United States has repeatedly shaken its fist in Gods face, removing His name everywhere from schools to the government.

When you do that, God just backs away, she said, citing Romans 1, which speaks of the retributive judgment of God.

God gives us over to ourselves, and I believe that is where we are right now; it really is the judgment of God, Lotz said. America has a window of opportunity to return to the Lord, but its just a window, and its going to close. Were going to find our nation without God, and without Him, we dont have His protection, we dont have His wisdom.

If we're not careful, we're going to totally lose our way, she stressed. America will become unrecognizable. The world is a very dangerous place right now. We desperately need God.

On Saturday, the 72-year-old daughter of famed evangelist Billy Graham is set to participate in The Return: National and Global Day of Prayer and Repentance in Washington, D.C., to pray for the U.S. and its citizens.

Led by bestselling author Jonathan Cahn, the event will also feature Dr. James Dobson, Pat Robertson, Mike Lindell, Alveda King, Kevin Jessip, Michele Bachmann, Kevin Sorbo, Gordon Robertson, Marcus Lamb, Bishop Harry Jackson, and many more.

As part of the revival, leaders from over 150 nations will be participating in a day of prayer. The broadcast will be hosted in over 90 languages in real-time translation.

Lotz admitted that Cahn, an old friend, has asked her to participate in events for years  but I always declined, she said. I just didnt feel like revival would come until we were desperate for it.

As a child, Lotz recalls asking her mother, Ruth Graham: "With all of father's meetings and events that have taken place, why haven't we had a revival?"

"And my mother said, It's because we're not desperate enough. So I always felt like something needed to trigger it," the evangelist shared. "But Jonathan kept telling me he felt strongly impressed by the Lord that a call to revival needed to be held in September of 2020. So based on his strong conviction and my belief that we need to return to the Lord, I agreed to participate in The Return back in January."

And then, "COVID-19 broke out, the economy experienced a recession, and anarchy swept the streets," she said.

Additionally, America is being attacked socially and racially, Lotz said, contending that evil people jumped on unthinkable tragedies like the death of George Floyd to further their wicked agendas.

"Its more than unrest. It feels like were being attacked invisibly," the evangelist emphasized. My prayer is that this is the trigger. If this doesn't make us desperate for revival, if this doesn't make us return to the Lord and beg for His mercy, then I'm not sure anything will. We're in a freefall.

She pointed out that in Matthew 24, Jesus described the signs that would indicate His return was near.

He said they are like birth pains which means I think they increase in intensity and frequency," she explained. So instead of seeing the signs once every hundred years, it's once every 10 years, then every year, and then every month.

The Jesus in Me author said she believes recent events such as Hurricane Sally, record-breaking flooding, and the fires in the West are some of the birth pains the Bible mentions.

We've left our foundation of faith in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, she said. Until we come back to the Lord through repentance and prayer, then I don't think there's any hope for America actually.

Just under one year ago, Lotz completed treatment for breast cancer. Today, she is doing well and continues to receive good reports at her checkups.

I dont take my health for granted, she said. I thank the Lord that Ive come this far. I just walked 2 miles, my hair is growing back, and Im maintaining strength.

Thankful for every day God gives her, Lotz told CP she lives her life with the idea that I dont want any regret five minutes before seeing Jesus face to face.

I want to live in such a way that, if Jesus was coming back tomorrow, I wouldnt have done anything differently. And that requires reading my Bible, she said.

If you're 28, 72, or your 80s, or 90s, there's nothing we can do more important than read our Bible, Lotz added. The Bible is the truth. The Bible is the way God communicates to us. Feelings come and go, and they can be very misleading. But God's word doesn't change. Keep your eyes fixed on Jesus. This is a wake-up call to return to the Lord.
Three people were charged Thursday after an investigation revealed they stole thousands of dollars from a Lacey-based nonprofit that assists veterans in Ocean County, authorities said.

Jesse Violante, 33, of Tuckerton, Mary Anne Dileo, 67, of Manahawkin, and Gary Mclain, 33, of Little Egg Harbor, were each charged with theft by unlawful taking, according to a release from the Ocean County Prosecutors Office

Violante and Dileo surrendered to police Thursday, were processed and released pending their future court appearances. Mclain did not turn himself in and a warrant was issued for his arrest, the office said. Anyone with information on his whereabouts was asked to contact Ocean County Prosecutors Office Detective Lindsey Llauget at (732) 929-2027, ext. 3462.

The trio are former employees of Vetwork, which is governed by a board of directors and assists veterans in the county with services such as obtaining employment and finding suitable housing, officials said.

Violante was the director of Vetwork between February and June 2019 and was responsible for overseeing the employees of the organization and certifying all expenses, the office said. Dileo was the office manager and was responsible for processing payroll, while Mclain was in charge of community outreach.

The prosecutors office began an investigation after an audit commissioned by the organizations board of directors showed that all three took additional payments on certain weeks in excess of their regular payroll checks, authorities said.

In total, Violante received five extra payments totaling $5,855, while Dileo received 26 duplicate payments totaling $19,588, and Mclain received five duplicate payments which equaled $4,972, the office said. The extra payments were not authorized by the Vetworks board, nor were they included in the documents submitted to the County of Ocean for purposes of obtaining funding.

It is disturbing, to say the least, that employees of a nonprofit organization designed to assist our veterans here in Ocean County would steal from that very organization," Ocean County Prosecutor Bradley D. Billhimer said in a statement. These defendants lined their pockets with money that was intended to help those who sacrificed so much for our country. This type of conduct is truly shameful.

Thank you for relying on us to provide the journalism you can trust. Please consider supporting NJ.com with a voluntary subscription.

Chris Sheldon may be reached at csheldon@njadvancemedia.com.
An aerial view of factories of Taiwanese shoemaker Pouyuen Vietnam in Ho Chi Minh City, July 9, 2020. Photo by VnExpress/Quynh Tran.

Budget collection from foreign direct investment companies accounts for over 50 percent of the total in several Vietnamese localities, a report says.

The ratio was as high as 93.5 percent and 72 percent respectively in the northern provinces of Vinh Phuc and Bac Ninh in the 2011-2019 period, according to a report compiled by the Ministry of Planning and Investment.

Several major FDI projects, including Honda Vietnam plants, are based in Vinh Phuc, while Bac Ninh has factories of the worlds largest electronics supplier Foxconn.

Other localities with high ratio of revenues coming from FDI companies are the southern provinces of Dong Nai and Binh Duong (63 and 52 percent, respectively), and the northern province of Bac Giang (60 percent).

Nationwide, FDI companies contributed an average 28 percent of budget collection in the period.

However, the investment ministry said there was a lack of connection between FDI companies and local suppliers, and many FDI projects were focused on assembling.

The localization rate is low in some industries. A survey of the Japan External Trade Organization (JETRO) shows that the localization rate of Japanese companies in Vietnam was 36.3 percent last year.

Just 5 percent of the FDI companies in the country were using advanced technologies, the report said.

It said FDI companies contribute about 20 percent of Vietnams annual GDP. Last year, FDI firms exports accounted for 71.3 percent of Vietnams total.

FDI companies created 10 million jobs last year with their productivity 2.4 times the national average.

As of August this year, there were 32,539 active FDI projects in Vietnam with a total of $233 billion of disbursed investment.
Locky Gilbert professed to have fallen in love with winner Irena Srbinovska on Thursday's finale episode of The Bachelor, and it's now quite clear, that he's smitten.

The 31-year-old former Australian Survivor star warmly embraced Irena on a night out in Sydney on Friday, after finally being able to go public with their romance.

Locky passionately locked lips with Irena, 31, on an inner city street, and pointed to a sign on the wall that read 'school of nursing' - in a nod to her chosen career path.

How's your heart rate, Locky? The Bachelor passionately locked lips with Irena Srbinovska under a nursing sign in Sydney on Friday (pictured) - after FINALLY being able to go public with their newfound love

Irena appeared just as smitten, wrapping her arms around Locky's muscular frame.

Locky was very much a gentleman on the night, giving the brunette beauty his grey suit jacket to keep her warm.

Irena showed off her leggy figure in a leopard print frock and black mule heels.

She styled her shoulder-length locks out, and enhanced her striking facial features with elegant makeup.

Gesture: Locky, 31, pointed to a sign on the wall that read 'school of nursing' - in a nod to her chosen career path

Thoughtful: Locky was very much a gentleman on the night, giving Irena, 31, his grey suit jacket to keep her warm

Meanwhile, Locky cut a suave figure in a crisp white dress shirt, navy slim-fit pants and white pristine sneakers.

During Thursday night's gut-wrenching finale, Locky told both Bella Varelis and Irena that he was in love with them - but then had the tricky task of sending one home.

After an emotional break-up with Bella, Locky composed himself and then professed his love for Irena, telling her he couldn't wait to spend the rest of his life with her.

Smitten: The former Australian Survivor star could not wipe the smile off his face, while Irena gazed adoringly into his eyes

Her man: Irena, who cut a glamorous figure on the night, revelled in the company of her new beau

In love: Locky chose Irena as his winning contestant on Thursday's finale episode of The Bachelor

In a new interview with Who magazine, the happy couple revealed the codenames they used to communicate with each other while the show was airing.

'Mine was as simple as Roger Roger and it had a smiley face,' Locky admitted, referring to the moniker he used to save Irena's number in his phone.

'And Locky was under Doug in my phone,' Irena revealed.

'Douglas is Locky's middle name so that's where I got it from and no one picked up on that!' she explained.
Dane County: The home of the University of Wisconsin has seen chart-topping turnout for Democrats in recent elections. How much higher can they run up the score to counter Republicans in rural counties? Madison, the county seat and state capital, was among the population centers that most successfully responded to the coronavirus outbreak during a statewide election in April, closing just about a third of voting locations. In November, officials dont anticipate having to close any. But concerns remain regarding mail-in ballot confusion; the deadlines for ballots to be received are still being fought over in court.
METROPOLITAN district leader Sarah Kiely, who tragically lost her husband Damien to cancer, has backed the Dying with Dignity bill.

But she wants to see members of Fine Gael afforded a free vote when the matter comes before Cabinet.

And the City East member looks likely to also be invited to address the partys top brass on her own experiences of losing a loved one so early in life.

The bill, which allows terminally ill people to end their own lives, is to be debated in the Dail in the coming weeks, and has secured the backing of Sinn Fein, which makes its passage more likely.

Its something which has hit Cllr Kiely personally, following the passing of her husband aged just 45 in 2018 in Milford Care Centre.

We did discuss this issue when Damien was first diagnosed. I felt very strongly about choice. He did say to me if things got really hard and he wasnt able, he said would you help me. I said yes, Cllr Kiely told the Leader.

For me, it is important that end of life care is appropriate. Sometimes its difficult to have these conversations with people. Obviously I had to have these with Demien, he had to have them with me, because we came to a point where we realised things were not going to plan.

Cllr Kiely has acknowledged that it is a vote of conscience and has urged Fine Gael leader, Tanaiste Leo Varadkar to allow people to express their wishes in the way they feel.

Its important everyone is heard in this debate. If I had a vote in this, I would go in favour. But I really hope the parliamentary party chair Richard Bruton will impress upon people how important this bill is. I see it as very progressive. Fine Gael has been very progressive up to now with the marriage equality referendum and the repeal of the eighth amendment, she said.

The Janesboro woman has also lobbied local TD, and former council colleague Brian Leddin, who is the chair of the Greens parliamentary party on this.

The last week of Damiens life was very stressful. I felt very alone. I felt an awful lot of pressure, she said.

Cllr Kiely could also take up an invitation to address the Fine Gael parliamentary party on the matter once Covid-19 restrictions allow.

She feels the passage of the bill would be a lovely way to remember Damien.

I would have done anything to help Damien. Whatever he wanted, it was never questioned, it was just done, the first-term councillor added.
"The four ministers should all be accountable for their lack of apparent oversight of the quarantine program that failed in its ability to contain the virus. The level of bureaucracy that supported the program that did not have health knowledge was ludicrous. Lawyers and economists dominated the professions of those making largely clinical decisions. All of our government departments should be subject to scrutiny going forward. The people in charge of our government departments lack expertise and are reliant on being 'informed' by the experts around them. We have seen how this has played out now in the most devastating of circumstances. These are our tax dollars at work, feathering the pockets of lifetime bureaucrats. Its time for change." - Marietta Daniel Andrews said he will not be resigning and that Ms Mikakos' resignation was appropriate. Credit:Joe Armao "Had to happen, and there should probably be two or three more including the Premier." - Adam

"Yes it's fair ... but Daniel Andrews, Martin Pakula and Crisp should also resign." - Anonymous "Although I like Daniel Andrews, I think the 'buck' should stop with his accountability because he is the 'Chief'." - Jayv "This should be one of many to resign given the incompetent and shambolic handling of hotel quarantine." - Anonymous

"It's not her actions she needs to concern herself with; it's her INACTIONS. Others should follow her out the door." - Anonymous "Yes, I think she had to resign, but what about the sloppiness of the Premier, the Minister for Jobs, the Police Minister, the CHO and the senior public servants? They are accountable too. Being at the top means knowing what's going on, being accountable, and making the hard decisions." - Kay

Many others came out in support of Ms Mikakos, saying the hotel quarantine failings were not entirely her fault. Mikakos is a scapegoat "Scapegoat. And yes, other ministers and high-level bureaucrats need to [go]. We the people of Melbourne are paying a high price for their mishandling of the situation. Saying 'sorry' doesnt cut it." - Anyonmous "Dan is throwing anyone under the bus to save his own skin." - Anonymous

Premier Daniel Andrews. Credit:Simon Schluter "She is just a sacrificial lamb thrown under the bus." - Anonymous "It's not fair and all people involved in the decision-making process need to share the blame. Also Dan Andrews is the Premier and captain of the state, needs to accept responsibility as the buck stops with him." - Anonymous

"I ultimately feel sorry for Jenny. After months of Andrews saying that he had confidence in her, till the day before the day he gave evidence. The person who should resign is Andrews. He did the ultimate backstab and is contradicting months of backing his Health Minister. [To be honest] the inquiry has shown how dysfunctional this government is and they all ultimately must allow an early election." - Anonymous "As usual we have to throw someone under the bus. Can we not just recognise that many, many decisions have been made on the fly, in rapidly changing circumstances, with little experience and context to draw upon and that under these conditions, mistakes get made? By all means, let's learn from it, but what value is there in a change of leadership at this level now?" - Brigid

"The scale of the disaster means it's unfair if it's just Mikakos. The secretary who received credible alarm bells FOUR times and did not brief her minister about the risk." - Nathan "Even if the ADF was in charge of hotel quarantine the outbreak still could have occurred. Outbreaks occur in hospitals where we have the best PPE and infection control practices. All it takes is one person taking off their PPE incorrectly, not sanitizing and then going to the shared tea room and touching the tap to pour themself a drink. It's not Jenny's fault, but I guess it makes us feel better to see some 'justice' served." - Amy "I really feel sorry for Jenny Mikakos. I understand why she felt that she needed to resign but I don't think that she should have resigned. The second wave that occurred in Victoria was a result of a chain of unfortunate events that wasn't solely her responsibility. To me, it was a structural issue with a lack of clear command and control in the hotel quarantining operation." - An

"No, I don't think that it's fair. I also don't think that other ministers need to be held accountable. I think that responsibility falls squarely on the shoulders of the private security companies involved. They were hired to do a job, and did not perform it correctly." - Jay It was fair: Mikakos needed to go "She had to, Dan was correct in his evidence at the enquire. It is a bit cheap of the opposition to say it was harsh when they wanted her to resign. At the end of the day, her team was in charge and she needs to be all over it and manage the quarantine program from up close and not from a helicopter." - Ray

"I believe that it is fair decision for everyone. Mr Andrews has done a great job that we can not expect him to know everything if PM did not pay attention to it." - Anonymous "Sadly her demise is deserved. She still avoided responsibility since she resigned on grounds of a disagreement with Dan." - Stephen "Yes she should have resigned weeks ago." - Shay

"The responsibility for health rested clearly on her shoulders. Clearly, she did not use the proper resources for the job and did not have adequate contingency plans ... I am also a long term Labor/Greens voter and agree with stage 4 lockdowns but this could have been avoided if Jenny Mikakos did her job properly." - Anonymous "I think it was very unfortunate but necessary as surely the buck rests with health in a pandemic. I feel Minister Mikakos' work ethic, humanity, and care for others were always on display and am saddened that she feels it necessary to resign entirely from politics. Even more culpable from my point of view is the approach and attitude of the Secretary of DHHS and some of the Dep Secs. To think you don't report to your Minister because the 'problems are solved' is unbelievable. I still don't think she gets it. DHHS needs a restructure and people with clinical and operational expertise woven into decision making at the very top. How could Professor Brett Sutton's expertise and role be ignored in terms of 'line of sight' to operations?!" - Anonymous

"Seems from the inquiry that there was a failure of communication between the health Minister and her department. Seems correct that she should go, as should the people in DHHS on the other end of that communication breakdown." - Phil Let's just move on "Figures are good - let's just move on through this crisis and thank Dan for job well done." - John "Mikakos was the Health Minister so, she should be accountable for the health mess. Good decision, lets move on and focus on the important point, how to get everybody safe and back on to live a life closer to normal." - Anonymous

"I don't think anyone should resign. Mistakes have been made however it's more important to learn from those mistakes than to continually listen to the 'blame game'. Mistakes have been made across all of the states and with the federal government. Let's just move forward and thank those who have done the best under difficult circumstances. If anyone should be stood down it should be the media." - Sandra "I think that instead of baying for retribution, an examination should be made of how a pandemic government structure should be set up for future and ongoing pandemics. We need to get to a stage where we learn from this. From my laymans viewpoint and only from the information that I have gleaned from the media and the commission, it was the cumbersome department structures involved that exacerbated an unknown pandemic crisis. Learn and move on." - Nola The failure was at the federal level

"The Morrison government simply washed their hands of the whole affair so that they could push any blame on state governments. The state health departments have no experience or training in border control or quarantine, it is obvious to anyone that they would make mistakes. The states should have been operating quarantine under the direction of the federal department. This scapegoating of state ministers simply misdirects the public from the real failure at a federal level." - Chris "Isnt quarantine part of border control and therefore a first-line federal government responsibility? Why didnt the Home Affairs ministry put in place Australia-wide procedures and controls? Pandemics have no borders just like bushfires and cyclones." - Sue "Its a global pandemic, not one minister or member of parliament should be responsible but all members of parliament state, federal or opposition. There needs to be a bipartisan approach to this global pandemic, not cheap shot political point-scoring. There also needs to be an effective state opposition ... This name-calling of dictator, chairman and gang of eight is hurting the LNP ... this is coming from a liberal voter." - Anonymous
Border guards patrol in Lao Cai Province in northern Vietnam, March 2020. Photo by VnExpress/Hoang Thuy.

Police in Lao Cai Province have taken in a woman for allegedly trafficking a 13-year-old girl to China in 2012.

Police in the border province received a complaint earlier this month from the victim that Hang Thi Su, 66, and her husband Sung Seo Chu, 51, had tricked her and sold her across the border.

Chu was in debt then, and so he and his wife tricked the girl into going to China to work.

They sold the girl to a Chinese woman for 8,000 ($1,178).

She managed to escape back to Vietnam last December.

Chu is already in jail with a 16-year sentence for stealing and trafficking minors.

Vietnam reported over 3,400 victims of trafficking between 2013 and 2019, over 90 percent of them women, children and people from ethnic minority communities.

Eighty percent ended up in China, which suffers from a huge gender imbalance due to its former one-child policy and illegal abortion of female fetuses by parents who prefer sons.
On September 25, the Peruvian government extended the national state of emergency until October 31 in order to stem the spread of the novel coronavirus, an ANI report confirmed. The South American country has had the worst fatalities rate in the world, figures tallying to 86 per 100,000 population. President Martin Vizcarra said that the national emergency might extent until the rest of the year, adding, that the extension until the end of the month ahead was made.

The state of emergency will be in place until the end of the year, this is the idea, President Martin Vizcarra, ANI quoted Vizcarra, citing a local RPP radio broadcast.

With more than 6,235 confirmed cases recorded as of September 25, the country has hit a total of 795,584 cases, according to the global coronavirus tally. At least 68 people succumbed to the COVID-19 on September 25, taking the death toll to 32,037. Peru, with the worlds sixth-largest caseload, imposed the state of emergency on March 16. The Presidential orders restricted the citizens from exercising their rights of liberal movement and personal security. A national curfew at night from 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. (local time) exempting Sundays, was also imposed across the country to limit the rate of transmission of COVID-19, according to an official press release on the governments website.

Read: London Put On COVID-19 Watchlist As Coronavirus Infection Rate Rises Again Across UK

Read: Nepal Urges SAARC Nations To Convene 19th Summit Soon; To Collectively Fight Coronavirus Pandemic

Social gatherings prohibited

Children under the age of 14 and the adults over 65 have been allowed to step out only for essential movements, and otherwise were advised to remain indoors. Social gatherings, including the indoor assembly of the family members, were prohibited by the Peru government. In quarantine areas, such as Amazonas, Madre de Dios, Cajamarca and several others, only one person per family was permitted to go outside during the non-curfew hours, according to the Peruvian governments quarantine measures.

Read: Coronavirus: Chinese Health Authorities Discover Virus Contamination On Seafood Packages

Read: 'Promising Method': Finland's Helsinki Airport Deploys Sniffer Dogs To Detect Coronavirus

(Image Credit: AP)
WASHINGTON  President Donald Trump nominated Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court on Saturday, capping a dramatic reshaping of the federal judiciary that will resonate for a generation and that he hopes will provide a needed boost to his reelection effort.

Barrett, a former clerk to the late Justice Antonin Scalia, said she was truly humbled by the nomination and quickly aligned herself with Scalias conservative approach to the law, saying his judicial philosophy is mine, too.

Barrett, 48, was joined in the Rose Garden by her husband and seven children. If confirmed by the Senate, she would fill the seat vacated by liberal icon Ruth Bader Ginsburg. It would be the sharpest ideological swing since Clarence Thomas replaced Justice Thurgood Marshall nearly three decades ago.

She would be the sixth justice on the nine-member court to be appointed by a Republican president, and the third of Trumps first term in office.

Trump hailed Barrett as a woman of remarkable intellect and character, saying he had studied her record closely before making the pick.

Republican senators are lining up for a swift confirmation of Barrett ahead of the Nov. 3 election, as they aim to lock in conservative gains in the federal judiciary before a potential transition of power. Trump, meanwhile, is hoping the nomination will galvanize his supporters as he looks to fend off Democrat Joe Biden.

For Trump, whose 2016 victory hinged in large part on reluctant support from white evangelicals on the promise of filling Scalias seat with a conservative, the latest nomination in some ways brings his first term full circle. Even before Ginsburgs death, Trump was running on having confirmed in excess of 200 federal judges, fulfilling a generational aim of conservative legal activists.

Trump joked that the confirmation process ahead should be easy and extremely noncontroversial, though it is likely to be anything but. No court nominee has been considered so close to a presidential election before, with early voting already underway. He encouraged legislators to take up her nomination swiftly and asked Democrats to refrain from personal and partisan attacks.

In 2016, Republicans blocked Obamas nomination of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court to fill the election-year vacancy, saying voters should have a say in the lifetime appointment. Senate Republicans say they will move ahead this time, arguing the circumstances are different now that the White House and Senate are controlled by the same party.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said the Senate will vote in the weeks ahead on Barretts confirmation. Barrett is expected to make her first appearance Tuesday on Capitol Hill, where she will meet with McConnell; Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, the chair of the Judiciary Committee; and others. Hearings are set to begin Oct. 12, and Graham said he hoped to have Barretts nomination out of the committee by Oct. 26.

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi warned that a vote to confirm Barrett to the high court would be a vote to strike down the Affordable Care Act. Schumer added that the president was once again putting Americans healthcare in the crosshairs even while the coronavirus pandemic rages.

Biden took that route of criticism, as well, framing Trumps choice as another move in Republicans effort to scrap the 2010 health care law passed by his former boss, President Barack Obama. The court is expected to take up a case against it this fall.

The set design at the Rose Garden, with large American flags hung between the colonnades, appeared to be modeled on the way the White House was decorated when President Bill Clinton nominated Ginsburg in 1993.

Barrett, recognizing that flags were still lowered in recognition of Ginsburgs death, said she would be mindful of who came before me. Although they have different judicial philosophies, Barrett praised Ginsburg as a trailblazer for women and for her friendship with Scalia, saying, She has won the admiration of women across the country and indeed all across the world.

Within hours of Ginsburgs death, Trump made clear he would nominate a woman for the seat. Barrett was the early favorite and the only one to meet with Trump.

Barrett has been a judge since 2017, when Trump nominated her to the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. But as a longtime University of Notre Dame law professor, she had already established herself as a reliable conservative in the mold of Scalia, for whom she clerked in the late 1990s.

She would be the only justice on the current court not to have received her law degree from an Ivy League school. The eight current justices all attended either Harvard or Yale.

The staunch conservative had become known to Trump in large part after her bitter 2017 appeals court confirmation included allegations that Democrats were attacking her Catholic faith. The president also interviewed her in 2018 for the vacancy created by the retirement of Justice Anthony Kennedy, but Trump ultimately chose Brett Kavanaugh.

Trump and his political allies are itching for another fight over Barretts faith, seeing it as a political windfall that would backfire on Democrats. Catholic voters in Pennsylvania, in particular, are viewed as a pivotal demographic in the swing state that Biden, also Catholic, is trying to recapture.

While Democrats appear powerless to stop Barretts confirmation in the GOP-controlled Senate, they are seeking to use the process to weaken Trumps reelection chances.

Barretts nomination could become a reckoning over abortion, an issue that has divided many Americans so bitterly for almost half a century. The idea of overturning or gutting Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 decision that legalized abortion, has animated activists in both parties for decades. Now, with the seemingly decisive shift in the courts ideological makeup, Democrats hope their voters will turn out in droves because of their frustration with the Barrett pick.

Justice Ginsburg must be turning over in her grave up in heaven, to see that the person they chose seems to be intent on undoing all the things that Ginsburg did, Schumer said.

Trump has also increasingly embraced the high court  on which he will have had an outsize hand in reshaping - as an insurance policy in a close election.

We dont have to do it before, but I think this will be done before the election, Trump told reporters Saturday. I think itll send a great signal to a lot of people.

Increases in mail, absentee and early voting brought about by the coronavirus pandemic have already led to a flurry of election litigation, and both Trump and Biden have assembled armies of lawyers to continue the fight once vote-counting begins. Trump has been open about tying his push to name a third justice to the court to a potentially drawn-out court fight to determine who will be sworn in on Jan. 20, 2021.

I think this will end up in the Supreme Court, Trump said Wednesday of the election. And I think its very important that we have nine justices.

No Democratic senators are expected to vote to confirm Barrett before the election, even though some did support her in 2017.

Two Democrats still serving in the Senate who voted to confirm Barrett in 2017, Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia and Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, now say its too close to the election to consider her nomination.

Meanwhile, outside conservative groups are planning to spend more than $25 million to support Trump and his nominee. The Judicial Crisis Network has organized a coalition that includes American First Policies, the Susan B. Anthony List, the Club for Growth and the group Catholic Vote to help confirm Barrett. The Republican National Committee has launched a $10 million digital campaign of its own, in conjunction with Trumps reelection campaign.
Belarus, a former Soviet republic closely allied with Russia, has been rocked by mass street protests since Lukashenko's claim of a landslide victory in an Aug. 9 vote

Belarusian security forces detained dozens of protesters on Saturday as crowds rallied in central Minsk accusing President Alexander Lukashenko of rigging last month's election.

One group of women chanted "Our president is Sveta!" - referring to opposition politician Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya who they say won the vote - before riot police dragged many of them into vans. Other protesters were arrested nearby.

Belarus, a former Soviet republic closely allied with Russia, has been rocked by mass street protests since Lukashenko's claim of a landslide victory in an Aug. 9 vote.

He has denied rigging the election and dismissed opposition accusations of mass arrests and abuses as a Western smear campaign.

On Saturday, video on social media showed police detaining Nina Baginskaya, a 73-year-old who has become a central figure of the protest movement after scuffling with police last month.

The footage showed a masked riot police officer ripping a red and white flag out of Baginskaya's hands before dragging her into a van.

Protesters have used the flag that Belarus adopted after the 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union, before Lukashenko restored the Soviet version four years later.

Lukashenko, a 66-year-old former collective farm manager, was sworn in for a sixth term on Wednesday in a ceremony held without warning, prompting thousands to take the streets of the capital.

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NASA astronaut Kate Rubins plans to cast her vote for the presidential election from the international Space Station - more than 200 miles above Earth.

Rubins is currently outside Moscow in Star City, Russia, preparing with two cosmonauts for a mid-October launch and a six-month stay at the ISS.

'I think it's really important for everybody to vote,' Rubins said. 'If we can do it from space, then I believe folks can do it from the ground, too.'

NASA astronaut Kate Rubins plans to vote in the election from the International Space Station

Members of the expedition 64 to the International Space Station (ISS), Russian cosmonauts Sergey Kud-Sverchkov (L) and Sergey Ryzhikov (C) and NASA astronaut Kate Rubins (R)

Most U.S. astronauts live in Houston. Texas law allows them to vote from space using a secure electronic ballot.

Mission Control forwards the ballot to the space station and relays the completed ballot back to the county clerk.

'It's critical to participate in our democracy,' Rubins said. 'We consider it an honor to be able to vote from space.'

NASA astronauts have voted from space before, with both Rubins and Shane Kimbrough completing ballots from the International Space Station.

'I think it's really important for everybody to vote,' Rubins said. 'If we can do it from space, then I believe folks can do it from the ground, too.'

Kimbrough last voted in the 2016 Presidential election at the International Space Station.

Astronauts are 'pretty much apolitical,' he told reporters at the time. 'And I'll be glad to welcome the new president, whoever that is.'

Rubins, the first person to sequence DNA in space, plans to work on a cardiovascular experiment and conduct research using the space stations Cold Atom Lab.

While she's there, shell celebrate the 20th anniversary of continuous human presence on the space station, and welcome the crew of the second SpaceX commercial crew mission, expected to arrive in late October.

Shane Kimbrough last voted in the 2016 Presidential election at the International Space Station

For astronauts, the voting process starts a year before launch, when they are able to select which elections they want to participate in while in space.

Six months before the election, astronauts are provided with a standard form: the 'Voter Registration and Absentee Ballot Request  Federal Post Card Application.'

A secure electronic ballot is forwarded to the astronauts by Mission Control in Houston and returned by email to the county clerk.

'They send it back to Mission Control,' said NASA spokesman Jay Bolden of Johnson Space Ccenter to Space.com. 'It's a secure ballot that is then sent directly to the voting authorities.'

NASA astronaut David Wolf became the first American to vote in space while on the Russian Mir Space Station.
A Florida family is grieving after two siblings - a well-known paramedic and a special-education teacher - both died from COVID-19 just a day apart.

Shyla Pennington, 41, was a teaching assistant who helped special needs children for almost 20 years and served in three different elementary schools in Volusia County.

Her brother Gerald 'Jerry' Jones, 51, was a longtime paramedic who was noted for his dedication and commitment to ensuring residents' well being.

The two siblings lived together before Pennington died of COVID-19 on September 19. Jones died on September 20.

Shyla Pennington and Gerald 'Jerry' Jones (left to right) both died of COVID-19 just two days apart in Volusia County, Florida

Greg Jones, the pair's father, shared several Facebook posts that detailed the tragic turn of events after Pennington and Jones were diagnosed.

'When it rains it pours, Our son Gerald Jones has been admitted to the hospital with Covid19 so please send your prayers for him as well as our daughter Shyla Pennington,' Greg wrote in a post on September 13.

On September 19, he revealed to friends and loved ones that Pennington had succumbed to the illness.

'Our daughter Shyla Pennington is now with God, she lost her battle with COVID19. I would like to thank everyone who prayed and supported her.'

Greg Jones, the sibling's father, shared updates on his children's conditions on Facebook

Kathleen Carman: 'Working with kids with special needs can be a bit challenging at times but [Pennington] was patient with them and loved them like her own'

Then, Greg shared the second heartbreaking blow in a post shared soon after.

'...After we lost our daughter we just got a call saying we lost our son to [COVID-19]. Rest in peace my children.'

According to The Daily Beast, Pennington tested positive for COVID-19 less than a week after classes began at Sugar Hill Elementary.

She was rushed to a local hospital on September 11 with low oxygen saturation levels. Pennington would later develop kidney and blood pressure problems while in critical condition.

'She was a dedicated employee who loved children and also was a devoted mother, daughter, sister, and friend to many,' the district told Daily Beast in a statement.

'We are deeply saddened by her passing, and our hearts go out to her family, friends, and colleagues in Volusia County Schools.'

The Volusia County school district said Pennington did not contract the virus at work, but did not provide any evidence of that.

Greg told Daily Beast that Pennington was not afraid to go back to school as cases and deaths continued to rise in the country.

'I even asked her, I said, "Im worried about you,"' Greg told the publication. 'But she said, "No, dont worry about me, Im good.'"

Pennington left behind various family members, including her 20-year-old son who is a collage student majoring in dance.

'She loved her sondid everything for him and also for the kids at the school,' Kathleen Carman, a former co-worker of Pennington, told Daily Beast.

'Working with kids with special needs can be a bit challenging at times but she was patient with them and loved them like her own.'

Before Jones' death, he was a member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars and served in Operation Desert Storm.

'He was probably one of the most loved people [at Volusia County EMS] ever,' Greg said about his son, per Daily Beast. 'He was super with people. He was a calming influence, which I guess in that profession you need.'

Greg Jones (right), pictured with his wife, said Jones was 'a calming influence, which I guess in that profession you need'

Janie Jarrad, a Volusia County resident, recalled Jones' strong sense of character and commitment to others.

'He came to the house a couple times for myself, taking me to the hospital and I was scared and [He] told me that everything would be okay,' Jarrard told Click Orlando.

Several tributes were posted in honor of Jones on social media and many recalled his kind nature.

'Jerry made a difference in so many lives during his 21 years of service in Volusia County, and held a presence that brought smiles to his coworkers and comfort to his patients day after day,' read a post in the  Volusia County EMS IAEP Local 77 Facebook group.

Volusia County Sheriff Mike Chitwood honored both siblings in a Facebook post shared earlier this week.

'Volusia County just lost two public servants, and a family lost two of their loved ones, to COVID-19.' write Chitwood.

Sheriff Mike Chitwood said on Facebook that Volusia County has 'just lost two public servants, and a family lost two of their loved ones, to COVID-19'

'The human toll of covid-19 is real, and these are the first responders and front-line workers who risk their own health and safety to keep our society functioning.

'No one has all the answers to this health crisis, but I pray we are doing enough to protect people like Gerald and Shyla. May their memories be a blessing.'

A GoFundMe was created by the siblings' mother, Mary Mullis Jones, and asked for help paying medical expenses.

A GoFundMe was set up for Pennington (left) by family and a separate one was created for Jones by the Volusia Ambulance Association

And a separate GoFundMe was set up for Jones by the Volusia Ambulance Association.

'When an emergency happens, 911 is called, and the paramedics arrive. When a paramedic has an emergency, we never ask for help; we fight through it, adapt and overcome.

'In a few instances, we need the support and help of our community. One of our own paramedics is in need of help.'

The two fundraisers have raised a combined total of $27,491 to pay for medical bills and other related expenses.
Forget about it, its over. Democrats need to put the Supreme Court appointment fight behind them as quickly as possible and move on to the real battle in November.

They have no power in the Senate, and they cannot afford to spin their wheels over an appointment whose conclusion is already foretold by the Republican majority.

And there is no avenue of attack open to them. The fear of a rollback of Roe vs. Wade or a shutdown of Obamacare plays well in blue states, but it also carries the potential for blowback in the battleground states.

Like it or not, the question of who succeeds the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg plays big in the media and with the base of both the Democratic and Republican parties, but it doesnt resonate with the average American.

Instead of dragging out the inevitable, Democrats should cut their losses and concentrate on winning the presidency.

Joe Biden is ahead in the polls, but hes hardly a sure thing. Hes never going to be a rock star, and the issues that have carried him so far  President Trumps coronavirus failings, the economic downturn  could still wane by election day.

Its all coming down to a mandate on Trump. Bidens problem is, that puts it all in Trumps hands  not Bidens.

Served cold: Democrats best revenge for the Republican court packing is to win the White House and Congress in November  then immediately admit the heavily Democratic District of Columbia and Puerto Rico as the 51st and 52nd states.

It would forever shift control of the Senate to Democrats and go a long way toward fixing the red-state bias of the electoral college.

Mail storm: President Trump is being his usual idiot self when he raises questions about the validity of voting by mail. But at least when it comes to California and a handful of other states that automatically send out mail ballots, he does have a point.

Most states require voters to ask for mail ballots, which is how California used to do it. That way, they know a real person is reaching out.

The way its working in California this year, however, every active voter on the state rolls will be sent a ballot. No request required.

What much of the public does not know is that its very hard to strike someone from the voter rolls. The rule is, if someone misses two consecutive federal general elections  a presidential election and a midterm  and then misses two more after failing to respond to a mailed query from county registrars, theyre supposed to be tossed off the rolls.

So, you can be gone from your registered address  or dead  for a long time before the state gets around to erasing you. Some estimates say that up to 10% of Californias 20 million registered voters arent where the state thinks they are.

Nonetheless, ballots will be going to their listed addresses. So some people who have moved wont get ballots. Residents at the old addresses will get ballots for people who are no longer living there or are no longer living, period.

There are safeguards against fraudulent voting  for starters, registrars carefully check signatures on the ballot envelopes to make sure they match whats on file with the state.

I hope so, because any screwups will give weight to cockamamie voter fraud conspiracies, which is just what Trump wants.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

Tough question: Youre a practical kind of politician, someone told me on a Zoom round table the other day. Whats your position on whether Ruth Bader Ginsburg should have resigned when Barack Obama was still president and given him the opportunity to name her replacement instead of Donald Trump?

I said: Your definition of me as a practical politician is correct. And being a practical politician, Im not going to answer that question. Thank you.

Dancing in the streets: Johns Grill has taken outside dining to a new level.

Carlos Reyes, the violinist with the enhanced sound system, turned Ellis Street between Stockton and Powell into a dance hall last Sunday, with everybody in masks and 6 feet apart, shaking it like it was the Summer of Love on Haight Street.

And heres hoping you can shake it wherever you are.

See you next week.

Want to sound off? Email wbrown@sfchronicle.com.
The finance ministry sources have refuted the claims that the government diverted funds collected for GST (Goods and Service Tax) compensation to states. The response came after a CAG (Comptroller and Auditor General) report pointed out that "there was short crediting to the Fund of the GST Compensation Cess collections, totalling Rs 47,272 crore during 2017-18 and 2018-19".

Ministry officials, on the condition of anonymity, said there was no diversion of funds whatsoever. The compensation due to the states for 2017-18 and 2018-19 was fully paid, and that the time taken in reconciliation of compensation receipts can't be termed as diversion of GST Cess Fund, they added.

Also read: GST compensation cess used elsewhere against law: CAG

They said the compensation receipt in the Consolidated Funds of India was subject to reconciliation in the coming months, as usual, in the forthcoming financial year. If, for that reason, the amount remained in the Consolidated Fund of India, that can't be treated as "diversion", they said.

CAG report noted that the short-crediting was a violation of the GST Compensation Cess Act, 2017. "The amount by which the cess was short-credited was also retained in the Consolidated Funds of India and became available for use for purposes other than what was provided in the act," it said.

Short crediting of cess collected during the year led to overstatement of revenue receipts and understatement of fiscal deficit for the year, the CAG report said. "Further, any transfer in the subsequent year would become an appropriation from the resources of that year and would require Parliamentary authorisation," the report added.

Also read: GST revenues crash 25% for 26 states

In their defence, the finance ministry officials said that even the CAG report itself has not said the "compensation cess" was diverted. They explained the amount collected under compensation cess fund has been regularly and fully distributed to states as per their dues and budgetary provisions and by the end of July 2020 everything has been accounted for and released.

Sources say all amounts, including taxes, cesses, etc, that are collected by the Centre should, under the Article 266 of the Constitution, get credited first to the Consolidated Fund of India. Only then, they could be transferred to any other fund through a budget head in the Union Budget.

Also read: GST compensation: 21 states go for Option 1 borrowing plan

Over Rs 62,611 crore were collected in 2017-18, of which the government released full compensation dues of Rs 41,146 crore to the states and UTs, said the sources. Similarly, funds worth over Rs 95,081 crore were collected in 2018-19, of which Rs 69,275 crore were paid as full compensation dues to states and UTs.

The officials said over Rs 47,271 crore collected in 2017-18 and 2018-19 remained unutilised for reconciliation post full payment of GST compensation dues to the states and UTs. But, they reiterated the surplus amount was not diverted for any other purpose. It was used to make good for the shortfall of Rs 70,000 crore in 2019-20 when the Centre released Rs 1,65,302 crore as GST compensation against a cess collection of Rs 95,444 crore, they said.

Also read: 7 critical GST flaws govt needs to address at the earliest
Readers hoping to buy Bristol-Myers Squibb Company (NYSE:BMY) for its dividend will need to make their move shortly, as the stock is about to trade ex-dividend. If you purchase the stock on or after the 1st of October, you won't be eligible to receive this dividend, when it is paid on the 2nd of November.

Bristol-Myers Squibb's upcoming dividend is US$0.45 a share, following on from the last 12 months, when the company distributed a total of US$1.80 per share to shareholders. Based on the last year's worth of payments, Bristol-Myers Squibb stock has a trailing yield of around 3.0% on the current share price of $59.49. We love seeing companies pay a dividend, but it's also important to be sure that laying the golden eggs isn't going to kill our golden goose! We need to see whether the dividend is covered by earnings and if it's growing.

See our latest analysis for Bristol-Myers Squibb

If a company pays out more in dividends than it earned, then the dividend might become unsustainable - hardly an ideal situation. Bristol-Myers Squibb paid a dividend last year despite being unprofitable. This might be a one-off event, but it's not a sustainable state of affairs in the long run. Given that the company reported a loss last year, we now need to see if it generated enough free cash flow to fund the dividend. If cash earnings don't cover the dividend, the company would have to pay dividends out of cash in the bank, or by borrowing money, neither of which is long-term sustainable. It distributed 28% of its free cash flow as dividends, a comfortable payout level for most companies.

Click here to see the company's payout ratio, plus analyst estimates of its future dividends.

Have Earnings And Dividends Been Growing?

Stocks in companies that generate sustainable earnings growth often make the best dividend prospects, as it is easier to lift the dividend when earnings are rising. If business enters a downturn and the dividend is cut, the company could see its value fall precipitously. Bristol-Myers Squibb was unprofitable last year, but at least the general trend suggests its earnings have been improving over the past five years. Even so, an unprofitable company whose business does not quickly recover is usually not a good candidate for dividend investors.

Story continues

The main way most investors will assess a company's dividend prospects is by checking the historical rate of dividend growth. In the past 10 years, Bristol-Myers Squibb has increased its dividend at approximately 3.5% a year on average. We're glad to see dividends rising alongside earnings over a number of years, which may be a sign the company intends to share the growth with shareholders.

Remember, you can always get a snapshot of Bristol-Myers Squibb's financial health, by checking our visualisation of its financial health, here.

To Sum It Up

Should investors buy Bristol-Myers Squibb for the upcoming dividend? It's hard to get used to Bristol-Myers Squibb paying a dividend despite reporting a loss over the past year. At least the dividend was covered by free cash flow, however. To summarise, Bristol-Myers Squibb looks okay on this analysis, although it doesn't appear a stand-out opportunity.

With that being said, if dividends aren't your biggest concern with Bristol-Myers Squibb, you should know about the other risks facing this business. For example, we've found 4 warning signs for Bristol-Myers Squibb (1 is significant!) that deserve your attention before investing in the shares.

We wouldn't recommend just buying the first dividend stock you see, though. Here's a list of interesting dividend stocks with a greater than 2% yield and an upcoming dividend.

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.



Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com.
West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee, in a nine-page letter, has warned Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar of legal consequences and has accused him of trying to destabilise an elected government.

You have passed judgments on the current state of affairs of our state in the following words safe haven to terror, crime, flourishing illegal bomb-making, corruption etc. Such unsubstantiated statements without evidence or mere imputations are absolutely false and baseless and may cause unnecessary panic among common people and cause loss of life, for which law will hold you responsible, the letter stated.

On September 19, after the National Investigation Agency (NIA) arrested six alleged Al Qaeda operatives from Murshidabad district, Governor Dhankhar, in a series of tweets, had alleged that the state has become a home of illegal bomb-making.

Also read: No morality, just political compulsion - Punjab CM on SADs exit from NDA

Thus with due respect to your August post, in the interest of the people of West Bengal and the Constitution, I request, air and advise you in the capacity of the chief minister of this state, to act within the mandates of the Constitution and refrain from acting on a political mandate, if any, to destabilize a democratically elected government, Banerjee wrote in her letter.

Late in the night, Dhankhar tweeted that he would respond on Sunday.

As communication @MamataOfficial has found way in public domain I seek media to focus on my eye opener note @WBPolice



Significantly, unlike her earlier physical stance in support of cop @KolkataPolice, this time defence is by way of letter.



Response tomorrow pic.twitter.com/wjQy8o8cfD  Governor West Bengal Jagdeep Dhankhar (@jdhankhar1) September 26, 2020

The letter stated that the Governor had enquired into criminal investigations which were going on against an accused named A Singh. Even though the letter didnt clarify who is A Singh, a senior police officer said that it was Arjun Singh, a Bharatiya Janata Party lawmaker.

This is illegitimate and reeks of favoritism. Further, the accused, by successfully obtaining the Governors extra-legal intervention and interference, has actually put the Governor in a dangerously precarious position which might have consequences under the law, the letter stated.

Also read: Meeting between Fadnavis, Sanjay Raut sets tongues wagging

Dhankhar tweeted: DGP @WBPolice did not appear as requested-third time in a row- cant be overlooked. DGP does not want to explain affairs @MamataOfficial CM writes instead, on his behalf. Is this what constitutionalism envisages? Is CM being rightfully counselled? Would respond to CM.

The acrimonious relationship between Raj Bhawan and the government has been making headlines since last September with the TMC accusing Dhankhar of overstepping his limits and interfering in day-to-day affairs of the government.

Expressing her pain and anguish the chief minister also wrote in her letter that the governor is like the British Crown and has no right to interfere with the day-to-day administration of the state government.
The US Department of Interior intends to appeal a judges decision to oust William Perry Pendley, Donald Trumps appointment to the Bureau of Land Management, after he has directed the agency for more than a year without Senate confirmation.

US District Judge Brian Morris ruled on Friday that Mr Pendley has unlawfully served in the role for more than 400 days without Senate approval, breaking from constitutional procedure.

The judge ruled that Interior Secretary David Bernhardt cant select another person to run the agency as an acting chief until that person is appointed by the president and confirmed in the Senate.

"Pendley has served and continues to serve unlawfully," Judge Morris ruled.

He argued that his ascent did not follow any of the permissable paths outlined in by federal law and the Constitution.

The ruling following a legal challenge from Montana Governor Steve Bullock, a Democrat, who argued in a lawsuit that Mr Pendley  a former oil industry attorney  could exploit most of the states federal land to oil and gas extraction.

He called the ruling a win for the Constitution, the rule of law, and our public lands.

In June, Mr Trump announced he intended to formally nominate Mr Pendley for the job, but he withdrew the nomination this month ahead of critical elections in November, including the Montana Senate race, in which the governor is running to unseat the incumbent Republican.

Despite the presidents withdrawal, Mr Pendley  as his temporary appointment was set to expire  issued an order to subvert his expiration by creating his own position as a deputy director, according to a document obtained by The Associated Press, while leaving the top post vacant.

The BLM manages nearly 250 million acres of federal land, or roughly one of every 10 acres, in the US.

In office, Mr Pendley has approved two plans in Montana that would open 95 per cent of federal land in the state to oil and gas development, Governor Bullock argued in court filings.

Mr Pendley has joined a long list of the presidents department heads who have turned their interim appointments into permanent leadership, without congressional oversight.

The president has filled several high-level jobs in his administration with appointees in ostensibly temporary or acting roles, circumventing the Senate confirmation process.

A government watchdog recently argued that the presidents acting officials at the Department of Homeland Security  including its director Chad Wolf and deputy Ken Cuccinelli  were unlawfully appointed.

The Government Accountability Office said that the two men were appointed through an invalid order of succession. The DHS inspector general has declined to investigate the report and is leaving the measure up to the courts.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 04:59:26|Editor: huaxia

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TRIPOLI, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said on Friday that 124 illegal immigrants have been rescued off Libya's western coast.

"A total of 124 refugees and immigrants were intercepted or rescued yesterday (Thursday) by the Libyan Coast Guard aboard a rubber boat off Libya," UNHCR said in a statement.

"UNHCR and its medical partner, the International Rescue Committee, provided humanitarian assistance and medical care to survivors, who embarked from Al Khums (in western Libya). Survivors were from Mali, Ghana and Sudan," it added.

The UNHCR estimated that more than 8,300 migrants have been returned to Libya so far.

Following the 2011 fall of former leader Muammar Gaddafi's government, Libya has been plagued by a state of insecurity and chaos that prompts thousands of illegal immigrants to attempt to cross the Mediterranean Sea toward Europe.

Many illegal immigrants, who were either rescued at sea or arrested by authorities, remain detained in overcrowded reception centers in Libya despite repeated international calls to close those centers. Enditem
President Donald Trump has issued an executive order helping newborns in need of care, tying the measure to federal money.



Trump promised Wednesday to sign an executive order that would require health care providers to provide medical care to all babies born alive as he makes an election-year push to appeal to voters.

It is the policy of the United States to recognize the human dignity and inherent worth of every newborn or other infant child, regardless of prematurity or disability, Trump said in the order, released Friday.

According to the order, babies born extremely premature or that might live with long-term disabilities should be protected, adding that discouraging parents from seeking treatment devalues lives. The order targets hospitals receiving federal funds and seeks to bring oversight administered by the secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services.

It also allows the secretary to prioritize discretionary grant funding and research money to programs and activities developing treatments helping the survival of infants born alive with an emergency medical condition in need of treatment.



Trumps announcement follows numerous attempts by GOP lawmakers in Washington and in state capitals around the country to pass legislation that threatens prison for doctors who dont try to save the life of infants born alive during abortions.

Organizations representing obstetricians and gynecologists previously said current law already provides protections to newborns, whether born during a failed abortion or under other circumstances. But when anomalies are so severe that a newborn would die soon after birth, a family may choose whats known as palliative care or comfort care. That might involve allowing the baby to die naturally without medical intervention.

It is not necessarily a crime to forgo sophisticated medical intervention in cases where severe fetal abnormalities leave a newborn with no chance of survival. This has happened on rare occasions in the course of a late-term abortion. The U.S. government recorded 143 deaths between 2003 and 2014 involving infants born alive during attempted abortions.

In a video message Wednesday to the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast, Trump said his born alive executive order would ensure that babies born alive no matter the circumstances receive the medical care that they deserve.

This is our sacrosanct moral duty," Trump said.

Critics said Trump was trying to score low-hanging political points."

It seems this administration will once again seek a solution to a nonexistent problem, said Jacqueline Ayers, a vice president at Planned Parenthoods political advocacy arm, the Planned Parenthood Action Fund. Health care providers already have an obligation to provide appropriate medical care.

Trumps comments come as his campaign and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden work to win over Roman Catholic voters in the Nov. 3 presidential election. For decades, that group has been a pivotal swing vote in U.S. presidential elections, with a majority backing the winner  whether Republican or Democrat  nearly every time.
Ghanas High Commissioner to the United Kingdom and Ireland, Papa Owusu Ankomah returns to the country on Saturday September 26 after nearly four years of service in that country as Ghanas envoy.

A note from his office said Mr, Owusu Ankomah has duly informed the diplomatic community in the UK of his departure and was officially bid farewell by members of the community.

Owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, he granted audience to most of the diplomatic corps virtually. The Marshal of the Diplomatic Corps, Alistair Harrison CMG CVO, called on His Excellency Owusu-Ankomah to bid him farewell and used the opportunity to present to the High Commissioner a parting gift from the Queen, which was a picture of the Queen and Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh.

He had warm words of inspiration for the High Commissioner of deepened relations between Ghana and the United Kingdom and the excellent work undertaken by the High Commissioner. He also wished the High Commissioner well in his future endeavours, the note said.

The Marshal of the Diplomatic Corps, Alistair Harrison (presenting a parting gift from Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth) and His Excellency Papa Owusu-Ankomah.

Papa Owusu-Ankomah also called on the Minister for Africa of the United Kingdom, Mr. James Dundridge, who represented the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, Rt. Hon. Dominic Raab.

Minister James Duddridge recalled the excellent relations that exist between Ghana and the U.K. which most recently, had enjoyed further boost due to the effective and prominent role that the High Commissioner played during his tenure.

The Minister recalled the participation of the President of Ghana at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM), and the UK-Africa Summit both held in London in April 2018 and January 2020, respectively and expressed profound gratitude to the High Commissioner for institutionalising his good works based on a rich experience which had led to uncountable highlights of his stay in the U.K.

The Minister for Africa, Mr. James Dundridge, to Adam Afriyie

MP & Trade envoy for Ghana, Commonwealth and Development Office, and the High Commissioner together with the Head of Chancery, Mrs Matilda A. Osei-Agyeman during the farewell meeting.

Other persons Papa Owusu Ankomah engaged are the Secretary -General for the Commonwealth family, Rt.Hon. Patricia Scotland, the Secretary-General of the International Maritime Organisation, Mr. Kitack Lim, the Dean of the Diplomatic Corps, His Excellency Khaled Abdulaziz Al-Duwaisan GCVO, and the Dean of the African Diplomatic Corps, Hie Excellency Estifanos Habtemariam Ghebreyesus.

Papa Owusu-Ankomah, is proceeding on leave prior to the end of his duty tour on 30th November, 2020.
New Delhi :

Twitter is buzzing with news alerts from India and rest of the world. Here are the latest updates from the micro-blogging site in one scroll:

#10:58 PM

Quebec police now say just 1 of the individuals arrested in connection with Canada mosque attack is considered a suspect-AP

#10:08 PM

Hafiz Muhammad Saeed put under house arrest: Pakistan media

#9:44 PM

680 luxury watches worth Rs 1.30 crore stolen from showroom at Connaught Place in high-security Lutyens Zone of New Delhi-ANI

#9:12 PM

All party meeting held in a good atmosphere, all said that demonetisation must be discussed in the session: LS Speaker Sumitra Mahajan-ANI

#9:00 PM

Prime Minister Narendra Modi reached Parliament for dinner hosted by Lok Sabha speaker Sumitra Mahajan-ANI

#8:45 PM

Republican Hindu Coalition announces support for Trump's Executive Order on Immigration-ANI



#7:23 PM

Trump says he will announce Supreme Court pick Tuesday

#7:15 PM

Manipur police arrested one person belonging to People's Revolutionary Party of Kangleipak (PREPAK) from Mongsangei Boroi Makhong-ANI

#7:10 PM

Sukma (Chhattisgarh): Woman naxal killed in a joint operation of CoBRA's battalion & district police. Arms and ammunition recovered-ANI

#7:05 PM

Manipur police arrested one person belonging to People's Revolutionary Party of Kangleipak (PREPAK) from Mongsangei Boroi Makhong-ANI



#5:54 PM

Payment Banks can pose challenge to traditional banks due to lower cost, says JaitleyA

#5:47 PM

Four names which have been selected are very good, must help in implementation of our report: Justice Lodha on SC appoints BCCI administrators-ANI

#5:38 PM

What I did was with full satisfaction of mine that we are not doing anything against law of the land: Manmohan Singh on BJP allegations #Mallya

#5:18 PM

Limits placed on cash withdrawals from ATMs stand withdrawn from February 1

#5:17 PM

Limits placed on cash withdrawals from ATMs stand withdrawn from Feb 01. Banks may, at their discretion, have their own operating limits:RBI

#5:02 PM

Hitendra Nath Goswami unanimously elected as Speaker of Assam Assembly-ANI

#4:59 PM

There are no jobs, capital formation is declining, credit growth is the lowest in several decades: P Chidambaram, Former Finance Minister-ANI

#4:58 PM

Jallikattu Management Committee have decided to conduct jallikattu on Feb 5th in Avaniapuram, Feb 9th in Palamedu &Feb 10th in Alanganallur-ANI

#4:57 PM

Where are the jobs?Where is new capital investment? Where is credit growth?: P Chidambaram, Former Finance Minister-ANI

#4:56 PM

Indian economy not in good shape: Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh-ANI

#4:42 PM

Court summons CM Arvind Kejriwal, suspended BJP MP Kirti Azad as accused in criminal defamation plea by DDCAA andA Chetan Chauhan-ANI

#4:34 PM

72-yr-old Sufi woman found dead with her throat slit in Bangladesh, amid series of systematic assaults on minorities, Sufis, bloggers-PTI

#4:32 PM

Mortal remains of 14 in Gurez, which couldnt be evacuated earlier because of inclement weather, were brought to Srinagar on Monday-ANI

#4:31 PM

5 Army soldiers who had been trapped under snow after the caving in of track in Machill sector on 28 Jan succumb to injuries-ANI

#4:22 PM

Brussels bomber Abrini charged over Paris attacks: French lawyers

#4:17 PM

Have not received any proposal from MNS till now, Shiv Sena will fight against BJP with full power: Uddhav Thackeray-ANI

#4:05 PM

Congress party to hold strategy meeting regarding Budget session-ANI

#3:50 PM

SC appoints former CAG Vinod Rai to head the BCCI along with Ramachandra Guha and Vikram Limaye-ANI

#3:03 PM

Former CBI Director Ranjit Sinha moves SC seeking recall of its earlier order that sought investigation of his role in coal block scam (ANI)A

#2:56 PM

Amulya Patnaik appointed as next Delhi Police Commissioner (ANI)A

#2:51 PM

Vikramajit Sen appointed as administrator of DDCA by Delhi HC;he'll call a meeting to reconstitute DDCA working committee&sports committee. (ANI)A

#2:45 PM

BSF seized 4 packets of contraband suspected to be heroin from the area of border outpost Pulmoran near the India-Pakistan Border (ANI)A

#2:40 PM

BJP President Amit Shah addressing a rally in Amritsar (ANI)A

#2:31 PM

Tamil Nadu Government introduces bill in Assembly to hike penalty upto a2 lakh for allowing sewage flow in streets (ANI)A

#2:27 PM

Bhansali Productions clarify that there is no romantic dream sequence or any objectionable/romantic scene b/w Padmavati & Alauddin Khilji (ANI)A

#2:17 PM

BJP MLA Suresh Rana kicks up controversy, says curfew will be imposed in Kairana, Deoband, Moradabad if he is re-elected in UP polls. (PTI)A

#2:08 PM

UP CM Akhilesh Yadav addresses a rally in Etah (ANI)A

#1:56 PM

RSS defamation case: Bhiwandi Court adjourns hearing till 3rd March 2017 #RahulGandhiA (ANI)A

#1:51 PM

Vodafone says it was in talks to merge its Indian operations with Idea Cellular: Reuters (ANI)A

#1:35 PM

All India #TrinamoolCongress releases statement,says will not be present in parliament for first two days of #BudgetSession pic.twitter.com/3RitqvISJY a News Nation (@NewsNationTV) January 30, 2017

#1:19 PM

First loan to Vijay Mallya was granted in 2004, then in 2008. Despite his cos declared NPA, restructuring of his loan was done in 2010:BJP (ANI)

#1:14 PM

Rahul Gandhi reaches Bhiwandi Court (Thane, Maharashtra) for hearing in the defamation case against him over remarks on RSS (ANI)A

#1:12 PM

Allahabad HC's Lucknow Bench directs state govt to submit report of action taken on 02 Feb over Etah school bus accident (ANI)A

#1:03 PM

The Supreme Court also levied a fine of Rs 1 lakh on Asaram (ANI)A

#12:50 PM

Kingfisher & IDBI employee loan default case: Hearing on bail application of the accused adjourned till tomorrow by Special CBI Court,Mumbai (ANI)A

#12:46 PM

Kambala matter adjourned for 2 weeks by Karnataka HC, HC advised petitioner to come back once SC grants verdict on jallikattuA (ANI)A

#12:32 PM

Delhi HC issues notice to Delhi Govt,MHA&Assembly Secy on petition seeking that recnt 2day Delhi assmbly session b declared unconstitutional (ANI)A

#12:24 PM

SC orders registration of a new FIR against Asaram for filing fake documents in connection with his health (ANI)

#11:59 AM

Contractor overseeing road repair work in Bihar's Jamui killed by Maoists (ANI)A

#11:52 AM

Death toll from Quebec City mosque attack rises to six with eight injured A (ANI)A

#11:47 AM

Swati Singh(BJP leader and wife of expelled BJP leader Dayashankar Singh) to contest from Lucknow's Sarojini Nagar: KP Maurya,BJP UP chief (ANI)A

#11:44 AM

Ceiling of an MCD school in Delhi's Alipur collapses.More details awaited (ANI)A

#11:41 AM

Supreme Court dismisses bail application of Asaram in connection with two rape cases (ANI)A

# 11:39 AM

# 11:22 AM

SC refuses to hear petition that sought disclosure of election candidates' funding sources; SC asked petitioner to approach HC for relief (ANI)A



# 11:06 AMA

UP: 6 bus passengers dead in collision b/w a bus and a truck on NH28 in Sant Kabir Nagar. 27 injured, out of which 10 are critical: ANI

# 11:01 AMA

Delhi: President Pranab Mukherjee pays tribute at Rajghat on Mahatma Gandhi's 69th death anniversary

# 11:00 AM

Canada PM condemns mosque shooting as 'terrorist attack'

# 10:56 AM

100 Fire cracker companies move SC seeking modification of Court's earlier order which put a ban on sale of firecrackers in Delhi and NCR

# 10:56 AM

Army Chief Gen Rawat flags off motor bike expedition of 9Gorkha Rifles which completed 200-yrs.Expedition begins in Delhi;to end at Siliguri



# 10:56 AM

Delhi: PM Modi pays tribute at Rajghat on Mahatma Gandhi's 69th death anniversary

# 10:55 AMA

Former PM Manmohan Singh and P. Chidambaram to hold special Congress briefing at 4.15 pm at party HQ

# 10:05 AM

Terrorist hideout busted by security forces in Shopian district of J-K. Arms and ammunition seized

# 9:20 AM

Ludhiana: NRIs owing allegiance to different political parties campaign for upcoming

# 8:47 AM

Quebec City police confirm fatalities in a shooting at a local mosque, 2 people arrested

# 8:46 AM

Landing operations at Delhi Airport suspended due to dense fogA in the national capital

# 8:42 AM

Miss France Iris Mittenaere has won the Miss Universe crown at the recently concluded pageant in Philippines

# 8:37 AM

TMC to not attend all party meet called by govt today as Mamata Banerjee has called a meeting of party MPs at 12 noon in Kolkata

# 8:23 AM

5 dead after gunmen opened fire gunmen opened fire in a Canada's Quebec City mosque during evening prayers

# 8:13 AM

Security guard accused of 25-year-old woman's murder at her Infosys Pune office, arrested from Mumbai

# 7: 47 AM

All party meet called by govt ahead of budget session at 11.30am, similar meeting called by Lok Sabha speaker at 7pmA (ANI)A

# 7:22 AM

Rahul Gandhi to appear in Bhiwandi court situated in Maharashtra for the defamation case against him over his remarks on RSS (ANI)A A

# 7:20 AMA

Akhilesh Yadav to address 5 rallies in Uttar Pradesh (ANI)A

# 7:18 AM

BSP Supremo Mayawati to address 2 rallies in PunjabA (ANI)A

# 7:15 AM

28 trains arriving late, 10 rescheduled and 1 cancelled due to fog and other operational reasons DelhiA (ANI)A

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.
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The Vietnam Coast Guard has the right to chase vessels at sea for inspection and control in the following cases: violation of sovereignty, sovereignty right, national jurisdiction ...

The law clearly defines the position and functions of the Vietnam Coast Guard

Specifically, the Vietnam Coast Guard is the people's armed force, a specialized force of the State, acting as the core of law enforcement and protecting national security, order and safety at sea.

The Vietnam Coast Guard has the function of advising the Minister of Defense to promulgate according to its competence or propose to the Party and the State on policies and laws to protect national security, order and safety at sea;

Other functions include: protect the national sovereignty, sovereignty right and jurisdiction in the territorial waters of Vietnam; management of security, order and safety, and ensure the observance of Vietnamese laws, international treaties to which the Socialist Republic of Vietnam is a signatory, and international agreements within their competence.

The law also stipulates that the Vietnam Coast Guard is responsible for collecting information, analyzing, assessing and forecasting the situation to propose policies, solutions, and plans to protect national security and enforce the law on the sea.

The Coast Guard is a unit of research, analysis, prediction and consultation with competent authorities to promulgate policies and laws on the protection of sovereignty, sovereignty rights, national jurisdiction, and national security within Vietnamese territorial waters, ensuring order and safety, and combating crimes and law violations at sea.

Vietnam Coast Guards ship 8020 - Photo: Dong Ha

The Vietnam Coast Guard is also responsible for protecting sovereignty, sovereignty rights, national jurisdiction, security, national interests; protecting marine resources and environment; properties, legitimate rights and interests of agencies, organizations and individuals at sea.

The Coast Guard is a unit that fights against crimes, law violating acts, maintains security, order and safety at sea; search, rescue, and participate in dealing with incidents of marine environment; participate in building defense and security posture and handling defense and security situations at sea ...

The right to seize ships according to regulations

In terms of powers, the law stipulates that the Vietnam Coast Guard has the right to patrol, inspect and control people, ships, goods and luggage in Vietnamese waters according to regulations; use of weapons, explosives and support tools; use professional technical facilities and equipment.

The Vietnam Coast Guard has the right to handle administrative violations in accordance with the law on handling of administrative violations; conduct a number of criminal investigation activities in accordance with the law on organization of criminal investigation agencies, the law on criminal procedure; chasing ships that violate the law at sea.

In addition, the Vietnam Coast Guard has the right to arrest ships in accordance with the law on arrest of ships and a number of other jurisdictions ...

Article 17 specifies the exercise of the right to pursue ships at sea of the Vietnam Coast Guard.

Specifically, the Vietnam Coast Guard exercises the right to chase ships in the following cases: violation of sovereignty, sovereignty right, national jurisdiction at sea; disobeying the signals and orders to stop ships of the Vietnam Coast Guard; implementing international cooperation in pursuit activities ...

The scope, authority and order of chasing ships at sea by the Vietnam Coast Guard shall comply with the provisions of Vietnamese law and international treaties to which Vietnam is a signatory.

The Law on Vietnam Coast Guard includes 8 chapters, 41 articles and it took effect from 1 July 2019.

Thanh Binh
BJP leader from West Bengal Rahul Sinha on Saturday expressed his displeasure after he was dropped as the national secretary after a reshuffle of the partys central team.

The Bharatiya Janata Party president JP Nadda announced the new team of the partys national office-bearers and two former Trinamool Congress leaders were given prominent posts. Mukul Roy, a former confidante of Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee, was given the post of a vice president. Another former TMC lawmaker Anupam Hazra was also promoted as a national secretary.

Sinha posted two videos on Twitter in English and Hindi citing his disapproval over defectors from Trinamool Congress being assigned central leadership in the BJP. However, he did not name anyone.

Served @BJP4India for 40 Years as the Warrior and today just to include @AITCofficial Leaders, I have been asked to Left the Post of the Party, Sinha tweeted along with a video.

Served @BJP4India for 40 Years as the Warrior and today just to include @AITCofficial Leaders, I have been asked to Left the Post of the Party.@narendramodi @BJP4Bengal pic.twitter.com/yN1Zok8BdV  Rahul Sinha (@RahulSinhaBJP) September 26, 2020

For 40 years, I have served BJP. I have always been a soldier for the party since its inception. But a Trinamool leader walks in and I have to abandon my post. This is sad and unfortunate, Sinha said in the 50-second video.

I shall refrain from talking about how BJP has rewarded me at this point in time. Over the course of the next 10-12 days, I will speak about todays events and will also inform you about the step I am going to take, he added.

The elevations of Roy and Hazra comes ahead of the assembly elections due in March-April next year in West Bengal and experts say the move could have a far-reaching impact on the state polls.

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A travesty: Progressive Christian leaders slam Breonna Taylor grand jury decision

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Progressive Christian leaders have expressed outrage over a grand jury in Kentucky deciding not to file homicide charges against the three Louisville police officers involved in the controversial death of 26-year-old Breonna Taylor in March.

In a decision announced Wednesday after a four-month investigation, the 12-member Jefferson County Grand Jury opted to indict former police detective Brett Hankison on three counts of first-degree wanton endangerment for endangering the lives of people in a unit neighboring Taylors apartment when he fired multiple rounds on March 13.

The grand jury also decided that two other officers involved in Taylors death were justified when they fired their weapons into her apartment because her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, fired at them while carrying out a narcotics warrant on the apartment late at night.

Walkers initial shot fired at the police, who he claimed had not identified themselves, was met with gunfire from the officers. In the confusion, Taylor was fatally wounded by six shots.

As Taylors death has been among the many highlighted by protesters nationwide demonstrating against police brutality, the outcome only inflamed the protests across the U.S. last night.

While the grand jury opted to indict Hankison on three counts of first-degree wanton endangerment, these counts are not directly tied to the death of Taylor. The other two officers, Jonathan Mattingly and detective Myles Cosgrove, were not indicted.

The indictment announcement spurred widespread criticism as well as protests in multiple cities, including Louisville, where 127 demonstrators were arrested overnight. Additionally, two police officers were shot in the wake of the grand jurys decision.

The officers  Aubrey Gregory and Robinson Desroches  are expected to recover as injuries are not life-threatening. A suspect has been identified by the Louisville Metro Police Department as 26-year-old Larynzo Johnson.

The Rev. William Barber II, the co-chair of the Poor Peoples Campaign and pastor of Greenleaf Christian Church in Goldsboro, North Carolina, called the grand jury result a damnable decision.

Police used a battering ram and broke the door off its hinges as they entered Breonna Taylors apartment, shooting her at least five times. Anything less than indictments for the full extent of the officers actions cannot stand, the pastor, who is also president of the North Carolina State Conference of the NAACP, tweeted.

Yes, they endangered the neighbors. But Breonna Taylor got a casket, and not a single officer is charged in her death or will be tried in state criminal court for it. She cannot be erased from this story.

Barber went on to call Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron, who is black, an enabler of racism for not allowing these officers to be tried in Breonna Taylors death. Barber argued that just because the attorney general is Black does not mean he gets a pass on criticism.

Four leaders of the Presbyterian Church (USA), among them Stated Clerk of the General Assembly J. Herbert Nelson, the first African-American head of the denomination, also denounced the decision.

In a joint statement, the PC(USA) leadership said their hearts break at the news. The leaders stated that the grand jury findings only makes us feel that our cries have fallen on deaf ears.

This is a travesty. People of color should not have to live in fear of those who are called to protect and serve, the PC(USA) leaders contend. We grieve with Breonna Taylors family and continue to lift them up in prayer as her community seeks to heal.

The denominational leadership called on people to renew efforts to bring justice to those who have been denigrated, used, ignored, and repressed because of the color of their skin.

The liberal mainline denomination Evangelical Lutheran Church in America posted to Twitter a prayer regarding Taylors death.

When one part of the body of Christ hurts, the whole body hurts, the ELCA tweeted on Wednesday afternoon.

As we remember the life of Breonna Taylor, Living God, may we be re-membered as your body, connected to one another and empowered for the work you call us to do in the name of Jesus and the power of his Spirit.

Some, including columnist Andrew C. McCarthy of the National Review, defended the grand jury decision, stating that criminal law is not designed to address every human tragedy.

The cops were doing their job in executing a lawful search warrant at a location that was quite justifiably tied to a notorious criminal  Ms. Taylors former boyfriend, Jamarcus Glover, wrote McCarthy.

How they came to be at Ms. Taylors home, with a search warrant based on probable cause that evidence of narcotics crimes would be found, is the part of the story the social-justice warriors would have us omit.

McCarthy labeled the death of Taylor a calamity and a tragic loss, but stressed that the law is not equipped to address catastrophes that are not crimes.

Denny Burk, professor of biblical studies at Boyce College in Louisville, posted a blog post on Wednesday praising Camerons remarks earlier in the day in which the attorney general mourned Taylors death but also called for the rule of law, due process, and justice.

Amen to this from Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron: If we simply act on emotion or outrage, there is no justice. Mob justice is not justice, Burke tweeted.

In a statement Thursday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, stated that Cameron conducted exactly the kind of thorough, impartial investigation that justice demands.



I have full confidence in the Attorney Generals painstaking pursuit of facts and justice, McConnell assured. Many Kentuckians have channeled their continuing grief and anger into a peaceful exercise of their First Amendment rights. But in Louisville last night, we saw more of the lawlessness, riots, and violence that has plagued American cities too often this year.



McConnell also condemned the fact that citizens businesses were vandalized, fires were set in the streets and two officers were shot.
Natural gas was first hailed as the bridge between the fossil fuel past and the renewable future. Then it came under fire because although cleaner than oil and coal, it is not entirely emission-free. But according to a new report from Energy Market Advisors, it will rule the energy mix of the United States even 20 years from now.

The reasons for this continued dominance are simple enough even if they may be unpleasant for the most hard-line supporters of renewables such as solar and wind. Gas is not only cheap, but its supply is also continuous, so, importantly, it does not need battery storage the way solar and wind do, which increases the total costs of such installations even if other costs are falling, which they are.

These falling costs will undoubtedly pave the way to much more solar- and wind-heavy energy mix across North America, while coal sinks into oblivion, partly driven by its worse economics, the report said. By 2044, close to half of the existing coal power generation capacity will be gone. At the same time, solar will grow from 60 GW this year to some 250 GW in 2044  an impressive fourfold growth. Wind will grow, too, albeit more modestly, from 115 GW today to 191 GW in 2044. But gas will rule them all.

To date, natural gas accounts for some 41 percent of North American energy generation. In 2044, according to Hitachi ABB Power Grids, gas will account for 43 percent. This, compared with the explosive growth seen in solar and wind, does not seem particularly impressive. The thing to remember is, however, that even with this almost absent growth, gas will be the fuel driving the biggest portion of power generation in North America. And this means that the fossil fuel era is far from over, really.

Related: The World's Most Expensive Crude Get Expensive Again

In some parts of the United States, it will even continue to be the dominant energy source even in 2044, according to the EMA report. In the Midwest, for instance, natural gas will account for 49 percent of energy generation in that year, while renewables will account for 31 percent. In the Southeast, gas will come to account for 57 percent, while renewables rise from less than 10 percent to 20 percent.

The forecast dominance of gas is not something that some governors such as New Yorks Andrew Cuomo would want to hear as they strive for 100-percent renewable energy. But there is another reason gas will be dominant: it will help make the grid resilient to the intermittency of renewable energy generated by solar and wind farms. Because it is not intermittent like them, gas can provide the essential baseload every grid needs to provide a reliable power supply to its users. And if the supply is not reliable, the green energy boom could easily lose public support.

We need to pay attention to the integrity of the electrical grid. Because if we do not, we are going to lose this whole green thing were doing. Were going to lose the public, a Long Beach state Assemblyman, Patrick ODonnell, told the California water board this summer when a heatwave revealed the states weak spots in energy supply.

Cheap natural gas prices and the energy sources ability to fill in where sustainable energy falls short will speed investment growth, the EMA report authors wrote. As an energy source, gas is regarded as a stop-gap solution for renewables.

It may even become something more than a stop-gap solution if the projected strong growth in renewable capacity additions does not pan out. The expiry of the production tax credit and the phase-out of the investment tax credit could drive a slowdown in new solar and wind capacity additions, Shilpa Kokate, Advisory Director for Easter U.S. for Hitachi ABB Power Grids, told Oilprice.

There is also the issue of a carbon tax that will greatly help the shift to renewables from fossil fuels as will overall regulatory support for this shift, which has been essential for the advent of renewables everywhere. But there is also another thing, according to Kokatefailure to appreciate the role of natural gas in helping maintain the reliability of power supply.

Opposition to fossil fuels is understandable. It could become problematic, however, if it is so complete that it overlooks the role natural gas, if not other fossil fuels, plays in energy security. Renewable energy is clean, certainly, but as the sun does not shine around the clock, and the wind does not blow constantly and at a constant speed, they need storage to provide a reliable power supply. Building enough energy storage to eliminate the need for natural gas completely is a challenging task: battery installations take up a lot of space, and they dont cost a dollar a kW. Until these challenges are overcome, gas will continue to be needed.

By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
India's Covid-19 tally shot past 5.9 million with 85,362 fresh cases in a span of 24 hours, while over 4.8 million people have recovered from the disease so far, according to the Union Health Ministry's data. This has pushing the nation's recovery rate to 82.14 per cent. India has added over 1,000 deaths every day for 26 days now. The mortality toll stands at 93,379. The Covid-19 case fatality rate was recorded at 1.58 per cent.



Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Friday urged the international community to pledge to share the Covid-19 vaccine whenever it is found, as it is a "global and moral responsibility". Speaking at the 75th United Nations General Assembly, Morrison asked the international community to seek an answer as to how the virus was transmitted to humans.

The warned that the global death toll could hit two million before an effective vaccine is widely used. WHO urged Europeans to ask themselves whether they had done enough to avoid the need for lockdowns. Earlier, Spain's capital Madrid brought another eight districts under tougher restrictions, which now affect a million people in the city. In France, staff from bars and restaurants in the southern city Marseille protested against the closure of their workplaces which was brought in on Saturday. And in the UK, tougher restrictions were announced in several regions as new daily infections rise.




OTTAWAThe RCMP has arrested and charged an Ontario man with falsely claiming to have committed terrorist acts.

The national police force says the criminal charge against Shehroze Chaudhry, 25, stems from numerous media interviews in which he described travelling to Syria in 2016 to join the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant and committing acts of extremism.

The Mounties say the Burlington, Ont., mans interviews were published in multiple media outlets, aired on podcasts and featured in a television documentary, raising public safety concerns.

Chaudhry is charged with a Criminal Code offence of perpetrating a hoax related to terrorist activity.

He is to appear in court in Brampton, Ont., on Nov. 16. RCMP Supt. Christopher deGale says hoaxes can generate fear and create the illusion there is a potential threat to Canadians.

As a result, the RCMP takes these allegations very seriously, particularly when individuals, by their actions, cause the police to enter into investigations in which human and financial resources are invested and diverted from other ongoing priorities, said deGale, the officer in charge of an RCMP security enforcement team.

The RCMP says it collaborated with several other agencies during the course of the investigation.

Read more about:
The pandemic thunders on like a ghost train on an invisible track. The times are shadowed by one dominant truth  uncertainty in the present, opacity into the future. Will there be a vaccine, when, and how effective will it be? What until then? No consensus exists on how governments should respond to rampant infection despite nine months of obsessively charted, comparative evidence on different strategies from scores of countries. European nations end lockdown, then a couple of months later, find themselves overwhelmed by new waves of the virus and wonder what to do.

Premier Daniel Andrews at the hotel quarantine inquiry.

The leadership example of General Kutuzov, as portrayed by Tolstoy in War and Peace, is instructive. Kutuzov was the saviour of Russia in the war against Napoleon. He is so old, fat and near-blind he can hardly mount his horse. He is hounded by a swarm of people proffering advice and strategy.

The advisers are led by a group of German generals who draw up detailed plans for the whole campaign, for each battle, and for each segment within a battle. Kutuzov takes no notice. He has learnt that, in reality, the battles are so complex, fast moving and unpredictable that the most elegant and rational models for the movement of troops are not only useless, they get in the way of the minimal influence he can actually exert.

The moral here is not inaction in the face of accelerating infection rates. Indeed, the extreme Swedish model of minimal intervention is now largely discredited. Sweden kept its economy open and left its people largely free, yet its economy has performed no better, in the most recent quarter, than its heavily restricted Scandinavian neighbours.
The tight knit community of Garrienderk over the Cork/Limerick border, within a mile of their Cork neighbours in Charleville town, have a great sense of pride in their own place and have come together to beautify and enhance their area of South Limerick.

Garrienderk is half of the Effin/Garrienderk parish, which is divided by the Cork/Dublin rail line, and the community started some years ago by setting up a Community Development Association, the members of which declared war on the unscrupulous people who dumped rubbish on the two km stretch of roadway from their village almost to edge of Charleville town.

The Association got the buy-in and support, financial and otherwise, from everybody in the community, and having successfully cleared up the rubbish problem they set about levelling and lawn seeding the grass margins on both sides of the busy roadway to prevent a recurrence and to discourage future offenders.

They have now added flower beds and other planting to brighten up the area, and acquired a vacant house in which they intend to create a centre for the use of the local community to come together for meetings and other activities.

The very active committee is headed by chairman Jim Pitman with Joe Power as the very efficient secretary and the treasurer/accountant is Mike Murphy. There are two trustees in Dermot Kelly and Ger Prendergast.

The area around that side of the parish is steeped in local history and an aural version of this is presently being recorded by members of the older generation going back to the 1920's after the War of Independence, the Treaty and the Civil War, when unemployment was rife and life was tough with the only work was with the farming community.

But the people were resilient and made do with little until their children came of the age when the emigrant ship and England beckoned, and it was there the majority went for the work they could not get at home. Very few returned save for the odd holiday at Christmas, and so the Garrienderk lost many of its sons and daughters to emigration.

The Garrienderk Bridge over the Cork/Dublin rail line, which was blown up by the IRA during the Civil War, was viewed by General Michael Collins on his way to West Cork, just two days before he was shot dead at Beal na Blath. The photograph of Collins on the bridge was taken by local man Owen Hickey and was the last picture of him taken alive. Other prominent local people from the area were Peter O'Farrell and Dan Browne, who were prominent in the fight for independence, Rev. Brother Stephen Russell, a native of the area who was an Alexian Brother, and William Blakeney of Mount Balkeney, to mention a few.

Their stories, which give a fascinating glimpse of how people lived in the 20th Century, will be available when the community centre has been developed, so that local people may delve into the past, and get a flavour of what life in this part of rural county Limerick was like, and contrast it with how the present generation live their lives today.
ROCHESTER, N.Y. - Rochester Mayor Lovely Warren tapped a Black woman to become the new interim city police chief, saying Saturday she will bring a fresh approach to policing amid the tumultuous aftermath to Daniel Prudes death.

Cynthia Herriott-Sullivan, who retired from the department in 2009 as a lieutenant, will become the first woman to head the police department on Oct. 14.

Warren fired former Police Chief LaRon Singletary this month after police body camera video was released of Prude, a Black man who died several days after officers put a hood over his head and pressed his face into the pavement on March 23.

The videos release nearly six month after Prudes death sparked days of protests in the city, as well as insistent calls for police reform and the mayors resignation. Warren lauded Herriott-Sullivans police experience and ties to the community and said she will help her bridge the gap between the police and residents.

I am confident that she will bring a different perspective and instil a fresh approach to policing, both of which are very much needed in our city, particularly at this difficult time, Warren said at a news conference.

Herriott-Sullivan will take over a police department in disarray since Prudes relatives released the video. Warren claimed Singletary had initially misled her about the circumstances of the death. Other senior police officials have announced their retirements or departures from top command positions.

A week ago, the city by Lake Ontario was further traumatized when gunfire at a backyard party killed two teenagers and wounded 14 others. Police have yet to announce arrests in that case.

Herriott-Sullivan is currently the interim deputy executive director at the Rochester Housing Authority. She told reporters that despite tough times, she believes the community can work together in the city she loves.

Ironically, I left law enforcement because I wanted to have a bigger hand in helping people stay out of jail rather than putting them in, she said. And so I moved on to roles that helped me in in dealing with criminal justice disparities.

Warren said earlier this month that the interim chief would serve until June, giving the city time to conduct a national search for a permanent replacement.
Brushing aside condemnation from Western powers, Chinas leader, Xi Jinping, called his policies in the ethnically divided region of Xinjiang a totally correct success, and vowed more efforts to imprint Chinese national identity deep in the soul of Uighurs and other largely Muslim minorities.

Mr. Xi made the remarks during a two-day conference that ended Saturday, which is likely to set the direction of Chinese policy in Xinjiang for years to come. While the initial official summary of the meeting gave few details, Mr. Xis unyielding words signaled that condemnation from the United States, the European Union and other powers has not shifted his determination to subdue Xinjiangs Muslim minorities through a dual strategy of political indoctrination and state-driven demographic change.

Viewed overall, Xinjiang is enjoying a favorable setting of social stability with the people living in peace and contentment, Mr. Xi told the meeting, according to the summary issued by Xinhua news agency. The facts have abundantly demonstrated that our national minority work has been a success.

Mr. Xis speech was revealed at the end of a week that exposed the stark costs of Chinas security strategy in Xinjiang, as well as continued international ire over the indoctrination camps and detention sites that have held hundreds of thousands  and possibly a million or more  Muslim minorities in Xinjiang. But Mr. Xi gave no signs of markedly softening his policies there.
ANN ARBOR, MI  Where do we go from here?

That was the question community members were asking at an anti-racism protest held at the University of Michigan Diag Saturday. Dozens of community members attended the event, including a bike caravan that rode to the Diag just after 11 a.m. with signs and bullhorns in hand.

Trische Duckworth, executive director of Survivors Speak, said so many things have been happening and there is never any resolve, which is something that needs to be found.

Weve got to put our heads together because, while we have a responsibility as African Americans, we didnt start racism, and were not going to be able to finish it, Duckworth said. So, we need our caucasian brothers and sisters to bring their voices, add their voices to the conversation and have those hard conversations with people that wont have them with us.

Duckworth hosted the event and brought several speakers to the microphone on the steps of the Hatcher Library, including Rep. Debbie Dingell and Washtenaw County prosecutor-hopeful Eli Savit. Both spoke about the late Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and her impact on the country and the changes she created, which is part of the reason for the protest.

This is all about change and its bringing all of us together to talk about that change and make the world a better place, Dingell said.

The protest comes just three days removed from a Kentucky grand jury choosing not to move forward with charges against any officers for their role in the death of Breonna Taylor, who was shot multiple times by officers who entered her home using a no-knock warrant during a narcotics investigation. One officer, Brett Hankison, was charged with three counts of wanton endangerment in connection to the March 13 police raid.

Breonna Taylor killing: 1 ex-police officer charged with endangerment for shooting into apartments

After hearing the announcement, Duckworth  who said she is normally optimistic -- said she had a moment of pessimism.

When you continue to see no justice, its like, what the hell are we fighting for? Duckworth said. But I believe we are in a time now thats very different because you have people rising up of all different ethnic backgrounds that are saying, OK, we see this, its not right and we have to do something about it.

Also speaking at the meeting were attorney Bill Amadeo as well as ShaTeina Grady El and her husband, Daniyal. An investigation by the Michigan Attorney Generals Office found that a deputy with the Washtenaw County Sheriffs Office was justified in punching ShaTeina Grady El during a May 26 incident in which sheriffs deputies ordered the couple to leave the scene of a shooting.

The AGs office will instead be charging ShaTeina Grady El with three felony counts of resisting and obstructing an officer, one count of resisting and obstructing an officer causing injury and one count of malicious destruction of property.

Attorney general determines deputy was justified to punch woman during arrest

Speaking to the crowd, ShaTeina Grady El said the next step in the fight against racial injustice is education.

I think (education) will start fixing things because if you dont know that youre supposed to be an upright, moral-standing person, then you wont act that way, ShaTeina Grady El said.

After listening to speakers for about an hour, the group marched through downtown Ann Arbor and stopped at the corner of Huron and Main streets, where they were silent for 8 minutes, 46 seconds, which symbolizes the length of time officers kneeled on the neck of George Floyd, killing him earlier this year.

There will be an event next month that will explore the disparities that are plaguing the African American community in Washtenaw County, Duckworth said. There will be some speakers from many different walks of life, and at the end, the group will come together for a community think tank to make action items that people can work on as individuals and as a group to bring about racial and social equity in the county, Duckworth said.

The event will run from 2 to 6 p.m. Oct. 17 at Lillie Park, 4365 Platt Road in Ann Arbor. More information can be found here.

READ MORE:

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Private health care major Fortis Healthcare handed over a cheque of Rs 2.5 crore to Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) in the presence of Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare Ashwini Kumar Choubey on Saturday.

Fortis Healthcares MD and CEO Dr Ashutosh Raghuvanshi handed the contribution cheque to ICMRs director-general, Dr Balram Bharghav and senior financial advisor of the apex research institute Rajiv Roy. Raghuvanshi told IANS that the money presented to the ICMR is a contribution from Fortis as a part of their commitment to extend support to the government in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.

ICMR has been at the cutting edge of healthcare innovation and research in India. They are working tirelessly to protect our country from the onslaught of COVID-19, and we take this opportunity to applaud their commendable efforts. Fortis stands with ICMR in fighting the pandemic and forging new avenues of technological medical advancement. We are glad that we can contribute a humble sum of Rs 2.5 crore to ICMR as part our commitment to extend every possible support to the government during this time," he said.
Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has cancelled the suspension order of a food safety officer, who had reportedly not served fresh chapatis to the CM during his visit to Indore on Wednesday.

Manish Swami was suspended for alleged dereliction of duty during the CMs visit, said an officer of the district administration. However, when the CM learnt of the punishment through the social media late on Friday, he asked the collector to reinstate Swami.

Talking to media persons in Sagar on Friday, chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan said, I dont have any problem in eating rukhi sukhi chapatis and I dont feel that it is appropriate to suspend an officer for serving not so fresh food to me. I never mind if I go through any difficulty during my visit to different districts because I am a public servant and dedicated to work for the welfare of the people.

Also Read: Chouhan refers to poll panels guidelines, tweets appeal to wash hand completely

Manish Swami thanked CM and said, I dont know the reason behind my suspension but I am so happy that the CM sir thought about me and ordered the revocation of the suspension order.

Indore district collector Manish Singh, who issued the order of suspension, couldnt be contacted for his comment.
Over two billion people-more than a quarter of the global population-do not have access to safe water. As part of Chicago Water Week, nonprofit Surge for Water and investment firm SBB Research Group will discuss their long-term partnership to provide safe water to thousands of people in Kaberamaido, Uganda.

Shilpa Alva, executive director of Surge for Water, founded her organization in 2008 to address the global water crisis. She will be joined at Chicago Water Week by SBB Research Group's Jordan Robinson, who has spearheaded the firm's collaboration with Surge for Water since 2015. Their projects together have repaired wells, distributed hundreds of water filters, and provided vital educational resources, which has resulted in 1,953 people now having access to safe water in their community.

"Surge for Water has a tremendous impact on so many lives," said Robinson. "We are proud to partner with them and look forward to discussing our work together at Chicago Water Week."

The online event will take place on Wednesday, September 30, 2020 from 2:00-3:00 PM. To attend, register for free at the following link:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/how-the-city-of-big-shoulders-is-addressing-the-global-water-crisis-tickets-119613853255?aff=erelexpmlt

To make a tax-deductible donation to Surge for Water, visit https://surgeforwater.org/donate/

About SBB Research Group

SBB Research Group is a Chicago-based investment management firm that views the market through a systematic, interdisciplinary lens. Led by applied mathematician Sam Barnett, PhD, and Matt Aven, an experienced professional in economics and computer science, the company specializes in bespoke investments designed to protect and grow investor capital.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200926005023/en/

Contacts:

Katie Lach

Organization: SBB Research Group

Email: partnerships@sbbrg.org

Address: 450 Skokie Blvd, Building 600, Northbrook, IL 60062 United States

Phone: 1-847-656-1111

Website: https://www.sbbrg.org
The Trump administration has issued new restrictions on U.S. technology exports to Chinas biggest semiconductor manufacturer, warning that the exports could benefit Chinas military.

The Commerce Department on Friday notified U.S. companies that they will now need a license to export certain technology to Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp., or SMIC, according to a copy of the Commerce Department letter reviewed by The Washington Post.

The letter said the licensing regime will be in place "pending the U.S. government's review of SMIC and its subsidiaries."

The Pentagon earlier this month said the Trump administration was considering adding SMIC to the Entity List, a trade blacklist that would block U.S. technology sales unless companies receive a license.

The Commerce Department "has determined that exports to SMIC or its subsidiaries, including those listed above, may pose an unacceptable risk of diversion to a military end use in the People's Republic of China pending the U.S. government's review of SMIC and its subsidiaries," said the letter, which was reported earlier by the Financial Times and The Wall Street Journal.

SMIC and other chip manufacturers depend on U.S. software and chip-making machinery to produce semiconductors.

The Commerce Department declined to comment on the letter but said it is "constantly monitoring and assessing any potential threats to U.S. national security and foreign policy interests" and "will take appropriate action as warranted."

Zoe Zheng, a spokeswoman for SMIC, said the company has "no relationship with the Chinese military and does not manufacture for any military end-users or end-uses."

A report last month by SOS International, a defense contractor in Reston, Va., said that SMIC has a variety of ties to China's defense sector, including an ongoing relationship with CETC, a state-owned developer of military electronics.

SMIC has helped CETC test new manufacturing technologies, and has used CETC technologies in its own manufacturing, according to the report. SOS also said Chinese military researchers have disclosed in research papers using SMIC technology to manufacture chips.

Restricting U.S. tech exports has become a favorite Trump administration tool to counter China's rise as a technology and military power, and to punish Chinese entities for alleged human-rights abuses.

The Entity List, overseen by the Commerce Department, now includes more than 300 Chinese companies. The Trump administration has previously used it against Chinese telecom company Huawei, companies engaged in alleged human rights violations in China's Xinjiang region, and most recently against Chinese entities allegedly involved in building controversial islands in the South China Sea.

Founded in 2000 in Shanghai, SMIC ranks among the top five semiconductor manufacturers in the world, according to a report from the United States International Trade Commission, or USITC.

Industry experts say that SMIC's technology lags behind that of chip manufacturers in Taiwan and the United States but that Beijing is pouring billions into the industry to help SMIC and other Chinese companies catch up.

SMIC has enjoyed generous government financial support, including low-interest loans, tax breaks and investments to help build manufacturing facilities, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in Paris said in a report last year.

SMIC started as a private company, but state investment has grown over time, and the state owned more than 45 percent of SMIC stock as of 2018, according to the OECD report.
Steps are being taken to involve Egyptian companies more investment in the future of Iraq

Iraqs ambassador to Cairo and permanent representative to the Arab League Ahmed Nayef Al-Dulaimi held a series of meetings with Egypts ministers of housing, investment, industry, and international cooperation last week to discuss the participation of Egyptian companies in the ongoing reconstruction of Iraq.

The meetings were followed by an announcement by chair of the African Federation of Construction Contractors Associations (AFCAA) Hassan Abdel-Aziz that seven Egyptian companies are seeking to win infrastructure and residential building projects in Iraq as part of the countrys reconstruction plans.

The projects will be financed by international bodies based on agreements to pay for projects funded by international donors, whether through long-term loans or grants, Ibrahim Al-Sheweimi, adviser to the Egyptian Federation of Construction and Building Contractors (EFCBC), told Al-Ahram Weekly.

Such agreements are main sources of funding for reconstruction in any country, he added.

The head of the Federation of Arab Contractors had estimated that Iraq needed between $150-$200 Billion for reconstruction.

The Iraqi government welcomes Egyptian companies to participate in the reconstruction, and it has previously declared that Egyptian companies have support and priority ahead of any other foreign companies to work in Iraq. Egyptian companies have been on the ground in Iraq for many years, and they are welcomed by the Iraqi government and public, Al-Sheweimi said, adding that as the situation stabilises, more Egyptian companies will naturally return to Iraq.

Egypts contractors are always looking for markets where there is political stability and financial support from the relevant government for projects. These are important factors for any company wanting to work in another country, whether in the region or beyond, said Mohamed Loqma, a board member of the EFCBC.

Loqma noted that while Egyptian companies are currently busy with national projects at home in several sectors across the country, they are also looking forward to working in promising markets abroad in the near future. The idea is to build trust and establish expertise such that they have priority once these markets open, he said.

The political leadership supports Egyptian companies working in Arab and African markets, Loqma said. The best example is the way President Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi has closely followed up on dam projects carried out by the Arab Contractors Company in Tanzania, as well as projects at home. This is a political guarantee that the government is providing to reassure companies that they will receive their dues on time.

Meetings have been held between representatives of the Iraqi government and Egyptian ministers, including the minister of housing. These talks also included the EFCBC and representatives of the Arab and African Associations, most recently two weeks ago. The focus was on the contributions of the Egyptian government and companies in the reconstruction, Ahmed Afifi, secretary of the Foreign Relations Committee at the EFCBC, told the Weekly.

The meetings concluded with the formation of a joint working group including the respective Contractors Federations in Iraq and Egypt to facilitate the work of Egyptian companies that want to work in Iraq. The groups first task will be the preparation of a comprehensive portfolio of reconstruction projects to be proposed by the Iraqi government, whether in infrastructure or services.

The portfolio will include summaries of the Iraqi law as this pertains to labour regulations, regulations on companies and banks, wage rates, and other rules and regulations for companies operating in Iraq. It will also contain information on visas, whether for businessmen or temporary labour.

The joint working group of the Contractors Federations in Egypt and Iraq is preparing a door-knock mission to Iraq so that Egyptian and Iraqi contractors can meet their peers as one of the key conditions for bidding for projects is to have a local partner in Iraq, Afifi said.

The group will also draw up lists of contractors in different fields, so companies can meet peers in the areas of power-plant construction, water and sewage plants, road works, bridge construction, airports, and other infrastructure work.

Afifi said he hoped the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) would provide support for Egyptian companies operating in Iraq by facilitating letters of guarantee and credit procedures at banks in Iraq or through representatives of Egyptian banks in the country.

These steps are also anticipated for the East African countries, which are also promising markets for Egyptian contractors, he said.

*A version of this article appears in print in the 10 September, 2020 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly

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Lawmakers on Wednesday unveiled details of a 2021 state budget agreement for the first time, and by the end of the day, the deal was approved and headed to the governors desk.

Crafting a plan for how the state should spend taxpayer money looked a lot different this year because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Budget officials and lawmakers condensed whats typically a months-long negotiation with multiple proposals and public committee hearings into a few weeks of closed-door negotiations, ultimately coming to an agreement on a framework in mid-September.
Three constables on Friday arrested two thieves who snatched a mobile phone from a 28-year-old man, after chasing the accused for more than a kilometre at Marine Drive.

Vinod Kharvi was taking a selfie at the Marine drive promenade when the accused, identified as Suraj Tiwari, 22, and Adnan Shaikh, 25,both residents of Worli, went close to Kharvi on their bike, slapped him and snatched his mobile phone, said Marine Drive police.

Constable P Bhoye, who was on patrolling duty, heard Kharvis shout for help and chased the two accused on his bike. Bhoye also alerted two of his colleagues who were on duty near Mafatlal Club and they arranged for a roadblock immediately and arrested the accused, said an officer from Marine Drive police station.

Mrityunjay Hiremath, senior inspector from Marine Drive police station, said, Shaikh has a criminal history, and cases of theft and robbery have been registered against him at Worli and Sion police station. We have booked them under section 392 [punishment for robbery] and 34 [common intention] of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
By ANI

MUMBAI: Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut on Saturday said Bihar Assembly polls should be contested on developmental and law and order issues.

However, taking a jibe at Bihar government Raut said if the state has exhausted all issues, then issues from Mumbai can be sent as a parcel.

This comes a day after the Election Commission of India (ECI) announced the schedule for Bihar Elections, according to which elections will be held in three phases with polling to take place on October 28, November 3 and 7, and the counting of votes to take place on November 10.

"Elections in Bihar should be fought on the issues of development, law and order, and good governance, but if these issues have exhausted, then issues from Mumbai can be sent as a parcel," Raut told ANI.

"The COVID-19 has not eradicated from Bihar. The preparedness for the elections must be informed to voters, how one will be able to cast his votes, and how politicians will be able to do the rally," he added.

Meanwhile, commenting on the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) investigation of a drug case, related to actor Sushant Singh Rajput's death case, Raut said, "The probe of the case started about murder and suicide. Now, Narcotics came into the case. Nobody knows where will it go. It is under NCB's jurisdiction to summon anyone to join the probe."

Rajput was found dead on June 14 at his Mumbai residence.

Mumbai Police had declared it a case of death by suicide. However, Rajput's father, KK Singh registered an FIR in Patna under sections related to abetment to suicide and later demanded a CBI investigation.

On August 19, Supreme Court had directed the CBI to investigate the case while holding that the FIR registered in Patna over the actor's death was legitimate.

The agency has registered an FIR against actor Rhea Chakraborty and others in connection with the Rajput's death after the Centre accepted Bihar government's recommendation to transfer the probe in the matter from Patna. CBI is currently probing the actor's death case.

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) had on July 31 registered an Enforcement Case Information Report in the late actor's death case after a First Information Report was filed by Rajput's father against Chakraborty in Bihar on July 28.

The NCB, which is probing the drugs case related to Rajput's death has arrested several people in the case including Chakraborty, her brother Showik, Abdul Basit Parihar, Zaid Vilatra, Dipesh Sawant and Samuel Miranda.

The NCB had launched an investigation after it received official communication from the ED, in which there were various chats related to drug consumption, procurement, usage, and transportation in connection with Rajput's case.
Amid protests by farmers across the country over the three agriculture-related Bills passed by Parliament, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Saturday slammed the proposed legislations as big blunders" and demanded their immediate withdrawal.

In a video message under the partys campaign titled Speak up for Farmers against the Bills, Rahul Gandhi said: Attacks on you have started  first it was demonetisation, then GST and then during the Covid-19 pandemic not a single rupee was shared with you all. The government is trying to make you slaves, slaves of corporates. And now these three controversial Bills are an attempt to finish you."

We are standing with you and we will stop these Bills altogether," he said.

The Congress leader added: I want to tell the government that it is one of the biggest blunders. If the farmers came out on the streets, then a huge loss is going to happen. Withdraw these Bills immediately without taking much time and give guarantee of the MSPs to farmers," he added.

The Congress is protesting against the farm Bills along with other opposition parties. These are The Farmers Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020, The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020, and The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020.
Barrett also was asked about the article she co-wrote two decades earlier on Catholic judges. While she said she would write the article differently with the hindsight of 20 years, she said she stood by the core proposition of that article, which is that if there is ever a conflict between a judges personal conviction and that judges duty under the rule of law, that it is never, ever permissible for that judge to follow their personal convictions in the decision of the case rather than what the law requires.
Suspected cocaine and cash seized by the PSNI

Four people were arrested after suspected cocaine and cash were seized during a police operation at Belfast International Airport.

Detectives from the Paramilitary Crime Task Force (PCTF) made the seizure yesterday. It is part of a "proactive operation" into suspected drugs criminality linked to the INLA in Belfast.

Two men, aged 35 and 40, were charged on Saturday with possession of a class A drug and attempting to fraudulently export a class A controlled drug.

Both men are due to appear at Antrim Magistrates Court on Tuesday October 20.

Two women, both aged 36, were also arrested. One of released on bail pending further enquiries and one was released unconditionally.
The Ministry of Aviation has acquired land at Kajebil in the Ahanta West Municipality of the Western Region for the construction of an international airport.

The initiative is currently at the feasibility study stage pending approval from the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning (MoFEP).

Mr. Joseph Kofi Adda, Minister of Aviation, who disclosed this, mentioned that the region really needed an international airport considering the fact that it houses the oil and gas industry with its allied ventures.

The minister was in the Central and Western regions to see the potentials the two regions had in the aviation space. He said the Takoradi Airport had immense significance because it served the oil and gas as well as the mining industry.

He said the aviation sector was a significant element in the country's economic development hence the need to expand the sector by developing infrastructure and improving services to make sure that business development and tourism were supported to enhance the economic lives of Ghanaians.

He further stated that his outfit was in consultation with MoFEP to see how best air travel fares could be reduced to make it affordable to enable more Ghanaians to access internal flights to be able to do quick businesses.

He added that more airlines had shown interest and would soon take off to bring competition to the airfares so that it would come down for more Ghanaians to afford.

He said though the renovation works at the Takoradi Airport was being done solely by the Ghana Air Force, the Ministry of Aviation had been supporting with gadgets to do civil works, among others.

He said his ministry was also liaising with the Ministry of Finance to raise some money to support the rehabilitation and reconfiguration for the arrival and departure halls to help bring comfort to passengers.

Air Vice-Marshal Frank Hanson, Chief of Air Staff, said the Takoradi Airport expansion project would enable it to take more domestic airlines to open the market for competition which would also beat the airfares down for more patrons.

The Western Regional Minister, Kwabena Okyere Darko-Mensah, noted that the absence of a civilian airport hampered air transport business in the region.

He said the expansion project was necessary to position the Takoradi Air Force Base to be able to give more room to civilian passengers until the region had an alternative airport.

He explained that the Ghana Air Force was already on the Board of the Civil Aviation Authority and could, therefore, do a proper collaboration to augment the operations of the airport and support it to improve on its operations.

---Daily Guide
US President Donald Trump is set to unveil his Supreme Court nominee on Saturday, barely five weeks out from the November 3 presidential election, with US media reporting that he has chosen conservative judge Amy Coney Barrett for the job.

If the 48-year-old law professor is indeed nominated and confirmed, her lifetime appointment would consolidate a conservative majority in the countrys top court, possibly for decades to come.

Citing sources close to the process, media outlets including The New York Times and CNN said Trump would put forward the judge, who is considered hostile to abortion rights, to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a progressive icon who died on September 18.

We are going to be announcing somebody great, the US president said in Virginia on a whirlwind three-state campaign tour Friday.

Trump did not name his nominee, but he has previously called Barrett outstanding.

An official announcement is expected at 5 pm (2100 GMT) Saturday.

The subject is certain to feature prominently on Tuesday, when Trump and Democratic rival Joe Biden hold their first of three presidential debates.

Nothing short of outrageous

Democrats including Biden have demanded that Republicans delay replacing Ginsburg, a champion of womens rights, until after the election.

Considering the fact that this Supreme Court nominee may serve on the court for 30 years, it is nothing short of outrageous that they want to approve her in fewer than 30 days, Senator Dick Durbin, the Democratic whip, told CNN on Saturday.

Barrett would be the youngest justice on the court.

A majority of Americans -- by 57 to 38 percent -- oppose the push for confirmation before the election, according to a new Washington Post/ABC poll.

But leaders of the Republican majority in the Senate, which is tasked with confirming Supreme Court nominees, said they expect a vote either before the election or, at latest, during the ensuing lame duck session before the inauguration of the next president in January.

We will certainly do that this year, Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell has said.

Liberal groups push back

If Barrett is confirmed, the Supreme Court would have a 6-3 conservative majority as it faces issues as divisive as abortion, gun rights and healthcare.

Barrett was first named to the bench in 2017. A deeply conservative Catholic and mother of seven -- she would be the high courts sixth Catholic -- Barrett is considered antagonistic to abortion rights, a key issue for many Republicans.

Liberal groups strongly oppose Trumps push to rush through a conservative appointment.

We know whoever this president puts forward will be an offense to Justice Ginsburgs legacy and her fight to ensure that women are treated fairly, Planned Parenthood president Alexis McGill Johnson said in a statement, adding that a Trump appointee would likely target both abortion rights and the healthcare program known as Obamacare.

We will fight with everything we have to stop any Supreme Court confirmation before the inauguration, she said.

The American Civil Liberties Union also urged the Senate to postpone action until after the election.

Democratic leaders have vowed to do everything possible to prevent a confirmation vote before the election, but the 53-47 Republican majority in the Senate leaves them with few options.

A full bench

For Trump, nominating a conservative justice at this point is a way to fire up his base heading into Novembers election.

Biden has strongly criticized the Republicans plans for a quick vote and appealed to senators not to act before the election.

On Friday, the former vice president traveled from his home in Delaware to Washington for a solemn ceremony in the US Capitol paying tribute to Ginsburg.

In a sign of the raw political feelings, Trump was booed by a crowd when he visited the Supreme Court on Thursday to pay respects to Ginsburg.

Trump has twice refused this week to clearly guarantee a peaceful transfer of power if he loses, evoking outrage from Democrats and seemingly increasing odds of a tense legal standoff.

Republican leaders have said that if the fate of a disputed election rests with the Supreme Court -- and Trump has warned without evidence that illegal mail-in ballots could rig the outcome -- a full bench of judges will be needed to prevent a deadlock.
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Two traffickers of rhino horns have been arrested in Kenya after a three-month investigation into a trafficking network operating from Nairobi, the Kenyan Wildlife Services (KWS) said on Saturday
Continuing its attempt to wipe out the Uyghur ethnic community, China in recent years have closed and demolished many major shrines, mosques and other holy structures across Xinjiang that have long preserved the culture and Islamic beliefs of the regions Muslims, according to The New York Times.

Citing a report by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), The New York Times reported that around 8,500 mosques across Xinjiang have been completely demolished since 2017 - more than a third of the number of mosques the government says are in the region.

What it does show is a campaign of demolition and erasure that is unprecedented since the cultural revolution, Nathan Ruser, the researcher at the institute who led the analysis, was quoted as saying.

Under Mao Zedong, several mosques and other religious sites were destroyed since 1966.ASPIs report is based on a random sample of 533 known mosque sites across Xinjiang, and satellite images of each site that were taken at different times to assess changes.

Meanwhile, the Beijing government has dismissed the reports on the widespread demolition of religious sites in Xinjiang and termed it as total nonsense.

According to China, the ASPIs report is biased as the institute is being funded by the US government.

What we see here is the deliberate destruction of sites which are in every way the heritage of the Uighur people and the heritage of this land, Rachel Harris, an expert on Uighur music and culture at the University of London who reviewed the report, was quoted as saying.

The New York Times reported that China had banned festivals and pilgrimages at Ordam in 1997, and other shrines closed in the following years.

By 2018, the Ordam shrine was leveled, thus, wiping out one of the most important religious sites in Xinjiang.

The New York Times further reported that in the city of Hotan in southern Xinjiang a park has been built where according to satellite images used to be a mosque till 2017.

While some religious sites in Xinjiang have been razed, some have been turned into official tourist attractions.

Last month, Radio Free Asia had reported a public washroom being constructed on the site of a demolished mosque in Atush of Xinjiang province.

(This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text. Only the headline has been changed.)

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Authorities in Belarus detained a lawyer representing a top opposition activist who was jailed this month amid mass protests against the country s authoritarian president, who won a sixth term in a disputed election.

The lawyer Lyudmila Kazak, went missing Thursday, with police confirming later in the day that she had been detained. According to Kazaks lawyers, she faces administrative charges of participating in an unauthorized rally and resisting a police officer.

Kazak was defending Maria Kolesnikova, a key member of a council Belarus' political opposition set up to push for a new presidential election. Kolesnikova is facing charges of undermining state security that could bring a five-year prison term, if she is convicted.

Kazak relayed several messages Kolsenikova sent from jail, encouraging protesters to continue anti-government rallies that have rocked Belarus for nearly seven weeks.

Freedom is worth fighting for. Do not be afraid to be free, one such message said. I do not regret anything and would do the same again.

Kolsenikova has said Belarusian security forces drove her to the border with Ukraine to try to make her leave the country, but that she tore up her passport. She alleged officers threatened to kill her.

Her lawyer's detention followed the arrest of Yegor Martinovich, chief editor of popular independent news outlet Nasha Niva. Martinovich is accused of slander against a government official, and faces up to three years in prison.

Hundreds of thousands of Belarusians have been protesting daily since the Aug. 9 presidential election. Official results extended the 26-year tenure of President Alexander Lukashenko, giving him 80% of the vote. Lukashenko's strongest opponent, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, got 10% support.

Both opposition members and some poll workers say the vote was rigged, and the United States and the European Union condemned the election as neither free nor fair. Many European countries refused to recognize Lukashenko as the legitimate leader after his unexpected inauguration earlier this week.

Anti-Lukashenko protests have rocked the country daily since the election, with the largest rallies in Minsk attracting up to 200,000 people. In the first days of protests, police used tear gas, truncheons and rubber bullets to disperse crowds. Several protesters died, many were injured and nearly 7,000 were detained.

The response to street demonstrators intensified again this week, with police detaining hundreds and injuring many. Despite the crackdown, protests continued in Minsk on Friday, with groups of people in different parts of the capital forming human chains of solidarity and singing songs.

___

Daria Litvinova in Moscow contributed to this report.
Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison speaks during a state memorial honoring victims of the Australian bushfires at Qudos Bank Arena in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, on Feb. 23, 2020. (Loren Elliott/Reuters)

Australian PM Backs Vaccine Sharing and Virus Inquiry

Scott Morrison is standing firm on his calls for the independent investigation into COVID-19 virus to look at its origins and urged all nations to share a vaccine once it is proven.

The prime minister took to the virtual stage on the morning of Sept 26 addressing the 75th United Nations general assembly, praising the World Health Organisation for establishing an inquiry into the global response to coronavirus.

There is also a clear mandate to identify the zoonotic source of the COVID-19 virus and how it was transmitted to humans, he said in the pre-recorded speech.

This virus has inflicted a calamity on our world and its peoples. We must do all we can to understand what happened for no other purpose than to prevent it from happening again.

The inquiry resolution backed by 145 countries in May does not mention China, instead committing to an impartial, independent and comprehensive evaluation of the pandemic.

China eventually supported the European Union motion.

Ties between the two nations have since been fraught, with tariffs being imposed on some goods and Australian journalists being evacuated from China.

Morrison urged other leaders to share a coronavirus vaccine if they discover one.

He has previously said if Australia found a vaccine, it would be shared across the world.

This is a global responsibility and its a moral responsibility for a vaccine to be shared far and wide, Morrison said.

Some might see short term advantage or even profit.

But I assure you to anyone who may think along those lines, humanity will have a very long memory and be a very, very severe judge.

Morrisons speech also focused on the dangers of disinformation, urging for more to be done to prevent it.

Disinformation costs lives and creates a climate of fear and division, he said.

It goes against Australias values and beliefs as a free, open society.

The prime minister also touched on trade rules and the need to peacefully resolve disputes through dialogue.

As an outward-looking, sovereign, trading nation, Australia also values the rules and institutions that enable international trade, Morrison said.

We know that trade creates wealth and brings nations together. It makes us more prosperous, all of us.

We wont retreat into the downward spiral of protectionism in Australia.

Morrison says Australia is leading efforts to reform the World Trade Organisation to create non-discriminatory trade rules as well as a digital guide.

We need to make sure these standards serve all countries rather than any single power and that they are developed in line with the fundamental principles of the global order.

On reform of the UN itself, Morrison said Australia wanted to see multilateral institutions deliver for us and all nations.

Were committed to ensuring they are fit for purpose, that theyre effective, that theyre open and transparent and, most importantly, that they are accountable to the sovereign states that form them.

Rebecca Gredley and Paul Osborne in Canberra
President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev has sent a congratulatory letter to Xi Jinping, Chairman of the Peoples Republic of China.

"Dear Mr. Chairman,

It is on the occasion of your countrys national holiday  Establishment Day of the Peoples Republic of China that on my own behalf and on behalf of the people of Azerbaijan I extend my most cordial congratulations to you and your friendly people.

We are delighted to witness success and achievements of the Peoples Republic of China, your country becoming one of the leading nations of the world and day by day growth of its prestige in the international arena.

We attach utmost importance to the comprehensive development of Azerbaijan-China relations that have ancient history. The traditional ties of friendship and cooperation that bind our countries and peoples are enriched today by new substance of cooperation in the political, economic and humanitarian spheres. This cooperation will certainly continue to develop successfully also within the Belt and Road project that you have initiated.

The solidarity and mutual support demonstrated by our countries since the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic that humanity faces have once again proven that our bilateral relations were built on solid foundation. I seize this opportunity to express my gratitude to you for assistance of the Peoples Republic of China in our country in the fight against the coronavirus disease.

I am confident that the ties of friendship and mutually beneficial cooperation between Azerbaijan and China that are based on good traditions will continue to develop and strengthen through our joint efforts for the sake of prosperity of our peoples.

On this notable day, I wish strong health and success to you and everlasting peace and prosperity to the friendly people of China," the letter said.

--

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
President Trump is engaged in an ongoing campaign to erode confidence in the legitimacy of the upcoming presidential election.

In addition to his refusal to say he would accept the elections results, Trumps baseless claims about voter fraud crystallized Thursday when he alleged that two minor problems involving ballots amounted to a conspiracy.

On Thursday, Trump publicized a Department of Justice press release about nine military ballots being discarded erroneously in Luzerne County, Pa., and referred vaguely to ballots that are a whole big scam.

All nine ballots were initially reported as having been cast for Trump. The Justice Department later retracted this statement, saying it did not know who two of the ballots were cast for.

A second Justice Department release also made clear that election clerks in Luzerne County opened the envelopes because they thought they might be ballot requests that required a response, rather than ballots filled out by voters.

Trump also referred to a report that the U.S. Postal Service found trays of mail on the side of the road Monday morning in Outagamie County, Wis. A few ballots were reported to have been mixed in with the rest of the mail.

President Trump and a mail-in ballot. (Photo illustration: Yahoo News; photos: AP, Getty Images, Matt Slocum/AP)

There is, of course, a big difference between human error and a conspiracy to cheat.

But the president pointed to these incidents as an example of cheating. We want to make sure the election is honest, and Im not sure that it can be, he said.

Trump campaign spokesman Matt Wolking tweeted  without any evidence  that the Pennsylvania incident was proof that the Democrats are trying to steal the election.

Wolking later deleted the tweet, but not before his unfounded claim spread like wildfire across social media.

Insinuations of a plot to steal the election, meanwhile, encourage citizens to feel as though voting doesnt make a difference, and discourage them from doing so.

All the unsupported claims of fraud and chaos in voting tend to discourage people from voting because they are more apt to believe that their votes dont count, Rick Hasen, author of Election Meltdown, told Yahoo News.

Story continues

The presidents unfounded and wild claims came the same week that Republican leaders in Pennsylvania were quoted discussing plans to possibly stop all votes from being counted in the presidential election.

The Atlantic reported this week that Republicans are discussing an attempt to discard the popular vote in key swing states and install Trump for a second term through a vote by the state legislature that overrides the will of the people.

Such a scenario sounds far-fetched, and some experts said they did not think it a likely outcome. But the Atlantic article quoted two top Pennsylvania Republicans confirming that this is under discussion with the Trump campaign, and an unnamed legal adviser to the Trump campaign was also quoted in the piece saying that the presidents aides are discussing contingency plans to bypass election results and appoint loyal electors in battleground states where Republicans hold the legislative majority.

Pennsylvanias Senate majority leader, Jake Corman, told the Atlantics Barton Gellman that we dont want to go down that road of the legislature taking the election into its own hands, but we understand where the law takes us, and well follow the law.

The Republican argument rests on President Trumps unsupported claim that mail voting will lead to fraud. Pennsylvania GOP Chairman Lawrence Tabas told Gellman that the election might have significant flaws and that Americans may lose faith and confidence in the integrity of the election.

But the biggest driver of confusion about election results is the steady stream of baseless claims by the president himself that mail-in voting will lead to cheating, despite assurances from top election officials  both Republicans and Democrats  that it is not possible to rig the election through voter fraud.

Ohios secretary of state, Frank LaRose, a Republican who worked for Trumps transition team, told Yahoo News recently that the idea that a massive conspiracy could be undertaken that could actually change the result of a governors race or U.S. Senate race, or certainly a presidential race, is a very far-fetched idea and beyond, really, the realm of possibility.

Vice President Mike Pences own election law adviser, Michael Adams, told Yahoo News recently that youre not going to see widespread fraud in a presidential or a Senate or a governors race. Its just not feasible.

Ben Ginsberg was the Republican Partys top election attorney for the past two decades, overseeing the GOP legal effort in the 2000 election recount and advising the Trump campaign in 2016 and 2020 before his recent retirement. He wrote an op-ed earlier this month that concluded that four decades of dedicated investigation have produced only isolated incidents of election fraud.

And FBI Director Christopher Wray said in congressional testimony on Thursday that we have not seen, historically, any kind of coordinated national voter fraud effort in a major election, whether its by mail or otherwise.

These statements bolster the consensus view of other election experts, which is that election fraud happens sometimes, but only on a small scale, and the impacts are on local elections, like in a race for mayor or some other local office. We have seen voter fraud at the local level from time to time, Wray said Thursday.

Youd have to go back to the 1960s to find significant fraud on a large scale, Hasen told Yahoo News.

Republicans claim that delays in counting votes will be caused by recent court decisions that give Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin  the three states that decided the 2016 election  several days after Election Day to keep counting ballots.

There is a significant bottleneck, which may cause a delay in announcing results, that Republicans could easily remove in these states. But they have yet to do so in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, and have done the bare minimum in Michigan.

The law in these three states has prevented election clerks from opening mail ballot envelopes before Election Day. In many states, clerks are allowed to open mail ballot envelopes as they arrive, and either count them or prepare them to be counted.

In Ohio, clerks open mail ballot envelopes weeks before Election Day, and this means that on election night, the first ballots counted are those vote-by-mail ballots, LaRose said.

LaRose described the rules in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania as a really terrible situation because of how they will delay reporting results if theyre not changed.

In Pennsylvania, the secretary of state has requested the ability to open mail ballot envelopes starting three weeks before Election Day. The Republican-controlled legislature has so far offered to give clerks only three days.

In Michigan, the secretary of state requested the ability to open mail ballot envelopes at least one week before Election Day. The Republican-controlled legislature gave clerks only one day.

And in Wisconsin, election law is controlled to a large degree by the state Legislature, which is held entirely by Republicans. They have done nothing to give clerks more time ahead of Election Day to count mail ballots, or even prepare them to be quickly counted on election night as is done in Ohio.

There is also evidence that Republicans may try to slow down the counting process of mail ballots through objecting to the validity of ballots, thereby creating a backlog and a delay that lasts well past Election Day. This could work hand in hand with evidence-free claims of fraud to set up a possible attempt to override the actual voting results in these states.

Spokespeople for Pennsylvania Senate Majority Leader Corman and Pennsylvania House Speaker Bryan Cutler both told Yahoo News that they want to be able to challenge any mail ballot for validity. They claimed this limited the time they could give clerks to pre-canvass mail ballots, but the Pennsylvania secretary of states office told Yahoo News this was false.

The Atlantic article reports that Republicans used the primary election process as a test run, watching how officials in key Democratic strongholds like Philadelphia counted their mail-in ballots, to prepare to make challenges in the fall election. Republicans are also seeking to recruit volunteers to be poll watchers, who can observe voting in polling places. But the presidents son Donald Trump Jr. put out a request for poll watchers while claiming, without evidence, that Democrats plan to rig the election. If Trump supporters go to polling places with fantasies of widespread cheating, that could lead to disruption of voting and longer lines.

And Republicans have already tried to stop votes from being counted, during the 2018 midterm election in Florida. Trump and other Republicans made baseless claims of voter fraud in an attempt to cast doubt on the results as election officials attempted to count every vote in a pair of close races for Senate and governor. Republicans ultimately won both races.

Republicans have already begun to make accusations of cheating by highlighting reports that detail mistakes made by election clerks and claiming  without evidence  that this is proof of cheating. In a recent interview with CBS News, White House chief of staff Mark Meadows refused to acknowledge FBI Director Wrays conclusion that voter fraud is not significant in national elections, and tried to argue that the nine erroneously discarded ballots in Pennsylvania contradicted Wray.

Ginsberg, the longtime Republican election attorney, blamed Trump for sowing confusion.

It is absolutely correct to look for fraud and to try to root it out. Whats not correct is the president of the United States drawing conclusions that elections are fraudulent or rigged without having the evidence, Ginsberg said on Showtimes The Circus.

A foundational basis of our country is the credibility of election results, Ginsberg said. This time for the first time the president of the United States is denigrating the credibility of our elections and who the winners are, corroding a pillar of the country and the democracy and the way the government runs.

_____

Read more from Yahoo News:
JEE Advanced 2020: Many aspirants who are supposed to take Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) Advanced on Sunday, reached capital city Patna on Saturday in an effort to assure timely reporting at exam centre.

Around 30,000 aspirants will take the JEE Advanced exam across 72 centres spread over 11 cities in the state. In Patna alone, more than 15,000 aspirants will take the exam.

JEE Advanced 2020 Live Updates

Recently, a NEET aspirant from Darbhanga district was denied entry at Kolkatas exam centre due to late arrival by 10 minutes which priced him one year of preparation.

Taking a lesson, several students moved to their exam centre city a day prior to prevent such instances.

Punit Kumar, a resident of Siwan, said, My exam centre is in Patna. I cant take risk after reading such news. I have not received message about reporting time yet but exam would commence at 9 am. So, I reached here a day before to avoid any unprecedented event.

Similarly, Akash Gupta, a native of Gopalganj, said, Weather condition is not good. Heavy rainfall in past few days have disturbed roads and communication. I cant bear losing a year due to reaching late. I am staying in a hotel near Boring Road.

While several aspirants rued that they were compelled to skip the exam as they have been allotted exam centre in other states despite filling four to five choices in Bihar.

Ravi Raj, a resident of Gaya, said, I have been allotted exam centre in Kolkata which was my eighth choice. All first five choices were exam centres in Bihar. I am unable to arrange for travel in such short period.

Another aspirant Vikrant Kumar who lives in Arrah said, I have been allotted exam centre in Delhi which was my last choice. There was no option for changing exam centre. I am skipping exam merely because of distant exam centre.

Meanwhile, city exam centres on Saturday were seen completing last-minute preparation for conducting exam.

Ajay Singh, who is managing Uniconcept exam centre at Kankarbagh, said, We are ready for conducting exam. This time crowd will be less than Main exam. Exam halls, computers, staircase and other surface of common touch have been sanitised already. Students and staff are acquainted with safety protocols after taking first round of examination.

As per National Testing Agency (NTA), candidates are supposed to wear dress with no large buttons, chain, rings, hair pins and related accessories on exam day. Candidates are advised to wear slippers and sandals.
Kuwait's sovereign wealth fund was last night said to be in talks about buying a stake in Rolls-Royce.

The struggling British engineering giant reported a record annual loss of 5.4billion last month and is looking at ways to drum up 2.5billion from investors.

Among its options are raising cash by issuing new shares or debt, with the Kuwait Investment Office said to be interested in buying shares, according to Sky News.

Struggling British engineering giant Rolls-Royce reported a record annual loss of 5.4bn last month and is looking at ways to drum up 2.5bn from investors

The talks have emerged after Singapore's Government Investment Corporation was also said to have expressed an interest.

Rolls-Royce denied any decisions had been taken yet 'as to whether or when to proceed with any such options, the precise amount that may be raised, or any allotment of shares to any investor including any sovereign wealth fund'.

The coronavirus pandemic has plunged the global aviation industry into crisis, with international travel still heavily restricted.

That has prompted financial trouble for Rolls, which gets paid according to how many hours planes using its engines are flown.

And it has been hit particularly hard because it only makes engines for larger aircraft that fly long-haul routes, which have been worst-hit in the crisis.

Rolls believes business will not pick back up to 2019 levels until 2025. It has already announced plans to cut 9,000 jobs and said factories in Nottinghamshire and Lancashire will close.

Experts have warned the Government could be forced to step in to save the 114-year-old firm from collapse.
A 19-year-old Dalit woman, who was allegedly raped by four men in Hathras, is struggling for life in an Aligarh hospital where she has been put on a ventilator, officials said on Saturday.

The woman, who was gangraped on September 14, was brought to the Aligarh hospital the next day. She has sustained injuries on the neck and is on ventilator, a JN Medical Hospital spokesperson said.

Hathras Superintendent of Police Vikrant Vir said the four accused have been arrested.

Giving details of the incident, the SP said that the woman had gone to the fields with her mother on the fateful day and had gone missing soon after. She was later found brutally injured, with her deep cuts on the tongue. The accused also attempted to strangulate her.

The SP said initially they came to know that Sandip (20) had tried to kill her following which he was arrested the same day. In her statement to the magistrate, the survivor said that, besides Sandip, Ramu, Lavkush and Ravi raped her and when she resisted, they tried to strangulate her, leading to the cut in the tongue, the official said.

Later, Luvkush and Ramu were also arrested and the fourth accused was arrested on Saturday, the SP added.

A report from Aligarh said the condition of the girl was critical.

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Candidates who have appeared for the theory examination can check their score using their roll number and date of birth

The Banaras Hindu University Postgraduate Entrance Test (BHU PET) 2020 has been declared on the varsity's official website bhuonline.in. The entrance examination was conducted in online mode between 24 and 31 August, according to a report by Careers 360.

Candidates who have appeared for the theory examination can check their score using their roll number and date of birth. The result mentions details including name, roll number, registration no, course, index, open rank of the candidate and BHU rank.

The university will soon release BHU PET 2020 cutoff in the form of ranks separately for female candidates as well as male and female candidates combined. Those who have qualified the entrance test will be issued a call letter for the counseling process.

Hindustan Times reported that the counseling for admission to various programmes under PET 2020 is expected to start from 8 October. The counseling process for undergraduate programmes will commence from 10 October.

Candidates have been advised to visit the university's entrance test portal to check updates on counseling schedule, cut-off marks, offer of admission, fee payment deadline, hostel allotment.

Steps to check BHU PET 2020 results

Step 1: Log on to BHU official website bhuonline.in

Step 2: Tap on Theory Result PET-2020 tab on the homepage

Step 3: Enter your entrance exam roll number and date of birth in DD/MM/YYYY format

Step 4: Click on the search button

Step 5: Your BHU PET 2020 theory exam result will appear on the screen. Check score and details carefully before downloading

Here is the direct link to check the result: https://bhu2.ucanapply.com/FinalResult20/entrance/?app-id=UElZMDAwMDkzMQ==

As per a report by The Times of India, the results of entrance exam of remaining postgraduate courses (MA/MSc-Psychology, MA/MSc-Mathematics, MSc (Ag), MSc (Ag)/MTech in Dairy Technology and MSc-Computer Science) are expected to be declared on 28 September.
The Conservative cabinet minister for education in Croydon Borough Council, Maria Gatland, has resigned her post after the revelation that, 35 years ago, she was a member of the IRA.

Back then, she was known as Maria Maguire, the glamour face of Provisionalism, a middle-class girl from Dublin who'd been caught up in post-Bloody Sunday emotionalism.

But a decent enough creature underneath it all, and disgusted by the IRA slaughter of Bloody Friday, she not merely left the movement, but also spilled the beans to British intelligence. And having been sentenced to death by her former chums, including her bed-partner, Daithi O'Connell, she went into hiding.

Well, if that isn't having made amends, then what is? Look at the prime architects of her early decisions in life. Mike Jackson, adjutant of the 1st Battalion, the Parachute Regiment on Bloody Sunday, went on to become head of the British Army, a knight of the realm with a DSO and Bar. Gerry Adams, the most senior member of the IRA in Belfast during the Bloody Sunday butchery, has since been a guest of the British Prime Minister at Downing Street and at Chequers, and of the US president at the White House. His books have made him a millionaire. But poor Maria's political career is in ruins.

I know nothing of Maria Maguire's reinvention as Maria Gatland, Conservative politician, just that she had to go into hiding, to change her name, and to create a new identity, to save her from being murdered by the very organisation whose leaders have since been welcomed on deep-pile carpets in London and Washington.

So by those same rules, she should have been welcomed by the Tory party, and congratulated for the blow she'd struck against the IRA, at grave risk to her own life. Instead, her fellow Conservatives have tut-tutted over her shameful past.

And this takes us neatly to one inescapable problem, which was central to both the start of the Troubles, their unforgivable protractedness, their final conclusion, and aftermath. It is this: the English don't care about Ireland, north or south. They don't know about it, and don't want to know.

They've never wanted to know. It is a key feature of their identity. It might almost be the defining characteristic of Englishness. Either way, this attitude enabled generations of English politicians and academics to encapsulate the complexities and the aspirations of the peoples of this island with the simple and meaningless term the Irish problem. This was as if it were the Irish who were always the problem, rather than  say  the chronic English failure to establish a permanently harmonious and informed relationship with a historically weaker neighbour.

And there's nothing we can do about this, nothing. At the height of the Troubles, whenever I was in a London bank trying to get money on my Belfast cheque book, I was invariably asked whether Belfast was in Ulster or Eire. Bombs were going off in the streets of London on this very issue, yet bank clerks did not know whether the capital of Northern Ireland was in the United Kingdom.

Moreover, only a deep and pathological uninterest in a neighbouring island could have allowed the British to have endured the Troubles for so long. They were not stoic during this time, so much as comatose.

Not even dead soldiers woke them from that stupor.

There is much British agonising about their losses in Iraq and Afghanistan, yet there was none at all about the far greater death toll in the North: 103 British soldiers were killed in 1972 alone, the year Maria Maguire threw herself into the arms of the IRA.

No pomp and ceremony as those flag-draped coffins were lowered from transports at RAF Brize Norton; merely a brief graveside ceremony in some London suburb or small Scottish town, a firing party, the sound of clay on coffin. And then a return to an Alzheimer-like trance of the British attitude towards Ireland.

How else could the British have tolerated the fact that the Republic allowed the IRA army council to go home nightly to their own little beds, and nights of untroubled sleep, throughout the Troubles? (How would the US have reacted if Mexico or Canada had hosted terrorist organisations which murdered its soldiers and bombed its cities?)

This ignorance, this intellectual neglect, is not (contrary to a much-cherished Irish mythology) based on some fundamental anti-Irishness.

It is more a form of passive species-blindness, broken occasionally by the odd mythic intruder, like Father Ted or Ballykissangel.

And it was the very absence of any general English sense of the Irish as a group that enabled the Irish as individuals  Henry Kelly, Terry Wogan, Eamonn Holmes, Bob Geldof  to become household names in Britain at the height of the Troubles. Occasionally, the sentry that is England rouses from his slumber and blindly lashes out, as in the case of poor Maria Maguire. But then he will fall asleep again; and on that somnolent watch, new and wholly unprecedented difficulties between the two countries will arise, which, upon half-waking, he will once again blearily call the Irish problem.
U.S. Senators from Tennessee and Georgia quickly weighed in on President Trumps decision to nominate Amy Coney Barrett to the United States Supreme Court.

Senator Marsha Blackburn said, Amy Coney Barrett is a respected constitutionalist and an excellent nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court. Much like her mentor, the late Justice Antonin Scalia, she will be a textualist and originalist devoted to upholding the rule of law. She is a jurist we can trust to safeguard our religious liberties at a time when these freedoms are increasingly under attack.

Americans saw firsthand Judge Barretts commitment to her values and principles during her confirmation hearing for the U.S Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit in 2017. Since taking the bench, she has authored nearly 100 opinions.

Beyond her experience on the bench, Judge Barrett is a mother of seven with an impressive legal career. After graduating from Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee, she received her law degree from Notre Dame Law School, where she is now a professor.

I look forward to hearing her testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee in the coming weeks.

Senator Lamar Alexander said, "I have voted to confirm Justices Roberts, Alito, Sotomayor, Gorsuch and Kavanaugh based upon their intelligence, character and temperament. I will apply the same standard when I consider Judge Barrett's nomination to replace Justice Ginsburg."



"Judge Amy Coney Barrett currently serves on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. Judge Barrett was confirmed by the Senate on October 31, 2017, by a vote of 55 to 43. I supported Judge Barrett's nomination to the Seventh Circuit."

Senator David Perdue (R-GA) said, Georgians want a Supreme Court that applies the law, not makes the law. Judge Amy Coney Barrett is an outstanding choice to serve on our nations highest court. Throughout her impressive legal career, Judge Barrett has been an ardent defender of the Constitution and steadfast supporter of the rule of law. Having clerked for Justice Antonin Scalia, Judge Barrett understands the importance of protecting our nations founding principles. The Senate will now move with due haste to consider Judge Barretts nomination. This is about more than one seat. This is about saving our Republic by maintaining the balance of power between our three branches of government.

Senator Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.) said, As the first U.S. Senator to call for a vote before the election, I am so proud to support Amy Coney Barrett as President Trumps nominee for associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. With her background as a former clerk to the late Justice Scalia and an originalist, Judge Barrett will protect individual liberties including the right to life, the Second Amendment and religious liberties by ensuring the Constitution, and our laws, are applied as written.

While she brings a tremendous record of upholding the Constitution, personal integrity and sterling qualifications, we know that the worst elements of the Left will come after Judge Barrett with everything they have. But as someone who has stood up to the radical Lefts cancel culture and won, my advice for a fellow strong conservative woman is this: Keep going, keep pushing, keep fighting and keep winning.

Our Constitution, the right to life and the future of our country are all worth fighting for. My Republican colleagues and I will have your back, and we will confirm you as the next female United States Supreme Court associate justice.

Tennessees Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate Marquita Bradshaw said, While expected, todays Supreme Court nomination is a stunning example of flagrant hypocrisy on the part of this administration and those who support it. If Mitch McConnell rushes through this confirmation process, as he has promised he will do, rest assured, I will help lead the charge to expand the number of justices on the bench, in order to restore a system of balanced justice to our nations highest court.

Bill Hagerty, Republican nominee for the Senate seat held by Senator Lamar Alexander, said, I applaud President Donald Trump for nominating Judge Amy Coney Barrett. She is a dedicated Christian public servant - a solid constitutionalist, who will steadfastly serve our nation.

I stand with President Trump and the Republican Senate majority as they do their job to fill the vacant Supreme Court seat. Its reprehensible that the Democrats are already attacking an imminently qualified judicial nominee because of her faith. The First Amendment is not just about freedom of the press; its also intended to protect freedom of religion. If the Democrats can attack Judge Barrett for being a person of faith, just think of what theyre capable of doing to our religious freedom. As your Senator, I will always fight for your religious freedom, and I will fight to confirm outstanding constitutionalist justices and judges to the federal bench.

Rep. Chuck Fleischmann said, I support President Donald Trumps decision to nominate Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the United States Supreme Court. She is a qualified and principled judge with a proven track record of upholding our constitution. She will be a great addition to our nations highest court.

Attorney General Herbert H. Slatery III said, Judge Amy Coney Barrett is an exceptional jurist and will make an exceptional justice. She appreciates that a judge's role is not to create the law but to apply the Constitution and the laws of the United States as written. I encourage the Senate to give her a respectful hearing and a speedy vote. And I hope that many of those who are anxious about her nomination will over time come to appreciate her commitment to the rule of law and her fidelity to our Constitution.
Appeared in Charlie Hebdo edition 1470 of 23 September 2020

Open letter to our fellow citizens: Letas unite to defend freedom

Never before have the media, who often defend widely differing points of view and for whom manifestos are not the usual form of expression, jointly decided to address their audiences and their fellow citizens in such a solemn manner.

We are doing so now because it seems crucial to alert you to one of the most fundamental values of our democracy: your freedom of expression.

Today, in 2020, some of you receive death threats on the social media when you express certain opinions. Certain media are openly targeted by international terrorist organisations. States exercise pressure on French journalists aguiltya of having published critical articles.

The violence of words has gradually mutated into physical violence.

Over the last five years, men and women in our country have been assassinated by fanatics because of their origins or their opinions. Journalists and cartoonists have been executed to stop them ever writing and drawing freely again.

aNo-one should be troubled for their opinions, even religious, provided that their manifestation does not trouble public order as established by the lawa states Article 10 of the 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, now included in the French constitution. This article is immediately complemented by the following: aThe free communication of thoughts and opinions is one of the most precious rights of man: any citizen may thus speak, write and print freely, except to answer for the abuse of this liberty in cases determined by the law.a

Nevertheless, the whole legal edifice, developed over more than two centuries to protect your freedom of expression is suffering its greatest attack since the second world war. And this time the attack is coming from new totalitarian ideologies, sometimes claiming to draw inspiration from religious writings.

Of course, we expect the public authorities to deploy the police resources necessary to ensure the defence of these freedoms and to firmly condemn states that violate treaties guaranteeing your rights. But we are worried that the natural fear of death is tightening its grip and inexorably stifling the last remaining free spirits.

What then will remain of the dreams of those who drafted the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen in 1789? These freedoms seem so natural to us that we sometimes forget the privilege and the amenity that they represent for each and every one of us. They are like the air that we breathe, and that air is becoming rarefied. To be worthy of what our forebears obtained and bequeathed us, we must resolve not to concede another inch to these deadly ideologies.

Our countryas laws provide every one of you with a framework authorising you to speak, write and draw like few other places in the world. It is up to you, and you alone, to use it. Yes, you have the right to express your opinions and to criticise those of others, be they political, philosophical or religious, provided that you remain within the limits fixed by the law. Let us recall here, in solidarity with Charlie Hebdo which has paid for this freedom with its employeesa blood, that the crime of blasphemy does not exist in France. Some people are believers and may naturally be shocked by blasphemy. Nevertheless, they are unreservedly associating themselves with what we are doing. Because by defending the right to blaspheme, we are not defending blasphemy but freedom.

We need you. We need your mobilisation. We need the bulwark of your conscience. The enemies of freedom must understand that we stand together as their resolute adversaries, whatever our differences of opinion or belief. Private citizens, local elected members, political leaders, journalists, militants from every party and association, more than ever in these uncertain times we must unite our strength to drive out fear and ensure the triumph of our indestructible love of Freedom. a

#DAfendonsLaLibertA (Letas defend freedom)

Signatories :

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A recent study by CheckPoint shows that the Instagram Android App has a critical problem of hacking the camera and the headphone jack of the smartphones. Due to this issue in the Instagram App, the attackers got a chance to control the whole device by just sending images that are crafted to the users of those smartphones.According to Facebook , this enhanced security issue affects all the versions of the Instagram App before 128.0.0.26.128 that was released in February 2020. Due to this issue, the smartphones turn into a tool for snooping the users that dont know anything about it. Bad actors not only hack the phones of the users but also enable hostile variations in the Instagram profiles of the users.Due to this attack, not only the profile of the users is hacked but also the privacy of the users is breached that affects their reputation on social media and can lead to different serious issues. As this issue was found, Facebook engineers addressed the issue and released the update six months ago. This news was delayed to allow most of the users of Instagram to update their Apps so that they can reduce the problem caused due to the bug.Still, Facebook claims that this Instagram bug doesnt affect most of the smartphones throughout the world. But this bug may cause memory corruption that will lead to the execution of remote code that permits Instagram to easily access the camera, microphone, contact, photo gallery, and GPS. So after accessing them, the attackers can do various actions to the defected smartphones.Due to this malfunction, the adversary can control the size of the memory covered by the specific image, the length of the data that is overwritten. This will in turn provide a chance to the violators to attack different locations and to change the remote code execution. CheckPoint researchers provide various tips to the users, like, updating all the applications and operating systems frequently, monitoring all the applications that are demanding extra permissions, and also checking that on which application they are demanding the permission, and before approving anything take a second to properly read all the instruction given and if the instruction is unsatisfying for you then dont accept them.However, there may be chances that various other bugs may be introduced in the future. So for this type of malfunctions the company has to prepare themselves early before any loss as they have to protect the data of many users.Photo: Esra Hacioglu / Anadolu Agency / Getty ImagesRead next: Instagram Might Soon Introduce Group Stories, Advanced Sticker Options In DMs and Much More
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has treated his youngest daughter to a trip to the zoo as she joined him on a visit to Adelaide.

Mr Morrison and his daughter Lily, 12, arrived at Adelaide Zoo on Saturday and were shown around by zookeepers, even getting to cuddle some furry animals.

The adorable Quokkas appeared to be Lily's favourite as she smiled widely while holding onto the tiny wallaby.

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison with his daughter Lily who is holding a quokka during a visit to the Adelaide Zoo on September 26

Mr Morrison was not shy at holding a quokka but appeared worried while his daughter and zoo keepers watched on

Father and daughter smile at each other as Mr Morrison pats the quokka being held by Lily

The prime minister was not shy either but looked a bit worried as he held a quokka while his daughter and zoo keepers watched on.

Following their cuddling with the animals, the pair took a tour around the zoo and stopped to chat with other families.

His visit comes after South Australia reopened its borders to New South Wales on Friday following low COVID-19 cases and community transmission.

He said Sydneysiders would be right behind him and head to South Australia providing a massive $800million boost to the economy.

Mr Morrison speaks to zoo keeper Amelia Kennett while his daughter Lily rubs her finger on the quokka

Mr Morrison bumps elbows with Adelaide zoo visitor Max wishing him a happy 7th birthday

Mr Morrison with his daughter Lily Morrison and Senator Simon Birmmingham during a visit to the Adelaide Zoo on September 26

Mr Morrison speaks with zoo visitors during a visit to the Adelaide Zoo on September 26, 2020

Mr Morrison stressed once again that when other states reopen their borders or not they should explain to the people why.

'All I've simply asked is when states make those decisions that they do it efficiently, that they explain the reasons and they seek to administer it in a way that is done fairly,' he said.

'They are judgments that at the more micro level the states will make and so I leave them to make them.'

The trip also saw Mr Morrison visit the newly constructed shipyard for the navy's fleet of frigates, and speak at the SA Liberal Party's annual meeting.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison watches on from the stands during the Round 9 NRL match between the Cronulla-Sutherland Sharks and the Penrith Panthers on July 11

Back in July, Mr Morrison was slammed for taking a break to spend time with his family but was instead spotted at an NRL game.

'I will not be joining them for that full-time. I will also not be standing aside from the tasks I have all day,' he said on Friday.

Australians vented their frustration as Mr Morrison's break came at the same time as COVID-19 cases were surging again in Victoria.

Others however said the prime minister deserved some time off for all the work he had put in.
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Johnson & Johnsons coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccine has showed promising results and can move to large-scale trials, according to a published report by CNN.

Early results show how the vaccine produced a strong immune response to the 800 participants in the trial, CNN reported.

The participants were divided in a first age group of 18- to 55-year-olds, in which 99% of the participants developed antibodies, and a second group of 65-year-olds and older, according to the report.

Because of the positive results, the vaccine can now move to a large-scale trial, becoming the only single-dose immunization in Phase 3 in the United States, the report explained.

Pfizer and Moderna are also both in late-stage coronavirus trials and have emerged as front-runners in the hunt for a vaccine, but their vaccine would require multiple doses.
With Octobers arrival heralding the onset of chilly days and even colder nights, restaurant owners and operators are now facing a new challenge - what to do about outdoor dining when shirtsleeve weather comes to an end.

A dining capacity lifeline in an era of limited access to traditional restaurant space, outdoor dining has been a welcome stopgap measure for those eateries that needed to bring in enough revenue to keep afloat.

Given the persistence of COVID-19, authorities seem reluctant to authorize further reopening of inside dining, making those tables on decks, terraces, or even in the street out front essential to the short-term survival of many restaurants.

Three-season outdoor dining has long been a part of the operating strategy for many restaurants here in New England. Windscreens, heaters, and tents have traditionally been used by some operators to make al fresco service an April-to-October reality.

A few area restaurants, newly dependent on their outdoor seating, are already promoting cold weather enhancements. Mezze Bistro + Bistro in Williamstown has, for instance, recently installed five heaters to its back porch, which is currently the restaurants primary dining space.

Adding heaters can be frustrating and expensive, however, with freestanding, commercial-grade gas units currently costing as much as $1200 and up each. Adding to the difficulty involved is the problem of actually locating a source for such heaters, with suppliers already reporting being backordered on their most popular units.

Another obstacle to maintaining outdoor dining in the weeks ahead is compliance with public health and building code guidelines. In order for outdoor dining to remain a truly low-risk option, adequate ventilation of the dining space is a must. This likely means no fully-enclosed tents will be permitted, and adequate ventilation will have to be provided for any other sort of enclosure, such as a modular greenhouse or a plastic bubble.

Building inspectors will also expect that proper precautions are in place to anchor and stabilize such structures against wind and other late-season weather hazards.

Side dishes

The Steaming Tender Restaurant in Palmer has announced that, starting October 1, they will be offering limited seating on their 1909 parlor car.

The restaurant has also embraced the apple and pumpkin season. Their bar is stocking fall season craft brews, and the barkeeps are compounding autumn cocktails like apple cider spiked with caramel vodka.

For more information, contact the Steaming Tender Restaurant at (413) 283-2744.

The recently-reopened White Hut on Memorial Avenue in West Springfield, which is now operated by the Bean Restaurant Group, has created a new breakfast menu for the venerable roadhouse eatery.

The morning food agenda features the Hut Sandwich, an egg, cheese, and breakfast meat creation made with a patrons choice of bread. A two egg and toast plate and several omelet creations are available as well.

Breakfast is available daily Monday through Friday from 6:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. and on weekends from 8 a.m. until 10:30 a.m.

The White Hut has also partnered with Ludlow-based Harmony Springs, Inc. to feature that companys line of locally made soft drinks. Harmony Springs uses natural flavors and spring-fed wells to produce its beverage products.

White Hut is now begun offering online ordering at WhiteHut.com; their telephone number is (413) 733-8000.

With controversy still simmering about the safety of indoor dining, the Blue Heron Restaurant in Sunderland is taking no chances with the health of their patrons.

As theyve been doing since indoor dining resumed early in the summer, the Blue Heron has de-emphasized inside climate control measures to instead favor plenty of fresh air circulation.

Now that nights are becoming crisp and cool, the screened windows in the dining room continue to remain open, with the heat turned on as necessary.

Deborah Snow and Barbara White, co-owners of the Blue Heron, are encouraging guests to take the establishments open window policy into account when coming to dine. Bringing a sweater, they suggest, is probably a good idea.

The restaurant is open for limited indoor seating Wednesday through Sunday evenings from 5 p.m. until 9 p.m. Online ordering for take-out, family style meals, and grocery ordering all remain available as well. The restaurants web site at blueherondining.com is a source for more information.

The Blue Heron answers at (413) 665-2102.

As part of a chainwide effort to come clean by no longer using food additives, Miami-based Burger King has announced that it has completed removal of artificial flavors, coloring, and preservatives from its signature Whopper sandwich.

Overall, Burger King reports that about 85% of the items on its menu are now additive-free.

Fans of Jakes Restaurant in downtown Northampton may be interested to hear that Jakes has opened a second location across the river in Amherst. Located at 63 Cowls Road in Amhersts newly christened Mill District, Jakes at the Mill is currently offering online ordering, curbside pickup, and outdoor dining.

The breakfast menu at Jakes suggests choices ranging from French toast, biscuits and gravy, and an egg-topped hash bowl to a breakfast burrito than can be customized with guacamole, bacon, soy sausage and more.

At lunch the restaurant features the Jakes Burger, a six-ounce ground beef patty sandwich that can be tweaked with a number of topping options. Pork tacos, a Cuban sandwich, mac & cheese, and several salad bowls are also available.

Jakes serves a selection of beers and even offers pickup purchasing of selected grocery items.

Hours for Jakes at the Mill are Wednesday through Sunday 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., Wednesday through Sunday. Orders can be placed through Jakes main web site, jakesnorthampton.com. The restaurant answers at (413) 230-3717.

Panera Bread locations have tweaked their popular mac & cheese menu item, creating a Broccoli Cheddar Mac & Cheese option. A permanent addition to the bakery-cafe chains offerings, the dish is made with broccoli, julienned carrots, and macaroni tossed with two different cheese sauces.

There are Panera Bread locations nearby in Hadley on Route 9, on Memorial Drive in Chicopee, in West Springfields Riverdale Shops, and in East Longmeadow across from Heritage Park.

The arrival of October means its Oktoberfest time at the Student Prince CafC and Fort Restaurant in downtown Springfield. Starting October 1, the establishment will have a considerable assortment of German and Oktoberfest beers on tap; the Student Prince Oktoberfest menu will also be available.

Contact the Student Prince at (413) 734-7475 for more details.

First introduced in September 2019 as a limited-time-only add-on option, carne asada went on to become Chipotle Mexican Grills fastest selling new menu introduction.

Discontinued in January 2020 because of supply chain challenges, carne asada is returning starting September 28. Made from beef top sirloin seasoned with cumin, coriander, lime, and chopped cilantro, the carne asada is sous-vide cooked at central commissaries and griddle finished at the time of service.

This falls reintroduction is also to be a limited-time offering, but the chains management has revealed that carne asada will made permanent once an adequate ongoing supply of the product can be ensured.

Hugh Robert is a faculty member in Holyoke Community Colleges hospitality and culinary arts program and has nearly 45 years of restaurant and educational experience. Robert can be reached on-line at OffTheMenuGuy@aol.com.
Judge Richard Anderson has served on the 19th Judicial District Court's criminal bench since 1997 and hopes to serve one more term before hanging up his black robe for good.

But Christopher Dassau, a lawyer and Baker City Court prosecutor who was once a staff attorney for 19th JDC Judge Wilson Fields, would like to send Anderson into retirement at the end of the year and begin his own judicial career.

Qualifying opens for all 15 seats on the 19th Judicial District Court The 19th Judicial District Court seat that longtime Judge Janice Clark must relinquish at the end of the year because of her age drew two cand

The election for the Division G seat is Nov. 3.

Anderson, 64, of Central, is a Republican who practiced law for 15 years before embarking on a nearly 24-year judicial career that has seen him preside over 200-plus jury trials, including six death penalty trials  the late south Louisiana serial killer Derrick Todd Lee being the most high profile.

"The difference between me and my opponent  experience," Anderson stressed in a recent interview. He pointed to both his legal and life experience.

Dassau, 36, of Baker, is a Democrat who has served as Baker's city prosecutor since 2012. He said the fact that he does not prosecute felony cases doesn't diminish his courtroom experience.

"Fairness and justice are the same whether you're handling a felony or misdemeanor or traffic violation," he said.

Anderson, who was reelected without opposition in 2002 and 2008 and defeated attorney and Democrat Joyce Plummer in 2014, said he has kept the campaign promises he first made in 1996: to be tough on crime, especially violent and repeat offenders, while giving nonviolent offenders a chance to rehabilitate; protect public safety and victims' rights; serve with honesty and integrity; and not legislate from the bench but apply the law as written.

Incumbent 19th JDC judges win re-election Tuesday Incumbents ruled the day Tuesday in East Baton Rouge Parishs judicial races as all six 19th Judicial District Court judges on the primary bal

"That's what I've done for almost 24 years. You know what you're getting with me. I'm not going to change," he said. "I love to hear people say, `You're doing what you told us you would do."

Dassau said he works as a prosecutor to protect the public and victims of crime, while also focusing on rehabilitation and social development opportunities for offenders where possible.

"I'm the candidate that's going to help bridge the gap between our communities and the criminal justice system," he said.

As a judge, Dassau said he believes he would have the responsibility to be active in the community and help make things better.

The scoop on state politics in your inbox Get the Louisiana politics insider details once a week from us. Sign up today. e-mail address * Sign Up

"Our criminal justice system can be more than crime and punishment," he said.

Anderson feels his role in applying and enforcing the law is critical to both public safety and the economic growth of the community.

"Public safety is a byproduct of what I do as a judge," he said.

Anderson noted that when companies are considering where to do business, "public safety is one or two on their list."

"If it's not safe, they're not going to open stores," he said.

Anderson said one of his greatest joys is running into someone in a store who previously appeared before him in court, and hear them say he turned their life around with his tough but fair treatment.

"Those are the things that really make me feel good," he said.

Though Anderson and Dassau are of different races and party affiliations, neither man is making the election about race or politics.

"That's not an issue at all," Dassau, who is Black, said of the candidates' skin color. "I'm talking about Christopher Dassau and what I bring to the table."

Anderson has been a member of the Republican Party longer than Dassau has been alive  more than 46 years to be exact.

"If you come sit in my courtroom, you can't tell" which political party I belong to, said Anderson, who is White.

The subdistrict that contains Division G includes Baker, Central, Zachary and areas of Baton Rouge including Alsen, Broadmoor, Brownfields, Glen Oaks, Greenwell Springs, Merrydale, Monticello, Park Forest, Scotlandville, Sherwood Forest and Sherwood.

Early voting for the election is scheduled Oct. 16-27, excluding Oct. 18 and 25, which are Sundays.
Alleging that the Congress betrayed the farmers, Scindia blamed Digvijaya for the previous government's 'failures', adding that Digvijaya held the remote control of then chief minister Kamal Nath

BJP leader Jyotiraditya Scindia on Saturday launched a frontal attack on his former Congress colleague Digvijaya Singh and accused the Opposition party of "betraying" farmers by not waiving farm loans promised ahead of the 2018 assembly polls.

Addressing a gathering in Indore district, Scindia avoided taking name of then Congress chief Rahul Gandhi who had promised the waiver during electioneering.

He also said Digvijaya Singh would become a "proxy chief minister again" if the Congress emerged victorious in the Assembly bypolls due on 28 seats.

"During the 2018 MP assembly elections, he (the then Congress chief Rahul Gandhi) had said that the crop loan of farmers would be waived within 10 days if the Congress forms government, but this promise was not kept," said Scindia, who had quit Congress in March this year.

He said the Congress had committed 'gaddari' (betrayal) with farmers by not keeping the loan waiver promise. "You all (voters) must remember that a vote cast to Congress would come handy in making Digvijaya the proxy chief minister again," Scindia said.

Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan also attended the function.

Describing Digvijaya Singh and former CM Kamal Nath as "elder and younger brothers", Scindia said, "Digvijaya Singh remains behind the curtains and had remote control of then chief minister Kamal Nath".

"Today, Digvijaya and Kamal Nath are calling me a gaddar (traitor) and Shivraj Singh Chouhan 'nalayak' (worthless). But the fact is that the Congress had betrayed 7.5 crore people of Madhya Pradesh in the last elections," he added.
New York, Sep 26 : New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and state Governor Andrew Cuomo have clashed over reforms to the New York Police Department (NYPD), it was reported.

On Thursday, Cuomo demanded that every city and town in the state submit a plan to overhaul the police department, while slamming de Blasio for not starting work on the proposal, even as shootings have spiked in the city, Politico news reported.

According to the Governor, 146 other jurisdictions have initiated their plans, which must be implemented by April 2021 or it will lose state funding.

Cuomo's executive order was signed in June amid protests over the police killing of George Floyd, an unarmed African-American man on May 25 in Minneapolis.

But in response, the Mayor on Friday told the WNYC public radio station that Cuomo "doesn't have his facts straight".

"If he wants to make personal attacks, he can do that. But he does not have his facts straight. Seven years of non-stop reform, and it's time we have an honest conversation about this and stop these games," de Blasio was quoted as saying.

He also cited a series of NYPD reform initiatives that have been implemented in his two terms in office.

The city had 180,000 fewer arrests last year than in the final year of the Bloomberg administration, Politico news quoted the Mayor as saying.

The jail population has fallen to levels not seen since the 1940s.
The future of abortion rights is likely to be at stake with President Trumps nomination of Judge Amy Coney Barrett for the Supreme Court, and many will be watching California Sen. Dianne Feinstein to see if she reprises her focus on the conservative nominees Catholic beliefs in Senate confirmation hearings.

That line of questioning didnt go well for Feinstein and other Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee when Barrett was being considered for an appeals court seat in 2017. In questioning whether Barretts religious beliefs would shape her views on the constitutionality of abortion and other issues, Democrats came under attack from conservatives who accused them of being anti-Catholic.

Pursuing that angle again would be a mistake that could hurt Democrats in the election, just as polls show Catholic voters leaving Trump for Joe Biden, said Doug Pagitt, an evangelical Christian pastor who supports the Democratic challenger.

That is the only thing that I worry about over the next 30 days  that Democrats are going to come across as afraid of religious people or that they dont like religious people, said Pagitt, executive director of Vote Common Good, a 2-year-old organization trying to convince Catholics and evangelicals to vote for Biden.

Anything that could be interpreted toward casting aspersions on someone because of their religion could be a real misstep because it could be construed as religious bigotry, said Robert Jones, CEO of Public Religion Research Institute, an independent polling firm.

And that could be used to political advantage for Trump, Jones said.

The issue is on the radar because of what happened during Barretts Senate confirmation hearing three years ago, after Trump nominated her to serve on the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals.

Feinstein and several other Democrats pressed Barrett, then a law professor at Notre Dame University, about her legal writings, in particular a 1998 law review article in which she explored what Catholic judges should do when deciding death penalty cases.

Barrett wrote that judges cannot  nor should they try to  align our legal system with the Churchs moral teaching whenever the two diverge. They should, however, conform their own behavior to the Churchs standard.

Democrats also questioned Barrett about a speech in which she told Notre Dame law school graduates that your legal career is but a means to an end, and ... that end is building the kingdom of God.

And they questioned why she had joined other academics in signing public letters to Catholic leaders affirming the churchs belief that marriage should only be between a man and a woman. Barrett replied that she would follow precedent when it came to legal questions involving same-sex marriage.

Feinstein, the lead Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, told Barrett in 2017 that dogma and law are two different things. And I think whatever a religion is, it has its own dogma. The law is totally different. And I think in your case, professor, when you read your speeches, the conclusion one draws is that the dogma lives loudly within you, and thats of concern.

Many conservatives took offense, particularly at Feinsteins use of the word dogma, Then-Judiciary Committee member Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, accused Democrats of placing a religious test on the nominee. The conservative Judicial Watch Network created digital ads saying Feinstein and other Democrats were sending a message when it came to those seeking judgeships: Catholics need not apply.

Barrett said at the time that I would faithfully apply all Supreme Court precedent.

In 2017, a Feinstein spokeswoman said that Professor Barrett has argued that a judges faith should affect how they approach certain cases. Based on this, Sen. Feinstein questioned her about whether she could separate her personal views from the law, particularly regarding womens reproductive rights.

But conservatives havent forgotten. After word of Barretts nomination leaked Friday, one organization of social conservatives said Democrats were trying to silence her because they hate her.

Democrats and the mainstream media think they can bully Amy Coney Barrett into silence or pressure President Trump into choosing another nominee  or abandoning his constitutional right to appoint a new justice altogether, Terry Schilling, executive director of the American Principles Project, a social conservative organization that has opposed same-sex marriage and transgender rights, wrote in an email to supporters.

One aspect of Barretts faith that did not come up in 2017, but could this time, is her membership in a small Christian organization called People of Praise. Members of the group pledge a lifelong oath of loyalty to love and service to fellow community members. They are assigned to a personal adviser  referred to as a head, in the case of men, and until recently as a handmaid for a woman. The group now calls a female adviser a woman leader.

The reference to handmaid has inspired pro-choice protesters in recent years to wear the red cloak and white bonnet of the women depicted in Margaret Atwoods dystopian novel The Handmaids Tale, which later became a TV series.

The novel depicts a theocratic society where women known as handmaids are forced into child-bearing slavery. Even though Atwood has said that another Christian sect was the inspiration for her book, there will no doubt be red-cloaked protesters outside Barretts confirmation hearing, as there were during Justice Brett Kavanaughs 2018 appearances before the Judiciary Committee.

Pagitt, the pastor supporting Biden, says Democrats need to be sensitive to Catholics sensibilities if they bring up Barretts religious beliefs.

The political danger to the Democratic Party would be one of timing  alienating Catholic voters during Barretts hearings could short-circuit their migration to Biden.

An August survey by Vote Common Good of 1,430 self-described evangelicals and Catholics voters in five battleground states  Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Florida  showed an 11-point shift away from Trump over the past four years and toward Biden, a Catholic who attends Mass weekly and carries a rosary in his pocket. Trump, who identifies as Presbyterian, rarely goes to church.

The survey found that Biden is on track to narrowly beat Trump among Catholics in those states and cut into the presidents wide lead among evangelicals.

The survey, which was conducted by an independent firm and overseen by behavioral experts and academic pollsters from University of Southern California and three other universities, found that voters werent leaving Trump because of any positions he was taking on issues, but because they found Biden to be more virtuous.

While abortion is likely to be a major issue in Barretts hearing, more than half of all Catholic voters support abortion rights, according to 2019 Pew Research poll. Catholic support has swung between Democrats and Republicans in presidential races over the past 20 years. Four years ago, they supported Trump, but that could change this year, said Jones, the Public Religion Research Institute CEO.

Evangelicals are still solidly for Trump, but Catholics have been moving around a bit, Jones said. Its unclear where its moving it here.

Joe Garofoli is The San Francisco Chronicles senior political writer. Email: jgarofoli@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @joegarofoli
HANDOUT/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock

Police in Vietnam have seized over 300,000 used condoms that were being washed, repackaged and sold as new, according to local reports.

Binh Duong provincial market inspectors raided a factory near Ho Chi Minh City over the weekend after receiving a tip from a local resident about its unsanitary practices, the Associated Press reported, citing local, state-owned paper Tuoi Tre.

Upon arriving at the factory, inspectors found bags of about 320,000 recycled condoms that had been boiled, dried, reshaped, and then repackaged in plastic bags, the newspaper reported, per the AP and The New York Times.

The owner of the factory, a 34-year-old woman, reportedly told inspectors that the factory had bought the used condoms from a man in the area.

RELATED: The Coronavirus Pandemic May Cause a Global Condom Shortage

She told investigators that she was paid 17 cents for every two pounds of recycled condoms, the Times reported.

Footage from local state-owned broadcaster Vietnam Television reportedly showed thousands of condoms at the factory spread out across the floor. The bags filled with recycled contraceptives weighed almost 800 pounds.

HANDOUT/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock

The Times said it remains unclear just how long the business has been in operation or how many condoms have been sold.

RELATED: Amazon Is Selling Products That Were Scavenged from the Trash, Report Finds

Police will continue to investigate and find others involved in the operation, the AP reported. According to the Times, a woman was arrested in connection with the scheme, though it remains unclear if she has been charged with a crime.

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A health official told the Tuoi Tre newspaper that recycled condoms posed extreme health risks to users.

"This must be prevented," the official said.
Harley-Davidson Inc. is riding out of India. Thats as much of a problem for the American motorcycle icon as for one of the largest two-wheeler markets looking to make its mark globally.

Harley said in a regulatory filing Thursday that it was discontinuing sales and manufacturing operations in the worlds second most populous country as part of its company-wide restructuring, or the Rewire" plan, a five-year strategy to reset its business, focus on high-priority markets and tighten up by streamlining models.

That the Milwaukee, Wisconsin-based company is pulling out of a thriving market for motorbikes speaks to a troubled international strategy in need of overhaul. It comes as Prime Minister Narendra Modi is pushing his Make in India" program, with the autos sector (including two-wheelers) as a key part and potentially $23 billion in production incentives on the way. Nonetheless, Toyota Motor Corp. said last week it wont expand further there.

India hasnt been an easy market for Harley, where its had an assembly plant for a decade and sells a few thousand bikes. The company operates a complete knock-down" assembly plant, where components and parts are imported from the U.S. and assembled into motorcycles for the local market. It also produces the Harley-Davidson Street series for sale outside North America. Finding the price sweet spot and gaining traction in India, even with models made for the market with smaller engines, has been difficult. Discounts sometimes help; at other times, they turn off buyers. Bike manufacturers have struggled with the existential approach  more for less, or vice versa? Indian consumers are aspirational and not that easy to please: A cheaper model of a high-end brand wont cut it. Taxes on larger powertrains are punitive. Harleys bikes can cost as much as 11 lakh (about $15,000). Thats steep for a market where the average bike with decent mileage starts at 50,000, and its nearest competitor prices closer to 1,50,000.

Harley was never going for the mass market, of course. Its long since moved beyond the Wild One to the Weekend One, selling the emblazoned-leather-jacket lifestyle of the American biker on the open road to those who can pay a top price for it. Still, in India, there has been opportunity. Volumes of premium-segment motorcycles have been growing for the last six years. Top-end models have drawn first-time buyers from higher-income levels, and are potentially an upgrade choice for the 70-some million riders of smaller bikes, according to analysts from Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Its main rival in the segment is Eicher Motors Ltd.-owned Royal Enfield  priced well below a Harley, with a similar brand appeal.

The Harley cult hasnt grown big enough to convert into substantial sales. The top 10 brands in India have 70% of the market, according to Macquarie Group Ltd. analysts. Most of the best-selling models have been around for at least 17 years, on average. The majority of new launches fail when it comes to gaining share. As the analysts put it, the best way to get a toehold has been when new segments emerge. Harley hasnt rolled into one. It priced itself too high, then tried to make cheaper versions that didnt appeal to fans.

The company is hamstrung to some extent by the parts it imports and then assembles at its Bawal plant. Tariffs have been a point of contention with U.S. presidents from George W. Bush to Donald Trump. But Harley struggled even after they were cut. The company has also suffered in the wider global trade frictions, with net revenues affected by tariffs imposed by China and the European Union, and by the U.S. on items imported from China. Part of the problem for motorcycles has been the transition to the latest emission norms (a good thing). Keeping up, though, has meant an increase in imported content for parts, according to Goldman Sachs analysts. Duties and taxes havent been lowered to keep pace, while ownership costs and road taxes have increased. All together, state levies make up to approximately 50% of a vehicles on-road price, the highest among comparable countries, the analysts say.

Modis ambitious plans could have been helped by a symbolic gesture to hold on to Harley. Indias inability to keep a premium manufacturer with an outsize brand points to misaligned incentives and dim prospects for becoming a top-end hub. Middle-weight players are doing fine, and large domestic manufacturers like Bajaj Auto Ltd. and TVS Motor Co. export 47% and 26% of their production. But that may be the ceiling.In contrast, Thailand has several production-linked incentives, along with significant research and development expenditure benefits and relatively low corporate tax rates. Premium, larger-engine motorcycle makers have flocked there, including Harley, which has a manufacturing facility.

Both India and Harley are walking away from what could have been a big opportunity.

This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text. Only the headline has been changed.

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Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 14:56:45|Editor: huaxia

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Photo taken on Sept. 26, 2020 shows belongings of Chinese soldiers killed in the 1950-53 Korean War, in Incheon, South Korea. A set of 117 remains of Chinese soldiers killed in the 1950-53 Korean War were casketed in South Korea on Saturday to be sent back to their homeland, Seoul's defense ministry said. The ceremony to lay the 117 remains in coffins was held at a provisional morgue of the 17th army division of South Korea in Incheon, west of the capital Seoul. (Xinhua/Wang Jingqiang)

SEOUL, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- A set of 117 remains of Chinese soldiers killed in the 1950-53 Korean War was casketed in South Korea on Saturday to be sent back to their homeland, Seoul's defense ministry said.

The ceremony to lay the 117 remains in coffins was held at a provisional morgue of the 17th army division of South Korea in Incheon, west of the capital Seoul.

In 2014, South Korea agreed with China to repatriate the remains of fallen Chinese soldiers according to international law and humanitarian spirit, the Seoul ministry said.

From 2014 to 2019, South Korea had returned the remains of 599 Chinese People's Volunteers martyrs killed in the Korean War, including 437 in 2014, 68 in 2015, 36 in 2016, 28 in 2017, 20 in 2018 and 10 in 2019.

The repatriation ceremony is scheduled to be held at the Incheon International Airport on Sunday.

The Chinese People's Volunteers fought alongside the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) army in the Korean War against the South Korean army and the U.S.-led UN forces between 1950 and 1953. Enditem
The Prime Minister is like a man who finds a wasps nest in his house  and burns the house down to get rid of it.

The wasps, having more sense than him, flew off as soon as they felt the heat. But the house is gone.

Now he stands by the smouldering ruins, blaming everyone but himself for this futile catastrophe.

I suspect that some of the things he said on Tuesday night will bring him down, especially the outrageous threat to use troops. If we have been as well-behaved as he pretends to believe, how can such things be justified?

The Prime Ministers wild arm-waving appearance on Tuesday night has at last alerted many previously complacent people to the danger we are in. The poor man had so plainly taken leave of reality that even his most loyal supporters now wonder if this can go on

His actions make nonsense of his words. It was the same when he said: I am deeply, spiritually reluctant to make any of these impositions, or infringe anyones freedom.

No he is not. If he was, he would have listened to the many brilliant experts whose wise counsel he has ignored from the start, such as Sunetra Gupta, John Lee and Carl Heneghan.

They would have told him that the wild prophecies of Imperial College, and the equally wild projections offered on Monday by Messrs Vallance and Whitty, Undertakers to the Nation, were not necessarily right.

Johnson was never compelled to strangle the economy and turn daily life into a crime. He chose to do it.

All he can now suggest is doing it again, on the basis of figures so dubious and stretched that sensible people gasp to see them. Isnt there a saying about doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result?

Well, I think that did it. Can you hear the faint but definite sound of minds changing? The Prime Ministers wild arm-waving appearance on Tuesday night has at last alerted many previously complacent people to the danger we are in.

The poor man had so plainly taken leave of reality that even his most loyal supporters now wonder if this can go on. After long slow weeks of coaxing the nation back to work, he told everyone to go home again.

A large part of the crazy, unenforceable tangle of new regulations seemed to be based on the belief that Covid spreads only when you are standing up.

Millions of eyes opened to the discovery some of us made long ago  that anti-social distancing rules are not based on serious research, but on random guesswork and a desire to frighten us all into doing anything they tell us.

Johnson was never compelled to strangle the economy and turn daily life into a crime. He chose to do it. All he can now suggest is doing it again, on the basis of figures so dubious and stretched that sensible people gasp to see them. People are seen in Soho, London

After spending piles of funny money bribing the nation to go out to restaurants, he slammed new and dispiriting restrictions on them. Business owners  who had assumed till now that he must know what he was doing  finally broke cover to say these new rules would destroy jobs. Actually they have already done so.

The Chancellor, Rishi Sunak, chose on Thursday to avoid any direct reference to the true economic state of the country. It is too frightening, and he knows it.

When he eventually does produce a Budget, it will be one of the most miserable and stringent anyone has ever seen. Instead he found a clever way of voicing his despair with the direction of the Government.

The words We must learn to live without fear demand a complete U-turn from a Cabinet that has distilled power out of fear for six disastrous months  and used that power to smash up the wealth of centuries.

Has there ever before been in this country a government that destroyed so many livelihoods on purpose? People wrongly think the phrase herd immunity sounds cruel (It is not. It has been used for decades, by vaccination experts.

I suggest national immunity as a substitute). But the months of furlough have been far crueller, keeping up the pretence that dead jobs can be brought to life again.

The reckoning is coming, far too late, but at least it is coming. Let us hope it comes quickly. The faster this absurd Maoist experiment is brought to an end, the more survivors there will be.

Now that the National Trust appears to have become a Trotskyist organisation, mainly concerned with railing against the sins of the past, I have a suggestion: As the NT has taken over the franchise for spreading Leftist propaganda, I am thinking of setting up a new body called the Workers Revolutionary Front, which will buy up beautiful stately homes, and encourage visitors to come and see them, offering tea and slices of walnut cake in relaxed, chintzy surroundings. Then the NT can get on with the revolution in peace.

Its time for MPs to do their jobs

ON Wednesday, Parliament must vote to renew or ditch the dictatorial Coronavirus Bill, which it enacted in a sort of mesmerised trance, without a vote, half a year ago.

It should scrap this nasty, despotic thing. And you can help. You need to email your MPs now, in large numbers. Do not try to reason with them.

Be polite, brief and acid. Say you have noticed that MPs have ceased to do the job for which they are paid more than 80,000 a year.

They are not representing you. They have let hundreds of thousands of jobs be destroyed without a squeak of protest.

They are not holding the Government to account. Ask if they think that people who do not do their jobs should continue to be employed on large salaries. Remind them that they can be removed at the next Election. Leave it at that.

It is the only argument most of these boobies can understand. But please do it.

Grandparents wont fall for Nicolas video nasty

The Scottish Government has made one of the nastiest propaganda films I have seen outside a tyranny. It shows an attractive young woman making a cup of tea for a man who is presumably her grandfather.

But horror-movie music and disturbing special effects twist this innocent, kindly act into an evil murder.

The woman (who, wicked thing, has dared to spend an evening of fun with friends) is contaminated by the hated virus.

The watcher sees her spreading slimy greenish handprints all over kitchen and kettle, then sees her face smeared with diseased muck, which she carelessly transfers to her grandparent, who innocently thanks her for the lovely cup of tea.

Implication: the deluded old fool will die because of her cruel carelessness.

The woman (who, wicked thing, has dared to spend an evening of fun with friends) is contaminated by the hated virus

The Scottish Government says this poison was aimed at the non-compliant and is an impactful and memorable way to remind them of the very real risks the virus poses.

Well, this is all bilge. Grandparents arent stupid or deluded.

Many of us would rather see our grandchildren in the years we have left than cower at their approach, or hide away from them. Young people are mostly very responsible and probably take the Covid precautions too seriously. And then theres this.

Covid-19 very seldom kills healthy people, young or old. Its victims are overwhelmingly both very old and suffering from severe underlying conditions.

As such, they are much more likely to be killed by the Government dumping them in an ill-protected care home than they are to be murdered by their feckless grandchildren.

Make a film about that, why dont you, Nicola Sturgeon, instead of trying to turn happy families against each other?

If you want to comment on Peter Hitchens click here
Ashim Kyomuhendo

A man has been arrested in Uganda after he allegedly stabbed his 20-year-old sister to death during an argument.

It was gathered that the incident happened on Thursday, September 24, at Nakulaye Zone 5, a Kampala city suburb in Lubaga Municipality.

The Kampala Metropolitan Deputy Police Spokesperson, Luke Owoyesigyire, who confirmed the incident, identified the suspect as Ashim Kyomuhendo, 28,.

Owoyesigyire said Kyomuhendo allegedly stabbed and killed his sister Aminah Namara, during an argument at around 4am, on Thursday morning. It is purported that Namara visited her brother a month ago and they have been staying together at his home.



Our officers have conveyed the body of the deceased to the City Mortuary in Mulago for a postmortem as we continue with further investigations to ascertain the exact cause of the murder, Owoyesigyire said.

The girl was stabbed to death

According to one of the eyewitnesses, Kyomuhendo picked a knife and stabbed his sister in the chest, and in the neck before he fled to his friends home in Kasubi-Nabulagala.



The two engaged in a serious verbal exchange. Out of blue Kyomuhendo charged when the sister insulted him to the extent of reminding him of his past which compelled him to stab her two times, in attempt to stop her from spilling more secrets about him, the eyewitness said.

Police have also arrested Harriet Komuntale, a wife to the suspect to aid in the investigations. She is detained at Nakulabye Police station.
Some Democratic strategists are raising the alarm about the millions of dollars being spent by super PACs in support of nominee Joe Biden, saying too much is being spent on White swing voters while not enough is being devoted to driving up turnout among voters of color.

The complaints are perennial, but they carry new resonance this year, as Biden has struggled to inspire enthusiasm among young Black voters and Latinos.

Many in the liberal wing of the Democratic Party have urged leadership to pay closer attention to voters of color, whom they say increasingly form the backbone of the party but cannot be taken for granted. This month, a prominent Democratic donor publicly scrutinized super PAC spending, urging groups to change course as the election nears.

At the same time, President Donald Trump's campaign has sought to drive up his support among voters of color; on Friday, Trump was scheduled to appear at events for Black and Latino voters and unveiled a $500 billion plan to invest in Black communities.

The Democratic concerns come as more than $150 million has already been spent by the main super PACs supporting Biden, some of which have made it part of their strategy to win back supporters of former president Barack Obama who pivoted in 2016 to Trump.

Nse Ufot, executive director of the New Georgia Project, which focuses on mobilizing young voters of color in Georgia, said her group's work is especially challenging this year given the lack of enthusiasm for Biden among Black youths, the disproportionate impact of the coronavirus on Black communities, and confusion around voting during a pandemic.

When she sees announcements of tens of millions of dollars being spent on disaffected White voters in swing states, she said, she finds such spending strategies "insulting."

"One hundred million people didn't show up to vote, and your obsession and willingness to invest tons of resources in the unicorn of an Obama-Trump voter is madness," Ufot said, referring to the eligible voters who did not vote in 2016. "It is not a part of a strategy that is designed to animate and inspire the core of the Democratic Party and the Obama coalition, if you will. . . . Sticking to the same old tactics, sticking to the same old playbook, I don't know that that's a winning strategy."

Wealthy Democratic donors are now pouring money into super PACs, which can raise and spend unlimited amounts of money to try to influence elections, by running political ads and working on get-out-the-vote efforts.

Their donations have fueled pro-Biden super PACs, which are now vastly outspending those supporting Trump's reelection, as Biden gains a significant cash lead in the weeks before the election.

A report released this month by Democracy in Color, a group founded by longtime Democratic donor Steve Phillips, argues that some of the biggest Democratic super PACs financed by the party's wealthiest donors have disproportionately focused on persuading swing voters, pointing to spending announcements and publicly available expenditure data.

It suggests that such spending has come at the expense of voters from diverse communities who have a propensity to vote Democratic, particularly in potential pickup states, such as Georgia and Arizona. It urges super PACs to change course on their spending strategies for November.

"We need to improve how money is spent," said Phillips, who has been a vocal proponent of a more multicultural approach to liberal politics. "The stakes are enormous. It's putting at risk what can be achieved both in terms of presidential as well as flipping the Senate."

Tory Gavito, president of Way to Win, a coalition of liberal donors focusing on the Democratic electorate in the South and Southwest, argued that "a new cadre" including women, voters of color and liberal Whites will drive Biden to the White House.

"It's that energy that's going to create coattails for Biden, not the other way around," she said. She said she believes current Democratic spending is informed by "inertia," relying on spending strategies of the past that have neglected those communities for too long.

Federal records show the biggest Democratic groups have spent at least $108 million this year in 13 key states, and the amount spent on each state varies widely. More than $27 million has been spent in Iowa, whereas at least $2.7 million has been spent in Texas, a state with a growing population of racial minorities.

Democracy in Color is particularly critical of super PACs that have emphasized Midwestern swing states and White working-class voters. For example, American Bridge super PAC has pledged to spend $100 million to persuade potential Trump defectors in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan.

American Bridge said that it has been transparent about its targeted focus this year and that it expected other groups to fill the void.

Some of the groups named by Democracy in Color noted they have significant efforts directed toward minorities. This week, two Democratic super PACs - Priorities USA Action and Senate Majority PAC (SMP) - announced a $7.5 million digital advertising program focusing on mobilizing voters of color.

In addition to its other efforts, SMP is investing millions into registering and mobilizing Black voters in North Carolina, Michigan and Georgia; spending millions on Spanish-language ads in Arizona; and funding litigation in North Carolina to improve voting access for Black voters, said its president, J.B. Poersch.

"It's through a diverse coalition of partners that we have a track record of success of turning out voters of color and winning Senate races in states like Arizona, Nevada and Alabama," Poersch said. "Our goal in 2020 is to not only replicate past successes but to turn out even more voters of color that are crucial to retaking the Senate majority."

Officials with Priorities USA, which plans to spend more than $200 million this cycle, have emphasized the importance of spending money on both White working-class voters and voters of color, citing polling that indicates even the slightest decrease in support among either group could create a toss-up race for Biden.

The group has launched a $32 million campaign focusing on Black and Latino voters, which began last November. It plans to spend another $34 million on voting rights litigation, which would help make sure voters of color do not face barriers to casting their ballots.

"We're proud of the work we've done this cycle to build a diverse in-house team to execute our programs and remain committed to living our values as we work to protect and expand voting rights and communicate directly with communities of color," said Patrick McHugh, executive director of Priorities USA.

Some Democratic groups focusing on voters of color say the spending gap is improving but there is more work to be done.

Adrianne Shropshire, executive director of BlackPAC, a group focused on Black voter outreach and engagement, said it has been involved in advising SMP in crafting its spending strategy, which she views as a step in the right direction.

"There's been some progress. There is more progress to be made," she said.

Still, the Democracy in Color analysis argues that these investments lag in comparison to other swing states with majority-White voters, pointing out that there is a "grossly disproportionate focus on Iowa and Michigan, the omission of Georgia, and the overlooking of African Americans in North Carolina."

Others say new spending announcements targeting communities of color at this point in the general election come too late, particularly in areas where voters have a deep distrust of the parties and already face barriers to voting, such as in Georgia.

"When we talk about" a "state with a history of targeting Black voters at polls, this late investment and the same playbook from years past is particularly insulting," Ufot said.

- - -

The Washington Post's Anu Narayanswamy contributed to this report.
A federal judge scheduled an unusual Sunday morning hearing to decide whether the U.S. can go through with its ban on the video-sharing app TikTok.

ByteDance Ltd., TikToks Chinese owner, has asked the court to block the ban, set to begin on Sunday night, even as it pursues approvals from the government for the sale of a stake in its U.S. operations to Oracle Corp. and Walmart Inc. under pressure from President Donald Trump.

Trump cited national security last month in announcing a ban on the widely used network from U.S. app stores. The president, who has also barred WeChat, owned by Chinas Tencent Holdings Ltd., has told ByteDance its only alternative is to sell its American TikTok business. The Justice Department argues that the apps could allow Chinas government to gain access to the personal data of millions of Americans.

On Friday the government emphasized those concerns to the judge in a filing, urging him not to grant the temporary block. U.S. lawyers cited the FBI directors assessment that the Peoples Republic of China  or PRC  poses the greatest long-term threat to our nations information and intellectual property as a reason for the ban.

One of the tools that the PRC uses to further its goals is bulk data collection, the U.S. government said.

ByteDance, founded in 2012 by Zhang Yiming, has close ties to the Chinese Communist Party and must abide by laws that require it to co-operate with Chinas government, the U.S. said.

In April 2018, the CCP forced ByteDance to shutdown one of its other platforms, and Mr. Yiming issued a public apology in which he pledged to co-operate with and elevate official CCP media, the U.S. said. Following this public atonement, ByteDance underwent organizational restructuring with CCP infrastructure now built into it.

The ban, announced in an Aug. 6 executive order, is part of a wider effort by the administration to take a hard line against Beijing, as Trump bets it will help him win re-election. Starting at 11:59 p.m. on Sept. 27, it would remove TikTok from the app stores run by Apple Inc. and Googles Android, the most widely used marketplaces for downloadable apps. People who dont yet have the app wouldnt be able to get it, and those who already have it wouldnt have access to updates needed to ensure its safe and smooth operation. TikTok is used regularly by 19 million Americans.

Ahead of the looming deadline, ByteDance had argued for an expedited schedule in the case. The U.S. pushed back at a hearing on Thursday, saying ByteDance had filed a separate suit more than a month ago and was late in requesting the injunction in this one. In defence of the ban, the government again cited security concerns.

TikTok is allowed to continue operating with respect to existing users but cannot add users, and the reason for that is that there are significant national security risks, Assistant U.S. Attorney Daniel Schwei told the judge.

TikTok said that the ban was already undermining its business model by scaring users away and that it had sought relief as soon as it was allowed to under the law. It said the government would have argued its request was premature if filed earlier.

The urgency of this is created by the Sunday night ban, attorney John Hall said. That part of it makes absolutely no sense to us.

Hall told the judge the ban would increase risks to existing users by preventing them from getting regular security updates. He said the deadline was affecting the companys reputation with users, who are considering moving to less attractive platforms.

In the social media industry, Hall said, users retained is absolutely the lifeblood of their business.

The case is TikTok Inc. v. Trump, 20-cv-2658, U.S. District Court, District of Columbia (Washington).

Read more about:
There is an unacceptable view in the financial community that as long as earnings are on the rise, dividends paid and share prices rising that governance doesn't matter.

Dozens of scandals dating back to the Lonrho in the 1970s and Robert Maxwell in the 1990s illustrate how wrong this is and why governance codes and company law moved on.

Alison Levitt QC's devastating indictment of executive and governance shortfalls at fast fashion Boohoo Group rams home the requirement for better stewardship.

Reports of problems in Leicester clothes factories date began in 2015, but Boohoo's board, dominated by executive chairman Mahmud Kamani (pictured), never confronted the issues

Her 234-page independent review of the appalling conditions in Boohoo's Leicester supply chain is a remarkable piece of work.

Levitt embarked on the probe on July 5 when much of the economy was still in lockdown.

She managed to produce a credible assessment of the shortcomings and come up with ideas for fundamental changes in monitoring the supply chain and shaking up board structures in just three months.

There are big lessons here for City regulators. More than a year after Neil Woodford's investment empire collapsed, his wounded investors, many of whom saw life savings destroyed, are still awaiting information on how this could happen.

The Financial Reporting Council disclosed this week that it had completed its investigation into auditor KPMG's role at construction group Carillion, which collapsed early in 2018.

But it declined to release the report which has been passed back to the auditors for comment. The delays will ensure that by the time the findings are released, the train will have long ago left the station.

Boohoo may breathe a sigh of relief that no criminal laws were found to have been breached in the supply chain. But what Levitt found is still shocking.

A series of alerts to problems in the Leicester sweat-shop factories date back to a University of Leicester report in 2015, and a subsequent series of media reports on abuse.

Boohoo may breathe a sigh of relief that no criminal laws were found to have been breached in the supply chain. But what Levitt found is still shocking

However, a Boohoo board, dominated by powerful executive chairman Mahmud Kamani, never confronted the issues.

Levitt found that, far from being media exaggerations as Boohoo claimed to the investment community, 'charges of poor working conditions and low rates of pay in many Leicester factories are not merely well-founded but substantially true'.

The QC argues that Boohoo was so focused on its commercial success and its own employees that it felt very little responsibility for the Leicester factory workers 'because they were largely invisible to them'.

Truth is that Kamani and his fellow directors should have known.

As the report notes, Kamani 'covertly owns or controls many of the factories [in Leicester] through a complex web of directorships.

Further, the chairman has a social and family relationship with Witness 98 and their family, who own Morefray Limited and Revolution Clothing Co Limited, the two companies at the centre of the media allegations in early July 2020'.

Indeed, anyone reading the report and could not be unaware of rickety governance. Inter-company transactions, such as the purchase of his son's firm Pretty Little Thing in May 2020 and post-event adjustment to profit and loss to recognise such transactions, have been commonplace.

Levitt is unforgiving on governance mistakes, noting that the company's risk management systems are 'significantly undeveloped' and that commercial concerns such as growth and profit were prioritised 'in a way that risks were almost invisible at the senior level'.

In its response, Boohoo accentuates the positive but offers no apology to the Leicester factory workers who, for many years, have worked for pay way below the minimum wage and in ghastly conditions.

It is promising change, including the appointment of an experienced and respected individual to police supply chain improvements. It also proposes the appointment of two non-executive directors so there is a majority of independents on the board.

There are huge lessons in the Boohoo report for City advisers and the London Stock Exchange.

Many of the criticisms of Boohoo's governance and over-powering chairman, interwoven company and personal interests and placing performance ahead of governance could apply to the recent float of online beauty and lifestyle group The Hut.

Profits and immediate riches always triumph over governance with horrendous outcomes.
To the editor:

I want to offer a sincere, strong endorsement for Diane Middleton as Delta College Trustee for Bay County in the November election.

Having lived my 53 years in Midland, Bay City and Saginaw I can say Diane understands the need of the community and will represent whats right for us, not her.

Diane Middleton is one of the most genuine people Ive met, kind, caring, and smart. I cant think of a more qualified person for the role.

Diane has all the professional qualifications; having served as trustee since January 2015, and currently serving as board chair, a Delta College grad and years of professional experience. As a proven, engaged, and effective trustee, Diane offers a people-centric, business friendly mentality to help the students of Delta College be successful.

My great grandmother, Lillie Plueddemann named Delta College back in 1961, and Im 100% sure Lillie would also approve of this endorsement.

In this world of nasty politics, anxiety, and noise  Diane is a person of integrity who rises above all that and does the right thing for those who she serves.

Please consider Diana on voting day and thank you for reading.

DON PIERING

Midland
For businesswoman Carol Schwartz, the fact there was only one woman in Tony Abbott's cabinet in 2013  foreign minister Julie Bishop  was simply not good enough.

"I'm a strong believer that our parliaments should represent what our society looks like," says the Reserve Bank director, property heavyweight and philanthropist. "Women are just over 50 per cent of our society so it seems nuts to me that we don't have that political representation."

Nakita Thomson and Wesa Chau are among 17 women running in October's council elections who have come through the Pathways to Politics for Women program initiated by Melbourne businesswoman Carol Schwartz. Credit:PaulJeffers

Having learned of the Kennedy School's From Harvard Square to the Oval Office that helped to equip American women for a run at politics, the dynamic Ms Schwartz got the University of Melbourne on board with starting a similar program aimed at boosting the number of women running for any level of Australian office.

The pilot for the Pathways to Politics for Women program, funded in part by Ms Schwartz's family Trawalla Foundation, was launched by Ms Bishop and Labor's Tanya Plibersek in Federal Parliament in 2016.
French President Emmanuel Macron, acknowledging he 'believed in science" criticized attacks on the World Health Organization by "the epidemic of disinformation" surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic.

"Humanity will overcome this pandemic. A cure will be found," Macron said in a recorded message delivered Tuesday during the 75th UNGA.

"As we await that moment, everyone knows that we must learn to live with the virus. We have no choice," Macron emphasized.

"This new reality, this new world reality is clear. It's brutal. It's dizzying. And we must face it."

Macron warned the international; community about "the collapse of our frameworks of cooperation."

"Today's world cannot be left to the rivalry between China and the United States, regardless of the weight in the world that these two great powers share, regardless of the history that ties us, especially to the United States."

Macron urged the General Assembly to "make sure that Iran never has access to a nuclear weapon" and fulfill the Iran nuclear nuclear deal known as JCPOA.

Turning to North Korea, Macron said France supported efforts undertaken by the United States to allow negotiations, "even if tangible results have not yet been achieved."

"What we're looking for now is specific gestures of commitment and engagement by North Korea," Macron said.

North Korea "needs to commit to a denuclearization process which is complete, verifiable and irreversible," Macron said.

"It's the only way to achieve a political solution. Lasting peace in the Korean Peninsula."
Jack Barile had been waiting much of the summer for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to publish his research on the most effective way to persuade people to wear masks in a pandemic.

A psychology professor at the University of Hawaii, Barile said the study he'd co-authored -- which found that people are more likely to wear masks if leaders promote a "positive attitude" about them -- was stuck in the federal review process. The agency and the White House, it seemed, were "slow-walking critical research without clear explanation," Barile said.

Then, just days before the study by Barile and his co-authors was finally scheduled to publish, Barile was walking to the park scrolling through the latest headlines on his phone when a photo of President Donald Trump filled his screen: Marching down a hallway at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, Trump, who had refused to wear a mask in public, was seen donning one for the first time.

At the time, Trump had been under increasing pressure to wear one, including from members of his own party. But it wasn't until that July 11 hospital visit, three months after the White House recommended widespread mask-wearing, that he was seen publicly heeding the guidance. At the time, he said he decided to wear one because he'd be around wounded veterans who had "just got off the operating tables." He tweeted wearing a mask was "patriotic."

Barile's study published three days later, on July 14, along with two others that touted the importance of wearing a mask, including one co-authored by the CDC director himself.

"I couldn't help but just start laughing when I saw. The timing just seemed so ridiculous," Barile said.

MORE: After CDC whiplash, here's what science says about airborne transmission of the coronavirus

Barile, who worked at the CDC for two years as a research fellow before taking his job at the University of Hawaii in 2012, said it could be "total coincidence" that the research publication came just days after the president's first appearance in a mask.

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But if it wasn't, he wouldn't be surprised.

"Most at the CDC would tell you the same thing if they could. This stuff has gone on for a long time. Decades," Barile said.

At the same time, Barile also cautioned that he's never seen anything like this. "There's always been political influence on CDC publications, but it's been a lot stronger with the COVID situation," he said.

With more than 200,000 lives lost to COVID-19, the U.S. is facing a reckoning on science and politics. Even basic scientific research, like whether to wear a mask in a pandemic, is now being seen through the lens of the 2020 election and Trump politics.

PHOTO: President Donald Trump wears a mask as he visits Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., July 11, 2020. (Alex Edelman/AFP via Getty Images, FILE)

That's a big problem, health officials say, because to overcome the pandemic, most Americans will have to agree on basic steps to stop the spread of the virus, whether it's wearing a mask or accepting a vaccine.

The White House, in response to ABC News, denied that "politics is influencing approvals or decisions," calling it a "dishonest narrative."

"Every decision the CDC and FDA has made under the Trump Administration has been data-driven to save lives, and this dishonest narrative that the media and Democrats have created that politics is influencing approvals or decisions is not only false but is a danger to the American public," White House deputy press secretary Judd Deere said in an email.

The CDC did not respond to a request for comment.

According to an ABC News/Ipsos poll released this month, fewer than 1 in 10 Americans have a great deal of confidence in Trump to confirm a vaccine's effectiveness, with another 18% reporting only a "good amount" of confidence.

"Frankly I'm not going to trust the federal government's opinion, and I wouldn't recommend to New Yorkers based on the federal government's opinion," said Democratic New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who has been accused by conservatives of politicizing the pandemic, at a Sept. 24 news conference.

MORE: Majority of Americans report no confidence in Trump to confirm vaccine safety, effectiveness: POLL

For Bela Matyas, a health officer for Solano County Public Health in California, the politics involved is just dispiriting.

"As a local health officer I should be able to rely on my state and the federal officials to help me with understanding truth, but I don't," said Matyas, who has worked previously with the CDC to study novel coronavirus transmission in hospitals.

The result is a mentality that every locale seemingly is on its own -- but it raises the question, Matyas said, of whether that is the best way to deliver the best care to each and every community.

"Clearly, if we're all over the place in decision-making, we are doing a disservice to our community," Matyas said. "So not having a fallback, trustworthy source of credible data is a problem."

In recent weeks, media reports have detailed extensive efforts by Trump's political advisers to sway the findings of the administration's public health agencies.

According to emails obtained by Politico and the New York Times, political appointees have tried to influence CDC's weekly scientific digest to be more in step with the president's handling of the pandemic. And one of those advisers, Michael Caputo, a former HHS press secretary now on medical leave, accused the CDC in an online rant of harboring a "resistance unit" and called on Trump's supporters to arm themselves ahead of the election.

PHOTO: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director Dr. Robert Redfield speaks at a hearing of the Senate Appropriations subcommittee reviewing coronavirus response efforts, Sept. 16, 2020, in Washington, D.C. (Andrew Harnik/Pool via Getty Images)

The media reports alarmed much of the medical field, as experts described the weekly reports by CDC as sacred.

"It goes through a lot of red tape, because it's representing this federal agency," said Dr. Leonard Mermel, a professor at Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University and medical director of Rhode Island Hospital's Department of Epidemiology and Infection Control.

"So despite all the checks and balances that have worked very well for decades, what's going on now appears to be radically different and with the potential for ulterior motives," said Mermel.

On Wednesday, more accusations of political meddling followed Trump's promise to review a vaccine guidance document by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

The document would normally be subject to an interagency review, including by the White House Office of Management and Budget. But Trump also has repeatedly said a vaccine could be available before Election Day on Nov. 3.

MORE: Lets not lose our 3rd chance to contain COVID-19: OPINION

The following day, the National Academy of Sciences and National Academy of Medicine -- two private nonprofits dedicated to advancing scientific and medical research -- took the rare step of issuing a statement urging the administration to leave scientists alone.

"We find ongoing reports and incidents of the politicization of science, particularly the overriding of evidence and advice from public health officials and derision of government scientists, to be alarming," wrote Marcia McNutt, president of NAS, and Victor Dzau, president of NAM.

"It undermines the credibility of public health agencies and the public's confidence in them when we need it most," they wrote.

For their part, the CDC and its director, Robert Redfield, have sent mixed messages in communicating the public health message, including reversing guidance on the CDC's website, which already contains dozens of pages of duplicative and often conflicting advice on such matters as whether to send children to school and how to protect them.

PHOTO: President Donald Trump speaks during a discussion with State Attorneys General in the Cabinet Room of the White House, Sept. 23, 2020 in Washington, D.C. (Oliver Contreras/Pool via Getty Images)

This month, for example, the CDC abruptly changed its guidance on whether to get tested if a person doesn't have symptoms and whether there is evidence that the virus is airborne.

Redfield also has declined to address Trump's insistence that Redfield's timeline for a vaccine being available to most Americans only by summer 2021 is wrong. Yet, he adamantly denies that CDC has been influenced by politics either way.

"People don't understand the ability to suck energy out of people working 24-7 when they get unfairly criticized or unfairly characterized," he told a Senate panel this week.

Barile, the CDC study co-author and professor, agreed with that sentiment -- at least as it applies to the career scientists who are studying the pandemic. He said he'd never met anyone in his time at the CDC with an agenda other than to get out quality public health information.

"It is unfortunate that political influence appears to have entered a space where science should remain pure," he said.

ABC News' Benjamin Siegel contributed to this report.

Amid pandemic, confidence in CDC erodes with questions of political interference originally appeared on abcnews.go.com
Taprooms and eateries are sounding the alarm as the Winnipeg metro area moves to newly mandated COVID-19 restrictions following this weekend, with Manitobas restaurant association calling it the last nail in the coffin amid already plunging revenues.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 25/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Taprooms and eateries are sounding the alarm as the Winnipeg metro area moves to newly mandated COVID-19 restrictions following this weekend, with Manitobas restaurant association calling it the "last nail in the coffin" amid already plunging revenues.

Starting Monday, the province is making masks mandatory in all indoor spaces within the citys 18 municipalities. Groups of no more than 10 people will be allowed to gather within indoor or outdoor spaces for at least four weeks.

WAYNE GLOWACKI / FREE PRESS FILES "I dont have a clue whats coming Monday yet," said Robert Johnson, owner of D Jays Restaurant.

But speaking at a suprise news conference Friday, Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Brent Roussin did not clarify exactly how those restrictions would apply to the hospitality industry.

While the restrictions on gathering sizes dont apply to bars or restaurants, because they are already operating under an existing health order, Roussin said its "very likely" changes will be implemented at city establishments after the industry is consulted in the coming days.

"Government and public health officials are consulting with the restaurant industry as well as bars, beverage rooms, brew pubs, microbreweries and distilleries on steps that could be implemented to lower the risk of COVID-19 transmission," reads a statement to the Free Press from Manitoba Public Health. "Additional measures may be put in place following these consultations."

The restrictions come as only 30 per cent of restaurants within Manitoba are making normal sales as of this week, according to figures from the Canadian Federation of Independent Business  seven months since the onset of the pandemic and early lockdowns.

That leaves local operators unsure how business will look come Monday and for the foreseeable future.

"I dont have a clue whats coming Monday yet," said Robert Johnson, the owner of D Jays Restaurant on Portage Avenue. After early pandemic struggles, the restaurant has seen a steady increase in business this summer, but any forthcoming changes will likely have an adverse effect on restaurants like his, whether the rules change or not. "From now until Christmas is crucial for our industry," he said. "This is where we make the fat so we can survive January to March."

He said hell have to wait and see what changes are coming for businesses like his, but he hopes the province is clear on what restaurants need to do to properly enforce the rules while continuing to do business.

SUPPLIED Shaun Jeffrey worries that new guidelines could mean "further decimation of the industry."

"I sincerely hope the government keeps talking to restaurants (to consult)," he said.

Shaun Jeffrey, executive director of the Manitoba Restaurant & Foodservices Association, says the new guidelines could mean "further decimation of the industry."

"While were very hopeful and glad that the province is consulting us through this unlike previous restrictions," he said, "this news could mean a lot of restaurants and pubs  who have already been facing pressures  will have to make that last decision about whether they can survive or will need to close permanently."

Jeffrey clarified that while wearing masks at eateries before being seated is mandatory for customers, larger businesses that can accommodate more than 10 people with social distancing will be allowed to do so.

"I certainly hope this doesnt dissuade people from supporting their local businesses," said Jonathan Alward, Prairies director for CFIB. "Consumer confidence has already been down this whole time and I suspect it will only go down further as a result of this."

RUTH BONNEVILLE / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS "This new stuff will probably scare people away and make things hard for a lot of people," said Steve Hrousalas, who runs Rae & Jerry's Steak House.

Steve Hrousalas, who runs Rae & Jerrys Steak House on Portage Avenue, said his restaurant can accomodate more than 50 people with social distancing. But he worries the new restrictions will limit people from wanting to dine indoors.

"The biggest problem for me right now is that none of this has been explained to us properly," he said. "Weve already been following all these protocols this whole time, while also paying for expensive personal protective equipment out of pocket. This new stuff will probably scare people away and make things hard for a lot of people.

"Its going to be a challenge to survive."

John Kolevris, owner of Saffrons Restaurant on Corydon Avenue, said having an outdoor patio at his location "makes things easier to convince people and have them feel safer."

"But I dont know the damage this will do because patio season wont last much longer either as we head into winter," he said.

MIKAELA MACKENZIE / FREE PRESS FILES "I dont know the damage this will do because patio season wont last much longer either as we head into winter," John Kolevris, owner of Saffron's restaurant, said.

Cordova Tapas & Wine was hoping to make some revenue off of Nuit Blanche this fall. But as organizers pulled the plug and are rescheduling the art party originally scheduled for tonight, the Exchange District taprooms owner Greg Stevenard hopes the government steps up with support.

"Restaurants have a cost, and the province should help minimize it," he said. "Its in their interest for us to survive."

"Theres a point when a restaurant cant be struggling anymore and has to consider bankruptcy or closure, and in full confidence, were not too far from that ourselves."

Mike Del Bueno, owner-manager of King + Bannatyne in The Exchange, said Mondays changes to gathering sizes will clearly impact restaurants of all types as people reconsider dining out and as patio season nears an end. King + Bannatyne also relies on a busy catering schedule, and with gathering sizes limited for the next month at least, Del Bueno expects cancellations for many upcoming engagements.

"It is what it is," he said. "In the end, whats going to slow this down is people not being in contact with people, so this is something we will have to deal with."

 With files from Ben Waldman

Twitter: @temurdur

Temur.Durrani@freepress.mb.ca
ATLANTA, GA  Why does Georgia report regularly on coronavirus infections in nursing homes but not in schools?

The state of Georgias position  at least concerning schools  is that the public has no legal right to information about coronavirus outbreaks the state is investigating, according to a report. The underlying reason may well be lack of cooperation from some school systems, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

In August, the Georgia Department of Public Health mandated weekly reports from schools. In mid-September, the agency agreed to produce the data, but dropped those plans last week.

The Department is concerned about possible non-cooperation of schools in reporting data and has decided to maintain the confidentiality of the weekly COVID-19 school reports, the agency wrote in denying The Atlanta Journal-Constitutions open records request.

According to Georgias health department, only about 70 percent of Georgias 2,300 schools are reporting, even though its supposed to be mandatory.

While lack of transparency isnt an issue yet in metro Atlanta because most classes are still online, its a concern elsewhere. The Atlanta newspaper reported that some parents have essentially crowdsourced school systems coronavirus statistics by starting social-media groups to share information.

GEORGIAS CORONAVIRUS NUMBERS FOR SATURDAY, SEPT. 26

Georgia Department of Public Health in Atlanta reported a total of 313,873 confirmed cases of COVID-19 at 2:50 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 26. According to the health departments website, that includes 1,381 newly confirmed cases over the last 24 hours.

Georgia also reported 6,914 deaths so far from COVID-19, with 44 more deaths recorded in the last 24 hours. In addition, the state reported 28,035 hospitalizations  118 more than the day before  and 5,176 admissions so far to intensive-care units.

No information is available from Georgia about how many patients have recovered.

Counties in or near metro Atlanta continue to have the highest number of positives, with Fulton County still in the lead.

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Fulton County: 27,480 cases  91 new Gwinnett County: 27,296 cases  109 new Cobb County: 19,513 cases  83 new DeKalb County: 18,600 cases  79 new Hall County: 9,225 cases  78 new Chatham County: 8,407  30 new Clayton County: 7,094  33 new Richmond County: 7,062  35 new Bibb County: 6,039  15 new Cherokee County: 5,994  35 new

Counties in or near metro Atlanta also continue to have the most deaths from COVID-19.

Fulton County: 572 deaths  1 new Cobb County: 426 deaths  1 new Gwinnett County: 402 deaths  1 new DeKalb County: 360 deaths  2 new Dougherty County: 187 deaths Muscogee County: 169 deaths  1 new Bibb County: 168 deaths Clayton County: 162 deaths  1 new Richmond County: 162 deaths  1 new Chatham County: 157 deaths  3 new

As of Saturday, Georgia has administered more than 3.1 million COVID-19 tests, with about 9 percent of those tests the less reliable ones used to detect antibodies.

For the more reliable test for the virus itself, 10.2 percent of tests came back positive. For the less reliable test for antibodies, 8.2 percent came back positive. The overall positive rate was about 10 percent.

As more Georgians were tested over the last month, the percentage of positive tests inched upward from about 8 percent to more than 10 percent. However, over the last few weeks, the percentage of positives has stabilized at about 10 percent. According to the World Health Organization, positive test results should no more than 5 percent for two weeks before reopening for business as usual. Georgia largely reopened for business in April and May, and since then Gov. Brian Kemp has promoted the use of face masks but has steadfastly refused to mandate them.

All Georgia statistics are available on the state's COVID-19 website.

Globally, more than 32.6 million people have tested positive for COVID-19, and more than 985,000 people have died from it, Johns Hopkins University reported Saturday.

In the United States, more than 7 million people have been infected and more than 204,000 people have died from COVID-19 as of Saturday. The U.S. has only about 4 percent of the world's population but more confirmed cases and deaths than any other country.

This article originally appeared on the Dallas-Hiram Patch
Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen visited Air Force and Navy personnel in the southern port city of Kaohsiung on Saturday, to boost morale amid escalating tensions in the Taiwan Strait.

On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, China sent two planes into Taiwan's air defense identification zone, according to Taiwan's Ministry of National Defense.

In response, the Taiwanese side dispatched air patrols, the ministry said.

Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen has remained defiant, visiting a military base on Tuesday and encouraging the personnel, in particular pilots and crew.

On Saturday, Tsai visited the 3rd Logistic Unit of the Air Force Command Headquarters and listened to servicemen's briefing on their daily jobs, maintaining and repairing aircraft engines.

At a meal with Navy servicemen afterwards, she called them "unsung heroes" in the first presidential visit to the unit during its over six decades of existence.

The president also said she was "very impressed" with the capabilities of Navy servicemen who wear heavy diving suits to operate underwater.

China has increased diplomatic and military pressure on Tsais government over her refusal to agree to Chinas insistence that the island be considered part of Chinese territory.

The vast majority of Taiwanese reject the prospect of political union with China under the one country, two systems framework used for Hong Kong.

Following Tsai's election in 2016, China cut off contact with the Taiwanese government and has sought to isolate it, siphoning off the island's diplomatic allies while ratcheting up political, military and economic pressure.
Focused on mobilizing voters by reaching them wherever they are, Supermajority, a women's group led by progressive leaders, is hosting "Supercharge: Women All In," on Saturday.

The Supercharge campaign plans on mobilizing 2 million women to vote and is targeting young women, women of color and women in the key battleground states of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Arizona. The group says between now and Election Day, it will send 4.5 million text messages, make at least 250,000 phone calls and write 50,000 letters. Supermajority, which launched in 2019, and endorsed former Vice President Joe Biden in August, has already trained and engaged one million women.

Juanita Tolliver, political director at Supermajority, tells ABC News a large emphasis of the event is community building.

"We always knew we wanted to create a space that builds community," she said. "But with the reality of the world, experiencing the COVID-19 pandemic, the economic recession, the ongoing fight for Black lives. We knew, also, that we're going to have to morph this not only into a virtual event but an event that emphasizes joy."

PHOTO: Democratic U.S. vice presidential nominee Senator Kamala Harris speaks at a campaign event in Detroit, Michigan, U.S., September 22, 2020. (Emily Elconin/Reuters)

Tolliver added, "we wanted to create a sense of community where people can come together across the country to laugh, sing, dance and get ready to vote."

Saturday's event includes remarks from former Sec. of State Hillary Clinton; Democratic vice presidential candidate Sen. Kamala Harris, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Sen. Elizabeth Warren.

MORE: Harris and her husband court Black, Jewish voters in Miami

Viewers can make a voting plan with comedian Amy Schumer, who will be helping her dad make a voting plan. Fellow entertainers Big Freedia and Eva Longoria will also make appearances alongside many other activists, politicians, artists and activists. The event, which is geared towards an audience of women and non-binary people, isn't limited to a guest list of only men. Senators Bernie Sanders and Ed Markey will speak as well as Jamaal Bowman, a progressive Middle School Teacher who upset a 16-term incumbent Democratic Rep. Eliot Engel for his congressional seat.

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In addition to traditional panels, viewers will have various breakout sessions, including a body movement session with Jessamyn Stanley, live art, a DJ set, dance party breaks and a special virtual "yelling room."

Tolliver said that the yelling room is meant to be a cathartic experience where people will be able to go into an interactive digital room and scream.

"We knew that, in this moment of a pandemic in the fight for Black Lives in an economic recession, people are frustrated, and people need an outlet. The yelling room is just one of those ways that we're providing that outlet for the audience."

"Women are the majority of Americans and majority of voters, and this election season, women are fired up. Supercharge is a day to celebrate women and the work we are doing to change this country for good," Supermajority co-founder Cecile Richards said

PHOTO: ABC NEWS - 12/19/15 - ABC News coverage of the Democratic Presidential debate from St. Anselm College in Manchester, NH, airing Saturday, Dec. 19, 2015 on the ABC Television Network and all ABC News platforms. (Ida Mae Astute/ABC)

Richards, noting the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, added, "Women have been on the frontlines of this pandemic - as health care workers, moms, caregivers, teachers - and we need a government that takes our health and our families well being seriously. We welcome everyone who cares about the future to join with us - to laugh together, learn together, and then get to work - to run the largest possible woman-to woman-voter turnout program, and make history."

Organizers said that Saturday's Supercharge event will also be in honor of the memory of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died last week at the age of 87 due to complications of metastatic pancreas cancer.

MORE: Brooklyn municipal building to be renamed for hometown legend Ruth Bader Ginsburg

"I think one thing that we want to make sure women understand is how your life could be different had she not have a job has she not fought for the rights for you to have financial accounts and pay your debts without a male cosigner or approver and just the impact that she's had on the fight for women's rights inequality writ large," Tolliver said.

Harris, Clinton, Pelosi and Warren seek to 'Supercharge' women to vote at Supermajority event originally appeared on abcnews.go.com
Look, I think the process arguments seldom make much of a difference to the public. I think what is much more important is, the reasons why McConnell has pulled the levers in the way he has, always on behalf of the rich and powerful, never in the interest of working Americans, Sen. Michael F. Bennet (D-Colo.) said.
By Trend

Azerbaijani Minister of Economy Mikayil Jabbarov visited the enterprises in Ganja city, the Ministry of Economy told Trend.

The issues of strengthening the economic potential of the city, creating an industrial zone and allocating the appropriate areas for this purpose were discussed with Head of the Executive Power of Ganja Niyazi Bayramov.

The minister visited Azeraluminium LLC located in Ganja, one of the leading non-ferrous metallurgy companies in Azerbaijan and the only producer of primary aluminum in the South Caucasus.

The main enterprise of the company - "Aluminum complex" is located in Ganja. The complex includes four plants (casting and continuous metal rolling, electrolysis, processing and painting under pressure, anode processes) and two additional sections (silicon grinding substation, mechanical repair station). The total capacity of plants for the production of primary aluminum is about 50,000 tons per year.

The issues of ensuring sustainable supply of raw materials, expanding the production of primary aluminum, organizing the production of various products as a result of deep processing, optimizing production and increasing competitiveness were discussed during the talks with the management of the enterprise.

Then the minister visited the Ganja Automobile Plant. The enterprise assembles vehicles for various purposes, agricultural machinery (tractors, combines, etc.), trucks and other equipment.

The existing production capacity of the enterprise, its potential for assembling new types of equipment, including tractors, other agricultural machinery and buses, the possibility of sale were discussed during the meeting with the management of the plant. The need of increasing the competitiveness of the enterprise was emphasized.

---

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
NUR-SULTAN -- Authorities in Kazakhstan have attempted to block protest rallies called on September 25 by the exiled opposition leader Mukhtar Ablyazov.

Ablyazov coordinates the activities of the banned Democratic Choice of Kazakhstan movement from exile in France.

Authorities in several cities and towns closed off streets, surrounded public squares, and prevented would-be demonstrators from going to areas where they'd been called upon to gather together for rallies.

Despite the obstacles, several people in Almaty managed to present their demands publicly.

In Nur-Sultan and Aktobe, RFE/RL correspondents reported that several protesters were detained by authorities on September 25.

In Semey, in the East Kazakhstan region, police also detained RFE/RL's Kazakh Service correspondent Khadisha Akaeva for about one hour along with journalist Daniyar Adilbekov from informburo.kz website.

Akaeva says she sustained minor injuries after she was taken into custody by police.

Ablyazov, the former head of BTA Bank in Kazakhstan, is wanted by authorities in Kazakhstan, Russia, and Ukraine on suspicion of embezzling some $5 billion. Ablyazov and his supporters reject the charges as politically motivated.

Ablyazov was sentenced to life in prison in absentia in 2018 after a court in Kazakhstan found him guilty of masterminding the 2004 murder of another banker.

In a separate trial in absentia in Kazakhstan that ended in 2017, Ablyazov was convicted of embezzlement, abuse of office, and organizing a criminal group. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison on those charges.

Several politicians and activists have fled Kazakhstan in recent years, fearing for their safety or anticipating politically motivated prosecution.
Part of Jaffnas heritage in stone disappearing By N.Lohathayalan View(s): View(s):

In the north, monumental stones built centuries ago, for the common good are in danger of disappearing.

No effort is made to protect them, and the young are not being taught their cultural value.

In the past when there was no modern transport, men carried loads on their back and shoulder-high chumai-thaangi (load carrier) stones allowed them to rest a load and carry it again without help from others.

There were also other stones for cattle to scrub themselves against (back-scrub stones), stone water-troughs for cattle, rest-houses for travellers to rest, and pools for bathing and cooling off.

Well before motorised transport was available, rest houses, bathing pools, chumai-thaangis and yes, back-scrub stones were introduced, over two millennia ago, says Jaffna Universitys Professor of history, P. Pushparatnam.

These landmarks have been vanishing with the introduction of bullock carts. These were put-up by the rich benefactors among us; some as memorials and even as Shiva temples.

In Vadamaratchy, just one person has put up these fixtures in seven places, Prof Pushparatnam said, while stressing that in Portuguese times these stones were spared because they were not seen as idols.

Prof. Pushparatnam believes that back-scrub stones together with monastery-like rest houses, chumai-thaangis, and water troughs for cattle, all worked in unison to create a unique culture. This was visible only in Jaffna. There is evidence that in the 17th century, back-scrub stones were erected. The evidence is found in stone inscriptions called Veeraaththai.

Currently, the Archaeology Department has put up sign boards around those monumental stones and in some places fenced-off the area from public access.

Even today, such cultural treasures are now seen in Jaffnas Kayts (Karaitivu) and Delft (Neduntivu) but 60 years ago over 1,000 of these were scattered across the peninsula, according to Prof Pushparatnam.

These were centred around the road system of the time, that is to ease the thirst of stray cattle and rest houses for pedestrians. As pedestrian pathways were widened into streets, those who did not recognise their importance and greatness as cultural landmarks, destroyed them to our great detriment, he explained.

Three years ago, 36-year old R. Nishanthan, a building contractor who lives on Changiliyan Road in Nallur, erected a back-scrub stone in front of his house with a water trough next to it.

Asked for his motivation, whether he knew the cultural importance of the stone and from where he got it, he said that in the times of kings and colonial rulers, these symbols showed how our forebears looked after cattle.

They are a symbol of that heritage, a monument to our kindliness from the time of Asokas missionary monks who built animal hospitals [third century BC] to the Tamils Buddhist period. Wherever we had water in Jaffna, back-scrub stones were built, he said.

Mr Nishanthan alleged that those terrorising people by moving fences near water resources, struck down the chumai-thaangis and discarded the rubble.

This stone that I planted is from the rubble of such a monument that I picked up, he said.

By the entrance of Shroffs Rest House in Naguleswaram temple, Keerimalai, Jaffna there used to be chumai-thaangi, a back-rub stone, and a stone trough but the chumai-thaangi is now missing.

According to an inscription in the area, they were built over 150 years ago because their creator was Kathiravelu Shroff of Hong Kong Bank. It is over 110 years since his demise in 1909. It is he who established the back-scrubbing stone at the Sandilipai school, and the scrubber next to it.

Locals noted that it has not been possible to get permission from the Archaeology Department to renovate the rest house.

Elders of the area say heritage must not be sacrificed for progress.

Registrar A. Senthilkumaran, 58, said that as a schoolboy travelling from the Jaffna Post Office to Kankesanturai, he had seen more than 15 of these heritage monuments, but all of them had disappeared.

Similar monuments in front of the Nanthavil Muniappar Temple have all vanished except for the water-trough.

Markandu Arulchandran, a cultural officer of the Jaffna District Secretariat, said there are many such load carrier stones that are still protected by the Archaeological Department.

According to him, those load carriers, back-scrub stones for livestock, and rest houses for travellers were setup centuries ago for people who walked to their destinations.

There were instances where load-carriers were built by influential families in the belief that the women in those families would be able to give birth without problems, Mr Arulchandaran said.
People leave bars and restaturants at closing time in Soho, London (Picture: Getty)

Pubs, restaurants and cafes are the sources of one-fifth of COVID-19 infections, according to medical experts.

Pubs contributed to 9% of cases but hospitality venues altogether were at 20%, deputy chief medical officer Jonathan Van-Tam said on Friday.

He briefed MPs and peers amid calls from some politicians to see the evidence behind giving pubs a 10pm curfew.

A scientist advising Boris Johnson claimed he had never heard the curfew plan discussed before it was announced this week.

Health minister Lord Bethell has suggested late-night intimacy is one reason for the governments decision to introduce the earlier closing time for hospitality venues.

In a debate on COVID-19 regulations, he said establishments that follow the rules are unlikely to present a threat but he added that not all do.

Earlier on Friday, former Labour cabinet minister Lord Blunkett said the elephant in the room was whether the Eat Out to Help Out scheme might have driven a spike in infections.

He added: Infection rates during August rose and admissions to hospital by the end of August had started to rise.

Has this any correlation with the Eat Out to Help Out, which economically was incredibly successful, but might actually have contributed to where we are today.

Pubs now have to close at 10pm (Picture: Getty)

Independent peer Baroness Wheatcroft called for greater clarity from the government and claimed the public was confused as to why you could meet people at pubs or restaurants but not at home in locked-down areas.

She said: I listened to the deputy chief medical officer Professor (Jonathan) Van-Tam and he made it very clear that the hospitality industry did help fuel the spread of the disease.

Independent peer Baroness Uddin warned restaurants faced a massive hit due to the 10pm curfew.

She said: The hospitality industry once again will take a massive hit just as many, including in the British curry industry, felt some hope of survival.

Coronavirus: what happened today

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Captain Amarinder Singh and Sukhbir Badal

Chandigarh: Shiromani Akali Dal president Sukhbir Singh Badal on Saturday demanded the immediate promulgation of an Ordinance by the Punjab government to declare the whole of the state as an agriculture market (Mandi) to ensure that the centers new anti-farmer Acts do not apply in the state.

Instead of being obsessed with Akali phobia day and night and indulging in petty mudslinging against his opponents, the Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh must act to safeguard the farmers.

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Sukhbir Badal and Capt AmarinderThe best and in fact the only way to block the implementation of the centers new Acts in Punjab is to declare the entire state a Principal Market Area or a Mandi for farm produce because any area declared as Mandi or Principal Market Area by the state government is exempt from the application of the new central laws.

If you declare the whole state a Mandi for agricultural produce, the big corporate sharks would not be able to enter the state and thus the farmers here would be saved from their fangs, said Badal, addressing his plea to the Punjab CM.

Badal said that this initiative needed to be taken by the Chief Minister at the earliest, preferably today itself. There is no time to waste. Captain should immediately make use of this route by issuing an Ordinance to this effect before the centers Bills become Acts and are notified by the Government of India, said Badal in a statement here today.

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Sukhbir Singh BadalEarlier, addressing massive gatherings of farmers and Akali workers this afternoon in Patiala and Ludhiana, Badal declared that the Shiromani Akali Dal would whole heartedly support the Punjab Chief Minister in this initiative.

We urge him to first immediately issue an Ordiannce declaring Punjab a Mandi and follow it up quickly by convening a special session of the Punjab Vidhan Sabha to convert the Ordinance into a formal Act. The SAD urges every political party to rise above political considerations to ensure a unanimous passage of such a Bill to declare Punjab a market for farm produce.

Badal said that the SAD expresses full solidarity with and support to all initiatives, agitation, Bandh or any other programme announced by farmers representative, regardless of which organization or party starts it.

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Badal warned the Punjabis especially the farmers against deep rooted conspiracies to divide the farmers movement by getting some political parties to engage in petty confrotationism against one another rather than focusing in a united way on the farmerscause.

Sukhbir Singh Badal

This is no time for petty politics. The SAD wants to see all political parties sinking their differences and standing together to support the farmers. The SAD is for the unity of all Punjabis in this battle. The whole cadre and leadership of SAD fully supports every effort by every farmers Jathebandi and every political party in their battle against the Centres anti-farmer move.

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Unity of all Punjabis and all farmers all over the country in general and in Punjab and Haryana in particular is a prerequisite for success in this battle, said the SAD president.

Badal was here to mobilise the party workers for October 1 march, which would commence from all the three holy Takht Sahibs in Punjab and culminate at Mohali, after which the SAD delegation would submit a memorandum to the Punjab Governor for President of India.

SADShiromani Akali Dal is not just a political party. It is essentially a movement for justice for all downtrodden people, especially the farmers in Punjab. Every Akali is a farmers and every farmers is an Akali at heart, he reiterated, adding that every farmer family in the state has always taken deep pride in being associated with the Akali legacy.

Speaking further, he underlined, We will lead the farmers or follow them or do whatever they want us to do to protect their interests.
Hong Kong marked its first day without a local Covid-19 infection since September 15 on Saturday, recording just one imported case, as the citys welfare chief offered praise for a wage subsidy scheme he said was not perfect but had helped avoid a wave of lay-offs amid the pandemic.

The Centre for Health Protections announcement, which marked the sixth consecutive day with single-digit cases, came a day after Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor declared the third wave of Covid-19 under control, while warning of the lingering threat of infections with unknown sources.

The newest patient, a 48-year-old arrival from Bahrain, pushed the citys coronavirus case tally to 5,059.

Get the latest insights and analysis from our Global Impact newsletter on the big stories originating in China.

Health officials said the male aircrew member, who landed in the city on Thursday, had a virus test on arrival and stayed at the Hong Kong SkyCity Marriott Hotel in Chek Lap Kok. Two other crew members on the same flight were listed as his close contacts and had to be quarantined. Officers found the man fell ill on Monday.

While no local cases were recorded on September 15, four imported infections were identified.

Speaking on a Saturday radio show, Secretary for Labour and Welfare Law Chi-kwong conceded the citys wage subsidy scheme would not save the job of every resident, but said it had bolstered a July-August job market that was worse than the peak of unemployment during the 2003 severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars) outbreak.

We know [the scheme] is not perfect, but it did bring some help, Law said, referring to the HK$81 billion (US$10.5 billion) Employment Support Scheme, under which the government pays up to 50 per cent of employees salaries through their employers for six months, with the monthly subsidy for each worker capped at HK$9,000.

Law explained that while the job market remained in poor shape, about 50,000 more people were employed in July compared with April, indicating the wage subsidies had worked.

Story continues

Local supermarkets ParknShop and Wellcome had lived up to their part of a wage subsidy bargain, labour secretary Lai Chi-kwong said. Photo: Winson Wong

Without the scheme, the furloughs could be much worse, he said.

Despite the jobless rate hovering at a 15-year high of 6.1 per cent for the three-month period between May and July, Law said setting up unemployment help for those who lost their jobs during the pandemic would be too costly and take at least 18 months to implement.

Meanwhile, supermarket chains ParknShop and Wellcome had followed through on the government-imposed condition that they provide discounts and special offers to customers to qualify for the second tranche of wage subsidies, Law said.

ParknShop on Wednesday unveiled a HK$32 million lucky draw cash giveaway, while rival Wellcome said a day earlier it would roll out HK$120 million worth of sweeteners and keep the price of 300 daily goods unchanged for six months.

Law said those plans met the requirement that they gave back half the cash received from wage subsidies to the community.

[The government] also encourages the supermarket chains to offer discounts to the public in general, he added.

But while supermarkets had been among the few sectors to thrive amid the pandemic, others said even the wage subsidy scheme had not been enough to keep them afloat.

Freddy Yip Hing-ning, president of the Hong Kong Travel Agent Owners Association, said the tourism sector had been the hardest hit and that government relief packages would never be enough given the length of time travel agencies had to bear operating expenses with no income.

No Hong Kong sector has been more devastated by Covid-19 than tourism, says Hong Kong Travel Agent Owners Association president Freddy Yip. Photo: Sun Yeung

Yip renewed calls for the government to specifically relax restrictions on public gatherings from four to 30 for the tourism sector, so they could begin organising local tours.

He also said a future Hong Kong Tourism Board scheme that would subsidise domestic tours should set no limit on the number of local firms that could apply.

I urge the Tourism Board not to set a quota [on the number of travel agents under the planned scheme]  All licensed travel agencies that run local tours should be given a chance to apply, he said.

Pro-establishment lawmaker Ma Fung-kwok, representing the sports, performing arts, culture and publication sectors, meanwhile, said he estimated that many workers in the industries he represented were freelancers who had been dealt a major blow by the pandemic, with some jobless for eight to nine months.

But the government has not been very willing to give us more support, so I am very anxious

Ma Fung-kwok, lawmaker for sports, performing arts, culture and publication sectors

Ma estimated that while there were more than 100,000 self-employed people facing an uncertain job status in his sectors, only about 40,000 of them were eligible for a one-off HK$7,500 handout under the governments wage subsidy scheme.

Most of the rest cannot get a cent, he said.

He noted that many performance and business venues had been forced to close as the epidemic intensified and many more had been unable to operate as usual.

But the government has not been very willing to give us more support, so I am very anxious, he said.

A representative from Hong Kong Live Performance and Production Industry Association said he hoped officials would allow businesses to run online concerts at vacant venues for free.

Separately, applications open on Sunday for a one-time handout of HK$10,000 to low-income, non-permanent residents, with applicants to receive the money in about eight weeks.

Law encouraged the more than 200,000 people expected to benefit from the scheme to submit their applications online. They also have the option of signing up at 17 designated Bank of China branches across the city.

The funding for the handout will come from the Community Care Fund, which was established by the government in 2011 to help residents dealing with financial hardship.

Law reiterated that Bank of China had been chosen to implement the cash handout to save crucial time that would have been otherwise spent setting up the system across all banks.

This article Hong Kong marks first day with no local Covid-19 cases since September 15, as city welfare chief says imperfect wage scheme saved jobs first appeared on South China Morning Post

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Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 16:53:45|Editor: huaxia

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BEIJING, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- China's interbank money market recorded 95.1 trillion yuan (about 13.96 trillion U.S. dollars) worth of transactions in August, up 14.9 percent year on year, data from the People's Bank of China showed.

The pledged repo turnover rose 17.6 percent year on year to 83 trillion yuan, while outright repo turnover was 700 billion yuan, down 11.4 percent from the same period last year, the central bank said in a report.

Last month, interbank lending transactions shrank 0.3 percent year on year to 11.5 trillion yuan. Enditem
Choosing a duvet cover isn't only about picking the most appropriate colour for your interior design scheme.

Indeed, most people overlook the most important aspect of a duvet cover in favour of making sure it is aesthetically pleasing.

But it is imperative to prioritize its quality over its look, otherwise it may end up affecting whether you have a good night's sleep.

Pictured: The White Company offer a range of bedlinen sets, with detailing in various colours

Rachel Clark, of Alexander James Interiors, explained: 'When it comes to picking a duvet cover, quality is everything.

'Quality bedding results in a quality night's sleep. When it comes to selecting bed linen for our bedroom designs, we like to use The White Company or John Lewis for their wide range of luxurious bedding sets, using only the finest cotton, linen, silk and cashmere.'

Type of fabric

She went on to say: 'Choosing a duvet cover is often down to personal preference, some like a cooler, crisper material, whereas others like a softer, warmer feel to their bed linen. For most of us, it is important to be cool in the summer and warm in the winter.'

For a cooler night's sleep, opt for a cotton percale material Rachel Clark, Alexander James Interiors

This may sound obvious but how it translates into the type of materials is perhaps less understood.

For example, for a cooler night's sleep, Ms Clark recommends opting for a 'cotton percale' material, which is cotton that is tightly woven for a firmer feel.

Meanwhile, for a cosier night's sleep, flannel and cotton cashmere bed linen is a perfect option.

Ms Clark added: 'For a luxurious, silky feel to your bedding, cotton sateen and cotton silk bed linen is a great option - not only does it have temperature regulating qualities, but it also provides the perfect sheen finish for the room, draping beautifully across the bed.'

The White Company offer a range of bedlinen sets, with detailing in various colours. Neutral white bedding can provide the foundation for luxurious bedspreads, throws and bedroom cushions in accent colours.

'By investing in a quality bed linen set in a neutral colour, you're able to easily change the look of the room by using different cushions or an alternative bedspread without worrying about any unfortunate colour clashes in your bedroom design scheme,' Ms Clark said.

The bed linen experts at John Lewis agree with neutral base colours, with its home design stylist Wil Law, explaining: 'To refresh a bedroom, consider swapping over your duvet colour. For a relaxed look, consider 100 per cent linen and embrace the natural creases. Layer texture and colour onto plain linens for added interest.

'Start with a block colour for the duvet cover and first set of pillow cases, then introduce a contrast colour for the additional pillow cases. Layer two throws at the bottom of the bed, mixing materials such as cotton and wool for extra texture.'

Thread count

Duvet covers also come in different 'thread counts', which is the number of vertical and horizontal threads per square inch of bed linen.

The higher the thread count, the more threads there are within the fabric - and the softer and smoother the feel is considered to be.

However, this is ultimately down to personal preference and a lower thread count can feel light and airy to touch.

Thread count is also generally considered to be less important than the type of fabric used.

Alexander James Interiors recommends these duvet covers for your budget...

Luxury

The Ultimate Collection 1600 Thread Count Cotton Bedding, John Lewis, 360

Pictured: The Ultimate Collection 1600 Thread Count Cotton Bedding set from John Lewis

The Ultimate Collection 1600 Thread Count Cotton Bedding set from John Lewis is available with both standard or oxford style pillow cases.

The high thread count gives a luxurious, refined finish with a satin sheen for the ultimate indulgent look.

High Street

The Savoy Bedlinen collection, The White Company, from 90

This duvet collection by the White Company has a trim of densely stitched cord

The Savoy Bedlinen collection by the White Company has a trim of densely stitched cord in either white, silver, mink or navy.

The ultra smooth 400-thread-count Egyptian cotton percale bed linen has a soft feel and a beautiful drape.

Budget

Cotton Rich Duvet Cover And Pillowcase Set, Next, 25

Pictured: This duvet set from Next comes in more than half a dozen different colours

This bed set is available in a range of more than half a dozen different colours, including taupe, white.

In 180 thread count percale, it is comfortable and breathable for a good night's sleep.
Welland residents are being reminded there isnt a war going on in the city.

On Saturday, Canadian Armed Forces will descend on the city for a fourth scheduled occasion since August, conducting training along the canal corridor near Welland International Flatwater Centre.

Soldiers will participate in the activity between 6 a.m. and 1 p.m. while wearing full camouflage attire, carrying gear and moving canoes. A military presence will be on-site during the exercise, says a news release from the city.
Frank Corona was working as a detective when he investigated a home robbery in which a Vietnam veterans medals were stolen, along with other valuable personal items such as jewelry and guns.

But his 25-year service as a Marine kicked in when he and his supervisor, another former Marine, decided to replace the missing medals and present them to their fellow veteran.

Thats what Marines do, Corona said.

Thomas Faleskie, a retired Marine Corps lieutenant colonel who flew helicopters in the jungles of Vietnam, said the sameafter he got over the surprise of the unexpected ceremony.

Faleskie and his wife, Lisa, arrived at the Spotsylvania Sheriffs Office on Friday afternoon. She knew about the presentation, but he didnt. Corona lured him there under the ruse that he had found some keys that might have been taken during the January 2019 robbery.

When the couple pulled up to the front of the building in an Army-green Toyota truck, Tom Faleskie, 83, thought theyd gotten their signals crossed and had crashed another event in progress.

Little did he know the crowd of about 30 onlookersincluding five people who pointed television and newspaper cameras at himwere there to document his reaction.

Absolutely floored, Im still in a state of shock, he said later. I never would have expected this, I still cant believe its happened.

Then, a reporter wondered how he felt about a fellow Marine coming to his aid the way Corona and his supervisor, 1st Sgt. Greg Hamilton, did. Faleskie echoed Coronas earlier statement.

Thats what youd expect from a Marine, he said.

Faleskie had on a blue face mask so it was difficult to gauge his reaction when Corona presented him a shadow box filled with replacement medals. Corona and Hamilton paid for the items themselves.

Corona read the citation from Faleskies second Distinguished Flying Cross medal, which described a particularly hairy incident in October 1968. Faleskie was one of 16 helicopters pilots assigned to move an entire battalion in the midst of hostile forces in the Quang Nam Province.

Snipers fired at him as he waited for Marines to safely get on board, then he headed to the drop-off zone where others waited to launch the assault. Twelve other choppers suffered so much damage during the campaign, they were grounded.

Thats when Faleskie assumed command and skillfully directed and controlled subsequent flights into the dangerous pickup and assault landing zones, according to the citation. His superb leadership and resolute determination inspired all who observed him.

Faleskies take on the dangerous mission?

It was a rough morning, but we got it done, he said, stressing how important it was for him to finish the mission so the battalion wasnt separatedand even more exposedto enemy fire.

Lisa Faleskie secretly gave Corona the citation. She said her husband is so humble, he never would have shared it. Likewise, he probably wouldnt have wanted the big fuss made over him, if hed known about the presentation ceremony beforehand.

But then, humility was something else those involved had in common.

When asked about the medals Corona had replaced for him, Tom Faleskie switched the focus to Corona, praising him for reaching the pinnacle of sergeant major, the highest rank for an enlisted man.

Hes absolutely amazing, Faleskie said.

When Hamilton was asked about his part in the event, he pointed to Corona and said, He did it all. When one of the Washington television reporters asked Corona to be interviewed on camera, he deferred to Hamilton.

And, when Corona welcomed the Faleskies to the event, he thanked the crowd that gathered and said this is about nothing else but Tom and Lisa. He emphasized the courage Faleskies showed in the face of danger, and the way he stayed in harms way until the men were safely loaded and unloaded.

That is a great American, Corona said. I want to thank you for that.

Youre welcome, was Faleskies muffled response through his mask.

Ooh-rah said other Marines in the crowd, including members of the Jack Maas detachment of the Marine Corps League.

In the Marine Corps, you never leave anybody behind, said Bob Singer, sergeant-at-arms with the local detachment. Theres always a bond there.
A transport plane carrying air force cadets crashed and exploded near a highway in northeastern Ukraine in the evening of September 25. The countrys State Emergency Service said 27 people had been on board -- seven crew and 20 cadets, one of whom survived. The Antonov An-26 aircraft crashed while trying to land during a training exercise, Ukraine's Defense Ministry said, adding that the black boxes with flight data had been found. The State Security Service, a Ukrainian law enforcement agency, said the plane crashed five minutes after the crew commander asked to land after the left engine of the twin-engined plane failed. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy declared September 26 a national day of mourning and called for a prompt investigation.
Ambassador Le Thi Tuyet Mai (Photo: VNA)

Geneva - Vietnam and a number of member states of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) agreed to establish an informal working group on trade and gender during an online meeting at the level of ambassador and head of delegation in Bern, Switzerland, on September 23.



Ambassador Le Thi Tuyet Mai, Head of the Permanent Mission of Vietnam to the UN, WTO, and other international organisations in Geneva, affirmed that as a member of the Buenos Aires Declaration, Vietnam supports the establishment of the working group, which is aimed at improving womens participation in international trade, especially amid the COVID-19 pandemic.



Vietnam always attaches great importance to incorporating gender equality into law building and enforcement, adopting inclusive development policies, facilitating womens participation in business activities and international trade, and encouraging the development of female entrepreneurs, she said, adding that it wants to learn from other countries experience in such matters and stands ready to join in the working groups activities.



Dorothy Tembo, Executive Director ad interim of the International Trade Centre and Co-Chair of the International Gender Champions Trade Impact Group, noted that the next step is how to expand the participation of WTO member states in the Buenos Aires Declaration, which now has 127 member nations.



Members of the Buenos Aires Declaration 2017 vowed to share their experience to encourage womens participation in national and international economies through the WTO, via information exchanges and voluntary reporting during the WTO trade policy review process.



They also pledged to share best practices for conducting gender-based analysis of trade policies and for the monitoring of their effects, share methods and procedures for the collection of data and analysis of gender-focused statistics related to trade, work together with the WTO to remove barriers for womens economic empowerment, and ensure that Aid for Trade supports tools and know-how for analysing, designing, and implementing more gender-responsive trade policies.
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Asia

India: Accredited Social Health Activist workers in Karnataka protest

Hundreds of Accredited Social Health Activist (ASHA) workers in Karnataka state protested outside Freedom Park in Bangalore on Wednesday. They were demanding a fixed monthly honorarium of 12,000 rupees ($US162), regular health checks for all ASHA workers, and the provision of face masks, hand sanitisers, gloves and PPE kits.

Around 42,000 ASHA workers withdrew a threatened 20-day state-wide strike in July after a false assurance from the health minister that their demands would be considered. They have not had any response. Workers said they were paid only 4,000 rupees monthly, despite their crucial work in the fight against COVID-19.

Around 600,000 ASHA workers held a two-day national strike on August 7 and 8 to demand better pay, full-time jobs and payment of government employee salary levels and associated benefits. The highly-exploited, low paid workers said that they had not been provided with PPE kits, despite regularly calling for this basic equipment since March.

Karnataka child care and village workers protest

Anganwadi (childcare) workers and Gram Panchayat (village council) workers in Karnataka demonstrated in Belagavi on September 2. Village council workers gathered outside the district council demanding payment of wage arrears of full-time and contract workers outstanding since 2017. They also want to be a paid pension, time-bound promotions and a 3,000-rupee ($US40.8) financial assistance payment for all Anganwadi workers involved in COVID-19 related work.

Anganwadi workers protested outside the Deputy Commissioners office calling for a wage increase and for kindergarten classes to be held in childcare centres. Under the governments New Education Policy, kindergarten classes will be held in schools, eliminating thousands of jobs at Anganwadi centres.

Punjab pensioners and workers demand pay and allowances

Punjab and UT Employees and Pensioners Front members held a protest hunger strike outside the deputy commissioners office in Amritsar on September 16 to demand implementation of a Pay Commission report released three years ago.

They also called for the release of five outstanding instalments of the dearness allowance, a fixed 2,000-rupee ($2US7.2) medical allowance, an 18,000-rupee salary for ASHA workers, midday meal and Anganwadi (childcare) workers.

Tamil Nadu: Magna International workers continue support for sacked unionists

Magna International auto-parts factory workers in Oragadam, Tamil Nadu, struck on September 17 and began ongoing protests to demand reinstatement of four workers suspended on March 19 for attempting to form a union.

The protesters also called on the company to reverse its decision to transfer 12 workers, allow formation of a union and begin wage increase negotiations. The strike followed a protest hunger strike by some workers on August 26 over the same issues.

Motherson Automotive Technologies and Engineering (MATE) workers showed their solidarity with the striking Magna workers and participated in a joint rally on September 22. Magna is a global automotive supplier of electronics with 348 manufacturing plants in 28 countries.

Swiggy online food delivery workers strike in Uttar Pradesh

Hundreds of delivery workers from the online food delivery platform Swiggy struck in Noida on September 17 in protest against company pay cuts. It was their third one-day strike in a week. Nearly 300 workers participated in the strike near delivery Sector 16 and said they intend to continue industrial action until they win their demands.

The company imposed a pay cut on August 9, slashing the base payment of a single order by over 50 percentfrom 35 rupees ($US0.47) to just 15 rupees.

The company has also eliminated a target-based fixed monthly incentive of roughly 3,000 rupees for a full-time delivery worker and 2,000 rupees for a part-timer.

Swiggy delivery workers in Chennai, Tamil Nadu and Hyderabad, Telangana state held strikes in August over the brutal pay cuts to demand the company restore the previous wage package and implement a daily base pay rate.

Pakistan: College educators in Rawalpindi demand service structure

More than 150 lecturers and professors from government-run colleges demonstrated in Rawalpindi, Punjab province, on September 19. They were demanding the immediate implementation of a service structure, a five-tier promotion formula and timely promotions as previously promised by the government. The rally blocked traffic on a key city road for more than an hour.

According to protesters more than 6,000 educators in Punjab are impacted by the absence of a service structure and are not entitled to any pay protection. The protest was called by the Punjab Professors and Lecturers Association.

Bangladeshi garment workers demand outstanding pay and reopening of their factory

More than 700 Bangladeshi garment workers from the A-One BD garment factory in the Dhaka Export Processing Zone staged a two-day sit-down demonstration on Monday and Tuesday outside the National Press Club. They were demanding reopening of the factory, which closed in April, and distribution of eight months of unpaid arrears.

On Tuesday workers marched and held a rally and then submitted a memorandum to the prime ministers office. They suspended the demonstration after the state minister for labour affairs and the Bangladesh Export Processing Zone Authority (BEPZA) offered a worthless promise that workers issues would be addressed within 25 days.

BEPZA authorities previously claimed that the workers arrears would be paid within three months of the factory being sold. The factory previously employed 1,100 workers. The Bangladesh Garment Workers' Solidarity organised the demonstration.

Vietnamese garment workers strike over pay and conditions

Hundreds of workers went on strike and protested outside the Mai Lan Anh garment factory in Vietnams south central coastal Khanh Hoa province on September 17. They were demanding the company pay them correctly for August and also pay their health insurance because workers who had sought hospital treatment were told that their health insurance cards were not valid.

The garment workers had been on contracts and only paid $US150 per month. In August, management slashed workers wages and told employees that they would be paid according to their productivity. Workers have alleged that they were forced to work extra overtime and threatened with being sacked or locked in the factory if they tried to leave.

Australia

Australia: Maritime union ends industrial action at Port Botany

The Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) suddenly called an end to industrial action by its 580 members at the Port Botany container terminal of DP World Australia (DPWA) on September 19 after agreeing to restart negotiations with the company over its proposed enterprise agreement (EA).

The action against DPWA involved rolling stoppages and work bans which were part of similar industrial action by MUA members at terminals owned by Patrick Stevedores and Hutchinson Australia in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and Fremantle. Around 2,400 waterside workers are involved in the dispute.

The MUA says it has reached a national in principle agreement with DP World but claims there are outstanding local issues at several ports. These include company demands for roster and idle time changes in exchange for increased productivity, as well as long outstanding job security issues related to automation and outsourcing.

The union claimed that Patrick wants to scrap about 50 pages of conditions in its proposed EA. The company ended negotiations over its proposed EA in April with the union demanding the rollover of the current agreement and a 12-month ban on outsourcing and automation. Hutchison is docking the pay of its workers by 30 percent, claiming that this reflects the value of lost productivity due to work bans.

Qantas baggage handlers protest against job cuts

Baggage handlers from Qantas held two days of protests on Thursday and Friday to oppose a plan by Qantas to outsource their jobs. The Transport Workers Union organised demonstrations in Adelaide, Darwin, Perth, Brisbane and outside the Qantas head office at Mascot airport, Sydney, making useless appeals to politicians and Qantas CEO Alan Joyce to reverse the decision.

The airline says its decision to outsource baggage handling will save it almost $100 million, with the jobs set to go from ten major airports across Australia. At least 2,500 workers stand to lose their jobs on top of 6,000 who have already been targeted for redundancy.

The low-cost airline Jetstar, which is wholly owned by Qantas, has announced it will also outsource ground handling at the six Australian airports where the work is done in-house, impacting 370 jobs.
Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau makes a speech in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, on September 24, 2020. (Reuters/Blair Gable)

Canadian PM Says Will Take Into Account US Drug Import Plans, but Canadians First

TORONTOCanadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Friday that while he is willing to entertain demands from the United States for Canadian medications, he would put the nations needs first.

In a bid to lower drug prices, U.S. President Donald Trumps administration on Friday finalized a plan that includes a measure allowing states to purchase medicines from Canada.

Thats a move that Trudeau and Canadian distributors have opposed in the past, and they have said will not work.

Our priority will always be to ensure an adequate and safe supply for Canadians first and foremost, Trudeau said at a news conference, when asked about the U.S. plan.

But he added that any moves by the United States will be taken into account as the country builds up its pharmaceutical capacity during the coronavirus pandemic, and added that Canada would be there to help other countries in need as well.

At least ten U.S. states, including Florida, have passed or proposed laws to allow such imports from Canada, and as of Friday there is federal approval.

Some of Canadas major distributors are subsidiaries of U.S. companies, who are unlikely to participate in a program to lower prices, since their revenue reflects a cut of the value of the drugs they provide to pharmacies in the much larger U.S. market.
After more than a month of stalled talks, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi have agreed to resume discussions about the next coronavirus relief bill to help Americans amid the pandemic.

On Thursday, Mnuchin told the Senate Banking Committee that he has spoken to Pelosi about 15 to 20 times in the past couple of days. The discussions centered around the Continuing Resolution (CR) which aimed to provide additional funding for the government that would last until the end of the year.

New coronavirus relief package?

According to Fox Business, the Treasury secretary added that he has spoken with the House speaker about the CARES Act. Speaker Pelosi told reporters on Thursday that she was expecting talks with the White House will be resumed shortly, saying she soon hopes they will be able to gather around one table soon.

The comments from both officials come amid rising tensions whether another round of emergency relief funds will be given to American workers and families suffering through the coronavirus pandemic.

While both Democrats and Republicans agree on a general level that a COVID-19 relief package should be a priority, politicians have had difficulties deciding on the amount that should be distributed.

Democrats have agreed to settle for a $2.2 trillion bill, down from their initial proposal of about $3 trillion included in the HEROES Act. The legislation was passed by the House in May and includes the extension of unemployment benefits and the second round of $1,200 stimulus checks.

Also Read: Trump Shows Support on Proposed $1.5 Trillion Economic Relief Bill Including Another Round of Stimulus Checks

However, Republicans have been skeptical and wanted to limit the bill to a fund of $1 trillion. The decision is due to some officials fearing that country's growing deficit which is expected to hit a staggering $3.3 trillion before the end of the year.

The inclusions of the next coronavirus relief bill are expected to be a second stimulus check, assistance for local and state governments, airlines, and small businesses.

Continued negotiations

The legislation would also provide rental assistance, an extension of unemployment benefits, and financial support for the Postal Service and election security, as reported by Forbes.

Pelosi's sudden change of mind is a result of some Democrats agreeing to pass a skinnier bill, arguing the growing need of Americans of a new relief package. More than 100 House Democrats signed letters last week addressed to the House speaker, urging her to move forward with the relief bill negotiations.

One of the letters was from Representative Cindy Axne of Iowa, where she urged the House speaker to propose a simplified and straightforward COVID-19 relief bill. This week, Axen began collecting signatures from various lawmakers for a second letter to Pelosi that says Americans cannot wait any longer and are in dire need of support.

According to CNBC, Pelosi guided Democratic committee chairs to draft legislation. Reports say that as soon as next week, The House could begin voting on a new coronavirus relief bill. However, Democrats do not yet have a plan in mind.

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said during a congressional testimony this week that the previous CARES Act was able to provide support to Americans by giving them much-needed money and helping them keep their homes. He added, however, that more support is needed moving forward as the COVID-19 virus continues to rampage around the world.

Related Article: Donald Trump Touts Coronavirus Vaccine Coming As Soon As October

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Donald Trump insisted Friday that the only way he will lose the presidential election in November is if Democrats cheat through mass mail-in ballot measures implemented in light of in-person voting concerns due to the coronavirus pandemic.

'That's the only way we're going to lose, is if there's mischief,' Trump told a crowd of ultra-loyalists at a rally in Newport News, Virginia. 'And it'll have to be on a big scale. So be careful.'

'And we do want a very friendly transition,' he assured. 'But we don't want to be cheated and be stupid and say 'Oh let's transition.' Well we'll go and we'll do a transition and we'll know that there were thousands and thousands of ballots that made a difference through cheating. We're not going to stand for it.'

The president was forced to affirm there would be a peaceful transition of power if Joe Biden wins in November after refusing to answer a direct question on the matter earlier this week during a White House press conference.

Trump has often railed against mail-in voting, as several states have taken measures to send out ballots to all registered voters in the midst of the global health crisis. He claims the alternative voting option will cause more instances of fraud and will disproportionately benefit Democrats.

He has also insinuated the election will not be legitimate if mass mail-in voting is implemented.

'This is a disaster waiting to happen,' Trump said of mail-in voting. 'And the only hope we have really, other than going through a long, unbelievable litigation in the end after it's over. Because we're going to win. We're not going to lose this, unless they cheat  that's the way I look at it.'

Donald Trump said Friday that the only way he would lose the election in November is if Democrats cheat with mass mail-in ballot measures

'That's the only way we're going to lose, is if there's mischief. And it'll have to be on a big scale. So be careful,' Trump warned an ultra-loyalists crowd at a rally in Newport News, Virginia

The president also assured there would be a 'very friendly transition' of power if he did lose in November

'We can't let them cheat. We can't let them  our country is at stake,' the president said to a roaring crowd. 'Because these people will destroy our country, we can't let this happen. And this is a scam. They know it, the media knows it, but the media doesn't want to cover it. They know exactly what's going to happen and so do I. But the Democrats know better than all of us what's going to happen.'

He warned his supporters against harvesting, where those delivering the ballots try to sway voters one way or the other, and urged them to report any suspicious activity or potential sabotage.

'If you see anything, you just have to report it and everything. We're all watching,' he said.

President Trump was asked during a press briefing Wednesday evening if he would commit to a peaceful transfer of power after the November election  and declined to do so.

'Well, we'll have to see what happens,' Trump said.

It was a similar comment to those he made in 2016 when asked similar questions.

'Win lose or draw in this election will you commit here today for a peaceful transferal of power after the election?' Trump was asked at the top of his press briefing.

'Get rid of the ballots and you'll have a very peaceful  there won't be a transfer frankly, there'll be a continuation,' the president continued, in a likely reference to mail-in ballots.

He continued: 'The ballots are out of control. You know if. And you know who knows it better than anybody else, the Democrats,' he said.

This caused many Republican lawmakers to come to the defense of U.S. election integrity, ensuring there will will a 'peaceful' and 'orderly' transition no matter who the victor is.

Biden was at a loss for words when asked how he felt about the president's comments.

'What country are we in?' the former vice president queried to reporters.

'I'm being facetious,' he clarified. 'I said, what country are we in? Look, he says the most irrational things. I don't know what to say.'

The president made the comment as some of his fiercest critics have accused him of making moves toward authoritarianism. Biden said this summer trump will 'try to steal' but said he is convinced the military 'will escort him from the White House with great dispatch.'

Trump visited Virginia the night before he will announce who he is nominating to fill the Supreme Court seat left vacant by Ruth Bader Ginsburg with her death last Friday

Thousands donning Trump insignia gathered for an outdoor rally on the tarmac of the New News/Williamsburg International Airport in Virginia Friday evening.

Rain cleared out before the president's arrival as a brisk wind welcoming the first week of fall prevailed throughout the night as Trump spoke just 38 days before Election Day.

Many attendees wore face coverings with Trump's campaign logo or slogan plastered across, while others did not comply with Centers for Disease Control recommendations, and several had masks pulled below their chins for the duration of the rally.

The overall theme of the night? Fill that seat!

Crowd members encouraged Trump in the form of blue signs with white lettering and verbal chants to nominate a conservative Supreme Court Justice to fill liberal Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's seat, which was left vacant with her death last Friday.

Earlier in the day, reports emerged that the president will nominate Federal Judge Amy Coney Barrett to replace Ginsburg, who lied in repose at the Supreme Court and Capitol this week.

Ginsburg died at 87-years-old due to complications from pancreatic cancer.

Trump has promoted filling the seat before the election, further suggesting he will question the outcome in November and is expecting a potential Supreme Court battle over the ultimate victor.

By getting his nominee through  a seemingly simple task with a Republican Senate majority  Trump wants to further ensure a conservative majority on the highest U.S. court, as well.

Virginia is the furthest southern state on the East Coast that voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016  with all the other southern states voting red.

Trump lost the state by a more than 5 per cent margin, with Clinton earning 49.8 per cent compared to his 44.4 per cent.

Polls taken in Virginia show Biden winning in November somewhere between five and 14 per cent.

The president admitted he did not pay much attention to Virginia in 2016, claiming his advisors said it was a lost cause to the left. But after a marginal loss, Trump believes he could win over the Old Dominion state this time around.
TOKYO - The Defense Ministry is considering three sea-based alternatives to the land-based Aegis Ashore missile defense system that was scrapped earlier this year.

Defense Minister Nobuo Kishi disclosed the three alternatives at meetings Thursday of lawmakers from the Liberal Democratic Party and its ruling coalition partner Komeito. Kishi indicated the ministry will carefully examine the three proposals, which feature radars and missile launch equipment on a ship or floating structure. A fit-for-purpose ship dedicated to ballistic missile defense is expected to be at the forefront of these considerations.

The ministry's three concrete options are a Self-Defense Forces destroyer; a converted commercial merchant ship; and building a floating offshore structure similar to an oil rig. It is expected all three options would involve two units operating radar and missile launch equipment used in the Aegis Ashore system. The government has signed a contract with the United States for this equipment.

Increasing the number of Aegis-equipped vessels would fall under option one. However, this alternative would involve hefty construction costs, and radar for Aegis Ashore differs from that used on an Aegis ship. Because of these and other reasons, "This option is becoming more unlikely," a senior Defense Ministry official said.

Another option that has been ruled out featured a land-based radar system and missiles launched from a sea-based platform. This plan was scrapped because of concerns over possible communication delays between the two components.

The ministry will compare and examine the cost, functions, technical feasibility and other factors of the three sea-based alternatives. It plans to reach a conclusion by the end of this year.

The ministry considered introducing the Aegis Ashore system because it could intercept incoming attacks around the clock throughout the year and it would reduce the workload of Maritime Self-Defense Force personnel. The sea-based alternatives cannot accomplish these objectives, and they highly likely will be restricted to ballistic missile defense.

These developments prompted some pointed questions from LDP and Komeito lawmakers at the meetings. "Won't this place an unreasonable burden on the MSDF?" asked one, while another said, "Won't a separate destroyer be needed to protect the commercial trading ship?"

The ministry has since indicated the Ground Self-Defense Force could be used in the sea-based alternative.
Niagara has great potential in its underutilized lands along the Welland Canal from Thorold south through Welland and Port Colborne, says Ian Hamilton.

Hamilton, chief executive officer of the Hamilton Oshawa Port Authority (HOPA), joined Thorold Mayor Terry Ugulini, Welland Mayor Frank Campion and Port Colborne Mayor Bill Steele Friday to create a network of multimodal hubs along the canal through a memorandum of understanding.

To be called Niagara Ports, HOPA and the three municipalities will work together to snap up lands declared surplus by Transport Canada along the waterway, then work to bring new industry and jobs to the region.

This is very important for the City of Thorold, and Welland and Port Colborne. We have assets along the Welland Canal that we can utilize, and we have the multimodal capability with good rail and highway systems already in place, said Ugulini, after the signing at Lock 7 Viewing Centre in Thorold.

He said Thorold has a couple of properties its looking at, and there are industrial sites that would create the opportunity for investment as Niagara Ports grows.

These assets (the canal lands) have been underutilized because of the shift to on-time delivery, with everyone using transport trucks, he said. This pandemic has taught us that we have to start to do things differently.

I believe that coming out of this pandemic with our eyes wide open, were going to be looking at utilizing and leveraging these assets and take some pressure off the highway system, said Ugulini, adding there will be job creation.

Steele agreed, saying the economy would grow as well, with between three and five spinoff jobs for every one created by Niagara Ports.

He said it will increase the tax base as well, bring in more investment to the lakeside city and update the marine industry.

Partnering with Welland, Thorold and HOPA gives us bigger clout when it comes to the federal and provincial governments.

Steele said the partnership already has a big foot in the door with Niagara Centre MP Vance Badawey, chair of the House of Commons standing committee on transport, infrastructure and communities.

He said the idea for creating a port in Niagara came many years ago when he served on council with Badawey as mayor.

We tried to do this many years ago, but we couldnt get the synergies going. Unless we collaborate more, things will never get done, said Steele.

He said theres land along the east pier on the canal, north of ADM and along the Highway 140 corridor that could be used to create the port.

Campion agreed with Steele about the Highway 140 corridor and said there are lands there not being utilized for what they should be.

This is an important issue for Welled. We need to utilize our canal lands to their full potential.

Campion said that in the past, industry sprang up along the canal that ran through the middle of the city.

Today bollards, where ships tied up, are still visible on the now recreational canal.

RELATED STORIES Business Niagara Ports strategy aims to bring the world to Welland, Port Colborne and Thorold

With the canal bypass built east of the citys downtown core, the connection was cut. But Campion said the city still has good rail and highway access for any company looking to move to the area.

He said the city is open to any industry willing to be part of Niagara Ports and improve the economy of Welland and Niagara.

We have the company on the canal that makes containers (CNTNR transforms shipping containers into prefabricated homes). If we could get some tie-offs for them (on the canal) they could ship their goods around the world, said Campion.

Hamilton said HOPA has a vision to create an integrated network of marine assets in the Great Lakes, especially in southern Ontario.

We believe this (Niagara Ports) is a wonderful addition. By tying together all the assets, it allows us to invest in the right places. We can take advantage of economies of scale an create the right infrastructure, attract businesses and service the existing ones, said Hamilton.
Only a fraction of farmers in Uttar Pradesh sells their produce to government agencies taking the Minimum Support Price (MSP) route while the rest prefer to trade in the open market or deal with private agents, sometimes even below MSP for different reasons.

MSP is the primary and immediate concern of farmers who are protesting the three agriculture reform bills passed by Parliament recently. They fear that after the enactment of new laws, the Centre may withdraw the safety net (MSP).

We cannot trust verbal commitment on MSP. The government must make a provision in the law itself guaranteeing that MSP will continue, said Bharatiya Kisan Union state president Rajveer Singh Jadaun.

Based on the recommendations of the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices, the Central government declares MSP for around two dozen crops before their sowing seasons. The idea behind MSP is to give a guaranteed price and assured market to farmers and protect them from price fluctuations and market imperfections.

Also read: Congress steps up attack on govt on labour codes, says it has removed security net for workers

Although the MSP system is considered an important tool that protects farmers interests by assuring a threshold price to them, studies show that only a fraction of crops under MSP are sold to the government in UP where wheat and paddy are two major crops.

It is observed that 28 percent of farmers in Uttar Pradesh sold their grains under MSP, 63 percent sold their grains in the open market and the remaining 8 percent kept for their self-consumption. It has also been observed during the course of study that 82 percent of the farmers reported to have faced various limitations in selling their food grains/crops at MSP, the NITI Aayog found in its Evaluation Study of Efficacy of Minimum Support Price on Farmers.

The sample study was published in 2016 with a reference period between 2007-08 and 2010-11, covering farmers of 36 districts (six in UP) across 14 states.

Ajit Kumar Singh, economist and former director of Giri Institute of Developmental Studies, said it was true that only a fraction of farmers sold their food grains to government agencies, the role of which was very limited.

Our survey revealed that farmers sold more than half of their produce to traders, 28.3 percent to the wholesalers, 25.8 percent to the village traders and only 14 percent to government agencies, he said, quoting a study commissioned to him by UPs planning department in 2010.

Also read: Former Bihar DGP meets Nitish Kumar, may join JD(U) in run-up to polls

These figures, according to him, indicated that agricultural marketing in the state was dominated by the traders and the role of government agencies was quite limited.

As a result, the farmers do not get a fair value of their produce, he said.

According to former additional director (food and civil supplies) AK Singh, sometimes farmers prefer to sell their food grain in the open market also because they get price above MSP.

In that sense, MSP is a useful system as sometimes forces private agencies to offer a better price to farmers, he said.

The NITI Aayog study also found that due to the unavailability of instant cash at MSP, small and marginal farmers preferred to sell to traders who made on the spot payments.

It was also found that sometimes, small and marginal farmers resorted to distress sales due to urgent need for money or to repay the loan taken before the sowing season. Some also pointed out that MSP was too low as it did not cover the rising farming costs, the report said.

Singh also found in his study that farmers faced a lot of problems in selling their produce in regulated markets. Nearly three-fourths of the farmers surveyed complained of undue deductions. Often, the produce was declared of lower quality and hence lower price is offered.

More than two-thirds of the farmers surveyed complained about the long distance from the market and lack of transport facilities. Delayed payment and false weighing were the other common problems faced by the farmers. About 20 percent farmers opined that they face problems in marketing as they have small surplus to sell, he said.

According to the NITI Aayog study, the respondents selected in UP villages were in favour of the continuation of MSP which indicated that in spite of all the lacunae in the process of implementation, people, on the whole, had benefitted from the MSP policy.

Singh also said that MSP was an important mechanism that insulated farmers against market price fluctuations as well as for the government to buy wheat and paddy for the Public Distribution System (PDS) pool.

I, therefore, feel that farmers fears that the government may do away with the PDS system are a little exaggerated, Singh stressed.

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Former Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre has been approached by Boris Johnson to become Chairman of Ofcom, in the latest example of Downing Street's determination to shake up the Left-wing establishment.

The attempt to install Mr Dacre at the broadcasting regulator comes as Whitehall mandarins are trying to put the brakes on the Prime Minister's drive to install Charles Moore  a Brexiteer critic of the BBC  as the Corporation's next Chairman.

The Mail on Sunday understands that Mr Dacre, 71, who edited the Daily Mail for 26 years until 2018, was wooed by Mr Johnson over drinks at No 10 earlier this year and was asked to consider succeeding Lord Burns.

He is due to step down imminently, after agreeing to go this year rather than complete his four-year term in 2022.

Former Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre has been approached by Boris Johnson to become Chairman of Ofcom, in the latest example of Downing Street's determination to shake up the Left-wing establishment

The attempt to install Mr Dacre at the broadcasting regulator comes as Whitehall mandarins are trying to put the brakes on the Prime Minister's drive to install Charles Moore (pictured)  a Brexiteer critic of the BBC  as the Corporation's next Chairman

Paul Dacre: Former Daily Mail editor who dominated journalism for 26 years By James Gant for MailOnline Paul Dacre was the editor of the Daily Mail for 26 years. The journalist was educated at University College School in Hampstead, north London, before studying at Leeds University. He had a taste for news from a young age, having edited his school magazine and university student paper. After leaving Leeds he worked for the Daily Express as a reporter but joined the Daily Mail a decade later in 1980. He spent a year editing the London Evening Standard before taking up the mantle at the Mail in 1992. He became well known for his campaigning headlines such as 'Murderers' in 1997, where he accused five men of killing Stephen Lawrence. Mr Dacre also received widespread praise for his role in stopping Gary McKinnon being extradited to the US for hacking into Pentagon computers. He was personally thanked by the 46-year-old Asperger's sufferer's mother for 'standing up for Gary non-stop for years'. Ahead of his potential role as chairman of Ofcom, Mr Dacre was formerly a member of the Press Complaints Commission and chairman of the Editors' Code of Practice Committee. Next year Mr Dacre will lift the lid on his time at the Mail in a three-part Channel 4 programme called The World According to Paul Dacre. Advertisement

During ongoing conversations with Downing Street, Mr Dacre said that he was interested, subject to 'assurances' about 'freedom and independence'.

The combination of Lord Moore as BBC Chairman with Mr Dacre at Ofcom would be greeted with dismay at the BBC.

During his tenure at the Daily Mail, Mr Dacre would rail against the bloated bureaucracy and Left-wing bias of the Corporation  but also said that he would 'die in a ditch' to preserve it and hoped that it could be saved from itself.

Lord Moore, the former editor of The Daily Telegraph and The Spectator, was revealed by this paper last week to be Mr Johnson's preferred candidate for BBC Chairman.

He has since accepted an approach to replace Sir David Clementi when he steps down in February and has discussed contractual terms.

However, civil servants at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport have complained to No 10 that the position has to be formally advertised in order to follow 'due process'.

It comes amid an ongoing battle between Downing Street and Whitehall, with Mr Johnson's influential adviser Dominic Cummings waging war on the power of civil servants to stymie No 10's operation.

Lord Moore, 63, is a vehement critic of the Corporation's 'Leftwing woke values' and objects to its guaranteed 4 billion-a-year income from the licence fee.

In 2010, he was fined 262 for not possessing a licence, having donated the equivalent sum to charity in protest at the BBC's refusal to sack Jonathan Ross for making prank calls with comedian Russell Brand to the actor Andrew Sachs.

Allies of Mr Johnson complain that Civil Service selection protocols introduced by Jeremy Heywood when he was Cabinet Secretary forced candidates to jump through 'hoops' designed to ensure the selection of 'members of the same Left-wing cabal'.

Ofcom, which regulates the broadcasting, telecommunications and postal industries, will be at the centre of Government efforts to curb the powers of online giants such as Facebook, which have used their power to cannibalise the revenues of traditional media firms.

Shadow culture secretary Jo Stevens questioned the Government's priorities following the reports.

She told Sky News's Sophy Ridge On Sunday: 'I think the whole idea of announcing appointments before a process has actually taken place is a bit strange and I think the public will be wondering where the Government's priorities are on this.

'Why are they worrying and interfering in an open process and appointment for BBC and head of Ofcom, both two very senior independent public service posts that carry significant salaries?

'Why are the Government interfering in that sort of thing, when they should be concentrating on getting a grip on test and trace, keeping coronavirus rates under control and getting the economy back on track?'

Ms Stevens added: 'I'm not going to comment on individuals being trailed as potential heads of the BBC or heads of Ofcom.

'When an appointment is made and announced we'll take a position and we'll take a view and comment on it then, but the fact is that the BBC and Ofcom are integral to our national interest, Ofcom regulates the BBC, they should be free from political interference, they should be impartial and the stuff that's being trailed about these appointments is quite worrying.'

The Mail on Sunday understands that Mr Dacre, 71, who edited the Daily Mail for 26 years until 2018, was wooed by Mr Johnson (pictured) over drinks at No 10 earlier this year and was asked to consider succeeding Lord Burns

Lord Burns (pictured) is due to step down from Ofcom imminently, after agreeing to go this year rather than complete his four-year term in 2022

Charles Moore: Former Spectator and Telegraph editor who was fined for refusing to buy a TV Licence By James Gant for MailOnline Charles Moore was born in Hastings, East Sussex, before heading to Eton College followed by Cambridge University. He has written three volumes in his biography of former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, with the last one - published last year - described by the Sunday Times as 'one of the great biographical achievements of our times'. He often appears on television as a commentator on politics and culture and writes for the Telegraph. During his time editing the newspaper Mr Moore was once Boris Johnson's boss, but described working with him as 'a nightmare'. In one of the more bizarre moments during his editorship, the newspaper was successfully sued for libel by the then MP George Galloway after they claimed he had been paid by Saddam Hussein's regime. Ahead of any role at the BBC, Mr Moore was once fined 262 plus costs by Hastings magistrates when he refused to buy a TV licence. The move came when the Corporation failed to sack Jonathan Ross after the TV host and Russell Brand made offensive telephone calls to Andrew Sachs. Advertisement

It is understood that Mr Dacre was approached because Mr Johnson wanted a candidate with a history of supporting freedom of expression and the freedom of the press and a determination to rein in the giant digital monopolies.

Mr Dacre, who was instrumental in the editorial launch of Mail Online, the world's largest newspaper website, is said to be keen to ensure that the online giants pay other media outlets  and local papers in particular  for the content they recycle.

Mr Dacre also masterminded the launch of Metro, Britain's most widely read paper, and chaired a Government review which successfully recommended reducing the 30-year rule under which state documents were kept secret, reducing the period to 20 years.

Appointing Mr Dacre would represent a culture change for Ofcom: Ed Richards, a former chief executive, wrote a Labour manifesto for Tony Blair and was a former head of corporate strategy at the BBC.

In a further blow for the BBC this weekend, its combative current affairs presenter Andrew Neil revealed that he was leaving the Corporation to spearhead rival GB News, which is expected to start broadcasting early next year.

Mr Neil is a close friend of Sir Robbie Gibb, Theresa May's former Director of Communications, who The Mail on Sunday revealed last month was leading efforts to raise money for the new channel.

The BBC had been in discussions with Mr Neil about a new interview series, but the deal was said to have been 'too little too late' for Mr Neil, who will present the new channel's flagship evening programme as well as being company chairman.

The BBC Chairman job is formally a Royal appointment, on the recommendation of the Culture Secretary. However, Downing Street will have the final say.

A Government spokesman said: 'We will launch the application process for the new chair of the BBC shortly.

It is an open recruitment process and all public appointments are subject to a robust and fair selection criteria.'

The process for the Ofcom chairmanship is expected to open next month.

In a further blow for the BBC this weekend, its combative current affairs presenter Andrew Neil (pictured) revealed that he was leaving the Corporation to spearhead rival GB News, which is expected to start broadcasting early next year

The news sparked a Twitter storm, with some hailing it as a win against 'woke TV types' but others criticising Mr Johnson.

The journalist Matt Chorley said: 'Huge news that Donald Trump has chosen Paul Dacre as his pick for the Supreme Court.'

Ex-editor of the Sun Kelvin MacKenzie put: 'Fantastic news that No.10 intend to appoint Daily Mail's great Editor Paul Dacre to be the new chairman of the media regulator Ofcom. Woke TV types will be seeking fresh careers.

'First time the Liberal grip on broadcasting has been broken in my lifetime with the appointment of ex-Mail editor Paul Dacre as chairman of Ofcom and ex- Telegraph editor Charles Moore as chair the BBC. A doco showing woke producers cr***ing themselves will win Baftas.'

Poet Matt Abbott wrote: 'Paul Dacre being appointed to run Ofcom is a bit like Genghis Khan being appointed to run a care in the community project.'

Monty Python actor John Cleese commented: 'Just heard about Paul Dacre. I've just realised how like Trump Johnson is. Quite a shock...'

Director of Council for Arab-British Understanding Chris Doyle commented: 'Charles Moore and Paul Dacre will try to kill off the BBC and have great fun doing it.'

Lord Adonis added: 'If the story about Paul Dacre and Charles Moore to run Ofcom & the BBC is true, then this is Cummings operating straight out of the Trump playbook with the intent to undermine our democratic institutions.'
The US government has put sanctions on Chinas largest smartphone chipmaker, Shanghai Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC), dealing further blow to Chinese companies with business dealings in the United States. On Friday, September 25, the US Department of Commerce told American companies that exports to SMIC posed an unacceptable risk of being diverted to military use, according to a copy of the letter seen by the Financial Times. The move threatens to cut off SMIC from crucial US software and chipmaking equipment, depriving the company of vital business. Companies will now require licenses to export products to SMIC.

SMIC has already lost business with its biggest customer Huawei due to US sanctions. The chipmaker had warned of similar sanctions in its IPO prospectus in July. The sanctions are also said to effect US chipmaker Qualcomm, which relies on SMIC to fabricate some of its chips. Qualcomm is said to be SMICs second largest customer after Huawei. China has previously declared its opposition to US sanctions on Chinese companies. Last weekend, Chinas Ministry of Commerce announced that it will curb the operations of foreign companies deemed unreliable.

The Financial Times reported that SMIC today said the company was not yet aware of the new sanctions, and was looking into the situation. It also said that it is continuing to engage with the US Department of Commerce. The company was quoted as saying that it has no relationship with the Chinese military, and does not manufacture for any military end-users or end-uses.

The US Department of Commerce did not immediately respond to FTs request for comment.
Seplat recently received a complaint from five households at Okpe and Sapele in Delta State, indicating the presence of hydrocarbons in their respective dug shallow water wells.

An emergency response was immediately activated and an investigation team comprising the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR), the National Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency (NOSDRA), and Delta State Ministry of Environment conducted a joint investigation visit, alongside the Seplat emergency response team.

Seplat has prioritized the safety of the residents of the affected area by providing potable water and secured the water wells from access. We will continue to support the investigation and provide palliative support to the households in line with the companys firm commitment to its robust Health, Safety and Environment culture in all areas of its operations.

Seplat has carried out checks of other water boreholes in the same vicinity and have drilled additional test boreholes. None of them has any signs of hydrocarbon in the water. No oil leaks or seepage has been traced back to the Seplat operated facilities.

We wish to thank the affected households for their co-operation and peaceful approach and to reassure them and the communities that we are expediently investigating the root cause of the incident.

Seplat is a leading indigenous energy company in the prolific Niger Delta area of Nigeria. Seplat has built strong partnerships with its vital local communities, promoting trust and confidence amongst its various stakeholders, ultimately resulting in a stable operating environment that facilitates the creation of shared value.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-27 05:34:40|Editor: huaxia

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SAO PAULO, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro was discharged on Saturday after undergoing an operation to remove a bladder stone at the Albert Einstein Hospital in the city of Sao Paulo, the government reported.

"The president, hospitalized since Friday morning, was discharged from the hospital at 1:30 p.m. (1730 GMT) on Saturday," said hospital medical staff.

The president left the medical center and boarded a plane to Brasilia, where he will spend the weekend at the presidential residence and will return to work on Monday, according to local press.

Before discharge, the hospital's medical report stated that Bolsonaro is in excellent health, "with no surgical complications. He is not presenting bleeding and does not have a fever."

This was the sixth operation that Bolsonaro has undergone since September 2018, when he was stabbed in the stomach at an event during his presidential campaign.

Four of the operations were linked to the stabbing and the last was a vasectomy that took place in January.

According to a government statement, the president is expected to participate in the launch of the Mining and Development Program on Monday at 5:00 p.m. local time (2100 GMT). Enditem
Victoria's new coronavirus cases are falling "a little faster" than expected, Premier Daniel Andrews has said, adding that he would be working "into the evening" to determine what steps out of lockdown will be taken on Sunday.

More restrictions will be eased from Monday than originally outlined as the state's case numbers continued to drop "ahead of schedule".

Premier Daniel Andrews on Saturday. Credit:Jason South

However, Mr Andrews has warned restrictions will not be eased dramatically, again dampening expectations of a significant departure of the road map out of lockdown.

"We are not throwing the doors open tomorrow," Mr Andrews said at a press conference dominated by questions about Jenny Mikakos' resignation.
MBABANE  Schools expectation to comply with the COVID-19 regulations is affected by acute lack of financial resources to provide necessities for protection against the virus.

Though schools are only open for Grade VII, Form IIIs and Form Vs, an outcry has been sent that they can hardly cope with the high operational expenses, as government has not settled the free primary education (FPE) as well as the orphaned and vulnerable childrens (OVC) fund.

A group of inspectors dispatched by regional education officers allegedly found that some schools were lacking in the checklist of compliance with COVID-19 regulations.

Sources

Eswatini News gathered from reliable sources, who are part of the inspectorate, that some schools did not have a reliable source of running water while in others, the safe social distancing was not practised. However, it was said that the process of inspecting schools was still ongoing.

One of the schools, John Wesley Primary School in Mbabane, had to temporarily send pupils away two weeks ago, as inspectors were not entirely pleased with some compliance essentials.

A group of inspectors met behind closed doors with the school administration to iron out the concerns.

When this newspaper sought to find out the cause of concern, it was revealed that sinks for washing of hands was found to be blocked, such that water supply had to be disconnected, resulting in a temporary non-compliance.

The COVID-19 rules are strict in that the water has to be running and should not collect in the sink but go directly to the sewerage or to the ground.

There should be no room for such water to be reused because of the presumption that it could have been used by someone who is COVID-19 positive, said the source.

The schools Head teacher, Norman Gumedze, said a communication breakdown among the schools administrators was to blame for the temporary disturbance in water supply.

The issue was all about the responsibility to buy buckets for water storage, but we have fixed it now and learning was interrupted for only a day, he said.

The primary school had to share the hand washing station with that of the secondary school, and has water tanks for use in case of water shortage.

Issue

Meanwhile, Principal Secretary the Ministry of Education and Training Bertram Stewart, when commenting on the issue, said: Such cases should be expected because it is obvious that water cannot be in perennial supply. So the shortage of water from time to time is bound to happen.

He assured that all officials were, however, vigilant to ensure that there was compliance at all times. Later on, Stewart issued an announcement calling upon head teachers to forward lists of pupils supported by the State for payment to the ministry by Tuesday.

These are only those in Form V, Form III and Grade VII

Some of the costly regulations that come with compliance with COVID-19 include having a dedicated person to record temperature, identities and residential addresses of all who enter the schools premises, keeping a constant supply of water and buying personal protective equipment where necessary.

Meanwhile, the Eswatini Principals Association (EPA) said it had been inundated with calls from members who were asking it to act on the delays in payment of free primary education fees and for orphaned and vulnerable children.

Welcome Mhlanga, the president, said as a result, the association had scheduled a meeting with its executive to find a solution to the widespread concerns.

When we agreed to reopen schools with the little resources we had in our coffers, we had not anticipated that it would take this long for government to pay the OVC fees, he said.

He said government had deposited a third of the school fees, and that schools were operating on a shoe-string budget without the rest of the money.

Some schools have been calling to say they can no longer sustain anything now. Reopening a school comes with a lot of financial requirements, which they were not prepared for, he said.

Beneficiaries

Meanwhile, he registered doubt at the sincerity of governments stance that schools were delaying in submitting lists of claims for pupils who are beneficiaries.

I am not suggesting that all principals are efficient, but it beats me why a principal would neglect to submit the very thing that will help in the education of the children, he said.

The president also decried that the delays in settling the balances came at a time when the pupils were about to sit for their final examinations.

Most head teachers are being compelled by circumstances to buy things on credit, which is not right, because it creates queries for the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), he said.

On the other hand, the budget estimates for the financial year 2020/21 state that government intended to channel E227 923 959 towards free primary education, while the budget for orphaned and vulnerable children is E180 million. At least 592 public primary schools benefit from this funding.






Like Scalia, for whom she once clerked, she is a committed Roman Catholic and a devotee of his favored interpretation of the Constitution known as originalism. Those qualifications delight many on the right but dismay liberals who fear her votes could result in the chipping away of some laws, especially the Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion.
A 16-year-old teenager has been taken to hospital after he was allegedly punched and suffered puncture wounds to his torso and chest in Brisbane's CBD.

Paramedics were called to Queen Street Mall just before 11pm on Friday over a disturbance between the boy and three other people.

The boy was taken to Royal Brisbane and Womens Hospital, where he remains.

Police said they were looking for at least two suspects.

A crime scene was declared and investigations are continuing.
Some residents and county officials are concerned that a hyper-tense political environment is complicating the November general election as voters sort through misleading information and a flood of campaign materials.

We expect this to be one of the busiest election days in recent memory, county Commissioner Brian Allen said regarding the countys preparations for Nov. 3.

The constant flood of political mailers residents are receiving was a chief local concern. In most cases, residents just throw them away. But voters and county officials noticed some of the mailers, in conjunction with robocalls, could cause confusion surrounding mail-in ballots.

Confusing applications

A Centre Twp. voter, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of harassment, received the robocalls and multiple applications for mail-in ballots from third-party groups over two weeks. The voter said shes concerned the mailers could cause problems, and she doesnt want Perry voters to miss the election.

Its confusing at the least, she said.

A Centre Twp. voter received multiple mail-in ballot applications from third-party groups supporting President Trump even though she and her husband already are receiving mail-in ballots for the election. She said that could cause confusion for some voters in the county.

The issue came up at the Aug. 31 county commissioners' meeting and an elections board meeting. Residents said theyve received multiple calls from Donald Trump Jr., the presidents son, saying the campaign would be sending absentee ballot applications, urging voters to fill them out, and return them as soon as possible. The calls say theyre approved by the Republican National Committee.

But residents said theyve already registered to vote by mail, so they dont know why theyre receiving this.

I didnt know what was coming, but it just got weirder, the Centre Twp. voter said in an interview.

The voter and her husband voted by mail-in ballot during the primary, and indicated they wanted to do so again in November when they registered online with the Pennsylvania Department of State. The husband has asthma, and they felt it was safer to vote by mail during the coronavirus pandemic.

We knew (COVID) wasnt going to be gone by November, she said.

The robocall messages came on Aug. 25. The Centre voters received two of them. The first mailings came to their home that Thursday, just as the Republican National Convention was finishing with President Donald Trumps acceptance speech.

The mailing is a folded card with campaign messaging about where the candidates stand on the issues, promising an election guide inside and saying Apply today to safely & securely vote by mail in all capital letters. The sender was Common Sense Voters of America LLC with a Washington, D.C. address.

According to a Philadelphia Inquirer story, an attorney active with Republican politics in Ohio registered the nonprofit name there in June. He declined to answer questions about the group, saying he wasnt authorized to do so by his client.

The mailer sent to the Perry voters contains two applications for mail-in ballots, already addressed to the Perry County elections office, along with additional images and issues-centric messaging. Its clearly supportive of President Trumps reelection but doesnt directly tell the recipient to vote for him.

The next week, the same Centre Twp. voters received two more similar ballot applications from different third-party groups.

A Centre Twp. voter received multiple mail-in ballot applications from third-party groups supporting President Trump even though she and her husband already are receiving mail-in ballots for the election. She said that could cause confusion for some voters in the county.

The county said the mailers did not come from its offices. But Commissioner Allen, a Republican, agreed they are concerned about ballot confusion with such mailers. Where does the campaign end and the election start?

Where does that cross the line? Allen asked.

Checking ballots

Wanda Murren, the communications director for the Department of State, said such third-party applications for mail-in ballots are legal and efforts to encourage voting are welcome, but she urged caution.

The Department of State supports any efforts to encourage participation among eligible voters, Murren wrote in an email. Still, we urge registered voters to use the Departments online ballot application at www.votesPA.com. The online application is faster and more secure. It eliminates mailing time by instantly forwarding the application to the proper county election office. The electronic application also saves significant amounts of time and labor for county election offices that process the applications.

Murren said the state has heard similar concerns about third-party mailers with some voters thinking theyre receiving a ballot, but its just an application. Secondly, if voters have already requested a ballot either through the department or county election office, they do not need to fill out any other application. And if theyre concerned about the information being asked of them on third-party applications, they can check it against sample applications at the state election site.

There are still more issues. Some voters who used mail-in ballots in the primary dont know if theyre receiving one for the general election.

Were finding that many voters cant recall if they checked the box for the annual list, Murren said.

Adding yourself to that list when applying for a mail-in ballot means you will receive a ballot for each election in that year. Next election year the voter will receive an application for a mail-in ballot. At that time, the voter can decide if they want to continue voting by mail, or vote in person by simply not returning the application. Voters can check the status of their mail-in application by going to www.votesPA.com/MailBallotStatus and entering their personal information. If it returns a screen that lists a mail-in application with a status of pending at the far right, then that voter is receiving a mail-in ballot. Voters can also check with their local election office on the status of their ballot.

Still, voters need to keep in mind some election deadlines. The last day for voters to register is Oct. 19, according to the state. The last day to apply for a mail-in or civilian absentee ballots is Oct. 27. In-person voting is Nov. 3. Polls open at 7 a.m. and close at 8 p.m. If you are in line to vote at 8 p.m., even outside a polling station, workers must allow you to cast your ballot.

Court rulings

One of the things holding counties back  until last week  was they didnt have a certified ballot because the Department of State was waiting for court challenges to be resolved about which candidates would be listed on ballots. This a regular process that looks at a candidates petitions, signatures and other technicalities of filing to run for office.

The state Supreme Court handed down those decisions on Sept. 17, which will remove Howie Hawkins, Green Party candidate for president, from the ballot. Counties can now print ballots and send to voters who have requested them.

At the same time, the court was hearing arguments about deadlines for mail-in ballots, when they can be received by election offices and still counted. That also affected the counties.

We cant give people deadlines, Allen said before the decisions. Were not getting anything from the Department of State.

The Supreme Court ruled that although the states mail-in law says ballots must be received by election day, the realities of the pandemic, high voter turnout, and other logistics warranted extending the deadline for receipt of ballots by three days. That should give county election offices more time to count both in-person and mail-in ballots. They still need to be post-marked by election day.

Democrats praised the decision, saying it will allow all valid ballots to be counted. Republican leaders in the state legislature are urging the courts to reconsider the decision saying it violates the constitution.

Either way, local and state election officials are urging voters to complete their ballots and send them back to the county office as soon as possible. That will reduce chances they get delayed, and make sure they are counted.

Better than this

The Centre Twp. voter said she is most concerned about confusion, and its effect on the election, not any particular politician. They were registered independent for much of their life, but switched to Democrat in the spring for the primary. The voters have friends and family of different political registrations and are concerned any of them could have their votes invalidated if there are application conflicts.

They could file twice, and I dont want that, she said.

No matter who Perry Countians are voting for, she also doesnt want problems to reflect poorly on the countys ability to hold elections.

I dont want our county to look bad, she said.

Jim T. Ryan can be reached via email at jtryan@perrycountytimes.com
Srinagar, Sep 26 : The Jammu & Kashmir Police along with security forces have arrested a terrorist associate in north Kashmir's Handwara and recovered arms and ammunition from his possession.

Police said on a specific input, a cordon and search operation was launched by Handwara police along with the Army and CRPF in the orchards of Mandigam Kralgund village.

"During search, one terrorist associate identified as Akeel Ahmad Parray, son of Wali Mohd, resident of Mandigam Kralgund was apprehended," police said. "Incriminating materials including arms and ammunitions were recovered from his possession. Preliminary investigation reveals that he is an active terrorist associate, linked with proscribed terror outfit LeT." Police have registered a case and investigation has been initiated.
WASHINGTON  Two Senate Republican committee chairmen sought to revive allegations around Democratic nominee Joe Bidens son six weeks before the election, yet their report broke little new ground in finding that Hunter Bidens role on the board of a Ukrainian natural gas company put State Department officials in an awkward position.

Dedicated career-service individuals pushing to fight corruption in Ukraine were troubled that the son of then-Vice President Biden took a paid position in 2014 on the board of Burisma Holdings, an energy company owned by a corrupt oligarch, according to the 87-page interim report.

The findings issued Wednesday by Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, head of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, and Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, chairman of the Finance Committee, into Hunter Bidens allegedly extensive and complex financial transactions dont disclose any impact on policy, or prove wrongdoing.

But the Republicans asserted that the younger Bidens foreign financial entanglements raised concerns about conflicts of interest as well as criminal financial, counterintelligence and extortion concerns.

President Donald Trump and his personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani have asserted that Vice President Biden sought the ouster of a prosecutor in Ukraine who was investigating Hunter Biden. The House impeached Trump for pressing Ukraines president to find evidence to back up the theory. In fact, Joe Biden represented the U.S. and European allies in seeking the ouster of the prosecutor as corrupt.

The Republican senators detailed millions of dollars in transactions and payments that they said came from Chinese businessmen with ties to the Chinese government as well as $3.5 million from the widow of the former mayor of Moscow for a consultancy agreement with a firm co-founded by Hunter Biden.

Trump tweeted, Wow, big news.

Biden campaign spokesman Andrew Bates dismissed the Republican report, lashing out particularly at Johnson. Bates said in a statement that the senator diverted his committee from oversight of the catastrophically botched federal response to the coronavirus pandemic to promote a long-disproven, hard-core right-wing conspiracy theory to bail out Donald Trumps re-election campaign.

Hunter Biden has said that in hindsight, serving on Burismas board may have been poor judgment, though he maintains he didnt do anything improper.

Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said in a tweet Wednesday that the bogus narrative of this report  peddled by a Russian disinformation campaign  was disproved by every witness who testified.

Sen. Gary Peters of Michigan, the top Democrat on the Homeland panel, pointed out that Johnson has refused to make public all of the witness transcripts from his inquiry. Peters said its unconscionable that the chairmen are continuing to advance false information intended to undermine our democratic process at the expense of the bipartisan work we should be doing to protect our national security.

Democrats issued a minority report saying the evidence confirms that there was no corruption, wrongdoing or impropriety on the part of Vice President Biden.

The Trump administration, which has refused to cooperate with Democratic inquiries into the president and his aides, worked with the Republicans in their probe and handed over multiple documents.

Although the Republican report cites George Kent as one of the State Department officials who found Hunter Bidens role awkward, Kent testified during the House impeachment hearings that Joe Biden did nothing wrong.

Asked if there was any factual basis to support allegations against Biden, Kent replied: None whatsoever. He also testified that he didnt witness any efforts by any U.S. official to shield Burisma from scrutiny and said its a fair assessment that Biden was fighting corruption in Ukraine and Trump wasnt.
New York (United Nations) 25 September 2020 (SPS)- The President of the Republic of Zimbabwe, H.E. Dr. Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa, called on the UN Security Council to increase efforts towards ending the occupation of Western Sahara, in his speech before the UN General Assembly yesterday.

He further stressed that self-determination and independence are intrinsic and fundamental rights that should be enjoyed by all without distinction.

In this regards, he recalled that peace, security and stability are a pre-requisite for sustainable development. This can only be achieved in an inclusive process characterized by equally shared commitment and responsibilities. We count on the international community to strengthen its support for AU-led peace efforts. We also look forward to greater collaboration between the AU and the UN in maintaining sustainable international peace and security in accordance with Chapter VIII of the Charter of the United Nations, more particularly in ensuring the effective implementation of the AU's campaign on Silencing the Guns. (SPS)

090/500/60 (SPS)
FOR Mr Biggy Shoko, talking to an elephant that had attacked him in Hwange two years ago in his native language, saved his life as the jumbo was already charged and ready to kill him.

Injured and unable to walk, Mr Shoko had no defence as he had been jabbed on his thigh by the elephant and was bleeding profusely. Mr Shoko said the only option was to talk to the elephant to spare his life.

I fell down after tripping on a log and when I opened my eyes, I was staring straight into the elephants eyes and it was about to lift me again from the ground and I said to it hey suka lapha, hamba wena (go away) and when I wanted to shout for the third time it kept staring at me and it just shook its head and started retreating back to its calf that was close by and it left. That is how I survived, he said.

Mr Shoko believes the elephant heard his plea. As he was now defenceless, vulnerable and desperate to hang on to dear life. He said the jumbo just vanished and he waited for help to arrive. Mr Shoko is one of the many victims of human wildlife conflict within the Hwange National Park caused by the fight for resources between humans and animals.

Like all other victims, Mr Shoko feels he must be compensated or at least have medical expenses covered by the Zimbabwe National Parks and Wildlife Authority which caters for the affairs of wildlife in the country. But that has not been the case as the authority has not offered any compensation or medical assistance to victims of attacks of wild animals.

ZimParks spokesman Mr Tinashe Farawo said the organisation was aware of the plight of people affected by wild animals.

We are in the process of crafting a Human Wildlife Conflict Policy so that we can deal with the problem of conflict in our parks.

We are taking notes from the communities that are affected on what they feel can be done. We are not prescribing what they should do as such but we are working together to come up with solutions, he said.

Mr Farawo said the long-term solution is to depopulate where they have more animals and populate where they have fewer animals.

This is not only in Zimbabwe but across the continent. Our animals are overpopulated and they have become a danger unto themselves because they are destroying their habitat, he said.

Mr Shoko was attacked by an elephant that was with its calf when he was on his way to work at Zambezi Gas in Hwange.

He said the elephant charged at him and he also fled but he was outpaced by the elephant and it lifted him with its trunk. He said wild animals, especially elephants need to be monitored and driven away when they stray into human settlements.

Mr Shoko was hospitalised and took three months to recover from his ordeal while his employer covered medical bills.

We all hope that when one is injured by wildlife that will have strayed into the communities, they are assisted. We are scared of the jumbos but we stay in the same community and we encounter them while doing various activities. We cannot all run away from this habitat, he said. Sunday News
GRAFTON  The newest residents of Graftons Mississippi Riverfront will be welcomed at a 3 p.m. ceremony Sunday near the lighthouse park.

Created by Kurt Knickmeyer, Bobbie Heinemann and Rick Fortner, the concrete sculpture features a turtle, a frog and two catfish.

The sculptures will be unveiled at an event hosted by the Grafton Parks Committee. Participants are asked to bring their own chairs.

The trio used rebar and plaster lathe to create a form, then poured concrete into the form before guniting  or spraying a mix or mortar or concrete to the surface  and modeling the sculptures into their final shapes.

In the end, were just trying to make a nice piece of sculpture, Knickmeyer said.

The turtles shell measures 10 feet by 12 feet, atop which sits a smaller frog. To the tail, the turtle measures 18 feet long, which is more than twice the length of the catfish sculptures. They are 6 feet and 8 feet in length.

The sculptors are known for their work in The City Museum in St. Louis and the small turtle park across from the St. Louis Zoo. as well as playground furniture, Knickmeyer said.

Sundays event coincides with the first Riverside Flea Market of the year in Grafton. The popular event has not been held this year because of pandemic concerns.

It returns from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at The Loading Dock today and Sunday.

Riverbank Gifts at 225 E. Main St. is also celebrating its first year anniversary from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. today and Sunday.
Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has said that opposition parties wanted to create a rift between his administration and the armed forces. Talking to journalists in Islamabad on Friday, he said that he was aware of meetings that opposition politicians had held with the countrys military leadership.

PM Khan said the Pakistan Army continued to support democracy and listen to his administration. The opposition is not happy to see the unprecedented harmony between the government and the army and they want to create a rift between the civil-military leadership, he said. The army does 100% what I ask it. The army honoured my decision on different important issues, like returning Indian Air Force fighter pilot Abhinandan Varthaman to India, opening of the Kartarpur Corridor for Sikh pilgrims, policies on Afghanistan and India, and so on.

Talking about the Gilgit-Baltistan assembly elections in November, Khan claimed that India wanted to create unrest in Gilgit-Baltistan. Without giving any proof, he said his government and the Pakistan military were aware of Indias growing interest in Gilgit-Baltistan.

The Pakistan PM also accused India of fomenting sectarian trouble in the country, but didnt provide any evidence to back his claim. They want to create a sectarian crisis in Pakistan, he alleged.
The United States Department of Justice sent a strongly-worded letter to San Francisco Mayor London Breed on Friday, warning of "further action" if current restrictions on places of worship amid the coronavirus pandemic are not lifted.

Under the city's current health order, only one congregant at a time is allowed to worship indoors. Even though San Francisco is permitted to allow 25% capacity at indoor places of worship under its status as a red tier county, local officials have taken a stricter approach.

In a letter signed by assistant attorney general Eric S. Dreiband and attorney for the Northern District of California David Anderson, the DOJ called the city's restrictions "draconian, out of step with the treatment afforded other similar indoor activities in San Francisco, wholly at odds with this Nations traditional understanding of religious liberty, and may violate the First Amendment to the Constitution."

The DOJ cites a recent concurrence from Chief Justice John Roberts in a denial of application for a church-related case, in which Roberts writes that emergency pandemic-related restrictions on religious activities are constitutionally permissible so long as the restrictions "apply to comparable secular gatherings."

"The Health Order provides more favorable treatment to a range of secular activities including activities that typically feature similar or greater degrees of personal contact as religious gatherings," the DOJ attorneys write to Breed. "Personal service providers including barber shops, nail salons, massage locations, and tattoo parlors  where there is significant contact between the service provider and the customer over an extended period of time  are permitted to serve as many customers indoors as they can space at six feet apart. Gyms and fitness centers are permitted to serve '10% of the facilitys normal maximum occupancy or . . . the number of people who can maintain at least six feet of physical distance from each other in the facility at all times.'"

In a statement released Friday, city attorney Dennis Herrera defended the approach taken by local health officials.

"We must be doing something right," Herrera said. "Meanwhile, more than 200,000 Americans are dead from this virus. Maybe the federal government should focus on an actual pandemic response instead of lobbing careless legal threats. San Francisco is opening up at the speed of safety. Religious gatherings indoors and outdoors are already set to expand in a few days. This expansion is beyond what is described in the federal governments letter. It's consistent with San Franciscos careful approach and follows closely behind what the State of California allows."

Eric Ting is an SFGATE reporter. Email: eric.ting@sfgate.com | Twitter:@_ericting
The Sopranos prequel film may be postponed until next year, but the world of Tony Soprano has been alive and well in New Jersey this week.

Though actors celebrated a wrap on The Many Saints of Newark in 2019, the production has returned for reshoots after the films release was delayed because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Now that the production has been back in the shows home state and in New York filming scenes for the movie, weve gotten more glimpses at some of the characters in the Sopranos backstory ahead of the new March 12, 2021 release date.

Heres what weve seen so far, along with some questions raised by those details.

Tony Soprano (Michael Gandolfini)

James Gandolfinis son Michael Gandolfini plays a young Tony Soprano in the film, which depicts the future mob boss of the DiMeo crime family in the 60s and 70s in Newark and the surrounding area.

The movie was written by Sopranos creator David Chase and Lawrence Konner and is being directed by Alan Taylor, who won an Emmy for directing an episode of the show.

Michael Gandolfini wants you to know that we are done filming and that you should stop by today! Take a picture in the... Posted by Holsten's on Friday, September 25, 2020

Michael Gandolfini was in Bloomfield in May 2019 to film scenes for The Many Saints of Newark" at Holstens Brookdale Confectionery, and he returned Wednesday for more (The Many Saints of Newark also filmed the same day at Rombiolo Bakery Cafe in Bloomfield).

Of course, this is an obvious callback to the show because Holstens is the last place viewers saw Tony Soprano when the 2007 series finale infamously cut to black, leaving viewers wondering whether Tony was alive or dead.

The booth where Tony and his family sat that night became a tourist destination, as did Holstens in general. When James Gandolfini died in 2013, the ice cream parlor set out a remembrance for the actor at the table where he filmed. Michael Gandolfini, 21, visited that table once again this week when he returned for reshoots (the place was outfitted with sidewalk snow and tinsel because its apparently winter in Tonys world).

Another detail: Gandolfini has been wearing a West Orange High School jacket in some scenes. An episode in the fifth season of The Sopranos called The Test Dream shows Tony in a dream sequence with his high school football coach, who criticizes him for turning to a life of crime. WOHS is emblazoned on a jacket in the coachs office. Tony calls it one of his Coach Molinaro dreams" (see clip above). He tries to shoot his coach in the dream, but the bullets melt into his hands.

In flashbacks during the original show on HBO, a younger Tony is seen living in Newark with his mother, Livia Soprano, his father, Giovanni Frances Johnny Boy Soprano, and his sister, Janice. In one scene, Livia remarks on the 1967 Newark riots on Springfield Avenue."

Actors filming a scene in May 2019 for "The Many Saints of Newark." The film depicts the 1967 Newark riots. Aristide Economopoulos | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

Riot scenes for The Many Saints of Newark were filmed in Newark, in the vicinity of Branford Place near Hobbys Delicatessen, in the spring of 2019.

City blocks were transformed with new signs to look like the late 60s, and the street was strewn with debris for the production. Background actors portraying Newark residents filled the scenes, and other background actors played Newark police officers and National Guardsmen.

Does Tonys jacket mean that in The Many Saints of Newark, his family moves to the suburbs  as in West Orange  after the riots, also known as the Newark Rebellion? The shows dream sequence certainly supports that.

Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini) and Carmela Soprano (Edie Falco) in the series finale of "The Sopranos" filmed at Holsten's in Bloomfield. Carmela met Tony in high school.Craig Blankenhorn | HBO

Carmela DeAngelis, aka Carmela Soprano

We know that Tony Soprano met his future wife, Carmela DeAngelis, in high school.

(Yes, hed been giving her grief for that long!)

During recent filming, Gandolfini has appeared alongside a blonde actress who could pass for a young Edie Falco. She was also wearing his West Orange jacket  a possible Carmela?

Jon Bernthal and Vera Farmiga as Johnny and Livia Soprano in #TheManySaintsOfNewark. pic.twitter.com/eWxCI0LsKn  The Many Saints Club (@ManySaintsClub) July 30, 2020

Livia Soprano (Vera Farmiga) and Johnny Soprano (Jon Bernthal)

Vera Farmiga, who by all appearances is playing Tonys mother Livia Soprano, has been seen wearing a more coiffed version of Livias signature hairstyle on set in New York.

Farmiga, a formidable actor who was nominated for an Oscar for her role in the 2009 film Up in the Air, grew up in New Jersey, attending school in Newark and Flemington.

Jon Bernthal (The Punisher") plays Tonys father and Livias husband, Giovanni Frances Johnny Boy Soprano, who died in 1986.

Corey Stoll plays Uncle Junior in "The Many Saints of Newark."Steven Ferdman | AFP via Getty Images

Junior Soprano (Corey Stoll)

Corey Stoll (First Man, House of Cards) gets to play Tonys Uncle Junior and Johnny Boy Sopranos brother, Corrado Soprano, in The Many Saints of Newark.

Stoll has been seen on set wearing the newsboy cap and thick-rimmed glasses that are Juniors signature  and a plaid robe!

Anthony Imperiale (Jim Santangeli)

While most Sopranos characters are delivered to us from the mind of David Chase, a real-life Newark figure will be portrayed in The Many Saints of Newark  Anthony Imperiale.

Imperiale, who died in 1999, served in the state Assembly and Senate in the 70s and 80s. Signs for Imperiales Assembly campaign have been seen on set (he also ran for Newark mayor more than once).

Imperiale, who started out on the city council in Newark, had pushed for white people to arm themselves during the riots and started street patrols at night. He was opposed to desegregation busing and known for wearing outlandish costumes at the citys Columbus Day parade.

Anthony Imperiale was known for wearing costumes at Newark parades, like this one from 1976.Star-Ledger file photo/Bill Coco

Jim Santangeli, who plays Imperiale in The Many Saints of Newark, filmed a scene in which he rides atop an elephant-like structure wearing a gladiator costume, like Imperiale did in real life.

In 1975, Imperiale was bitten by a lion he had rented from West Milfords Jungle Habitat for his gladiator-themed parade float.

Dickie Moltisanti (Alessandro Nivola)

Alessandro Nivola, one of the first actors to be announced in connection with The Many Saints of Newark, plays Richard Dickie Moltisanti, father of Christopher Moltisanti, played by Michael Imperioli in the HBO series.

Moltisanti means many saints in Italian, linking in with the films title.

Dickie, a soldier in the Soprano crew and cousin to Carmela Soprano, acted as a mentor to young Tony, like Tony did with Christopher in the TV series. Dickie was killed in the 70s, when Christopher was just a baby. Nivola has been seen filming scenes with Bernthal in which he gets rough with some unknown characters.

Actor Alessandro Nivola, left, in Newark during a break in filming for "The Many Saints of Newark" in May 2019.Aristide Economopoulos | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

BREAKING NEWS: New release date for The Sopranos prequel movie



 March 12, 2021 



The Many Saints of Newark



Starring

 Alessandro Nivola

 Michael Gandolfini

 Jon Bernthal

 Ray Liotta@immatureAMRCN pic.twitter.com/sm1mTToA46  The Sopranos Club (@TheSopranosClub) April 20, 2020

Paulie Walnuts, Sal Big Pussy Bonpensiero and Silvio Dante

You might be wondering where Tony Sopranos capo, Paulie Gualtieri, aka Paulie Walnuts, is in all this.

Apparently, were looking at Billy Magnussen (Aladdin) for the role of young Paulie. Magnussen also appears in the upcoming James Bond film No Time To Die.

Steven Van Zandt played Silvio Dante, Tonys consigliere in the series. For the young version of this character, look to John Magaro, who starred in the David Chase film Not Fade Away.

Billy Magnussen: a young Paulie Walnuts (Tony Sirico memorably played the original article). HBO; Rodin Eckenroth | Getty Images

Samson Moeakiola (Hawaii Five-O) is rumored to be playing young Sal Big Pussy Bonpensiero, a future soldier in the Soprano crew.

The Many Saints of Newark also stars Hollywood newcomer Michela de Rossi, an actress from Italy (she was on set in 2019 for a scene filmed at a makeshift Satriales in Paterson); Newark native Ray Liotta; Tony winner Leslie Odom Jr. (Hamilton); Gabriella Piazza (New Amsterdam) and Alexandra Intrator (a possible Janice Soprano?).

Thank you for relying on us to provide the journalism you can trust. Please consider supporting NJ.com with a subscription.

Amy Kuperinsky may be reached at akuperinsky@njadvancemedia.com
Washington: Timothy Ray Brown, the American once known as the Berlin patient" who in 2008 became the first person to be cured of HIV, is terminally ill with cancer, according to his partner.

Timothy is not dying from HIV, just to be clear," his partner Tim Hoeffgen told the activist and writer Mark King, who published a blog post on the subject on Tuesday.

HIV has not been found in his bloodstream since he was cured. Thats gone. This is from the leukemia. God, I hate cancer," added Hoeffgen.

King told AFP he had reached the couple by phone last Saturday. Brown, 54, is receiving hospice care at his home in Palm Springs, California. Im going to keep fighting until I just cannot fight any more," Brown told King.

Brown made medical history and became the personification of hope for the tens of millions of people living with the virus that causes AIDS when he was cured more than a decade ago.

He was studying in Berlin in 1995 when he learned he had become infected. Then, in 2006, he was diagnosed with leukemia, or cancer that affects the blood and bone marrow.

To treat his leukemia, his doctor at the Free University of Berlin used a stem cell transplant from a donor who had a rare genetic mutation that gave him natural resistance to HIV, hoping it may wipe out both diseases.

It took two painful and dangerous procedures, but it was a success: in 2008 Brown was declared free of the two ailments, and was initially dubbed the Berlin Patient" at a medical conference to preserve his anonymity.

Two years later, he decided to break his silence and went on to become a public figure, giving speeches and interviews and starting his own foundation. I am living proof that there could be a cure for AIDS," he told AFP in 2012. Its very wonderful, being cured of HIV."

Last year, the second-ever person was announced cured from the same method. Initially called the London patient," he later went public, identifying himself as Adam Castillejo.


Bhumi Pednekar whos winning hearts for her performance in Dolly Kitty Aur Woh Chamakte Sitare is basking in the success. But shes not just a talented actress but also an environmentally conscious citizen who has taken up climate conservation as a cause to raise awareness among fellow Indians. In the past few months the actress has worked hard to raise awareness and bring a change in the world in her best possible way.



Bhumi has now launched a lauded online and offline initiative called Climate Warrior through which she is mobilising citizens of India to contribute towards protecting the environment. Now, Bhumi is reaching out to school students to involve them towards climate conservation and has collaborated with a key global initiative, Climate Action Project, which reaches out to 10 million students across 107 countries!

Bhumi says, The changes we are observing are real and are an undeniable threat to our entire civilization. This current year we have witnessed the Australian bushfires burning 18 million hectares of land, one billion animals were killed and many endangered species in the country were driven to extinction. We saw the Oil spill in Russias Arctic region, Uttarakhand forest fires burning 51 hectares of land, we faced the Cyclone Amphan in West Bengal and Odisha, strongest to hit the West Bengal in over a decade, with 86 deaths in the state and finally we witness the California wildfires, where 3,154,107 total acres burned.



She urges students to come forward and raise their voice on climate conservation globally. Bhumi says, The effects are already visible and will be catastrophic unless we act now. We need everyone joining hands together to ensure that we leave behind barrels of hope and prosperity for the current generations and generations to come and education is the significant channel to achieve this n in goal. Let us join hands and us make a difference.

The Climate Action project was launched in October 2020 and is supported by governments in 15 countries. The project is free, student-centred and aims to lead to a change of behaviour through education. The project has collaborated with WWF and NASA and allows teachers to connect and interact with other teachers from every continent. Now thats a great move Bhumi!
By Trend

The Armenian authorities controlling the separatist regime in Karabakh have crossed the red line, despite the fact that all the years after the ceasefire came into force, Baku has patiently tried to resolve the conflict peacefully, Guram Markhulia, President of the "Caucasus International Center for the Study of Geohistory and Geopolitics" told Trend.

As he noted, this is exactly why the Armenian leaders are turning to their diasporas, resettling people from Lebanon to the occupied territories in order to convince the world community that this is Armenian territory.

According to the expert, even refugees from Lebanon and Syria do not want to move to the occupied lands of Karabakh, since they do not consider these lands to be Armenian.

"In his recent speech, President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev reiterated that the four resolutions of the UN General Assembly on the liberation of Azerbaijani lands are not being implemented. It is a pity that international organizations are not active in this matter," said the expert.

According to Markhulia, the world community knows that Nagorno-Karabakh belongs to Azerbaijan and Azerbaijan is recognized by the world community as an independent state.

"But sooner or later any patience comes to an end. How long it is possible to negotiate in vain, and even more so in conditions when Azerbaijan is clearly being provoked," Markhulia said.

The expert has no doubts that the blow from Azerbaijan will be powerful, given the arsenal, fighting spirit and mood of the Azerbaijani Army, and its result will be the restoration of the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan.

"But do the Armenians understand the consequences of their destructive position and policy?," Markhulia asked.

--

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
The first presidential debate is scheduled to begin in four days, when Trump and Biden take the stage in Cleveland to answer questions from Fox News's Chris Wallace. The biggest question of all is whether Biden will show up or suddenly come down with the Wuhan virus. The second biggest question is whether, if Biden does show, he'll be functional. The Washington Post confesses that people close to Biden are worried, but that fear is assuaged with the ludicrous claim that Trump won't be able to handle tough questions, either  because he never gets them!

As we near the first 2020 presidential debate, Biden is the invisible man. Thomas Lifson has advanced the credible theory that Biden's campaign is trying to alter his circadian rhythm. If, as people speculate, Biden has dementia, he's going to be prone to sundowning, which means that, as the day draws to a close, he could become increasingly confused and even delusional. Lifson believes that Biden's team is trying to move his internal clock ahead by 12 hours so his body believes that the debates are taking place in the morning rather than in the evening. In that way, Biden will be at his best.

Trump has been blunt: he believes that Biden will be full of drugs to help him keep his focus for the debate. At the same time, Trump makes the important point that Biden has been spouting political talk for 47 years. In theory, even with a brain that's drifting away, training and drugs will ensure that Biden can go through the motions:

Trump is smart to temper expectations. If the expectations for Biden are too low, if he manages to make sense, the media will pronounce him the winner. After all, he's not as incoherent as snippets would have you believe. For example, his seemingly silly statement about quartermasters working in ladies' clothes was part of a longer, poorly expressed but still intelligible point he made in a speech to veterans about jobs after they leave the service:

Even as Trump warns his followers that Biden may make sense, Sean Sullivan and Josh Dawsey, of the Washington Post, wrote an article trying to lower expectations. It's not clear if they're doing so because they're genuinely concerned or because they want Biden's performance to look stellar next to everyone's assumptions that he'll be incoherent.

The article's main professed concern is that Trump may goad Biden into losing his temper. Although the left loves to say Joe is an incredibly nice guy, he's not. He's always had a mean streak, and it's worsened with age. He talks about punching people, insults their intelligence, says they're liars, calls them names, and generally does not show to advantage when his dander is up. Or, as the Post's writers delicately say:

The prospect of a cage match between a president for whom no subject is off-limits and a challenger who can be openly emotional is making some Biden advisers nervous. They see a fine line between Biden's passion and empathy, which can appeal to voters, and the raw anger that sometimes gets him in trouble and could undercut his pitch as a calming alternative to a president who thrives on chaos. "When you go at his family, he becomes hotter than hell, which is part of the thing I worry about," said John Morgan, a Florida trial lawyer and major Biden donor. "I think what Biden has to be careful about is not letting his Irish temper blow when that happens." Biden-supporters shouldn't be too worried, though, the writers counsel. First, they say, Trump isn't much for preparation. "The president's view is: He's been president for four years, he's been in training every day," one ally said. "He thinks he doesn't need any prep."

Second, both candidates' lack of debate experience is a double-edged sword. The authors are concerned that Biden's last election year debate was in 2012, but they believe that the primaries helped buff his skills. It's Trump, though, who the Post warns should be most worried: "Trump himself has rarely been exposed to hostile questioning during his presidency  so he, too, could be out of practice."

In what universe do these post reporters exist? There has not been a single day of his presidency when Trump hasn't fielded hostile questions from the media, all of which are phrased in the most disrespectful tones. If there's one thing Trump can handle with equanimity  indeed, with the fierce joy of a true warrior  it's hostile questioning.

Don't underestimate Biden, who's ridden at the debate rodeo before, and who will have been prepped and energized in ways we don't even want to imagine. But don't underestimate Trump, either. He can think on his feet and has the magical knack of making leftists expose their worst selves.

Image: Created in Pixlr; underlying photos are from the public domain and a YouTube screen grab.
The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) announced late on Saturday it has pulled out of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) coalition at the Centre over the passage of contentious farm bills passed in Parliament earlier this month.

Sukhbir Singh Badal, the SAD president, said after a marathon meeting of the partys core committee, the top decision-making body, that all leaders were unanimous in deciding that they can longer be part of the NDA.

Shiromani Akali Dal core committee decides unanimously to pull out of the BJP-led #NDA because of the Centres stubborn refusal to give statutory legislative guarantees to protect assured marketing of crops on #MSP and its continued insensitivity to Punjabi and #Sikh issues, Badal, whose party has been one of the oldest allies of the BJP, tweeted late in the night.

Shiromani Akali Dal core committee decides unanimously to pull out of the BJP-led #NDA because of the Centres stubborn refusal to give statutory legislative guarantees to protect assured marketing of crops on #MSP and its continued insensitivity to Punjabi and #Sikh issues. pic.twitter.com/WZGy7EmfFj  Sukhbir Singh Badal (@officeofssbadal) September 26, 2020

The SAD and the BJP had been allies since 1996 when both forged a pre-poll alliance ahead of the 1997 Punjab assembly elections which brought them to power.

The announcement came days after SAD leader Harsimrat Kaur Badal resigned as the minister of food processing industries from the Union Cabinet to protest against the government pushing through the farm bills seeking to liberalise agricultural markets in Parliament. She had resigned on September 17.

Also Read: Harsimrat Kaur Badal quits Cabinet over farm bills

However, while announcing the SADs decision to withdraw its only representative from the Narendra Modi Cabinet, Sukhbir Singh Badal had said the party will continue to support the government and the BJP but will oppose anti-farmer policies.

On Saturday, Sukhbir Singh Badal said the SAD will continue to stand by its core principles of peace, communal harmony and guard the interest of Punjab and Punjabi in general, and Sikhs and farmers in particular. He said the decision has been taken in consultation with the people of Punjab, especially party workers and farmers.

Also read: Failed to convince govt about farmers grouse: Harsimrat Kaur Badal

Badal said the bills on agricultural sector brought by the BJP-led government are lethal and disastrous for the already beleaguered farmers. He said the SAD was the oldest ally of the BJP, but the government did not listen to it in honouring the sentiments of farmers.

The SAD is the third major NDA ally to pull out of the coalition after the Shiv Sena and the Telegu Desam Party (TDP).
By PTI

AHMEDABAD: The Gujarat government- organised Navratri festival will not be celebrated this year in view of the COVID-19 pandemic, Chief Minister Vijay Rupani said on Saturday.

However, the government has not yet clarified its stand on whether Navratri celebrations, marked by 'garba' dance, will be allowed to be organised by individuals.

"The nine-day traditional state-level Navratri festival, organised by the state government every year will not be celebrated in the larger public interest due to the prevailing COVID-19 pandemic situation this year," a release quoted Chief Minister Vijay Rupani as saying.

The festival was supposed to be held between October 17 and October 25.

The government's decision comes at a time when the state has reported over 1.3 lakh confirmed coronavirus cases and more than 3,400 deaths.

The state-level garba function, held at GMDC Ground in Ahmedabad every year, was started by Prime Minister Narendra Modi when he was chief minister of Gujarat.

The PM had participated in the festival last year and performed 'aarti' at the GMDC ground.
NASA has released an intriguing image of cyclones in Jupiter's north pole that appears to be swirls of striking colours. The image was previously taken by NASAs Juno mission to inspect the gas giant on the planet and its citizen scientist Gerald Eichstadt first created a composite image from the selection of Juno views and then processed it in extreme false colour.

Calling it Jupiters roses, NASA shared the picture on social media Friday, September 25. Even though it is different than the normal view, the rendered image gives the researchers a vivid perspective on the planets violent, stormy atmosphere. NASA explained, The greatly exaggerated colour is partially a result of combining many individual images to create this view.

Read - Can You See Jupiter Tonight? Find Out Which Celestial Bodies Will Be Seen Tonight

Read - A Closer Look At Jupiter Surface Pictures And Features; Check Out

How was the pattern derived?

Elaborating on the composition of the incredible image, NASA said the huge, persistent cyclone that is found at Jupiters north pole is visible in the centre which is further encircled by smaller cyclones ranging from 4,000 to 4,600 kilometres. When seen together, the pattern of storms covers an area greater than that of Earth.

Eichstadt worked on the image that was taken by the Juno spacecraft in February this year. NASAs Juno mission has been credited for providing the first clear view of the planets polar regions including similar patterns of storms at its south pole. The Jovian InfraRed Auroral Mapper (JIRAM) instrument on the spacecraft has mapped the entire region.

Recently, a new portrait of Jupiter captured by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope on August 25 was released by the space agency that updated the scientists about a significant storm brewing. The new pictures also showed the 'cousin' of the famous Great Red Spot on Jupiter gearing up to change its colour.

As @NASAHubble captured new images of storms on Jupiter, @NASA satellites are keeping an eye on an active Atlantic hurricane season. Hurricane #Sally, seen here, dropped up to 16 inches of rain in some areas as it made landfall.https://t.co/91dCMEOGazhttps://t.co/j6sxBojaf2 pic.twitter.com/HJjlknm04J  NASA Earth (@NASAEarth) September 17, 2020

Read - NASA's Hubble Captures Crisp New Portrait Of Jupiter As Great Red Spot Plows Into Storm

Read - Jupiter, Saturn, And Moon To Align Second Time This Weekend, To Form A Triangle

Image Credit: NASA
DMDK founder and actor A Vijayakant has been admitted to the private MIOT Hospital in Chennai after he tested positive for Coronavirus on September 22.

He was completely stable and was expected to make a full recovery, an update from the hospital said on Thursday, adding that he should be ready for discharge soon.

A press release from the DMDK, however, said that Vijayakant went to MIOT Hospital on regular check-up that he would undergo every six months and was found to be having mild symptoms of Covid-19.

He was treated for that immediately and was cured of the illness, the party press release said.

Meanwhile, leaders cutting across party lines wished Vijayakant a speedy recovery. Chief Minister Eadappadi K Palaniswami, in a tweet, said that he had spoken to his wife and party treasurer, Premalatha, and enquired about the actors health

Deputy Chief Minister O Panneerselvam also tweeted, wishing a speedy recovery to Vijaykant, while DMK President posted in Facebook he wanted him to be back in public life.

MDMK general secretary Vaiko described him as a well mannered and nice man to be friends with and wished him a speedy recovery.

From Kollywood, too, there were too many wishes for his recovery. Actors Rajinikanth and Sathyaraj spoke to the actors family members and enquired about his health, while Radha Ravi said he was shocked to hear the news of his hospitalization. Director Gowthaman also wished him a speedy recovery.
CHENNAI: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Saturday (September 26) filed a chargesheet against nine Tamil Nadu Police officers including then station house in-charge (SHO) of Sathankulam police station, in connection with the custodial deaths of father-son duo P Jayaraj and J Bennicks.

A CBI spokesperson said the agency filed the chargesheet against 9 police officials -- S Sridhar, K Balakrishnan, P Raghuganesh, AS Murugan, A. Samadurai, AM Muthuraja, S Chelladurai, X Thomas Francis, S Veilumuthu, -- all from Sathankulam Police Station in Tamil Nadu. The agency filed the chargesheet in a Madurai court under several sections of the Indian Penal Code.

According to the CBI official one accused, then a Sub Inspector died during the investigation. The CBI registered two cases on July 7 related to the allegations of custodial death of the father-son duo of traders in Tamil Nadu`s Kovilpatti on the request of the Tamil Nadu government and further notification by the Centre.

Live TV

After registering the case, a CBI team camped continuously at Madurai and worked on the cases even through the COVID-19 pandemic. Nine CBI officers were infected with coronavirus while investigating the case.

The incident took place on June 19 when the father-son duo was arrested for keeping their mobile shop open in Sathankulam market during the COVID-19 infused curfew. According to reports, the duo was subjected to extreme torture while in custody after which they were admitted to Kovilpatti government hospital on June 22.

While son J Bennicks died the same night, his father P Jayaraj breathed his last the next morning.

The incident led to massive uproar across the country with a demand for strict action against the accused police officers.
BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept. 26

Trend:

Azerbaijani Ambassador to Russia Polad Bulbuloghlu visited Russias Saint Petersburg city and met with Governor Alexander Beglov during the visit, Trend reports citing the Azerbaijani Embassy in Russia.

During the meeting, the sides discussed issues related to preparation for Azerbaijan's participation in the 9th St. Petersburg International Cultural Forum, which will be held on November 12-14, 2020.

This year, Azerbaijan will partake in this international event with a special "guest" status.

The sides also exchanged views on the further development of humanitarian and cultural ties, the export of agricultural products from Azerbaijan to St. Petersburg and other issues of mutual interest.
A 32-year-old Worcester resident is facing charges Saturday after allegedly stealing a truck from a hospital and crashing it into the Worcester Police Department cell room entrance.

The delivery truck was stolen from the parking lot at Saint Vincent Hospital. The suspect drove down the street to the station, crashing into the station cell room entrance around 5:15 a.m., according to police spokesman Lt. Sean Murtha.

Louis Diamond, of Edwidge Street, is facing a series of charges including larceny of a motor vehicle, vandalism, aiding a prisoner in police custody, negligent driving and breaking and entering in the nighttime to commit a felony. Diamond will be arraigned in Worcester District Court.

The crash caused significant damage to the cell room doors, police said, but did not cause any serious injuries.

No further information was available as of Saturday afternoon.
Before Hamilton police found 20-year-old Amy Hager dead inside her downtown apartment, officers had been called there before over arguments between her and her 39-year-old boyfriend.

While the calls were considered minor, experts say any type of domestic violence can be a warning sign of danger.

Hagers boyfriend, Shaun Chiasson, is charged with second-degree murder in her death.

It is absolutely, profoundly devastating ... anywhere. And when its in your own community, its that much more impactful, said Nancy Smith, executive director of Interval House of Hamilton.

Whenever a woman is killed, the first thing she always thinks about is that womans partner, said Smith, who is co-chair of the Women Abuse Working Group, alongside Good Shepherd Womens Services director Tessa Mcfadzean.

Because, she said, evidence shows a pattern of behaviour, whether in Hamilton, Ontario or across Canada: Most women are killed by a current or former partner.

Smith did not know Hager and is not privy to police evidence in the case, but she says there are usually warning signs.

Police search around the King Street East apartment building where Amy Hager was killed Monday night, finding nothing. John Rennison/The Hamilton Spectator

Often neighbours hear yelling and arguing ... thats the tip of the iceberg, she said, adding that it can quickly escalate to more violent acts.

Hager and Chiasson had been together for at least a couple of years, first in Brampton and then in Hamilton.

Det. Sgt. Peter Thom, of the major crime unit, said there are police records both from Hamilton and Peel Regional Police for calls about arguments.

Hamiltons victims of crime unit will be reviewing those previous incidents, Thom said.

Police can flag addresses where there is concern for domestic violence, even where no charges have been laid, but that does not appear to have happened in this case.

Before her death, Hager hadnt seen her family in a couple of years, but kept in touch by text message every couple of months, Thom said.

Now, her devastated family is asking for privacy as police try to piece together what was happening in her life before she was killed. Its believed she spent most of her time with Chiasson.

It seems to have been very much just the two of them, Thom said.

What is known, is that she didnt work and was supported by disability benefits. Neighbours in the walk-up brick apartment building at 907 King St. E. where the pair lived knew her to say hello, but police have only found people who knew Hager  both superficially.

Police would like to hear from anyone who knew her in Hamilton.

Thom said an autopsy was complete Wednesday evening, however, police are not releasing her cause of death.

It is alleged a weapon was used and detectives believe they found that weapon inside the third-floor apartment, he said.

Police found her body after first being called to the area of King Street East and Sherman Avenue to help with an ambulance call around 9:10 p.m. on Monday, Sept. 21. Chiasson was in front of the apartment building and was hurt.

Thom wouldnt give details about the state Chiasson was in, but said it was unusual.

Its believed Chiasson may have exited his third floor apartment through a window and gone out to the street to seek help.

His injuries could be consistent with him making his way out the apartment not though his front door, Thom said.

The exact details of what happened are not clear, but police do not believe Hager hurt Chiasson and there is no evidence anyone else was involved.

He was taken to hospital, where he underwent surgery. Police had recognized Chiasson from past dealings and, given his appearance, were concerned about what may have happened in the apartment.

A superintendent let police into their unit around 10 p.m., and they discovered Hagers body. Its believed she had been dead for some time.

Detectives are trying to narrow down the last time she was seen alive, including by reviewing surveillance video, canvassing the area and appealing for anyone who may have seen Hager to come forward, Thom said.

Police, including forensics, have been at the scene since Monday night. They expected to release the scene Friday afternoon.

Police also searched around the King Street East apartment building, but found nothing.

Detectives believed Hager was the victim right away, but it took until the autopsy Wednesday to officially identify her. Then, on Thursday morning, police notified her family.

Through police, the family provided a photo of Hager. It is a school picture from 2016.

At the time of her death, her hair was darker, she was a little over five-foot-two and weighed less than 100 pounds. Thom said police would like to hear from anyone who may have seen her Monday.

According to the Canadian Femicide Observatory for Justice and Accountability 118 women and girls were killed in Canada in 2019, on average one every three days.

In Hamilton, this includes dozens of cases over the last several decades.

Most recently, Holly Hamilton was stabbed 17 times and was found in the trunk of her car in January 2018. Her ex-boyfriend, Justin Dumpfrey, is charged with second-degree murder. A mistrial was declared at his first trial last January. A new trial was supposed to start in September, but has been delayed.

Natasha Thompson, a 36-year-old mother, was shot dead on her neighbours doorstep in November 2017. Her boyfriend, Mark Joseph Champagne, is charged with second-degree murder. His case also remains before the courts.

Hamilton police responded to 7,090 calls for domestic violence last year, including 1,657 incidents in which charges were laid.

In Ontario, there is mandatory charging in domestic violence cases, meaning police must always lay charges if there is evidence. The most common charges include assault, threatening, criminal harassment and failing to comply with court orders.

Smith, the co-chair, said the Women Abuse Working Group has often shown support for families in court and written community victim impact statements when domestic violence killers are sentenced.

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, she said local organizations initially saw the number of women in shelters decrease.

Our biggest fear was the silence, Smith said, adding that the isolation imposed by the pandemic increased the risk of domestic and sexual violence.

Organizations braced for a surge. That surge did come, along with increased demand for programming. The demand has remained high with shelters at or over capacity ever since.

While awareness about gender-based violence has grown in recent years, the problem has also grown.

Hamilton organizations work collaboratively together, she said. But we need to do much more.

This includes everything from educating young people, to modelling healthy relationships, to believing women, to maintaining funding commitments from all levels of government.

Domestic violence is its own global pandemic, Smith said.

Chiasson was expected to appear in court by video Friday afternoon. He remains in custody.

Anyone with information, who knew Hager or who may have seen her before she was killed, is asked to call Det. Lisa Chambers at 905-546-3843.

To remain anonymous, contact Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-8477 or crimestoppershamilton.com.

Nicole OReilly is a Hamilton-based reporter covering crime and justice for The Spectator. Reach her via email: noreilly@thespec.com

Domestic violence resources

Assaulted Womens Helpline: 1-866-863-0511

Femaide: francophone womens support line: 1-877-336-2433

Hamilton Police Services victim services branch: 905-546-4904

Sexual Assault Centre (Hamilton and Area) support line: 905-525-4162

Inasmuch House emergency crisis line: 905-529-8600

Interval House Hamilton emergency crisis line: 905-387-8881

Martha House emergency crisis line: 905-523-6277

Marys Place emergency crisis line: 905-540-8000

Native Womens Centre emergency crisis line: 1-888-308-6559

For more resources, including tips on recognizing abuse and safety planning, go to the Women Abuse Working Group website: wawg.ca
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They are young men who live their lives on the fast lane. They love the good things of life but lack the legitimate means to acquire them. Rather than seek legitimate means of fulfilling their fantasies, they took to cybercrimes, defrauding unsuspecting individuals and organisations until they recently came under the radar of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

The onslaught by operatives of the anti-corruption agency has since dislodged these young persons from their bases in the urban centres to various rural communities, particularly in the Southwest to escape EFCCs searchlight.

It was gathered that many remote settlements in Lagos, Oyo, Osun, Ondo, Ekiti and Ogun states are now hosts to fleeing internet fraudsters. They include communities like Ikotun, Ojodu-Berger, Alagbado, Abule Egba, Badagry, Ijanikin, Oto-Awori, Lambe, Matogun, Giwa, Oke Aro, Ajuwon, Akute, Ifo, Ewekoro, Ilaro, Ijebu Ode, Sagamu, Ilisan Remo, Itele, Atan, Ogbomoso, Oshogbo, Ado Ekiti, and Akure, safe havens where some of the embattled fraudsters are now recruiting young school leavers into their syndicates.

True to its slogan, you can run but you cant hide, however, the anti-graft agency is unrelenting in smoking out the scammers popularly called yahoo boys from their various hideouts. One such was a raid carried out in the early hours of June 16 at Itele, a sleepy community near Ota in Ogun State, in June this year. Residents of the community were roused recently by the unusual presence of EFCC operatives who cordoned off several roads as they searched vehicles that moved in and out of the community in an operation that was to shock unsuspecting residents.

A few minutes later, their targets were picked up in their posh vehicles while one of the scammers escaped in his car.

At the end of the raid, the operatives attached to the Lagos Zonal Office of EFCC arrested five yahoo boys, namely Adeshina Michael, Ayeni Emiloju, Odenigbo Anthony, Afolabi Gbenga and Oyibogbola David Seun.

Posh cars of different brands allegedly acquired with the proceeds of their fraudulent activities were recovered from the suspects.

Investigation conducted by The Nation revealed that no fewer than 32 internet fraudsters who had relocated from Lagos to Ogbomosho in Oyo State were smoked out of their hideouts on Tuesday, August 11 by personnel of Ibadan Zonal Office of the EFCC,

In October last year, anti-graft personnel recovered the sum of N223 million from the bank account of an alleged internet fraud kingpin, Ajayi Gbenga Festus, during a raid on his hideout in Ekiti State.

The suspect was allegedly the head of a syndicate dislodged from the city, who relocated to a remote community in Ado-Ekiti to beat the dragnet of the EFCC.

According to the spokesman of the Ibadan Zonal Head of the anti-graft agency, Mr Friday Ebelo, during a media briefing at Iyaganku, Ibadan zonal office, Festus was working in concert with other cyber criminals overseas.

He described Festus cartel as highly sophisticated web of a conspiracy designed to illegally access the accounts of individuals and organisations to defraud them of their money.

He added: Illicit transactions made through Festus Nigerian bank accounts amounted to N223 million. The suspect served as a conduit pipe through which proceeds of crime reached members of the syndicate.

Ebelo added that Festus had pocketed up to N75 million within eight months from the illicit transactions.

Like others, 26 yahoo boys were smoked out of his Modzak Hotel in Abule Egba, a suburb of Lagos on December 4, 2019.

The raid was carried out by EFCC personnel attached to its Ibadan zonal office on a hotel believed to be a hideout for internet fraudsters.

The operation was a sequel to a manhunt for one Rasaq Balogun, a suspected internet fraud kingpin, whose illicit activities were uncovered during a raid on the hideout of suspected internet scammers in Abeokuta, Ogun State.

Balogun was said to have recruited and harboured in his Modzak Hotel (in Abule Egba) yahoo boys to carry out scams on the internet.

The suspected kingpin and 26 other young men whose age ranged between 18 and 35, were arrested and taken to the Commissions Ibadan zonal office for further interrogation.

Also recovered from the suspects were three vehicles, fetish items, laptops, mobile phones, and documents suspected to contain fraudulent data from the suspect.

Follow Us on Facebook  @LadunLiadi; Instagram  @LadunLiadi; Twitter  @LadunLiadi; Youtube  @LadunLiadiTV for updates
Supporters of President Trump listen as he speaks at a campaign rally in Jacksonville on Thursday night. (Copyright 2020 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)

Donald Trump on Friday night plans to buck state and local health officials who are warning of a severe public health threat when he holds what they are calling a gargantuan rally at a southeast Virginia airport .

The presidents re-election campaign is planning to pack up to 4,000 people into an airport hangar at Newport News/Williamsburg International Airport. Local officials have placed a crowd limit of 250 people on public gatherings.

Natasha Dwamena, director of the Hampton and Peninsula Health District, has asked the presidents campaign organisation and the company that operates the hangar to limit the crowd to 250 people. The Trump campaign, however, has signaled it has no plans to divert from its initial plans.

In a letter to Richard Martinez, general manager of Atlantic Aviation, Ms Dwamena said a crowd of 4,000 would pose a concerning public health risk.

But local and state officials reportedly told reporters on Thursday even if an injunction was slapped on the company that owns the hangar, it would come after the event  so they cannot stop it.

There likely is nothing officials can do to persuade a president who is publicly Covid-skeptical, and mocks mask-wearing.

At a campaign stop at a Jacksonville, Florida airport, Mr Trump reveled in the size of the crowd there.

You can't lose when you have a crowd, you can't lose. You know you can look at the crowd. I can look at this crowd. I can look at it as far as the eye can see, he said to loud cheers.

As far as the eye can see I'd leave here, I said we're not losing Florida, he said. I can tell you that you can tell you can feel it. You can feel it. You have an instinct.

Polls show Mr Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden essentially tied just over a month before the election. Virginia, however, appears safely in the former vice presidents column, though Mr Trump hopes to influence statewide races there.

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The $1.4 million (est.) Massachusetts Sire Stakes kick off on Sunday (Sept. 27) at Plainridge Park and the 2020 edition looks to be one of the most competitive sessions to date. With the flexibility of the Massachusetts resident mare program, many of the eligibles shipping in have already competed in other sire stake programs this year and are coming into these stakes in top form.

The three-year-old divisions for both genders and gaits will take place on Sunday (Sept. 27) followed by the two-year-olds on Monday (Sept. 28). Post time for both days will be 2:00 p.m.

Sundays card has 28 sophomores going postward including two two-year-old champions looking to repeat at three.

Without A Warning (RC Royalty-Concentration) was the 2019 MASS champion two-year-old trotting filly who ended the year with $188,160 on her card after sweeping all three legs and the final.

This year the filly has been competing successfully in the New York Sire Stakes all summer, finished as the second highest point-getter in her division and made the $225,000 final for the second year in a row. In that race she finished a very solid third behind a runaway Hypnotic AM. Two starts before that she posted an impressive win 1:55.1 in a NYSS event at Yonkers Raceway and all told, has made $138,662 in only eight starts this year.

Her main competition is Dramatra (Trixton-Bourbon N Grits) who is a sister to 2013 Hambletonian champion Royalty for Life.

Dramatra has seen limited stake competition in New Jersey, making only five starts over the last two years. But she has been building an impressive resume recently in overnights at Plainridge where she has won four out of her last six starts including a lifetime best 1:55.1 outing in August. She comes into this first leg off a 1:55.3 win and looks to be tuned up and ready for a top effort.

Both fillies are trained by George Ducharme. Scott Zeron will drive Without A Warning from post three at 6-5 and Shawn Gray will steer Dramatra from post two at 9-5.

The other returning champion Sunday is pacing gelding Finnbar (Real Desire-Unbeachable) who is coming off a lifetime best win of 1:53.3 just two weeks ago. He followed up that trip with a solid second place finish after being parked out most of the mile. Has been racing consistently at Plainridge but has shown his best form in those two starts.

Wyatt J (American Ideal-Think Pink) rolls into town on the strength of a four-race win streak at Yonkers Raceway that saw him take a career best mark of 1:53.1. After two NYSS starts earlier this summer, Wyatt J found his groove in overnight condition races and looks to cash in during the month of October in Massachusetts.

Trainer Nancy Longobardi has Ron Cushing up behind Finnbar from post five at 7-1 while Wyatt J will team with Scott Zeron from post two at 9-5 for trainer Linda Toscano.

The three-year-old male trotting division should be very closely contested having three standout performers.

Double Dealing (RC Royalty-Heather Spur) is another Ducharme pupil and was second best in the MASS final last year. In 2020 Double Dealing was very effective in the NYSS Excel A series where he made the $50,000 final. He has four wins this year and took a lifetime mark of 1:54.2 at Tioga Downs.

Then there is the powerful duo from the Domenico Cecere barn, Dazzling Lindy and Marquis Lafayette.

Dazzling Lindy (Crazed-Lindy On The Rocks) finished third in the MASS final last year and has come back looking much improved. In only five starts at Plainridge, Dazzling Lindy has won three while finishing second and third in the other two. His wins include a lifetime best 1:55.2 outing last week.

Marquis Lafayette (Ready For Cash-Highscore Kemp) has only four lifetime starts, but his single 2020 start is worth noting. It was a 13-1/2 length, 1:55.2 romp that gives immediate legitimacy to his presence.

Double Dealing drew the pylons for driver Shawn Gray and is 3-2. Dazzling Lindy and Drew Monti leave from post six at 2-1 and Marquis Lafayette starts from post five at 5-2 for Scott Zeron.

The three-year-old pacing fillies are also closely matched with a former track record holder leading the way.

Rys Red Rocket (Sunshine Beach-Mo Molly Blue Chip) broke the Plainridge track record for three-year-old pacing fillies on July 23 when she went a personal best 1:52.2 mile. Whereas that mark has since been broken again, she has continued to race well through the summer and is highly regarded here.

Shes A Fireball (Western Maverick-Fire Can Fly) was the Maine Sire Stake champion at two but did not fare well in the MASS final after making a break. This year she has two wins, a new mark of 1:55.1 and was race timed in 1:52.4 while finishing only 1-3/4 lengths behind Rys Red Rocket in her track record performance.

Trainer Gretchen Athearn has Matty Ice Athearn up behind Rys Red Rocket who drew post six at 3-2 while Ron Cushing will steer Shes A Fireball from the pylons at 5-2 for trainer Heidi Gibbs.

The two-year-old divisions begin on Monday (Sept. 28) as 33 first-year campaigners go postward.

The trotting fillies will go in two divisions week one and each has a definite favorite.

Moni For Lindy (Credit Winner-Live Moni) competed twice in the NYSS this year, winning at Tioga Downs in 1:55.3. She won two starts ago in the Wood End Light series at Plainridge Park in 1:57.4 and is the even money chalk from post four in the short field. The Domenico Cecere-trained filly will be driven by Scott Zeron.

In the second split, Me Too Baby (Muscle Hill-Baby Shaq) comes in off an impressive gate-to-wire victory in 1:58.2 in a division of the Wood End Light and looks to have a decided advantage over her competitors after that start. Me Too Baby is the 3-5 favourite off the pylons for Team Athearn.

The pacing males have several strong entrants and the weeks leading up to the finals should be interesting.

Mullinax (American Ideal-Up Front Kellie Jo) was a star in the NYSS Excel A series this year, winning two legs before going a lifetime best 1:53.2 mile in the $50,000 final. He has won four out of his last five starts, finishing second in the other which brings him into this race at his best for trainer Mark Ford.

Maui (Bettors Delight-Barbara Ann) had two impressive wins in 1:54 and 1:54.3 in conditioned races before falling short in his most recent effort in Plainridges Nauset Light series while stablemate Dancing Lew (Rocknroll Dance-Love Rocks) just took his mark of 1:54.4 at Plainridge after finishing fifth in his lone Pennsylvania Stallion Series start at the Downs at Mohegan Sun Pocono. Both geldings hail from the Kevin Switzer stable.

Mullinax is 2-1 from post seven with Scott Zeron, Maui leaves from post two with Shawn Gray at 8-5 and Dancing Lew drew post six with Bruce Ranger at 7-2.

The trotting colts and geldings feature two more standouts from the NYSS.

Incommunicado (Chapter Seven-Gran Cavalla) was the fourth leading point-getter among his peers and finished third in the NYSS final at Yonkers after cutting the mile and falling short by only half a length. Trainer Ake Svanstedt will be making his first appearance in the MASS and looks to be one to beat.

Beantown Madness (Conway Hall-Armbro Archer) competed in the NYSS Excel B series all summer where he amassed four wins in five starts. In his last start at Plainridge he won by five lengths in a career best 1:56.1, which was only 2/5ths of a second off the track record. Another George Ducharme trainee, Beantown Madness -- the half-brother to the great Arch Madness -- will have much to say in the coming weeks.

Incommunicado leaves from post six at 2-1 with Scott Zeron and Beantown Madness drew post eight with Shawn Gray at 3-2.

The pacing fillies offer a wide-open affair that should go down to the wire.

Rightfully Mine (American Ideal-Leah) finished as the third top point-getter in the NYSS and made the final where she drew poorly and had a rough trip.

So Amazing (So Surreal-Teddy Ballgirl) was a NYSS Excel A star that also made that final and had an unfortunate draw. So Amazing beat Rightfully Mine at Plainridge Park on September 4 in the Nauset Light series where she went a career best 1:53.4.

Suzie Blue Chip (American Ideal-Betty Hill) comes in off three straight wins including her 1:54.4 best at Plainridge and a NYSS Excel B event.

Rightfully Mine drew post two for trainer Sheena Mcelhiney who has Scott Zeron up at 2-1, Ducharmes So Amazing drew post seven at 5-1 for Bruce Ranger and Suzie Blue Chip starts from post six at 9-5 with Shawn Gray up for Eve Bergeron.

Here is the complete MASS schedule:

Sunday, September 27, 2020

Three-year-old first leg

Monday, September 28, 2020

Two-year-old first leg

Sunday, October 4, 2020

Three-year-old second leg

Monday, October 5, 2020

Two-year-old second leg

Sunday, October 18, 2020

Two-year-old third leg

Monday, October 19, 2020

Three-year-old third leg

Monday, October 26, 2020

Two- and three-year-old finals

(Standardbred Owners of Massachusetts)
NHK has learned that residents of a town in western Japan oppose a plan to build a cemetery for Muslims.

Muslims face a lack of burial sites in Japan, where the dead are normally cremated.

To help solve the problem, a Muslim group based in Beppu City, Oita Prefecture, purchased a roughly 8,000 square meter plot of land in neighboring Hiji Town. The group is preparing to apply for permission from the town to build a cemetery.

But residents of two districts near the site have submitted a petition signed by more than 100 people to the town office and the town assembly.

They cite concerns that drainage water from the cemetery would contaminate their irrigation and drinking water.

Eto Kiyotaka, who proposed the petition, says the Muslim group has said the cemetery plan would be canceled if water quality tests indicate problems. But Eto says if problems happen, it will already be too late.

Khan Muhammad Tahir Abbas, who heads the Beppu Muslim Association, says he's disappointed that local residents do not accept the group's explanation that burials are carried out around the world. He says his group will continue efforts to allay their concerns.

The town assembly plans to vote on the petition on Thursday after which the town office says it will consider its response.
CHICAGO - Although Amy Coney Barrett is the presidents choice to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, she is more aptly described as heir to another departed Supreme Court justice: conservative hero Antonin Scalia.

Like Scalia, for whom she once clerked, she is a committed Roman Catholic and a devotee of his favoured interpretation of the Constitution known as originalism. Those qualifications delight many on the right but dismay liberals who fear her votes could result in the chipping away of some laws, especially the Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion.

President Donald Trump nominated the 48-year-old federal court appellate judge from South Bend, Indiana, at a Rose Garden press conference Saturday.

In remarks moments after Trump named her, with her husband and their seven children looking on, Barrett paid homage to Ginsburg.

I will be mindful of who came before me, she said, citing Ginsburgs career as a trailblazer for womens rights. She not only broke glass ceilings; she smashed them.

But Barrett also highlighted how she is, in her approach to the law, a polar opposite to Ginsburg.

She said of Scalia: His judicial philosophy is mine, too.

Her nomination sets Barrett on the path to help conservatives hold sway over the court for decades. Its as sure to energize the presidents base as it is to galvanize his foes heading to Election Day. Senate Republican leaders have said they have the votes to confirm her this year, likely before Novembers election.

Beyond the election, Barretts elevation could bring a national reckoning over abortion, an issue that has bitterly divided many Americans for almost half a century. The idea of overturning or gutting Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 decision, has been an animating political issue exploited by both sides.

Her writings and speeches show a commitment to originalism, a concept that involves justices endeavouring to decipher original meanings of texts in assessing whether someones rights have been violated. Many liberals say that approach is too rigid and doesnt allow the Constitutions consequences to adjust to changing times.

On abortion, questions have arisen about Barretts involvement in organizations that vigorously oppose it. But she has not said publicly she would, if given the chance, seek to scale back rights affirmed by the high court.

Barrett has been a federal judge since 2017, when Trump nominated her to the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. But as a longtime University of Notre Dame law professor, she had already established herself as a reliable conservative in Scalias mould.

She gained a reputation as a Scalia clerk in the late 1990s as bright and adept at picking apart poorly reasoned arguments. Ara Lovitt, who clerked with her, recalled at her investiture ceremony for the 7th Circuit that Scalia had high praise for her.

Isnt Amy great, Lovitt remembers Scalia saying.

On Saturday, Barrett also referenced the close friendship between Ginsburg and fellow opera lover Scalia, saying Ginsburg showed that justices can disagree on principles without rancour in person.

Before becoming a judge, Barrett discussed how court precedents provide welcome stability in the law. But she seemed to leave the door open to the possibility of reversing ones about which there remained sharp disagreement.

Once a precedent is deeply rooted, a 2017 article in the University of Pennsylvania Journal of constitutional Law, which Barrett co-wrote, said, the Court is no longer required to deal with the question of the precedents correctness. But it added: None of this is to say that a Justice cannot attempt to overturn long-established precedent. While institutional features may hinder that effort, a Justice is free to try.

Barrett and her husband, Jesse Barrett, a former federal prosecutor, both graduated from Notre Dame Law School. Their seven children include two adopted from Haiti and one with special needs.

Trump said Saturday that Barrett would be the first female justice to serve with small children. Looking at her kids in the front row, the president said: Thank you for sharing your mom.

Barrett would be the only justice on the current court not to have received her law degree from an Ivy League school. The eight current justices all attended either Harvard or Yale.

If she is confirmed, six of the nine justices will be Catholic.

How her religious beliefs might guide her legal views became a focus for some Democrats during bruising confirmation hearings after Barretts 7th Circuit nomination. That prompted Republicans to accuse Democrats of seeking to impose a religious test on Barretts fitness for the job.

At Notre Dame, where Barrett began teaching at 30, she often invoked God in articles and speeches. In a 2006 address, she encouraged graduating law students to see their careers as a means to building the kingdom of God.

She was considered a finalist in 2018 for the high court before Trump nominated Brett Kavanaugh for the seat that opened when Justice Anthony Kennedy retired. Even some conservatives worried her sparse judicial record made it too hard to predict how she might rule, concerned she could end up like other seemingly conservatives who wound up more moderate.

Three years on, her record now includes around 100 opinions and dissents, in which she often illustrated Scalias influence by delving deep into historical minutiae to glean the meaning of original texts.

In a 2019 dissent in a gun-rights case, Barrett argued a person convicted of a nonviolent felony shouldnt be automatically barred from owning a gun. All but a few pages of her 37-page dissent were devoted to the history of gun laws in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Barrett twice joined dissenting opinions asking for abortion-related decisions to be thrown out and reheard by the full court. Last year, after a three-judge panel blocked an Indiana law that would make it harder for minors to have an abortion without her parents being notified, Barrett voted to have the case reheard by the full court.

Barretts financial disclosures show ties to a number of conservative groups. She and her husband have investments worth between $845,000 and $2.8 million, according to her 2019 financial disclosure report. Judges report the value of their investments in ranges. Their money is invested mostly in mutual funds.

When she was nominated to the appeals court in 2017, Barrett reported assets of just over $2 million, including her home in Indiana worth nearly $425,000, and a mortgage with a balance of $175,000.

In the two previous years, Barrett received $4,200 in two equal payments from Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative Christian law firm, her financial report shows. In 2018 and 2019, she participated in 10 events sponsored by the Federalist Society, which paid for her transportation, meals and lodging in several cities.

Barrett was raised in New Orleans and was the eldest child of a Shell Oil Co. lawyer. She earned her undergraduate degree in English literature in 1994 at Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee.

She also clerked for Laurence Silberman for a year at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Between clerkships and entering academia, she worked from 1999 to 2001 at a law firm in Washington, Miller, Cassidy, Larroca & Lewin.

___

Associated Press writers Mark Sherman in Washington and Ryan J. Foley in Iowa City, Iowa, contributed to this report.

___

Follow Michael Tarm on Twitter at http://twitter.com/mtarm
Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan on Friday condemned the fresh publication of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed by a French satirical weekly, urging UN efforts against what he called rising Islamophobia.

Addressing the UN General Assembly in a prerecorded message, Khan said that rising global nationalism has accentuated Islamophobia" and said that Muslims continue to be targeted with impunity in many countries."

Incidents in Europe including republication of blasphemous sketches by Charlie Hebdo are recent examples," Khan said.

We stress that willful provocations and incitement to hate and violence must be universally outlawed.

This assembly should declare an international day to combat Islamophobia and build a coalition to fight the scourge."

Charlie Hebdo, known for its irreverent humor and absolutist belief in free speech, has repeatedly stirred anger in the Islamic world by publishing cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed.

Many Muslims consider any physical depiction of their prophet to be blasphemous.

Twelve people were killed in an attack by Islamist gunmen on Charlie Hebdos office in Paris on January 7, 2015.

In a defiant gesture timed with the trial this month of accomplices to the massacre, Charlie Hebdo reprinted some of the caricatures.

On Friday, a man with a cleaver wounded two people outside the newspapers former offices in Paris before being arrested by police.

Blasphemy is an especially sensitive issue in Pakistan, which has seen mob or vigilante killings of people accused of disrespecting Islam.
(Photo : Virtual Private Network: Why You Should Choose NordVPN )

Nowadays, there are many reasons that can lead us to choose a VPN because only with this service can we obtain the necessary privacy so as not to take risks when connected. In fact, surfing the net is definitely dangerous if you don't use the right tools to protect your data and only thanks to a quality private VPN can we really rest assured. It is no longer a secret: there are many companies that offer this type of service but certainly there are some that stand out in terms of reliability and efficiency. NordVPN is one of these and for this reason today we rely on this service to understand what are the advantages of a virtual private network.

First of all, it's good to understand what a VPN is and how it works. The acronym stands for Virtual Private Network. We are therefore talking about an indispensable service to encrypt your internet traffic and therefore to protect your data and your identity on the network. Thanks to a VPN it is possible to surf in complete safety and it is no coincidence that this is a highly recommended service in the business environment, because it allows you to connect the offices located throughout the territory in a simple, immediate but above all safe way. Basically, a VPN can be compared to a geographically extended LAN because it is virtual and therefore accessible from anywhere in the world to those in possession of the permissions.



The VPN works through a specific system called tunneling, which allows you to encrypt your network activities and mask your IP address. In this way, any data entered on the web is untraceable by potential hackers but also by censorship bodies.

The benefits of a NordVPN service

The advantages of the Virtual Private Network often depend on the type of service you choose, so today we rely in particular on NordVPN which is one of the best. Let's see why it is convenient to choose the virtual private network, both in the corporate and non-corporate environments.

Possibility to have a dedicated IP address

In a business environment, having a dedicated IP address allows you to access private servers or remote systems in complete safety. In fact, network administrators can specify a list of authorized IPs and only these have the possibility to access, while all the others remain excluded. In this way, from anywhere in the world you can enter your server without running the risk of intrusion by malicious people and thus protecting the data.

IP address protection



In the private sphere, with NordVPN you can hide your IP address when surfing the net and this is a huge advantage. In this way, in fact, no one can see which sites you visit or which files are downloaded to your device.

24/7 support

Customer support is provided 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. This means that any complaints can be resolved on the spot.

No censorship and bandwidth limits



Another advantage of the VPN service is that it allows you to bypass government censorship. A classic example is Netflix, which normally does not allow access to content from other countries. With the virtual private network it is possible to bypass this limit and also access US Netflix from France, for example. With more than 5000 servers in more than 60 countries, it's clear that this is a very powerful VPN service.

Available on various platforms



NordVPN is available on a wide variety of platforms; Windows, Android, iOS, macOS, Blackberry, and Windows Phone. It's also compatible with a variety of smart TVs, and most importantly, it provides secure proxy connections for Firefox and Chrome.

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Providing various subscription packages; 1-month plan, 1-year plan, 2-year plan and 3-year plan at affordable prices.



1-month plan: $ 11.95 / month

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The payment system is also very flexible as NordVPN accepts multiple payment systems; Visa, MasterCard, Bitcoin, Alipay and many more.

There are many other advantages that are not listed in this post. One thing is for sure, NordVPN is the best VPN service to date.

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
This is Naked Capitalism fundraising week. 827 donors have already invested in our efforts to combat corruption and predatory conduct, particularly in the financial realm. Please join us and participate via our donation page, which shows how to give via check, credit card, debit card, or PayPal. Read about why were doing this fundraiser, what weve accomplished in the last year, and our current goal, thanking our guest writers.

Brainiacs, not birdbrains: Crows possess higher intelligence long thought a primarily human attribute STAT

Kitty see, kitty do: cat imitates human, in first scientific demonstration of behavior Science

When the pandemic quieted San Francisco, these birds could hear each other sing National Geographic (nvm).

First Evidence of a Planet in Another Galaxy Discover

Zombie storms are rising from the dead thanks to climate change Live Science (dk).

Expect Plagues of Locusts as Climate Change Gets Worse, Say Scientists Vice (Re Silc). On plagues of locusts, see NC here, here, here, and here.

Debt collectors bulk up to deal with US property loan defaults FT

Revenge of the Money Launderers Matt Taibbi

The Trouble with Carbon Pricing Boston Review

Will Gavin Newsom Stand Up to Big Oil? Capital & Main

#COVID19

Not Much Progress on PPE Reshoring MedPage Today

China?

To help defuse US-China tensions, Asian states must agree on Americas role in region South China Morning Post

Rat-ical hero: Landmine detection rat Magawa wins gold medal for life-saving work in Cambodia Channel News Asia

UK/EU

New Cold War

The Deportation Machine (Review) NACLA

Trump Transition

Trump Approves Final Plan to Import Drugs From Canada for a Fraction of the Price KHN. Small ball What the Intelligence Community Doesnt Know Is Hurting the United States Center for American Progress. It doesnt know who reads their memos: Despite what the IC may know about other things, it tracks almost no data about those who consume intelligence, including the president and his or her national security team; policymakers; law enforcement; the military; and the U.S. Congress. This shortcoming means that the IC cannot observe customer-related patterns and trends, provide insights into what its customers value, or inform business-related decisions such as which collection platforms will yield the highest return on investment. Neera carrying water. Trump downplays impending arrival of Galactus, Devourer of Worlds. Duffel Blog

2020

Supreme Court Battle

Assange

Boeing

Airlines Face Desolate Future as Attempts to Reopen Crumble Bloomberg

Riots and Protests

Imperial Collapse Watch

Class Warfare

Former YouTube content moderator describes horrors of the job in new lawsuit CNBC

People expect technology to suck because it actually sucks Tonsky

Antidote du Jour (via):

See yesterday Link and Antidote du Jour here.
A second night of downtown Charleston protests ended as it began, with protesters dividing themselves into small groups across the street from each other, avoiding police who pledged to disperse any large, non-permitted gatherings.

Before about 30 demonstrators gathered at the corner of King and Calhoun streets around 6:30 p.m., Charleston police, State Law Enforcement Division and sheriff's deputies gathered downtown, parking cruisers in the square and along Meeting and King streets.

When protesters decrying Sheriff Al Cannon and no-knock warrants tried to turn from their Meeting Street route to Broad Street, deputies forced them back. And protesters made it about a block down King Street before police, led by Chief Luther Reynolds, herded them back up to Marion Square.

It was a repeat of the tactic from the night before when officers kept protesters from marching down the crowded, tourist-friendly street with its upscale shops and restaurants.

"Unlawful assembly of 25+ people without a permit is illegal in the City of Charleston," the Police Department tweeted. "Criminal activity will not be tolerated."

Around 10 p.m., police called Marion Square a "designated area" for the protest, and ordered demonstrators from the sidewalks into the park.

The protest was in response to the recent decision in the shooting death of a Black woman, Breonna Taylor, by police serving a no-knock warrant in Louisville, Ky. Taylor's case has become a rallying cry as protesters nationwide call out racism and demand police reforms.

David Austin Bennett, who has been protesting daily since Wednesday, said he has tried to get permits in the past but was turned down. The "loosely organized" group didnt apply for a permit for Saturday's protest, he said.

By the end of the night, police arrested Bennett on a charge of failure to obey a lawful order. Three others were also charged  two with unlawful carry of a handgun and one with public intoxication.

We just feel like its a right. We shouldnt need one, Bennett said of permits. But well follow the rules, even if we dont agree with them.

The department said it respects the right to peacefully protest but warned against destroying property or disobeying police orders. Bennett described the message as an insult to a group that hadn't been linked to any violence.

"Hey hey, ho ho, Al Cannon has got to go," the crowd chanted.

Bennett held a megaphone plastered with a sticker from Kristin Grazianos campaign. Graziano is running to unseat Cannon in the Nov. 3 election for sheriff.

Black people used to live here, protester Elijah Whiteside yelled into a megaphone. Liar, liar, gentrifier.

Protesters also chanted support for Iona Sass, a North Charleston woman who said police brutalized her when she couldnt find her ID.

As protesters approached Le Macaron French Pastries, a State Law Enforcement Division agent shepherded patrons from the sidewalk tables through the front doors. The customers watched the marchers through the windows.

As they continued south past Market Street, there were squad cars parked at cross streets.

When protesters turned down Broad Street, heading toward City Hall, two SLED agents stopped them, warning theyd begin making arrests if the demonstrators didn't turn down another street.

The protesters stood still, yelling at the officers and holding their hands above their heads.

The march can continue on Meeting Street only, an officer told them.

After several minutes, the protesters relented and retraced their steps up Meeting Street to the City Market, where organizers climbed the stairs and led chants.

No-knock warrants are a product of the war on drugs, Bennett told the crowd there. The war on drugs is racist, no-knock warrants are inherently racist.

By 9 p.m., the group had returned to Marion Square. Officers didn't intervene when the protesters sat together on the ground, but cruisers flipped their lights on and sped ahead of the group as they rose and walked about a block down King Street. Officers, led by Chief Luther Reynolds, herded them back north to the park.

Im tired of being persecuted for exercising my rights, one protester told the crowd. Our tax dollars pay for these streets. We should be able to walk down these streets.

On Friday night, several dozen people dispersed after police blocked them from walking up King from the opposite end. Videos from the event show demonstrators marching down the sidewalk in single file to avoid blocking the roadways.

About 50 people had gathered at City Hall, brought together by activist group Stand As One. After a few speeches, they marched down Broad Street and onto King. They didn't make it far. Police had blocked both traffic and pedestrians. They told the marchers it was an unlawful assembly.

King Street was the scene of violence and destruction May 30. It was the worst rioting Charleston had seen in over a century, damaging more than 150 businesses.

Taylor was shot multiple times March 13 after her boyfriend fired at officers who had entered her home during a narcotics raid, authorities said. Taylor's boyfriend said he didnt know who was coming in and fired in self-defense, wounding one officer.

For months, protesters have called for the officers to be charged with murder. Demonstrations reignited when, on Wednesday, Kentucky Attorney General Cameron announced a grand jury indicted one officer on wanton endangerment charges connected to the gunshots fired into a neighboring home, but not the ones that killed Taylor.

Cameron said the other officers were not charged with Taylors killing because they acted to protect themselves.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
For the past two months, China has been buying U.S. soybeans at a faster pace, according to reports.

That is the news farmers in Illinois have been hoping for since the signing of the Phase One Trade Agreement with China in February.

The agreement was a relief for Illinois farmers, who were anxious to resume major trading with their largest customer after the damage that the soybean market has suffered in the past two years due to the U.S. tariff battle with China.

In the Phase One agreement, the sales promised are aspirational rather than guaranteed, analyst Jonathan Coppess, of the University of Illinois, cautioned.

The Phase One agreement left some real flexibility for China to make purchases or not, depending on market conditions and prices and so forth, Coppess said.

Reports of China making aggressive purchases in the past few weeks are a positive sign, Coppess said, but he is waiting for year-end numbers before evaluating what the recent sales mean.

Andrew Larson, of the Illinois Soybean Association, said he has been hearing anecdotal reports of increased Chinese purchases from Illinois farmers, which he takes as a good sign for fall sales.

Larson said China has made tremendous bookings for the shipping capacity of soybeans in recent weeks.

Bookings are indicators of intent to purchase, Larsen said, noting that it can be canceled, and they are not the same thing as purchased cargos of soybeans.

Larson agreed with Coppess that it is too early to tell if the vast Chinese purchases promised in the Phase One agreement will materialize by the end of the year.

He said he is hopeful that as more markets, including China, are reopening and recovering from COVID-19 economic damage, U.S. soybeans demand will continue to grow.

Larson also said he is encouraged by interest in U.S. corn and soybean purchases from many other buyers in countries worldwide, including Taiwan, Vietnam and Indonesia.
TOKYO  From the shrines of Nikko and the temples of Kyoto to the castles of Matsumoto and Himeji, the Japanese are fiercely proud of the countrys centuries-old monuments of cultural heritage.

Not so for a 113-year-old carousel in the nations capital. Despite a celebrated history that includes roots in Germany, a visit by Theodore Roosevelt, a stint in Coney Island in Brooklyn, and nearly half a century entertaining visitors to the Toshimaen Amusement Park in Tokyo, the El Dorado now sits in storage, its fate unknown.

The merry-go-round, and the faded time capsule of a park that housed it, are making way for a Harry Potter theme park  a familiar tale in a very old country that tends to discard the merely somewhat old for the new.

With the carousels last whirls came a final flicker of nostalgia, as hundreds rushed to ride its hand-carved horses and ornate wood chariots before the park shut down in late August.
New York Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC) on Friday pulled out of an event commemorating the former Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin, who was assassinated in 1995 at a Tel Aviv rally.

A spokesperson for AOC told The Times of Israel (TOI) the popular congresswoman, 30, would not attend the event, organised by Americans for Peace Now (APN), and scheduled to take place next month.

The spokesperson did not explicitly outline to the TOI why AOC, considered a rising star in the Democratic party, cancelled her appearance. The Independent has contacted AOC's representatives for additional comment.

Earlier on Friday AOC, representative for New York's 14th district, had said in a tweet that her team was "taking a look" at the event, due to be held close to 25th anniversary of Rabin's death.

"Hey there - this event and my involvement was presented to my team differently from how its now being promoted," AOC tweeted on Friday afternoon. "Thanks for pointing it out. Taking a look into this now."

She had been responding to a comment from the journalist Alex Kane - a contributor to the Jewish currents magazine - who said that, for many Palestinians, Rabin would be "remembered his brutal rule suppressing Palestinian protest during the First Intifada, as someone who reportedly ordered the breaking of Palestinian bones".

Mr Kane said in a follow-up tweet a source told him the event was sold to AOC as focusing on Oslo and Rabin, and APN wanted her to speak on her congressional work on the issue. "It wasn't framed to her as a Rabin memorial. That's why she canceled," he added.

Palestinian activists heavily criticised AOC after her attendance at the event was announced.

Ali Abunimah, a leading BDS activist and co-founder of The Electronic Intifada, a website covering Palestinian issues, said AOC's attendance was just disgusting and called Rabin an unrepentant war criminal.

His legacy is one of violence and dispossession for Palestinians, Adalah Justice Project, a Palestinian advocacy group wrote on Twitter, after news of AOC's withdrawal filtered through. Thank you AOC for listening to the lived experience of the Palestinian people.

Rabin, the 5th prime minister of Israel, was elected to office in 1992. He was the first PM to recognise the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) as legitimate representative for the Palestinian people.

He formed a strong relationship with former PLO chairman Yasser Arafat, who died in 2004. Rabin was assassinated by Yigal Amir, an Israeli ultra-nationalist opposed to the Oslo Accords.
Roxy left black and blue after television fight with Candice Warner Ads for Channel Sevens SAS Australia went to air last week and if the teaser is anything to go by there will be no shortage of drama on the endurance reality show. According to on-set sources, contestants were required to get into a physical fight in one scene. Publicity maven Roxy Jacenko was left black and blue after being paired with retired ironwoman - and her friend/client - Candice Warner. The boxing challenge saw contestants don gloves and headgear as the SAS instructor shouted at them to keep fighting. The same challenge took place on the UKs version of the program, shocking viewers when a female was punched by a male rival. But the ramifications of Jacenko and Warner's fisticuffs went beyond physical injuries. According to the on-set snitch, it also ended their friendship, and the pair have terminated business ties since the scuffle.

Jacenko's influencer management business The Ministry of Talent was until recently managing Warners career, most notably during her husband David Warners global headline-making ball-tampering scandal. Rumours the former athlete had fallen out with Jacenko gathered steam last week when Social Diary's industry newsletter announced new management for mother-of-three Warner. SAS is due to air next month and will see contestants including former Bali inmate Schapelle Corby, retired rugby union player and Bachelor Nick Honey Badger Cummins, and Jackson Warne (son of Shane), undergo excruciating physical and psychological tests that are used in the real SAS selection process. Packer Barham gets wedding-ready - sans groom

Publishing heiress Francesca Packer Barham has apparently split from her personal trainer-cum-sneaker cleaner ex-boyfriend Sam Zacahria and is lapping up the single life. The usually elusive Packer Barham has been a social butterfly of late and is keeping friends guessing just what she is up to. Is Francesca Packer getting wedding ready despite no obvious groom? Credit:Getty Chessie went on a social media posting spree last week sharing images from sunset drinks to selfies of her professional makeup. But what really got friends talking was her plans to go wedding dress shopping. The buxom brunette planned to try on bridal dresses at the Vera Wang boutique in the Intercontinental - until it seems she realised that being spotted trying on gowns when she doesn't have a boyfriend, let alone an actual groom, was probably not the best look. Last month the 25-year-old set a new Australian record at auction after dropping more than half a million dollars on a huge diamond sparkler. Packer shut down rumours of an engagement telling Emerald City sister column Private Sydney: "I promise you there is nothing to announce."

Drew Mitchell in new romance Drew Mitchell is dating aspiring model Charlotte Barge. Credit:James Brickwood Former rugby union player and notorious ladies man Drew Mitchell has caught himself a new squeeze. Friends of the sporting commentator say, Mitchell, 36 has been spied getting cozy with aspiring model Charlotte Barge. When Emerald City caught up with a giggly Barge she was in the midst of what sounded like more than a few celebratory champagnes to mark her 30th birthday last Friday. Barge was unable to confirm or deny she was in a relationship with Mitchell but if liking each other's photos on social media is anything to go by it's clear the pair aren't shy about being linked to one another. The former Wallaby has a long list of famous ex-girlfriends including Delta Goodrem and Jasmine Stefanovic.
Sophie Dillman stars Ziggy Astoni on long-running soap Home and Away.

And on Thursday, the actress flaunted her sensational figure in a bikini for a scene with her co-star and boyfriend Patrick O'Connor on Palm Beach set, north of Sydney.

The 27-year-old was seen making her way to filming wearing a burgundy coloured bikini top with a blue towel wrapped around her waist, holding a surfboard and her phone.

Surf's up! Sophie Dillman (pictured) flaunted her ample assets in a burgundy bikini as she films scenes on the set of Home and Away on Thursday. The 27-year-old wrapped a blue towel around her waist, held a surfboard in one hand and her phone in the other

She and Patrick rehearsed their scene, which appeared to be a tense conversation between their characters Ziggy and Dean Thompson.

Midway through their discussion, Ziggy answers a phone call and looks shocked by the news she's just heard.

The scene appeared to end and Sophie seemed to laugh off the scene after Patrick excited the shot.

Getting into character: She was filming a scene with her co-star and boyfriend Patrick O'Connor (pictured) on the Palm Beach set, north of Sydney

Tense: She and Patrick rehearsed their scene, which appeared to be a tense conversation between their characters Ziggy and Dean Thompson

Is everything OK? Midway through their discussion, Ziggy answers a phone call and looks shocked by the news she's just heard

Cut! The scene appeared to end and Sophie seemed to laugh off the scene after Patrick excited the shot

After filming with her boyfriend, the blonde beauty was back the beach set to do a scene with co-stars Courtney Miller, Sarah Roberts and Lynne McGrainger.

Ahead of rehearsing their scene for actresses enjoyed a conversation with one of their producers.

Sophie looked fierce in an animal print mini dress, paired with black sneakers.

Chit chat: After filming with her boyfriend, the blonde beauty was back the beach set to do a scene with co-stars Courtney Miller (left), Sarah Roberts (centre) and Lynne McGrainger (right). The actresses enjoyed a conversation with one of their producers

Wild thing: Sophie looked fierce in an animal print mini dress

Courtney, who plays Bella Nixon, dressed in multi-coloured top with green high waisted shorts with black boots, and carried a camera with a long lens.

Alongside her was Sarah Roberts, who stars as Willow Harris, wearing a yellow camisole top with a black leather skirt and heeled boots.

Irene Roberts, played by veteran star Lynne McGranger, wore a floral top with a V-neckline paired with navy trousers.

After chatting with their producers it was time for the actresses to prepare for their scene with Sarah getting in place for a conversation with Sophie.

Costume: Courtney, who plays Bella Nixon, dressed in multi-coloured top with green high waisted shorts. Sarah Roberts wore a yellow camisole top with a black leather skirt. While Irene Roberts wore a floral top with a V-neckline paired with navy trousers

In character: After chatting with their producers it was time for the actresses to prepare for their scene with Sarah getting in place for a conversation with Sophie

Sophie has been a cast member for slightly longer than Patrick, having portrayed Ziggy Astoni since June 2017.

In the beginning, their characters Dean and Ziggy didn't get along. But over time they became close friends, and eventually, lovers.

Similarly, Sophie and Patrick's romantic relationship seems to have blossomed from a friendship, simply achieved by spending time together.
The Punjab and Haryana high court has dismissed a plea by Grewal Eye Institute, Sector 9, against a February order of the Chandigarh State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission.

Upholding an order of the district consumer forum, the commission had directed the institute to pay Rs 1 lakh to a Chandigarh resident.

The institute had filed a plea in March arguing that it can entertain petitions in certain categories of cases against consumer panel orders.

However, the bench of justice HS Madaan observed that the institute, itself having approached the commission, cannot now say that it lacked jurisdiction. It added that the institute, under the Consumer Protection Act, 1986, can approach the national commission.

The complainant, Shabnam Khunger, a Chandigarh resident, had approached the consumer forum, stating that she had visited the Sector-9 institute for an eye check-up in October 2017 and was advised a cataract surgery. She was informed about two kinds of surgeries Phaco or Robolazr  worth Rs 1.49 lakh.

For this, she contacted her insurance firm for cashless treatment, but was allowed treatment worth only Rs 48,000 and her claim of Rs 1 lakh was rejected. This prompted her to approach the consumer forum.

The insurance firm was of the view that there was no need for a robotic surgery. Hence, the remaining amount was repudiated. The institute had argued that it was the patient who opted for it.

The forum had then ordered that the insurance firm was liable to pay the entire amount, and penalised the eye institute for unfair trade practices by directing it to pay the complainant Rs 1 lakh.
The Ghana Armed Forces and the Ghana Police Service have issued a joint statement in which they said they were able to foil attempts by secessionist groups in the Volta Region, to burn down the Ho Central Market.

It is hereby stated that an earlier pre-emptive operation on Thursday, 24 September 2020, foiled a plan by the Group to burn the Ho Central Market and other key installations, the statement jointly signed by the Director of Public Relations for the Ghana Armed Forces, Col. Eric Aggrey-Quarshie, and the Director of Public Affairs for the Ghana Police Service, Superintendent Sheila Kessie Abayie-Buckman, said.

Also, the statement said 31 members of the militant group, which mounted roadblocks to stop all entry and exit, to and from the region, respectively, were arrested on Friday, 25 September.

The Homeland Study Group Foundation (HSGF), which has declared the region independent of Ghana, insists on the areas autonomy from Ghana, thus, its activities.

One of the militants, according to the security agencies, was killed during their attempt to take over the Volta Region on Friday.

Three others got injured.

Also, the Police Commander at Aveyime was wounded and has been evacuated to the Police Hospital, the statement noted.

Additionally, it said the wounded HSGF members have also been evacuated to the Ho Teaching Hospital.

Read the full statement below:

SECURITY AGENCIES BRING UNDER CONTROL ACTIVITIES OF HOMELAND STUDY GROUP FOUNDATION (HSGF)

1. The Ghana Armed Forces (GAF) and the Ghana Police Service (GPS) hereby jointly make reference to the activities of the Homeland Study Group Foundation (HSGF), which occurred at the dawn of Friday, 25 September 2020, in the general area of Juapong, Sogakope, Aveyime, Mepe and Akuse and to assure the general public that the situation has since been brought under control.

2. It is confirmed that at about 2:00 am on the stated date, elements of the HSGF attacked the Aveyime and Mepe police stations, and further mounted roadblocks on the JuapongAccra and SogakopeAccra main roads, thereby disrupting the daily routine of the citizenry.

3. In response to these unlawful acts, a joint military-police Team, in conjunction with other security agencies deployed to the affected areas and succeeded in apprehending 31 members of the Group.

These arrested persons have since been brought to Accra for interrogation. Fire exchanges between the Group and the Security Agencies led to the death of one (1) member of the HSGF and injury to three (3) others.

The Police Commander at Aveyime was also wounded and has been evacuated to the Police Hospital.

The wounded HSGF members have also been evacuated to the Ho Teaching Hospital.

4. All the roadblocks have also been cleared and the security agencies have taken control of the highways and strategic installations within the Region.

It is hereby stated that an earlier pre-emptive operation on Thursday, 24 September 2020, foiled a plan by the Group to burn the Ho Central Market and other key installations.

5. We wish to re-assure the general public that the security and intelligence agencies are in firm control of the situation and remain undaunted in their resolve at preserving and protecting the sanctity of the entire territory of our dear country.

6. In the meantime, the general public is entreated to remain calm and to volunteer any relevant information on the activities of the Group for necessary action to be taken.

---Classfm
Ather Energy has unveiled a collectors edition version of the Ather 450X electric scooter called as the Series1. The Bengaluru-based company says that the Series1 will be available to those who had pre-ordered the Ather 450X before its launch in January 2020.

Whats different with the Series1 of the Ather 450X as compared to the regular variant is that it gets a special paint scheme and uses translucent side panels, something that the company says has never been done before on a production two-wheeler. These panels give a look at the aluminium trellis frame underneath, giving the scooter a unique look. Other changes include the use of a high-gloss metallic black body paint with red accents all throughout the body of the scooter, including the wheels too.

The Ather 450X Series1 comes with translucent side panels. (Photo: Ather Energy)

Tarun Mehta, CEO, and Co-founder of Ather Energy said, Like all our scooters, the Series1 is built from scratch and we hope our community loves it as much as we loved building it. Building automotive-grade translucent panels are tricky and I am super excited that Ather is bringing them out for the first time ever with Series1. The teams have been working on it for months and despite the lockdown have been able to produce something truly fantastic.

The deliveries of the Series1 will begin in November in 11 cities - Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kochi, Coimbatore, Kozhikode, Mumbai, Delhi NCR, Pune, Ahmedabad and Kolkata. However, the first batch of these scooters will be shipped with black panels on the sides and not the translucent ones as the company is still finalising on some final details. The translucent panels will be available to Series1 owners in May 2021 post which, the company will fit these panels for free.

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Other than that, the 450X Series1 continues to have a 7-inch touchscreen instrument cluster that runs on an Android-based OS but gets a special intro screen and red-accents in the UI to give it a different feel, which is specific to the Series1.

The touchscreen instrument cluster of the Ather 450X Series1 gets minor UI changes. (Photo: Ather Energy)

Powering the Series1 is the same drivetrain as the Ather 450X. This includes a 6 kW electric motor that is powered by a 2.9 kWh lithium-ion battery, making the scooter capable of doing 0-40 km/h in a claimed 3.3 seconds. It also gets three riding modes  Eco, Ride and Sport, along with an addition Warp mode which swaps a bit of range for quicker acceleration and higher top speed.
With many stars joining the drug probe which emerged out of the mysterious death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput, senior advocate Vikas Singh, representing the Bollywood actors family, said that the NCB probe is overshadowing and hindering the investigation behind the real truth in the death case.

Why call the whole of Bollywood? There are no seizures from these people who have been called today or tomorrow. In an NDPS case, everything depends on the quantity, the family feels it is being done to divert from the main issue (death case of sushant)," said Vikas Singh while holding a press conference here on Friday.

The senior advocate further stated that media attention is being diverted from the case by calling the big stars.

CBI has not issued a single press statement regarding the probe and the direction in which the investigation is going is a little worrying for the family," Singh said.

He also alleged that over a week has passed since the CBI team probing the case landed in Delhi but they havent met the team of doctors at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS). Today we are completely helpless on the case as no one from the CBI is doing any press briefing. It is the lack of interest and the speed with which the case is going that is worrisome," Singh said.

Claiming that one of the doctors from the AIIMS team suggested its a murder case, Singh said, One of the doctors in the team of AIIMS suggests it is 200% death by strangulation and not a suicide. This is after photos clicked by Sushants sister Mitu were shared with him."

If there is a case of murder then obviously the speed, tenor of the investigation will be different. Unfortunately, none of the family members were staying with Sushant and Hence we dont know what exactly happened," he said.

Earlier in the day, the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) began questioning Bollywood actor Rakul Preet Singh, Dharma Productions executive producer Kshitij Ravi Prasad and Deepika Padukones former manager Karishma Prakash in connection with its probe into the drugs case related to death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput.

According to NCB officials, Rakul, Karishma and Kshitij deposed before the drug law enforcement agency in a drug case related to the death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput.

NCB officials said Rakul was the first to arrive at the NCB office followed by Karishma and Kshitij.They are being questioned about their alleged drugs chats that came to the fore after the NCB seized the electronic devices of several people.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 23:38:19|Editor: huaxia

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BAGHDAD, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- The Turkish fighter jets bombed on Saturday several border villages in Iraq's semi-autonomous region of Kurdistan, causing damages, an Iraqi official agency reported.

"The Turkish warplanes bombed the edge of several Kurdish villages near the town of Zakho in the northern province of Duhok," the state-run Iraqi News Agency (INA) said.

"One of the missiles landed near a house in the village of al-Rwaisi near Zakho and caused serious damages to the house," INA said, asserting that the Turkish airstrikes caused a state of panic among the Kurdish villages.

Meanwhile, the official website of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) said that "the Turkish airstrikes have continued during the past two days in many areas inside the region."

The website of PUK, which is the region's second-biggest party, also said that the Turkish bombardments have been carried out under the pretext of the presence of headquarters and positions of the Turkish outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).

The Turkish forces frequently carry out ground operations, airstrikes, and artillery bombardments against the positions of PKK militants in northern Iraq, especially the Qandil Mountains, the main PKK base.

The PKK is listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States, and the European Union. Enditem
US Sen. Chris Van Hollen, in a podcast with Al-Monitor this week, said that Saudi Arabia should be held to what he called the "gold standard" of civilian nuclear agreements: no domestic enrichment of uranium (which, at high levels, can be used to produce nuclear weapons) and adherence to the Additional Protocol of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which allows for more expansive verification and inspection by the IAEA.

This gold standard is what the United Arab Emirates calls its civil nuclear deal with the United States, which includes both conditions.

If its good enough for the UAE, it should be good enough for Saudi Arabia.

And if its good enough for Saudi Arabia and the UAE, maybe zero enrichment should be the standard for Iran too.

Indeed, a regional dialogue on civilian nuclear power should be part of the next wave of discussions about a new or revised nuclear deal, as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), as we know it, is on shaky ground, even if Joe Biden wins the presidential election.

Three reasons why the JCPOA is in trouble even if Biden wins

Both US President Donald Trump and former Vice President Biden have signaled that after the elections there will be a new round of diplomacy with Iran, as we discussed here three weeks ago.

Trump has said he is ready to negotiate a new deal with Iran. Despite his rejection of the Iran nuclear deal, Trump wants his own, better deal with Iran, and has consistently expressed his interest in direct talks with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani. Indeed, often overlooked is that US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has said he is willing to talk to Iran "with no preconditions," in the context of a 10-point agenda for what the United States wants to see Iran change in its policies.

Biden, for his part, has said that the United States would rejoin the JCPOA if Iran returns to "strict compliance. But Biden, like Trump, also seems to want a new deal. He writes that rejoining the pact is a starting point for negotiations to strengthen and extend the JCPOA, "while more effectively pushing back against Irans other destabilizing activities."

Iran, so far, is rejecting the pitch from both candidates.

First, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, speaking this week at the Council on Foreign Relations, said Iran is absolutely not going to negotiate a new or revised nuclear deal, adding that the United States must compensate Iran for the "billions upon billions of dollars of economic damages as a result of the US sanctions." Neither Trump nor Biden is likely to provide Iran a payout for its tally of the costs of sanctions.

Second, there is the issue of Iranian compliance. According to the last IAEA report in June, Tehran had not allowed access or provided adequate answers regarding two sites that may have been "related to possible undeclared nuclear material and nuclear-related activities in Iran." While a flurry of meetings and promises by Iran cheered the IAEA and the EU last month, the proof of Iranian compliance will be in subsequent reports.

Third, there are the "facts on the ground" since 2018: the expiration of the arms embargo on Iran and the blizzard of US sanctions on Iran since the Trump administration withdrew from the deal. By accepting the JCPOA, a Biden administration would need to accept likely Russian and Chinese arms sales to Iran, as we report here, a tough pill to swallow if Biden and the United States remain concerned about Irans "destabilizing activities. And would Biden simply end all the Trump sanctions, as Iran would expect, or would it go case by case, maybe expecting something in return?

and three suggestions for the next round of Iran diplomacy

A second Trump or first Biden administration will be negotiating with Iran, one way or another. Irans hard-line position now is no surprise, given that prospect, but the hedge here is that Iranian officials will be ready to talk. Iran is hurting badly as a result of US sanctions and its interest is in getting sanctions lifted.

The Europeans want the United States back in the fold. The alternative to diplomacy could well be nuclear proliferation in the Middle East, which the JCPOA sought to prevent. Any progress on Iran will also require diplomacy with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping, who have both deepened ties with Iran over the past three years.

Here are three suggestions to inform the next round of difficult diplomacy with Iran, building on the JCPOA.

First, there needs to be a regional dialogue on cooperative and safe approaches to the development of civilian nuclear power, as well as the well-established and vexing regional security issues. US partners in the region cant be on the sidelines of the talks this time. Israels Ambassador to the US Ron Dermer told Al-Monitor that the JCPOA was a "failed experiment." No new deal with Iran is going to work if Israel is opposed: lesson learned. Unlike the JCPOA negotiations, Biden or Trump, depending on who wins, will hear out Israel and the key Gulf states in the next round.

Despite Irans unsurprising negative reaction to the UAE-Israel normalization deal, UAE-Iran ties had otherwise been improving. The diplomatic door may not be shut, as Irans leaders no doubt see the normalization deals are directed against them. The UAE can start the conversation about nuclear power, a dialogue that should eventually include the other Gulf states, the IAEA and the signatories to the JCPOA.

The roadblock is that Iran has been adamant that it has a "right" to enrich uranium, as a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Its nuclear program is driven by concerns not just about the Gulf states, but Israel, which has nuclear weapons, as well as the United States.

Such a conversation will be a long slog, and a very long shot, unless a Trump or Biden administration is content again to grant Iran its "right" to enrichment, as was done in the JCPOA.

I dont know if Irans receptive to the UAE model of nuclear development, UAE Minister and Ambassador to the United States Yousef Al-Otaiba told Al-Monitor, but I know it hasnt really been positioned; it hasnt been used as a template.

Second, Bobby Ghosh of Bloomberg writes that a subsequent Iran deal should include a US-Iran treaty, which did not happen with the JCPOA. A treaty would validate the deal with the US Congress and the American people, and cannot be overturned by executive order, as Trump did with the Iran agreement. Ghosh views the prospects for a treaty as more likely with a Biden win and Democratic control of both houses of Congress. The treaty option would more effectively institutionalize the deal, and should be an incentive for Iran to negotiate. But dont rule out a treaty under Trump, if he wins and there are talks. Pompeo, for his part, has said the next Iran deal should be a treaty.

Third, the first order of business for building confidence and simply doing the right thing should be an exchange of prisoners. Zarif said this week that Iran is ready for an exchange of Iranians held in the United States or elsewhere in return for the dual-national prisoners being held in Iran, as we report here. This is one book that needs to be closed as quickly as possible.

Absent a new round of US-led diplomacy with Iran, the region faces the prospect of increased destabilization in Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and the Gulf, as well as a possible nuclear arms race. If Iran goes for the bomb, Saudi Arabia and Turkey are likely to follow. The alternative, of a region working collaboratively to harness peaceful nuclear energy and de-escalate conflicts that have gone on too long, seems a better bet for the region.
In the summer of 1941, just before Pearl Harbor became the top Google search item except there was no Google, Ron Zabrok drove from St. Paul, Minn., to California, in a 1939 La Salle Victoria Coupe on a family errand.

Ron, now 96, remembers it, as he does everything, in sharp detail and living colour. He could tell you the make of the sparkplugs if you asked him. He was 16 and it was the first time hed left Minnesota but it wouldnt be the last, not by a damn sight, as they used to say. He loved the travel.

Hed get to do a lot more. Several months later, the day of Dec. 7, 1941 shot forceful ripples through the world, and it was like the world and the war both told him Go, and Ron, heeding the feeling, went. Off again, this time to a boot camp in Idaho.

After that there was a holdover  they had to wait until the USS Rotanin, Crater-class cargo ship, got built  but at length he and his and his crewmates put out from San Francisco for the Pacific theatre, other side of the planet, fetching up for history at places like Okinawa and Peleliu.

That ship  the Rotanin (they spelled it wrong, says Ron; it was named after the star Rotanen)  would, as it turned out, achieve fame in the movies, but of that more in a minute.

Ron can still tell you everything about it. Some 4,000 long tons of displacement, Joshua Hardly vertical triple expansion reciprocating steam propulsion engine. Double A Bofors gun mounts. And his home is full of naval memorabilia  articles, books, plaques and insignias. A picture of him and his two older brothers, both Marines, during the war. Theres also a certificate, under glass, commemorating his passage across the Equator, and the hazing ritual whereupon he graduated, he says, from pollywog to shellback.

But the movement didnt stop with the war. After it, Ron criss-crossed the continent working on natural gas conversion, during the big postwar natural gas boom. He went everywhere  Philadelphia, then Seattle, later, on up to Quebec, Winnipeg. Eventually, Hamilton.

After years of listening to the world tell him go, he heard love tell him to stop. And he did. In Hamilton, in 1958. For the charming personnel manager at Eatons  Shirley Sanderson.

New to the city on a job and looking for something to do one night, Ron went to a Paul Jones dance at the YMCA. There was nothing else going on.

There he met Shirley. He was a good dancer and so was she. They hit it off. It was 1958. They had dinner at the Hillcrest, took in Old Yeller at the Tivoli. They had something else in common.

Neither of us wanted to get married, he says. They were having too much fun.

And so, of course, later that same year, what did they do? They got married. Thats how it goes, right?

By that time, Ron had almost as many miles behind him as Haleys Comet. His odometer, so to speak, was spinning like a crown and anchor wheel. With Shirley, he settled down. They had two children. Eventually they started a fuel company together in Hamilton.

Now, Shirleys gone. She was 99 when she died last year.

All those miles he logged, in cars and cargo ships, are way behind him but when he talks about those days, when he reproduces detail after detail, of those years on the Rotanin during the war, you can feel the waves heaving and picture the characters, and so Im convinced that if Thomas Heggen, Rons shipmate on the Rotanin, hadnt written Mister Roberts, Ron probably would have.

Mister Roberts was a huge success, first as a novel, then as a Broadway adaptation starring Henry Fonda and, best of all, as a movie, with Fonda reprising the Broadway role as the title character and also starring James Cagney as the hard-assed captain, William Powell as the ship doctor and, most memorable of all, Jack Lemmon as Ensign Pulver.

The film, directed by John Ford, was nominated for a Best Picture Oscar (1956), losing to Marty, but Lemmon won a best supporting actor statuette.

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Interestingly, though the names of all the characters are different from the real crew mates on whom they were based (the ship in the movie was called the USS Reluctant, not the Rotanin), Heggen for some reason preserved the name of Ensign Pulver.

The real Ensign Pulver was nothing like the character in the movie, says Ron. He was a funny guy. But not so gregarious and yakety yak. And he was six-four. Lemmon was considerably shorter.

Heggen himself was dead of an overdose long before the movie came out. He was found in his bath tub in 1949. Reports say it was the terrible pressure to do a followup on the book. Ron always thought it was because he was one of the Dear John soldiers, whose wives or girlfriends took up with someone else while they were on duty.

Ron says Heggen captured the crews camaraderie, the longing by some to transfer onto a fighting craft like a battleship in order to see action (a longing central to the plot of Mister Roberts), the anxiety (for one thing, kamikaze attacks), the shore leaves and the boredom.

Heggen himself wanted a transfer. And, says Ron, there was an electrician on the Rotanin who also badly wanted a transfer and almost got one until the Third Fleet pulled out of port early because of storms. So the electrician stayed on the cargo ship. Lucky. Because the destroyer he wouldve been on ended up lost in a storm. Ron remembers everything.

Im a fan of Mister Roberts, a salty satiric precursor to rawer darker Second World War satires like Catch-22. And the one who introduced me to Ron, crew mate to the actual Ensign Pulver, is Rob Williams, Rob being long addicted to Rons stories, told with such startling clarity, which hed hear at American Legion Post 18 in Burlington. Its a small group of former American servicemen now living in the area, representing all branches, not just navy. For more, americanlegionincanada.us Theyd love to hear from those, both Canadian and American, who served in U.S. forces.
A Tinder creep was fired from his job after abusing a woman he met on the dating app when she rejected him.

Brave Ebonie Sanderson, 26, took to Instagram to share horrific voice messages from the man after she refused to have sex with him.

Ms Sanderson posted the messages as a warning for single women across Sydney to avoid the 'privileged misogynistic PIG' called 'Tom' from Bondi.

Her post was quickly picked up by Clementine Ford and her feminist army whose social media campaign got him fired in less than 24 hours.

Scroll down for video

Ebonie Sanderson (pictured) posted voice messages from a man on Tinder after he abused her for refusing to have sex with him

Writing on Instagram Ms Sanderson said: 'This is what happens when you say NO or call out a man for being disrespectful.

'You apparently earn yourself the right to get verbally abused and fat-shamed on more than one platform.

'No I didn't "ask for it" and yes, I'm entitled to change my mind and tell someone I'm not interested anymore because I feel uncomfortable and intimidated by one's aggressive and forceful nature.

'If anyone comes across this man on dating apps or social media, please report him.

The speech pathology student decided to share the man's responses on social media after she was fat-shamed

'Tom' sent Ms Sanderson abusive messages on Snapchat (pictured) after declining an offer to go round to his house

'I will never change my weight for anyone else but MYSELF!!!'

Ms Sanderson shared a series of messages she had received on Snapchat from 'Tom', after declining his invitation to come to his house.

'The fat liberal arts chick... teach me,' he wrote.

'I know you know deep down you are below me, that there is hierarchy in society.

'And the dysgenic like you are there to serve us.

'You are the inferiors.'

She also shared voice messages from the man which became increasingly vulgar and abusive before she blocked him.

'You're actually a fat f***ing pig. You know that? Thanks. You did waste my time,' he said.

'You're f***ing ugly. Your a** looks OKAY and you would have been one f***. You would have been just one f*** because you're a disgusting fat pig.'

When she called him out for his aggressive behaviour he then doubled down and defended himself.

'Look at my f***ing face. I don't have to struggle to get laid. I especially don't need a FOUR like you to get laid.'

Clementine Ford shared the series of messages on Friday night along with a screenshot of the man's LinkedIn profile and the name of the company where he worked.

'This is horrifying male entitlement. It's abuse meted out in response to rejection. It's violent and disgusting,' she wrote.

In the 24 hours since the post was shared thousands of women have rallied around Ms Sanderson in a show of support.

The response was big that Clementine Ford shared an update urging her followers to stop contacting the man's company calling out his behaviour.

'Someone has forwarded me an email they were sent from the CEO of the company Tom worked for,' she wrote.

'If anyone comes across this man on dating apps or social media, please report him,' Ms Sanderson wrote

'HE HAS BEEN FIRED, EFFECTIVE IMMEDIATELY!'

Ms Sanderson told Daily Mail Australia the situation unfolded over a period of only hours.

'He was persistent.. he wanted me to come over THAT night. That was when I started to feel uncomfortable,' she said.

The speech pathology student sent him a message apologising and saying she was no longer comfortable meeting up with him.

'Then all these voice messages came through, just abusive messages about my appearance, and my weight,' she said.

Ms Sanderson told Daily Mail Australia said the messages escalated over a number of hours

She blocked him on Snapchat and Instagram, but he added her another account and continued messaging her.

She said despite being a strong and confident woman the comments he made were incredibly hurtful.

'I am I am really comfortable with my weight and initially I was like this doesn't matter but then in the end I realised an insult is an insult and I realised subconsciously I couldn't stop thinking about it,' she said.

'That was when I snapped and thought he can't get away with this and have no consequences whatsoever.'

So she drafted up a post and hit publish on Instagram.

I woke up with hundreds of messages - so many people have messaged me to say they had experienced this or that they resonate with this or that they are struggling with online dating,' she said.

She said despite being a strong and confident woman the comments 'Tom' made were incredibly hurtful

Tom's boss told Daily Mail Australia he dismissed him after receiving a flood of angry emails this morning.

'I had a read through of the contract and validated that it was an act of serious misconduct and that he was no longer fit for employment with us,' he said.

The CEO said he was 'shocked and disgusted' by the messages.

'There is just no place in our workplace for someone who treats women with that amount of disrespect.

'I have four daughters aged between 10 months and nine years old so that was one of the first things I thought about, and my blood boiled to imagine someone to ever speak to one of my little girls like that.'

Tom's social media accounts on LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook have disappeared since the posts were shared.
A coronavirus testing firm has hired Prime Minister Boris Johnson's half-brother as it hopes he can 'open doors'.

Max Johnson, 35, has joined the board of private 'wellness' firm REVIV Global which specialises in providing vitamin injections delivered through IV drips.

But the company has recently branched out into testing for Covid-19 by offering private antigen tests for 89 each.

The appointment has been met with criticism and was branded 'concerning' as senior staff at REVIV begin now holding talks with the government over coronavirus testing.

A coronavirus testing firm has hired Prime Minister Boris Johnson's half-brother Max (pictured together) as it hopes he can 'open doors'

REVIV's Medical Director Dr Michael Barnish said he hoped that by getting Max Johnson on board would help them 'open doors'.

The company's tests are currently operating beyond the NHS Test and Trace system.

But Dr Barnish told the Mirror: 'They're outside of the national system, but we're absolutely happy to work with the national system.

'I personally haven't been in any talks with them, but I know full well that our CEO has - and obviously Max Johnson, etcetera... there are talks going on.

'We're happy to support in any way we can the government testing strategy.'

Sarah Lomas, the CEO and President of REVIV Global, said in a press release: 'The appointment of Max Johnson comes at an exciting and critical point in our shift to the Med-Tech sector.

'Having built a global preventative health brand in 41 countries, we are ready for aggressive growth.

'The current pandemic has created unprecedented investment opportunities for REVIV.'

Labour Shadow Cabinet Office Minister Helen Hayes has criticised the appointment

Mr Johnson himself has said he was honoured to join the firm but the move has been criticised by Labour Shadow Cabinet Office Minister Helen Hayes.

She told the publication: 'It is unacceptable for businesses to take advantage of the government's incompetence and charge 89 for the privilege of using the same labs as the national Test and Trace system.

'The fact that a relative of the Prime Minister is now being employed by the same business is concerning.

'Such a connection must not in any way influence Government decisions which must always be taken objectively, fairly and in the national interest.'

In April, REVIV was forced to delete a blog post after the Advertising Standards Authority ruled it had suggested the firm's 'Megaboost' Vitamin drip could be used to prevent Covid-19.

A spokeswoman for REVIV Global told MailOnline that REVIV is not working with the Government on Operation Moonshot or any other publicly funded testing plan.

She added that the company offers not-for-profit C19 testing for companies and individuals as well as stating that Max Johnson being on the board does not give REVIV political or financial advantage in the UK.

MailOnline has contacted Max Johnson for comment.

The appointment comes just days after it was announced the UK may be 'weeks behind' its target of 500,000 tests a day due to a shortage of vital chemicals and analysing machines.

Boris Johnson pledged to more than double current capacity from 260,000 by the end of October, despite backlogs in laboratories and Britons being asked to drive hundreds of miles to get a swab.

But it appears the government's desperate drive to boost testing ahead of the winter will not be delivered because manufacturers can't make enough chemical reagents and analyser machines in time.

The shortage adds to Britain's ongoing testing fiasco, which was also blamed on a lack of staff.

The appointment comes just days after it was announced the UK may be 'weeks behind' its target of 500,000 tests a day due to a shortage of vital chemicals and analysing machines

Britons all over the country were last week unable able to get swabbed for the disease  despite some drive-in sites standing completely empty.

Boris Johnson was forced to admit that Britain doesn't have the capacity to carry out the number of Covid-19 tests it needs to.

And Baroness Dido Harding, head of Test and Trace, revealed demand was four times higher than capacity.

In response to the issue, the Department of Health this week unveiled a rationing list for swabs.

Hospital patients, care home residents and NHS staff are at the front of the queue, and teachers are fifth in line  behind the thousands of volunteers taking part in surveillance studies.
When Anadarko Petroleum Corp. confirmed last year it would be constructing a $20bn liquified natural gas (LNG) plant in Mozambique, this was major news. Mozambique's first onshore LNG plant would be creating tens of thousands of jobs - and contributing to sustainable, long-term economic growth that would impact millions of people.

NJ Ayuk, executive chairman, African Energy Chamber

A missed opportunity? Really?

What Mozambique stands to gain

LNG can em-power Mozambique

Mozambique has been working for this

We must put people first

Two additional LNG projects have been announced since then: the $4.7bn Coral FLNG Project by ENI and ExxonMobil, and the $30bn Rovuma LNG Project by ExxonMobil, ENI, and the China National Petroleum Corporation. While these two have been postponed by the Covid-19 pandemic, the original LNG Mozambique project has been moving forward.French oil major Total acquired the project and finalised project funding in July, even in the face of recent terror attacks in northern Mozambiques Cabo Delgado province, where Totals LNG plant will be constructed.Thats why its so disheartening to learn that a UK-based environmental group is pursuing actions that could jeopardise the projects timely progression, all in the name of preventing climate change. Friends of the Earth has said it will initiate a legal challenge against the UKs decision to provide $1bn in funding for the Mozambique LNG project.Never mind the projects importance to everyday Africans. Never mind its potential to grow and diversify the economy. Never mind that projects like this are just what Mozambique needs to address its energy poverty, or that the Mozambique government has invested considerable time and resources into making this LNG project possible.This is not the first time that not so well informed radical activist have attempted to interfere with Africas energy industry in ways that do not help poor Africans but serve their own interest. International organisations, including the World Bank, and private investors, under pressure by environmental groups, have been dropping support for African fossil fuel production. A lot of poor people are suffering from this and hundreds of millions more will if we to change direction.I find it stunning that, during a time when much of the world is talking about the need to respect black perspectives, environmental groups seem to have no qualms about dismissing African voices.As Ive said in the past, I agree that climate change should be taken seriously. And I understand the risks it poses to Africa. The thing is, why are non-African organisations trying to dictate how African countries address those risks? The message in this case seems to be that they know best. That idea is insulting, and interfering with an African countrys efforts to build up its economy  simply because fossil fuels are involved  is completely unacceptable.UK Export Finance (UKEF) is one of eight export credit agencies to provide funding for Totals Mozambique LNG project, which includes the construction of a two-train liquefaction plant with a capacity of 12.9-million tonnes per year.UKEFs $1bn commitment includes awarding $300m in loans to British companies working on the gas project and guaranteeing loans from commercial banks worth up to $850m. The UKs parliamentary under-secretary for the Department for International Trade, Graham Stuart, has pointed out that Totals LNG project could be transformational for Mozambique and create 2,000 jobs in the UK as well.But Friends of the Earth has said they will seek a judicial review into the UK governments decision to help finance a project that, as they put it, will worsen the climate emergency. The groups director, Jamie Peters, also expressed his disappointment in a letter to the UK government. The UKEFs funding decision, Peters said, represents a lost opportunity for the UK to be a world climate leader.My question to Peters is, what about Mozambiques opportunities? To help everyday people improve their lives? To earn a decent living? To have a reliable source of energy? Im talking about an opportunity to nudge the average life expectancy in Mozambique above 59 years, where it stands now.The Mozambique LNG project is poised to make those things possible. As far as Im concerned, losing that opportunity would devastating.I cant overstate the far-reaching implications and potential that Totals Mozambique LNG project represents for local businesses, communities, and individuals.Total estimates that its plant will generate about $50bn in revenue for Mozambiques government during its first 25 years in operation. That revenue can be directed toward much-needed infrastructure, educational programs, and economic diversification programs.Consider direct foreign investment in Mozambique: Totals $25bn investment in the LNG plant is more than twice Mozambiques current GDP.How about the plant construction project? Not only will it generate tens of thousands of local jobs, but it also will provide training opportunities for local people. Indigenous companies will be contracted to provide goods and services.This pattern will continue once the plant is operational. Locals can train for and take a wide range of positions, including professional and leadership roles. Over time, subject matter experts who can share their knowledge in Mozambique, and with other African companies, will be cultivated. And, once again, the plant will be looking to local companies to provide products and services.In addition to these far-reaching economic opportunities, the LNG produced at the plant will provide affordable energy for Mozambique.The need is urgent. Only about 29% of the population has access to electricity today. Medical care is hindered. Education is impacted. And sustainable economic growth is an uphill climb.Earlier this year, I praised the government of Mozambique for negotiating for part of the LNG production to be diverted to the domestic market, meaning it can be used for power generation. Since then, the government secured financing for a 400MW gas-fired power plant and transmission line to Maputo, the countrys capital, which will dramatically improve power reliability there.By the way, when the Mozambique government ensured that some of the plants LNG production would be available for domestic use, it also laid the foundation for monetisation and economic diversification. In Mozambique, LNG will be available to serve as feedstock for fertiliser and petrochemical plants. It can be exported by pipeline to neighboring companies. And that, in turn, can help Mozambique build even more infrastructure and contribute to even greater widespread prosperity.Id also like to point out the thought and preparation that the Mozambique government has put into making its natural gas operations beneficial for the country as a whole since approximately 180 trillion cubic feet of natural gas reserves were discovered there in 2010.Mozambiques national oil company, ENH, hired global energy research and consulting firm Wood Mackenzie to help it prepare for the responsibility of managing and selling its corresponding portion of the resources. Since then, ENH formed a consortium with international oil and gas trader, Vitol.The government also has sought the support of more experienced energy producers and international partners. Earlier this year, President Filipe Nyusi met with Norway's Crown Prince Haakon and signed an agreement for support on natural gas resource management.But even before that, Mozambique laid the foundation for a successful oil and gas industry with the new Petroleum Law of 2014. And with that legislation in place, the country completed a successful bidding round for exploration blocks. These efforts, along with careful negotiations with international oil companies, is what brought Mozambique to where it is today: on the cusp of becoming a major LNG producer. And these efforts are what will make Mozambiques LNG industry a success, not just in terms of government revenue, but also in improving the lives of everyday people.Mozambique is not asking for aid to lift its people out of poverty. Its attempting to capitalise on its own natural resources. The government isnt trying to make a quick buck. Its working to lay a foundation for long-term growth. And efforts like the Exxon and Total Mozambique Projects are more than an opportunity for international oil companies, or even Mozambiques government. They have the potential to improve the lives of millions of everyday people.I recognise the need to protect our planet and prevent climate change. But interfering with financing for Africas fossil fuel projects is not the right path. We must not dismiss the value of projects like these or their ability to make meaningful changes for the better in Mozambique. And we must not put environmental ideals ahead of the pressing needs that are facing people right now.
Washington, Sep 26 : Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden has said that US President Donald Trump will leave office if he loses the November 3 election, according to media reports.

"I just think the people in the country are going to be heard on November 3," The Hill news website quoted the former Vice President as saying on MSNBC on Friday.

"Every vote in this country is going to be heard and they will not be stopped. I'm confident that all of the irresponsible, outrageous attacks on voting, we'll have an election in this country as we always have had, and he'll leave," he added.

Biden's remarks came after Trump earlier this week refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power if he does not win the election and also suggesed that the result will be challenged in court.

The White House has played down his comments, saying the President will accept the outcome of a "free and fair" election.

But on Thursday, the Republican-majority Senate passed a resolution reaffirming its commitment to a peaceful transition of power.

The non-binding resolution reaffirmed the Senate's commitment to "the orderly and peaceful transfer of power called for in the Constitution of the US", adding that "there should be no disruptions by the President or any person in power to overturn the will of the people of the US".

Several Republican Senators have also pushed back the President's remarks that he's "going to have to see what happens", including Majority Leader Mitch McConnell who said that "the winner of the November 3 election will be inaugurated on January 20th".

"There will be an orderly transition just as there has been every four years since 1792,: the Trump ally tweeted on Thursday.

Trump is currently trailing Biden nationally by 10 points, according to latest polls.

Surveys showed tight races in a number of key battleground states.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Congressman Dan Crenshaw has a new political ad out, and he's not pulling any punches.

The Republican congressman from Katy brought together a whole crew of fellow Texans in one action-packed, movie-trailer-like television spot for a mission to "save Texas." Candidates Wesley Hunt, Genevieve Collins, Beth Van Duyne, Tony Gonzales and August Pfluger all make appearances.

I won't bother trying to sum it up; you really just have to watch it and experience it for yourself. If you need to be persuaded, Crenshaw jumps out of a plane.

'CACTUS JACK SENT ME': I tried the McDonald's Travis Scott meal, and it didn't even taste like him

Honestly, this is so wild that it works. Crenshaw bypassed the usual Texan politician's way of listing a bunch of problems he hopes to fix in a voiceover over scenes of him riding horses, driving a truck in a wide-open Texan prairie, and petting a cattle dog on from a wooden rocking chair on his ranch-style porch. You know, like all us Texans do.

I have no idea how much this cost, who originally pitched it, or whether this is an online exclusive ad, but Crenshaw is right: It's definitely not boring.

I sincerely hope Crenshaw has just ushered in a new age of political ads more akin to movie trailers. I want to see my next congresswoman recreate the trailer to "Legally Blonde" or my next senator deliver Aragorn's final battle monologue from "The Return of the King." Why not? It would catch my attention.

Here's to what is hopefully a new era of political ads. I never want to see a politician on a horse ever again.
Cinema halls are set to reopen in West Bengal from October 1 after remaining closed for over six months in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, Chief Minister said on Saturday.

She also said musical, dance and magic shows would be permitted in the state from next month.

"To return to normalcy, Jatras, Plays, OATs, Cinemas & all musical, dance, recital & magic shows shall be allowed to function with 50 participants or less from 1 Oct, subject to adherence to physical distancing norms, wearing of masks & compliance to precautionary protocols," the chief minister said on Twitter.

The decision comes amid repeated requests by actors of the Bengali film industry, including Trinamool Congress MPs Dev, Nusrat Jahan and Mimi Chakraborty, and industry bodies to reopen movie theatres, underscoring that cinema hall owners and employees are under severe financial stress.

The Eastern India Motion Pictures Association (EIMPA) and the Multiplex Association of India (MAI) had in June separately urged the Centre to grant permission for restarting shows in cinema halls.

The West Bengal government had allowed shooting for films, TV serials and web series from June 1 with not more than 35 persons on set and adhering to all health and safety protocols.

Cinema halls have been shut since the nationwide began in late March.
So many readers of our pages have such a profound love of Fethiye and the surrounding region they have made it their home while others will visit as often as they can  whether thats twice, three or even four times a year.

But, if your own love affair is from a distance or if COVID-19 has thrown up barriers its impossible to cross right now, it may easy to hop on a plane to your happy place as often as youd like.

That doesnt mean your love for the region is any less strong though  and we were reminded of that by some lovely words and pictures we received recently from Canadas Suzanne Rolland.

A love story

Responding to request for albums of pictures from readers of favourite locations and themes, Suzanne writes: I have completed ten trips from Canada to Turkey and always I am in love with its people, landscape, seaside, food, wine, scenery to the point where I hold the Turkish sun in my hands at sunset on the Fethiye promenade.

Turkey is the land for me to experiment with new things  like having a glass of Turkish wine during a family trip on a gulet; like paragliding at 76 over Oludeniz; like smoking a water pipe; like climbing to the top of the Kas amphitheatre .. all of them were wonderful moments in my life.

Readers albums

The pictures below reflect some of those magic moments for Suzanne  but do you have similar memories of a special place you have visted in Turkey you would like to share with our readers? If so, why not submit them for consideration?

They dont need to be a particular shape but, to reproduce on the website, they do need to be of a reasonable resolution  perhaps 1mb or more.

The subject is up to you but  like Suzanne  wed also ask that you include a few details about yourself, what inspired you to take the images and a little bit about them.

Please feel free to submit your album of no more than 15 images and the relevant details to fethiyetimes2017@gmail.com and well do the rest.

Well look forward to hearing from you 

Trying out the nargile 

You cant visit Cals at sunset and not take a picture
Copyright  2020 Albuquerque Journal

The Federal Railroad Administration has awarded Amtrak a $5.6 million grant for track and infrastructure improvements between Trinidad, Colorado, and Lamy.

Combined with nearly $5 million in federal funding Amtrak has set aside, and another $1 million from the state Department of Transportation, Amtrak says a total of $11.5 million will be invested in the stretch of track utilized by the Southwest Chief passenger train. The Southwest Chief makes daily trips in each direction with stops in Raton, Las Vegas, Lamy, Albuquerque and Gallup along a 2,265-mile route between Chicago and Los Angeles.

A good amount of the money will be used for stabilization and protection up at (Raton Pass) to protect against falling rock, said Marc Magliari, an Amtrak spokesman. We also believe there will be an enhanced level of safety.

The work includes laying ties along a 31-mile stretch of track south of Raton Pass and the replacement of 12 miles of bolted rail with welded rail between Lamy and Madrid. Funding will also be used on rockfall prevention at Raton Pass, the steepest rail route in the contiguous United States, and Glorieta Pass.

Our past and current investments, from Kansas through Colorado and New Mexico, demonstrate our commitment to the Chief route and also preserve this segment for eventual inclusion in a north-south connection along the Front Range between Denver and Albuquerque, via Colorado Springs and Pueblo, Bill Flynn, Amtraks president and CEO, said in a news release.

Flynn also gave credit to the respective Congressional delegations for pushing the effort. U.S. Sen. Tom Udall (D-NM) said improving infrastructure is critical to New Mexicos economic development efforts and important to communities along the railway.

Rail lines like the Southwest Chief link communities across our state and nation, he said.

The work is scheduled to begin in 2021 and be completed in 2022. The BNSF Railway and the Rio Metro Transportation District will perform much of the work in New Mexico.

Rio Metro, which operates the Rail Runner Express commuter train, will do work on 22-miles of track between Lamy and Madrid, according to Robert Gonzales, and assistant director for Rio Metros rail operations.

Well be upgrading the signal system, replacing rail and installing slide fences to prevent rock slides, he said.

Gonzales added that Rio Metro this week completed installing a Positive Train Control system, a safety system meant to prevent trains from derailing or crashing into each other, along the 96-mile Rail Runner Express route.

Rio Metro was required to install the safety equipment before the end of the year, or risk losing federal funding.
Doing his third-rate Churchillian impression, Boris Johnson this week reached once more for that hoary old cliche that we are all in this together. Arlene and Michelle clutched at that sentiment too.

Really? Spare me the Dunkirk spirit this time round. Because that's not what I'm seeing. If the last six months have taught us anything, it's that Covid-19 kills - and some people couldn't give a damn so long as it's not them.

The pandemic may have illuminated the best of humanity - the courage of medics and essential workers, acts of kindness by volunteers, Captain Tom shuffling round his garden - but it's also exposed the selfish, the cruel and the ignorant.

Sadly, we're not one harmonious people looking out for each other. Instead, we now live in a three-tier society. When it comes to keeping yourself and your loved ones safe, it's every man and woman for themselves.

Your circumstances determine your predicament - and survival means taking personal responsibility for your safety.

The first tier is those whose lives are most at risk: the elderly, the ill and those with underlying conditions. They've stayed away from others since March because the next person they meet - without knowing it - could give them the virus. For them, nothing will change until there is a vaccine. They're still hiding out.

Then there are the carers for people at risk, such as those with elderly parents or parents of children that need protected. Typically, these people are in their 20s-50s, use public transport, must go into cities and towns and are economically active. Their everyday life is restricted and filled with caution. They worry constantly that they've become carriers of a virus they don't know they have, but which could kill someone they love. They diligently wash hands, wear masks and socially distance.

And finally, there's the third tier who are actually now our first class citizens. They eat out, fly off on holiday, slip back just before the quarantine period and don't see why your worries about your parents should impact on their lifestyle. Politicians have encouraged them to get out and save the economy. They've calculated that if they contract Covid their risk is minimal so, hell, bring it on.

There's a particularly annoying self-styled macho man on the loose. Before Covid, DUP MP Sammy Wilson's 'straight-talking Ulsterman' persona had a certain charm. But no more. That photo of him not wearing a mask on the Tube, shortly after the ice-cream parlour stunt, was infuriating. Similarly the pitch invasion by Dungannon Clarkes' GAA fans was risibly excused by some as what men do when their team wins. Let's not even return to the Bobby Storey funeral outrage.

These types are everywhere. In supermarkets male goons mansplain through their very body language, shimmying unmasked past the sanitiser and reaching over terrified little old ladies for burgers, knowing full well the message they send out. And these blokes have female alter egos, like women who stand either side of an aisle gabbling incessantly to each other, a little piece of theatre to pretend they're sticking to the rules. Because they won't stop blethering, you're expected to walk through their corridor of spittle.

Throw these people a wary glance and you'll fall victim to a new form of intimidation: the 'what are you looking at, Covidiot?' glare.

Maybe I'm a sucker for nostalgia but I hanker for when we queued outside stores and numbers inside were limited. It felt safer. Relaxed rules now only stretch to optional sanitiser, maybe a mandatory mask - and a Perspex screen to protect staff.

Sure, some people have to bring children along, but must they treat the place like Butlins, running amok around scared older folks? How can you not realise that's just wrong?

Then there are the house parties, and not just in student land. One friend who's shielding tells of the despair they feel listening to the revelry wafting across hedgerows from all-day get-togethers. The only bubbles they're concerned with are the ones they're necking down. Of course, some people are genuinely confused. The Government - or governments, since so many issue slightly differing advice - have made a mess of it.

In Northern Ireland we've opened the unfortunately named "wet bars" as restrictions are tightened on pubs in England. You might think this indicates we've the virus under control but you'd be wrong. The rate of transmission is galloping here.

And some anomalies are just ludicrous. Only gatherings of six between two households are allowed, but until yesterday six from any number of households could sit at a pub table. Now, it's two households. Still, try policing that one, bartender.

Yes, the rules are paradoxical and governments could act more decisively. But there's hypocrisy too - some feigning confusion are determined to find loopholes to do exactly as they please.

Most offensive is the nasty narrative around Covid deaths, which focuses on how the majority of victims are elderly and purposefully ignores the fact the virus kills younger people - and nearly took the life of a then 55-year-old PM.

The subtext is that old people die all the time, they've had a good innings and are just being greedy by wanting to hang in there for another few years. The world can't stop just because they want to stay alive. Some commentary borders on making the case for a kind of euthanasia, ignoring the reality that many over-70s have rich lives.

Cicero said "No man is so old that he does not think he could live another year". A man or woman of 71, 81, or 91 doesn't want to die. They have hopes, plans, hobbies, churches to go to, family members to be with.

Tragically, some prefer to double down on the latest tinfoil hat conspiracy theory and cough literally and metaphorically in the face of others.

The only thing we're in together is denial.
By Trend

The ethno fascism of Armenia is a menace to regional stability, Member of the Senate of Pakistan Anwar ul Haq Kakar told Trend.

Commenting on the presence of Armenian ASALA terror organizations in the occupied territories of Azerbaijan, Kakar said he strongly condemns terrorist activities on Azerbaijan's occupied lands, and Armenia's targeting of Azerbaijani civilians.

These actions are a crime against humanity. The ethno fascism by Armenia and the fact that a terrorist is treated as a hero in Armenia (Garegin Nzhdeh), is a menace to regional stability and is a grave violation of human rights, Kakar said.

I appeal to the international community to recognize these actions for what they are as soon as possible, and be wary of these trends as it can engulf not just immediate neighbors, but its protracted presence can ignite new fire in Europe too, Kakar said.

He once again emphasized that injustice anywhere should be obstructed or otherwise it has all the potential to become a new norm.

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, 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 the withdrawal of its armed forces from Nagorno Karabakh and the surrounding districts.

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Re: Hootsuite cancels ICE deal

In response to your article Hootsuite cancels Ice deal, I sincerely hope that this Hootsuite employee and "hundreds of google employees" demonstrated (peacefully of course) in 2014 against the Obama-Biden strategy of separating children and their parents.

It was Obama-Biden's own laws that were responsible for these actions. Indeed, Obama was called the "Deporter-in-Chief" during his administration.

In response to another article, Sen. Bernie Saunders is complaining about Pres.Trump deciding which votes should or should not be counted. That is what the SCOTUS is for.

What does that mean? It means to me that the Democrats are not interested in the peoples' right to a fair and honest election. Sen Saunders should be enthusiastically telling his fellow democratic senators to "advise and consent."

The following comment has not been followed by Castanet, but I think it is a sad comment on the state of affairs in the U.S. Some people were so ignorant when Pres. Trump was reviewing the body of SCJ RBG.

In the middle of his visit, some people started chanting,"vote him out". This is the most disrespectful kind of attitude one can imagine. I have never heard a disparaging word against her since her death.

Doug McNair
From demarcating spaces for parking of school buses to appointing staff for thermal checking, a lot of preparation is required to adhere to safety protocols

On 8 September, 2020, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India released an SOP for partial reopening of schools from 21 September and for students of classes 9 to 12 on a voluntary basis to clarify doubts and take guidance from their teachers, in keeping with the governments phase-wise unlocking activities.

This has facilitated partial reopening of schools in several cities in India starting this week, though parents remain uncertain and concerned, and schools are also mulling over how to get back to the regular regimen in view of the prevailing COVID-19 situation.

Schools grappling with multiple challenges

Genius International Public School, Ropar, Punjab is a K-12 school with over 1,900 students. Says Director and Principal Dr Bindu Sharma, Re-opening schools, even in a phased manner poses a lot of challenges for school managements, given that enforcing discipline among people on social distancing and wearing of masks is still a difficult proposition.

The principal explains that schools have a lot of planning to do right from demarcating spaces for parking of school buses, to fixing of specific entry and exit gates, appointing staff and materials for thermal checking and sanitisation, seating arrangements and appointing staff to monitor students for social distancing.

These challenges are over and above our academic commitments. The pandemic has also brought about a divide between parents and schools with regard to payment of fees and created hostility among some parents who are not positive about depositing fees, she said.

According to her, it is also difficult for teachers who would have to get used to wearing masks while teaching and enforce social distancing during class time. At the same time, they will have to continue with the rigors of online teaching, preparing teaching material online, correcting homework and internal assessments and maintaining students records online.

From the childrens point of view, having stayed at home for a long time, it will take time for them to get back to the structured mode of learning or recommence a disciplined daily routine.

With only a limited number of students allowed to sit per classroom, arranging for more classrooms, bringing in more teachers for a class, making seating arrangements and the cost burden of security precautions, housekeeping as well as infrastructural rearrangements will be a huge burden on schools.

Says Harshida Harikumar, Principal, Manasarowar Pushkarini Vidyashrama, Mysore, As of now, the SOP by the government clearly says that students from Classes 9  12 can go to school on a voluntary basis to clear doubts. We are planning to wait for another ten days and for instructions from our Block Education Officer.

The school is part of an association of CBSE schools called Mysore Sahodaya School Complex, a CBSE initiative. All the schools in the Sahodaya have decided to wait till the end of the month to see if the state government issues any other directive.

One school in Mysore had sent an intimation to parents to send children to school from Monday, 21 September and the parents raised strong objections. Parents are not comfortable sending children to school, even if it is only to clear doubts, said Harshida.

Manasarowar Pushkarini Vidyashrama has been conducting online classes from May, and except for the skeletal staff that works at the principals office, no one, not any of the teachers, has been asked to come to school. Considering the continuing spike in COVID-19 cases, Harshida sees no purpose in schools being kept open only to clear doubts.

Moreover, the dual burden of handling online classes for students who continue to learn from home and attending to students who come to school will take a toll on the teachers. However, having been a centre for the recently conducted NEET examination, the school is prepared with all the necessary infrastructure and amenities to reopen.

R Buvana, Principal, Noida International Public School, says that the foremost concern about phased reopening of schools stems from parents who are hesitant about sending their children to school, especially since the number of COVID-19 cases has been increasing steadily with no signs of the curve flattening.

Another concern she says is the declining interest on the part of the students because they have continuously been in their homes for a long time and are also stressed about the financial burden on their parents.

Reopening schools will impose additional costs for institutions to maintain safety protocols necessitated by the pandemic situation.

Buvana has gone to great lengths to get herself trained in technology to conduct online classes and has trained the teachers. Online classes are being carried out seamlessly and the school has successfully completed 60 percent of the syllabus for the senior classes. They have established a reliable online system of assessment and student feedback and are geared up to continue online teaching till the end of the academic year, if necessary.

Founder-Principal of Brookfield International School, New Chandigarh, JK Singh emphasizes that the SOP clearly mentions students need to come to school only if they have to clarify doubts. According to him, considering that in India the size of a class is anywhere between 40-80, only about 10-14 students can be accommodated per classroom.

Moreover, schools can function only for four hours a day. Hence, no learning will happen even if students come to school. But for this, the school has to invest heavily in upgrading infrastructure and making arrangements to maintain safety protocols.

Given that parents have raised objections to payment of fees, many schools in Punjab have closed because there has been no collection of fees. Schools have many liabilities which they have not been able to reduce due to non-payment of fees, says Singh.

Teachers have done magnificently during the pandemic, because it is really difficult to transition to online teaching, learning how to use software tools to prepare and present teaching materials. But many teachers have not been paid salaries and have been looking for alternative means of earning money. This is the stark reality, he says.

Parents and student speak

Anitha Nagaswamys son is studying in the eleventh standard and she is the Secretary of the Parent Teacher Association (PTA) at Padma Seshadri Bala Bhavan Sr. Sec School, Chennai. We live in a semi-joint family set-up and have elderly people at home. We have an assorted mix of age groups of people and some of them would be more vulnerable to coronavirus than the others. That is the worry. Children may be asymptomatic but we dont want elders in the house to pick up something because a child went to school, says Anitha.

Like her, many are not comfortable sending their children to school till there is mass access to a vaccine for the virus.

Right now, online classes are being conducted more or less smoothly and most parents are happy with how schools are going about this in a methodical fashion. Tests are being conducted and the school management as well as the teachers are doing a remarkable job. Of course, children are missing their friends but that is a small sacrifice considering the larger picture. It makes sense to wait for the situation to get better, Nagaswamy feels.

Poonam Singh is a teacher at the Naval Children School, Mumbai and also a parent. It is impractical to expect 15 and 17 year olds to maintain social distancing, especially after a long closure of schools, she says, Even in our school, which is safe and within the complex, a few teachers come from outside. However much you sanitize or monitor social distancing, children are exposed to risk.

Singh feels that as long as there is no vaccination, schools should remain closed; even if this stretches to a full academic year or even two, it does not make a difference in the long run. As the numbers continue to rise, she is fearful of the situation spiralling out of control in cities like Mumbai, especially in railway stations and public transport, once the schools and colleges reopen.

People like us in the navy live in a self-contained complex and problems are less. But for people outside, the risks are high. We lost one of our brilliant teachers to COVID-19 recently. I think the education ministry must seriously look at ways and means of conducting online board exams like countries abroad and also make arrangements for all students to take these exams online.

Dr Karthik Pandit and his wife are Ayurvedic doctors in Old Agrahara, near the Mysore Palace and he also manufactures Ayurvedic medicines. They have treated several mild and moderate cases of COVID-19. We want our kids to go back to school, but not in these circumstances, considering that in Karnataka we have 600-700 daily cases of COVID-19, says the couple.

At the same time, Pandit admits that since both parents have to go out for work, his daughter and son tend to get depressed staying at home and would perhaps rather go back to school. And he guesses so rightly. His daughter Mahi, who studies in Class 9, says she would like to go to school if they reopen because it has been months since she has seen her teachers and friends in person. We miss school very much. It has taken us some time to get adjusted to online classes. Since there is no other way, we have accepted the situation. But we would love to go back to school. There is nothing to do at home! she exclaims.

But some students themselves are sceptical how things will pan out. Sahil* a Class 11 student of Chinmaya Vidyalaya, Chennai says, I will not go to school if it is only on voluntary basis, because there is no point. But if school starts in a full-fledged way, I would like to go. There will be safety precautions and a new normal once we go back to school. But I look at these as changes and not challenges.

Sahil adds, I hate virtual meetings and cannot do it for six more months. Meeting people in person is different from meeting them online; even though you would be meeting the same friend, the feeling is not the same!

The global experience so far

According to UNESCO, 146 countries around the world shut down schools, affecting at least two-thirds of students globally. While COVID-19 remains uncontrolled in the USA, some states reopened schools and the experience has not been very good despite enforcement of social distancing among students, adopting rigid sanitization routines and temperature checks. Large numbers of students and teachers have been testing positive for the disease.

USA witnessed a 90 percent increase in the number of COVID-19 cases among children during August-September and several clusters of coronavirus cases emerged in many states. Fear of infection among tens of thousands of students and teachers in multiple states in the US is pushing officials to switch to a full or partial schedule of online classes. Some schools have delayed reopening due to lack of preparedness as well as observing the impact of reopening by other schools.

Schools across Europe and the UK have reopened after months of online learning and are following guidelines laid down by their governments on social distancing as well as safety precautions. Primary schools reopened in England on 1 June and secondary students started on 15 June.

In France, schools reopened on 1 September. In Germany children have returned to school full time since early August while Greece had extended the reopening of schools to 14 September due to a surge in COVID-19 infections. Italy followed Greece in reopening schools on 14 September while Dutch schools opened in August.

In Norway schools reopened gradually from 27 April, children were not required to wear face masks and school hours remained unchanged due to their efficient handling of the the COVID-19 situation.

Polish and Russian schools reopened on 1 September, while primary and secondary schools in Spain started the academic year in a phased manner over the first three weeks of September.

Remarkably, Sweden schools stayed open throughout the pandemic and reopened after summer break in mid-August.

Japan reopened its schools in June necessitating parents to take their childrens temperatures every morning and enter the results on a health report, which is then brought to school and checked by teachers on arrival. Emergency plans were charted to close schools if the virus struck the children again.

South Korea, viewed as one of the worlds coronavirus success stories for its management of the disease, ordered closure of all schools yet again in late August following a resurgence of coronavirus cases. The Ministry of Education ordered a return to online learning for all schools and kindergartens till 11 September, except for high school students scheduled to write the national university entrance examinations in early December.

South Korean schools have capped attendance at one-third in elementary and middle schools and two-thirds in high schools to guarantee social distancing.

In India, it appears that most children are waiting with bated breath to get back to school. However, it appears that the dilemma among school managements, parents and the governments is likely to continue until the world sees a way out of the impasse, which could only be through the much-awaited vaccine.

This article was first published in Citizen Matters, a civic media website and is republished here with permission. (c) Oorvani Foundation/Open Media Initiative.
Tariq Mahmood Ahmad, Minister of State for the Commonwealth and United Nations at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office addresses the United Nations Security Council at the United Nations Headquarters in New York City, on Aug. 29, 2018. (Andrew Kelly/Reuters)

UK Criticizes China Over Hong Kong and Xinjiang at UN Meeting

Britain on Friday criticized the Chinese communist regime for abusing rights and freedoms in Hong Kong and Xinjiang, and pressured the regime to give the United Nations unfettered access to Xinjiang.

Tariq Ahmad, the UKs Minister for the U.N. and Human Rights, on Friday delivered a speech to the U.N. Human Rights Council, drawing its focus to the serious situation in China.

He called on the Chinese regime to uphold the rights and freedoms in the Joint Declaration, to respect the independence of the Hong Kong judiciary, allow unfettered access to Xinjiang, and to release all those who are arbitrarily detained.

Hong Kong

The National Security Law imposed on Hong Kong, which Ahmad said is a serious breach of the legally binding Sino-British Joint Declaration, a violation of Hong Kongs autonomy, and a threat to rights and freedoms, is being implemented with the apparent intention to eliminate dissent, he told the council.

It allows prosecution of certain cases in mainland China, a jurisdiction where defendants are often held for long periods without charge or access to legal counsel, and where we have concerns about judicial independence, due process, and reports of torture, Ahmad said.

The National Security Law, which went into effect on July 1, gives the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) sweeping powers to target individuals for any acts of secession, subversion, terrorism, or collusion with foreign forces. The offenses can carry a maximum penalty of life imprisonment.

Riot police detain a man as they raise a warning flag during a demonstration against the new national security law in Hong Kong, on July 1, 2020. (Anthony Kwan/Getty Images)

Among those arrested under the draconian law are Agnes Chow, a high-profile pro-democracy activist; Jimmy Lai, a media tycoon in Hong Kong; Wilson Li, a freelancer for Britains ITV News; and Samuel Chu, a pro-democracy activist and U.S. citizen.

Foreign Citizens at Risk Under National Security Law

German citizens in Hong Kong on June 30 received a warning from the Federal Foreign Office that they should exercise caution with regard to political statements, since it cannot be completely ruled out that German citizens in Hong Kong would not also be subject to measures under the new law.

In addition, the office said that acts committed by foreigners outside the territory of Hong Kong are also included in the scope of the law. This means that, for example, a criticism publicly voiced in Germany about the regimes behavior could lead to consequences if the person who voiced it enters Hong Kong.

Be especially careful and be aware that political statements, including those on social media, can be considered relevant, the office warned.

An expert witness on Aug. 17 told the parliamentary Canada-China committee that all Canadians are at risk under the expansive law.

Canadian citizens with ties to Hong Kong must now consider whether what they say in Canada will be used against them in the event that they so much as set foot on a Hong Kong registered airliner, he told the committee.

The United States on Sept. 15 issued an advisory warning against traveling to China and Hong Kong, citing the risk of arbitrary detention and arbitrary enforcement of local laws.

Xinjiang

Ahmad also highlighted at the U.N. Human Rights Council meeting the systematic human rights violations in Xinjiang.

Culture and religion are severely restricted, and we have seen credible reports of forced labor and forced birth control, he said. Staggeringly, up to 1.8 million people have been detained without trial.

Chinese officials have repeatedly derided allegations of genocide, forced sterilization, and the mass detention of nearly 1 million Uyghurs in Xinjiang, saying the allegations are lies fabricated by anti-China forces.

A recent report (pdf) indicates military-style training centers are now built in Tibet, reminiscent of the system used in Xinjiang.

Ahmad said Britain remains seriously concerned about the pressure on media freedom across China.

Bowen Xiao, The Associated Press, and Reinhard Werner from The Epoch Times German edition contributed to this article.
If you or your children always have enjoyed going trick-or-treating or distributing candy on Halloween, dont let COVID-19 frighten you to the point of postponing that tradition in 2020.

In fact, here in Ohio, the state Department of Health has stated that participating in Halloween festivities should be made by local communities, individuals and parents/guardians.

Recently, some local government entities have stated their positions about trick-or-treating taking place in their communities. And were glad to see theyre receptive to residents using their own judgment about whether to be involved in traditional trick-or-treating.

For example, Fairport Harbor Village Council unanimously approved a motion to allow trick-or-treating in the community from 6 to 8 p.m. Oct. 31.

Lets let Fairport Harbor be leaders, said Councilman Anthony Bertone, prior to the vote at a meeting held Sept. 15. Lets show the world how we can live with COVID.

Fairport Harbor Mayor Timothy Manross said that based on input he received from other village administrators, he felt comfortable with permitting old-fashioned trick-or-treating in the village.

I believe its something that if folks feel like putting on a porch light and handing out candy, and parents feel like sending the kiddies out (trick-or-treating), I believe that could be done in a socially responsible manner, he said.

Meanwhile, Perry Township trustees approved a motion stating that trick-or-treating is scheduled from 6 to 8 p.m. Oct. 31.

Trustees emphasized that the motion they passed on Sept. 22 was not an endorsement to go trick-or-treating or hand out candy, but more of an advisory of when the activity is designated to take place. That position will be restated in an article on trick-or-treating for 2020 in the townships upcoming newsletter, township Administrator Karen Sundy said.

Im going to say that the set hours, as they always are on Halloween, are from 6 to 8 p.m., and tell people if you dont want to pass out candy, dont turn your light on, and if youre not comfortable with your kids going, dont send them, its really that easy, she said.

The Ohio Health Department also issued a list of recommended guidelines to help prevent the spread of COVID-19 during Halloween activities. Those tips include:

* Holding a drive-through trick-or-treating event.

For parents with children who prefer this option, four drive-through events will take place in Lake County this October, according to Eastlake Councilman Mike Zuren.

The programs are slated from noon to 2 p.m. Oct. 3 in Willowick at 32901 Vine St., from 2 to 4 p.m. Oct. 17 in Painesville at 69 Pearl St., from 6 to 8 p.m. Oct. 25 in Mentor at Great Lakes Mall in Mentor, and from 2 to 4 p.m. Oct. 31 in Painesville at 1509 Mentor Ave.

These events are open to the public and children under 18 will receive a free goodie bag filled with candy and treats, according to Sherri Falkenberg, event coordinator for Lake Events.

* Leaving treats in the mailboxes of friends and neighbors.

* For parents taking their children trick-or-treating, limit the number of houses visited and ask children to stay as far away from the treat givers as possible.

* For anyone distributing candy to trick-or-treaters, refrain from having children select their own treats from a bowl or common container, or set up a hand-sanitizing station.

* Clean candy wrappers with sanitizing wipes once children return home from trick-or-treating and before they begin unwrapping candy

In conclusion, we believe that trick-or-treating in Northeast Ohio can be conducted safely this year if participants use common sense and abide by guidelines for social distancing and mass gatherings, which have emphasized throughout the COVID-19 saga. Heres hoping Halloween will be a fun time and scary for no other reason than some of the ghouls, goblins and other costumed characters who will make appearances in communities throughout our region.
EU's Vestager appeals court veto of $15 billion Apple tax order FILE PHOTO: "European Competition Day" at the German Economy Ministry in Berlin

By Foo Yun Chee

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager on Friday appealed a court ruling dismissing her order to iPhone maker Apple <AAPL.O> to pay 13 billion euros ($15 billion) in Irish back taxes, a landmark case in the European Commission's crackdown against sweetheart tax deals.

The Luxembourg-based General Court in July scrapped the Commission's 2016 ruling, saying that EU competition enforcers had not met the requisite legal standard to show that Apple had enjoyed an unfair advantage.

Vestager said the case was important, a sign that her drive to get multinationals pay their fair share of taxes would continue unabated.

"The General Court judgment raises important legal issues that are of relevance to the Commission in its application of State aid rules to tax planning cases," she said in a statement.

"The Commission also respectfully considers that in its judgment the General Court has made a number of errors of law," Vestager said.

She said legislation is required to close the tax loopholes and ensure transparency, in a call to EU countries to revamp rules.

Apple said the court judgment proved it has always complied with Irish laws and that the issue was more about where it should pay taxes rather than the amount.

Irish Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe said Ireland has always been clear that the correct amount of Irish tax was paid and that the country provided no state aid to Apple.

The Commission's case centred on two Irish tax rulings that it said artificially reduced Apple's tax burden for over two decades, which in 2014 was as low as 0.005%.

Vestager has three ongoing tax cases, Ikea's <IKEA.UL> and Nike's <NKE.N> deals with the Netherlands, as well as Huhtamaki's <HUH1V.HE> agreement with Luxembourg.

($1 = 0.8587 euros)

(Reporting by Foo Yun Chee; editing by Barbara Lewis)
2020-09-27 - 12:48 am

Bahrain Mirror (Exclusive): A tumult is a state of noisy confusion. This is exactly what happened on Sunday (September 19, 2020) when the people of Bahrain woke up and read the Akhbar Al-Khaleej newspaper front-page report, which seemed to be reporting news from the Interior Ministry, entitled "huge terrorist attack aimed at blowing up a number of public and security installations in Bahrain".

The report mentioned that the Interior Ministry investigations revealed that a number of what it described as terrorist elements in Iran had begun to form a new organization called "Soleimani Brigades."

This is a sample of the propagation of lies that has been going on since 2011. The source of this lie is the interior ministry's so-called "evidence", which is based on public prosecution investigative files, and falls into the category of confessions extracted from citizens who have been brutally arrested and tortured, as documented by reports of international human rights organizations.

What is new this time is that Akhbar Al-Khaleej, one of the state's tools for spreading lies, exposed the reality of the region's media outlets, especially Bahrain's media allies.

The lie started with Akhbar Al-Khaleej newspaper and then it was widely circulated, starting with Al Arabiya and Al Jazeera channels, the Saudi Al-Ekhbariya, then a lazy Reuters reporter copied the news which was circulated around the world through various media platforms. Many of which cornered the Bahraini Ministry of Interior by flooding it with requests for comment or clarification. The ministry was forced to admit that: the news was old and that the details were inaccurate.

The Interior Ministry said in a statement "Concerning inquiries received by the Police Media of the Interior Ministry about a front-page report on "Akhbar Al Khaleej" newspaper on Sunday 20 September 2020 entitled "Major Terrorist Plot Foiled", the case is dated back to the beginning of 2020, and it is now at the concerned court; hence it isn't a new case."

"Releasing inaccurate details about the case and in this way would affect its trial process, and it had been better if the newspaper considered the correct and logical timeframe of the incident. Media resources are urged to follow professional standards of the sector, as the way the report was published created regional and international confusion."

"The security authorities are committed to performing their national security protection duties."

The ministry did not end its statement by saying that it "reserves its right to take legal action", which should have been stated. Akhbar Al-Khaleej is a mere tool for fabricating lies, thus it will neither be punished nor held accountable. The law in Bahrain does not apply to everyone and does not treat everyone equally. It is rather laughable that Akhbar Al-Khaleej published the Interior Ministry's comment; however, the report remained to be circulated under the name of Reuters, Al Jazeera, Al Arabiya and CNN Arabic.

Arabic Version
The Illinois Supreme Court unanimously has ruled that parents involved in civil unions have the same step-parenting rights as married individuals and that those rights continue even after the death of their spouse.

This is a great decision, not only for the LGBTQ community but for all couples who decided to enter into a civil union, John Knight of the ACLU of Illinois said in a statement after the ruling. The court clearly recognized that when the Illinois General Assembly passed the Civil Union Act, it intended to extend to civil union partners all the rights and responsibilities of marriage, including those of a stepparent.

The case actually did not involve an LGBTQ couple. It involved a woman, Kris Fulkerson, whose partner, Matthew Sharpe, died in 2017. Sharpe had a child  identified in court documents only as A.S. Sharpe  with his ex-wife, Crystal Westmoreland, before their 2013 divorce.

Sharpe and Westmoreland shared equal parenting time, but A.S. continued to live with Sharpe at their home in the Metro East with Fulkerson and her three children. After Sharpe died, Westmoreland took custody of A.S. and stopped allowing the child to visit Fulkerson or her other children.

Fulkerson filed a petition seeking visitation rights and an allocation of parental responsibilities. Westmoreland then asked the circuit court to certify two questions for an appellate court to decide: Whether a party to a civil union has standing to request visitation with her deceased partners child as a stepparent, and whether that party has standing to request parental responsibilities.

Under Illinois law, the court noted, stepparents are allowed to seek visitation rights and parental responsibilities when their spouse dies. The court also noted that only three other classes of non-parents are allowed to seek visitation rights  grandparents, great-grandparents and siblings.

The question before the court, however, was whether someone who is not married to the birth parent, but instead is part of a civil union, qualifies as a stepparent.

In 2011, the General Assembly passed the Illinois Religious Freedom Protection and Civil Union Act, known more simply as the Civil Union Act, as a way to confer most of the rights of marriage to couples who were not legally married. That was prior to the U.S. Supreme Court legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide.

That law states: A party to a civil union is entitled to the same legal obligations, responsibilities, protections, and benefits as are afforded or recognized by the law of Illinois to spouses, whether they derive from statute, administrative rule, policy, common law, or any other source of civil or criminal law.

An appeals court panel answered no to both of those questions, but in a unanimous opinion Thursday, the Illinois Supreme Court reversed those decisions.

We find that, in enacting the Civil Union Act, the General Assembly intended to create an alternative to marriage that was equal in all respects, Justice Rita Garman wrote for the court. This intent was not limited to partners rights as to each other.

I am so pleased by the courts ruling. This was not just a court case. It was about my family, Fulkerson said in a statement issued through the ACLU. When my partner and I entered into a civil union seven years ago, we understood that our civil union would give us all the same rights and responsibilities as a marriage. I became a stepparent to a child who became an important part of my life and the life of my entire family. We forged a strong relationship as a family, one that did not end  legally or emotionally  at the death of my partner.

The case now goes back to circuit court for a judge to decide how much visitation and parental responsibility Fulkerson will have.
Just a little over two weeks before the start of early voting, a U.S. district judge in Laredo ruled Friday to reinstate straight-ticking voting in Texas, sending local officials scrambling ahead of whats expected to be a record-high turnout election.

U.S. Southern District Judge Marina Garcia Marmolejo wrote that she made the decision with the pandemic in mind. Harris County officials and others across the state have warned that a long ballot would cause voters to take 15 minutes or more to make their picks, extending wait times because of the lack of a straight-ticket option, which allows voters to select candidates of one party across all races.

This was to be the year when that option ceased to be offered to Texas voters, under a 2017 state law.

By creating mass lines at the polls and increasing the amount of time voters are exposed to COVID-19, HB 25 will cause irreparable injury to plaintiffs and ALL Texas voters in the general election, wrote Marmolejo, who was appointed by President Barack Obama in 2011.

TEXAS TAKE: Get political headlines from across the state sent directly to your inbox

The suit was brought by the Texas Alliance for Retired Americans, the national senatorial and congressional committees of the Democratic Party, and Sylvia Bruni, chair of the Webb County Democratic Party.

Marmolejo sided with the plaintiffs, who argued that time constraints caused by lack of straight-ticket voting would illegally impede Texans right to vote and disproportionately impact African-American and Hispanic voters, who tend to use the method more than non-minority voters.

Upon hearing news of the ruling late Friday, Bexar County Election Administrator Jacque Callanen said she was speechless.

For us right now to have to stop what were doing and reprogram and retest, and with the early start of early voting  oh my God, Callanen said. It's unbelievable. I can't say we won't do it, but it's going to take everything in us, and we're going to have to throw as many people at it as we can.

She added that even just adding three Green Party candidates to the ballot, per a court ruling earlier this month, caused a one-week delay in preparation plans.

Marmolejo said her injunction only related to in-person, not mail-in voting, but if Bexar County were to have to reprint ballots and mail them out, it could add at least a week of work.

The office has already been working seven days a week to prepare for the Oct. 13 start of early voting, Callanen said. Gov. Greg Abbott pushed forward the start date of the early voting period by a week to create a safer voting environment during the pandemic, though that decision is being challenged at the Texas Supreme Court in a pending case.

Attorney General Ken Paxtons office, which represents state agencies, did not respond to a request for comment.

The state, which has aggressively fought against and successfully warded off multiple lawsuits by Democrats this year attempting to overturn voting restrictions, is likely to seek emergency relief from the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans. The Fifth Circuit is considered one of the most conservative federal appellate courts in the nation.

Joseph R. Fishkin, a University of Texas law professor who studies election law, said the Fifth Circuit could intervene on an emergency basis, but its hard to say whether it would and how long such an appeal might take.

It is certainly not a situation where I would say that You can take this to the bank. It wont be changed before the election, Fishkin said. Far from it.

Fishkin said the Fifth Circuit, if it intervenes, is likely to reference the Purcell principle, a Supreme Court precedent stating that courts should not change election rules too close to an election to avoid voter confusion and election administration problems.

The irony is, Fishkin said, as you keep fighting about it, the election only gets closer. Fishkin added that last-minute rulings with profound impacts on upcoming elections are becoming more common nationwide as Democrats and Republicans clash over issues of voter access.

Texas Democratic Party Chair Gilberto Hinojosa applauded the decision by the district court Friday.

Time and time again Republican leadership has tried to make it harder to vote and time and time again federal courts strike it down, Hinojosa said in a statement. Texas Democrats will have to continue to win at the ballot box to protect the right vote. Until the new Texas majority wipes out these out-of-touch Republicans, Texas Democrats will never stop fighting for Texans in court.

The decision Friday is a 180-degree turn for Marmolejo, who had tossed out the case in June, calling the arguments by plaintiffs speculative. But she said Friday that several developments have since bolstered Plaintiffs' arguments, citing the number of confirmed infections at 7 million and deaths at over 200,000 nationwide. That alone warranted a rehearing, she said.

The July primary runoff provided a window into some of the possible problems that can be anticipated in November, such as a lack of poll workers and fewer polling places available. Texas has done little to address those concerns since, she said.

In the 44-page ruling, she acknowledged the burden that the decision may put on election officials who have already begun preparing ballots and programming voting machines. But she said the potential for harm to voting rights outweighed any resulting inconveniences.

House Bill 25, passed in 2017 on mostly partisan lines and favored by Republicans, put Texas in line with the majority of states that do not offer straight-ticket voting; just six states continue the practice, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Regardless, Marmolejo said Texas voters have come to rely on it as part of their voting experience.

IN-DEPTH: With straight ticket option gone, Harris County worries voters will need much more time in booth

The straight-ticket option was discontinued after the 2018 general election. It had previously been in place for almost 100 years.

While the method had been key to helping Republicans become the majority party statewide, as Texas demographics have changed, Democrats have begun to benefit more in the last decade. In 2018, more than two-thirds of voters used straight-ticket voting. That year in Harris County, the straight-ticket vote was 77.2 percent of the total vote, and that vote split 55.3 percent for Democratic candidates and 44 percent for Republican candidates.

State Sen. Paul Bettencourt, R-Houston, said he has no doubt when the case goes to the Fifth Circuit, the straight-ticket law will be upheld. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has a history of upholding Texas election laws, he said, and he expects nothing different in this case.

I strongly believe it will be overturned, Bettencourt said.

Staff writer Jeremy Wallace contributed to this report.
Bachelor beauty, Hannah Ann Sluss is making waves in Miami.

The finalist on Peter Weber's season of The Bachelor was seen frolicking around Miami with a friend on Friday as they took a break from work to soak up some Florida rays.

The former pageant winner and model, 24, put on a dazzling display in an all white number as she showed off her toned curves on the beach.

Making waves: Former Bachelor contestant Hannah Ann Sluss, 24, showed off her toned curves in a skimpy white bikini while vacationing in Miami on Friday

R&R: The former pageant girl and model took a break from her work day to soak up some Florida rays

The model turned reality television star, took to Instagram Thursday to announce that she was back at her 'old stomping grounds' turning to her 1.3M followers for weekend recommendations while down south.

For her beach outing, Hannah kept it cohesive in a matching white outfit as she fit right in with Miami locals, showing off her popping backside and sunkissed skin.

The Tennessee-born beauty opted for a skimpy white high rise bikini that hugged her killer figure, riding slightly up her behind as she strolled along the water.

Cheeky: For her beach outing, Hannah kept it cohesive in a matching white outfit as she fit right in with Miami locals showing off her popping backside and sunkissed skin while strolling on the sand

Protecting herself from the sun, Hannah wore a plunging linen wrap top that exposed a hint of her cleavage and tummy.

She matched the top with a pair of white palazzo pants, and accessorized the look accordingly with a gold necklace, oversized gold hoops and a pair of light framed sunglasses.

Leaving her brunette locks down to achieve optimal beach waves, Sluss chatted with her friend while dipping her toes in the water.

The TV personality was seen holding onto a cocktail in a plastic cup as she indulged in a relaxing day in the Miami heat.

Cohesive: The reality TV darling matched the top to a pair of white palazzo pants and accessorized the look accordingly with a gold necklace, oversized gold hoops and a pair of light framed sunglasses

Earlier in the day Hannah posted that she and her friend had had a productive day after spending a rainy Thursday night relaxing in their hotel and ordering room service.

'This is one of the first nights I can just chill' she said, adding that she felt super tired and her feet were swollen from the flight.

The friends woke up bright and early Friday, and got to work in the gym before getting their brunch on with some guacamole and celery.

'Stomping grounds': The Tennessee born beauty traded in the Los Angeles life for a quick vacation in Miami as she and a friend made the most of the tropical paradise for the weekend

On Thursday the television fan favorite seemed to throw subtle shade at ex-fiance 'Pilot Pete', 29, as she modeled in a wedding dress to Ariana Grande's 'thank u, next' on her Insta-story.

Captioning the video of her sashaying in the floor length lace gown, Hannah wrote 'the lyrics on point'.

The post comes less than a year after Sluss was snubbed by Peter on television in March after the pair ended the finale engaged.

After the proposal, it was revealed that Peter had called things off a mere weeks after the show was filmed to move on with contestant Madison Prewett, before eventually dating his current girlfriend and ex-Bachelor contestant, Kelly Flanagan from his season.

Heartbreak: Hannah made it to the finale where Peter asked for her hand in marriage. After a brief engagement, Peter ultimately called off the proposal to move on with other contestant Madison before eventually dating; March 2020

Though her journey for love on the Bachelor did not work out, Hannah has remained in good spirits since the show.

Speaking to US in early September, Sluss shared:

'I feel like Im on my third life now. Prior to the show was one life and then the show was my second life, being engaged included, and now Im on my third life living in Los Angeles, being single and kind of just making the most out of this new life.'

During her time as a single Los Angeles lady, the Southern belle has been working up a storm modeling for various brands, and indulging in classic Bachelor Nation privileges.
A British holidaymaker has died in hospital after being pulled from a Spanish hotel swimming pool in a 'critical condition'.

The woman was in cardiac arrest when she was pulled from the pool in Lanzarote and revived at the scene by a lifeguard and emergency responders.

Police on the island confirmed today she had lost her fight for life after being rushed to Doctor Jose Molina Hospital in the island capital.

A routine investigation into her death, coordinated by a local court, is now underway.

The alarm was raised just before 5pm on Thursday by staff at the four-star HL Rio Playa.

The dead woman is understood to have been staying at the hotel with her partner.

The woman was in cardiac arrest when she was pulled from the pool in Lanzarote and revived at the scene by a lifeguard and emergency responders

There were conflicting reports about her age, as she was initially said to have been aged 35 in a statement put out by an emergency response coordination centre whereas police sources have said she was 58.

One well-placed source said: 'It all happened so quickly.

'The lifeguard pulled her out of the water and stabilised her with CPR but sadly she died shortly after arriving at hospital.'

Health sources confirmed she had died in A&E at Doctor Jose Molina Hospital.

A Civil Guard source also confirmed the British woman's death, adding: 'A routine investigation is underway but there is nothing pointing to any criminality in what happened.

'The investigating court will be sent the post mortem results and will instruct police to carry out any further inquiries if it is deemed appropriate.

'The autopsy will shed more light on what exactly occurred.'

In a statement released before it emerged the British woman had died, a spokesman for a regional government-run emergency coordination centre said: 'A 35-year-old British woman was pulled from the water after going into cardiac arrest and symptoms of near-drowning at a hotel in Playa Blanca in the municipality of Yaiza.

Police on the island confirmed today she had lost her fight for life after being rushed to Doctor Jose Molina Hospital in the island capital

'The alarm was raised just before 5pm on Thursday.

'She was taken by ambulance to Doctor Jose Molina Orosa in a critical condition.'

Playa Blanca, on the south side of Lanzarote, is considered to be the third largest tourist area on the island.

It has one of the best pleasure ports on the island and is close to the Papagayo beaches with their white sand and crystalline waters.

At the end of last month two youngsters on holiday with their families died within hours of each other following separate Spanish swimming pool tragedies.

A child aged three drowned at a pool in Pilar de la Horadada near Torrevieja on the Costa Blanca, around 9pm on August 27.

Local reports said a second youngster aged six believed to be a relative had discovered the boy in the water and alerted his parents.

Emergency responders tried without success for nearly an hour to save his life when they reached the scene. The youngster was French.

The incident, at a house on a residential estate called Pinar de Campoverde, happened hours after a four-year-old boy who was rescued from a pool at a water park in Tarragona 300 miles north, lost his fight for life in hospital.

The alarm was raised just before 5pm on Thursday by staff at the four-star HL Rio Playa (pictured)

The youngster had been admitted to the city's Joan XXIII Hospital four days earlier.

He was assisted after being pulled out of a pool at the Aquopolis Costa Dorada near Salou as the water park was about to close.

The Pilar de la Horadada drowning was the fourth in a month in a Costa Blanca swimming pool which had claimed the life of a young child.

On July 29 a Dutch girl aged four drowned at a pool in Calpe north of Benidorm at the northern end of the famous stretch of coastline.

On August 5 a four-year-old Belgian boy was found floating in a pool at a relative's house in the Brit-popular area of Ciudad Quesada near Torrevieja where his parents had made a stopover.

They had only arrived hours earlier and were due to stay the night before continuing to Castellon further north.

Local reports said one one of his relatives, described as a nurse, jumped into the pool to pull him out and emergency responders spent nearly 45 minutes trying to revive him without success.

On August 9 a two-year-old boy drowned at his parents' holiday villa in nearby La Zenia.

His body was discovered by his teenage sister.

The French family had only just arrived at the villa two days before the tragedy.

Initial reports at the time pointed to the boy, one of five children, drowning after leaving the villa unnoticed while the rest of the family was inside.
TORRINGTON  Susan B. Anthony Project (SBAP) is now accepting orders for their Holiday Wreath Sale.

SBAPs annual sale reaches hundreds of community members who look forward to the event every year, as an opportunity to support victims of domestic and sexual violence, members said in a statement.

Products for sale include handmade evergreen wreaths (small, medium, and large sizes), centerpieces, and grave blankets. To view the product selection and place an order online, visit http://sbaproject.org/get-involved/holiday-wreath-sales. Orders must be placed by November 2, 2020, and wreath pick-up will be available starting Nov. 21 at SBAPs Counseling and Advocacy Center, located at 179 Water St.

All proceeds support the free, confidential services that SBAP provides to victims, including their 24-hour crisis line, emergency shelter, transitional living services, counseling, court and medical advocacy, community education and prevention, and more.

The funds we receive from our annual Wreath Sale are critical to provide services for victims, and with all of the changes these past six months due to COVID, this effort is now more important than ever, said SBAP Development Associate Denise Torson.

This years wreath sale will include protocols set in place to keep SBAPs wreath sellers and customers as safe as possible, with updated contactless pick-up procedures. More information can be found at www.sbaproject.org/

A Wreath Sale Sponsorship is available to local businesses who wish to lend additional support to the agency, which includes recognition on all products sold and in all promotional materials, signage on pick-up day, a discount on bulk orders, and more. For more information on this sponsorship opportunity, contact Ashley Cerruto at acerruto@sbaproject.org.

Those interested in becoming a Wreath Friend and selling wreath products on SBAPs behalf to friends, families, colleagues, and other groups can contact Denise Torson at dtorson@sbaproject.org.

Founded in 1983, Susan B. Anthony Project promotes safety, healing and growth for all survivors of domestic and sexual abuse, and advocates for the autonomy of women and the end of interpersonal violence.

SBAP provides 24/7/365 crisis and support services, as well as education and prevention programs, free of charge, to two cities and 18 towns in Northwest Connecticut. For more information about the services and programs offered by Susan B. Anthony Project, visit www.sbaproject.org/, or call 860-489-3798. The 24-hour crisis line is 860-482-7133.
Depression, like a silent killer, affects over 265 million people worldwide, while its subtype called major depression is one of the most common mental disorders in the United States. The condition can lead to suicidal tendencies in severe cases if one is unable to pull oneself out of the fatal trap of a self-destructive mindset.

For one such woman in Orlando, Florida, who was plagued with depression, anorexia, and sleeping disorder, hope for a healthy life came through an ancient self-improvement discipline, which is practiced by over 100 million the world over.

[The practice] saved me from desperation and gave me a brand new life.  Annie Cao, from Orlando, Florida

Depression Strikes

Annie Caos smooth-sailing life weaved around a loving family and an assuring career came crashing down when her health suddenly began deteriorating. It all started after she experienced a series of unfortunate events way back in 1999; she eventually became suicidal.

I was miserable for seven years. In 2007, I was still on different medications despite no improvement in my depression, Cao, a Vietnamese by origin, told Minghui.org. I wanted to die. I was quick-tempered all the time.

I lived in fear and suspicion every day, without a single thread of hope, she said.

Caos severe depression worried her husband and children who then took her to see famous doctors and psychiatrists. She also tried different medications, both Western and Oriental, but experienced no improvement.

I felt my situation deteriorating and out of control, Cao said. I became anorexic and lost a lot of weight. I was a bag of bones.

A photo of Annie Cao taken in 2007 when she was suffering from depression. (Minghui)

With her continued depression, Cao also developed severe insomnia and had to rely on sleeping pills. However, she could hardly sleep for a few hours only to be jolted awake from nightmares.

I feared light and noise. I always worried that invisible evil beings wanted to do me harm. I isolated myself from friends and acquaintances, even my own family, she said.

Caos condition worsened; she often used to get frightened hearing the sirens of ambulances or police vehicles. She shaved her head and resorted to locking herself up in a dark room. Seeing her unable to break out of the mental ordeal, Caos family took turns watching her day and night.

Finding Hope

After seven trying years, in 2009, hope finally illuminated Caos gloomy life. She came across the ancient mind-body cultivation system of Falun Gong, or Falun Dafa, which consists of five gentle exercises, including meditation. The exercise system is rooted in the moral teachings of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance to guide ones life in a positive direction.

Falun Gong was first introduced to the public in China in 1992; the practice gained huge popularity by the late 1990s and was recognized for its healing power, both spiritual and physical.

Falun Gong practitioners demonstrating the second set of exercises at Las Olas Beach, Florida, in July 2020. (Minghui)

Cao learned about Falun Gong from one of her mothers friends who narrated her own experience of practicing the meditation system.

I spoke with her for several hours, Cao recounted. What she said was so encouraging and exciting. From that moment on, I wanted to become a Falun Gong practitioner myself.

With the assistance of other Falun Gong practitioners in Florida, Cao started her journey to health and wellness. She began learning the exercises and studying Falun Gongs main text, Zhuan Falun, which has been translated into over 40 languages and explains the principles of moral living and upright conduct.

Cao said that initially she had difficulties understanding some of the things mentioned in the book and relied on her husband, who would read the book to her and explain the meaning of the words that she couldnt understand. Caos husband also helped her learn the five sets of exercises, and in the process of supporting her, he too began practicing its meditative exercises.

My life underwent earthshaking changes after that, she said. As I started to read the book, I knew this was what I had been seeking, a path of cultivation.

Cao said it is the miraculous nature of Falun Gong that helped her recover from her illnesses, and her short temper was replaced with tolerance and kindness.

A healthy-looking Annie Cao after she recovered from depression. (Minghui)

[M]y health improved a lot  and felt much better than before. My eyesight returned to normal and my rheumatism disappeared. My appetite also came back, Cao said.

I now enjoy sound sleep and no nightmares ever disturb me.

Having her health restored, Cao could finally enjoy a life free of depression and anxiety. She said that she never misses a chance to share the beauty of the practice with anyone she thinks can benefit from the practice.

[The practice] saved me from desperation and gave me a brand new life, she said.

My personal experience is a testimonial to the miraculous nature of Falun Dafa, she said. Falun Dafa is so vast and boundless, like the ocean, and I am a lucky little fish swimming in the sparkling freshwater.
Getting worse.... Posted by Erin Butler on Tuesday, September 15, 2020

Living on Easy Street in Orange Beach was anything but easy last week as residents worried about what to do next after being driven from their flooded homes by Hurricane Sally.

But following the chaos Billy Coogan noticed his neighbor and insurance agent providing advice to frightened residents.

McGee was calming everyone down, said Coogan, a landscaper and resident of Mulligan Place subdivision where he owns two houses and where his insurance agent, McGee Scarbrough, also lives.

He would stop what he was doing and look up their policies that his agency didnt even sell them, added Coogan.

Indeed Scarbrough, an insurance agent with Randy Jones and Associates of Foley, met with between 50 to 60 storm-shocked residents faced with catastrophic flooding to their homes along Easy Street, off Alabama State Route 180. He dispensed advice in some cases, and reassured others who had little idea on what to do next.

I had one older guy who walked up and he was crying, I dont know what to do or where to start, said Scarbrough. I told him, here is what well do. People dont understand that there is a number on their policy where they (can contact) to file a claim.

Billions in losses

The grinding process of contacting insurance companies, waiting on adjusters and pressing forward on restoring damaged property is playing out in coastal Alabama in the week following Hurricane Sally. Properties throughout Coastal Alabama are damaged from the floodwaters and strong winds of more than 100 mph that ravaged coastal Alabama. It was the first time there was widespread property devastation in Baldwin County resulting from a hurricane since Hurricane Ivan in 2004.

Insurance forecasters are pegging Hurricane Sallys damage to the region between $1 billion to $3 billion. Catastrophe modeler Karen Clark and Co. of Boston estimates the insured wind and storm surge losses to residential, commercial, industrial properties and automobiles at around $2 billion.

AM Best, a New Jersey-based credit rating agency that focuses on the insurance industry, estimated one day after the storm that Hurricane Sally would not constitute a major insurance loss compared to the ongoing wildfires in California, Oregon and Washington. The firm also believes the insurance losses to be less than Category 4 Hurricane Laura, which caused more than $10 billion in damages in southwestern Louisiana and southeastern Texas in late August.

The AM Best estimated Hurricane Sally as more of a flood event, where the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) through the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) accounts for 82% of the insurance coverage for floods, with the balance coming from private insurers.

Chuck Watson of Georgia-based Enki Research, which tracks tropical storms and models the cost of their damage, is estimating the overall loss from Hurricane Sally between $7 billion to $8 billion. Of that, $3 billion is insurance losses.

Our numbers are higher because we are counting things like government expenses, and redirected economic activity, said Watson. What we will do is look at what the impact of the storm will be six months after landfall when the dust settles and you look at lost income and expenses incurred for governments like overtime.

Watson said the stuff not covered by insurance, but which is eligible for reimbursement under FEMAs disaster declaration, includes cleanup costs and infrastructure fixes by local governments. Other costly losses include the hurricanes disruption to businesses, which are often not insured, as the result of power outages. Hurricane Sallys reach was widespread in coastal Alabama, leaving many coastal residents in the dark days after the storm.

12 Fort Morgan damage

The disaster declaration issued by President Donald Trump on Sunday makes federal funding available to assist individuals and local governments in their recovery efforts. The individual assistance helps reimburse people for temporary housing, home repairs and low-cost loans to cover uninsured losses.

The federal help also assists city halls throughout coastal Alabama in offsetting the expensive removal of debris from roadways. In Mobiles case, the estimated cost of removing debris rose almost $3 million from the citys initial assessments.

Some preliminary estimates are being released by coastal Alabama officials. Mobiles cost estimates in public damages were around $10.9 million. That majority of that amount includes $8.6 million in debris removal, $900,000 in damages to parks and recreational facilities and $976,000 in emergency protective measures.

In Gulf Shores  where the eyewall of Sally made landfall -- city officials are estimating over $27 million in damages to structures, with over $5.3 million in sand loss. The city is looking at over $5.9 million in debris removal expense that was necessary to haul off more than 300,000 cubic yards of debris.

City spokesman Grant Brown said the federal disaster declaration, approved by Trump, is allowing cities to remove the debris at a faster pace.

In Daphne, city officials announced Monday that debris removal cost around $2.5 million. Damage to the citys road system  which includes traffic control signals, bridges, streets, culverts, etc.  was estimated at $400,000. All told, the city will seek around $3 million in reimbursements from FEMA.

Claims roll in

But for insurance agents like Reggie Pulliam, the concerns in the neighborhoods blasted by Sally are foremost on his mind. Pulliam, who opened Coastal Alabama Insurance in 2016, said that within one week after the storm, his office filed close to 500 claims. Of those, only three of the claims were considered a total loss of someones house.

Honestly, this storm was not catastrophic, said Pulliam. Homes are still on slabs and pylons and piers. The vast majority of claims are for trees on homes, holes in roofs and trees on fences.

The fortified roof of Matt Fetner in Orange Beach, Ala. (bottom right) was not damaged by Hurricane Sally. Many of his neighbors were not so lucky.Insurance Institute for Business and Home Safety

He added, The No. 1 claim were having are holes in roofs. He said that homes that received a gold fortified standard have very little claims from the damage Sally wrought. That fortified standard  created by the Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety (IBHS) 20 years ago  provides insurance discounts to individuals who construct their properties to become more resilient during hurricanes. Alabama leads the nation in building to fortified standards.

Related: Alabama leads nation in building the strongest hurricane-resilient homes

Other insurance agencies are providing some details from Sally. State Farm Insurance, which AM Best lists as the No. 1 insurer of auto policies in Alabama, reported that at end of the day on Monday, they reported over 1,020 auto claims and 5,730 homeowner claims in Alabama.

Alfa Insurance Group, which is based in Alabama and is listed by AM Best as the No. 2 insurer of auto policies, is reporting 2,800 total claims including property and auto. The claims are related to the hurricane and include all parts of the state.

Of the total claims, Alfa has inspected 60% of 1,800 of them. The company has 50 insurance adjusters on the ground working hurricane claims.

Alfa is suspending policy cancellations due to non-payment of premiums and is waiving late fees for policyholders facing financial hardship due to the hurricane. A 30-day extended grace period is available for Alfa farm, automobile, homeowner, and other property policies.

Insurance companies are also providing a laundry list of tips for their clients. Allstate Insurance Group is referring people to their Good Hands Recovery Guide as a resource for individuals, homeowners and business owners affected by the storm, whether they are customer or not.

Those who suffered flood damage, such as those living Coogans subdivision, will likely be working through coverage provided by the federal governments NFIP. The program offers maximum limits of up to $250,000 on homes and up to $500,000 on non-residential buildings.

Document everything

Dewana Davis, flood insurance specialist with FEMA, said that so far, only 2,470 claims have been submitted in Alabama from Sally. She said that the number was less than what the agency anticipated.

Roofers in Gulf Shores begin repairing this roof on a beach house. Hurricane Sally damage to Baldwin County September 17, 2020. (Joe Songer | jsonger@al.com).Joe Songer | jsonger@al.com

For the amount of damage, we looked and saw as it was playing out on the news, I thought it would be more, said Davis. She said the NFIP would be able to handle the claims submitted to them.

Pulliam describes the claim process as two waves with the first one being similar as being in the eye of the hurricane where a rush of activity is initially filed with insurance companies. The second wave, he said, occurs after the adjusters meet with the clients.

I know in the next few weeks, everyone is going to have issues with claim adjusters, said Pulliam. We are begging clients to document everything. Generally, the more documents you have, the more justified (your claim will be). As long as were documenting everything, it will get approved.

Scarbrough agrees. You have to document more than anything. Pictures. Pictures. Pictures.

Scarbrough, even as he deals with the damage to his Orange Beach home, continues to meet with clients and others who simply have questions on what to do next.

I didnt do anything that any other insurance agent would not have done, Scarbrough said, adding that people just started showing up and calling him immediately after the storm hit and on the day after. People found I could help them process their claim. The faster you get in, the quicker you can get relief.

Tips for preparing an insurance claim

Insurance companies reached by AL.com offer the following advice to homeowners who are recovering from Hurricane Sally:

-Retain receipts from purchases related to temporary repairs to include with any claims.

-Take photos, save receipts, and track your time spent cleaning the property. Separate the damaged from the undamaged property. Damaged property includes discarded items, structural damage and standing flood levels. Make a list of damaged property

-Be wary of unsolicited or unexpected offers to perform repairs or conduct inspections. Disaster victims are targets for insurance scams. According to the Alabama Attorney Generals Office, under state law, a contractor who performs residential roof work directly for a homeowner and the cost is over $2,500 must be licensed by the Alabama Home Builders Licensure Board, including being properly bonded. A residential roofing contractor cannot represent or offer to negotiate on the homeowners behalf with the insurance company.

-If building property is removed such as drywall and carpet, keep it on the premises. If it must be removed, cut a sample piece to give to a claims adjuster.

-When dealing with flooding, do not dry anything that has to be removed such as carpet and drywall.

-With vehicles that were flooded, note the depth of the floodwaters in relation to your car. File the claim and check with a qualified mechanic to determine how extensive the problems caused by flooding might be. Saltwater is more damaging than freshwater and can increase the chances of corrosion.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Friday defended her previous suggestion that Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden should not debate President Trump, claiming the president has no fidelity to fact or truth.

Ahead of the first presidential debate next week, Pelosi doubled down during an appearance on Morning on CBS on comments she made last month that the former vice president should skip the debates so they dont become an exercise in skullduggery.

When asked if she still believed Biden should sit out the three presidential debates on September 29, October 15, and October 22, she said Oh, I do.

Not that I dont think hell be excellent, she continued. I just think that the president has no fidelity to fact or truth and, actually in his comments the last few days, no fidelity to the Constitution of the United States.

He and his henchmen are a danger, with their comments, are a danger to our democracy, Pelosi added. So I dont want to give him  I mean, why bother? He doesnt tell the truth.

Last month Pelosi said she wouldnt legitimize a conversation with [President Trump], nor a debate in terms of the presidency of the United States, though she acknowledged that the Biden campaign, who has rejected the California Democrats suggestion, felt differently.

As long as the commission continues down the straight and narrow as they have, Im going to debate him, Biden said. Im going to be a fact-check on the floor while Im debating him.

Biden said Wednesday that he would begin to prepare heavily for the first debate, which will be hosted by Fox Newss Chris Wallace in Cleveland, Ohio on Tuesday.

More from National Review
NEW HAVEN  The president of the city police union is alleging the mayor mocked the criminal justice system in a tweet about the grand jurys decision on Breonna Taylors death.

Florencio Cotto, president of Elm City Local, objected in a statement to Mayor Justin Elickers suggestion that officers involved in the shooting of Taylor were not held appropriately accountable, noting the criminal justice system in Kentucky had rendered a decision.

Elicker tweeted Wednesday that he was shocked that the grand jury didnt charge any officers for the murder of Breonna Taylor.

What happened to Breonna was wrong in so many ways and the officers should be held accountable, said Elicker.

Cotto alleged that Elicker had mocked the criminal justice system with his tweet and spread fake news about officers not being held accountable. He described Elickers comments as disgraceful.

But in a statement, Elicker said while he recognized that the legal process had concluded, he continues to question the very nature of the decision and if justice was served in this case, as others have and are across the country.

To his understanding, he said, the responsibility and duty of elected officials, community leaders, and civically minded citizens is to bear witness to acts of injustice, to call out such injustices, and then to advocate for remedy when one is so deeply moved to do so.

The death of Breonna Taylor and the legal outcomes of the case deserves serious attention, he said.

Taylor, a Black woman, was shot and killed by police after officers entered her home six months ago on a no-knock warrant, looking for a suspect who did not live at the address.

David Cameron, the Kentucky attorney general, has said the investigation into Taylors death showed the officers announced themselves before entering her apartment. He also said that police were justified in firing their weapons because Taylors boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, fired a shot that hit one of them, Sgt. John Mattingly, in the leg.

Walker later told police he did not know who was entering the apartment, and charges against him, for attempted murder of a police officer, were dropped.

Mattingly and another officer, Myles Cosgrove, fired 32 shots altogether. Six bullets struck Taylor, according to Cameron, who said the fatal bullet came from Cosgroves gun.

The third officer, Brett Hankinson, faces three counts of wanton endangerment for firing into a neighboring apartment that had multiple occupants. He was fired from the Louisville police department in June.

Cotto noted that Hankinson had been indicted in the case by the grand jury in Kentucky, while the two other officers, one of whom was wounded, were not.

In protests around the country, activists have contended that the incident should have result in charges related to Taylors death, given that she was shot and killed.

Perhaps the Mayor should respect the decision of the Grand Jury while still mourning the tragic loss of Breonna Taylor. Perhaps the Mayor should state the truth that the officers were serving a search warrant signed by a judge and during the course of the warrant a police officer was shot, said Cotto. Perhaps the Mayor doesnt know that police officers in New Haven serve search warrants and police officers in New Haven have been shot (while serving a warrant). September 23rd, 2017 was the most recent.

Cotto called for Elicker to apologize to New Haven police, saying he had inappropriately framed the narrative around the case.

Otherwise, your bias toward the police must be noted so when one of our fine officers is hurt, then they and their family wont be surprised when you engage in harmful, fake news tweeting, said Cotto.

Elicker, however, said, in his statement, No statement I made was directed at the members of the New Haven Police Department and to associate statements made about a specific case in Kentucky as a generalized attack on New Haven officers is little less than an attempt to silence the voice of local elected officials in this important and historic national conversation that is happening.

Now more than ever, we must stand up and call out injustices, even in the face of adversity, said Elicker.

I am proud of the work of the women and men in service to our residents in the New Haven Police Department and support them unapologetically to their critics. We will continue the work in our tireless pursuit of improving policing for all communities and neighborhoods of the city so that incidents such as the one that took place in Kentucky, which took the life of Breonna Taylor and wounded two officers, does not happen here.

william.lambert@hearstmediact.com; Reporting from Meghan Friedmann and the Associated Press was included in this story.
The bodies of two Palestinian fishermen whom Egyptian naval forces killed in Mediterranean waters were returned Saturday to the Gaza Strip, the territory's Interior Ministry said.

Hamas, the Palestinian militant group ruling Gaza, has called on Egypt to investigate the incident, condemning it as violence targeting those hunting for a living for their children.

The shooting occurred Friday as three fishermen were fishing near the Gaza-Egypt maritime frontier, said the Palestinian fishermen union, noting the three were brothers. The third brother was receiving treatment in Egypt.

There was no immediate comment from Egyptian officials, but the union said fishermen usually work near the border and the Egyptian navy is aware of their presence.

Even if they happen to exceed the limit, shooting and killing them is unjustifiable, said Nezar Ayyash, head of the fishermen union. They could have stopped them because their boats engine is weak and cant run faster than the naval boat.

Egypt sent the bodies via the Rafah crossing point, Gazas main gate to the outside world, on its 13-kilometer-long border with the Gaza Strip Saturday evening.

Israel and Egypt imposed a blockade on Gaza in 2007 to isolate Hamas after it seized control of the territory from the internationally backed Palestinian Authority. Hamas relations with Egypt have experienced different phases of warmness and tension, but Cairo has been a longtime mediator between Hamas and Israel, securing numerous ceasefire deals and unofficial truces between the two sides to calm down cross-border fighting.

Ayyash of the fishermen union said the Egyptian military has killed six Gaza fishermen in separate incidents in the past 14 years. He said the fishermen will go on a general strike for three days to protest the loss of their colleagues.
A cannon sits in silhouette on the horizon line, the pinks and purples of a sunrise - or is it a sunset? - painted across the sky. A fiddle plays. A man's gravelly voice recites a letter from 1861.

"Sarah, my love for you is deathless. It seems to bind me with mighty cables that nothing but omnipotence can break, and yet my love of country comes over me like a strong wind and bears me irresistibly with all those chains to the battlefield."

Sullivan Ballou, the narrator tells us, was a major in the 2nd Rhode Island Volunteers. He was killed a week later in the first battle of Bull Run, dying in a Civil War clash in Virginia hundreds of miles from his home.

This scene has been played, parodied, rewound and played again countless times in the 30 years since it first aired on PBS. But it is no less affecting now than it was in 1990 when the Ken Burns series, "The Civil War," became a cultural phenomenon.

The nine-part documentary drew 40 million viewers - one in every six Americans alive at the time. President George H.W. Bush watched it. So did Army Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf, while preparing for the Persian Gulf War. And it has had a lasting, and in many cases, misleading impact on how Americans see the war.

Like "Gone With The Wind" and statues that glorify Confederate generals, the series romanticized a conflict fought over the right of White Southerners to own, profit from and brutalize enslaved Black people.

Sarah Sanders once invoked the documentary to defend a senior Trump official who'd claimed a "lack of an ability to compromise" caused the Civil War. Historians online said the claim was outrageous, offensive even. Even Burns chimed in, tweeting, "Many factors contributed to the Civil War. One caused it: slavery."

But the press secretary had prepared a defense that day. "I don't know that I'm going to get into debating the Civil War," she told reporters, "but I do know that many historians, including Shelby Foote in Ken Burns's famous Civil War documentary, agree that a failure to compromise was a cause of the Civil War."

She was partially right. Not about the cause of the Civil War, nor about Foote being a historian - he wasn't, not a trained one anyway. But in the first few minutes of the series, Foote does in fact say the conflict happened "because we failed to do the thing we have a real genius for, which is compromise."

While still giving credit where it's due, scholars have spent three decades trying to undo the damage of "The Civil War," writing op-ed after op-ed, and even whole books of criticism, charging large sections of it are misleading and inaccurate.

Re-watching the series now, after a summer of protests sparked by the police killings of Breonna Taylor, George Floyd and other Black Americans, popular culture may have finally caught up to those historians.

Much of the documentary comes off as hopelessly dated, archaic even, and at times breathtakingly tone-deaf.

- - -

Even three decades ago, Burns correctly pointed to slavery as causing the Civil War.

In the first episode of his series, there's a 13-minute explanation of how slavery divided the nation until it broke, set to the keening harmonies of Sweet Honey in the Rock, as archival photos of enslaved people drift slowly across the screen.

One of the first historians to appear is a Black woman, Barbara Fields, saying, "If there was a single event that caused the war, it was the establishment of the United States, in independence with Great Britain, with slavery still a part of its heritage."

In the next clip, she is contradicted by Foote's "failure to compromise" claim.

Now, there's nothing inherently wrong with two interviewees disagreeing - one might even call that balanced, responsible journalism. But then Foote keeps talking. And talking. And chuckling at his own jokes, pausing to smoke his pipe before talking some more. All told, Foote is on screen for nearly 46 minutes; Fields only eight and a half. Balanced it is not.

"You really get the feeling that Burns, for all of his incredible gifts as a filmmaker, he really kind of fell in love with Shelby Foote," said James M. Lundberg, a Civil War historian who teaches at Notre Dame, in a phone interview with The Washington Post.

Foote's screen time is dripping with Lost Cause fables as thick as his accent. Stonewall Jackson looks out over a gruesome battlefield, eating a peach. A Confederate private, on duty alone at night, has a conversation with an owl. And Nathan Bedford Forrest - a slave trader who oversaw the massacre of hundreds of Black soldiers at Fort Pillow and founded the Ku Klux Klan - is as much a genius as Abraham Lincoln, physically attractive, "born to be a soldier the way John Keats was born to be a poet."

Historian Keri Leigh Merritt, who called for a new Civil War documentary series in 2019, is stunned by the flowery compliments bestowed on Forrest. "There's no such thing as a good slaveholder, but there were slaveholders who were not horrifically violent. He was horrifically violent," Merritt said in a phone interview. "And that was well-known at the time. That was well-documented. Both Foote and Burns clearly knew that."

Foote, who died in 2005, was a novelist, not a trained historian, though Sanders is not the first to declare him one. So did The Post in a 1990 article that also called Foote "Ken Burns's onscreen alter-ego." He's so omnipresent that Burns seemed to endorse him.

In contrast, Fields, who still teaches at Columbia University, is an Ivy League-trained historian and the only person in the series with a PhD in history, Merritt pointed out. Her fewer appearances are largely confined to segments about Black people; there are several episodes of the series in which she doesn't appear at all.

In 2015, when Post columnist Alyssa Rosenberg pressed Burns about the imbalance between Fields and Foote, and asked if he would edit it the same way again, he said, "Yes. Because what works, works."

When asked if Burns still feels this way in 2020, a spokesman pointed to a June CNN interview, in which Burns said, "In many ways, we would probably be making a different kind of film now," before pointing out the discussion of slavery in the first episode and that Fields gets "one of the last moments in the film."

Not the last, though. She's followed by Foote, again, and a long reading of a Confederate soldier's reminiscence, dreaming that he'll still get to fight the war in heaven.

- - -

To the untrained eye, history written nearer in time to the period it covers seems like it would be more accurate than history written much later. Memories are fresher, records more plentiful.

This isn't necessarily the case, and a prime example is the Civil War. After the end of Reconstruction, as white supremacy re-clutched its grip on Black America, a false history began to emerge. In this "Lost Cause of the Confederacy" narrative, White Southerners didn't sacrifice their sons to preserve the "cornerstone" of slavery; they were the victims of a Northern aggressor, fighting nobly for dignity and states' rights. Enslaved Black people, when they were mentioned at all, were not terrorized captives whose labor and wages were stolen, but happy in their servitude and tricked into rebellion by devious abolitionists.

For decades, the proponents of the Lost Cause put up the statues and wrote the history textbooks, and ten of millions of Americans learned this version of events.

Unfortunately, even setting Foote aside, a thread of Lost Cause glorification is stitched through the fabric of "The Civil War." In nearly every episode, Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee is described by the narrator as a "courtly," "magnificent," "brilliant," "commanding" man who "disapproved of secession" and "hated slavery," despite his avid and intentional participation in both.

There are other threads. Even amid the constant fawning over Forrest, Burns doesn't sanitize the horror of Fort Pillow. The series does a good job of describing Abraham Lincoln's evolution from "Send them back to Africa" to the Great Emancipator. Abolitionist Frederick Douglass's writings are quoted throughout. But the narrator introduces him as a "runaway boy." Douglass was a man of 20 when he escaped slavery and in his early 40s at the start of the Civil War. Such clumsy language wouldn't escape notice now, in an era in which Ibram X. Kendi and Isabel Wilkerson dominate the bestseller lists.

"If he, Ken Burns, and his co-writers had been trained . . . they would have learned that the people they were relying on for much of this history were in fact white supremacist, pro-Confederate, pro-Lost Cause men. White men," Merritt said. The academy is generally a few decades ahead of popular culture, Merritt explained, and it was entirely possible to make a more accurate film in 1990 had they relied on other scholarship, such as that of W.E.B. Du Bois, Kenneth M. Stampp and Eric Foner.

Instead, the series suffers from an inappropriate presentation of "both sides." Again, showing both sides is often a sign of responsible journalism. But the problem with the Lost Cause narrative is not just that it isn't "woke" by today's standards. It is also not true.

The attempt to splice together real and pseudo histories of the war is perhaps best encapsulated by the narrator's thesis: "What began as a bitter dispute between union and states' rights ended as a struggle over the meaning of freedom in America."

Well, no. Something close to the reverse is true: What began as a struggle over the meaning of freedom in America was afterward whitewashed into a dispute over states' rights.

Burns had no way of knowing what would happen the past few decades, but another refrain in the series - that the conflict united us in a way that we could never conceive of splitting again - rings hollow in these bitterly partisan times.

Both Merritt and Lundberg credit "The Civil War" with sparking their interest in history in their youths. That's a common story for White historians of a certain generation, Merritt said. It wasn't until later that she began to realize its problems, and she thinks White audiences are ready to hear truths that may make them uncomfortable.

She isn't waiting for Burns to reboot the series. She is writing her own - which will center on the experiences of enslaved people - with co-writer Rhae Lynn Barnes and an advisory board of big-name scholars like Tera Hunter and Douglas Blackmon. They were in talks with production companies when the pandemic shut everything down.

If it does get made, perhaps Burns will be among the first to watch it. As protesters tore down statues in June, he told Chris Cuomo, "It's very important for people like me, my complexion, to be as quiet as possible and to listen. What I know from my reading of history is that the Confederate monuments have to go."
Lebanon's prime minister-designate Mustapha Adib resigned on Saturday after failing to form a reformist government in the wake of the Beirut port blast. The announcement deals a blow to French President Emmanuel Macron's efforts to break a dangerous stalemate in the crisis-hit country.

In a televised speech, Mustapha Adib apologised for his "inability" to achieve Lebanese "aspirations for a reformist government."

"I apologise for not being able to continue the task of forming the government," Adib said during a press briefing at the presidential palace on Saturday.

The prime minister-designate, who until recently had been Lebanon's ambassador to Germany, was only named to the top job last month after the resignation of Hassan Diab.

Adib was appointed on 31 August just hours before French President Emmanuel Macron made his second visit to the country since a deadly port blast, pressing for the speedy formation of a reformist government.

The massive blast on 4 August left 190 people dead, injured thousands more and damaged many parts of the coastal capital. It also rekindled public anger against Lebanon's entrenched political elite, with many blaming the explosion on government incompetence that allowed 2,750 metric tons of ammonium nitrate to be stored in a warehouse at the port.

No consensus

Adib was under international pressure to form a government quickly to access aid money that donors said should only go to Lebanon if reforms are implemented.

Coalition talks however have been hampered by the country's confessionalist system under which different religious groups share power in the government.

A Paris 15-September deadline to form a crisis cabinet within two weeks of French President Emmanuel Macron's visit to Beirut on 1 September came and went with no sign of breakthrough.

Adib admitted that "as the efforts to form the government were nearing their ends, it became clear to me that this consensus no longer existed."

The French-backed Adib had tried to form a cabinet made up of independent specialists that could work on enacting reforms.

However, his efforts were blocked by the two main parties representing Lebanon's large Shiite community--Amal and Hezbollah, who insisted on retaining hold of the key Finance Ministry.

Blow for French initiative

The failure to form a new goverment comes as a blow to Macron's diplomatic efforts to pressure them to reform.

Sources close to the French president on Saturday told AFP that Adib's resignation amounted to a "collective betrayal by Lebanon's political parties".

UN envoy to Lebanon Jan Kubis expressed similar sentiments on Twitter: "Such a degree of irresponsibility, when the fate of Lebanon and its people is at stake!"

"Politicians, have you really scuppered this unique chance created by France?"

President Michel Aoun accepted Adib's resignation and was set to "take the appropriate measures according to the requirements of the constitution", his office said, adding that the head of state still supported the French initiative.
A man was arrested on Friday in Odishas Bargarh district on charges of manufacturing a dubious vaccine for Covid-19. The authorities raided his premises and seized several vials labelled Covid-19 vaccine from his possession. The raid was conducted after the man himself emailed the authorities asking for a licence to sell his product.

Police and drug enforcement officials in western Odisha district of Bargarh arrested 32-year-old Prahallad Bisi after a raid on his premises in Rusuda village. When drug inspectors asked him to reveal the composition of his purported vaccine, he refused, calling it a top secret.

We got to know about his claim when he sent an email asking for a licence to sell the product he calls the vaccine. During the raid, we found several glass vials with stickers of Covid-19 vaccine, some powders and chemical materials, said Bargarh drug inspector Sasmita Dehury.

Also Read: Odisha Covid-19 cases touch 2 lakh, temporary shutdown in some places

We have booked him under section 18(c) of the Drugs and Cosmetics Act 1940. We are investigating if the man was previously involved in administering any drugs in the locality, Dehury added.

The accused, who has studied up to class 7, however, had yet not started selling the fake vaccine.

Also Read: Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine produces strong immune response in early trial

Apart from the fake vaccine, the officials also found some medicines to cure infertility at his premises. Bisi said it fetched him a high price.
Massachusetts added another state to its list of high-risk states for COVID-19.

Starting Saturday, people traveling to-and-from Oregon will need to quarantine or get tested for coronavirus.

There are 41 states included on the high-risk list as of Saturday.

Gov. Charlie Baker enacted a travel order on August 1 mandating all visitors and residents entering Massachusetts following a high-risk area quarantine for 14 days or produce a negative COVID-19 test result that has been administered up to 72 hours prior to arrival in Massachusetts.

Visitors are urged to obtain a negative result before traveling to Massachusetts.

Failure to comply with the order could result in a $500 fine per day.

Exemptions are allowed for travelers from lower-risk states, people commuting for work or school and patients seeking specialized medical care.

The current list of lower-risk states includes:

Colorado

Connecticut

Maine

New Hampshire

New Jersey

New Mexico

New York

Vermont

Washington

Massachusetts residents are urged to limit any out-of-state travel only to states designated as COVID-19 lower-risk areas.

Anyone arriving from an international destination must fill out the Massachusetts Travel Form and must quarantine for 14 days or meet the 72-hour testing rule.
Thai Deputy Prime Minister Supattanapong Punmeechaow (Source: Bangkok Post)



Speaking at a business seminar, Supattanapong said the government has used nearly 800 billion baht (25 billion USD) to support the economy.



The government will continue to introduce stimulus measures and plans subsidies under a "co-pay" scheme, rather than handouts, to help spur consumption, he said, without giving further details.



Deputy Secretary General of the National Economic and Social Development Council Danucha Pichayanan said in a bid to cope with the impact of the outbreak, the government has introduced a 1.9 trillion baht response package, including a 1 trillion baht borrowing plan.



The borrowing will lift the public debt to GDP ratio to 57 percent from about 47 percent in July, still within a 60 percent cap, he added.



The Asian Development Bank (ADB) forecast that the Thai economy could contract by 8 percent this year./.
Greens leader Adam Bandt will urge crossbenchers and the Labor opposition to help overturn planned changes to the federal government's wage subsidy scheme, seizing on modelling which shows it would cost less to maintain JobKeeper at its current rate than to bring forward income tax cuts.

Mr Bandt has seized on Parliamentary Budget Office-backed analysis showing it would cost $11.3 billion to keep the wage subsidy at the higher rate until March next year.

In contrast, the independent costing shows that bringing forward the government's scheduled personal income tax cuts by two years to July 2020 would cost the budget $27.7 billion, and that bringing the cuts forward by one year to July 2021 would cost $14.14 billion.

Greens leader Adam Bandt says cutting wage subsidies in favour of tax cuts is "trickle-down brutality". Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

Mr Bandt argued that rather than tax cuts, the better economic stimulus was to ensure low and middle income earners were able to keep themselves homed and fed during a recession.
A staff member prepares textbooks at a bookstore ahead of the new school semester in Handan in China's northern Hebei Province on Aug. 24, 2020. (Photo by STR / AFP) / China OUT (Photo by STR/AFP via Getty Images)

Chinese Textbook Alters Bible Passage, Says Jesus Stoned Woman to Death

A Chinese ethics textbook has altered a story from the Bible, twisting its ending to have Jesus stone a woman to death while claiming that he is a sinner.

The distortion, the latest in a long line of measures by the atheist Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to control and suppress religion in the country, has sparked outrage among Christians, with many also calling on the Vatican to reconsider its partnership with the regime.

The textbook in question is entitled Professional Ethics and the Law and is used in vocational training schools across China. It was approved by the editorial review committee overseen by the regimes ministry of education in 2018, according to ChinaAid, a U.S.-based Christian advocacy group.

It quoted a well-known story from the New Testament, Jesus and the woman caught in adultery, but instead of citing it faithfully, the textbook upends the conclusion of the parable, casting Jesus as a killer.

In the original passage in the Gospel of John, a group of men interrupts Jesus teaching session, bringing in a woman accused of adultery. They ask Jesus whether she should be stoned to death as prescribed by Mosaic Law. After first ignoring their interruption, Jesus says that the person who is without sin should throw the first stone. The accusers then leave realizing that no one is without sin. Jesus then turns to the woman and asks if anyone has condemned her, and she answers no. Jesus then says, Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.

The textbook instead subverts the ending to read: When everyone left, Jesus stoned the woman to death himself, saying, I am also a sinner. But if the law could only be enforced by men without blemish, the law would be dead.

The question section under the passage asks the reader, Through this short story, how do you view the law?

The alteration came to light after a parishioner posted an image of the passage onto social media earlier this month. A Christian teacher at a vocational school later confirmed the content, adding that the textbook content varies in different regions across China, according to Hong Kong-based Catholic news outlet UCA News.

Netizens were enraged by the textbook, with many decrying the passage as blasphemous. Some comments on social media read: The CCP is the devil. The sin of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is unforgivable. What is it that is not a devil?!

ChinaAid Association, a U.S.-based Christian advocacy group, condemned the malicious distortion, saying it seriously distorts and defiles the image of Jesus Christ in Christianity.

The group said the false account is to make a point serving the Partys governing philosophy.

The CCP textbook infers that if only people without sin can enforce the law, the law will become powerless, ChinaAid said in a statement. It implies that because illegal behaviors of Chinese judicial officials in law enforcement are unavoidable, they should be tolerated.

They said the regime has for years been trying to reinterpret the biblical doctrine and theology to conform to the socialist values [Chinese leader] Xi Jinping advocates.

The CCP has presided over a tightening crackdown on underground Christians and other religious groups, demolishing churches and detaining church members and leaders.

In September 2019, Chinese officials forced a Catholic church in the eastern province of Jiangxi to replace a picture of the Virgin Mary and her child with that of Chinese leader Xi Jinping, according to Bitter Winter, an online magazine reporting on religious freedom issues in China. The officials also ordered the church to display the national flag at the entrance and to replace its church name with a banner that read Follow the Party, thank the Party, and obey the Party.

Many are also urging the Vatican to review its relationship with the regime. In September 2018, the Holy See signed a historic deal with the CCP on the appointment of bishops in the country. Prior to that, Chinese Catholics were split between those who worshiped at underground unofficial churches loyal to the Vatican, and the state-sanctioned Catholic church led by bishops appointed by the regime. After the deal, Pope Francis immediately moved to recognize seven bishops that had been appointed by Beijing without the Vaticans approval.

The deal, the details of which were not made public, triggered sharp criticism from overseas Catholics and rights advocates who described the move at the time as a capitulation to the communist regime, citing the CCPs systematic persecution of underground Christians.

The two sides are expected to renew the agreement which is due to expire shortly, according to Reuters citing a senior Vatican source.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo recently urged the Vatican to take a stronger stance against the CCPs worsening rights abuses.

Its clear that the Sino-Vatican agreement has not shielded Catholics from the Partys depredations, to say nothing of the Partys horrific treatment of Christians, Tibetan Buddhists, Falun Gong devotees, and other religious believers, Pompeo wrote in an article published in the U.S. religious magazine First on Sept. 18.

The Vatican endangers its moral authority, should it renew the deal, he added on Twitter.

Pompeo is due to meet with Pope Francis when he travels to Rome at the end of the month.

Eva Fu contributed to this report.
Lawyer Satish Maneshinde Wants CBI To Set Up A New Medical Board

Rhea Chakraborty's lawyer Satish Maneshinde said in his official statement, "The Disclosure of a 200% Conclusion by an AIIMS Doctor in the team headed by Dr Gupta in the SSR case, on the basis of photographs is a dangerous trend. To keep the investigations impartial and free from inference, the CBI must constitute a new Medical Board."

Rhea's Lawyer Claims That Agencies Are Being Pressurised To Reach A Pre-Determined Result

He further added, "The agencies are being pressurised to reach a pre determined result for obvious reasons on the eve of Bihar Elections. We have seen the VRS of DG Pandey unfolding a few days back. There should not be a repetition of such steps."

Rhea's Lawyer Reacts To Sushant's Lawyer's Claims

Satish Maneshinde's statement was a response to a tweet by Sushant Singh Rajput's family lawyer Vikas Singh in which he claimed that a doctor who is a part of the AIIMS team, had told the photos sent to him indicated that the actor's death was by strangulation and not suicide.

However, Dr Sudhir Gupta had refuted Vikas Singh's claims and was quoted as saying by Times Now, "No conclusion or conclusion opinion of homicide or suicide could be made by seeing ligature marks and scene of occurrence. It's difficult for doctors and next to impossible for general people, needed solely internal link discretion and forensic interpretation."
New Delhi: Bollywood actor Rakul Preet Singh has moved the Delhi High Court seeking urgent interim directions from the court restraining media from running shows or publishing articles against her in connection with the drug probe which emerged out following the death of Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput.

The matter is likely to come up for hearing in the coming week.

The petition filed through advocates Himanshu Yadav, Aman Hingorani and Shweta Hingorani claims that Rakul Preet has been in Hyderabad for a film shoot and was shocked to see media reports in the evening of September 29 to the effect that the Narcotics Control Bureau, Mumbai has summoned her to appear before it in Mumbai on September 24 in connection with the ongoing investigation in the Rhea Chakraborty`s drugs case.

"...the Petitioner had received no such summons from the NCB at either of her Hyderabad or Mumbai addresses and accordingly she remained in Hyderabad. The Petitioner`s father, Col. Kulvinder Singh (Retd), decided to take the morning flight on 24.9.2020 to Mumbai from Hyderabad to ascertain the truth of such reports," the plea said.

"...however, from the evening of 23.9.2020 itself, the media started running fake news to the effect that the Petitioner, who was in Hyderabad, had supposedly reached Mumbai on the evening of 23.9.2020 for the NCB investigation," it said further.

It added that around 11.20 a.m. on September 24, the Petitioner received summons under Section 67 of the NDPS Act dated September 23 through WhatsApp in Hyderabad which said that she had to appear in person before the NCB, Mumbai at 10 a.m. on September 24.

It is from the email dated September 24 from the NCB that the Petitioner learnt that case in which she has been required to appear has been registered as Crime No. MZU/NCB/15/2020, the plea said.

Earlier this month, Rakul had approached the High Court seeking its direction in order to ask the media not to telecast, publish or circulate on the TV channels, cable, print or social media, as the case may be, any content in the context of Actress Rhea Chakraborty`s narcotic drugs case that maligns or slanders the Petitioner or which contains anything defamatory, deliberate, false and suggestive innuendos and half-truths in respect of the Petitioner, or to use sensational headlines, photographs, video-footage or social media links which invade the privacy of the Petitioner.

While issuing notice on the said plea, a single-judge bench of the high court presided by Justice Navin Chawla had said, "There has to be some restraint. Media gets to know info even before the officers themselves. Reputations are getting tarnished."

"It is hoped that media houses and TV channels would show restraint and abide by the Program Code and other guidelines while making any report in connection with Rakul Preet Singh," the bench had said further.
New Delhi: The Election Commission of India (EC) has issued guidelines for holding a free, fair, and safe assembly election in Bihar amid the COVID-19 pandemic. "The Election Commission of India is committed to holding a free, fair, and safe election to the Legislative Assembly of Bihar before the cessation of its term," a statement from the EC said on Friday.

The official release added that it had directed the Bihar election machinery to ensure a smooth, effective, inclusive and time-bound completion of the Special Summary Revision of Electoral Rolls to ensure maximum registration of un-enrolled citizens.

"Special efforts were made to identify the critical gaps in the electoral rolls and targeted SVEEP activities were carried out to address them," it added.

It also said, "At the entry of hall/room used for election purposes, thermal scanning of all persons shall be carried out, hand sanitizers shall be made available at all locations, social distancing shall be maintained and as far as practicable, large halls should be identified and utilized to ensure social distancing norms."

The norms for the number of people accompanying a candidate for the submission of a nomination is now two instead of five, and only two cars will be allowed for the purpose, instead of three. Online facilities have also been created for filing in the nomination forms and for the first time, candidates will also be able to deposit a security amount online.

Live TV

"Keeping the containment guidelines in view, the Commission has limited the number of persons including the candidate for door-to-door campaigns to five, and the convoy of vehicles in roadshows should be broken every five vehicles instead of 10. The interval between two sets of convoys of vehicles should be half an hour instead of a gap of 100 meters," the EC statement said.

It also said that public meetings and roadshows were permissible with instructions but will be subject to containment instructions issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs or the state. It further mandated face masks, hand sanitizers, thermal scanners, gloves, face shields, and PPE kits during the electoral process while ensuring social distancing norms.

The EC also laid down guidelines for each polling station, including sanitization a day before the poll, markers for social distancing, putting up of COVID-19 awareness posters, and availability of hand gloves.

As of August 23, 7,29,27,396 electors are registered to vote in the coming state elections, the EC said. Election Commission of India on Friday announced that the Bihar Assembly elections will be held in three phases with polling to take place on October 28, and November 3 and 7, and the counting of votes to take place on November 10.

The Assembly elections for 243 seats in Bihar are due in October-November and the tenure of the current Assembly is scheduled to end on November 29.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 06:42:05|Editor: huaxia

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WASHINGTON, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President Donald Trump intends to nominate Judge Amy Coney Barrett to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court, multiple U.S. media outlets reported on Friday.

Barrett, 48, is a conservative judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit. She was nominated by Trump for the post in 2017 and confirmed by the Senate with a 55-43 bipartisan vote.

A former clerk for the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, Barrett quickly emerged as a top contender to fill the seat vacated by Ginsburg, a liberal icon who died last week at the age of 87.

Trump will make the announcement at the White House on Saturday afternoon.

The president successfully appointed two conservatives on the Supreme Court's nine-justice bench, Neil Gorsuch in 2017 and Brett Kavanaugh in 2018, tilting the institution to the right with 5-4 majority. Barrett's confirmation would cement a 6-3 conservative advantage.

U.S. Supreme Court justices, who have life tenure and can serve until they die, resign, retire, or are impeached and removed from office, and play an enormous role in shaping the country's legislation and policies on issues such as abortion, LGBT rights, gun rights, climate change, and presidential powers.

Republicans, who have a 53-47 majority in the Senate, appear to have enough votes to confirm Trump's third Supreme Court pick. Only two Republican senators have said they would not support taking up a nominee prior to the November election.

Democrats oppose moving forward with a vote on Ginsburg's replacement before Election Day, pointing to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's decision in 2016 to block former president Barack Obama's Supreme Court nominee because it was an election year, all but ensuring a fierce confirmation battle on Capitol Hill.

McConnell and Senate Republicans have argued that this time is different because the Senate and the White House are held by the same party.

Trump also reportedly considered Barbara Lagoa, a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, for the country's highest court. Enditem
ST. JOHNS, N.L. - The Canadian government is giving $320 million to Newfoundland and Labradors struggling offshore oil and gas industry.

Natural Resources Minister Seamus ORegan made the funding announcement Friday at a news conference in St. Johns.

Premier Andrew Furey told reporters the province is creating an oil and gas sector recovery task force.

Furey said the task force will focus on supporting the industry and on figuring out how to best spend the $320 million from Ottawa.

Husky Energy said Friday in a news release the money is a first step, but that it wont keep its $2.2 billion West White Rose project moving.

Husky is looking for government investment in the project and announced earlier this month it was reviewing its operations in the province.

This report from The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 25, 2020.
Click here to read the full article on SPIN.

Ten days after calling record deals modern day slavery and literally pissing on a Grammy, Kanye West used Twitter the same way most artists do: to promote music.

On Saturday morning, the presidential hopeful shared a snippet of a new song titled Believe What I Say that not only gives off Old Kanye vibes but also features a sample of Lauryn Hills iconic Doo-Wop (That Thing). The 38-second-long clip is accompanied by footage from a boat ride in Haiti. The rapper arrived in the country yesterday to meet with president Jovenel Moise about building a city.

More from SPIN:

Preview Believe What I Say below.

BELIEVE WHAT I SAY (snippet) pic.twitter.com/U7Y2KQJ5UC  ye (@kanyewest) September 26, 2020

The new track follows Wash Us In the Blood, a collaboration with Travis Scott that Yeezy dropped in June. That song will be featured on his upcoming album Gods Country. Last year, West released his gospel album, Jesus Is King, followed by the Sunday Service Choir LP, Jesus Is Born.

I was thinking of not rapping again, because I rapped for the devil so long that I didnt even know how to rap for God, West explained to GQ earlier this year. Then one of my pastors told me, My son just said that he would want a rap album about Jesus from Kanye West. He didnt say, Kanye West, you should do this, or you need to do this. He just told me something that a child said. And that one thing made the difference.

To see our running list of the top 100 greatest guitarists of all time, click here.
I grew up inside this restaurant, and now my wife's helping out in the dining room and my daughter's working at the hostess stand. This is a family place - four generations and counting. I know every inch of pipe and wire we have running through here. I've been the plumber, the busboy, the handyman, the butcher, the bartender, the prep cook, the manager. I've done every job there is in this restaurant, and now I'm the one who has to shut us down.

It kills me. We were supposed to be getting ready to celebrate our 60th anniversary this year, and instead we're packing up and closing at the end of this month. I'll find another job, but it's more than that. It's home. These walls are like a family photo album. I try not to get too sentimental about it, because it won't change a damn thing, but sometimes the stress hits me and my heart starts going like crazy. I get frustrated. It makes me angry. How does this whole situation make any sense? I don't know a single person that's gotten covid, and I know that's probably lucky, but right now I can tell you about at least a dozen businesses going under and a few hundred people going broke.

I know this virus is real, OK? It's real and it's awful. I'm not disputing any of that. But our national hysteria is worse. We allowed the virus to take over our economy, our small businesses, our schools, our social lives, our whole quality of life. We surrendered, and now everything's infected.

I like to believe this restaurant is resilient. We tried to outlast it. My father worked here five days a week until he died at age 82, so that's in our DNA. When the governor first shut us down in March, I got together with my brother and my cousin, and we agreed to think of this as an opportunity. The restaurant was doing pretty good at that point. We had a little money to spend. We said: "Let's reinvest back in the business like it's supposed to be done." We remodeled the entire bar. We put in new bathrooms and new draft lines. We gave a tour to a few of our loyal customers, and they said: "Wow. When this place opens up, you're going to fill it every day. You'll be back bigger than ever."

At first the state was only allowing us do carryout. So, OK. We've got five dining rooms, 85 employees, and 13,000 square feet of space, and now you want us to operate like your regular old burger shack? How many people do you know who are willing to spend $40 on a lukewarm steak that's traveled halfway across town? That's not our typical business. We're old school. We don't have frozen hot wings that we heat up and toss in a cardboard box in five minutes. We buy the chicken fresh, cut off the fat, pound it out and bread it. Your wings take 25 minutes while you're enjoying a conversation and a cocktail or two. But that's the old world, right? What choice did we have? We redid our carryout menu to cut the prices down and teamed up with DoorDash and Grubhub. We created themed menus for Mother's Day and Easter. We delivered charity meals out to the hospitals and opened up a crab trailer out front so we could sell by the bushel. We were spending $800 a week on carryout containers, and there's no real profit in any of it. You lose out on booze. You don't get the same tips. We kept hanging on through March, April and May, but our revenue was down more than 80 %. We had to lay off 75 people. That's 75 families dealing with unemployment and financial hardships, and not because a virus made any of them sick.

When the state opened up for outdoor dining, I ran out to every Costco in the area and bought any picnic table I could find. We got 20 for $150 a piece. We roped off the parking lot and put out buckets of cold beer. We tried to make it look nice, but it's summer in Baltimore, and it's 90-some degrees outside and you're selling cream of crab soup to people who are sweating on the asphalt. Nobody really came. Why would they come? We stood out there for nine hours each day and we waited.

We got more creative. We kept on trying. We opened up at 50% capacity and had live music, themed dinners, mystery nights and a meal with a psychic. We reinvented this restaurant a dozen times, but none of it worked.

And what kind of support did we get? More rules. More restrictions. More regulations, mandates and curfews. We have to close at 10 p.m., because I guess maybe covid comes out at 10:01 - except apparently not at the casino down the road, because they have political leverage, and they get to stay open as long as they want. You can sit at our bar and have a drink, but you can't get up and mingle, because that's considered a health violation, so now I'm trying to serve you and police you at the same time. "Thanks for coming! We really need your business. Now put on your mask or sit the hell back down!" I have to buy disinfectants, individual ketchups, paper menus, and personal salt-and-pepper shakers or else I might get fined. My employees have to wear their masks all the time, even when they're alone in an office, but meanwhile we have a group of 40 people in the dining room with no masks on, and that's deemed safe because they're drinking water? None of it makes any sense.

We had a customer come in the other day, and she couldn't get seated because we had a few other tables, and we'd hit our 50% capacity in the one dining room she likes. I had to ask her to wait. I'd rather sit her down and take her money. I hate this rule, but now I have to enforce it. But she could see all the empty tables, and she didn't understand it. She got mad and decided to call 911 and tell them we were over capacity. Two armed police officers came through here. The whole foyer was empty. There was nobody at the bar. I've got a max fire rating on the wall for 323 people, and they couldn't count up to 100. I told them: "I dream about being over capacity, but I doubt it will happen again."

It's like Trump said: The cure has been worse than the disease. People spent too much time at home watching the news all day, drinking in this hysteria until they were spraying down their groceries and afraid to leave home. It became another anti-Trump thing in the press. The impeachment didn't work, the killer bees didn't work, so let's blow covid out of proportion and see if it hurts him. But it's the rest of us that got hurt. It was day after day of failure. It was a slow and painful death.

We went to see our accountant at the end of the summer. He looked over the numbers but he didn't say much, and that's not like him. I said: "What would you do?" He said the way things were going, we'd have nothing left to lose within a few months.

We made the decision right then. There wasn't much to discuss.

Our last day is September 30th, and then we're done.
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Hours after Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan fearmongered over India's UT of Jammu-Kashmir, India firmly responded and requested the United Nations for the floor to exercise Right to Reply in response to Pakistan's statements. Pakistan PM in his UNGA address repeated his claims on 'RSS' 'Hindutva' and commented on India's new domicile law for Kashmir - calling it a 'war crime'. As Khan began his speech, Indian delegate Mijito Vinito walked out of the hall in New York.

Indian delegate Mijito Vinito presented India's stand and asserted the rules and legislation in Jammu and Kashmir to be an internal affair.

The Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir is an integral and inalienable part of India. The rules and legislation brought in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir are strictly internal affairs of India. The only dispute left in Kashmir relates to the part of Kashmir that is still under illegal occupation of Pakistan. We call upon Pakistan to vacate all those areas that it is in illegal occupation of, said Mijito Vinito, First Secretary, India Mission to the United Nations.

READ: Pakistan's Opposition unites to demand Imran Khan's resignation; goes to war with Pak Army

Vinito further pointed out that the Pakistan PM is the same person who referred to the terrorist Osama Bin Laden as a Martyr in his Parliament in July. He further called out Pakistan PM Imran Khan's lie-filled 'incessant rant' at the UNGA, adding that it was the same man who admitted in 2019 that his country was harbouring terrorists who were trained by Pakistan while he was spewing venom about India.

This Hall heard the incessant rant of someone who had nothing to show for himself, who had no achievements to speak of, and no reasonable suggestion to offer to the world. Instead, we saw lies, misinformation, warmongering, and malice spread through this Assembly. The words used today at this great Assembly by the leader of Pakistan (Imran Khan) demean the very essence of the United Nations, Vinito said.

READ: Embattled Pakistan PM Imran Khan jumps on month-old report, offers India 'help' amid COVID

'Nation that is deeply buried in medievalism'

Further claiming that Pakistan 'provides pensions for dreaded and listed terrorists out of State funds', Vinito said,

This is the country that brought genocide to South Asia 39 years ago when it killed its own people. This is the same country that provides pensions for dreaded and listed terrorists out of State funds. This is the same country that has the dubious distinction of hosting the largest number of terrorists proscribed by the United Nations."

"For a nation that is deeply buried in medievalism, it is understandable that the tenets of modern civilised society such as peace, dialogue and diplomacy are farfetched," Vinito added.

READ: Pakistan PM Imran Khan fearmongers over Kashmir's domicile law at UNGA; India walks out

Pakistan PM Imran Khan Fearmongers Over Kashmir's Domicile Law At UNGA

Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan On Friday, repeated his claims about India's revocation of Article 370 and 35 A - terming them illegal, in his UN General Assembly (UNGA) address. Repeating his claims on 'RSS' Hindutva', Khan commented on India's new domicile law for Kashmir - calling it a 'war crime'. As Khan began his speech, Indian delegate Mijito Vinito walked out of the hall in New York.

Terming India as a country sponsoring 'Islamophobia', he claimed that India had regarded Muslims as 'propellers of COVID-19 virus' and alleged that they were denied medical attention. Commenting on Assam's NRC, he fearmongered that 2 million Muslims had been 'stripped off their citizenship'. India's Permanent Representative to UN - Tirumurti has vowed a 'befitting right of reply' to Khan's 'litany of vicious falsehood'.

READ: India's Mijito Vinito walking out is the only part of Pak & Imran's UN rant worth watching
The main opposition People Power Party's interim leader Kim Jong-in, right, speaks during the meeting at the National Assembly, Saturday, of a special investigative taskforce the party set up to look into North Korea's recent killing of a South Korean fisheries official earlier this week. Yonhap



South Korea will demand North Korea carry out another investigation into its recent killing of a Seoul fisheries official near the tense sea border, as the North's explanation had some key discrepancies from Seoul's account, Cheong Wa Dae said Saturday.



On Tuesday, North Korean troops shot the 47-year-old man who was adrift in its waters and incinerated his body, according to the South Korean military. He went missing the previous day while on duty aboard a ship near the Yellow Sea border island of Yeonpyeong.



North Korean leader Kim Jong-un apologized for the incident Friday in a message sent by the United Front Department, a key espionage agency handling inter-Korean affairs. The North claimed that what it set on fire was not his body but an object he was using to stay afloat.



After holding a National Security Council (NSC) session late Friday, the government decided to demand a further investigation and request a joint probe, if necessary, the presidential office said.



"As there exist differences between North Korea's explanation and our intelligence analysis, we decided to continue our investigation into the incident to uncover the truth," the office said.



It also vowed to "swiftly take steps to further heighten the military's surveillance posture on the Yellow Sea to prevent such an incident from happening again."




The Minister for Trade and Industries Honorable Alan Kwadwo Kyeremanteng has commissioned a newly constructed Business Resource Centre (BRC) at Obuasi in the Ashanti Region.

The Business Resource Centre initiative is in line with the industrial Transformation agenda of the Akufo-Addo government and will provide a one-stop enterprise support center at the district level designed to provide a broad range of Business Development Services (BDS) to potential and existing entrepreneurs and enterprises.

Currently, 67 BRCs are being constructed across the country, and are at various stages of completion. 37 of them have been completed with the other 30 at advanced stages expected to be completed by the end of the year.

The Minister for Trade and Industries Honorable Alan Kwadwo Kyeremanteng who led the commissioning of the project said the Business Development Center in Obuasi represents a new chapter in the history of Obuasi as a renowned gold mining town. He said the BRC will serve as an avenue to diversify the economy of Obuasi; leveraging the revenue generated from the Gold mine.

Speaking about the relevance of the Business Resource Centres is intended to develop the country through industrialization to enable the country to produce and consume what it produces. If this can be realized, he said, there is the need for the Business Resource Center to train people on how to develop their businesses.

The Minister for Trade added that "the BRC is the answer to the successes of businesses; whether start-ups or businesses already in existence.

With all districts in the country going to be beneficiaries of the newly constructed and equipped BRCs, Mr. Kyerematen stressed that Ghanaians will begin to understand that this government is serious about developing the private sector at the district level to help us address this challenge of unemployment.

Madam Philomina Yarney who represented the Executive Secretary of the National Board for Small Scale Industries (NBSSI) praised the Government for empowering the NBSSI since 2017 when it took over governance. She mentioned both Financial and non-financial support from Government as key in reviving the NBSSI.

She revealed that plans are far advanced by the Minister of Trade to transform the NBSSI from an agency into an authority to enable it operate optimally and deliver on its mandate.

The Municipal Chief Executive for Obuasi Honorable Elijah Adansi-Bonah on his part praised the President His Excellency Nana Addo Dankwa Akuffo Addo for the project. He also praised the President for his industrialization agenda through programs such as the One District One Factory. He said "the time has come for the country to add value to its primary products to make it highly competitive in the global market" .

Nana Asirifi Asare II, Kontihene of Edubiase Traditional Council also praised the President for the project and urge the youth to take advantage of the facility to help them gain employable skills.

The Business Resource center is a fully furnished structure which runs on three (3) energy sources, that is, National electricity grid, Solar system and a Standby generating plant. It also has a borehole for constant supply of water all at a cost of GH 3million Ghana Cedis. The funding source for the project is from the African Development Bank under the loan agreement with Ghana for the implementation of the Rural Enterprise Program under the Ministry of Trade Industry.
The launch of 1,000 telehealth facilities on September 25

Addressing the launching ceremony, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc said that with the launch, the Ministry of Health is materialising Vietnam's digital transformation programme. This is an important and significant platform with a vision towards better protecting of people and improving healthcare services.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc addressing the launching ceremony

According to acting Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long, 2020 has been a challenging year for the healthcare sector and the whole country with the COVID-19 outbreak. So far, the country has exerted strong control over the pandemic. During this period, the country has been developing new models in diagnosis and treatment, as well as the prevention and fight against the deadly virus, with telehealth contributing a great deal to quickly extending quality healthcare services.

Acting Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long delivered a speech at the launch

During the two months of development of the 1,000 telehealth units, increasing the quality of diagnosis and treatment was the main focus. The scheme not only applies technologies and IT to digitally transform the healthcare sector but also helps locals get better access to quality services at grass-roots facilities and narrowing the gap in the number and skills of healthcare practitioners between central and grass-roots units.

The launch is part of the telehealth development scheme in 2020-2025 approved in Decision No.2628/QD-BYT dated June 22, 2020.

Telehealth facilities join connections

In the near future, the healthcare sector will develop a healthcare network which gathers doctors and healthcare professionals nationwide, making it a forum to share experiences and exchange knowledge with an aim to better serve people.
YEREVAN.  Zhoghovurd newspaper of the Republic of Armenia (RA) writes: According to Zhoghovurd dailys information, the previous day the meeting in the format of the RA Prime Minister-government-provincial governor lasted about an hour and a half.

According to our information, the main topic of the meeting was the transition from the parliamentary model of government in the RA to the presidential model again. According to the information circulating, the authorities want to return to the presidential model again, as they believe that the parliament does not justify itself.

RA Minister of Justice Rustam Badasyan spoke about that transition and noted that it is not so realistic at the moment, as it is not possible to implement it constitutionally as well as of today.

According to our information, the [ruling] My Step [bloc] members raised a question about the events unrolling around PAP [opposition Prosperous Armenia Party] leader Gagik Tsarukyan, to which the RA Prime Minister [Nikol Pashinyan] replied that they had nothing to worry about, as everything is under control.
A temporary contractor in the battleground state of Pennsylvania mistakenly threw mail-in ballots for President Donald Trump in the trash, county officials revealed.

A top federal prosecutor announced on Thursday that his office had launched an investigation into a small number of discarded mail-in ballots cast in the upcoming 2020 U.S. presidential election.

The incident drew the attention of Trump who claimed it as proof that mail-in voting can not be trusted and was susceptible to fraud.

Luzerne County Elections Bureau claimed it stemmed from an administrative error and that county officials had not known who the votes were cast for until it was disclosed by the Justice Department earlier this week.

U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Pennsylvania is investigating nine discarded ballots in the state, seven of which had votes for President Donald Trump. County officials said on Friday that the votes were mistakenly thrown in the trash by a temporary worker

Pennsylvania is a crucial battleground state in the 2020 election

Luzerne County Manager C. David Pedri said in statement Friday that the temporary independent contractor 'incorrectly discarded into the office trash UMOVA ballots'.

UMOVA is an acronym for ballots from military and overseas voters.

The ballots were found in a dumpster next to the elections building.

Pedris said the worker began on September 14 but the the error was discovered by Luzerne County Elections Director Shelby Watchilla two days later.

'Ms. Watchilla immediately began an internal inquiry and informed her direct supervisor. The temporary independent contractor was removed from service and informed not to return,' Pedri said.

Watchilla 'contacted Luzerne County Office of Law who researched the matter and advised that this needed to be reported to the authorities'.

A request was then made to district attorney's office.

Pedri added that 'all garbage from the Elections Bureau' accumulated during the three days the contractor was working there was 'placed in a dumpster and secured by Luzerne County staff'.

'Each bag of garbage from the entire building in the dumpster was searched by the Federal Bureau of Investigations, the Luzerne County District Attorney's Office, Pennsylvania State Police as well as Luzerne County staff. All items of concern were taken into custody by the Federal Bureau of Investigations,' he wrote.

In a highly unusual public statement on Thursday, U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, David Freed, said his office and the FBI were contacted on Monday by Luzerne County District Attorney Stefanie Salavantis amid concerns about 'potential issues with a small number of mail-in ballots at the Luzerne County Board of Elections.'

He said his office could confirm that a 'small number of military ballots' were discarded.

'Of the nine ballots that were discarded and then recovered, seven were cast for presidential candidate Donald Trump. Two of the discarded ballots had been resealed inside their appropriate envelopes by Luzerne elections staff prior to recovery by the FBI and the contents of those two ballots are unknown,' he added.

The ballots from military and overseas voters were found in a dumpster outside the building

'Our investigation has revealed that all or nearly all envelopes received in the elections office were opened as a matter of course,' Freed added.

'It was explained to investigators the envelopes used for official overseas, military, absentee and mail-in ballot requests are so similar, that the staff believed that adhering to the protocol of preserving envelopes unopened would cause them to miss such ballot requests.'

In an earlier statement posted online, Freed's office had originally claimed all nine ballots had been cast for Trump. The link was abruptly removed later in the day on Thursday, and a revised statement was issued.

Dawn Clark, a spokeswoman for Freed's office, said the ballots 'were improperly opened' by county staff.

The news about the investigation in Pennsylvania, a state Trump carried in 2016 by 44,000 votes, could add fuel to Trump's efforts to cast doubt on the legitimacy of the upcoming election.

He has often asserted, without evidence, that widespread mail-in voting will lead to fraud. Democrats, meanwhile, have encouraged voting by mail so that Americans can safely vote during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Attorney General William Barr, pictured right with Trump, briefed the president about the discarded ballots before the investigation was made public on Thursday

Democrats have encourage mail-in ballots due to the pandemic Pictured, the DC Board of Elections hosts the event Vote Safe DC campaign that encourages residents to vote by mail

ABC reports that Attorney General William Barr personally briefed the president about the ballots shortly before the investigation was announced.

Speaking at the White House on Thursday, Trump said there had been ballots with his name on them found in a waste-paper basket.

'We want to make sure the election is honest and I'm not sure that it can be. I don't know that it can be with this whole situation, unsolicited ballots,' Trump said.

He later spoke on Fox News Radio where he again argued that mail-in voting would lead to widespread fraud in the the election.

'They were Trump ballots - eight ballots in an office yesterday in - but in a certain state and they were - they had Trump written on it, and they were thrown in a garbage can. This is whats going to happen,' Trump said in the interview.

'This is whats going to happen, and were investigating that."'

The announcement from the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Middle District of Pennsylvania had made not mention of 'fraud'.

Critics of the White House have spoken out saying that the incident is being used politically to bolster Trump.

'This is an ongoing investigation where there is no public interest reason to override the usual policy of not commenting -- and especially not to say for whom the ballots were cast. An unprecedented in kind contribution to the president's campaign,' Matthew Miller, the former director of the Justice Department's public affairs office, said on Twitter.

However Trump's team continued to push the story as evidence.

'Democrats are trying to steal the election,' Matt Wolking, the deputy director of communications and rapid response with the Trump campaign, tweeted.

Earlier this week, Trump claimed that the winner of the presidential race will not be known on Election Day  predicting a long 'dispute' between the two parties during a week when he caused an uproar when he refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power.

Trump's comment about a contested election, made during a speech in Atlanta, comports with what many political observers have been warning might occur.

It followed his own repeated attacks on mail-in voting and a claim Thursday the election won't be 'honest.'

'Now I dont know with this ballot situation,' he said during a speech on black economic empowerment.

'Youre not going to see it November 3. Democrats are playing games. You see that,' Trump said.

He told the crowd: 'But youre going to raising the hand if not November 3, hopefully shortly thereafter. I know youre going to be raising your hand, with me we may end up in a dispute for a long time, because thats the way they want it.

'But were going to end up winning, thats for sure,' Trump added.

He mocked the idea of staying beyond the Constitution's limit that would hold him to two terms.

'I told you he's a dictator! He will not give up power!' Trump said. 'Under no circumstances will he give up power. He intends to serve at least two more terms.'

Then Trump riffed about remarks that have 'a little sarcasm' and how they prompt people to shout 'twelve more years!'

Trump then cast a wide grin as his supporters erupted into chants of 'Twelve more years!'

He made the statements as he attacked mail-in voting, a method millions of Americans are using, with polls showing a disproportionate share of Joe Biden voting by mail.

According to ABC ballot envelopes can not be opened until the canvas is underway.

Counties are expected to properly store and maintain the security of returned ballots until such time.

Pedri said that the county will now 'attempt to contact the voters involved and process their votes'.

They also plan to provide extra training to all staff and install a security camera in the elections bureau to 'actively monitor and ensure that all staff are strictly adhering to proper procedures and protocols'.

FBI Director Christopher Wray recently discussed fraudulent voting and said that it had never been seen in a major election.

'We have not seen, historically, any kind of coordinated national voter fraud effort in a major election, whether it's by mail or otherwise,' he said during a Senate hearing Thursday.

Freed said in his statement that his office's inquiry 'remains ongoing'.




The Vietnamese Plant Protection Department in cooperation with the US Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) suggested sending APHIS staffs from the capital city of Hanoi to HCMC for irradiation treatment inspection.

A staff of the Vietnamese Plant Protection Department and US expert check fresh dragon fruits before exporting to US market.

APHIS staffs started working at Son Son Irradiation Center after conducting the isolation requirement and having SARS-CoV-2 negative result certificate.

In March, American experts had to go back home due to the complicated Covid-19 pandemic situation resulting in suspension of exporting fresh fruits to the market.On September 2, the US decided to send phytosanitary experts to the Southeast Asian country for working amid the Covid-19 well-control.The US has allowed to import six Vietnamese fresh fruits such as dragon fruit, rambutan, longan, lychee, star apple and mango so far with a total turn-over of around US$20 million a year.In the upcoming time, the Vietnamese Plant Protection Department will closely work with US Embassy in Vietnam, the US Department of Agriculture to promptly solve every issue related to trade in plant-based agricultural products, contributing to the bilateral trade promotion.From March 25 up to now, Vietnam has exported over 2,000 tons of fresh fruits to the US market, contributing to supporting farmers and enterprises in the current period of Covid-19.

By Thanh Hai- Translated by Huyen Huong
Today

A mix of clouds and sun. Gusty winds diminishing during the afternoon. High 69F. Winds N at 20 to 30 mph. Higher wind gusts possible.

Tonight

Partly cloudy skies. Low 52F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph.

Tomorrow

A mainly sunny sky. High 73F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph.
Pacific Gas & Electric warned they may have to cut power to almost 100,000 homes in Northern California with strong winds and warm temperatures creating a risk of new wildfires.

Company officials made the announcement on Friday, saying that 'hot and dry conditions, combined with expected high wind gusts, pose an increased risk for damage to the electric system that has the potential to ignite fires in areas with dry vegetation.'

PG&E say power may be shut off to up to 97,000 customers in 16 counties between Sunday morning and Monday, according to The Los Angeles Times.

Pacific Gas & Electric warned they may have to cut power to almost 100,000 homes in Northern California with strong winds and warm temperatures creating a risk of new wildfires. Firefighters are pictured putting out a brush fire in Northern California on Thursday

PG&E fear strong winds could down power lines and spark new blazes across the weekend

Counties which could be affected include Napa, northeast of San Francisco.

When heavy winds were predicted earlier this month, PG&E cut power to about 167,000 homes and businesses in central and Northern California in a more targeted approach after being criticized last year for acting too broadly when it blacked out 2 million customers to prevent fires.

PG&E equipment has sparked past large wildfires, including the 2018 fire that destroyed much of the Sierra foothills town of Paradise and killed 85 people.

This year, Northern California has been battling through the worst wildfire season on record.

A new round of hot, dry and windy weather is expected by the weekend. Firefighters are pictured putting out a blaze near Big Sur earlier this month

The North Complex Fire has torched more than 304,000 acres and is 78 percent contained. At least 15 people have died after being caught up in the inferno.

The August Complex Fire has burned through a whopping 867,000 acres and is only 38 percent contained. One firefighter was killed while working to train and contain that blaze.

Wildfires aren't the only reason why California residents have been experiencing deliberate power outages in recent months.

Back in August, PG&E was among a number of electric companies who conducted rolling blackouts amid fears that a heatwave would overwhelm the electric grid.

The Independent System Operator declared a Stager 3 Emergency, prompting PG&E to cut power to 250,000 homes.

Residents were unable to be notified due to the emergency announcement, leaving thousands of vulnerable people suddenly without air-conditioning in the midst of a severe heatwave.

Grid managers last implemented such a power cut in 2001, when the state was suffering from an electric crisis.
Leon Smith, died on September 25, 2020, peacefully at home with his beloved wife Jean and his stepson, Timothy Dean by his side. Jean and Tim had lovingly taken care of Leon since he was diagnosed with colon cancer in 2012.

Leon was born in 1925 in Chattanooga, to Frances Elizabeth and Henry Leon Smith. After graduating from Chattanooga High School in 1943, he entered the Army Air Force and completed pilot training on the P-61 Black Widow night fighter just as World War II ended. He studied civil engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology, and remained in Atlanta to work for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers until 1973. In 1975, Leon joined Sherlock, Smith & Adams in Montgomery, Alabama, where he worked as an architect for 14 years. In 1995 he and Jean moved back to the Chattanooga area and settled in Signal Mountain. Leons faith in Christ was most clearly expressed through his gift of music. He was a gifted soloist and sang in the Atlanta Symphony Chorus under Robert Shaw, and in the Choral Arts Society of Chattanooga. He was an active choir member and soloist at Second Ponce de Leon Baptist Church, Peachtree Presbyterian Church, and The Temple in midtown Atlanta and served as the Interim Choir Director at Memorial Presbyterian Church in Montgomery, Alabama. Leon was a member of Signal Mountain Presbyterian Church where he sang in the choir alongside his wife, Jean. Leons love of aviation continued throughout his life. Having owned a Cessna twin engine plane and enjoying membership in the Experimental Aircraft Association in Montgomery, AL. Leon was known for his humility, integrity, dry wit, and a curious obsession with crossword puzzles and puns.

He was preceded in death by his parents and his brother, Norman Smith.

He is survived by wife, Clarise Jean Smith, stepchildren, Timothy Dean, Jonathan Dean and Jennifer Dean Predmore, son, Richard Leon Smith, and daughter, Alison Smith Kosnett and her husband Philip Kosnett.

A memorial service will be held at 11:30 a.m. on Thursday, Oct. 1, in the sanctuary of Signal Mountain Presbyterian Church.

The family invites all to join with us in celebration of a life well lived and praise to our God who is exceedingly good and faithful.

Arrangements are by Lane Funeral Home, 601 Ashland Terrace, Chattanooga, Tn. 37415, 423 877-3524, lanefh.com.
Potential Mercia Asset Management PLC (LON:MERC) shareholders may wish to note that the Non-Executive Director & Co-Founder, Raymond Chamberlain, recently bought UK240k worth of stock, paying UK0.20 for each share. While that's a very decent purchase to our minds, it was proportionally a bit modest, boosting their holding by just 5.3%.

Check out our latest analysis for Mercia Asset Management

The Last 12 Months Of Insider Transactions At Mercia Asset Management

In fact, the recent purchase by Non-Executive Director & Co-Founder Raymond Chamberlain was not their only acquisition of Mercia Asset Management shares this year. They previously made an even bigger purchase of UK1m worth of shares at a price of UK0.25 per share. That means that even when the share price was higher than UK0.21 (the recent price), an insider wanted to purchase shares. Their view may have changed since then, but at least it shows they felt optimistic at the time. To us, it's very important to consider the price insiders pay for shares is very important. As a general rule, we feel more positive about a stock if insiders have bought shares at above current prices, because that suggests they viewed the stock as good value, even at a higher price.

Mercia Asset Management insiders may have bought shares in the last year, but they didn't sell any. You can see the insider transactions (by companies and individuals) over the last year depicted in the chart below. If you want to know exactly who sold, for how much, and when, simply click on the graph below!

Mercia Asset Management is not the only stock insiders are buying. So take a peek at this free list of growing companies with insider buying.

Does Mercia Asset Management Boast High Insider Ownership?

Many investors like to check how much of a company is owned by insiders. I reckon it's a good sign if insiders own a significant number of shares in the company. Insiders own 13% of Mercia Asset Management shares, worth about UK12m. This level of insider ownership is good but just short of being particularly stand-out. It certainly does suggest a reasonable degree of alignment.

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What Might The Insider Transactions At Mercia Asset Management Tell Us?

It is good to see recent purchasing. We also take confidence from the longer term picture of insider transactions. But on the other hand, the company made a loss during the last year, which makes us a little cautious. When combined with notable insider ownership, these factors suggest Mercia Asset Management insiders are well aligned, and that they may think the share price is too low. So these insider transactions can help us build a thesis about the stock, but it's also worthwhile knowing the risks facing this company. At Simply Wall St, we found 2 warning signs for Mercia Asset Management that deserve your attention before buying any shares.

If you would prefer to check out another company -- one with potentially superior financials -- then do not miss this free list of interesting companies, that have HIGH return on equity and low debt.

For the purposes of this article, insiders are those individuals who report their transactions to the relevant regulatory body. We currently account for open market transactions and private dispositions, but not derivative transactions.

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.



Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com.
President Donald Trump's campaign has grown increasingly focused on making inroads in Pennsylvania to offset potential vulnerabilities in other battlegrounds.

The president will travel to the state for the second time in a week on Saturday, hoping to attract the same rural and white working-class voters who delivered him a narrow victory here in 2016.

The in-person touch, in what may become the most important battleground on the map, complements an aggressive get-out-the-vote operation that has been working for four years to find new voters by knocking on doors in competitive neighborhoods.

Trump narrowly flipped three Great Lakes states Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin from blue to red in 2016. He has virtually no path to reelection without keeping at least one of those states in his column. His campaign has long viewed Wisconsin as his best option, but aides who requested anonymity to discuss strategy said their thinking has begun to shift.

There are growing concerns inside the campaign, the aides said, about Trump's ability to retain Wisconsin. Even winning that upper Midwest battleground wouldn't provided the needed votes if Trump's Democratic challenger, Joe Biden, claims Arizona.

But Pennsylvania would be enough.

With Pennsylvania, I don't have to make a play, we've got Pennsylvania, boasted Trump at a rally Tuesday night just outside Pittsburgh.

That may be harder than Trump suggests.

Despite fervent Republican efforts, no GOP nominee since George H.W. Bush in 1988 had captured the state until Trump did four years ago, winning by just 44,000 votes out of nearly 5.9 million votes cast. And as someone born in Scranton, Democratic nominee is also heavily focused on the state.

Recent Pennsylvania polls disagree over the state of the race: Some show Trump and Biden in a competitive race, while others have Biden slightly ahead of Trump.

And just as Florida, Florida, Florida became the moniker in 2000 for the electoral delays and controversies in the state that decided the election that year, Pennsylvania, which may be 2020's tipping point state, may have its own drama looming.

With 3 million or more voters expected to cast ballots by mail, lawmakers, party officials and election officials are warning that the conditions are ripe for a presidential election result to be left hanging in limbo on a drawn-out vote.

A partisan stalemate and lawsuits have held up fixes to glitches in the state's fledgling mail-in voting law, and Democrats are warning that as many as 100,000 or more mail-in ballots dubbed naked ballots could be invalidated if they aren't put in the proper envelope by people unaccustomed to voting by mail.

Pennsylvania is anchored by large cities Philadelphia to the east, Pittsburgh to the west on opposite ends, each with sprawling suburbs. But the rest of the state is largely rural, comprised of small cities and towns where Trump ran up the score four years ago.

He will likely need to again, as the president's prospects have slipped since 2016 in vote-rich suburban Philadelphia, where he underperformed by past Republican measures, raising the stakes on what his campaign's more aggressive outreach to new rural and small-town voters across the industrial north.

In Chester County, for instance, Trump was the first Republican presidential nominee in more than 50 years to lose what is Pennsylvania's fourth most-populous county and once a GOP stronghold. While 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney carried the county on the western edge of metro Philadelphia, Trump fell short by 10 percentage points.

If Trump is to carry Pennsylvania again, he cannot just add new voters in the state's expansive rural areas but must stop the bleeding outside Philadelphia, former Rep. Ryan Costello, a Republican, said.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
President Donald Trump is preparing to unleash vicious lines of attack in the first debate with Joe Biden, according to a new report, leaving some Democrats fearful that their nominee will be unprepared to counter.

The first of three presidential debates is scheduled to take place at 9pm ET in Cleveland, and promises to be a wild night of spirited arguments, and likely personal attacks.

While Biden has been in seclusion diligently preparing for the debate, Trump has largely eschewed traditional prep, instead pulling advisors aside on the fly to test out different lines of attack, according to a detailed report on Friday from the Washington Post.

Because Biden has largely avoided hostile settings in recent months, and reportedly plans to focus his arguments on how he would solve the coronavirus pandemic and improve the economy, some of his allies fear he may be unprepared to face vicious personal attacks on Tuesday.

'It's like training for a knife fight and somebody is getting an Uzi,' one Democratic congressional aide lamented to the newspaper.

President Donald Trump is preparing to unleash vicious lines of attack in the first debate with Joe Biden , according to a new report

Trump has already vowed to bring up Biden's son Hunter (with him above), the subject of a recent report from Republican senators, which claimed he 'cashed in' on his father's position

Trump has already vowed to bring up Biden's son Hunter, the subject of a recent report from Republican senators, which claimed he 'cashed in' on his father's position by joining the board of a Ukrainian gas company.

'I think it will be brought up in the debate,' Trump said at a recent rally in Fayetteville, North Carolina, shouting, 'Where is Hunter?'

The Biden campaign has slammed the claims against Hunter as 'a long-disproven, hardcore rightwing conspiracy theory'. Trump was impeached for pressuring Ukraine to investigate corruption claims against the Biden family, before being acquitted in the Senate.

On the campaign trail Biden has exploded at voters who bring up allegations against his son, telling one in Iowa: 'You're a d**n liar, man. That's not true.'

It has led some Biden confidants to fear that the Democrat could become flustered or loose his cool if Trump pursues the Hunter angle during the debates.

'When you go at his family, he becomes hotter than hell, which is part of the thing I worry about,' John Morgan, a Florida trial lawyer and major Biden donor, told the Post. 'I think what Biden has to be careful about is not letting his Irish temper blow when that happens.'

Biden (seen on Friday) has been in seclusion diligently preparing for the debate. His advisors say he should be prepared for vicious personal attacks during the debate

Biden campaign spokesman Andrew Bates blasted Trump over his presumed plans to bring up Hunter in the debate.

'For Donald Trump to demonstrate that the only case he can make for himself is to lash out at Joe Biden's children would be the ultimate admission that his presidency is a weak, pathetic failure,' Bates told the Post.

Biden's friends and advisers are urging him not to get dragged into exchanging ugly personal attacks with Trump.

'There is an old saying in debate circles: When you get down in the mud and wrestle with a pig, the pig has fun and you get covered in mud,' Senator Christopher A. Coons, a Delaware Democrat and close Biden confidant, told the Post. 'And the word that is typically used is not 'mud.' '

'I hope I don't get baited into getting into a brawl with this guy,' Biden said at a virtual fundraiser this month. He added, 'It's going to be hard, because I predict he's going to be shouting' and interrupting.

The Biden camp is counting on their candidate's decades of experience in the Senate, including countless hours of floor debate, to help him outwit Trump on Tuesday.

Trump himself has conceded that Biden has deep experience, but is hoping that Biden will become flustered or misspeak during the debate.

'Look, I think he's a professional,' Trump said earlier this week in a call-in interview with Fox & Friends when asked about the upcoming debate. 'I don't know if he's all there but I think he's a professional and that he can debate.'

'I have to assume he's going to do great  because he's been there 47 years he's been in the public service. A long time,' Trump added.

Former White House counsel Bob Bauer (center) is reportedly standing in for Trump in Biden's debate prep

Trump is seen during a 2016 presidential debate with Hillary Clinton. Trump himself has conceded that Biden has deep debate experience from his years in the Senate

Previously, Trump has also questioned Biden's mental acuity, and even, perhaps facetiously, called for a drug test prior to the debates to rule out any performance enhancing drugs.

'People will finally realize Biden is just not there,' one Trump advisor told the Post of Tuesday's debate.

Privately, some Trump allies fret that he will be unprepared for the debate, given that he is used to be surrounded by underlings who rarely openly challenge him, and his distaste for traditional prep.

'The president's view is: He's been president for four years, he's been in training every day,' one ally told the Post. 'He thinks he doesn't need any prep.'

Former White House counsel Bob Bauer is standing in for Trump in Biden's debate prep, the Post reported. Bauer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

'We take Joe Biden very seriously,' said Trump campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh. 'He's had decades in the Senate where all he does is debate.'

'The bar for Biden is very low. The expectations are low. So he doesn't have to do much to come out looking good,' Newsmax Chairman Christopher Ruddy, a close friend of Trump's, told the newspaper. 'The president just goes out there and says whatever is on his mind. It could get pretty wild.'
Thiruvananthapuram, September 26 : Former MP and CPI(M) leader M B Rajesh has slammed the media for treating the BJP-led central government with kid gloves over the damning finding by the CAG that the centre violated the GST act.

A CAG report tabled in parliament the other day revealed that the central government violated the GST compensation cess act by diverting funds collected as GST cess for other purposes.

The centre reportedly diverted Rs. 42,272 crore collected as GST cess to the consolidated fund of India in violation of the GST act instead of putting it in the GST compensation cess fund.

The amount was supposed to be distributed among the states to compensate them for the shortfall in revenue owing to the roll out of goods and services tax regime.

In a facebook post, Rajesh wrote that the CAG had unearthed a grave financial irregularity committed by the centre.

But he lamented that the news would die down in a day. None of the media outlets would hold debates, write editorials, use banner headlines, or draw cartoons to amplify the issue as the BJP knew how to get the media to toe the line, he wrote.

He also took a potshot at opposition leader Ramesh Chennithala, saying that the congress leader would gloss over the issue in his daily press conference.

If it had been the LDF in the dock instead of the BJP, the media and the opposition would have had a field day, he quipped.

On the CAG report, the CPI(M) leader alleged that the centre appropriated the cess collected from the states as well as the cess the states were otherwise legally entitled to get.

The CAG also found that the centre diverted funds from the GST fund to inflate its own revenue in the books and then asked the states to take loans to compensate for the shortfall in GST revenue, the facebook post said.

Rajesh also charged that the centre not only misappropriated the GST funds meant for the states but also other cesses in a similar manner. The BJP government committed financial irregularities to the tune of Rs. 2.3 lakh crore in toto as per the CAG report, he alleged.

He also said that the central governments decision to table the damning CAG report in parliament on the last day of the current session was a cunning move aimed at evading protests by the opposition parties.
The main Sligo to Donegal road was closed following the collision near Rathcormack on Sunday morning. Photo: Donal Hackett

The 48 year old man who lost his life in a crash on the N15 near Rathcormack on Sunday was a native of Bangladesh who operated a restaurant in Bundoran.

The father of three was travelling with his wife and youngest child when his Nissan Qashqai was in a collision with another car at approximately 11.50am.

He was pronounced dead at the scene.

The female driver (30s) of the second car, a Portuguese national living in Ballymote, was taken to University Hospital Galway by air ambulance where her condition is described as serious. She was travelling alone.

The road was closed for most of the day for an examination by Forensic Collision Investigators. An inquest into the driver's death will be held in the coming months.

Gardai in Sligo are appealing to anyone who may have witnessed the collision, or who may have dash-cam footage to contact them on 071 915 7000.
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You might think lady detectives are a fictional invention, but just like Netflixs newly released Enola Holmes, starring Millie Bobby Brown, Victorian women enjoyed working as female investigators. Often described as private enquiry agents, these women were hired by individuals, politicians, and even Scotland Yard, to make enquires and investigate criminal activity.

Victorian women were not all like the meek heroines depicted by Charles Dickens, brutally weighed down by their place in the world, many were like the tenacious women in Enola Holmes, which offers a far more accurate portrayal of the world Victorian women found themselves in.

If you lived in London in the 1890s, you would have done well to engage the services of Madam Paul, the working name of Mrs Upperley, a private detective who had begun her career in the well-respected detective agency of Messrs Slater in 1888. She had set up her own business in 1891 and preferred to work" rather than live on the pay her husband had.

The use of female agents by Scotland Yard was now well known, even if they were not always successful. Reports from Ireland in the Liverpool Echo in 1884 had told of the unfortunate failure of a recent British mission to infiltrate a group of Irish Republicans. Claiming that Dublin had just been visited by an English lady of extremely captivating manners, the paper reported, she appeared possessed of considerable means, and spoke patronisingly of dynamite and very warmly of the cause. As a result of a series of clever manoeuvres, however, it transpired that the lady was none other than a London detective or British spy, visiting the Irish capital professionally.

Not all the women employed as detectives were involved in government intrigues, often their work involved thefts or divorces cases, and some were used to infiltrate the most dangerous dens of criminal activity. Describing a local working-class woman who was often employed by Scotland Yard in 1876, one paper carried an eye-opening description of her: Small in stature, but possessing considerable muscular force and indomitable energy, this woman is equally dead to all sense of feminine delicacy, of nervousness or fear. She will assume the garb of a boy as readily as the dress of her own sex, and in either costume is ever ready to settle any dispute by an appeal to the art of self defence, which she has practised with disastrous effects on her adversaries, whether male or female.

It wasnt just in real life that saw Victorian women employed as private detectives, they were also popular fictional heroines. Over twenty years before Sherlock Holmes first appeared in A Study In Scarlet in 1887, James Redding Ware introduced us to Ms Gladden in 1864, his heroine in The Female Detective. G tells the reader little about herself, but drops tantalising clues on her secret double life. I know my trade is despised, she writes in the opening chapter,  my friends supposed I am a dressmaker, who goes out by the day or week  my enemies, what I have, are in a great measure convinced my life is a very questionable one.

In the months after G first adventured out, Revelations of a Lady Detective by William Stephen Hayward saw his heroine armed, and carrying a pistol to defend herself during her investigations. These exciting female lives, both in books and in the real world, are full of mysteries and murders.

It is our reliance on Dickens that has created a popular culture that as got Victorian women so wrong, and it takes brilliant, feminist historical dramas, like Enola Holmes, to show us a different world. One that is actually far more accurate than any adaptation of a Christmas Carol, to show you just how amazing Victorian women could be.

Fern Riddell is a cultural historian with an expertise on gender politics and suffrage in the Victorian and Edwardian eras. Enola Holmes is on Netflix now
Health workers in Kyrgyzstan have been forced to work long hours, often without promised extra pay and sometimes even with reduced pay, and subjected to a prisonlike quarantine regime during the COVID-19 pandemic, Amnesty International said in a new report on September 25.

Unofficial sources said 40 health workers died at the height of the outbreak from mid-March to late July, while official data from the Ministry of Health put the toll at 29 deaths, the new report said.

According to a tally by Johns Hopkins University, Kyrgyzstan has 45,757 confirmed coronavirus cases, with 1,063 COVID-19 deaths.

Kyrgyz doctors have worked selflessly, risking their lives every day looking after their patients, often in the absence of vital medical supplies," said Heather McGill, Amnesty Internationals researcher on Central Asia.

"It is appalling that in return they were denied their human rights, underpaid and forced to keep quiet about their problems for fear of retaliation,

said McGill.

The report -- titled Kyrgyzstan: Beyond The Call Of Duty: The Rights Of Health Workers In Kyrgyzstan -- says that since May, doctors have been working daily 12-hour shifts for two weeks in a row followed by 14 days of quarantine.

According to one doctor, quarantine conditions resembled being like in prison with reports of health workers often living 10 in a room and unable to see their families, the report said.

I am now working 24 hours a day. I cant leave because there are so many patients. I am working in a COVID department. I am the only doctor. I have an assistant who is a surgeon. I am the manager and I cant just leave at the end of my shift. I have to be there constantly. We manage to sleep three to four hours. I have been working like this for 30 days, one doctor told Amnesty International.

In the early phase of the outbreak, health workers were forced to work without adequate supplies of personal protection equipment (PPE). When they did receive such equipment, its quality was below standard and medical personnel lacked adequate training to use it, the report says.

Adding to their plight, Kyrgyz doctors and nurses, who are among the lowest paid professionals in the country, haven't been paid in a timely manner, while some have even had their salaries cut, the report revealed.

RFE/RL's Coronavirus Crisis Archive Features and analysis, videos, and infographics explore how the COVID-19 pandemic is affecting the countries in our region.

The main thing is that they pay us the salary they promised. I have to feed my family, one doctor told Amnesty, complaining that this promise was not met.

Because of low salaries, Kyrgyz medical personnel have migrated to other countries and to the private sector -- a trend that caused a chronic shortage of doctors in the state sector.

Amnesty says that, in addition to the great difficulties they encounter on a daily basis, Kyrgyz health workers also face repression. Doctors contacted by the rights group were often reluctant to speak out and those who accepted to be interviewed asked that their identities be kept anonymous for fear of reprisals from their superiors.

In the rare cases when health workers have publicly complained, they have suffered threats, dismissal, or humiliation from their employers.

The government of Kyrgyzstan should take steps to build greater resilience in the health system to better cope with the pandemic, and focus on protecting the rights of health workers. It must also ensure that everyone in the country can exercise their right to freedom of expression, and adopt measures to protect whistle-blowers, said McGill.

The report urges Kyrgyzstan to meet its human rights obligations under the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights and guarantee just and favorable conditions of work for all workers, including health workers.

Kyrgyzstan's Ministry of Health must ensure that all doctors are provided with PPE that complies with international standards and that they are properly trained in how to use it to avoid infection, the report concluded.
Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga hit the ground running on day one, meeting with ministers in charge of top policy goals from cutting red tape and digitizing the government to combating the new coronavirus.

Suga met with Taro Kono, who is in charge of regulatory reform, and Digital Transformation Minister Takuya Hirai on Thursday afternoon. The prime minister has called these two areas "two central themes" of his government.

Suga and Hirai discussed setting up a digital agency to take administrative paperwork online. In a news conference Wednesday, Suga promised to address delays in government digitization, which hampered the distribution of pandemic-linked payments.

"I was told to pick up the pace even more," Hirai told reporters after their meeting.

"We are being asked to move at a speed never before seen in Kasumigaseki," he said, referring to the nerve center of the Japanese government bureaucracy.

Taro Kono is charge of regulatory reform.

After the two meetings, Suga met with Health Minister Norihisa Tamura to discuss measures to contain COVID-19 and reverse the declining birthrate.

In the ruling Liberal Democratic Party's presidential race, Suga called for covering fertility treatment with the national insurance program. At the meeting, he asked Tamura to "promptly look into it."

The prime minister has also pledged to "put an end" to Japan's shortage of day care services, which has resulted in long waitlists for available spots.

On Japan's coronavirus response, Suga urged Tamura to expand capacity for PCR testing and consider cutting fees for private testing not covered by national insurance.

Suga has also been pushing for lower mobile rates since his days as chief cabinet secretary. "The top three mobile carriers have controlled 90% of the market for years, using airwaves that ultimately belong to the people," he said Wednesday.
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Millions of religious and ethnic minoritiesmen, women, and childrenherded on to trains, hauled away to concentration camps for reeducation, used for slave labor, their heads shaved and hair used for products sold to support the government. Women forcibly sterilized, babies forcibly aborted. All of this sounds familiar doesnt it?

It should, but according to a survey released last week, it likely will not. A significant number of U.S. adults under 40 lack basic knowledge of the Holocaust, which left 6 million Jews dead during World War II, as well as millions of members of other ethnic and social groups. This 50-state poll, commissioned by the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, found that 63 percent of U.S. adults between 18 and 39 years old did not know that 6 million Jews were killed during the Holocaust. Forty-eight percent could not name even one of the more than 40,000 concentration camps and ghettos operating in Europe in the 1930s and 40s.

In other words, for a growing number of Americans, the words Auschwitz and Dachau dont ring a bell, much less what happened behind their gates.

Does it really matter that a generation has emerged lacking basic history? After all, it actually makes for some pretty funny man-on-the-street interviews on Jimmy Kimmel Live.

Of course, its a bit more serious than that. Just in the past several months, for example, among the statues torn down and defaced by rioting mobs include statues of Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln, and the Massachusetts 54th Regiment statue in Boston. The 54th Regiment, by the way, was a Union Regiment in the Civil War made up of African Americans, many of whom gave their lives fighting for freedom and the end of slavery.

In other words, the ignorance of history means the inability to distinguish between heroes and villains. But its even worse than that. Earlier, when I was describing trains and camps and forced labor and torture and death, I wasnt talking about Germany or Poland from the 1940s. I was talking about Chinas treatment of Muslim Uighurs and other religious minorities right now.

Historical ignorance not only prevents us from learning from the evils of the past, we risk not even being able to recognize the evils of the past when they reemerge in our time. In Nigeria, for example, tens of thousands of Christians have been and, as recently as last week, are still being abducted, raped, and murdered by militant Islamists. The word that describes this is genocide, historically coined along with the phrase never again. Yet, in China and Nigeria genocide is happening again.

Last week, at a media-awareness event sponsored by the International Committee on Nigeria, former U.S. Representative Frank Wolf called on President Trump to create a special envoy on Nigeria, to coordinate with other nations and NGOs to bring pressure to bear on the Nigerian government to put an end to this hideous persecution of Christians by Boko Haram and Fulani militants. This is the sort of external pressure that can put an end to the suffering of Christians there.

Simply put, there is a connection between our national ignorance of history and the lack of a public outcry about the attempted genocides in Nigeria and China.

The refusal to learn history, at least in our case, is a form of arrogance that C.S. Lewis called chronological snobbery. This idea we moderns are morally superior to our forebears and have nothing to learn from the past can be clearly seen in the certainty so many young people have that they certainly wouldve been on the right side of history. Princeton Professor Robert George has noted that his students, particularly the more progressive ones, are nearly certain that they would never have supported slavery or remained silent about Adolf Hitler.

That, of course, is nothing but hubris. Hannah Arendt, at the trial of Adolf Eichmann in 1961, noted just how ordinarily human he was. And, at the Nuremberg trials after WWII, Nazi war criminals were quick to point out that many of their eugenics ideas came from American intellectuals, and that the country sitting in judgment over them practiced their own eugenics experiments, such as forced sterilizations. (That story is told in Edwin Blacks masterful book, The War Against the Weak: Eugenics and Americas Campaign to Create a Master Race.)

Just last week, a disturbing, horrifying accusation was leveled against a private ICE facility in Georgia, about an unusually high rate of hysterectomies performed on women without their understanding and consent. On its face, the story seems unbelievable. In truth, its only unbelievable if you ignore history.

And if history is ignored, we are doomed to repeat it.

Originally posted at breakpoint.org
New Delhi, Sep 26 : Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Sri Lankan counterpart Mahinda Rajapaksa held a virtual summit on Saturday in which they discussed bilateral relations and regional and international issues of mutual concern.

Modi congratulated Rajapaksa on his assumption of office as Prime Minister of Sri Lanka with a decisive mandate in the parliamentary elections in in August 2020. Rajapaksa expressed his gratitude for the good wishes and conveyed his keenness to work together closely with Modi, the Ministry of External Affairs said in a statement.

Rajapaksa commended the strong leadership shown by Modi in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic based on the vision of mutual support and assistance to the countries of the region. Both leaders agreed that the current situation presented a fresh opportunity to give added impetus to bilateral relations.

They expressed happiness that India and Sri Lanka have worked very closely in dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic. Modi reaffirmed India's continued commitment for all possible support to Sri Lanka for minimising the health and economic impact of the pandemic.
A collection preview is typically just that. A designer offers as much as he or she is willing about whats soon to hit the runway (or, more often this season, a digital platform), providing a sneak peak, creative insight, a sound bite or two. But sometimes, you have to spend a moment or two looking back.

Marnis Francesco Risso started last seasons journey down the rabbit hole by posing the question, Are we in a caged world and psychedelia is the thing that helps free us? That was last February in Milan, just as all normalcy was about to combust. A month prior, Rissos mens show was inspired by Edgar Allan Poes The Masque of the Red Death. The story tells of a prince who shuts himself off in his palace to avoid a horrible disease devastating his country. (In the end, the Red Death wins.)

Talk about being in tune with the culture. In a Zoom chat last week, Risso looked back and forward, to spring 2021s Marnifesto.



WWD: This call is about spring 2021. But I have to read back to you the premise of your fall 2020 collection  written in February: Are we in a caged world? Do you consider yourself clairvoyant?

Francesco Risso: Its funny that you are pulling that out. Sometimes the words just fly away. But during lockdown over all these months, sometimes those words just came back as something very powerful. This is one of the reasons why I wanted to compose this project that we are now calling Marnifesto, thats going to be [our presentation].

WWD: Marni-festo as in manifesto?

F.R.: Manifesto but Marni. Yes. I feel almost strange talking about a collection of clothes. This is because of exactly what youre saying, this caged world that we are living in. These months have been so much about this collective work. I mean, usually a collection is about collective work, but this time more than usual.

Somehow, the anarchy [has paved the way] for freedom and self-expression.This collection has been about the individual stories of all the people I work with, all their lives, their loves, their awakenings, my awakenings, the connections.

Story continues

I dont feel like I want to make a statement with this collection. Its not that during the lockdown I was thinking about [traditional inspirations], about the beautiful landscapes. Its the opposite. This has been almost like a social experiment where the dialogue between me and the people I work with is central to construct this collection.

And also, we pass the collection on to the people who will interpret the Marnifesto. Its a live show that will happen in several cities in the world: L.A., Detroit, Philadelphia, New York, London, Paris, Milan, Dakar [Senegal], Tokyo and Shanghai. The dialogue has passed from us to [the shows talent]. We sent the clothes to them, so thats why this is like a piece that is in evolution. And its in evolution because of our molding it, and the people who are wearing it. So its not about the I; its about the we.

WWD: So you sent clothes to people in all of those cities, and theyll wear them and there will be a live simulcast show going from one city to the other and showing each

F.R.: Its going to be a simultaneous show that will start at 3 p.m. and will achieve its highest point from 4 to 4:20, where we will have our show.

WWD: Whats the concept?

F.R.: What we worked on is to understand the peoples lives, their houses, where they live, their narratives, what they want to express. So, each person, each musician, each artist, will perform and play and express their urgencies in a sort of like geometry. Its going to be a collage.We are going to synchronize almost around 48 stories, and this is going to be our show.

WWD: It sounds quite elaborate.

F.R.: Its all happening through the peoples phones, through marni.com, through YouTube and digital platforms. Basically each person will be filming themselves, or through their friends, through their lovers, while they are waking up, going to work, doing their things. And what is going to be the common ground is that each will select a symbolic place in their hometown. So, a street. That will be our show. Each person is going to hit the street, and thats where everybody is going to be connected. Gathered between these stories theres going to be musicians singing, like Deem Spencer, Moses Sumney, Mykki Blanco. They are all part of our Marnifesto, walking and maybe singing to you on your phone.

WWD: Tell me about the casting.

F.R.: Well the casting started from the people who have done our shows many, many times, which is basically my family, my friends, the artists who have worked for Marni in the years. It naturally became a bigger casting, maybe bigger than our usual castings because we have 48 people. Usually our shows are a little smaller. So it happened naturally.

WWD: Who is producing this? This seems like quite the live endeavor.

F.R.: It is a big mission. Im collaborating with Tal Rosner [director of video] and John Kennedy [production head], who are players in this operation. Im very devoted to this collective work. Weve spent these months making this thing happen from sending the clothes, doing the fittings in the most remote places, from North Carolina to Detroit to strange places in Los Angeles to Tokyo, Dakar. So really literally even sending the clothes its been a mission.

WWD: Theres a stop in North Carolina?

F.R.: Actually Moses Sumney, hes in North Carolina. And he makes his own videos. So he is going to be filming himself.

WWD: Its one thing to fit clothes digitally on the fit model, how did you fit 48 people remotely?

F.R.: It was a big work. But most of the people are the people who we used to work with. And so we know what they fit, we know how they look. But thats what I mean, that this collective work is almost like a continuous evolution. The clothes have been started from a dialogue here and they continue to mold through the people who are wearing them. So things have changed while the fittings were happening. Things molded also through the personalities, and thats the beautiful thing about this Marnifesto.

WWD: Can you articulate the Marnifesto? Is that what it is, the idea of individuality?

F.R.: I would say that Marnifesto represents a celebration of what Marni is, a canvas that is multifaceted. And its the romanticism of a daily experience of what Marni is. I have been thinking a lot about this era, about how its expected for us to create innovation. But actually, to me the real twist is about fragility and the power of fragility. Somehow recognizing the fact that that patternmaker had put so many hours into that beautiful coat has been the key. [Its about] the hand that made a certain type of clothes in a certain moment. Thats the dialogue Im talking about. Its about recognizing, respect, love, the things that we actually stand for at Marni.

WWD: You talk about the dialogue with the people wearing the clothes, and ultimately the clothes become about their personalities. But you also talk about the connections of all of your team, the collective effort of them making the clothes. How do their stories come through?

F.R.: Their stories came through at the beginning of the lockdown, when we started a sort of collective poem. We started this epistolary work, a work of letters, that we shared between us, the team, the artists who worked for Marni in the past, some of the talent who will be in the show.We impressed the clothes with all these words. Our clothes are impressed and printed with all the words of the people who have worked on it.

WWD: So thats the unifying concept of the collection?

F.R.: Exactly.

WWD: Is it all in Italian? Is it in different languages?

F.R.: Different languages. Its a complete stream of consciousness. We have Portuguese Italian, Chinese, English. We have many languages.

WWD: It sounds fascinating.

F.R.: Its wonderful. Its still a work in progress, meaning that most of the poetry and words or feelings, notes, have been unified into a sort of collective poem that has gone onto this Marnifesto and onto the clothes. Some of the poetries are actually isolated onto special pieces that are this unique coat. So we have 20 to 25 coats, leather coats, that have been collaged from all the collections of Marni and then have been hand-painted.

WWD: Is the poetry a single work and everybody threw in their two cents, or did different people write their own individual poems?

F.R.: I actually started before the lockdown, asking each person to share with me something about what they were living or something about love, or anything they feel they wanted to write. So everything was extremely free. There was no control, there was no theme or anything. People sent images, people sent pieces of song. People sent their own poetry or their own songs. Even grocery lists or their journal from what happened at 10 a.m. or 12 or 6 p.m. That has been very emotional to me. And it made me want to build out the collection, continuing this dialogue. That was the strength of the collection, that fragility of that moment.

WWD: That fragility of that moment. You mentioned collaged leathers, which do not sound fragile. Describe the clothes.

F.R.: When Im talking about fragility, I mean that dialogue [that] reaffirms what is the Marni DNA. Sometimes we found ourselves making pieces and prototypes with staples and then giving that to our seamstress to remake it.

WWD: Staples as in a stapler?

F.R.: Yes, as a stapler. And when Im saying fragility this is what Im referring to. There is almost a primitiveness in the making of the object because what counts is that softness, the fact that it lies on the body naturally. It allows people to express themselves with sensuality, not in constriction. And so this is [the mood of] the clothes. And the words, they just go on top of it.

WWD: Are there three or four or five words that speak most poignantly to you about this moment right now and how youve expressed this moment in this collection?

F.R.: Two things that I keep thinking about  first of all, that this process has been about moving from I to we. And also about a sort of collective new humanism.

WWD: A collective new humanism?

F.R.: For me, this is the most important thing, that symphony that we are creating with these 48 people and the dialogue that was part of such big efforts here at Marni, with the team that worked with me.

WWD: Ive spoken with designers whove said that working remotely with their teams has brought everyone closer in some ways.

F.R.: There was a moment where myself and my colleagues, we found each other in a struggle, because our work is very sensorial. Its very much about the hand, and we didnt have that anymore. But that empathy allowed for each person to construct home-alone personal development. And when we finally could go back to work together, that was the real surprise. The real engagement came when finally we thought, OK, we stayed home and we learned more, and now we can be stronger together.

But I must say there is no joy in passing a pattern to a patternmaker through Zoom. There is no joy in feeling disconnected and having a call somehow dropping and not having that sensorial [experience]. So I feel even though technology can unite us, it can also make us further apart.

Thats why I am devoted to this Marnifesto, because of the importance of these 48 people who have committed to this project. They are not backstage, waiting to be called out and follow the scheme of the brand. This is a different operation thats about each ones expression. And there is no better time to do this. I mean, at least for me.

WWD: Are you all back at work together now?

F.R.: Yes. Its not many people. We have to go in cycles; its a continuous rotation. Of course, we try to have the safest way to work here. We get tested from time to time. Its a process that is new for all of us. But somehow, Im lucky to be here. I have lost people in this period.

WWD: Im so sorry.

F.R.: Its been a process. And Italy and Milan, there was a moment at the beginning of the lockdown at home where we thought, Lawrence [Steele, Rissos partner] and I, we thought oh, finally, we can finally stop a little bit and just enjoy a normal life. And then the oppression just comes, and you cant avoid noticing it. And the moment you restart and you touch clothes and you enjoy this mutual connection, this is when it becomes really emotional and you want to treasure it.

WWD: Its important for those of us who love this industry to telegraph the emotion of clothes. Its not just fabric cut into shapes that look pretty.

F.R.: Exactly. There is a system that needs to be protected, theres manufacturing, theres the people who believe in it, who fight, who work so much. And we cant make any innovation if we dont start respecting everything that we work on, basically.

WWD: For how long have you been planning your show? It sounds so complicated.

F.R.: A long time. I actually started to work on this project even before COVID-19. Marnifesto started basically before the last show. And of course, COVID-19 just made it more difficult.

WWD: More difficult but I would think also more personal, more poignant.

F.R.: More introspective, for sure.

WWD: I want to go back to your last seasons press notes: Are we in a caged world? How often have you thought of the question you raised back in February?

F.R.: Many, many, many, many times. I thought so much about that and even about what I said during the mens wear show, where I was basically raving about The Masque of the Red Death by Edgar Allan Poe, about the plague and about how that was like the last dance until the end. And so those words just kept hitting on my brain as something so urgent to contemplate.

WWD: Thats amazing. This has been so interesting. Before our Zoom times out, where are you right now? Are you at home?

F.R.: No, I am in my office in Milan.

WWD: You have quite a library behind you.

F.R.: This is what I call the black hole because I have so many amazing books but I never can find what I look for. Its like, I know that theres [what I want], but whenever I try to find it, its not there. And its fascinating because I find something else, which leads me to some other place.

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Louisville Metro Police Maj. Bridget Hallahan has been relieved of her command and will retire on October 1, officials said

The Kentucky police major who criticized Black Lives Matter activists and Antifa supporters in an email sent to her department has been relieved of her command and will retire in October.

Maj. Bridget Hallahan, who is white and commanded Louisville's Fifth Division, allegedly blasted BLM protesters and Antifa as 'punks' who will always be 'living in their parents' basement,' Walmart cashiers or 'washing our cars' in a message supposedly sent to colleagues in August.

She also allegedly claimed that police officers in the city and their families are also being 'doxed.'

The email was published by the Courier Journal Wednesday just hours before protesters erupted in anger over the decision by a Kentucky grand jury not to indict any of the three officers involved in the fatal shooting of Breonna Taylor with her murder.

Following the content of the alleged email being made public, Louisville Metro Police Department interim Chief Robert Schroeder said that Hallahan was relieved of her duties leading the Fifth Division and that she will retire on October 1.

'We are aware of these emails and we have been looking into them,' Schroeder said, according to Fox News.

'They were her personal opinions and do not represent the views of this department.'

Hallanhan's retirement comes just days after an email she allegedly wrote in August, criticizing BLM protesters and Antifa, was made public

The email was published hours before a grand jury decided not to indict any of the officers involved in Breonna Taylor's death for murder. Protesters are seen in Louisville Wednesday

In Hallahan's alleged email, she invited cops in her division to come to her office to 'vent together' and called on them not to 'validate' the protesters or to 'make them important'.

'I know it is hard to keep our thoughts and opinions to ourselves sometimes, especially when we, as a whole or as an individual, become the target of people in the public who criticize what we do without even knowing the facts,' Hallahan was said to have written in the August email.

Breonna Taylor was fatally shot in March by officers carrying out a search warrant

'These ANTIFA and BLM people, especially the ones who just jumped on the bandwagon 'yesterday' because they became 'woke' (insert eye roll here), do not deserve a second glance or thought from us. Our little pinky toenails have more character, morals, and ethics, than these punks have in their entire body,' the email continued.

'Do not stop to their level. Do not respond to them. If we do, we only validate what they did. Don't make them important, because they are not. They will be the ones washing our cars, cashing us out at the Walmart, or living in their parents' basement playing COD for their entire life.'

'COD' likely refers to the popular video game franchise, Call of Duty.

The message then made non-specific claims about the doxing of officers in the department.

Hallahan allegedly claimed it was happening 'merely because people just don't like being told what to do or what not to do by police'.

'There is currently no recourse we have for incidents involving the doxing of officers or their families,' the message reads.

'What we can do is speak up against them and put the truth out there. Through the PIO office and the LMPD FB page, we will come back at them on their own page to let them and everyone else know they are lying. We will print the facts. I will see to it.

'We have already taken care of one incident. I hope we never have to do it again. Just know I got your back,' she was said to have added.

Taylor's death has resulted in more than 100 days of protest in Louisville. BLM protesters are seen in the city's streets Wednesday night after the grand jury's decision

Protesters in Louisville are seen riding motorcycles on Wednesday night. Two police officers were shot shortly before the countywide curfew went into effect that night

Police are seen standing guard in downtown Louisville Wednesday following the grand jury's decision not to indict the officers for murder

Hallahan had commanded the division since last July and before that, oversaw the department's training division.

City officials called the message 'out of character' for her but said it was 'totally unacceptable'.

'I'm disappointed,' said Metro Councilman Brandon Coan. 'I think it's a totally unacceptable attitude of any police officer and extremely poor leadership from a major. I think she owes the community an apology and she'll have to deal with the consequences of her conduct.'

'I think it hurts the entire department,' added Councilman Bill Hollander.

'It's making constituents wonder what kind of people we're really employing and promoting to leadership positions. And that's very unfortunate. Our police officers have a very difficult job and they don't need this kind of inappropriate communication.'

Hallahan's alleged message emerged in the wake of the Courier Journal also revealing a supposed message sent by one of the officers involved in Taylor's fatal shooting, in which he defended his and his colleagues' actions.

Sgt. Jonathan Mattingly, who was wounded during the March shooting that claimed Taylor's life, allegedly emailed coworkers to accuse city officials of failing officers 'in epic proportions for their own gain and to cover their asses'.

Taylor, 26, was killed when Mattingly, Detective Myles Cosgrove and Officer Brett Hankison burst down the door to her Louisville home while executing a botched late-night raid and shot her six times.

The black EMT died after 32 rounds were fired into her home and neighboring addresses while the police were executing a search warrant for her home related to a drugs investigation over her ex-boyfriend, who had been arrested at a different address earlier that night.

Taylor's death sparked more than 100 days of protests in Louisville and around the country, which erupted with renewed vigor on Wednesday night following the grand jury's decision not to indict the involved officers on murder charges.

Hankison, however, was indicted on first-degree wanton endangerment charges related to shooting into the neighboring apartments during the incident. The Class D felony which carries a penalty of up to five years in prison.

During the Wednesday night protests in Louisville, 13 people were arrested on charges including property destruction, resisting arrest, failure to disperse and assault on a police officer.

Two police officers were also shot shortly before a countywide 9pm curfew went into effect that night.

The officers were responding to reports of gunfire near one of the protest marches and received non-life-threatening injuries.

Schroeder told reporters that a suspect was in custody and that one of the officers had needed surgery, CNN reported.

Protests also took place in New York City, Chicago, Seattle, Portland, Atlanta, Denver, Washington D.C. and many other major cities following the grand jury's decision.
A clutter-free bigger precinct with seating arrangement for visitors, and the most advanced light and sound show in Mumbai will be among the new highlights as the Maharashtra government is planning to revamp the British era Gateway of India. Tourists will be able to get all the facilities required at a tourist destination. They will also get an introduction to the financial capital of the country and Maharashtra as a state.

Despite being one of the most visited destinations in the country, the monument has no proper infrastructure for site management and also lacks facilities for the visitors. The new plan also envisages a proper crowd management system and security arrangements.

The state has roped in Abha Lambah, a conservation architect, who has prepared three proposals. It has also formed a committee of senior officials to execute the project.

Also Read: Renovations at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus station to be disabled friendly with separate arrival and departure

The design has been made to integrate all the requirements such as creating the right facilities and infrastructure and at the same time ensuring visual access to a visitor so that he or she can see the Gateway of India and the sea. A facility will also be developed to [ensure] the [visibility of] imposing [nearby] statue of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj, which is currently sort of lost in all the visual clutter, Lambah told HT.

It will give a kind of introduction to the city and to Maharashtra as a state. The plan has been incorporated from a security point of view and risk assessment. In all, it is an endeavour to look holistically to address concerns.

The iconic monument was built in the 20th century to commemorate the arrival of King George V and Queen Mary in India in 1911. It was later used as a symbolic ceremonial entrance to India for Viceroys and the new Governors of Bombay.

Also Read: Covid-19 vaccine trial begins at Mumbai hospital today: All you need to know

The jetties around the monument are used for boat rides to Elephanta Island, Alibaug and Mandwa. They are congested as 3 to 3.5 million passengers use them annually.

The state tourism department plans to hold the most modern sound and light shows based on different themes weekly at the monument. The themes will be related to the history of Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj, Marathas, freedom movement, and many more, said Valsa Nair Singh, principal secretary, state tourism department.

In February, state tourism minister Aaditya Thackeray and finance minister Ajit Pawar held a meeting on the development and conservation of 22 tourist sites, including the Gateway of India.

One of the most-busiest tourist destinations  Gateway of India  is divided among various government agencies and needed an integrated approach for its face-lift. For instance, the structure and 100-meter area around it come under the archaeological department. The jetty and boating area comes under Mumbai Port Trust, etc.

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Gratiaen Trust holds literary weekend and Childrens Day event for young readers View(s):

The Gratiaen Trust, in association with John Keells Foundation, is organising a series of events that will connect its award winning writers and their books with readers and lovers of literature.

The first in the series is a literary weekend being held this weekend in partnership with the Bentota Beach Hotel.The second celebrating Childrens Day is a fun day of readings and story-telling for young readers at the Sarasavi bookstore at the Galle Face One.

The Literary Weekend and the Childrens Day literary event were conceptualised as avenues to showcase Sri Lankan creative writing in English to readers.

As Neloufer De Mel, Chairperson of the Trust said, The Trust is always keen to bring Sri Lankan literature in English to readers. But we also hope that the interaction between writers and their audiences will inspire more Sri Lankan creative writing. We are particularly excited about our Childrens Day event. Each year the Gratiaen Prize attracts a significant number of childrens books and manuscripts.

Sybil Wettasinghe, who won the Prize in 1995, is a legend in this genre, and others such as Prashani Rambukwella have written books that have captured the imagination of many young readers and sold multiple copies. This year we were very proud to have among our short-listed writers, 16-year-old Praveen Jayamanna. We hope that both Sri Lankan literature in English for children and a younger readership will grow, resulting in wonderful childrens books that are widely read.

Both the literary weekend and the Childrens Day event are being held according to the social distancing norms currently in place. As a result, the number of participants at both events is restricted. However, edited videos of the writers sessions and of the panels from the Bentota event will be uploaded on the Gratiaen Trust Facebook page so that many others can also watch and listen to what the writers have to say.

The Childrens Day event will be held on October 1. Separate morning and afternoon sessions are being held to accommodate more children. The sessions will include dramatised readings as well as a workshop on the craft of story-telling. Both sessions are targeted at age groups 6-12 years.
On Sunday, Jennifer Dulos would have turned 52 years old.

Her birthday this year coincides with the eve of Yom Kippur, the day of atonement and the holiest of all days in the Jewish faith. We will celebrate Jennifers light, grace and laughter as we continue to mourn her loss, Carrie Luft said in a statement on behalf of family and friends of Dulos.

We also reinforce our support of the Connecticut State Police, New Canaan Police and other law enforcement organizations in their ongoing efforts to bring closure to Jennifers disappearance, the statement said.

Next week, from Oct. 1 to 4, Interval House Hartford will hold Purple with a Purpose with the Jennifer Farber Dulos Memorial Walk to End Domestic Violence. For details and to sign up for the walk, click here.

We are moved that Interval House is memorializing Jennifer in this effort to help others experiencing intimate partner violence. Jennifers case has received a great deal of attention, but the stories of most victims and survivors of partner violence are never told, the statement read.

Now more than ever, it is crucial to take action. Vital services, including family shelters and legal aid, have been reduced or shuttered during the pandemic and vulnerable people are at increased risk.

We encourage those who can do so to support Interval House, either by sponsoring a walking team or making a direct donation. Please keep Jennifer in your hearts and honor her strength and love by supporting Purple with a Purpose, the statement read.

Jennifer Dulos was 50 years old when she was reported missing on May 24, 2019. Her body has never been found.

Her estranged husband Fotis Dulos, 51, was charged in her disappearance and alleged death. His girlfriend, Michelle Troconis, 44, was arrested on June 1, 2019, and charged with tampering with or fabricating physical evidence and hindering prosecution, according to authorities.

On Jan. 30, 2020, Fotis Dulos died from an apparent suicide attempt.

Troconis has been released on $2.1 million bond, but under restrictions. She is accused of helping Fotis Dulos dispose of bloody items that contained the DNA of his estranged wife.

For more information, visit https://intervalhousect.org/walk/
New Delhi, Sep 26 : The government has not yet approved setting up of two special units -- human rights and vigilance - for the armed forces to look into any rights violations and corruption, even though defence ministry had given a go-ahead a year ago.

According high priority to the observance of human rights convention and values and ensuring zero-tolerance towards corruption, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh had approved the creation of these two units on August 21, 2019.

The nod was given based on a detailed internal study conducted by the Army Headquarters.

"Thereafter it was sent to Cabinet for approval. Now, it's been more than a year yet these two units have not seen the light of the day as the council of ministers has not given a green signal owing to financial implications," sources said.

Indian Army Spokesperson Colonel Aman Anand was unavailable for comment about the issue.

In the meantime, a human rights violation incident came to light which forced Army chief General Manoj Mukund Naravane to interfere and ensure action against errant officers.

On July 18, the Army claimed to have killed three militants in an operation in Amshipura village in Shopian district of Jammu and Kashmir. Later they turned about to be casual labourers and were allegedly killed in a staged encounter.

On September 18, the Army issued a statement that they found its troops "exceeded" their powers during an encounter in north Kashmir's Shopian district in which three men were killed in July this year and has initiated disciplinary proceedings.

The Defence Minister had approved a separate Vigilance Cell under Chief of Army Staff (COAS) with tri-services representation and an umbrella organisation under Vice Chief of Army Staff (VCOAS) for enhanced focus on human rights issues.

A vigilance cell that will look into complaints of corruption and impropriety will be directly under the COAS. An independent vigilance cell will be made functional under the COAS.

As per the proposal, additional director general (ADG), Vigilance, will be placed directly under the COAS for this purpose, who will be a major general rank officer. It will have three colonel-level officers -- one each from the Army, Air Force and Navy -- to have tri-service representation.

At present, the vigilance function for the COAS is through multiple agencies and there is no single-point interface, the Ministry of Defence said.

It has been decided to set up a special human rights section headed by ADG (major general rank officer) directly under the VCOAS. It will be the nodal point to examine any human rights violation reports.

To enhance transparency and ensure the best of investigative expertise is available to the section, a police officer of Senior superintendent/ superintendent rank will be taken on deputation.

(Sumit Kumar Singh can be reached at sumit.k@ians.in)
Sri Lanka to introduce AliPay to attract Chinese By Sunimalee Dias View(s): View(s):

Sri Lanka is looking at the possibility of introducing AliPay to the market in a bid to encourage more Chinese travellers to visit the country and ensure their payments will be made prior to arrival, a key government official said on Wednesday.

Ambassador-designate to China Palitha, Kohonna speaking at the discussion on post COVID Tourism from China at the Ceylon Chamber of Commerce said that there is a possibility of introducing AliPay. The event was organised by the Sri Lanka Association of Inbound Tour Operators (SLAITO).

AliPay is a mega payment app operated from China and is currently one of most popular mobile payment platforms available solely for Chinese nationals.

Responding to issues faced by travel agents and tour operators that Chinese travellers delay their payments, he noted that through this platform and under the COVID-19 concerns they could make use of this opportunity to request payments prior to arrival.

Mr. Kohonna said that Sri Lanka has to make a number of improvements in terms of our service levels, airport and airline.

He pointed out that the tourism industry needs to make sure Chinese tour guides will not be authorised to operate here and that in future the industry should be protected.

In addition he noted that they should not rip off the customer when they visit the country and in this sense he asserted Sri Lanka should retain its hospitality.

Fluency in Mandarin is essential to cater to the requirements of the Chinese traveller, he noted since most Chinese were comfortable in conversing in their own language and not in English.

Mr. Kohonna also called for improvements in SriLankan Airlines as well that operates as the national carrier to a number of destinations in China.

Recalling that about 169 million Chinese travel globally it was a disappointing state of affairs that Sri Lanka attracts only around 260, 000.

With about 60 per cent of Chinese between the ages of 18-45 years using social media it is imperative that the tourism industry engages them through this medium to visit Sri Lanka, he explained.

We know tourism and how to cater to tourists. So we should cater to Chinese in a manner that will be more proactive, he said.

Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority Chairperson Kimarli Fernando addressing the gathering said that Sri Lanka will be ready when the Chinese next travel to the country.

In this respect, she noted as the country has evolved into catering to a low-end category of tourists the industry needs to work on moving to a higher spending visitors.

Ms. Fernando said the authorities were having discussions on re-opening the airport and that a cabinet paper had been submitted to bring down smaller groups to the country with PCR tests.

However, healthcare officials insist that tourists need to remain in one place and this will be a big challenge since Chinese are apt to take to a round-trip tour of the country when they visit the destination.

Responding to queries from the industry she noted however, that Sri Lanka should not compare itself with the Maldives in trying to bring down visitors.

In the Maldives she noted each resort hotel was likely to be located on one island and travellers could access that place directly however, Sri Lanka is one big island.

SriLankan Airlines CEO Vipula Gunatillake said that they were awaiting the re-opening of the airport by the first quarter of next year to commence flights and has already drawn up a marketing plan.

He pointed out that Chinese travellers were keen users of technology like WeChat and through these platforms they could gain target their future customers.

Pre-COVID SriLankan had plans to double capacity from China and noted that they continued to operate flights to the market even now.

Sri Lanka has been seeing a boom in Chinese arrivals since 2013 and it is currently the second largest market next to India, Mr. Prabhath Harshakumar stated in delivering a presentation on the Chinese Market Overview.

He noted that since 2017 Chinese Destination Management Companies are operating in the country and through this Sri Lanka loses out on its foreign exchange.

Sri Lanka is perceived as a cheap and mass market destination, he said adding that the native Chinese are guiding the tourists visiting Sri Lanka thereby depriving the Sri Lankan guides of an opportunity.

Moreover, he noted that collection of payment for services provided to Chinese is a grave concern as Chinese tour operators drag the payment upto 190 days, he noted.

Sri Lanka participates in a number of travel fairs and had regular flights to and from China into a number of its destinations, Mr. Harshakumar said.
Britain will pledgea 30% increase in funding for the World Health Organization while urging reforms to the global health body

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson will pledge on Saturday a 30% increase in funding for the World Health Organization while urging reforms to the global health body and calling for a revival of cross-border cooperation to end "ugly rifts".

Delivering a recorded speech to the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), Johnson will say the COVID-19 pandemic has increased barriers to trade.

He will also present a five-point plan to improve the international response to future pandemics.

"After nine months of fighting COVID, the very notion of the international community looks tattered," he will say, according to advance extracts distributed by his office.

"Unless we unite and turn our fire against our common foe, we know that everyone will lose. Now is the time therefore ... for humanity to reach across borders and repair these ugly rifts."

His plan includes a global network of research hubs, more vaccine manufacturing capacity, and an agreement to reduce export tariffs imposed at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

He will commit an initial 71 million pounds to the global vaccine partnership known as COVAX to secure purchase rights on 27 million doses, and 500 million to a separate COVAX initiative to help poorer countries access a vaccine.

Johnson will also announce 340 million pounds ($433.23 million) in funding for the WHO spread across four years - a 30% increase on the previous four-year commitment - with around a third of the money dependent on reform to the organisation.

Britain, along with France and Germany, is expressing support for the WHO, albeit tied to reforms, when the body faces criticism over its pandemic response.

The United States gave a year's notice in July that it is leaving the U.N. agency - which was created to improve health globally - after Trump accused it of being too close to China and having mishandled the COVID-19 pandemic.

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Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 19:21:15|Editor: huaxia

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PHNOM PENH, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Cambodia reported one new imported case of COVID-19 on Saturday, raising the total number of infections in the kingdom to 276, the health ministry said in a press statement.

The latest case was detected on a 70-year-old Hungarian man, who arrived in the capital city Phnom Penh from France on Sept. 13 via a connecting flight in South Korea, the statement said.

It added that the man was first allowed to quarantine for 14 days at his rental home in the Siem Reap city after testing negative for COVID-19 upon his arrival.

However, his samples were tested again on Saturday by the Pasteur Institute of Cambodia, and the result showed that he was positive for COVID-19, the statement said, adding that currently the man is being treated in the Siem Reap provincial hospital.

Health Ministry secretary of state and spokeswoman Or Vandine said that after his arrival in Phnom Penh, the Hungarian man took taxi on Sept. 16 to travel to the Siem Reap city, where his wife lives. On the way, the driver stopped only once to tank up the car.

The spokeswoman said that during his stay in Siem Reap, the man had been at home with the only exception on Sept. 17 when he went out with his wife to buy paintings in a shop.

The couple had worn face masks during their trip, she said. "Currently, health authorities, in cooperation with the World Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, have been conducting contact tracing to find people who may have close contact with the man."

Cambodia has so far recorded a total of 276 confirmed COVID-19 cases with no deaths and 274 recoveries, according to Vandine. Enditem
New Delhi, Sep 26 : In another push for "Swadeshi", the Khadi and Village Industries Commission (KVIC) has roped in the Special Protection Group (SPG) -- a specialised security wing responsible for the protection of Prime Minister Narendra Modi -- as the biggest brand ambassador of Khadi.

The KVIC on Saturday inaugurated a new Khadi India Sales Outlet within the premises of the SPG Residential Complex at Dwarka in west Delhi. The outlet will benefit nearly 4,000 families of SPG officers and staff residing in two adjacent residential complexes in the area. The outlet was jointly inaugurated by KVIC Chairman Vinai Kumar Saxena and SPG Director Arun Sinha.

The decision to open the Khadi sales outlet was taken in order to provide pure and handmade "swadeshi" goods to the SPG members and their families, the KVIC said in a statement. "To further encourage these families to buy Khadi products, KVIC has decided to offer a 20 per cent discount on all products in this outlet." Spread over 125 acres, the SPG Complex in Dwarka is inhabited by nearly 15,000 people. Adjacent to it is another 26-acre residential complex housing over 800 families of SPG staff and hence a significant footfall of buyers is expected in the local shopping complex where the Khadi outlet is located. The SPG has provided KVIC the shop at a token rent of Re 1 per month.

The KVIC said that the development comes in the wake of the Prime Minister's call for "Atmanirbhar Bharat" and "Vocal for Local".

Earlier, Union Home Minister Amit Shah had ordered the paramilitary forces to sell only "Swadeshi" goods through its canteens. Recently, the KVIC also began supplying pure kacchi ghani mustard oil to the paramilitary forces following the first ever MoU with the ITBP for supply of provisions to the forces.

The KVIC will sell all Khadi fabrics and readymade garments as well as village industry products through the Dwarka outlet.

"Through the outlet, the KVIC will make available the best quality handmade and natural products to the SPG families," the KVIC Chairman said. "The SPG takes care of the security of the Prime Minister, who himself is the biggest brand ambassador of Khadi. And with this Khadi sales outlet, KVIC intends to take care of the families of the SPG officials and staff by providing them the best quality consumables."
1. Yes. Too many kids are staying home. They need a virtual learning option to keep up.

2. Yes. Teachers are out sick and subs cant handle the load. Online learning is needed.

3. No. Its too late in the school year to make a wholesale switch in teaching platforms.

4.No. Many parents arent in a position to stay home while their kids learn virtually.

5. Unsure. It may seem like a good idea from a health standpoint, but it has shortcomings.

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Metro Manila (CNN Philippines)  Unilever is set to transform the sustainability of global cleaning and laundry brands, including its portfolio in the Philippines.

The multinational consumer goods company announced it will replace 100 percent of the carbon derived from fossil fuels in its cleaning and laundry product formulations with renewable or recycled carbon by 2030.

This ambitious initiative is a core component of Unilever's 1 billion (P56.8 billion) 'Clean Future' investment, a ground-breaking innovation program designed by the company's Home Care division to fundamentally change the creation, manufacturing, and packaging of some of the world's best-known cleaning and laundry products.

"Clean Future is our vision to radically overhaul our business. As an industry, we must break our dependence on fossil fuels, including as a raw material for our products," said Peter ter Kulve, Unilever's President of Home Care.

Through the Clean Future program, Unilever will finance biotechnology research, carbon dioxide and waste utilization, and low carbon chemistry which are crucial in the transition away from fossil fuel derived chemicals.

The Clean Future investment will also be used to create biodegradable and water-efficient product formulations, to halve the use of virgin plastic by 2025, and support the development of brand communications.

The Clean Future initiative is a critical step towards Unilever's pledge of net zero emissions from its products by 2039, which the company announced in June 2020.

Central to Clean Future is Unilever's 'Carbon Rainbow', a novel approach to diversify the carbon used in its product formulations. Non-renewable fossil sources of carbon (identified in the Carbon Rainbow as black carbon) will be replaced using captured CO2 (purple carbon), plants and biological sources (green carbon), marine sources such as algae (blue carbon), and carbon recovered from waste materials (grey carbon).

Making Sustainable Living Accessible to Filipinos

As the 2030 Clean Future ambition takes shape, Unilever Philippines has joined the call of other companies for a global recovery plan that is grounded in bold climate action amid the unprecedented demand for cleaning products due to the pandemic.

"We listen to our consumers and continue to invest in strong partnerships and superior science; and our goal has always been to deliver products that are effective, affordable, and good for the planet," shared Unilever Philippines Chairman and CEO Benjie Yap.

Some of Unilever's products in the Philippines are now involved in making a sustainable living commonplace to Filipinos.

Surf operates a flagship sachet collection program across the country with Misis Walastik, while Domex backs a partnership with the Department of Education for safe toilets in schools with #TogetherWeAreUnstoppable. Breeze, Domex, Comfort, Sunlight, and Surf have also started to roll out new bottle packaging made of 100 percent recycled material.

"Our push for a Clean Future also drives the need for superior science in delivering effective and sustainable products. We do this to deliver products that give superior consumer experience and at the same time drives climate action as a consumer choice," said Marlo Mangilin, R&D PH Site Leader.

If you have an idea for an innovation, solution or opportunity to partner with Unilever to accelerate its Clean Future program, get in touch through the company's Sustainability Partnerships and Open Innovation Submission Portal.

More information about Unilever's Carbon Rainbow approach, Clean Future, and the projects that it is funding is available on the company's Clean Future website.
A meeting between Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Devendra Fadnavis and Shiv Sena parliamentarian Sanjay Raut at a five-star suburban hotel on Saturday sparked off speculation in the political circles over whether the two sides are trying to mend their relations amid the slugfest between the two in the past few months.

The meeting assumes significance, as the Sena-led state government is facing flak over the death case of actor Sushant Singh Rajput as well as amid the frosty relationship between the ruling party allies after right-wing trolls have targeted Aaditya Thackeray who is a Sena minister and chief minister Uddhav Thackerays son.

The BJP dismissed any political motive behind the meeting. Sanjay Raut wanted to meet Devendra Fadnavis to take his interview [for Sena mouthpiece] Saamana]. As Fadnavis wanted the interview to be published unedited, the two decided to meet once before the interview work on the modalities. The interview will take place after Fadnavis returns from Bihar, said BJP leader Pravin Darekar.

Raut, a strong critic of the BJP, did not react to the media reports on the meeting.

Political analysts have pointed out that there is more to the meeting than what meets the eye. No one will just meet to discuss an interview. This seems more of a message by the Shiv Sena to its allies Congress-NCP (Nationalist Congress Party) that it still shares good relationship with the BJP, said political commentator Hemant Desai.

Sena and BJP were ruling allies in state till 2019 and contested Assembly polls together. However, the two had differences over sharing the CMs post after winning the majority. Thackeray then forged an alliance with Congress and NCP to form a government under him. Sena and BJP have been involved in a bitter tussle since then.

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WWF/PA Wire Sir David Attenborough and Prince William

Prince William and Sir David Attenborough are bringing the movies to them!

Earlier this week, the 94-year-old naturalist and TV host joined the Duke of Cambridge, 38, at Kensington Palace, where the two enjoyed a private outdoor screening of Attenborough's upcoming film, David Attenborough: A Life On Our Planet.

In a nod to their bond, new photos show William sitting in a director's chair with Attenborough's name on it, while the naturalist opts for a chair marked with the royal's moniker.

The film, which is described as Attenborough's "most personal project to date," showcases "some of the most defining moments of his career as a naturalist and the devastating changes he has seen," according to a press release.

RELATED: Prince William Says Fatherhood Gives Him 'New Purpose' to Fight for the Natural World

GIAN EHRENZELLER/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock Prince William and David Attenborough

Like Attenborough  who has long documented the importance of the natural world  William has also created a documentary focused on conservation efforts as well.

Titled Prince William: A Planet For Us All, the documentary tracks his conservation battle and what he calls "my search for ways to protect the natural world." William spent part of the last two years making the film, which will air in the U.K. next month.

In a clip from the documentary, William is seen traveling across the world and talking with Attenborough, and opening up about how fatherhood has given him a "new sense of purpose."

Now Ive got George, Charlotte and now Louis in my life, your outlook does change. You want to hand over to the next generation, the wildlife, in a much better condition," he says in the clip.

Kate Middleton also makes an appearance in the documentary, telling Attenborough, "The children were very upset that we were coming to see you and they werent coming. They are massive fans."

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RELATED: Prince William Plays Journalist at World Economic Forum: 'Its Nice to Turn the Tables for Once'

GIAN EHRENZELLER/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock Prince William and Sir David Attenborough

Back in 2019, William took his concern for the environment and mental health to a global stage and saw what it is like to be on the other side of an interview when he spoke with Attenborough in Davos, Switzerland, for the World Economic Forum.

At the start of the interview, William said: Its a personal treat for me to be sitting asking you the questions. Its nice to turn the tables for once.

Attenborough, who also narrates the Netflix nature documentary Our Planet, spoke about the importance of protecting the environment.

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"We can wreck the natural world with ease. We can wreck the natural world without even noticing. But, in doing so, we wreck ourselves," he said. "I ask this room to care for the natural world."

Attenborough added, "There is more power in this room than any gathering anywhere. The people here need to do something about the natural world."
Suffolk District Attorney Rachael Rollins has expanded a database that lists Boston-area law enforcement personnel who have been accused of misconduct and may have questionable credibility.

As of Friday, the LEAD, or Law Enforcement Automatic Discovery, database includes the names of 136 law enforcement officers who work, have worked, or could work in Suffolk County. More than 115 names have been added in the last year, Rollins' office said in a statement.

Included on the list are nine current and former Boston police officers who were charged in federal court earlier this month in connection with an overtime scheme that netted the defendants more than $200,000, as well as several current and former Massachusetts State Police troopers who have faced charges in recent years.

The list currently includes 70 Massachusetts State Police troopers, 54 Boston police officers, five MBTA Transit Police officers, three Revere police officers, two Chelsea police officers, one special police officer and one IRS agent.

The overwhelming majority of law enforcement officers and employees in Suffolk County are dedicated and compassionate professionals who provide exemplary service to the communities they serve, Rollins said. The database is not voluminous, but the actions of the officers within LEAD are harmful, or potentially harmful to the community and the criminal legal system. When the credibility of law enforcement is in question, all participants in the system  and the public  should be aware of that. The people of Suffolk County deserve to know that the public officials they rely on for their safety are truly invested in it. Anything less is a betrayal of their trust and our obligation to serve.

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Every now and then, we come across heartwarming stories of individuals. One such heartwarming story is that of a Mumbai man who found a bag filled with cash but rather than keeping it for himself, he returned it to the rightful owner. This particular story touched so many chords and it featured on the official page of Humans of Bombay.

Humans of bombay FB

Story Of A Man Who Returned Cash

Other day, a man had gone to a public toilet and saw a bag lying there in one of the cubicles. He opened it and saw that there was money in it which was around Rs 15000. For a middle class man like him, that was a lot of money and he didn't even lie about that a thought crossed his mind that what if he kept the bag. However, after a few seconds, another thought crossed his mind - how the other person would feel if he would take his hard-earned money. He immediately rushed to the nearest police station and handed over the bag.

Bag returned to the rightful owner

Within hours of time, the police returned the bag to the rightful owner. When people heard this news they praised the act of kindness he has done and he also become a local hero among the people.

The man said, 'I became a hero! When people asked me why I decided to return it, I simply say, Kisi ka bura kar ke, mera acha kabhi nahi ho sakta."

This is not the first time someone returned money that didn't belong to them.



Here's the complete post.

The other day I went into a public toilet and saw a bag in one of the cubicles. I opened it and saw that there was... Posted by Humans of Bombay on Friday, September 18, 2020





Auto-Rickshaw Driver Returns Bag Full Of Cash & Jewellery To Couple Who Forgot It In His Vehicle

Recently, an honest auto-rickshaw driver went out his way to return a couple the bag they left it behind in his vehicle. The 60-year old driver, Vitthal Mapare, picked up the couple from Keshav Nagar and dropped them off at Hadapsar bus-stand. However, the couple forgot their bag which contained Rs 7 lakh worth jewellery and cash inside it. However, luck was in their favour as even during a time of financial crunch because of the COVID situation, Mapare didn't have any intentions to keep their valuable belongings. He said, "I moved ahead and went to BT Kawade road where I parked my vehicle to have tea. It is then that I noticed this bag lying on the back seat. I did not open it and took it to Ghorpadi chowky nearby and deposited it with sub-inspector Vijay Kadam there."


Unfolding chapters of a pioneering library in the hills By Udumbara Udugama The first free public library in the island, D.S. Senanayake Memorial Library in Kandy turns 100 in October View(s): View(s):

September is known as the reading month or literature month and making a worthy contribution to literacy in the Central Province is the century-old D.S. Senanayake Memorial Public Library in Kandy. In past years many programmes were arranged during the month, but with the COVID-19 pandemic activities have been curtailed. Still with their centenary celebration approaching in October, many events are being planned.

Opened in 1841 as the Central Town Library, originally a subscription library for the English educated local and foreign readers, in 1920 it was handed over to the Kandy Municipal Council as financial constraints crippled its functioning. It was opened on October 1, 1920, in a small building on Trincomalee Street as the first free public library in the island.

Librarian Mrs. H.M.P. Herath said the library was inaugurated as the D.S. Senanayake Memorial Public Library in 1962. The main library has seven sections- Lending, Reference, Childrens, Reading Rooms, Study Hall, Mobile and Binding Section. The Library has six branch libraries in Wattarentenne, Mahaweli Uyana, Mawilmada, Navayalatenne, Mahaiyawa and Nelumpokuna.

The main library has a large collection of books numbering around 300,000 in Sinhala, Tamil and English.The Reference section has rare books which are used mainly by students, scholars, historians and writers, Mrs Herath said.

Now fully automated using the KOHA Integrated Library System, the library has all the technology and on-line information facilities for the use of members and the general public, Mrs Herath said.

On June 13, 1983, the E.L. Senanayake Childrens Library was inaugurated and it has many activities such as the Kala Ulela and Art competition with the Kandurata FM Broadcasting Station and Story Hour. With schools now reopening, the Library is ready to get back into full gear.

The Kandy Municipal Council has pre-schools under its purview and the Librarian has submitted a request to the authorities to enrol children of six years of age as members. She said, This is to encourage children to get used to the reading habit from a young age as now children and young adults are less interested in reading due to their addiction to mobile phones and playing games.

The Mobile Library started on March 29, 2002 meanwhile provides a valuable service with some 22 service points with 9180 books and 2144 registered members. It serves elders homes, childrens homes, Prisons, Government and private sector office staff, villages and destitute people who are unable to come to the library. The membership fee is waived for those from the Deaf and Blind School, elders homes and childrens homes.

Library Assistant Vimukthi Herath is in charge of the Braille Section which was started on September 8, 2010.

There are many CDs and a unique method of a taped voice for the visually handicapped. The Braille books can be borrowed and read at leisure. This is the only active Braille library section in the Central Province.

The days newspapers can be accessed by anyone by producing their National IDs or any other authentic identification. There are also magazines, local and foreign in English and Tamil for reading.

The membership fee is very nominal. For adults in the Kandy Municipal Limits its a deposit of Rs.250 and an annual subscription of Rs.150, while children have a Rs.100 deposit and an annual subscription of Rs.50. Every year the library selects four students from low income families attending small schools in the city and gives them free membership, Mrs Herath added.

The library staff visits schools and home libraries and instructs them how they should maintain a library in a proper manner, according to a library system. Some homes even have a system of lending books to their neighbours and others, said the Librarian.

The library has had international assistance over the years. On February 2, 2007 a fire destroyed the Auditorium. The American Embassy which helped us to establish the American Corner in the library renovated the auditorium with a capacity to seat 700 people. They also started English and IT classes for students. There is also an Indian Corner, Mrs Herath said.

In 2001 under Japanese aid, the reference and lending sections were expanded with more facilities.

Celebrating 100 years in Library service, on October 19, there will be an all-night pirith ceremony and heel dana(breakfast) the next day for 25 Buddhist monks.
Undeterred by unconstitutional curfews, vehicular assaults, mass arrests, National Guard soldiers and fascist militiaabetted by militarized police departmentsthousands of protesters in major US cities continue to demonstrate against police murder and judicial injustice. The latest round of protests was touched off by the refusal of a Kentucky grand jury to bring charges against the police who murdered 26-year-old Breonna Taylor, an African American emergency medical technician, shot in her own Louisville apartment last March.

As of this writing, Democratic governors Kate Brown (Oregon) and Andy Beshear (Kentucky) as well as Republican Governor Mike Parson (Missouri) have declared states of emergency in response to ongoing or planned protests. In Illinois, Democratic Governor J. B. Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot have confirmed that hundreds of National Guard troops remain on standby to respond to any allegations of violent protests.

In New York City, five UH-60 Blackhawk helicopters with the Massachusetts National Guard, infamous for their role in ferrying US Army Rangers and special forces soldiers to battlefields around the globe, menaced thousands of protesters in the Bronx and Queens boroughs of New York City Friday evening, hovering and collecting intelligence on protesters.

In anticipation of growing protests in Boston, the Republican governor of Massachusetts, Charlie Baker, called up military helicopters as well as up 1,000 members of the Massachusetts National Guard on Thursday. Soldiers were seen deploying military equipment and erecting barriers on Friday night as over 1,000 protesters gathered in Gourdin Veterans Memorial Park in Roxbury. In addition to community members who have held ongoing protests throughout the summer, Fridays demonstrations were joined by hundreds of recently returned Boston University college students.

In Oregon, Governor Brown declared a state of emergency and ordered the deployment of hundreds of Oregon state troopers ahead of a planned rally on Saturday by the fascist Proud Boys. As part of the deployment, Brown waived any restrictions on police use of CS or tear gas. The far-right group was denied a permit by the city, but plans to mass hundreds of fascist sympathizers. The Proud Boys, along with the far-right Patriot Prayer group, have routinely engaged in drive-by attacks on left-wing protesters, shooting paintballs and spraying bear mace in an attempt to provoke violence.

In an interview with the Washington Post, Enrique Tarrio, the international chair of the Proud Boys, thanked Brown for providing security for his group, saying, I think its great given the fact that Portland has seen over 100 days of nonstop riots. Tarrio continued, It looks like the governor is finally getting the message. And it excites me that theyre allowing us to practice our freedom of speech unimpeded by the domestic terrorists were coming to protest.

Tarrio added that at the end of the day, we support our boys in blue and want to make this event as safe as possible. Just over a month ago in Kalamazoo, Michigan, the Proud Boys were allowed by police to violently attack protesters and at least one homeless resident.

In Los Angeles on Thursday, two protesters were injured in two separate vehicular assaults. In each case, the driver fled the scene before being briefly detained by police and released. No charges have been announced at the time of this writing. Less than a week ago, Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis proposed the Combating Violence, Disorder and Looting and Law Enforcement Protection Act, which included a prohibition on obstructing roadways. The proposed law states that a driver is NOT liable for injury or death caused if fleeing for safety from a mob.

Despite ongoing state violence and hit-and-run attacks, protests and marches have continued for the third night in a row, with more scheduled throughout the weekend following Wednesdays announcement by Kentuckys Republican Attorney General Daniel Cameron, who is African American, that no charges would be brought against two Louisville Metro Police Department (LMPD) cops, Myles Cosgrove and Jon Mattingly, responsible for the murder of Breonna Taylor on March 13.

The protests against the blatant hypocrisy and injustice perpetrated by the state against working class victims of police violence show no signs of receding, despite the best efforts of the Democratic and Republican parties to snuff them out through police repression. At the same time, the Democrats seek to obscure the class role of the police as armed state agents of the capitalist class and prevent a united movement of the working class by blaming police murders on white racism rather than on capitalism.

While it is true that the police recruit and foster racist, chauvinist and reactionary elements, their essential purpose is not to enforce a racial code, but to protect and defend the interests of capital against the working class, regardless of skin color. Recent examples of police violence against non-African Americans include Hannah Fizer, Jared Lakey, Andres Guardado and 13-year old Linden Cameron.

It is not a coincidence that neither Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden nor his running mate, former top cop" of California Kamala Harris, who made her career by jailing working class youth and expanding the use of state prisoners as virtual slave labor, have made note of any of these heinous assaults and killings of non-African Americans. That is because these cases cut across their racialist interpretation of police violence.

During Thursday night's protests in Louisville, over 100 protesters were menaced by local police and at least one agent provocateur after the police declared an unlawful assembly prior to the 9 p.m. curfew. Protesters sought sanctuary from riot cops and their fascist Oath Keeper militia allies at the First Unitarian Church, which is exempt from the curfew imposed by Democratic Mayor Greg Fischer.

Despite the fact that the protesters were granted refuge by the pastor, police maintained a perimeter around the group for over two hours. Sheri Wright, an independent journalist based in Louisville, in an interview with the Associated Press, commented on the forces arrayed against the multiracial and nonviolent group of young people.

She wrote: Im tired, Im in fear for my life, especially last night. Right now, were sitting here. Not only from LMPD (Louisville Metro Police Department) and all other law enforcement authorities that have been brought in, but there are lots of white supremacists. Wright noted the abuse from police she has personally suffered. Ive been shot at, as a member of the independent press, Ive been shot at by pepper balls.

While surrounded by the police, protesters noticed a white man who approached a section of the group and, according to protester Eliza Thompson, who spoke with the Washington Post, began badgering them with strange questions.

The newspaper reported: "Thompson said the man kept asking them, Why are you here? Where are we? Why are yall march? and also, Whos Breonna Taylor?'

The unidentified man then pulled out a pair of brass knuckles and attempted to start a fight with members of the group. I think he was trying to instigate something so the police could come into the sanctuary and start arresting people, Thompson said. They just need a reason to come in. If we fought, they would roll in heavy.

After protesters surrounded the man and drove him out of the parking lot, he continued to linger, well after curfew, and even spoke to another reporter. He claimed to be a nurse who lived nearby. Im friendly and on the left, the unidentified man said, before leaving shortly thereafter, walking through a line of riot police, unmolested.

On Friday at Jefferson Square Park in Louisville, the Taylor family and their attorney, Benjamin Crump, held their first press conference since the Kentucky grand jury decision was announced by Cameron.

Crump denounced the whitewash and demanded that the transcript of the secret grand jury proceedings be released. Breonna Taylor's entire family is heartbroken," he said, "and confused and bewildered, just like all of us, as to what did Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron present to the grand jury.

Crump then urged the family and supporters to place their hopes for justice in the hands of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, with Crump tweeting: I hope the FBI investigation finally gets justice for Bre and her family.

Tamika Palmer, Breonnas mother, offered a much more sober appraisal of the role of the police and the bourgeois courts, writing in a letter that was read aloud during the press conference: I was reassured Wednesday of why I have no faith in the legal system, in the police, in the law"

Speaking of Camerons decision not to bring charges against either Cosgrove or Mattingly, Palmer wrote, He [Cameron] helped me realize that it will always be us against themthat we are never safe when it comes to them.
P rotesters taking part in an anti-lockdown demonstration in London have been urged to abide by coronavirus restrictions and warned that violence will not be tolerated.

Saturdays protest in Trafalgar Square and Hyde Park comes a week after a separate event which saw more than a dozen officers injured when a small minority targeted police and more than 32 arrests were made.

The Metropolitan Police said it had been engaging with organisers throughout the week to remind them of their legal obligations and explaining the events could be in breach of coronavirus regulations.

While protests are exempt from the rule of six which is in force in England, organisers must submit a risk assessment and comply with social distancing.

Police said some organisers had done so but where this had not happened the Met will increase their engagement and encourage attendees to disperse.

They added that enforcement remains a last resort but will be undertaken if required.

Anti-vaccine protesters gather in Trafalgar Square

Commander Ade Adelekan, who is leading the Met operation, said while there is great frustration at the regulations, a large midday protest could put the health of protesters and their contacts at risk.

He said: I know there is great frustration to these regulations but they have been designed to keep everyone safe from what is a lethal virus.

Thousands gathered in Trafalgar Square last weekend / Getty Images

By flagrantly gathering in large numbers and ignoring social distancing, you are putting your health and the health of your loved ones at risk.

He added: Last weekend it was highly disappointing to see that a small minority of demonstrators targeted officers with violence. Some 15 officers were injured during this protest, with more than 32 arrests being made during the course of the day.

I will not tolerate a repeat of this behaviour this weekend and officers will respond quickly to any scenes of violence.

During last week's event, thousands descended on central London to protest against mass coronavirus vaccinations.

The event, organised by opponents of lockdown measures, saw coronavirus sceptics and so-called "anti-vaxxers" holding banners and chanting freedom Some branded the Covid-19 pandemic a "scam", while others read: "Save our rights. No mandated vaccines."

One protester held a banner calling for the Governments Sage scientific advisers to be sacked, as anothers declared Covid-19 a hoax.

Scuffles broke out between some demonstrators and police, with officers moving in on protesters as they congregated near Nelson's column.

The protesters formed human blockades opposite the officers to stop them from making arrests.

Disputes broke out between the two sides next to the National Gallery, before officers were pushed back by the loud crowd, who began cheering and chanting.
Section VI F of its policies reads:

The Nebraska Environmental Trust recognizes the importance of maintaining the property tax base to local communities. All government grantees are required to pay taxes or payments-in-lieu of taxes in accordance with applicable state or federal laws on real property acquired with Trust funding. All private grantees, for-profit or non-profit, are required to pay property taxes on real property acquired with Trust funding in full in perpetuity.

Grants issued for the purpose of acquiring title to real property to a grantee(s) which does not have the statutory ability to pay property taxes shall be accompanied by a one-time payment to the count(ies) affected. The payment shall be 15 (fifteen) times the amount of total property tax due in the last calendar year, less the levy amount which would have been due the grantee(s).

The policy assures that real property taxes will be paid to the extent allowed by law or that in lieu of tax, payments will be made. If the governor wants to remove real property tax exemptions to provide property tax relief, that is another discussion apart from the responsible actions of the Trust.
An Australian snorkeler was rushed to the hospital after being bitten on the head and neck by a saltwater crocodile while exploring the waters of a remote island off the coast of northern Queensland.

The 33-year-old man was attacked on Wednesday afternoon in deep waters 50 metres off Lizard Island, which is home to a large luxury resort. He is believed to have been bitten in Anchor Bay, offshore from the resort.

He was treated at the scene before being flown to Cairns Hospital, where he is being treated for non-life-threatening injuries, a spokesperson for the Department of Environment and Science said.

The man is in stable condition, but a spokesperson for the Royal Flying Doctor Service (RFDS), said that he is lucky to be alive.

He was doing remarkably well, given the circumstances, and was stable throughout the flight, Lee Poole, the RFDS spokesperson told the Brisbane Times.

Crocodile attacks in north Queensland are rare but obviously with an animal of that nature and size, they can be devastating and people have lost their lives," he added.

The island is known for being a crocodile hotspot and the attack is believed to be the 37th in the state since 1985, according to the same newspaper. Eleven of the attacks have been fatal.
Commodities are products whose price is set by the market. Crude oil, gold, and wheat can be traded over the internet. Rather than dealing with physical delivery, participants trade futures or CFDs. These derivatives allow you to profit from market trends.

In South Africa, traders can access global financial markets remotely. Platforms and apps like MetaTrader provide quick and affordable entry. Both types of derivatives can be profitable. But first, how do they compare?

CFDs vs. Futures

At their core, CFDs (Contracts for differences) and futures contracts are similar. Both derivatives can be traded on margin, and their value is tied to the underlying asset (e.g., crude oil). The key distinctions relate to financing and liquidity.

A CFD has no expiration date. It is simply an agreement between the broker and its client regarding the price of the underlying asset. The trader receives the difference between the price at the beginning of the contract and the price at the moment of liquidation. A futures contract, on the other hand, is an agreement to buy or sell the asset at a certain time and a certain price. Most traders of futures never intend to arrange physical delivery. Instead, they speculate on the pricing.

Choose the Best Broker

If you intend to profit from commodities, find a reliable intermediary. Today, leading brokerage firms offer different forms of access. Clients may use web platforms, desktop terminals and mobile apps. It means that trades are always a tap or a click away. This is true for popular systems like MT4 and MT5. Both are provided by Forextime for free.

Make sure the broker is a legit organization. Global brands have a clear advantage over home-grown competitors. They are chosen by millions, so customer feedback is not hard to find. A reputable company will also be monitored by an industry watchdog like CySEC.

Futures traders need access to diverse data. Moreover, costs must be low and support reliability. The same applies to CFDs. The requirements include:

* real-time quotes;

* tools for charting and screening;

* access to leverage;

* technical indicators.

Using Mobile Apps

Apps have most features of their desktop counterparts. However, their capabilities are usually more narrow. After all, mobile technologies are not yet ready to replace computer software.

However, this is not the goal. Instead, apps are seen as useful supplements. They allow users to continue trading even on the go. Traders need to keep track of the market, but few of us can sit in front of a laptop all day.

This is an important element of appeal. Mobile apps are attractive to investors who are always on the move. Unless trading is your full-time job, mobile access is indispensable.

Yet, do not expect to make a living by day trading via apps. This is hardly achievable. However, position trading is feasible. This means those who hold on to their assets for weeks or longer are most likely to benefit from apps. If you prefer hurried trades, you may feel more comfortable using a desktop terminal.

General Tips for Trading

To make the right decisions, do some homework. Analyse the current situation before the market opens. This way, when trading commences, you will know what to do. Keep monitoring the trends via your app. Mobile access allows you to do it on the go.

Apps have price charts and other graphic tools. These will help you spot the best entry and exit points for each trade. If you do not make up your mind before the market opens, you can do it later. A smartphone or tablet can provide all the necessary price data.

Today, commodity trading is more advanced than years ago. Those who favour technical analysis use special algorithms and sophisticated chart patterns. Adherents to fundamental analysis may also find the necessary data via apps. Mobile tools supply an unprecedented amount of research instantly. Thus, data collection is much quicker and more convenient than before.

Mobile Trading Technology

Today, mobile access is important for any business. Brokerage firms were quick to adopt portable systems. Traders of commodity futures may use popular apps like TradeStatio and Interactive Brokers. Google Play Store and App Store have dozens of dedicated products. Most of these apps have similar functionality.

In the past, commodity trading required calls to a landline phone. Today, it may be done through an app. Mobile access is a logical development, as the industry keeps up with the times. Most brokers with commodities in their offerings have mobile apps. Today, getting quotes and managing trades is easier than ever.
Governor Andrew Cuomo said he would establish a committee to review and distribute any coronavirus vaccine developed under the Trump administration. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

More than 1,000 New Yorkers have tested positive for Covid-19 in a single day on Friday.

It was the first time since 5 June that the state has reported a daily case number that high.

Positive cases in the state have been rising steadily over the last few weeks, according to ABC7. The rise may be attributed to the reopening of businesses and schools.

The state was seeing an average of approximately 660 people test positive each day. The state reported it had averaged 817 positive tests per day in the seven-day period that ended Friday.

On Saturday, Governor Andrew Cuomo announced there were 1,005 positive cases out of nearly 100,000 tests on the previous day.

Mr Cuomo called for continued practice of virus-mitigation guidelines.

"It's vital that New Yorkers continue to practice the basic behaviors that drive our ability to fight COVID-19 as we move into the fall and flu season," Mr Cuomo said. "Wearing masks, socially distancing and washing hands make a critical difference, as does the deliberate enforcement of state guidance by local governments."

According to Gareth Rhodes, a member of Mr Cuomo's Covid-19 Response Task Force, the overall per cent positive cases is actually far lower than in the early months of the pandemic.

He pointed out that the latest numbers were judged against 100,000 tests. In June, the numbers were compared to 60,000 tests.

Is there cause for concern? As long as COVID is here, yes, Mr Rhodes wrote on Twitter. "Key is ensuring these clusters dont spread into neighboring/other ZIPs.

He also said that the increase was lower in college-aged individuals, who made up only 16 per cent of all positive cases on Friday.

Certain neighborhoods in Brooklyn and Queens where private religious schools reopened for in-person schooling in early September have seen rising numbers.

New York health officials have warned that continued growth in Covid-19 cases in these neighborhoods could trigger severe restrictions on public gatherings.

Story continues

The rising numbers comes as Mr Cuomo announced he would form a committee to review and distribute any coronavirus vaccines developed under the Trump administration.

Im appointing a committee today that is going to come up with a vaccine distribution and implementation plan on how we will do it, Mr Cuomo said.

Mr Trump criticised the move.

I think you put the people of New York at great risk, and hes done that if you look at the nursing homes, 11,000 people died needlessly," Mr Trump said. "So when you look at that, its very sad.

Read more

Coronavirus: NHS Covid-19 app cannot process tens of thousands of test results

Man jailed for throwing large parties during coronavirus pandemic
Events are scheduled this afternoon in Mobile and Birmingham to in response to this weeks decision by a grand jury in Kentucky to not charge police officers in the shooting death of Breonna Taylor.

A block party to celebrate Taylors life is scheduled for 2 p.m. today at Lyons Park in Mobile.

The event also includes a protest, prayer vigil, public discussion, community grill-out, and musical performances, according to the organization Mobilize Mobile, which is promoting the event on its Facebook page.

In Birmingham, the group Alabama Rally Against Injustice is sponsoring a March for Breonna Taylor at Kelly Ingram Park at 2:30.

Police officers shot and killed Taylor during a drug raid in her apartment in March. Kentuckys attorney general said the officers were not charged with Taylors killing because they acted to protect themselves after Taylors boyfriend shot at them, wounding one officer.

Related: Breonna Taylors family wants video, hearing transcript released

Breonna Taylor decision: 2 Louisville police officers shot during protest
A North Korean flag flutters on top of a tower at North Korea's propaganda village of Gijungdong, as seen from Paju

By Hyunjoo Jin

SEOUL (Reuters) - South Korea urged North Korea on Saturday to further investigate the fatal shooting of a South Korean fisheries official and suggested it could be an unprecedented joint probe by the two sides, as public and political outrage over the killing grew.

The move came as a rare apology from North Korean leader Kim Jong Un appears to have failed to soothe criticism over the Moon government's handling over the accident.

After a National Security Council meeting last evening, South Korea's presidential office said it would call for a joint probe into the case with the North if needed, saying there were discrepancies in accounts of the accident from the two sides.

South Korea's military said on Thursday that the North's soldiers killed the man, doused his body in fuel and set it on fire near the sea border.

But the North Korean government said in a message on Friday that its soldiers shot the "illegal intruder" and denied burning his body.

The two Koreas have not conducted joint probes into previous accidents, including the death of the South Korean tourist who was shot at the North's mountain resort of Kumgang in 2008 and the Norths bombing of the Yeonpyeong Island which killed four South Koreans in 2010. The two Koreas have been technically at war since the 1950-53 Korean War ended in a truce.

"A chance of a joint probe is low. How on earth can we investigate the North Korean military?," said Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul.

The North has tightened border controls due to the Covid-19 outbreak, which further complicates the prospect of the joint investigation, he said.

"Given Kim quickly offered a rare apology, there is a possibility of an exchange of written questions and answers between two Koreas," he said.

'KOREAN LIVES MATTER'

In the message, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un was quoted as offering an apology for disappointing his counterpart Moon Jae-in and the South Korean people.

Story continues

The main opposition People Power Party said on Saturday Kims apology was not genuine, calling on the Moon government to send the case to the International Criminal Court and the U.S. Security Council.

The Moon administration faces an intense political backlash over how it responded to the incident, which coincided with a renewed push by the president for engagement with Pyongyang.

Critics questioned why the military did not attempt to save him despite allegedly spotting him six hours before he was shot dead.

"Peace is important in inter-Korean relations, but the most important thing is the lives of our people. Our people were shot by North Korea and why there is no such movement as Korean lives matter in South Korea?, said Thae Yong Ho, a former North Korean deputy ambassador to London who defected to the South, and became a lawmaker.

I am depressed. Why are we weak in front of North Korea," he said at a meeting of a parliamentary task force to investigate the case.

The maritime ministry official was reported missing while on duty on a fisheries boat near the island of Yeonpyeong close to South Korea's sea border.

South Korea's military said the man was apparently attempting to defect to the North, but his brother refuted the claims, saying that he must have had an accident. The North's message did not mention whether he was attempting to defect or not, saying the man said he was from South Korea.

(Reporting by Hyunjoo Jin; Editing by William Mallard, Sam Holmes and Raju Gopalakrishnan)
As part of its broader efforts to empower Emiratis, drive forward employee skilling in the government and achieve central goals of the Dubai Strategic Plan, the Dubai Government Human Resources Department (DGHR) has joined hands with IT giant Microsoft.

The DGHR's Riyada program aims to empower the Emirati workforce and equip them with technical, behavioral and professional competencies.

As per the deal, Microsoft will provide support under one of its pillars of its Tomoh Emiratization programme, which aligns well in delivering central aspects of Riyada, offering internship and secondment opportunities at Microsoft to UAE nationals.

The practical applications will include training and equipping Emiratis with worldwide on the job skills by shadowing professionals within Microsoft as well as offering them professional certification courses to accelerate their careers.

This partnership with Microsoft is focused on delivering world-class training to enhance the performance of UAE institutions, said Abdulla Ali Bin Zayed Al Falasi, Director General, DGHR, after signing a deal with Sayed Hashish, General Manager, Microsoft UAE, during a virtual online ceremony.

"We are confident that this agreement will serve to further elevate the Emirates as a global innovation center. The training and expertise provided to Emirati talent will enhance the skills of a future generation, cementing the UAEs status as a diverse digital hub of creativity and innovation," observed Al Falasi.

On the key DGHR partnership, Hashish said: "Our organization is committed to supporting the UAE future vision of a digital nation. The Tomoh programme will equip Emirati youth with globally recognized skills - a key pillar of the National Agenda and aligned to Vision 2021, thereby driving the nations digital transformation and global competitiveness."

The Tomoh programme has been carefully designed based on research looking at the current and future needs of the UAE job market.

It is aligned with the objective of deepening collaboration with Emiratisation initiatives and focused on three core pillars: Learn at Microsoft - that offers internship and secondment opportunities to UAE nationals and involves learning of globally recognized skills. Work at Microsoft - an opportunity for Emiratis to pursue careers at Microsoft, either through direct hiring of experienced Emirati professionals, or under the Microsoft Aspire Experience, designed for fresh graduates.

And Skill-Up Digitally - that enrolls students, job seekers and entrepreneurs into a powerful digital skilling programme, enabled by the Microsoft Cloud Society.

"This collaboration is a natural progression of Microsofts role in the UAE economic transformation journey in the quarter century we have been present in the Emirates. We seek to deepen our contribution to the Emirati community throughout the 21st century, by empowering the next generation of young talent," he noted.

Hamad Mattar, Business Programmes & Operations Lead, Microsoft Middle East & Africa, said: "In my eight years at Microsoft, I have benefitted from many possibilities and fulfilling career opportunities open to Emirati talent in a global technology company."

Tomoh is a real asset for us, and we have been impressed by the highly motivated, diverse and skilled Emiratis we have been able to work with through this initiative, he stated.-TradeArabia News Service
Authorities in Abuja have shut two of the four isolation centres that cater for coronavirus patients in the Nigerian capital.

COVID-19 isolation centres located inside Karu and Asokoro general hospitals are now closed following the reduction in the number of patients.

Only the treatment centres in Idu and THISDAY Dome will now hold COVID-19 patients in Abuja.

There has been a significant reduction in the number of daily infections across Nigerias 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).

For about a month, the West African nation has been recording daily figures below 300, an indication that the country is heading for a plateau in its epidemiological curve.

Health authorities, however, warn against relaxing, as low testing is still being witnessed across the country.

One critical issue is the number of tests being done, and yes the number of tests has actually declined, the director-general of Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), Chikwe Ihekweazu, said at a Presidential TaskForce on COVID-19 briefing.

There has also an increase in the number of patients being discharged across isolation facilities in the country.

Nigeria has recorded over 58,000 cases leading to the death of over 1,100 people. Meanwhile, about 49,000 of the infected total have fully recovered after receiving treatment.

Only about 8,000 infections are still active, data from NCDC shows.

With more than 5,000 infections and 77 deaths, Abuja is the most impacted city after Lagos. A little over 4,900 persons have recovered in FCT with 509 active cases as of Friday evening.

Closure

PREMIUM TIMES reporters who visited the Karu isolation centre on Friday saw that it was under lock and key. The same scenario was seen at the isolation centre in Asokoro.

Authorities said they decided to close down both centres, leaving the ones in Idu and THIS DAY Dome, since there are now fewer patients infected from the COVID-19 virus.

The acting secretary, Health and Human Services Secretariat, Federal Capital Territory Administration Mohammed Kawu, said the centres were not purposely built as COVID-19 treatment centres, hence the need to convert them to their initial purpose.

We officially converted both centres to conventional hospitals on August 24, 2020, because the number of COVID-19 patients is tremendously low, Kawu told PREMIUM TIMES on the phone.

The 500-bed capacity facility in Idu used to be an unoccupied railway school facility at the Abuja-Kaduna railway terminal at Idu. It was however converted to an isolation centre at the onset of COVID-19 in Nigeria.

THIS DAY Dome also has a 300-bed capacity, which is enough to cater for patients in the Nigerian capital. Both centres were intentionally built as isolation centres, the official said.
Shiromani Akali Dal on Saturday broke ties with the Bharatiya Janata Party, days after Harsimrat Kaur resigned from the Union cabinet over contentious farm bills.

Recently Centre introduced three agriculture bills, which directly affect farmers, labourers and local traders. The ordinances hit the argricultural sector. I spoke in Parliament that we were not taken into confidence over farm bills by the Centre," SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal.

He further said that in the last two months, SAD had been trying to attract Centres attention to the farmers issues and the impact of the Bills but their efforts went in vain. We were ignored and Harsimrat Kaur Badal immediately resigned as Union Minister in protest," the party president said.

Harsimrat resigned on September 17 soon after her husband and SAD president strongly opposed the bills in Lok Sabha, claiming these proposed legislations will destroy" the agriculture sector in Punjab, and announced that Harsimrat will quit the government in protest against these three bills.

Harsimrat Kaur Badal, who first became Union Minister for Food Processing in 2014 and retained the portfolio in the second term of the BJP-led NDA government starting 2019, said she kept on pleading with the government not to move ahead with these bills without taking farmers on board.

SAD voted against the three bills  Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, the Farmers Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, and the Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, which were passed by voice vote in Lok Sabha.

Large-scale protests by farmers in Punjab against the bills have put the regional party, which draws its support mainly from peasants, under pressure, culminating in the resignation of its only representative in the government.

BJP and SAD have been seen as natural allies which date back to the days of Jan Sangh, the precursor of the saffron party. Both parties have been contesting elections in alliance since 1997.

Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh termed the Akalis decision to quit the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) as nothing more than a desperate case of political compulsion for the Badals, who were effectively left with no other option after the BJPs public criticism of SAD over the farm bills.

The Akalis had no choice before them since the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had already made it clear that it held SAD responsible for failing to convince the farmers about the goodness of the farm Bills.

The SAD decision to quit the NDA was just the culmination of their saga of lies and deception, which eventually led to them being cornered on the issue of the Bills," said the Chief Minister, adding that Sukhbir Singh Badal was virtually caught between the devil and the deep sea after his initial unprincipled stand on the farm ordinances, followed by the sudden U-turn in the face of farmers protests.
Chinas insects and other invertebrates are spoilt for choice with the countrys array of deserts, rainforests, mountains and tropical coastlines. The winning photographs of the Wild China Biodiversity Photography Contest hosted by Wild China Film present the countrys sweeping lands and rare plants from unexpected perspectives. Here is a pick of the crop

Jan 21, 2022 06:20 PM
Chandigarh, Sep 26 : Ahead of the 2022 Assembly elections in Punjab, the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), one of the oldest allies of the BJP, quit the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) on Saturday after differences over the three 'controversial' farm sector Bills passed by the Parliament.

The decision to sever ties with the NDA was announced here by party President and MP Sukhbir Badal after the party's core committee meeting late on Saturday night.

Without taking any questions from the media, Sukhbir Badal said Akali Dal's alliance with the BJP ended, taking the interest of the farmers into consideration.
BAKU, Azerbaijan, September 26

By Jeila Aliyeva - Trend:

A large amount of vegetable oil was exported from the countries of the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) to Turkmenistan from January through July 2020, Trend reports citing statistics from the Eurasian economic Commission.

The total volume of olive oil exported to Turkmenistan is over 2 tons, palm oil  over 287 tons, sunflower oil  24,043 tons.

The total amount of exported olive oil is $6,480, palm oil - $258,714, sunflower oil  over $21 million.

Thus, olive and palm oil were exported to Turkmenistan from Russia, and sunflower oil from Russia and Kazakhstan.

Meanwhile, soybean oil was also exported to Turkmenistan. According to statistics, Belarus was the only exporter of soybean oil to Turkmenistan among the EAEU countries during this period.

Thus, Belarus exported over 117 tons of soybean oil to Turkmenistan for a total amount of $102,851.

Russia was the main exporter of vegetable oil from the countries of the Eurasian economic Union (EAEU) to Turkmenistan from January through May of this year.

The total volume of olive oil exported to Turkmenistan from January through May is over 2tons , palm oil  over 193 tons, sunflower oil- 16.7 million tons.

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Follow the author on Twitter: @JeilaAliyeva
State of Michigan health officials are in the process of creating the states COVID-19 distribution on the assumption that a vaccine is available in November.

Bob Swanson, Michigan Department of Health and Human Services immunization director, said its an all hands on deck effort to get the states vaccine distribution plan submitted to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Oct. 16. That plan will be modified and improved over time once a vaccine becomes available and distribution begins.

To date, over 120,000 Michiganders have been infected with COVID-19, with another 6,700 dying from the virus.

That federal deadline will be 30 days following the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) and U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) release of two documents, the federal governments strategy for distributing a COVID-19 vaccine and a COVID-19 vaccination playbook as part of Operation Warp Speed, which provides states with guidelines and a template to follow when drafting their own COVID-19 vaccine distribution plans.

Right now, an exact timeline for vaccine approval and distribution is unknown, but CDC Director Robert Redfield has said that the goal is to provide 300 million doses of a safe and effective vaccine by January 2021. The federal government invested more than $10 billion in six vaccine candidates through Operation Warp Speed, the Trump Administrations effort to accelerate the development, manufacturing, and distribution of vaccines and treatments to fight the coronavirus.

Are people to be left to die? Vaccine pleas fill UN summit

Swason said the state is using the information that was provided to MDHHS from the CDC as a planning assumption. He said the state is in decent shape with its distribution plan, despite so many unknowns, which include: the amount of vaccine that will be available, when a vaccine will be available for distribution, vaccine storage requirements, and the priority groups who will receive the first, initial doses, which will be limited, per CDC guidance.

That planning assumption is, and what the CDC has said, is that lets plan on having that vaccine available in November, he said. Whether its or not is irrelevant. Its what were going to use as a planning assumption so were ready by November. Nobody knows when the vaccine will be available yet, because thats all a part of the testing process and clinical trials that are going on.

Swanson said if initial doses of a COVID-19 vaccine become available in November or December, the state will be prepared. To support its vaccine distribution and preparedness efforts, the State of Michigan will soon be receiving $5,888,365 in federal CARES Act dollars to support those efforts.

He added that a lot of the states planning around distributing a COVID-19 vaccine is based on a foundation of vaccine distribution activities that have been built up and proven effective over the years, including the distribution of the H1N1 vaccine in 2009. He called that H1N1 distribution plan the backbone of what the state will use for the COVID-19 vaccine since there are some overlapping populations.

I have 100 percent confidence in the distribution process that we currently use, he said. Thats the same distribution plan we currently use for the vaccines for children program and the one we used during the H1N1 pandemic. If we continue with this system, I do have confidence that we will be able to get the vaccine where it needs to go. it has been proven now for many years.

Single-dose vaccine tested as US experts say no corners cut

The MDHHS-Division of Immunization is currently working with several partners to develop the distribution plan of COVID-19 vaccine. The initial, limited doses will be given to residents identified as being a part of critical populations.

According to the CDC, the distribution of initial vaccine doses will be based on CDC prioritization models. Priority groups may include: critical infrastructure workforce, people at increased risk for severe COVID-19 illness, people at increased risk of acquiring or transmitting COVID-19, and people with limited access to routine vaccination services.

Some of those COVID-19 vaccine priority groups will differ from that of influenza vaccine priority groups, which doesnt include health care workers. Within the states COVID-19 plan, officials are anticipating that specific group to be higher up on the priority list.

The states biggest challenge in distributing a COVID-19 vaccine will involve capacity and the speed at which the vaccine will be made available. The other big challenge will be vaccine storage requirements, which are unknown at this time.

Being able to get that amount of vaccine out to providers that can get it into peoples arms is really a big challenge, he said. Were trying to be as open as we can to all the different avenues and take advantage of the different partners that we have.

US outlines sweeping plan to provide free COVID-19 vaccines

If a states initial vaccine allocation is insufficient to vaccinate all those within the critical populations, the CDC is recommending that states identify smaller groups within these larger critical populations to determine who will receive the first available doses.

These groups may include: paid and unpaid people serving in healthcare settings who are unable to work from home, essential workers who cannot socially distance in the workplace, and people at increased risk for severe COVID-19 illness, including people 65 years of age or older.

As vaccine supply becomes more widely available, the state will engage with additional immunization partners and stakeholders, both public and private, to assure critical populations are protected once MDHHS officials know which groups will be prioritized and the initial limited vaccine supply is known and allocated to Michigan.

State health officials are planning to include local public health departments, federally qualified health centers, hospitals, pharmacies, tribal health centers, colleges and universities, long term care facilities, agencies for the aging, and current COVID-19 testing sites to serve as COVID-19 vaccination sites once MDHHS knows the priority groups and vaccine supply.

Health officials will be working with emergency preparedness partners statewide to assure previous plans that have been in place are ready. Right now, the MDHHS Division of Immunization is also preparing to enroll as many providers as necessary to receive, store, and vaccinate once the initial doses arrive.

At UN, China, Russia and US clash over pandemic responses

Currently, there are four COVID-19 vaccine candidates being produced in The United States that are going through a third and final clinical trial, just over eight months after COVID-19 was identified. The manufacturers include: AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Moderna/The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), and Janssen.

This is an unprecedented feat for the scientific community made possible by decades of progress in vaccine technology and a coordinated, strategic approach across government, industry and academia, said NIAID Director Anthony Fauci. It is likely that multiple COVID-19 vaccine regimens will be required to meet the global need.

On August 14, the CDC executed an existing contract option with McKesson Corporation to support COVID-19 vaccine distribution. The company also distributed the H1N1 vaccine during the H1N1 pandemic in 2009-2010.

If I rely primarily on that CDC McKesson contract, I do believe and trust that, said Swanson.

At this time, detailed planning is ongoing to ensure rapid distribution as soon as the FDA authorizes or approves a COVID-19 vaccine and CDC makes recommendations for who should receive initial doses. Once these decisions are made, McKesson will work under CDCs guidance, with logistical support from DoD, to ship COVID-19 vaccines to administration sites, including in Michigan.

Recognize differences between COVID-19 and flu as the season arrives

COVID-19 testing, treatment covered for 92% of Michiganders through 2020
The State Health Society of Bihar (SHSB) under the National Health Mission (NHM) has called for online applications from eligible and interested candidates for filling One Twenty Two (122) vacancies to the post of Hospital Manager, District Planning Coordinator and Senior DOTS plus TB-HIV Supervisor to be posted across the state of Bihar in India on a fulltime basis. The online registration process towards the same starts from September 25, 2020 onwards, and closes on October 31, 2020 by 6:00 pm as specified in the SHS Bihar notification.

CRITERIA DETAILS Name Of The Posts Hospital Manager, District Planning Coordinator and Senior DOTS plus TB-HIV Supervisor Organisation State Health Society of Bihar (SHSB)  NHM Educational Qualification MBA/PG Diploma in Hospital Management/Health Care Management/Health Administration/Rural Development/Rural Management; Graduation Experience Desirable Job Responsibilities null Skills Required null Job Location Bihar Salary Scale In the range of Rs. 19,000 to Rs. 25,000 per month Industry Health Application Start Date September 23, 2020 Application End Date October 31, 2020

SHS Bihar Recruitment 2020: Age Criteria And Fees

Candidates interested in applying for various posts through SHS Bihar Recruitment 2020 must not have exceeded 37 years of age (Gen/UR/EWS), 40 years (BC/MBC - Male/Female and UR/EWS Women) and 42 years (SC/ST - Male/Female) respectively as on September 1, 2020 as specified in the SHS Bihar notification.

Candidates must a pay a prescribed amount of Rs. 500 (UR/EWS/MBC/BC - Male) and Rs. 250 (SC/ST/PWD - male/female and UR/BC/MBC/EWS Women) respectively as application fee for various posts through SHS Bihar Recruitment 2020 through online mode as stated in the SHS Bihar notification given at the end of the article.

NHM Bihar Recruitment 2020 For 500 ASHA Trainer Posts, Apply Online From Today And Before October 31

SHS Bihar Recruitment 2020: SHSB Vacancy

Hospital Manager - 94

District Planning Coordinator - 15

Senior DOTS plus TB-HIV Supervisor - 13

Total - 122

SHS Bihar Recruitment 2020: Educational Eligibility

Desirous candidates applying for various posts through SHS Bihar Recruitment 2020 must possess an MBA/PG Diploma in Hospital Management/Health Care Management/Health Administration/Rural Development/Rural Management; Graduation from a recognized University/Institution with desirable work experience as mentioned in the SHS Bihar notification.

SHS Bihar Recruitment 2020: Selection And Pay

The selection of candidates to various posts through SHS Bihar Recruitment 2020 will be done through a Computer-Based Test (CBT) and Academic Qualification as notified in SHS Bihar notification.

Candidates selected to various posts through SHS Bihar Recruitment 2020 will be paid emolument in the range of Rs. 19,000 to Rs. 25,000 per month as mentioned in SHS Bihar notification.

CDAC Recruitment 2020 For 139 Project Engineers And Support Staff, Apply Online Before October 9

SHS Bihar Recruitment 2020: How To Apply

Candidates applying for various posts through SHS Bihar Recruitment 2020 must register online on the official SHS Bihar portal from September 23, 2020 onwards, and submit their applications on or before October 31, 2020 by 6:00 pm.

Download SHS Bihar Recruitment 2020 PDF Notification for Hospital Manager, DPO and Supervisor
Approximately 20% of students were expected to return to their designated campus across all Laredo schools this week. However, the totals ended up being much fewer than that.

LISD had a total of 981 students on Monday. As the week grew, more students arrived with the district ending the week with 1,040 kids on campus, or 4.7% of the total student population. The other 21,109 students that make up the 22,149 current enrollees are currently operating remotely.

UISD only saw 259 elementary, 58 middle and 52 high school students return to campus with similar numbers maintained throughout the week. This doesnt even make up 1% of the more than 40,000 students enrolled in the district.

Ultimately, the choice falls on the parents for whether they would like their child to return to school. In both districts, additional grade level students will be allowed to return to their campuses over the next following weeks.

A state mandate has stated that in the case where 50% of students return for on-campus instruction, the school district may implement a hybrid attendance schedule that would allow students to go to the campus two or three days a week and work remotely over the rest. However, each has a long way to go to get to that number.

According to the Texas Health and Human Services, as of Sunday, 3,445 positive student cases have been reported since the early August throughout public schools in Texas while 2,850 staff cases have been reported. It also noted that over 1.1 million students and 800,078 staff members were on campus during the first week of school.

At Sanchez-Ochoa Elementary School, Rosalba Martinez said that the initial transition has gone smoothly. With approximately 120 students expected to return on Monday, the campus saw 38 students come back. But 42 more joined on Tuesday and 36 on Wednesday giving the school 116 of its 120 total on the week as it, unlike the district, approached its local 20% goal hitting just over 19.3%.

Despite the lower-than-anticipated totals, Martinez said that students and teachers continued to follow all health protocols to ensure their safety. From wearing their face masks and shields, adhering to social distancing, sanitizing after eating and more, Martinez noted that students on campus felt like everything was as normal as usual. She saw them entering the school and their classes receptive of the changes made throughout the campus.

The students didnt seem phased, Martinez said. The community as a whole has prepared the children to come back.

With more students expected to return next week, she believes that the current level of protection works well. Students have their temperatures checked in when entering, arrival and dismissal are handled carefully, and classes are taught with their teachers a hand raise away.

But students are not the only ones who prepared for the return, as Martinez said that her staff prepared themselves to know where student congestion may be and how to address any issues had by students or their parents.

Roosevelt Elementary School Special Education Teacher Bertha De La Cruz echoed Martinezs thoughts about the reopening as she was looking forward to seeing her students return. Despite expecting more, only one student returned to class. She looks forward to seeing more of her students in the coming week.

To quell the concerns of parents, she emphasized that she and her three teacher aides would likely divide students up in the two rooms they have and follow the health protocols. Each student would have a shield in front of them and a handwashing station available in the room, De la Cruz said.

In De la Cruzs opinion, she does not feel there is a risk for students to return to classes as UISDs protocols are in place, but she does not blame parents for not sending students back to school. She added that to take care of her students was her calling, so the health and education of her students were the most important aspects to prepare for.

Im not saying its right or wrong to send the kids, but if you think its because they wont get taken care of, they are, De la Cruz said. Thats the most important thing, to help each other. We will get through it.

Similar to Sanchez-Ochoa, De la Cruz said that safety measures such as temperature checks, mandatory PPE and social distancing guidelines have been in place, and students have responded accordingly. When a student ran to hug his teacher, De la Cruz said that he stopped when he saw her with her mask and shield. And after a talk, he understood the situation and went through the day not wanting to go home.

I dont think children have fears, she said. They believes in what adults tell them, and if they tell them going to school will be OK, they will believe everything will be OK.

In the case of teaching both online and on-campus, the difficulty has increased, she said. Because she is teaching students in different locations, the attention is split, which is the biggest shortcoming of remote learning. By having her students in class, she can gauge the students needs and help them as necessary.

From home, guiding her students and finding their needs is more difficult, according to De la Cruz. She also said that ultimately she may have to teach her students parents to teach their children.

Both De La Cruz and Martinez agree that the best way to properly transition students back into the campus is through strong collaboration between parents, students, teachers and administrators. With the ongoing changes, patience will be needed by all to help get students back into classrooms in the best way possible.

With teachers who have always preferred traditional learning and are not keen on the new virtual platforms, De la Cruz said that it was difficult, but she learned to work virtually, how to manipulate the software and still made her classes more exciting for the students.

Martinez said that to better improve the return, she wants to continue to establish better communication with parents in order to get information to them much more efficiently. For her teachers, learning from the pandemic and optimizing trainings and documentation will develop better listening and comprehension skills in everyone.

We are learning from one another. Now we are becoming better listeners and visual learners, she added. We are picking up new ideas.

cocampo@lmtonline.com
Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) president and former deputy chief minister Sukhbir Singh Badal on Saturday urged all political parties and farmer unions to unite against the Central government.

Sukhbir was in Ludhiana to mobilise party workers for the October 1 protest march against farm bills, which would commence from all three holy Takhts in the state and culminate at Mohali. From here, a SAD delegation would go on to submit a memorandum to Punjab governor VPS Badnore for the President. A meeting was also held at the hall of Gurdwara Shri Manji Sahib, Alamgir, where social distancing norms were given a miss.

Also read: Snapping over two-decades-long ties, SAD pulls out of NDA over farm bills

Without naming any party, Sukhbir told the gathering that the parties should not get into petty politics. He also demanded the immediate promulgation of an Ordinance by the Punjab government to declare the whole of the state as an agriculture market (mandi) to ensure that the Centres new Acts did not apply in the state.

Also read| No longer the NDA envisioned by Vajpayee, Badal sahab: Harsimrat after SADs exit from alliance

Sukhbir also asked the chief minister to repeal amendments that the Congress government had made to the Agriculture Produce Marketing Committee (APMC) Act in 2017. These amendments are exactly the same as the black laws of the Centre against which farmers are protesting. We will fully support the state governments initiative to repeal these.
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Using a treatment without having any understanding of how it works is often thought of as unscientific, and suggesting that a placebo can help a sick patient has until now been viewed as unethical.

The New England Journal of Medicine just published an article about placebo (making you feel better) and nocebo (making you feel worse) effects, two of the most intriguing aspects of the supposedly scientific practice of medicine. These phenomena have long been seen as complicating pharmaceutical research. But today, we have a deeper understanding of how placebo and nocebo effects come about, down to the neural pathways. The fact that we understand the mechanisms better has made their use start to gain more legitimacy.

According to the article, placebo effects have been shown to be associated with the release of substances such as endogenous opioids, endocannabinoids, dopamine, oxytocin, and vasopressin. We even have some understanding of which substances mediate which type of response. For example, the placebo treatment of Parkinsons disease raise dopamine levels, and increased pain perception through verbal suggestion, a nocebo effect, has been shown to be mediated by the neuropeptide cholecystokinin.

In my own clinical experience (40 years last summer) and writing, the understanding of the impact of exactly how a treatment option is presented is a recurring observation and theme. See, for example, Negative Expectations, Patients are the Real Healers, Patient-Centered and Evidenced-Based Medicine  Can We Really Have Both? and Getting it Right.

As the NEJM article points out, many double-blind clinical trials of medications for pain and psychiatric disorders show similar effectiveness of placebo and active substance. Another interesting statistic is that up to 19 percent of adults and 26 percent of elderly patients report side effects from placebos. The article, in linking placebo and nocebo effects to patients relationship with and trust in their physicians, suggests that a patient who stops a medication may not or not only be doing this because of perceived side effects but perhaps deep down due to mistrust in their physician.

Similarly, patients with common colds who perceive their clinicians as empathetic report symptoms that are less severe and of shorter duration than those of patients who do not perceive their clinicians as empathetic; patients who perceive their clinicians as empathetic also have reduced levels of objective measures of inflammation such as interleukin-8 and neutrophil counts.

As we present patients with treatment options, we need to give more thought to the risk-benefit of the traditionally all-important notion of informed consent.

I, for instance, have tended to present statistics in a counterproductive way. Instead of saying 5 percent of people get a particular side effect, the article hints that maybe we should say that 95 percent dont get it while at the same time explaining the potential benefit of the treatment.

The article also suggests describing the severe or significant side effects of a medication can cause and then mentioning that other, milder side effects can occur, but because of the nocebo effect, the mere mention of these has been shown to increase the statistical probability that patients may have them. Giving the option of hearing all the non-critical reported side effects has been called contextualized informed consent and authorized concealment.

I cant help reflecting on how focused we are in medicine on the subject matter and how little we speak about the delivery of subject information. The business world seems to talk more about how to sell something than how to produce it. I think as physicians or scientists, we look down on that, thinking that a cup of coffee is a cup of coffee, so why are all these people devoting their lives to how to sell that cup of coffee?

So we need to get off our high horses and take a look at how we present information about what we sell because what we try and hope to sell may have a greater impact on our customers future health than which brand of coffee they choose to drink.

Hans Duvefelt is a family physician who blogs at A Country Doctor Writes: and the author of A Country Doctor Writes: CONDITIONS: Diseases and Other Life Circumstances.

Image credit: Shutterstock.com
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An excerpt from Dying with Ease: A Compassionate Guide for Making Wiser End-of-Life Decisions. Used by permission of the publisher Rowman & Littlefield. All rights reserved.

In 2017, there were 2,813,503 deaths in the United States. About a quarter of Americans die of heart disease, some 22 percent from cancer, and about one in twenty each for stroke and accidents. But there is one statistic that doesnt get included in CDC reports: the overall risk of dying, which is, of course, 100 percent. The most common cause of death is being alive. We all know this. We intellectually acknowledge that our lives are not permanent. Most people feel uncomfortable thinking, let alone talking, about their own death. When I have conversations with patients and families, people often say things like, I mean, I know everybody is going to die  often followed with a half-laugh and a but  What I heard when people said this was, Everybody is going to die  except me. We think of ourselves as exceptional. When I see a car veer all over the road, with the driver texting behind the wheel, I imagine that if I challenged the driver as to why they were doing it, I would be told that they are an excellent driver, good at multitasking, dont really do it that often, or some other excuse. These rationalizations would imply that they know the rules and the dangers of texting and driving but see them as irrelevant to their own behavior. Maybe you dont text and drive; maybe you rationalize speeding, eating too much, smoking, ignoring weather alerts, or cheating on your spouse or your income tax. We try to justify our behavior despite the known potential consequences; we seem to think that we will be the one who gets away with it. If we can deny these personal risks, even as we find ourselves halfway off the road, needing to buy larger pants, or called in for an audit, how much easier is it to avoid the personal reality of dying, an event we assume will be far in the future?

Harvard physician and end-of-life researcher Susan Block wrote, Arriving at an acceptance of ones mortality and a clear understanding of the limits and the possibilities of medicine is a process, not an epiphany. One advantage of recognizing the personal inevitability of your own death is that when the time comes, the idea will be neither novel nor shocking. You will have already done some of the inner screaming and weeping and will be just a bit more prepared to make the decisions and do the work required of you.

None of us remember the moment of our birth, but we all know we went through it; there is just no other way of getting here. It is almost unimaginable to think of ourselves as slimy wrinkled infants, but weve seen the pictures and have heard the stories from our parents. Since your birth likely seems unreal to you, take a moment, maybe the next time you step out of the bath or shower, and look at your navel in the mirror. It may be an innie or an outie, it may be pierced and sexy or hiding between abdominal folds, but it is there. It is a durable reminder that you were once a fetus being kept alive through that button in your belly. That wrinkled dimple is lasting proof that you joined with every other member of the human race in being born. And as such, it is also permanent evidence that you will die. Nobody gets out of here alive.

I know this very well. I am a doctor whose patients all died. I am a hospice physician; all my patients have been told they will die in the next several months, most even sooner. I didnt start out in medicine that way though. When I completed my training in hematology and medical oncology, full of scientific facts and wet-behind-the-ears enthusiasm, I was ready to take on complex diagnostic dilemmas and cure cancers. I knew that disease was the enemy and that my commission was to take the fight to that foe. It didnt take me long to realize, though, that rules of engagement were considerably less clear on the front lines than they were in the textbooks, journals, and conferences.

My patients, like all patients of all doctors, wanted me to be aggressive, to fight for them, and I did that with all the skill and armaments at my disposal. But there is something fundamentally flawed in this commonly held militaristic view of cancer treatment. The battlefield where the war is waged is not the cancer cell, the CT scan results, or the blood counts; rather it is the body of a human being, a body belonging to a person with fears, hopes, dreams, and nightmares. Whether or not the treatment works against the disease, the patient gets the side effects. Unfortunately, a few oncologists cope with the reality of disease, the adverse effects of treatment, and the deterioration and death they see every day by hating cancer more than they like people. Every doctor that treats patients with high-risk, life-threatening disease must find their own defense mechanisms to protect them from the suffering and dying they see so often. I suspect that this is part of what engendered the intensive care unit culture that was identified by the SUPPORT study and eloquently described by Dr. Zitter.

My coping strategy evolved in a different direction. I discovered a personal interest in those who walked into my office, lay on my examination tables, sat for interminable intravenous infusions, and went home knowing they would be throwing up a few hours later. It was the relationships with these people I encountered each day that got me up every morning and gave meaning to my practice. This was true (mostly) even for the times when the names of those I dreaded to see were on my schedule. I treated cancer aggressivelyafter all, thats what they came to me for, to fight their diseasebut, when they would allow, I also shared a bit of their lives and revealed a bit of mine. Births, marriages, grandchildren, graduations, job losses, crop production, and the county fair were frequent topics of discussion, along with the nausea and vomiting, hair loss, low blood counts, and results of the latest scans.

In Wooster, Ohio, where I practiced, a small not-for-profit hospice agency relied on local physicians, clergy, and many other volunteers to supplement the skills and dedication of their employed staff. It was through this work with Hospice of Wayne County, in making home visits when needed, that I learned the immeasurable value of presence. By continuing to care for my cancer patients until they died, I acquired insight into the equally essential virtue of nonabandonment. When I first attended a hospice and palliative medicine conference in the early 1990s, I realized that I had found my homea community of professionals of various disciplines who had found what I had discovered: that it is the people, not the diseases, that matter. It would be years before I would totally focus my medical practice on the care of the dying, but in the meantime, the lessons I learned from those at the end of their lives made me a better oncologist and maybe even a better person. As I mentioned above, the most important of those lessons is the realization that I also am mortal, and I too will die.

Jeff Spiess is an oncologist and palliative care physician. He is the author of Dying with Ease: A Compassionate Guide for Making Wiser End-of-Life Decisions.

Image credit: Shutterstock.com
AN initial report on the police use of tear gas against a group of protesters on Sunday has been completed.

The report, compiled by officers involved, is expected to be reviewed and recommendations made on if any protocols were breached by the officers engaged in the activities at the Queens Park Savannah in Port of Spain.
An agreement between Italy and the United States over space exploration can generate around 1 billion euros ($1.16 billion) for the Italian space industry, the CEO of aerospace and defence group Leonardo said.

Italy's Undersecretary to the Presidency, Riccardo Fraccaro, and NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine, agreed to cooperate on NASA's Artemis programme for the return to the moon and other space projects.

As part of its Artemis programme, NASA plans to send the first woman and next man to the lunar surface in 2024 and establish a sustainable presence there by the end of the decade.

Leonardo's Allesandro Profumo said Italy will make a significant contribution to the programme by providing the technology necessary for construction of moon landing systems and some of the habitable surface modules.

"The impact will be worth more than 1 billion euros, without considering all the positive effects for the supply chain and the related industries," Profumo said in a statement.

The Italian space industry currently employs 8,000 workers, of which 5,000 are at Leonardo, and generates an annual turnover of around 2 billion euros.
In order to meet rigorous and scientific safety standards, Pfizer should wait at least till late November before seeking FDA authorisation of its COVID-19 vaccine, more than 60 leading researchers and bioethicists has said.

A letter which was obtained by Bloomberg Law and verified by six signatories, was sent on September 25 following the reports that Pfizers COVID-19 vaccine clinical trial will yield conclusive results in October which puts the company ahead of Moderna and AstraZeneca in the race of the vaccine.

A spokeswoman from Pfizer confirmed the news that the company received the letter and is also working on a response.

COVID-19 Vaccine Frequently Asked Questions View more How does a vaccine work? A vaccine works by mimicking a natural infection. A vaccine not only induces immune response to protect people from any future COVID-19 infection, but also helps quickly build herd immunity to put an end to the pandemic. Herd immunity occurs when a sufficient percentage of a population becomes immune to a disease, making the spread of disease from person to person unlikely. The good news is that SARS-CoV-2 virus has been fairly stable, which increases the viability of a vaccine. How many types of vaccines are there? There are broadly four types of vaccine  one, a vaccine based on the whole virus (this could be either inactivated, or an attenuated [weakened] virus vaccine); two, a non-replicating viral vector vaccine that uses a benign virus as vector that carries the antigen of SARS-CoV; three, nucleic-acid vaccines that have genetic material like DNA and RNA of antigens like spike protein given to a person, helping human cells decode genetic material and produce the vaccine; and four, protein subunit vaccine wherein the recombinant proteins of SARS-COV-2 along with an adjuvant (booster) is given as a vaccine. What does it take to develop a vaccine of this kind? Vaccine development is a long, complex process. Unlike drugs that are given to people with a diseased, vaccines are given to healthy people and also vulnerable sections such as children, pregnant women and the elderly. So rigorous tests are compulsory. History says that the fastest time it took to develop a vaccine is five years, but it usually takes double or sometimes triple that time. View more Show

As reported by Bloomberg, Pfizer had signed a pledge earlier this month to not to cut corners on a vaccine.

The researchers in the letter said, "Under this standard, trial participants should be monitored for a minimum of two months following administration of the second dose. Given that many trial participants have not yet received their second dose, monitoring should occur through at least late November before an application for an Emergency Use Authorization should be considered by the FDA."

"If your vaccine is 75 percent effective, an estimated two thirds of the population would need to be vaccinated to achieve herd immunity. This vaccination rate would far exceed that of the annual influenza vaccine. To be successful, the public needs to have the utmost trust in the vaccine and the science behind it."

The scientists also added that a premature application would prolong the pandemic, with disastrous consequences. The reputation of Pfizer and the pharmaceutical industry would be severely damaged."
New Delhi: The National Educational Policy (NEP) 2020 focusses on capacity building of students, teachers, and institutions, Union Education Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank said, adding that the new policy would empower the people of the country.



Speaking at the 'National Education Policy - 2020: Bright Future of Education' webinar, the Union Minister expressed delight at the nation-wide approval of the new policy.

"The NEP will not only focus on building the capacity of students, but also of teachers and institutions. This is the first time the whole country is so excited about a policy. We have received over 15 lakh suggestions for the NEP and we are open to hearing more from the people of the country," Pokhriyal said.

"The government is seeking paragraph-wise suggestions for the NEP and countries around the world have shown interest in the implementation of the police in their countries as well," he added.

The new National Education Policy (NEP) approved by the Union Cabinet on July 29 is set to usher in a slew of changes with the vision of creating an education system that contributes directly to transforming the country, providing high-quality education to all, and making India a global knowledge superpower.

The policy aims to enable an individual to study one or more specialized areas of interest at a deeper level, and also develop character, scientific temper, creativity, the spirit of service, and 21st-century capabilities across a range of disciplines including sciences, social sciences, arts, and humanities, among others.
It's up to God to decide if Nancy Pelosi is a truly terrible person, but she's giving an excellent imitation of one here on Earth. Pelosi seemingly believes that 2020 has given her license to violate all political norms. In the past two months, Pelosi has called federal law officers "stormtroopers," violated the mask rule she insists upon for others, claimed that she was a victim of a hair salon "setup," and blamed California's fires, which are the product of natural heat waves and abysmal land management, on an "angry" Mother Nature. Her worst act ever, though, could be her siding with the mob with the lie that the Louisville police involved with Breonna Taylor's death are murderers.

We know now that the media and the authorities in Louisville lied about everything. This is the story they told: Breonna Taylor was a completely innocent, law-abiding E.R. technician. For no reason whatsoever, three policemen did a no-knock raid on her apartment. When they broke down the door, her valiant boyfriend tried to defend her by firing at these intruders. The police responded with a volley of bullets that killed the innocent Taylor as she lay in her bed.

The real story, which relies on independent civilian witness evidence, a long-running investigation into a narcotics ring, police body cameras, and forensic evidence, is different. Taylor's ex-boyfriend, who had a lengthy criminal record, was being investigated for running a drug and illegal weapons ring. Not only did Taylor frequently talk to him, but there was also reason to believe that he used her apartment to store the drugs and money.

The police had a search warrant to enter and search Taylor's apartment. When they arrived, they knocked and announced themselves so loudly that a neighbor  a disinterested, third-party witness  was able to testify under oath that it was not a no-knock raid. When no one answered at Taylor's door, the police broke it open.

Things happened quickly at that point. The first police officer through the door saw Taylor and a man, later identified as her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, standing at the end of the hall. Walker had a gun and was holding it with his arms extended.

Walker fired, hitting the police officer in the femoral artery, an injury that can be fatal. Faced with a deadly threat, the three officers ended up firing 32 rounds, six of which hit Taylor as she stood in the hallway, having watched her boyfriend try to kill a police officer. Interestingly, none of the 32 rounds hit Walker. It makes one wonder where he was.

On these facts, the grand jury and Kentucky's attorney general, Daniel Cameron, concluded that the police had acted appropriately by announcing their presence and firing only when they were under fire. Charging them with murder would be dishonest and immoral.

That didn't stop the mob, which went crazy in Louisville and other Democrat cities across America. In Louisville, Larynzo Johnson deliberately shot two police officers. Despite his manifest intent to assassinate public officials, he's facing only assault and wanton endangerment charges.

We've come to the point where we expect nothing but violence from the mob and cowardice from the prosecutors. However, if we are to have some semblance of a functional nation, we should expect our federal politicians to do their best to calm the American landscape, lest a civil war start and our major cities end up looking like Aleppo, Syria:

But looking out for the good of the nation isnt San Fran Nans style. Her style is that she will do anything, including destroying America if it means achieving political power. Thats why she went full demagogue, insisting that Taylor was murdered by the police:

Speaker Pelosi: "Justice was denied for Breonna Taylor and her family. Just think if it were your daughter, your sister, your cousin, your relative, your friend who was murdered by the police and the charging decision held no one accountable for her death." pic.twitter.com/ZpyC5tWBHN  The Hill (@thehill) September 24, 2020

Incidentally, there's nothing in the Democrats' George Floyd Justice in Policing Act that would have prevented what happened. The police entered under the color of law, loudly announced themselves, and responded to an attempt to kill them. Taylor, a young woman who was either a criminal or dumb enough to consort with criminals, paid the price. (The Act wouldn't have saved Floyd, either, because he was already dying from a massive fentanyl overdose when the police found him.)

If enough people vote for the Republican candidate in their House district, Nancy Pelosi will no longer be the most powerful woman in America. That's just one more reason for you to make sure to vote a straight Republican ticket at your polling place on November 3.

Image: Nancy Pelosi calls police murderers. Twitter screen grab.
Our country has lost one of the greatest jurists in our nations history. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the second woman ever to sit on the highest court in the land, was nothing short of a warrior for gender equality and workers rights.

The vacancy left behind by Justice Ginsburg demands careful and thoughtful deliberation, not an immediate power grab. But unfortunately, were seeing blatant hypocrisy. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said just hours after Justice Ginsburgs death was announced that the Senate will hold a vote on President Trumps replacement nominee, a complete reversal of his position on President Obamas election-year nomination in 2016.

As reported in the Omaha World-Herald article on Sept. 22, our own Senator Deb Fischer in a letter to a constituent regarding President Obamas nomination of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court in 2016 stated that It has not been the practice of the Senate to fill a Supreme Court vacancy that arises during an election year and further wrote that she agreed with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who cited the no-election-year-confirmation argument in blocking Garlands nomination.
Dr. Richard B. Kennedy cant help but shake his head when he sees people wearing masks with their noses uncovered.

Not only does it fly in the face of common sense, but its even more concerning in light of recent research showing COVID-19 has an easier time infecting people through the nasal passage than the mouth.

My first thought is, Oh come on, be smarter than that, said Kennedy, a Minnesota-based professor of medicine at Mayo Clinic.

His second thought is that they might as well not wear a mask at all. He estimates people are sacrificing abut 80 per cent of the masks protection by not covering their noses.

Clear evidence in understanding COVID-19, from how it infects people to why it causes health complications, is a constantly moving target. But it turns out many of the answers may have been right under our noses  literally.

While its well established that the primary way people get infected with COVID-19 is from inhaling aerosol droplets, Kennedy said there is emerging evidence its a lot easier for the virus to get a grip on our internal system when it enters through the nasal passage versus the mouth.

Thats because the nasal passage tissue is rich in cells that have a certain receptor the virus attaches to.

Theres more cells in the upper airway in the nasal passages that have high levels of receptor expression, Kennedy explained. So the virus is more likely to find the cell to infect, and its easier for the virus to infect cells sort of in the upper airway in the nasal passages than it is down in the lungs.

These cells are also present in the lungs, but at a lower concentration, which means the nasal passage seems to provides a more effective pathway for the virus to infect.

Robert Kozak, a clinical microbiologist at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in Toronto, said a useful analogy is to think of each cell as a house and the virus as a home invader.

If you think of a cell as a house, rather than just having one door, theyve now got your front door, a back door, a side door, a door in the garage  perhaps some of the lung cells might only have one door instead of a couple, Kozak said.

Not only does it seem the virus can more easily infect through the nose, but Kennedy also believes people are more likely to infect others this way.

My guess is based on the studies that if theres a higher concentration in the nose, that more of its going to come out through the nose, so a sneeze is probably got more virus than someone talking or singing or coughing, Kennedy said.

Its evident the nose and our sense of smell hold many answers to understanding COVID-19. Its now clear a loss of sense of smell, known as anosmia, is one of the most common symptoms of COVID-19. Valentina Parma, chair of the Global Consortium for Chemosensory Research, said her organizations data seems to show that anosmia is a better indicator of COVID-19 than fever.

If we consider a sample of 100 people with COVID-19, having a fever will show up in 50 per cent of cases, but smell loss in 70 per cent of cases, Parma said.

While loss of smell and taste are common as a cold and flu symptom, its usually attributed to nasal blockage from mucous buildup, Parma said. In contrast, people with COVID-19 typically report they have far less nasal blockage than they would with a cold, but an even more profound loss of sense of smell.

This is because its believed COVID-19 attacks the olfactory system, including the function of supporting cells in the olfactory epithelium, which is located right behind the bridge of the nose, Parma said. This could also explain why anosmia can linger for weeks or months after the virus subsides.

Usually when we cannot smell and my nose is stuffed, then I dont even get worried about it because I know when the cold is going to go away then my sense of smell will now function as usual, Parma said. But this doesnt happen with COVID-19.

She said the anosmia among COVID-19 patients typically lasts seven days to two weeks on average, but they are also seeing huge variability among patients, with some reporting lingering anosmia six months after infection.

Parma said she wants to emphasize the importance of anosmia as a positive indicator of COVID-19, especially as she expects symptoms such as runny nose and fever during fall and winter to become more common.

My message to the general public would be you need to start paying attention to your sense of smell, especially as were approaching flu season, Parma said.

For this reason, shes an advocate of objective tests to measure sense of smell, such as sniff tests. To that end, her organization has developed an online smell and sniff test which can be completed by people by using scents in their own home, such as banana or shampoo.

Rachel Herz, a neuroscientist at Brown University and an expert in the psychology of smell, is co-developing a different smell test with plans for it to be downloadable on mobile devices.

One interesting aspect of how COVID-19 affects this area is that while it affects the olfactory nerves, which are responsible for smell, it seems to have less impact on the trigeminal nerve, which is responsible for the physical sensation people experience from certain odours, for example burning from chili peppers or soothing from menthol.

This could be very useful in better understanding neurological diseases which also include anosmia, but no loss of trigeminal sensation loss, Herz said.

Theres potential for this to be used way beyond COVID for diseases like Parkinsons and Alzheimers, Herz said.

Another striking discovery in how COVID-19 affects the sense of smell is the presence of parosmia, which is when people experience a distorted sense of smell. Odours that were once present can suddenly become incredibly foul and Herz said more research is needed to understand this phenomenon and its connection to COVID-19.

In a sense, the pandemic has put much greater scrutiny on our sense of smell and the role it plays in overall health.

The silver lining for me and people that do research in the sense of smell has been that there has just basically been this global awareness of the importance of the sense of smell, where generally it has always been relegated to the least important of all of our senses, Herz said.

And what this is bringing to the fore is recognizing that it isnt just this trivial sensory system but, rather, it is involved with everything in our life experience.
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Hundreds of people participated in a caravan parade throughout major highways in the Cleveland area on Saturday in support of President Donald Trump.

Cars, trucks, SUVs and vans donning Trump flags drove through the interstates showing their support. Many also flew American flags.
Britain could be struck with 100 coronavirus deaths a day in three to four weeks, a top Government scientist has warned.

Professor Graham Medley, who sits on the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE), said the triple-figure toll was 'inevitable' as the virus remains dangerous to the community.

He arrived at the figure assuming a virus death rate of one per cent and 10,000 new infections being reported every day.

'Even if (the death rate) is 0.8 per cent, which I think would be a great success in terms of treatment, it still means that we are going to see deaths increase,' he told BBC Radio 4.

Britain recorded 24 deaths today in a preliminary count as the UK's fatality number continues to creep upwards. NHS England announced 20 deaths, while 3 were recorded in Wales and 1 in Northern Ireland. None were recorded in Scotland.

Health officials have yet to confirm the final daily figure, which takes into account data from every setting across the UK. The early count for England only includes laboratory-confirmed victims in NHS-run hospitals.

At the height of the pandemic between April 2 and 18 Britain was recording in excess of 800 deaths a day, while recording around 4,000 positive cases a day.

But testing capacity was far behind demand, meaning the vast majority of cases were missed. The Covid Symptom Study app, which has 4.2million contributors, has suggested that at this time there were as many as 100,000 new infections a day - pointing to a death rate of 0.8 per cent.

The World Health Organisation says the death rate from coronavirus stands between 0.5 and one per cent, based on available data.

Professor Graham Medley, member of SAGE, said the UK could face the triple-figure deaths in two to three weeks as the virus' death rate stands at around one per cent

IS BRITAIN'S COVID-19 OUTBREAK TAKING OFF AGAIN? Some top scientists had insisted there was not a true rise in cases because the test positivity rate - how many cases are found for every swab completed - had not changed wildly. However, this appears to no longer be the case. NHS Test and Trace data shows almost 3.3 per cent of people tested get a positive result compared to lows of 1.1 in July Britain's coronavirus outbreak appears to be speeding up again, according to official data. Friday saw another 6,874 Covid-19 cases recorded, meaning the seven-day rolling average is 54 per cent higher than it was a week ago. MailOnline analysis shows this is the sixth consecutive day the average compared to the week before has risen. Before last Saturday, the weekly coronavirus growth rate had dropped every day for an entire week. It had plummeted from the high of 84 per cent on September 12 to 20 per cent on September 19. It comes as chief scientific advisors to the Government, Professor Chris Whitty and Sir Patrick Vallance, terrified the nation by their gloomy prediction that cases may reach 50,000 per day by mid-October, if nothing is done. They claimed infections were doubling every week, in line with growing outbreaks in Spain and France. But scientists shot down the claims, warning it was based on old data that relied on just a few hundred positive cases. Even Boris Johnson distanced himself from the claims, saying the outbreak could be doubling up to every 20 days. Other figures from NHS Test and Trace also suggest cases had dwindled last week. But the newest statistics - released yesterday - only go up until September 16, meaning any spike in the past week has yet to be confirmed in another government dataset. Advertisement

Speaking on the Today programme, Professor Medley, from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said: 'The treatments have improved, the way the virus is transmitting is going to be different, but nonetheless it is a dangerous virus and inevitably it will lead to some deaths.

'Now whether it is as many - in February and March we were essentially assuming one per cent of infections would lead to deaths. Now even if that is 0.8 per cent, which I think would be a great success in terms of treatment, it still means that we are going to see deaths increase.

'At a level of 10,000 (cases) we are seeing now, means that in three or four weeks we are going to see 100 deaths a day.

'In order to stop that process increasing again, then we need to make sure that that transmission comes down now because that doubling time will carry on. The things that we do now will not stop 100 people dying a day but they will stop that progressing much higher.'

Britain's outbreak was initially concentrated in 20 to 40-year-olds, according to official data, but has since spread to older sections of the population that are more at risk from the disease.

Deaths in the UK hit 34 yesterday, a rise of 73 per cent on the weekly rolling average. The number of daily cases identified hit a record high yesterday of 6,874.

Figures reveal children and those aged below 45 are at far lower risk of dying from coronavirus than those aged over 75.

Office for National Statistics data reveals only four Covid-19 deaths were recorded in children aged one to 14 years old in England and Wales, or less than 0.01 per cent of the total. And 574 have been recorded in those aged 15 to 44, or 0.96 per cent of the total.

In comparison, 39,058 people aged 75 and over have died from the virus, or 65 per cent of the total.

The difference led a scientific paper published in Nature in July to conclude that those aged 80 and over are more than a hundred times more likely to die from the virus than patients aged 40 and below.

The World Health Organisation calculated the coronavirus death rate could be as low as 0.5 per cent after comparing the number of deaths and the number infected.

This gave the Infection Fatality Ratio, which was calculated using data from surveys done on a representative random sample of populations in different countries.

It comes after the Daily Mail revealed as many as 75,000 people could die due to the coronavirus crisis over the next five years, but only 41,000 of these would be due to the virus.

The figures were presented in startling research presented to SAGE which warned that the cure for coronavirus may be worse than the pill itself.

It said that 16,000 died from the disease in March and April alone, and a further 26,000 are expected to lose their lives in a year if people stay away from A&E and the problems in social care persist.

King's College London (KCL) scientists behind the COVID Symptom Tracker mobile app estimate there were at least 16,310 daily cases of the disease in the last week, more than double the 7,536 estimated last week

And an additional 31,900 could die over the next five years as a result of missed cancer diagnoses, cancelled operations and the health impacts of a recession.

The toll of deaths directly linked to the virus last night stood at 41,936.

The estimates, drawn up by civil servants at the Department of Health, the Office for National Statistics and the Home Office, were presented to Sage at a meeting on July 15. The documents stressed that had nothing been done to stop the spread of the virus in March, 400,000 people could have died of Covid.
Pune: The Chief Executive Officer of Pune-based Serum Institute of India (SII) Adar Poonawalla, on Saturday (September 26, 2020) asked the Centre government whether they have Rs 80,000 crores available over the next one year for the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines across India.

The 39-year-old who reportedly runs the world's largest vaccine manufacturer company and is also producing the coronavirus vaccine developed by the Oxford University, took to Twitter and said, "Quick question; will the government of India have 80,000 crores available, over the next one year? Because that's what Ministry of Health needs, to buy and distribute the vaccine to everyone in India. This is the next concerning the challenge we need to tackle."

Poonawalla also tagged the official Twitter accounts of the Union Health Ministry and the Prime Minister's Office.

In his next tweet, he wrote, "I ask this question because we need to plan and guide, vaccine manufacturers both in India and overseas to service the needs of our country in terms of procurement and distribution."

I ask this question, because we need to plan and guide, vaccine manufacturers both in India and overseas to service the needs of our country in terms of procurement and distribution.  Adar Poonawalla (@adarpoonawalla) September 26, 2020

Recently in an interview, he had expressed about the availability of the virus and said, "Realistically, for the whole world, for everyone on this planet, or at least 90% to get it, its going to be at least 2024."

Earlier on September 16, the SII got the nod from the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) to restart its phase two and three clinical trials for the COVID-19 vaccine.

According to ANI news agency, the SII had sought permission from the DGCI to restart the re-enrollment procedure for COVID-19 vaccine which is being developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University following the Data Safety Monitoring Board (DSMB) recommendations.

Live TV

On September 8, AstraZeneca had announced that it voluntarily paused the phase 3 clinical human trials of its vaccine candidate Covishield after one of the volunteers got ill.

But four days later, the AstraZeneca Oxford coronavirus vaccine trials were resumed on September 12 after it was said that "it's safe to do so".

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his address at the 75th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) session expressed, "As the largest vaccine producing country of the world, I want to give one more assurance to the global community today, Indias vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis."

PM Modi stated, "We are moving ahead with phase 3 clinical trials in India and in our neighbourhood. India will also help all the countries in enhancing their cold chain and storage capacities for the delivery of vaccines."

Earlier in the day, the Ministry of Health's data showed that the coronavirus cases across India have crossed the 59-lakh mark with more than 85,000 cases reported in the last 24 hours. The total coronavirus cases in the country stand at 59,03,933 that include 9,60,969 active cases, 48,49,585 recoveries and 93,979 COVID-19 related fatalities.
I can't help too much with stops across the Plains States. Others will have to chime in on that.

Here are the minimum night stays at the national parks in Utah. Anything less than this is just a check the box and take a picture by the sign visit.

Moab, Utah (base for both Arches and Canyonlands) 3 nights

Torrey, Utah (base for Capitol Reef) 1 to 2 nights. I prefer two

Bryce Canyon 1 night

Springdale, Utah (base for Zion) 2 nights

Other points of interest in the region that could possibly be incorporated.:

South Rim Grand Canyon 1 night

Page Arizona (Antelope Canyon/Horseshoe Bend/Lake Powell) 1 to 2 nights

Monument Valley - 1 night

Mesa Verde NP - 2 nights

Rocky Mountain NP. 2 nights

You may want to get a good US Atlas or large US road map. Find these destinations to see how they relate to each other. I'm pretty sure that a route would become pretty obvious from Ohio and back.

I hope you are planning on traveling next year sometime. The best time of year for this itinerary would be late September into October. You haven't said how much time you can devote to this trip. But you may want to seriously consider flying so that you have the 4 to 5 days that you'd spend on the road just getting to the area to use for more important destinations than states with a lot of corn and wheat. And if your focus is primarily the Utah parks, do them as a loop out of SLC. JMO.

Edited: 1 year ago
The Government is set to purchase two jet skis in an attempt to stop migrants illegally crossing the Channel following a record month for arrivals.

The Yamaha FX HO vessels will join Border Force's fleet of five cutters and six patrol boats, which work to intercept dinghies travelling to the UK from France.

At least 1,880 migrants have made it to the UK in September alone, roughly the same number believed to have crossed in the whole of 2019.

The jet skis typically cost between 15,000 and 20,000, but the Government is insisting on customisations including cruise control, a GPS display mount, and a 1800cc engine, the Times reported.

Former head of Border Force Tony Smith today warned that interception on the high seas is 'highly dangerous' as migrant boats are largely unseaworthy.

The Yamaha FX HO vessels will join Border Force's fleet of five cutters and six patrol boats, which work to intercept dinghies travelling to the UK from France. Pictured: Stock image

He added: 'I hope that common sense will prevail, and that the French and British governments will be able to reach agreement on a joint intervention and returns strategy which would both save lives and prevent others from taking similar risks in future.'

Home Secretary Priti Patel, who vowed to make the route 'unviable', recently appointed former Royal Marine Dan O'Mahoney as the Clandestine Channel Threat Commander.

He pledged to be more forceful when cracking down on traffickers, who helped the 416 people make the crossing to Britain in one day this month.

More than 6,500 migrants have successfully landed so far this year, with September already the busiest month so far, despite there being four more days to go.

The current single-day record for migrant crossings is 416, set on September 2.

At least 1,880 migrants have made it to the UK in September alone, roughly the same number believed to have crossed in the whole of 2019. Pictured: Arrivals on Tuesday

Former head of Border Force Tony Smith warned that interception on the high seas is 'highly dangerous' as migrant boats are largely unseaworthy. Pictured: Arrivals on Tuesday

It comes as the captain of the small French warship Aramis was heard instructing P&Os Pride of Kent ferry to move out of his way so he could shepherd a boat full of migrants floundering off the French coast towards British waters.

In the radio message, heard and recorded by the Mail on Tuesday morning, Aramiss captain says the dinghy is on his port side and he is escorting the tiny vessel safely on its journey in the Channel.

The captains instruction was issued an hour after dawn on an extraordinary day in the worlds busiest shipping route when nearly 400 migrants sailed from France and successfully reached the Kent coast.

Between sunrise and early evening its believed at least 50 small boats carrying men, women, children, five babes in arms and even a double amputee, reached Dover and the surrounding shorelines.

More than 6,500 migrants have successfully landed so far this year, with September already the busiest month so far, despite there being four more days to go. Pictured: Dover on Tuesday

The current single-day record for migrant crossings is 416, set on September 2. Pictured: Arrivals on Tuesday

The tally, provided by sources in the Kent area, is far higher than the official count of 32 boats issued by the Home Office.

Bella Sankey, director of humanitarian charity Detention Action, said: 'Priti Patel's claim she would make Channel crossings unviable lies in tatters as this has been the busiest month on record.

'This dangerous situation is not sustainable but desperate refugees will continue to risk their lives as long as the Government refuses to offer safe passage to the UK for those fleeing persecution.

'Unless the Home Secretary changes tack she will look neither tough nor compassionate and will please no one.'
(This Sept. 24 story, corrects projected U.S. shale output to likely struggling to achieve 7 million bpd by 2022 instead of likely falling by 4 million bpd in 2022, paragraph 4))

By Jennifer Hiller

(Reuters) - U.S. oil producer ConocoPhillips <COP.N> sees global demand returning to 100 million barrels per day and growing from there, with oil an "important part of the energy mix in any scenario" going forward, a senior executive said on Thursday.

The view stands in contrast to that of rival BP Plc <BP.L>, which sees the coronavirus pandemic leaving a lasting effect on global energy demand, though ConocoPhillips still expects "quite a bit of uncertainty next year," Senior Vice President Dominic Macklon said during a Q&A with Raymond James.

The company's capital spending in 2021 will be "somewhat below" its original planned 2020 level of $6.6 billion, Macklon said.

The hardest-hit area of the oil industry in 2020 has been U.S. shale, where producers cut production and sidelined equipment as oil prices crashed. While shale output was about 8.2 million bpd at the start of the year, at current prices the industry will likely struggle to produce 7 million bpd by 2022, Macklon said.

ConocoPhillips left seven drilling rigs at work in shale fields, but cut all fracking crews earlier this year as oil prices <CLc1> <LCOc1> crashed. It is returning two fracking crews to work, Macklon said.

Some shale producers are stockpiling federal drilling permits ahead of the Nov. 3 U.S. presidential election as a hedge against possible rule changes under a Democratic administration.. Just 20% of ConocoPhillips' Permian Basin acreage is on federal land in New Mexico, while the company expects to receive permits within a month for its Willow project along Alaska's North Slope, "in which case we wouldn't be exposed" to changes, Macklon said.

In July it agreed to buy land from Kelt Exploration Ltd in Canada's Montney shale oil play, in a $375 million deal. The 140,000 acres in British Columbia are adjacent to ConocoPhillips' own Montney lands.

Asked whether it would consider a purchase in an area where it does not already operate, Macklon said yes, but the preference is for assets "we know and understand well."

(Reporting by Jennifer Hiller in Houston; Editing by Nick Zieminski and Matthew Lewis)
Mauritius' Prime Minister Pravind Jugnauth has called on multinationals and governments to ensure that there is a fair distribution of vaccines to combat the spread of the coronavirus.

Addressing the 75th session of the UN General Assembly on Saturday, Jugnauth seized on the chance to mark his countrys claim in a territorial dispute, appearing in front of a map that showed the British-controlled Chagos Islands as part of Mauritius while discussing the countries long-running disagreement over the archipelago.

Jugnauth said the "pandemic has brought to the fore our collective vulnerabilities as viruses know no borders."

He added that the development of a safe and effective vaccine was vital in tackling the pandemic.

Image: @PKJugnauth/Twitter
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A 33-year-old man was airlifted to hospital with critical injuries Friday after being stabbed in north St. Catharines.

Niagara Regional Police were called to assist paramedics just before 10:30 a.m. on Geneva Street, north of Scott Street.

Police said they attended a multi-unit residence where they found the man with life-threatening stab sounds.

The man was transported by Niagara Emergency Medical Services to a local hospital in critical condition and then airlifted by Ornge air ambulance to an out-of-region hospital.

The suspects identify is unknown. Detectives from 1 District St. Catharines are investigating with assistance from the forensic services unit.

Police said the stabbing is believed to have happened inside one of the apartments between 10 and 10:25 a.m.

Detectives canvassed the area for more information and are asking any residents or businesses with security cameras in the area to review footage for anything suspicious.

Police are asking anyone with information to contact detectives at 905-688-4111, ext. 9964.

Police said they are not releasing information about the victim at this time.
(Photo : Photo by Andreas Rentz/Getty Images) A specially trained explosives detection dog with special dog sunglasses is seen at the Bundeswehr, the German armed forces, at the Bundeswehr center for dog training during the novel coronavirus pandemic on July 24, 2020 in Ulmen, Germany. German Bundeswehr announced that they are cooperating with the Tieraerztliche Hochschule Hannover veterinary school to train dogs to detect Covid-19 through their sense of smell in saliva samples from humans. The training program is still in its early phase (Photo : Photo by Kevin Frayer/Getty Images) A Chinese woman holds her dog that is wearing a protective mask as well as they stand in the street on February 7, 2020 in Beijing, China. The number of cases of a deadly new coronavirus rose to more than 31000 in mainland China Friday, days after the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the outbreak a global public health emergency. China continued to lock down the city of Wuhan in an effort to contain the spread of the pneumonia-like disease which medical experts have confirmed can be passed from human to human. In an unprecedented move, Chinese authorities have put travel restrictions on the city which is the epicentre of the virus and municipalities in other parts of the country affecting tens of millions of people. The number of those who have died from the virus in China climbed to over 636 on Friday, mostly in Hubei province, and cases have been reported in other countries including the United States, Canada, Australia, Japan, South Korea, India, the United Kingdom, Germany, France and several others. The World Health Organization has warned all governments to be on alert and screening has been stepped up at airports around the world. Some countries, including the United States, have put restrictions on Chinese travellers entering and advised their citizens against travel to China.

We've all heard of dogs knowing people's emotions or read facial expressions. But can it detect a positive COVID-19 person from sniffing his skin? Apparently, a study proves this. In fact, one airport from Finland already tries this method to know which person has the virus or not.

Can dogs detect viruses from people?

Have you heard about 'virus-sniffing dogs'? It turns out that dogs have the ability to sniff the virus from a person infected with it. But they require special training to do so.

In fact, an airport in Finland currently does this method in order to know which person has the virus or not. Finland's Helsinki-Vantaa airport has recently run a test trial of the virus-sniffing dogs.

People can volunteer to have the dogs sniff their skin. Once the dog reacts on the person-- through yelping, pawing, or lying down-- that person may be positive with the virus.

To those who are afraid of dogs, airport staff could also ask passengers to wipe their skin with a cloth tested by the dog through sniffing its smell.

To make sure the dog's sniff is accurate, the same person that the dog found COVID positive will undergo a free nasal swab test.

If the passenger tests positive on that too, he will be admitted to Helsinki University Hospital's health information station for further instructions.

Ten dogs have already started working in the airport, courtesy of the University of Helsinki.

Study shows dog accuracy could beat any COVID test

Finland was not the only place pushing on the idea of virus-sniffing dogs. Medical dogs all over the world were already being trained to do the same thing.

Researchers said that 94% up to 100% of the time, dogs can actually recognize Coronavirus from a person.

If this is accurate, researchers believe that an individual trained dog could replace any COVID-19 tests faster and cheapest way possible.

ALSO READ: How NHS COVID-19 App Works: Find Out How To Download, Activate, and Explore The Features

This article is owned by Tech Times



Written by Jamie Pancho

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev has sent a congratulatory letter to Xi Jinping, Chairman of the Peoples Republic of China.

"Dear Mr. Chairman,

It is on the occasion of your countrys national holiday  Establishment Day of the Peoples Republic of China that on my own behalf and on behalf of the people of Azerbaijan I extend my most cordial congratulations to you and your friendly people.

We are delighted to witness success and achievements of the Peoples Republic of China, your country becoming one of the leading nations of the world and day by day growth of its prestige in the international arena.

We attach utmost importance to the comprehensive development of Azerbaijan-China relations that have ancient history. The traditional ties of friendship and cooperation that bind our countries and peoples are enriched today by new substance of cooperation in the political, economic and humanitarian spheres. This cooperation will certainly continue to develop successfully also within the Belt and Road project that you have initiated.

The solidarity and mutual support demonstrated by our countries since the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic that humanity faces have once again proven that our bilateral relations were built on solid foundation. I seize this opportunity to express my gratitude to you for assistance of the Peoples Republic of China in our country in the fight against the coronavirus disease.

I am confident that the ties of friendship and mutually beneficial cooperation between Azerbaijan and China that are based on good traditions will continue to develop and strengthen through our joint efforts for the sake of prosperity of our peoples.

On this notable day, I wish strong health and success to you and everlasting peace and prosperity to the friendly people of China," the letter said.
As schools in the state continue to operate online for the last six months, teachers have now been asked to submit a weekly report on students getting access to online and offline education.

As per a government resolution (GR) released on Friday, teachers now have to upload details of the students attending classes online, those who are reached out offline via phone or other means and those who cannot be reached, despite all attempts. Teachers have also been asked to share data concerning learning outcomes. The data has to be uploaded on a portal created by the state education department.

The data should be uploaded weekly on http://covid19.scertmaha.ac.in. Teachers can create their user IDs and update this from time to time. The data is essential for combining details of education during the current times, states the GR.

The department has also given a list of 44 helpline numbers- one for every district in the state. Teachers can ask their doubts on these helplines, it states.

Prashant Redij, spokesperson of the Mumbai Principals Association said, It is good that the government wants to combine this data. But asking this through an official GR is like showing mistrust on schools. The same could have been asked by officials of the education department.
Actor Rakul Preet Singh was interrogated by Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) in Mumbai on Friday. During the questioning, she spoke about a reference to a word doob that had appeared in her alleged WhatsApp conversations with Rhea Chakraborty. She said it only referred to rolled tobacco.

On Friday, Rakul was spotted arriving at the NCB premises in Mumbai for questioning over the alleged drug nexus in Bollywood. Actor Deepika Padukones questioning session by NCB began on Saturday. Deepikas manager Karishma Prakash was also questioned on Friday.

According to a report in Mumbai Mirror, Rakul told NCB officials that doob in her WhatsApp chats with Rhea only meant rolled tobacco and not any other narcotic substance.

The report, quoting an NCB officer, said: In the course of our investigation in the Rhea Chakraborty matter, we came across a WhatsApp conversation between her and Rakul Preet Singh in which Rhea asked Rakul Preet whether she had doob and Rakul Preet replied saying it was at her house. The officer had added that during her questioning, Rhea had allegedly said the reference to the doob was a reference to marijuana.

Also read: Kangana Ranaut stands up for Anushka Sharma after Sunil Gavaskars comments but accuses her of selective feminism

On Friday, Rakul was seen entering the NCB guest house in Colaba around 10.30 am and left after four hours. She had been summoned by the NCB as part of its probe into Sushant Singh Rajputs death. Her name had cropped up during the interrogation of Rhea, who has been arrested along with over a dozen others, the official said.

(With PTI inputs)

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She has arrived in Milan for its bi-annual fashion week after wowing at Burberry's virtual London Fashion Week show last week.

And Joan Smalls was proudly displaying her amazing abs in sporty pink co-ords as she arrived to walk the runway at the Salvatore Ferragamo fashion show on Saturday afternoon.

The model cut a stylish figure in the off-duty look before changing into an autumnal-inspired ensemble to head down the catwalk, and was later seen leaving the fashion show in her casual ensemble.

Casual: Joan Smalls was proudly displaying her amazing abs in sporty pink co-ords as she arrived to walk the runway at the Salvatore Ferragamo fashion show

Joan showed off her relaxed sense of style in the casual pink shirt and matching shorts as she arrived for the latest fashion show.

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She accessorised the look with bright white trainers and a small backpack as she headed out of her car and into the fashion show.

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Donning rectangular sunglasses, Joan showed off her famous model physique in the laid-back look as she arrived for the runway showcase.

Leggy: The model cut a stylish figure in the off-duty look as she arrived for the catwalk show

Leggy: The model cut a stylish figure in the off-duty look as she arrived for the catwalk show

Flaunt it: Joan flashed her taut midriff as she re-positioned her crop top while outside

Later Joan cut an elegant figure in an orange turtleneck jumper, which she wore tucked into a white midi-skirt belted around her svelte midriff.

Joan layered the look with a white leather jacket which was covered in holes, while also teaming it with a pair of heeled shoes.

The Puerto Rican-born beauty carried a peach leather handbag down the catwalk and she showed off the accessory on the runway.

Chic: She added a pair of designer black framed sunglasses to her sporty ensemble

On her way: The model arrived in a black car and managed to hold on all of her items as she stepped out

Prepared: Joan carried a black jumper, pale pink mask and bright pink bag

Matchy matchy: She donned a selection of pink items including her co-ord and a bright bag

She wore her brunette locks swept back and opted for soft touches of make-up to highlight her natural beauty.

Joan is currently taking part in Milan Fashion Week, after wowing during London's virtual event last week.

Milan is only one of the four fashion capitals that is hosting the catwalk showcases with a few adjustments in light of the coronavirus pandemic.

Beauty: Joan tied her locks back and kept her makeup to a minimum

All smiles: She appeared to be in good spirits as she enjoyed Milan Fashion Week

Glam: Joan made sure to work all of her angles, flaunting her toned figure

Model material: Later Joan cut an elegant figure in an orange turtleneck jumper, which she wore tucked into a white midi-skirt belted around her svelte midriff

The city is hosting 23 shows over the next five days- a move which sets them apart from New York and London, who have both held virtual fashion weeks.

Paris has 20 scheduled shows planned next week but coveted guest lists have been reduced dramatically, in keeping with strict socially distancing guidelines.

Milan Fashion Week is being held as a breakthrough for Italy, seven months on from when the country dealt with the devastating effects of coronavirus.

Wow: The model, 32, looked typically elegant in an orange turtleneck jumper, which she wore tucked into a white midi-skirt belted around her svelte midriff

Incredible: Joan toted an orange handbag as she made her way around the outside runway

In the zone: She looked every inch the supermodel during the show

Back in February, Georgia Armani cancelled his show in Milan as the virus began to sweep through the country.

It comes just weeks after she appeared to have confirmed she is dating Henry Junior Chalhoub - a year after the pair were presumed to be 'just friends.

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Last August, they were snapped on a luxury yacht looking incredibly cosy, but it was said their relationship was platonic.

But at the end of July, they stepped out in Portofino, Italy holding hands and enjoying a romantic stroll, seemingly clarifying their romantic status.

Stunning: She wore her brunette locks swept back and opted for soft touches of make-up to highlight her natural beauty

Fashion: Joan completed her runway look with white leather slingback shoes
When close to half the companies in Australia have price-to-earnings ratios (or "P/E's") above 21x, you may consider Smartgroup Corporation Ltd (ASX:SIQ) as an attractive investment with its 15.6x P/E ratio. Nonetheless, we'd need to dig a little deeper to determine if there is a rational basis for the reduced P/E.

Smartgroup has been struggling lately as its earnings have declined faster than most other companies. The P/E is probably low because investors think this poor earnings performance isn't going to improve at all. You'd much rather the company wasn't bleeding earnings if you still believe in the business. If not, then existing shareholders will probably struggle to get excited about the future direction of the share price.

Check out our latest analysis for Smartgroup

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Keen to find out how analysts think Smartgroup's future stacks up against the industry? In that case, our free report is a great place to start.

Is There Any Growth For Smartgroup?

The only time you'd be truly comfortable seeing a P/E as low as Smartgroup's is when the company's growth is on track to lag the market.

Retrospectively, the last year delivered a frustrating 21% decrease to the company's bottom line. This has soured the latest three-year period, which nevertheless managed to deliver a decent 22% overall rise in EPS. Although it's been a bumpy ride, it's still fair to say the earnings growth recently has been mostly respectable for the company.

Shifting to the future, estimates from the five analysts covering the company suggest earnings should grow by 9.6% per year over the next three years. That's shaping up to be materially lower than the 18% per year growth forecast for the broader market.

With this information, we can see why Smartgroup is trading at a P/E lower than the market. It seems most investors are expecting to see limited future growth and are only willing to pay a reduced amount for the stock.

Story continues

The Key Takeaway

We'd say the price-to-earnings ratio's power isn't primarily as a valuation instrument but rather to gauge current investor sentiment and future expectations.

We've established that Smartgroup maintains its low P/E on the weakness of its forecast growth being lower than the wider market, as expected. Right now shareholders are accepting the low P/E as they concede future earnings probably won't provide any pleasant surprises. It's hard to see the share price rising strongly in the near future under these circumstances.

It's always necessary to consider the ever-present spectre of investment risk. We've identified 1 warning sign with Smartgroup, and understanding should be part of your investment process.

If P/E ratios interest you, you may wish to see this free collection of other companies that have grown earnings strongly and trade on P/E's below 20x.

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.



Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com.
Reaffirming India's 'faith and respect' in the United Nations, Modi said that the country has been 'waiting for a long time' for a 'logical conclusion' to the process of reforms in the UN.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday addressed the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) and said that "reform in the responses, in the processes, and in the very character of the UN is the need of the hour", especially in the context of the coronavirus pandemic.

He also made a strong pitch for India to be given a more decisive role in the decision-making processes of the global body, given that the country makes up for over 18 percent of the world's population. He also listed out India's achievements as a member of the international community and highlighted the welfare schemes introduced by the Centre.

Posing a question on the UN's relevance and role in the challenges faced by humankind presently, Modi said that while the organisation can claim several "stellar achievements", there is a need for "serious introspection" on the work done by it.

"With the changing times, if we dont change, then the drive needed to bring change will also get weakened," the prime minister said.

"One could say that we have successfully avoided a third World War. But we cannot deny that there have been several wars and many more civil wars. Several terrorist attacks shook the world and rivers of blood have continued to flow by. Hundreds and thousands of children, who would have otherwise enriched this world with their presence, have left us prematurely," Modi added.

Notably, the prime minister didn't make any references to Pakistan and India's concern of cross-border terrorism in his speech. On Friday, Pakistan prime minister Imran Khan had raked up the Kashmir issue at the forum, which got a sharp retort from India.

Delivering India's Right of Reply in the UNGA, First Secretary in the Permanent Mission of India to the UN Mijito Vinito said that "only crowning glory" that Pakistan has to show to the world for the last seven decades is terrorism, ethnic cleansing, majoritarian fundamentalism and clandestine nuclear trade,

The strong rebuttal came after Khan spoke about India's internal affairs, including the issue of Jammu and Kashmir, during his pre-recorded video statement at the high-level General Debate. Vinito, who was sitting at India's seat in the UN General Assembly hall for the General Debate, walked out when Khan started his usual "diatribe" about India.

However, Modi, in his speech on Saturday, chose to focus on the world's and India's response to the COVID-19 pandemic, which has caused one million casualties and disrupted lives around the world for the last six months.

Questioning the UN's role in mitigating the effects of the pandemic, Modi said, "Where is the United Nations in this joint fight against the pandemic? Where is its effective response?"

Detailing India's contribution to the global fight against the pandemic, Modi said that the country's pharmaceutical industry sent "essential medicines" to more than 150 countries.

He also stated, "As the largest vaccine producing country of the world, I want to give one more assurance to the global community today. Indias vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis."

"India will also help all the countries in enhancing their cold chain and storage capacities for the delivery of the vaccines," Modi the prime minister said.

'How long will India be kept out of decision-making?' asks Modi

Reaffirming India's "faith and respect" in the United Nations, Modi said that the country has been "waiting for a long time" for a "logical conclusion" to the process of reforms in the UN.

"Today, people of India are concerned whether this reform-process will ever reach its logical conclusion. For how long will India be kept out of the decision-making structures of the United Nations?" he questioned.

He added that India, with the largest democracy in the world, has been a "leading global economy for centuries" and also "endured hundreds of years of foreign rule".

Modi said, "When we were strong, we were never a threat to the world, when we were weak, we never become a burden on the world.

"How long would a country have to wait particularly when the transformational changes happening in that country affect a large part of the world?"

The prime minister also drew parallels between the founding principles of the UN and India's "fundamental philosophy".

"Within the halls of the United Nations, one has often heard the words 'Vasudhev Kutumkambh', meaning 'the world is one family'. In the United Nations too, India has always given priority to the welfare of the whole world," he said.

Asserting that Indians are aspiring for the country to play an "expanded role" in the global body's efforts, Modi said, "India is the country, which sent its brave soldiers to about 50 peacekeeping missions the world over to keep peace. India is that country, which in the course of maintaining peace, has lost the maximum number of its brave soldiers."

Modi lauds 'Neighbourhood First', 'Act East' policies

Hailing the Centre's neighbourhood-centric policies, Modi said that "any gesture of friendship by India towards one country is not directed against any third country."

"When India strengthens its development partnership, it is not with any malafide intent of making the partner country dependent or hapless," he said.

"From Indias Neighbourhood First Policy to our Act East Policy, as well as the idea of Security and Growth for All in the Region, or our views towards the Indo Pacifc region, we have always worked for the interests of humankind and not driven by our own self-interests," Modi said.

India will contribute 'rich developmental experience' as member of UNSC, says Modi

In his speech, Modi also noted that from January 2021, India will join the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) as a non-permanent member and expressed "gratitude to all fellow members states who have bestowed this trust upon India".

He said, "As the worlds largest democracy we will bring our years of rich developmental experience for the benefit of the whole world. Our way forward is to proceed from human welfare to the welfare of the world."

Speaking about India's agenda as a member of the UNSC, he said, "India will always speak in support of peace, security and prosperity. India will not hesitate in raising its voice against the enemies of humanity, human race and human values  these include terrorism, smuggling of illegal weapons, drugs and money-laundering.

"Indias cultural heritage, tradition, thousands of years of experience will always stand in good stead for the developing countries."

Towards the end of his speech, Modi spoke in detail about the welfare schemes introduced domestically by his government. He added that the "Reform-Perform-Transform mantra has made great efforts to bring about transformation in the lives of millions of its citizens."

He hailed the Centre's efforts to make banking facilities accessible, to free people from open defecation, and to provide free healthcare services in the last 6 years, among others.

In conclusion, Modi said, "I am confident that on the occasion of its 75th anniversary, the United Nations and its member countries will endeavour with a strong commitment to maintain the relevance of this great institution.

"Stability in the United Nations and empowerment of the United Nations are essential for the welfare of the world. On the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the United Nations, let us once again pledge to dedicate ourselves for the welfare of the world."

With inputs from agencies
Mumbai, Sep 26 : Abhishek Bachchan has praised Prachi Desai for her hard work, and the actress is naturally thankful for his compliment.

A few days ago, Abhishek called out a social media user for trolling him for having more followers on Twitter than Prachi Desai.

"OUTSIDER VS NEPOTISM. @ItsPrachiDesai 1.3M followers. @juniorbachchan 15.3M followers. And you guys are expecting good from #Bollywood. I mean How? It's high time that we should start appreciating and supporting #talent," the user tweeted.

The tweet caught junior B's attention and he had this response: "I assure you Mr Singhal the amount of followers you have on social media is by no means a barometer of acceptance or popularity or talent. My friend @ItsPrachiDesai is a very talented actor and doesn't need social media to endorse that. Her work speaks for itself." Seeing Abhishek's gesture, Prachi on Saturday took to the micro-blogging site to thank him.

"Thank you for such kind words. @juniorbachchan," Prachi wrote to her co-star of the 2012 release, "Bol Bachchan".
A study has found a link between the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus and previous outbreaks of dengue fever in Brazil, suggesting that exposure to the mosquito-transmitted illness could provide some immunity against COVID-19.The study found a significant correlation between lower incidence, mortality and growth rate of COVID-19 among the Brazilian population that had higher levels of antibodies to dengue. In the study that has not yet been published by the Duke University (Durham, NC, USA) but shared exclusively with Reuters, researchers compared the geographic distribution of coronavirus cases with the spread of dengue in 2019 and 2020. They found that locations that had witnessed intense dengue outbreaks in 2020 or 2019 reported lower coronavirus infection rates and a slower increase in the number of COVID-19 cases. This striking finding raises the intriguing possibility of an immunological cross-reactivity between dengues Flavivirus serotypes and SARS-CoV-2, according to the study, referring to dengue virus antibodies and the novel coronavirus. If proven correct, this hypothesis could mean that dengue infection or immunization with an efficacious and safe dengue vaccine could produce some level of immunological protection against SARS-CoV-2, it added.Miguel Nicolelis, a professor at Duke University who led the study, told Reuters that the results were especially interesting given that previous studies had shown that it was possible for people with dengue antibodies in their blood to test falsely positive for COVID-19 antibodies despite never being infected by the coronavirus. The researchers found a similar relationship between dengue outbreaks and a slower spread of COVID-19 in other parts of Latin America, as well as Asia and islands in the Pacific and Indian Oceans, according to Reuters.This indicates that there is an immunological interaction between two viruses that nobody could have expected, because the two viruses are from completely different families, Nicolelis told Reuters, adding that further studies are needed to prove the connection.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday, at the United Nations General Assembly's 75th session, advocated institutional reforms of the international organisation and inclusion of India in its Security Council.

In a 20-minute pre-recorded speech which was delivered virtually in view of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Prime Minister recalled the historical context in which the UN was set up in 1945. Though he acknowledged that the UN had several accomplishments to its credit but he pointed to the failure of the world body to prevent dozens of wars, civil wars and terror attacks in the last seven decades.

The UN, he said, needs to seriously introspect. "Thousands of people like you and me, were humans too. Lakhs of children vanished, lakhs became homeless. Were the efforts of the UN at that time and even now, adequate?" Modi asked in an evocative address.

For the last eight months, the world is combating the coronavirus pandemic, he pointed out while asking emphatically, "Where is the United Nations in that battle? Where is the collective and effective response to this crisis?"

The Prime Minister argued that institutional and structural reforms of the UN are a necessity of our times. The UN commands huge respect in India, he said adding that it is equally true that Indians have been waiting for the completion of the reforms for long. "Indians are worried and wondering if these reforms would ever reach a logical end. They have been asking till how long will India be kept out of the UN's decision making structure?" he said.

In a strong pitch for granting India a seat at the UN Security Council (UNSC), the Prime Minister highlighted the nation's role in the world and global peace. "For how long will a country which is the world's largest democracy, a country with more than 18 per cent of the world's population, a country with hundreds of languages, hundreds of dialects, many creeds, many ideologies, have to wait?" he asked.

"When we were strong, we did not trouble the world; when we were oppressed, we did not burden the world either," Prime Minister Modi said adding that India's philosophical values were in alignment with the founding principles of the UN.

"India will always use its experience as a pluralistic culture and democracy for the benefit of the world, humanity, security, progress and prosperity. We will always raise our voice against the enemies of humanity, human race and human valuesa- terrorism, arms smuggling, drugs, money laundering," he said.

The Prime Minister assured the world community that India will continue to help the world as it has even during the current coronavirus pandemic. He informed the Assembly that India is headed towards phase three of clinical trials for a Covid-19 vaccine. "India will provide help to everyone," he said.

While recounting how India has been dealing with its challenges, the Prime Minister explained his vision for self-reliant India and how it would be a force multiplier for the global economy.

Interestingly, Modi completely ignored Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan's diatribe against his government at the UN on Friday.
Louis Padulo is president emeritus of the University City Science Center (UCSC), where he served as president and chief executive officer since 1991, following a years appointment as visiting scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Prior to that, Padulo was president of the University of Alabama in Huntsville (UAH). He was a visiting professor in the Media Lab at MIT and at the University of Tokyo before joining UAH. Previously Padulo spent 13 years as dean of the college of engineering at Boston University and, in his last year, as associate vice president. At Boston University he was also a professor of mathematics and of engineering, as well as a senior fellow at the Center for Technology, Strategy and Policy. In addition, Padulo has served on the faculty of Stanford University for seven years, having also taught for nine years at Morehouse, Harvard, Columbia, Georgia State and San Jose State University.

Padulo has worked as a computer scientist for IBM, a design engineer for RCA, a systems analyst for the Mitre Corporation, and as a consultant for numerous national and international organizations. The author of two books and several articles, Padulo earned his doctorate at Georgia Institute of Technology, his master's degree from Stanford University, and his bachelor's degree from Fairleigh Dickinson University, all in electrical engineering. Since retiring from the Science Center, Padulo has served on several corporate and civic boards and frequently teaches product design and entrepreneurship courses as an adjunct professor at local universities. Padulo also served as the founding executive dean of Thomas Jefferson Universitys College of Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE).
The mother of Kenosha gunman Kyle Rittenhouse was given a standing ovation at a GOP event in Wisconsin as her son fights extradition to the state where he is charged with shooting dead two protesters.

Wendy Rittenhouse, a 45-year-old nurse's assistant and single mom to 17-year-old Kyle, received a warm welcome at a meeting hosted by The Republican Women of Waukesha County in Pewaukee on Thursday.

Conservative commentator and blogger Michelle Malkin, who attended the event, shared a photo on Twitter alongside the teenager's mother and her legal team.

Conservative commentator and blogger Michelle Malkin (far left) shared a photo on Twitter alongside Kyle Rittenhouse's mother, Wendy, and her legal team, on Thursday

Kyle Rittenhouse, 17, is charged with shooting and killing two protesters and injuring a third on the streets of Kenosha on August 25 (right). The teen is pictured left with his mother

Malkin said Wendy received a 'standing ovation' during an event hosted by the The Republican Women of Waukesha County

'Standing ovation from Waukesha County GOP women for my special guests, [John Pierce] & Wendy Rittenhouse, Kyle's mom,' she tweeted.

'Huge shoutout sent from all of us in WI to warrior [Lin Wood]. I was able to talk to Kyle by phone & THANK HIM for his courage!'

Kyle Rittenhouse is charged with first-degree intentional homicide for killing two protesters, Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber, during a night of unrest in Kenosha on August 25.

He is also charged with wounding a third demonstrator, Gaige Grosskreutz.

His attorneys have said Rittenhouse acted in self-defense and have portrayed him as a courageous patriot who was exercising his right to bear arms during a night of protests over the police shooting of black man Jacob Blake.

Last month reports emerged that Wendy may have been the one who drove her son from their apartment in Antioch, Illinois, across the Wisconsin border to attend the Kenosha protest with his AR-15.

Rittenhouse participated in a hearing on Friday at the Lake County Circuit Court in Illinois via video link from the detention facility where he is being held

Rittenhouse is charged with first-degree intentional homicide in the killing of two protesters: Joseph Rosenbaum (left) and Anthony Huber (right)

Wendy was applauded by guests after she was introduced at Thursday's event however, the president of the women's GOP group said she was not formally invited by the organization.

Nancy Kormanik told Patch Wendy had attended the meeting after Malkin, who had interviewed her earlier, brought her as a guest.

The attendees had gathered for an event focused on 'safety and self-defense', according to the news outlet.

Malkin's tweet was met with backlash from some users who criticized her for praising a 'killer' and a 'criminal.'

'This is truly a sick world that this kid is being celebrated and his parents are proud,' Twitter user Michael Fabus said.

'Applauding a killer. That's deranged,' another tweeted in response.

Several people replied to Malkin's tweet, criticizing her for 'celebrating a killer'

Others responded showing their support for the teenager

Rittenhouse, who was arrested in his hometown of Antioch, participated in a virtual hearing on Friday at the Lake County Circuit Court in Illinois from the detention facility where he is being held.

Lawyer John Pierce told the judge he planned to fight the request by Kenosha prosecutors that Rittenhouse be transferred to Wisconsin to face charges.

The judge, Paul Novak, gave 14 days for the defense to review papers and file pleadings ahead of an October 9 hearing.

Pierce asked for a month to prepare arguments challenging extradition that he said involve 'issues of some complexity, frankly that have not arisen in the country for some time'.

'We intend to challenge extradition by writ of habeas corpus,' Pierce said.

He didn't provide further details at the hearing about the basis for the challenge.

Novak granted two weeks to prepare those arguments. The delay in returning Rittenhouse to Wisconsin is the second in the case.
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y.  Fearing for her life, a female student at Tottenville High School stayed away from school for two weeks last year due to constant threats and harassment from other girls, a lawsuit alleges.

Despite the teens protracted absences, administrators did not notify her mother she was missing school, alleges a civil complaint.
By Stephanie Nebehay

GENEVA (Reuters) - U.N. rights experts and activists called on Tuesday for launching an international investigation into unlawful killings in the so-called war on drugs in the Philippines and for the International Criminal Court to step up its preliminary probe.

Sanctions should be slapped on officials responsible for inciting killings or failing to prevent them, said Agnes Callamard, U.N. special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions.

Callamard, speaking on a panel, read out a statement issued by 32 U.N. experts in late June, which she told Reuters "is as relevant as ever" as the Human Rights Council meets in Geneva.

Tens of thousands of people in the Philippines may have been killed in the war on drugs since mid-2016 amid "near impunity" for police and incitement to violence by top officials, the United Nations said in a landmark report in June.

The chief presidential legal counsel and presidential spokesman did not respond immediately to Reuters' requests for comment. Presidential spokesman Harry Roque said last June that the "rehashed claims" of impunity were unfounded.

The U.N. report said the drugs crackdown, launched by President Rodrigo Duterte after he won election on a platform of crushing crime, has been marked by police orders and high-level rhetoric that may have been interpreted as "permission to kill".

Callamard urged the 47-member forum to "establish an on-the-ground international investigation".

"I call on the International Criminal Court to prioritise the completion of its preliminary examination of the situation in the Philippines," she said.

She urged states to "apply sanctions against individual Filipino officials who have committed, incited or who have failed to investigate or prevent human rights violations including arbitrary killings."

Iceland, working with the Philippines, is proposing a resolution for consideration at the Council next week. But activists said that the draft text, which calls for technical cooperation, was weak as it fails to establish an international investigative mechanism.

Story continues

"The Philippines is hell-bent on getting itself off of the Human Rights Council agenda by any means except for actually improving the human rights situation on the ground," said Laila Matar of Human Rights Watch.

Rachel Chhoa-Howard, Amnesty International researcher, said: "Despite increased international attention over the years, killings continue and there appears to be no end in sight to the trail of blood."

"Amnesty and others definitely believe that the situation meets the threshold of crimes against humanity," she said, urging the Hague-based ICC to complete its probe this year.

(Reporting and writing by Stephanie Nebehay; additional reporting by Neil Jerome Morales in Manila, editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)
By Tom Haedrich

Deep-pocketed special interests are so assured of New Jersey voters passing the upcoming recreational marijuana referendum that pungent smoke is already wafting through the halls of Trenton. There are nine powerful organizations, including the ACLU and multiple cannabis trade associations, promoting pot legalization in New Jersey, aligned against two relatively small community groups on the Nov. 3 ballot question.

According to recent polling data, the vote-yes group may be justified in their optimism. However, the difficulty with relying on nominal statewide random sampling (approximately 500 people), as the Democratic Party discovered in 2016, is whats missing is a comprehensive, timely picture of actual voters. Its an egregious mistake to take New Jersey voters for granted using restrictive polling data.

Its also surprising how little public information has been disseminated for this important referendum question, especially with the anticipated amount of government tax dollars and business interests at stake. It seems as if todays cannabis government advocates and lobbyists are as assured of supposed outcomes as those who were disappointed in the last presidential election. The combination of referendum, presidential balloting and New Jerseys first all vote-by-mail election is a wild card situation that could bring about some unsuspected results.

One of the biggest concerns for caring New Jersey voters, at this point in time, is how pot proponents can justify legalization in the middle of a pandemic crisis with a deadly coronavirus that attacks, damages and can destroy the human respiratory system. While some claim that cannabis is no more harmful than tobacco, the two are not equal. Due to cultural joint sharing, frequent deep inhalation, and immunity compromising factors, marijuana can be much more damaging to a persons lungs and overall health. According to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, 16,000+ New Jersey citizens (200,000 nationwide) have died as a result of the coronavirus during just the past six months.

Additionally, important questions of social justice, especially marijuana decriminalization and expungement, are significant features directly related to needed New Jersey criminal justice reform. The referendum addresses neither, opting instead for a predominantly economic based approach. This past year was a lost opportunity for state leaders from both parties to demonstrate their commitment to ending the well known socially disruptive, historically biased application of New Jersey marijuana laws, particularly within communities of color.

Regardless of this currently unaddressed state failure, there is a chance that voters nationwide will do what New Jersey leaders have refused to, by the election of Democratic candidates Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. While Biden is strongly opposed to legalization, both are pledged to actively pursue decriminalization and expungement, a position that has broad and growing support throughout the country. Republicans Donald Trump and Mike Pence currently remain committed to narrowly conservative, status quo anti-marijuana policies.

The referendum deciding the current fate of New Jerseys recreational marijuana law is now in the hands of the states electorate. Voters will also have an opportunity in their presidential selection to participate in ending the ineffective, discriminatory and divisive War on Drugs started 50 years ago in the United States. May logic and good reason prevail, in deciding these critical issues, throughout New Jersey and the nation.

Tom Haedrich is a resident of New Vernon.

Send letters to the editor and guest columns for The Jersey Journal to jjletters@jjournal.com.
Police are trying to identify the man who drove through a crowd of demonstrators protesting racial injustice Friday night on Central Avenue near the University of New Mexico.

Albuquerque Police Chief Harold Medina said finding the person responsible is a priority and the department is following up on leads.

We will not tolerate this kind of behavior, Medina said in a Saturday statement.

Arthur Bell, an organizer with the Black New Mexico Movement, said Saturday that nobody was injured but called the incident concerning.

It was the groups third night of protesting after a grand jury in Louisville, Kentucky, decided not to file charges against the officers involved in the death of Breonna Taylor, a Black woman shot by police during a no-knock warrant in March.

Its disheartening  that people think its OK to put our lives in danger because we are standing up for someone else who doesnt have a voice, Bell said.

He said the driver initially stood among them but was escorted away after being singled out as an antagonizer. Afterward, Bell said the person drove by twice before veering from the far right lane into the crowd.

He waited until APD shut off the road  to where we thought we were OK, so we let our guard down a little bit, he said.

Video of the incident shows a driver in a black vehicle pushing through the crowd, appearing to bump into some demonstrators, before accelerating as the crowd pursued the vehicle a short distance.

One car just drove through the crowd. No one was hit or hurt. pic.twitter.com/sykcpKFVAI  Shaun Griswold (@shaun505) September 26, 2020

Bell said safety is always a top priority when the group demonstrates and BNMM has taken steps to ensure this kind of thing doesnt happen again.

Chief Medina said police try to work with protesters to block traffic for demonstrations, adding that its very dangerous for groups to block traffic with their own vehicles.

Bell said police have not been consistent, working with them during one demonstration but, for the three that followed, staging buses full of riot police nearby and circling helicopters  something he said was unnecessary and put us in a bad light.

Albuquerque police spokesman Gilbert Gallegos said the department understands the frustration but called every protest a balancing act.

He said a large police presence is more likely to escalate tensions and that tactical teams  sometimes on call or staged to respond if necessary  are an option depending on crowd size and location.

At the same time, the job of officers is much more difficult and dangerous when protesters demonstrate in the middle of busy streets and attempt to block traffic with their own vehicles, bikes or by other means, he said.

Bell said BNMM has seen an increasing aggression from counter-protesters but scare tactics will not hinder the group.

Fear is never something that were going to let keep us in the house. We are always going to take to the streets and whenever we have the opportunity we are going to express our opinion, he said. Anybody who feels like this person may have been right  we have women, children, elderly people in that crowd. Any of them couldve lost their lives that night.
JERUSALEM: Israel will hold rare talks with Lebanon next month in an effort to resolve a longstanding maritime border dispute, an Israeli official said Saturday.

The official said Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz will lead the Israeli delegation in talks mediated by the United States. Representatives from the three countries are likely to speak by video conference because of the coronavirus pandemic, the official said.

The official requested anonymity in line with regulations. There was no immediate comment from Lebanon.

Israel and Lebanon have no diplomatic relations and are technically in a state of war. They each claim about 860 square kilometers (330 square miles) of the Mediterranean Sea as within their own exclusive economic zones.

Both are hoping to explore and develop new gas fields in the Mediterranean following a number of big finds in recent years. U.S. diplomats have been shuttling between the two countries and pushing for direct talks in recent years.

Lebanon, which is mired in a severe economic crisis, is especially keen to develop offshore energy resources.

The Trump administration is likely to celebrate any direct talks as another diplomatic breakthrough in the Middle East, following recent agreements in which the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain Gulf countries that have never gone to war with Israel agreed to recognize it and establish diplomatic relations.

Israel invaded Lebanon during the countrys 1975-1990 civil war to battle Palestinian militants who had launched cross-border attacks, and it occupied a strip of territory in southern Lebanon until 2000.

In 2006, Israel fought a month-long war with Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group. Hezbollah has vastly expanded its arsenal of rockets and missiles since then, and today Israel views it as its most immediate military threat.

Neither side is believed to be seeking war, but they have traded fire on a number of occasions in recent years, and both have warned that a future conflict would be far more devastating for the other side.

Hezbollah, which is considered a terrorist group by Israel, the U.S. and other countries, is part of a political alliance that dominates Lebanons parliament and government.

Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor
Activists are surrounded by police on the Garzweiler power plant grounds in Grevenbroich, western Germany (dpa/AP)

Hundreds of anti-coal activists have entered a mine in western Germany to protest against the continued extraction and use of fossil fuels.

Environmentalists object to the German governments decision to allow the mining and burning of coal in the country until 2038, a deadline the activists say is too late to effectively tackle climate change.

Activists, dressed in coloured overalls and braving wind and rain, are also protesting over the planned destruction of several villages to make way for the expansion of the Garzweiler strip mine, west of Cologne.

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An Associated Press reporter witnessed some protesters break through police lines early on Saturday before being detained by officers.

Utility company RWE said some protesters also entered coal storage facilities.

The Garzweiler mine and nearby power plants have been a focus of protests for several years.

Environmentalists say they are among the biggest sources of harmful pollution and greenhouse gas emissions in Europe.

In her weekly video message, German chancellor Angela Merkel called for sustainable development, to help confront the threat of global warming.

Mrs Merkel cited Germanys increase in renewable energy production as an example of the measures her country has taken. She did not mention coal mines.
Vietnam recorded no new COVID-19 infections overnight, making the tally unchanged at 1,069, the National Steering Committee for COVID-19 Prevention and Control announced on September 26 morning.

Vietnamese citizens from abroad go to quarantine sites after entry into the country (Photo: VNA)

This day also marks the 24th consecutive day without community transmissions.

Among all the cases, 691 are domestically infected cases, including 551 recorded since the new outbreak began on July 25.

As of 6am on September 26, 999 COVID-19 patients had been treated successfully. The fatalities remained at 35.

Among patients under treatment, there is no longer any critical case, while four have tested negative for SARS-CoV-2 once, five twice and 13 thrice.

A total 21,842 people are being quarantined nationwide.

On September 25, eight more patients were given the all-clear from the disease, including six people treated at the National Hospital of Tropical Diseases in Hanois Dong Anh district, one at the Quang Nam Central General Hospital and another at the Tuberculosis and Lung Hospital in central Quang Tri province.

The newly-recovered patients brought the total number of recoveries in the country to 999, while there have been 35 deaths related to COVID-19 so far.

Among patients under treatment, there is no longer any critical case, while four have tested negative for SARS-CoV-2 once, 14 twice and 12 thrice.

As many as 21,842 people who had close contact with COVID-19 patients or entered Vietnam from pandemic-hit regions are being quarantined across the country.

Vietnamese citizens brought home safely from over 30 countries

More than 340 Vietnamese citizens were brought home from over 30 countries in Europe, Africa and Latin America on a flight on September 24-25.

The flight was arranged by Vietnamese representative offices in those regions, Vietnamese authorities, national flag carrier Vietnam Airlines and local relevant agencies.

The passengers were children under 18, the elderly, students who finished their study and had no accommodations, stranded tourists and businesspeople, workers with expired visas and contracts.

The Vietnamese representative offices had closely worked with local authorities to help the citizens travel to Paris airport and the Vietnamese Embassy in France also sent staff to the airport to assist them.

The same day, 340 citizens were repatriated from Israel on a flight arranged by Vietnamese authorities, the Embassy of Vietnam in Israel and Vietnam Airlines together with Israeli agencies.

The returnees included students who completed their training course in agriculture and those in extremely disadvantaged circumstances.

In a bid to ensure safety for citizens as well as prevent the spread of COVID-19, measures to ensure security, safety and hygiene were strictly implemented during the flight.

The flight crew and all passengers were brought to quarantine sites upon their arrival at Tan Son Nhat International Airport in HCM City and Noi Bai International Airport in Hanoi.

More repatriation flights will be conducted to bring Vietnamese citizens home, depending on their needs and quarantine capacity in Vietnam.

Da Nang returns to normal after COVID-19 outbreak

a Nang returned to normal today after successfully controlling an outbreak of COVID-19 infections in the city.

The move came after the city's Peoples Committee issued a legal document on Thursday announcing the city had controlled the risk of COVID-19.

Activities that were delayed to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in the city will be allowed to resume, but there must be a serious commitment and implementation of anti-pandemic measures as regulated.

At the same time, the city will continue to follow the Ministry of Healths message: Masks-Disinfectant-Keeping Distance-Avoiding Crowded Places-Health Declarations.

On September 18, the city allowed some activities and services to return to normal, except for bars, pubs, karaoke joints and massage parlours.

The latest data from the health ministry shows that a Nang has reported 394 cases of COVID-19, including 360 recoveries and 31 deaths so far.

The city had been placed on lockdown since July 28 after the 416th patient was confirmed positive for SARS-CoV-2 on July 25.

In a related movement, the Steering Committee on COVID-19 pandemic prevention and control in Thua Thien-Hue Province said as of today, the province had removed all measures to limit people and vehicles travelling from pandemic-hit areas to the province.

Specifically, the province has closed quarantine stations at Hue Train Station, Phu Loc District and Nam ong.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc issued a message on Thursday to ask relevant ministries, sectors and localities not to neglect measures to prevent and control the pandemic.

It aimed to firmly maintain the achievements of pandemic prevention, creating a basis for promoting an economic recovery and development, he said.

Hundreds of Vietnamese citizens successfully brought home on repatriation flights

More than 680 Vietnamese citizens were safely brought home from Israel, and 30 countries in Europe, Africa, and South America on repatriation flights carried out by national flag carrier Vietnam Airlines Bamboo from September 24 to September 25 as part of joint efforts by competent Vietnamese authorities and the host nations.



The majority of passengers onboard the flights were made up of agricultural trainees who had completed their courses, employees whose contracts and visas had expired, stranded travelers, children under the age of 18, pregnant women, the elderly, students with no accommodation due to dormitories closing, and others in difficult circumstances.

Ahead of the departure of the flights, Vietnamese representative agencies in the host nations worked alongside local authorities to facilitate the travel of the Vietnamese citizens to pick up points at local airports.

In addition, Vietnamese diplomats were also sent there in order to assist all citizens with necessary pre-departure procedures ahead of their departure.

As a means of preventing the potential spread of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), a range of epidemic prevention measures were taken during the journeys. Upon arrival in the nation, all members of the flight crew and passengers underwent a number of heath checks and were immediately placed into quarantine in line with regulations regarding COVID-19 prevention and control.

Moving forward Vietnamese authorities and relevant bodies based overseas are striving to arrange additional repatriation flights aimed at bringing home more Vietnamese citizens in the near future. Indeed, the schedule of future flights is likely to depend on both demand and the quarantine capacity at home.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 26)  Tropical Storm Ondoy, which spawned huge floods that killed over 400 people exactly 11 years ago Saturday, was a "game changer" as it drove the Philippines to strengthen disaster preparedness measures for effective response, an official said Saturday.

Nasubok nitong bagyo ang ating mga sistema kaya sinigurado natin na post-Ondoy, mayroon na tayong linkages and systems para masigurado iyong response activities, National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council spokesperson Mark Timbal told CNN Philippines Newsroom Weekend.

[Translation: Ondoy challenged our systems that is why we made sure that post-Ondoy, we formed linkages and systems to ensure response activities.]

Ondoy pummelled through Metro Manila, Central Luzon and southern Luzon, killing at least 464 people, and hurting 529 others.

The floods caused by the storm also damaged around P11 billion worth of agriculture and infrastructure, including schools, day care centers and health facilities, according to government data.

Timbal noted that since Ondoys onslaught, flood control programs have been accelerated, and waterways clearing operations have been continuous to prevent clogging.

Kita niyo po, successful na ang easement ng Pasig River at saka ng Marikina River pati iyong ating mga esteros sa Kamaynilaan ay na-decongest na. Na-relocate natin ang informal settlers sa safer areas, Timbal said.

[Translation: As you can see, easements of both the Pasig River and Marikina River have been successful. Estuaries in Metro Manila have also been decongested. We have also relocated informal settlers into safer areas.]

He added they also continue to train and assist local governments on disaster response.
Wedding gowns line the walls of Lovely Bride Philadelphia in Philadelphia, Pa. on Thursday, August 27, 2020. Owner Ivy Solomon noted that while some wedding vendors have suffered heavily due to the coronavirus pandemic, many brides still want a gown, regardless of the size of the wedding celebration. Read more

Weddings are supposed to be about love and togetherness. But when too much togetherness could violate the law, couples must decide whether to hold on to their dreams or go a different way.

The wedding website The Knot estimates that one million weddings in the United States this year will be affected by the pandemic. From the start of the restrictions in mid-March, many couples rescheduled to 2021 or even 2022. Others agreed to smaller affairs on or near their chosen date, perhaps under tents newly erected outside the catering venues. Some others have thrown caution to the wind, opting for a party they hope will not end up on the news someday.

Also out there are couples who drastically downsized, exchanging vows in a backyard with family, a few masked friends, and a Zoom setup. The dream of a reception had faded into the reality of an uncertain future.

Where there is talk of love, there is also talk of money. The pandemic has a steep price tag.

The market-research company IBISWorld estimates that downsizing, postponements, and cancellations due to COVID-19 will cost wedding and events companies over $670 million  a tiny fraction of an estimated $74 billion U.S. industry, but a loss nonetheless.

Fewer tux rentals. Smaller photo packages. And, in some cases, scuttled receptions, which have left some couples demanding refunds of their down payments with caterers, typically at least $5,000.

 READ MORE: Brides say yes to the dress, even as pandemic disrupts wedding plans

Online wedding forums are abuzz with couples who contend that they have been offered new dates that either do not work or are unrealistic because no one knows when life will return to normal. The deposits are nonrefundable, as the contracts state, and the law is generally on the caterers' side, even though neither the couples nor the caterers are responsible for the disruption.

While we are anxious to do everything we can to get everyone as close to their dreams and plans as we can, the reality of the situation is that we are also suffering in this pandemic and simply do not have the means to make everyone whole, said Jeffrey Miller, whose JAM Catering is one of the regions largest off-premises caterers, with exclusive rights to 17 venues in the Philadelphia area, including the John James Audubon Center, Tyler Arboretum, and Waterloo Village. Weddings are all JAM does.

Disrupted plans

Nicholas Sandercock, a lawyer based in Allentown, filed a writ of summons against JAM on behalf of a client. When you contract for a wedding, you give them a chunk of money, said Sandercock. You would assume that the money was being reserved for your wedding, and it seems theyre living on that.

This rankles Miller. People have a misperception of the business, Miller said. I cant fault them. What they dont see is the money weve spent getting ready for their event. He employs a staff of 100, including bookkeepers, kitchen workers, warehouse workers, and groundskeepers, all of whom he says are directly involved.

Same for Joe Volpe, who owns Cescaphe, a large Philadelphia on-premises catering company. At the signing of the contract, Cescaphe charges a planning fee  not a deposit  of $5,000. Unlike most caterers, Cescaphe does not require installments; the balance is due a week before the wedding.

Volpe said nearly all of his 350 wedding clients in 2020 at such venues as Vie, the Lucy, Tendenza, and Cescaphe had moved or shrunk their affairs to what he called microweddings" of fewer than 25 people.

Miller also estimated that virtually all of his clients  about 400 couples this year  had held or moved their affairs.

It has worked out for Jackie Martinez and Phil Headen, who had booked their Curtis Arboretum wedding, scheduled for Oct. 18, 2020, through JAM.

They had no complaints about sliding their reception to June 6, 2021. We felt like [June] would be a better fit for us because we have people traveling from all over and the variables are so great, said Martinez, 32, who is chief of staff for a director at the National Institutes of Health. Headen, 30, is a project manager for a software company. They said they didnt have to pay a surcharge to clinch a Sunday in June.

Sarah Morrison, 31, a podiatric surgeon, and Wylie Belasik, 36, who owns a gym, agreed to move their JAM wedding at the American Swedish Museum from Sept. 6, 2020, to Aug. 13, 2021, when they realized that their 140-person wedding would be capped at 50 people. They had a small ceremony on their previously scheduled day. I guess well renew our vows next August, Morrison said. Its a Friday the 13th. What more could go wrong?

Refunds on hold

Miller said JAM has been in the red. Revenue for the first six months of 2020 tallied nearly $447,000 while expenses totaled nearly $2.9 million, according to an accounting he provided. The company received $1,050,000 in Paycheck Protection Program loans, he said, but it still forced him to choose. Do I pay for [100 employees] health insurance [a total of $130,501], or provide larger refunds for our couples? Miller asked. He said he has given out a few hundred thousand dollars in partial refunds  with the understanding that cashing the checks cancels the contracts. Miller also said couples could apply money toward a future event.

Theresa Edler, whose daughter Caroline balked when she learned that her JAM wedding at Tyler Arboretum would be moved outdoors to a tent and that indoor dancing would be limited to 25 people, scoffed at Millers explanation. What this is saying to me is, Its been a horrible year for everyone, and because JAM has to maintain their level of service to the industry, we will take the deposits from all of the couples involved and utilize them to sustain our operations in the future. 

 READ MORE: Can I get married during the coronavirus?

Caroline Edler, 29, and Christian Benincasa, 28, were married Sept. 3 at Tyler, which had retained $1,000 of their deposit, and had a reception for 23 people in the Edlers' backyard in Havertown, remaining under the 25-person limit for gatherings. JAM still has their deposit of $4,000.

Benincasa filed a complaint with the Attorney Generals Office, one of 20 lodged recently against wedding caterers, a state spokesperson said Sept. 22.

Although the offices Bureau of Consumer Protection mediates disputes between consumers and businesses, it cannot compel a company to issue a refund and can step in only if it feels that the law is being violated. JAM cited the contract language in its response to the complaint.

In the case of Barbara A. Penny and Lawrence F. Delp, whose wedding was scheduled for Aug. 14, 2020, at John J. Audubon Center, its a substantial deposit.

Penny, 67, a lawyer, and Delp, 69, a retired banker, paid $14,475 to JAM in a series of installments starting March 3, about two weeks before the coronavirus restrictions began. The couple kept up payments. In mid-July, as government restrictions mounted, Penny and Delp said they realized that they were putting their guests at too much risk. They said they were offered restricted midweek dates in 2021 at the Audubon Center and other select JAM venues, but not preferred weekend dates  even though availability existed  unless they paid an additional $6,000.

Of the $8,625 paid to JAM for catering, the company offered a refund of $3,500 if a letter of release was executed. If the couple refused to sign the letter, JAMs refund would be $2,375. Audubon returned the facility fee, $5,850, in full.

Penny and Delp were married in their backyard on Aug. 9. The amount of work performed on our wedding event equated to two phone conversations, a couple of emails, and a tasting dinner for two, they wrote in an accounting of the expenses. They said they would like a refund of all but $1,000. They have not heard anything further from JAM.

Tom Wingert, 33, a marketing manager for Lululemon, and Anastasia Wohar, 34, an attorney, are planning a creative spin, if they need to.

Their black-tie wedding for 200 people was on the books for Aug. 8, 2020, at the Horticulture Center in Fairmount Park. In April, Wohar wrote to Constellation Catering to ask for remedies. I dont see a celebration with social distancing and a pandemic going on, said Wohar. To me, thats not a wedding. They chose a new date for the reception  Aug. 21, 2021  but got married on Aug. 29, 2020, with 14 people.

But what happens if next August it doesnt feel safe to have a celebration?

Theres two options, she said. We would either cut down our guest list to the appropriate number, or  and I dont want to use the word sell, but we would try to sell our contract to somebody who would want a Saturday date in August and would be comfortable with it. That way we, as in us and the venue, wont be losing any money. If the venue is open to it, we could transfer the contract to a new couple.
Murder detectives are investigating the disappearance of a crew member on a North Sea ferry 40 years ago amid new fears that he was pushed overboard.

Kevin Dundon, 22, went missing after he was seen washing dishes in the galley of the Townsend Thoresen ferry Viking Viscount on September 21, 1980.

It was thought that Mr Dundon from Clacton-on-Sea, Essex, may have gone into the sea, but a search failed to find his body.

Detectives have now taken new statements from people on board who believe he was a victim of foul play when he vanished 26 miles off Felixstowe, Suffolk.

Andy Guy, the Major Crime Review and Unsolved Case Manager for Norfolk and Suffolk Police, said: 'There seems to be growing support to suggest Kevin's disappearance was not accidental.'

Detectives are now appealing for new witnesses to come forward.

Kevin Dundon, 22 (pictured), went missing after he was seen washing dishes in the galley of the Townsend Thoresen ferry Viking Viscount on September 21, 1980

They are convinced that someone among the 86 crew and the 600 passengers on the ferry knows what happened to him.

Mr Dundon had only joined the Viking Viscount three days before disappearing on a return trip to Felixstowe from the Belgian port of Zeebrugge.

The last confirmed sightings of him were at 6.30pm when he left the galley through a door taking him to either the toilets or the deck.

Announcements were made over the public address system asking him to return before searches began on the ship.

Emergency services were informed that Mr Dundon was missing at 10.45pm - two hours after the ferry docked at Felixstowe.

The Viking Viscount left for Zeebrugge again at 11pm and joined three other ships, searching for him near the Galloper lightship until around 1.30am.

Thirty witness statements were taken at the time from people on the ferry, mainly crew members.

It emerged that Mr Dundon had spent time in the staff mess room which was frequented by crew and passengers invited in as guests.

His brothers, Jimmy, Tom and Danny Dundon, have always believed he was a victim of foul play.

Tom Dundon, 63, of Clacton-on-Sea said: 'The police cold case team contacted us again about four or five years to get DNA because the technology for it did not exist at the time.

'We spoke to them again. They re-interviewed everybody who was spoken to at the time and others who were not spoken to.

'They believe now, as we have always done, that he didn't go missing and something happened to him.

Kevin Dundon's three brothers Jimmy, Tom and Danny Dundon (pictured) have always believed he was a victim of foul play. Pictured from left to right are Danny, 60, Jimmy, 65, and Tom, 63

'When the boat docked at Felixstowe, a member of the crew went straight to the ship's padre and told him stuff.

'I got a call from the padre that night. He said he had heard some disturbing stuff, but he couldn't tell me what it was.

'This time, the police have been much more pro-active and they have been up and down the country interviewing people.

'We thought for years that they had brushed it away and nothing would happen.

'The sea at the time was like a pond. It was bright and calm, and you could see for miles and miles.'

Tom described his brother as 'always happy and chilled and really relaxed'.

He added: 'He loved music, buying new clothes and had a local girlfriend.'

Tom and his brothers said in a statement that their parents and sister Jennifer have all since died without knowing what had happened to Mr Dundon.

They added: 'Seeing our family being torn apart with grief was virtually unbearable.

'We remember that day vividly because the rest of the family were visiting Norfolk. It was a clear dry day with very good visibility into the evening, we were told the conditions were the same aboard the ferry.

Tom and his brothers said in a statement that their parents - Paddy and Rita (pictured) - and sister Jennifer have all since died without knowing what had happened to Mr Dundon

'Under these circumstances it is extremely unlikely Kevin could have gone overboard without being seen.

'We implore anyone aboard the Viking Viscount that evening who may remember anything - however small - about the incident, to please contact the police.

'It could be that a friend or relative may have mentioned something over the years and it would mean everything for us to finally know what happened to Kevin that evening, and finally give us closure.'

Mr Guy added: 'The original investigation faced some considerable hurdles due to the fact Kevin was on a ferry 26 miles out at sea when he was last seen alive, and which was carrying almost 700 souls.

Kevin was described by his brother Tom as 'always happy and chilled and really relaxed'. He added: 'He loved music, buying new clothes and had a local girlfriend'

'The matter was further complicated due to the fact a majority of the passengers on board appear to have travelled using a '60-Day Identity Card', rather than a passport and because the ID of the holder was not logged with the shipping company, not every passenger was identified and traced.

'Over the last two years we have identified and taken statements from individuals who were not seen at the time, but were on board the Viking Viscount with Kevin. There seems to be growing support to suggest Kevin's disappearance was not accidental.

'Although Kevin had only been with that ship for three days, if anyone does have answers as to what happened to him, it will come from his colleagues amongst the ship's crew, or people he came into contact with in the mess room.

'It is highly unlikely that Kevin was still on the ship when it docked at Felixstowe.

'I believe there are individuals who were on that ferry that know what happened to Kevin, but have not previously told us. Kevin's parents died without knowing what happened to their son, but there are three brothers who deserve to be given some answers and closure about the fate of their sibling.'

Anyone who believes they have information about Kevin Dundon's disappearance, is asked to contact the Joint Norfolk and Suffolk Major Crime Review and Unsolved Case Team on: 01953 423819 or by emailing: unsolvedcasereviews@norfolk.pnn.police.uk

Alternatively, contact the charity Crimestoppers 100% anonymously on 0800 555 111, or via their online form: www.crimestoppers-uk.org.
The conference should have full authority to launch a genuine peace process based on international law, Abbas told the virtual General Assembly in a recorded address

Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas appealed Friday to the United Nations for an international conference on the Middle East in 2021, hoping for a new start after US elections and the milestone of Gulf Arabs' recognition of Israel.

In an address to the General Assembly, Abbas asked Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to convene the meeting on the Palestinian issue "early next year" and bring in "all relevant parties."

"The conference should have full authority to launch a genuine peace process based on international law," Abbas told the virtual General Assembly in a recorded address.

"It should aim to end the occupation and grant the Palestinian people their freedom and independence in their own state along the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital and settle final-status issues, notably the refugee question," he said.

Abbas made his appeal amid concerns among Palestinians of dwindling support in the Arab world for their decades-long campaign for an independent state.

The United Arab Emirates and Bahrain earlier this month agreed to recognize Israel, a major coup for Israel and diplomatic win for US President Donald Trump.

The two Arab states, while saying they still support a Palestinian state, share the concerns of Israel and the United States about neighboring Iran.

Abbas said: "It is delusional to think that the Palestinian people could be sidelined."

"You should all know that there can be no peace, no security, no stability or coexistence in our region without an end to the occupation and without a just and comprehensive solution to the Palestinian question," he said.

The Palestinian Authority has refused diplomatic efforts by Trump due to his administration's staunch advocacy of Israel.

If Trump loses in November 3 elections, the conference sought by Abbas would take place under a US president Joe Biden, who is also a supporter of Israel but has vowed to promote a two-state solution.

The Palestinians have also agreed to hold elections in early 2021 as the shock of the Gulf Arabs' moves sparks new talks of reconciliation between Abbas' Fatah movement and Hamas, the Islamist militant group that runs the Gaza Strip.

Pope backs multilateralism

Pope Francis, addressing the world body for the first time in five years, distanced himself implicitly with Trump's "America First" ideology.

"At present we are witnessing an erosion of multilateralism, which is all the more serious in light of the development of new forms of military technology," he said in his video address.

"We need to break with the present climate of distrust," he said.

He said the world faced a choice between multilateralism and a path towards nationalism, protectionism and isolation.

"It excludes the poor, the vulnerable, and those dwelling on the peripheries of life," Francis said, warning that such a path would be "detrimental to the whole community."

The pontiff also called for a relaxing of international sanctions, which he called harmful to civilians around the world.

The UN General Assembly each year packs 10,000 world leaders, delegates and observers into a few congested stretches of New York, which becomes a hub for face-to-face diplomacy.

Due to the coronavirus, this year's summit is almost entirely virtual, with leaders sending in recorded addresses.

The summit has nonetheless been characterized by angry exchanges between the United States and China.

Trump used his speech on Tuesday to demand action against China over the "plague" of Covid-19, which he blamed on Beijing as it initially covered up news of the disease.

China's ambassador to the United Nations hit back by questioning the competence of the United States, which has suffered the world's highest death toll.

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Britain has recorded another 6,042 coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours - with 34 deaths - as a government infectious disease expert predicts that the UK is two to three weeks away from recording 100 fatalities a day.

While the cases are an increase of 1,620 from last Saturday, many experts say the daily totals for testing are not comparable to the same totals at the peak of the pandemic when the country's testing programme was much smaller.

More than 100,000 people are believed to have been catching the virus every day at the peak of the pandemic.

Nevertheless the country is gripped by a debate over the severity of the new increase in coronavirus cases in the UK, with some arguing that new medical breakthroughs mean the disease is more treatable resulting n fewer fatalities.

Many Conservative MPs also argue that the social cost of ever more stringent lockdown measures are causing more damage than the virus itself.

The 6,042 cases in the last 24 hours mark a 1,620-case rise on last Saturday, when 4,422 people were diagnosed with the disease, while yesterday saw another 6,874 infections. Data shows the rolling seven-day average of daily cases has surged by 54 per cent in a week.

Infections were squashed well below 1,000 from late June until early August following the lockdown in spring, but Covid-19 cases have been on the rise ever since.

The death toll now stands at 41,971, and Government statistics show fatalities are beginning to rise as well after infections began spiralling earlier this month. On average, 30 Britons are succumbing to the illness each day, 11 more than last week. It had dropped to a low of seven at the start of September.

It comes as in other coronavirus news:

Anti-lockdown protesters clash with police in Trafalgar Square, London, as 15,000 turn out for the march;

Welsh First Minister has advised the nation to already behave as though the restrictions are in force - which include a ban on travelling outside of the designated area without a 'reasonable excuse';

Sadiq Khan calls for stricter coronavirus measures in London warning the capital could go the same way as Birmingham, the North West and the North East unless action is taken now.

Unions call for in-person classes to be suspended as 3,000 students are put on lockdown for two weeks inside their halls;

A newlyweds reception party in locked-down Swansea is stormed by police after dozens of guests cram into the enclosed space.

Britain's coronavirus R rate could now be as high as 1.5, government scientific advisers warned on Friday after rises in all regions of the country

Infectious disease modelling expert Professor Graham Medley, who sits on the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) warns that it is 'inevitable' deaths will head into triple figures because the virus remains 'dangerous' to the community.

The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine professor said that if the UK starts recording 10,000 cases a day, and the disease retains a death rate of one per cent, deaths will reach 100 a day.

Office workers 'to wear masks in corridors, lifts and communal areas' Health chiefs are mulling over plans to impose face masks in offices, it has been reported. The stricter measures would see white-collar workers not required to wear a mask when sitting, but needing to have one on when in corridors, lifts or communal spaces. The rules will be part of a wider crackdown for indoor workspaces, where Public Health England data reveals 18 per cent of 729 respiratory disease outbreaks were recorded in the week to September 13. It also shows only five per cent occurred in food outlets, 45 per cent in care homes and 21 per cent in schools. A Minister told the Daily Express: 'The rules are going to be widened. We have to accept that this is going to be a new way of living that will be around for some-time and get used to it. 'The fines do send a strong, clear message about how to behave.' Further restrictions are also expected to be imposed nationwide in the coming weeks if the rule of six and 10pm curfew fails to stymie the number of new cases reported. Local authorities have already started pursuing a ban on mixing in other households, with mounting calls for this measure to be rolled out to the whole of the UK over fears lessons are yet to be learnt from March. Advertisement

At the height of the pandemic between April 2 and 18 Britain was recording in excess of 800 deaths a day, while recording around 4,000 positive cases a day. But testing capacity was far behind demand, meaning the vast majority of cases were missed, compounding calculations for a death rate. The World Health Organisation says the death rate from coronavirus stands between 0.5 and one per cent, based on available data.

Almost a quarter of the UK's population are set to live under tightened coronavirus restrictions after Leeds, Wigan, Stockport and Blackpool in England and Llanelli, Cardiff and Swansea in Wales were added to the UK's lockdown list.

Speaking on the Today programme Professor Medley said that although treatments had improved, the way the virus is transmitted is 'going to be different'.

'Now whether it is as many - in February and March we were essentially assuming one per cent of infections would lead to deaths. Now even if that is 0.8 per cent, which I think would be a great success in terms of treatment, it still means that we are going to see deaths increase,' he said.

'At a level of 10,000 (cases) we are seeing now, means that in three or four weeks we are going to see 100 deaths a day.

'In order to stop that process increasing again, then we need to make sure that that transmission comes down now because that doubling time will carry on. The things that we do now will not stop 100 people dying a day but they will stop that progressing much higher.'

Britain's outbreak was initially concentrated in 20 to 40-year-olds, according to official data, but has since spread to older sections of the population that are more at risk from the disease.

It was suggested those over 45 were at greater risk from the virus, and more likely to die from it, so could be 'segmented' from the rest of the population. The suggestion, revealed in papers from SAGE, was eventually advised against, as it was considered unlikely to be successful.

However, it is being kept under review, and news of it follows a similar option drawn up by officials to potentially target over-50s with another lockdown.

The minutes of the 48th meeting of the SAGE scientists, held on July 23, state: 'Although under-45s are at less risk from Covid-19, including lower risk of death, they are nonetheless at some risk and long-term sequelae (consequences) are not well understood.'

The document adds: 'Around two-thirds of people in the UK live in a household which includes one or more individuals aged 45 and above. Any segmentation based on this age threshold would therefore affect most households.'

The 'segmentation' looked at would have involved those over 45 shielding, which early in the pandemic meant staying at home, and avoiding unnecessary contact with others.

Yesterday saw another 6,874 Covid-19 cases recorded, meaning the seven-day rolling average is 54 per cent higher than it was a week ago. MailOnline analysis shows this is the sixth consecutive day the average compared to the week before has risen

Friday saw another 6,874 Covid-19 cases recorded, meaning the seven-day rolling average is 54 per cent higher than it was a week ago. MailOnline analysis shows this is the sixth consecutive day the average compared to the week before has risen

WHAT ARE THE SYMPTOMS OF LONG COVID AND HOW BAD IS THE PROBLEM? Covid-19 is described as a short-term illness caused by infection with the novel SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. Public health officials tend to say people will recover within two weeks or so. However it's become increasingly clear that this is not the case for everyone, and that the two-week period is only the 'acute illness' phase. The North Bristol NHS Trust's Discover project, which is studying the longer-term effects of coronavirus, is just one of a handful of studies to have shown the long impact of Covid-19. However it only studied hospital patients. A total of 163 patients with coronavirus were recruited to the study. Nineteen of those died. The remainder were invited for a three-month check-up and 110 attended. Most (74 per cent) had at least one persistent symptom after twelve weeks. The most common were: Excessive fatigue: 39%

Breathlessness: 39%

Insomnia: 24%

Muscle pain: 23%

Chest pain: 13%

Cough: 12%

Loss of smell: 12%

Headache, fever, joint pain and diarrhoea: Each less than 10% Patients who had suffered more severe Covid-19 reported more symptoms on their follow-up. Other long term symptoms that have been reported by Covid-19 survivors, both suspected and confirmed, anecdotally, include: Hearing problems

'Brain fog'

Memory loss

A lack of concentration

Mental health problems

Hair loss The impact of long Covid on people who had mild illness have not been studied in depth yet. Data from the King's College London symptom tracking app shows that up to 500,000 people in the UK are currently suffering from the long-term effects of Covid-19. That's according to the founder of the Long Covid Support Group, Claire Hastie, who said the lasting effects of Covid-19 had left her wheelchair-bound after being diagnosed in March. A survey recently found a third of British doctors have treated patients with long term Covid-19 symptoms, including chronic fatigue and anosmia. Advertisement

Minutes from July 16 note there is likely to be 'merit' in segmenting society by age, particularly 'to vulnerable people and those likely to have more contact with vulnerable people'.

It continues: 'Data shows that people tend to have more contacts with others around their own age, but also have a significant number of contacts with those 20-30 years older and younger than themselves (likely to mainly be contacts between parents and children).

'There are also significant levels of contact between grandparents and children.'

Figures reveal that children and those aged below 45 are at far lower risk of dying from coronavirus than those aged over 75.

Office for National Statistics data reveals only four Covid-19 deaths were recorded in children aged one to 14 years old in England and Wales, or less than 0.01 per cent of the total. And 574 have been recorded in those aged 15 to 44, or 0.96 per cent of the total.

In comparison, 39,058 people aged 75 and over have died from the virus, or 65 per cent of the total.

The difference led a scientific paper published in Nature in July to conclude that those aged 80 and over are more than a hundred times more likely to die from the virus than patients aged 40 and below.

Despite the gap in risk of death, however, there have been warnings over long Covid, or where symptoms persist after the disease subsides, which could already affect more than 60,000 people in the UK.

On Wednesday MPs called on the Government to address this problem, and admit that it exists, stating they had heard moving statements from those who had recovered but still suffered from fatigue, heart palpitations and breathing difficulties.

Layla Moran, chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on coronavirus said Westminster must commit further resources to investigating and tackling the problem.

Writing in the British Medical Journal, she said as the number of people suffering long Covid increases the situation will become 'more and more urgent'.

'In August, we heard from people living with long Covid and hundreds more sufferers admitted written evidence to our inquiry.

'Their testimonials were incredibly moving and concerning. What was clear was that we needed to make some urgent recommendations to the Prime Minister; the health, well-being and employment arrangements for those living with long Covid remain unaddressed.

'And as the number of people with long Covid grows, the situation gets more and more urgent.'

One of the victims was Claire Hastie, who is the founder of the Long Covid Support Group on Facebook.

She described how she used to cycle 13 miles to work but since her Covid-19 diagnosis in March, can no longer walk 13 metres and is now largely confined to a wheelchair with her children providing much of her care.

Dr Jake Suett, a staff grade doctor in anaesthetics and intensive care medicine who also suffers from long Covid, said that since catching the disease he has no longer being able to do 12-hour shifts in intensive care.

'And now a flight of stairs or the food shop is about what I can manage before I have to stop... if I'm on my feet then shortness of breath comes back, chest pain comes back.'

SAGE minutes have also revealed that the group considered a 'segmentation and protection strategy', where vulnerable parts of society are placed into lockdown to avoid a surge in deaths from the disease.

SAGE said up to two-thirds of the UK lives in mixed-age households, making the plan unworkable. Above are students enjoying a night out in Birmingham yesterday

SAGE considered a plan where those aged over 45 would be asked to shield while the rest of the population continued moving around. It is being kept under review. (Stock image)

Daughter stuck in Wales after flying 9,500 miles from Australia to be by dying father's bedside Pearl Findlay-James pictured with her father Patrick James A daughter has been stranded in Wales due to coronavirus restrictions after she flew 9,500 miles from Australia to say goodbye to her father. Pearl Findlay-James was allowed to leave the state of Victoria on compassionate grounds, and be at her father's bedside in Pembroke Dock, west Wales, but is now unable to get home. She had already paid for a ticket to Melbourne at AUS$8,900 (5,000) but, after the flight was cancelled, was forced to pay an additional AUS$4,000 (2,200) for a new ticket to Sydney. She will have to spend a further AUS$3,000 (1,600) on quarantine measures when she eventually returns home. Her father, Patrick James, died four days after she arrived in the UK. 'My whole family are in Australia. My husband, my children and my 10 grandchildren. It's time to go home,' she said. 'The UK is heading into its second wave and I'm worried this will make it even harder to get home. 'I've joked to my daughters - you better get ready to cook the Christmas turkey, because I don't know if I'm going to be there. 'I can take to my grave that I sat and held my dad while he went to God. 'Nobody can ever take that away from me, no matter what my journey is now.' Advertisement

The strategy, presented to the group by Professor Mark Whoolhouse, from the University of Edinburgh, would use an algorithm to identify those most at risk by accounting for age, ethnicity and health conditions.

They would be placed into lockdown, where they are trusted to avoid high risk locations and interactions, alongside a designated carer. This would allow parts of society, such as those who are healthy and of working age, to continue to contribute to the economy.

But SAGE did not advise that the Government follows this strategy, citing ethical concerns. Professor Woolhouse wrote: 'Segmentation and protection raises ethical questions as some measures are targeted at subsets of the population.

'However, lockdown also raises ethical questions as the benefits are felt mainly by those same subsets of the population. It needs to be understood that there are no easy options available.'

After seven more local lockdowns were announced yesterday in the North West and South Wales, Health Secretary Matt Hancock said it was in response to the 'acceleration' of Covid-19 across the country.

'Working alongside our scientific and public health experts and local leaders, we are prepared to take swift and decisive action to reduce transmission of the virus and protect communities,' he said. 'I recognise the burden and impact these additional measures have on our daily lives but we must act collectively and quickly to bring down infections.'

Matt Hancock said the strict lockdown measures are in line with those seen in Leicester, where they have successfully quelled a surge in cases, and the West Midlands.

'This will be difficult news for the people living in these areas, profoundly affecting their daily lives,' he said. 'These decisions are not taken lightly, and such measures will be kept under review and in place no longer than they are necessary.'

The tightened restrictions come after a surge in cases in the areas. The latest seven-day Covid-19 rate in Leeds was found to be 113.3 per 100,000 people, according to Government figures, while Leeds director of public health Victoria Eaton said there was an 8.4 per cent positive test rate.

The seven-day rolling average in Blackpool has risen from 48.8 per 100,000 a week ago to 69.6 per 100,000 on Friday, the Government's coronavirus dashboard shows. The rate in Wigan has risen to 122.6 per 100,000 people, while in Stockport it is up to 77.4 per 100,000 people.

On Thursday, Cardiff Council leader Huw Thomas said the capital had seen 38.2 cases of Covid-19 per 100,000 people over the past five days. Swansea's rate is 49.8.

Over the past seven days Cardiff's positivity rate has hit 3.8 per cent, exceeding the Welsh Government's 'amber' threshold of 2.5 per cent - part of its 'traffic light road map' strategy for managing the pandemic.

The leader of Leeds city council, Judith Blake, said there was 'a lot of confusion' and 'a lack of clarity' this morning as the draconian rules came into force in the city.

She told BBC Breakfast: 'We know that the restrictions themselves won't just work on their own, it has to come as part of a whole raft of measures in the city.

'The important message that we know from other areas is there is a lot of confusion, a lack of clarity, particularly in areas where there are different rules in one borough and the next-door borough has another one. This has to be a wake-up call to people.

'If things carry on the way they are, then I can't see how the Government won't be forced to take more measures that have more of an impact on our lives, on our ability to go out and do the things we need to do to keep the economy going.'

LEEDS: Revellers crowded into bars, pubs and restaurants as cases there rise to 113.3 per 100,000, according to figures

LEEDS: Two women enjoy a night out in the city ahead of the imposition of restrictions banning households from mixing

BLACKPOOL: A group of friends enjoy a night out ahead of further restrictions being imposed in a bid to curb rising cases

Leeds' director of public health Ms Eaton told reporters last night that the spread of the virus is 'very dynamic' across the city and that it was 'clear we have very widespread community transmission'.

'We have high rates in some of our student areas which we have increased more recently. It's clearly not just an issue for student areas,' she said, before warning cases wererising in all age groups and that compliance with self-isolation rules was low.'

Welsh First Minister Mark Drakeford has urged people in Cardiff to start behaving as though the new restrictions are in place, even though they do not come into force until Sunday evening.

He told LBC that police enforcement was the last resort, adding: 'If there are people who clearly deliberately flout the law you have to enforce.

'Yes, with fines if necessary. But for us that's the last resort, not the first resort. In Caerphilly (the first area in Wales to be locked down) we have had very, very good levels of co-operation. My experience is people are wanting to do the right thing.

The nation's health minister, Vaughan Gething warned the spiralling infections are comparable to the end of February where 'we ended large parts of NHS activity about two weeks later'.

He added: 'We have seen a sharp rise in cases in all of the areas where we are taking local restrictions and it is being driven by indoor household contact, so more people than should be in that household bubble going in and mixing.

'That has extended out into licensed premises as well, where again people are not following the rules.'

The latest data for Cardiff on the Government's dashboard shows the seven-day rolling average of cases surged to 21.9 per 100,000 on September 18, up from 11.6 a week ago. And in Swansea they have more than tripled from 6.4 per 100,000 on September 11 to 19.4 a week later.

Public Health England data shows only a handful of London's 32 boroughs are now seeing a sustained rise in infections - including Redbridge, Hounslow, Barking and Dagenham and Enfield. The data is set to be updated on Friday, but gives an indication of which boroughs are struggling the most

Blackpool has been exempt from restrictions imposed in the rest of Lancashire until today, with the seaside resort now brought in line with its neighbours.

Scott Benton, Conservative MP for Blackpool South, said the area initially avoided restrictions as its infection rate was 23 cases per 100,000 but that by Wednesday this had surged to 63 cases per 100,000, still below the average for the whole of Lancashire but a significant rise.

Mr Benton said on Facebook: 'The rise in cases is particularly high in areas of north Blackpool and the evidence is that this is due to transmission within the community rather than as a result of tourism (this explains why our local infection rate has remained low in comparison to other areas in the North West despite visitors coming here all summer).

'It is vital that we take sensible steps now to reduce the rate of transmission which is why these new restrictions are being applied.

'Nobody wants a second full lockdown and that idea behind these new rules is to slow the spread of Covid-19 so that we do not end up in a position where a full lockdown has to be considered.'

Wigan is to have restrictions reimposed after they were first eased on August 26 as case numbers surge again. Stockport is also seeing restrictions reimposed after a ban on mixing in each other's households was lifted on September 2.
New Delhi: In a powerful opening remark at the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday (September 26) made a strong pitch for reforms at the United Nations asking, "Till when will India be kept away from the UN's decision-making process?"

"Reform in the responses, in the processes, in the character of the United Nations is the need of the hour. It is a fact that the faith and respect that the United Nations enjoys in India are unparalleled. But it is also true that the people of India have been waiting for a long time for the completion of the reforms of the United Nations. Today, people of India are concerned whether this reform-process will ever reach its logical conclusion?," opined PM Modi.

Highlighting India's credential for the high table, he expressed, "For how long will India be kept out of the decision-making structures of the United Nations? A country, which is the largest democracy of the world, A country with more than 18% of the world population, A country, which has hundreds of languages, hundreds of dialects, many sects, many ideologies, A country, which was a leading global economy for centuries and also one which has seen hundreds of years of foreign rule."

For how long will India be kept out of the decision-making structures of the @UN? This is a country which is the largest democracy in the world. This is a country with more than 18% of the world population: Prime Minister of India, @narendramodi at the #UNGA pic.twitter.com/DaMCENFVJE  United Nations in India (@UNinIndia) September 26, 2020

He added, "When we were strong, we did not trouble the world; when we were weak, we did not become a burden on the world. How long would a country have to wait particularly when the changes happening in that country affect a large part of the world?"

Live TV

"The ideals on which the United Nations was founded are quite similar to that of India and not different from its own fundamental philosophy. The words Vasudhaiv Kutumbakam, the whole world is a family, have often reverberated in this hall of the United Nations," stated PM Modi.

He also expressed, "We treat the whole world as one family. It is part of our culture, character and thinking. In the United Nations too, India has always given priority to the welfare of the whole world. India is the country, which sent its brave soldiers to about 50 peacekeeping missions. India is the country that has lost the maximum number of its brave soldiers in the course of establishing peace. Today every Indian, while seeing the contribution of India in the United Nations, aspires for Indias expanded role in the United Nations."



India has sent its brave soldiers to about 50 peacekeeping missions the world over. And India has lost the maximum number of its brave soldiers in the course of maintaining peace: Prime Minister of India, @narendramodi at the #UNGA pic.twitter.com/dNXnuPZKef  United Nations in India (@UNinIndia) September 26, 2020

PM Modi also mentioned the ongoing COVID-19 crisis and said, "Even during these very difficult times of a raging pandemic, the pharma industry of India has sent essential medicines to more than 150 countries."

He added, "As the largest vaccine producing country of the world, I want to give one more assurance to the global community today, Indias vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis. We are moving ahead with phase 3 clinical trials in India and in our neighbourhood. India will also help all the countries in enhancing their cold chain and storage capacities for the delivery of vaccines."

Indias vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis. PM @NarendraModi at #UNGA pic.twitter.com/WWNNpiOr1Z  India at UN, NY (@IndiaUNNewYork) September 26, 2020

PM Modi also talked about India's responsibility as a non-permanent member of the Security Council from January 2021 and said, "I express my gratitude to all our fellow countries who have bestowed this trust upon India. We will use the prestige and experience of the largest democracy for the benefit of the whole world. Our path goes from human welfare to the welfare of the World."

He added that India will always speak in support of peace, security and prosperity and will not hesitate in raising its voice against the enemies of humanity, the human race and human values  terrorism, smuggling of illegal weapons, drugs and money-laundering.



India always speak for peace, security and prosperity.#PMModiAtUN pic.twitter.com/8n9SXwRGRm  Anurag Srivastava (@MEAIndia) September 26, 2020

"Indias cultural heritage, tradition, thousands of years of experience will always stand in good stead for the developing countries. Indias experiences, Indias developmental journey with its ups and downs will strengthen the way towards world welfare," said PM Modi.
A 36-year-old man faces an impaired driving charge after a vehicle crashed into a parked car Thursday night on King Street in Port Colborne.

Niagara Regional Police allege Christopher Vennell, of Port Colborne, was driving his 2015 Kia down King Street when he struck a 2015 Nissan near Charles Street.

Police said Vennell was seen walking away from the scene and that Welland detectives who were in the area at the time located him.

He was arrested for impaired driving and operating a vehicle with a blood alcohol concentration of more than 80 mg, and also treated for minor injuries.

Damage to both vehicles was described as moderate.

Vennell was issued an administrative drivers licence suspension and prohibited from operating a motor vehicle for 90 days.

He was later released from police custody and will appear in court at a later date.
Full coverage: President Donald Trumps rally at central Pennsylvania airport

President Donald Trump held a rally at Harrisburg International Airport Saturday, his second campaign event in Pennsylvania in less than a week.

Earlier this week, Trump held a rally at Pittsburgh International Airport. He returned to the midstate as he aims to fire up supporters in a region where he retains strong support. Both Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, the former vice president, have made repeated visits to Pennsylvania in recent weeks.

The event has ended, but was streamed live. You can review the video below:

Cant see the video? Click here.

Hours ahead of the presidents expected arrival at 7 p.m., many supporters were already lining up to see him.

Trump won Pennsylvania by a narrow margin  less than 1 percentage point  but he became the first Republican presidential candidate to win the commonwealth since George H.W. Bush did it in 1988. His victory in Pennsylvania helped propel him to the White House.

More: Here are Trumps, Bidens positions on fracking, police, other issues that could decide Pennsylvania

President Donald Trump is holding a rally at Harrisburg International Airport Saturday, Sept. 26. Supporters arrive by buses for the rally. | Photo: Mark Pynes of PennLive

Biden, a Scranton native, is aiming to move Pennsylvania back to the blue column. Polls indicate a tight contest in Pennsylvania that political analysts say is up in the air.

Pennsylvania is viewed by many as the crucial state that could decide who wins the presidential election.

This story has been updated as the rally ended.

President Donald Trump arrives for a rally at Harrisburg International Airport, Saturday, Sept. 26.

More from PennLive

Pa. officials react to President Trumps Supreme Court nominee, Amy Coney Barrett

Joe Biden faults President Trumps coronavirus response ahead of HIA rally

The first debate between Trump and Biden just might be the decider | John Baer
Shoppers Stop, Indias leading fashion and beauty destination is implementing newer technologies to connect with its customers. The brand has radically transformed its online business strategy to make it more engaging than ever before. In the last six months, the brand stood up to the challenging times and created innovative solutions to assist customers with their shopping needs, leading to a digital transformation.

As a part of this transformation journey, the brand has moved on to a new enterprise solution  SAP, has digitally revamped its popular Loyalty Program  First Citizens and has now offered the customer the convenience of shopping across myriad platforms: In-Store, Online (website and Mobile App) and via WhatsApp calling connecting with the Personal Shopper Program. The brand has mapped the following services as a part of its transformative journey; thereby ensuring a convenient, safe, and delightful shopping experience whether in-store or online:

White Glove service: The industrys first-of-its-kind, unique and award-winning Personal Shoppers service from the brand is now also available through WhatsApp by way of virtual shopping assistance. Customers can book an appointment and consult a Personal Shopper on a WhatsApp call and choose products from the store or catalogue. They can buy them via a safe and secure SMS link and have them delivered to their home in a quick and safe manner. Click on this link to know more bit.ly/2RWyzZy or simply send a Hi! on 90043 94244 and connect with a Personal Shopper anywhere between 11 AM and 7 PM, any day.

The merchandise can be collected at the store or one can have it delivered to their doorstep. Over 300 Personal Shoppers have undergone 43,000+ hours of digital training to deliver the best service to the customers. These Personal Shoppers contribute approximately 15% to the Companys revenues.

Digital store: Online shopping is taking over the market faster than one can comprehend. The brand is expanding its reach across the digital marketplace with one of the best online shopping sites and Mobile App. Customers can shop from the comfort of their house via the website or from the Mobile App and avail a host of Home Services including safe and quick home delivery and contactless billing. The mobile app and website with an attractive design, and an easy to navigate UI (User Interface), makes the entire shopping experience convenient, effortless, and delightful. The brands digital services like Endless Aisle, Express Store pick-up (Click n Collect), and Ship From Store on the website (www.shoppersstop.com) provides quick and helpful solutions to ones shopping desires. The online Chat-Now feature also enables ease of access.

Customers can browse through exclusive offers and bag some of the best deals available to them. Best deals on top categories, free shipping, and options like cash on delivery provide them with a hassle-free online experience to Shop Anytime Anywhere. Shoppersstop.com is a one stop destination for a family's fashion needs.

Enhanced In-store offerings: A customer can enjoy the privileges of using the Personal Shoppers Lounge in-store, while the Personal Shoppers assist them in choosing the right fit and size with the help of specially trained personnel deployed in Shoppers Stop stores across the country. One can even try the outfits in exclusive sanitized trial rooms at the Lounge. Customers can experience the comfort of queue-less billing at the Lounge with a Mobile POS. All of this while enjoying the perks and services of the Lounge area. Customers can visit any nearest Shoppers Stop store and buy in person with their minds at ease since the brand has ensured all safety measures and guidelines are in place to provide a delightful and safe shopping experience to its customers.

Sharing the insights into this transformative journey, Ms. Uma Talreja, Customer Care Associate, Chief Marketing and Customer Officer at Shoppers Stop Ltd. said, Shoppers Stop has been the pioneer in creating experiences for consumers, during the pandemic our staff has been closely in touch with our First Citizens and we saw an opportunity and direct demand for digital services from a large base of our consumers. Transforming as a phygital retailer is inevitable and we have integrated unique physical services like the lounge in the store with digital appointments, and online consultation and shopping through WhatsApp, chat and the Shoppers Stop website and app.

Through its latest campaign My Shoppers Stop My Way, the brand has created a proposition empowering its customers to shop safely, comfortably, and at their convenience. No matter how you want to shop or where you want to shop from, Shoppers Stop is there for you. It aims at bringing back the joy of shopping which customers missed during the lockdown period and encourages customers to shop across platforms.

The brand has roped-in well-known celebrities and influencers for this two-week campaign. Celebrity power-couple, Neha Dhupia and Angad Bedi, shop online and on WhatsApp to avail the Virtual Home Service. The young, talented actress, Shriya Pilgaonkar will visit her nearest Shoppers Stop store and shop in a safe and secure environment. The brand has also got popular faces such as Kirti Kulhari and Aiyyo Shraddha on board.

So, whether you want to visit the store or shop online, Shoppers Stop has got you covered. Visit your nearest Shoppers Stop store, log on to the website www.shoppersstop.com, download the app available on Android and iOS, avail our WhatsApp services, Virtual Assistance, Home Services or simply talk to our Personal Shopper.
The Asylum and Migration Pact, which the EU Commission presented on Wednesday, is so cynical and inhumane it is hard to find words to describe it. Wrapped up in sugary phrases about values, responsibility and solidarity, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has presented a plan that means deportation, misery and certain death for hundreds of thousands.

Gunter Burkhardt, the managing director of charity Pro Asyl, called the plan a diabolical pact of disenfranchisement. Driven by right-wing populists, the EU Commission is betraying the right of asylum and the human rights of people seeking protection, he commented.

Von der Leyen described the pact as a new beginning after the dealings with those seeking refuge in Europe from the wars in the Middle East and Africa had repeatedly led to fierce disputes within the EU. Europe must move away from ad hoc solutions to problems and towards a predictable and reliable system for migration management, said the EU Commission president.

This management is focused on throwing out refugees who have managed to cross the borders of Fortress Europe at the risk of their lives. Elementary principles of the right of asylum and human rights fall by the wayside.

No refugee quotas, but harsh deportations, was how news weekly Der Spiegel summed up the core of the plan. The pro-Green Party taz writes, Faster registration, faster decisions, faster deportation, if possible already at the external bordersthese are the most important innovations proposed by the EU Commission in its Migration and Asylum Pact. Migration Commissioner Ylva Johansson, who presented the pact together with von der Leyen, said, The message is: You will return.

To achieve this, the plan provides for two main innovations: screening procedures and deportation partnerships.

In the screening procedure, refugees arriving on European coasts are registered and pre-sorted (screened) within five days. Those who come from a country from which less than 20 percent of asylum seekers have been recognised so far are placed in the so-called border procedure and are deported again within 12 weeks.

In practice, this is tantamount to abolishing the right of asylum. During the screening and border procedures, refugees are considered not to have entered the country. They have no access to European courts and cannot appeal against a negative decision. The decision is left to the arbitrary rulings of immigration officials, who are often politically right-wing and subject to the instructions of their government. A fair asylum process is not guaranteed.

To make these screening and border procedures possible, reception camps on the European border will be transformed into huge prisons from which there is no escape. The burnt down Moria camp on Lesbos in Greece, which is currently being rebuilt as a tent city, serves as a pilot project. A task force from Brussels is to set up a model project on Lesbos, where the Commissions plans will be the first to be applied. Greece has already agreed to a joint pilot project, said von der Leyen.

The new camp Moria is a legal no mans land. Journalists are denied access, as are lawyers. Inmates are not allowed to leave the camp and must live in indescribable conditions. Water is rationed in bottles; there are no showers. Access to the sea next to the camp is blocked by barbed wire.

The deportation partnerships, the second innovation of the EU Pact, are a newly devised, perverse form of European solidarity. States which refuse to accept a fixed quota of recognised refugees can buy their freedom and show their solidarity by deporting a corresponding number of non-recognised refugees in exchange.

In future, states would be able to choose between reception and assistance with deportation, said Migration Commissioner Johansson. If they fail in deporting the refugees within eight months, for example, because of illness or refusal by the country of origin, they must take them in themselves.

In practice, this means that states like Hungary, which has been the most brutal in dealing with refugees so far, take on the role of security guard and doorkeeper for Fortress Europe. It is easy to imagine what this portends for the refugees concernedno means will be too barbaric to put them outside the EU. And the EU itself wants to take the lead in this. To this end, an EU coordinator for repatriations is to be appointed.

Von der Leyens Migration Plan, which has yet to be approved by the EU Parliament and the member states, leaves all the mechanisms in place that have condemned tens of thousands of refugees to face drowning in the Mediterranean, dying of thirst in the Sahara or enslavement by EU-funded human traffickers in recent years. It does not provide for a resumption of sea rescue operations or an end to cooperation with the notorious Libyan coast guard. Instead, the border management agency Frontex is to be further strengthened to seal Europes external borders even more hermetically.

In 2019, only 140,000 refugees had managed to apply for asylum in the EU, of whom at best, a third will be recognised. But even this numberone asylum seeker per 1,000 inhabitantsis too much for the EU.

Officially, the Asylum and Migration Pact originates from the EU Commission, but the actual authors are based in the Berlin Chancellery and German Interior Ministry. The proposals were agreed upon with Chancellor Angela Merkel, who currently holds the EU presidency. The Commission is thus essentially adopting a concept of the German EU Council Presidency.

Interior Minister Horst Seehofer had already circulated a paper to this effect last November, which was regarded as a kind of roadmap for the German EU Council presidency in the second half of 2020. It advocated binding preliminary examinations of asylum applications in detention camps at the EUs external borders, from where refugees with unfounded applications would be directly deported again. The camps should have an extraterritorial character. The EU should participate directly in the preliminary examination and deportation with its own asylum authority and Frontex. These plans are now reflected in the EU paper.

The ruthlessness with which Berlin and Brussels are ignoring elementary fundamental rights and the lives of refugees must be taken as a warning. They are demonstrating the same ruthlessness towards human life in the coronavirus pandemic, where they deliberately accept the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. Although infection rates are exploding, businesses and schools remain open so as not to jeopardise the profits of the economy and the assets of the rich.

Faced with the deepest crisis of capitalism since the 1930s and growing resistance from the working class and youth, the ruling class everywhere is turning to authoritarian methods of control. Von der Leyens Asylum and Migration Pact could also have been written in the party headquarters of the Alternative for Germany (AfD), the Italian Lega or the French Rassemblement National. It is implementing everything that these extreme right-wing and neo-fascist organisations have been demanding for years.

The working class must unconditionally defend all refugees and their fundamental right to asylum. Only then can workers defend their own democratic and social rights. This requires the construction of an independent movement of the international working class, which fights for the overthrow of capitalismthe cause of fascism, war and povertyand for a socialist programme.
KAMPALA  Bobi Wine lawyer Medard Lubega Sseggona says criminal elements in Government are portraying incumbent President Yoweri Museveni as a weak and a very frustrated leader.

Sseggona who personally grilled National Unity Platform founder Moses Nkonge Kibalama during court cross examination on Friday said, Kibalama didnt know the names of the law firm representing him.

Kibalama also confirmed to court that he has been under military detention for two weeks in Mbale, on orders of UPDF chief Gen. David Muhoozi, a claim the military has since described as malicious propaganda against the army chief.

Mr. Kibalama also disowned the video in which he appeared claiming that he was promised USD5 million by Bobi Wine real name Robert Kyagulanyi to change party leadership.

He also denied ever selling his party to Kyagulanyi.

I am not aware of it( the video recording). I was not selling any political party. There is no supermarket where political parties are sold. You ask them (Bobi Wine) if they bought the party, Kibalama told court in bemusement of everyone.

Lawyer Sseggona said he will expose this behind the schemes.

A week back most NRM Moblilisers abused Bobi Wine and even concluded that he failed to pay 5m USD to Kibalama. Yesterday in Court Kibalama instead exposed the state by saying he doesnt know who recorded the video, he didnt know where he was but he said he was not at his home, Lawyer Sseggona said on Friday warning that the trend represents a dangerous escalation of human rights violations.

He added: Its unfortunate that criminal elements in Government have decided to portray Museveni as a weak and frustrated leader.

Ssegona says Kibalama who has been under military detention was kidnapped by Intelligence Agencies and recorded the video on duress, he also signed the affidavit on duress since he said he didnt know what he signed.

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OFFICER Cadets Adrian Parker and Francis Glinton left the Turks and Caicos Islands two weeks ago for the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst.





The men travelled to the United Kingdom for rigorous training at the British academy, which has since begun.





The two, along with Officer Cadet Dixie Smith - who will attend Sandhurst next year along with a fourth potential officer - will form the commissioned officers of the TCI Regiment.





The fourth officer is yet to be selected.





All three cadets - Parker, Glinton and Smith - are Turks and Caicos Islanders.





Commenting on the selection during a press briefing last week, Governor Nigel Dakin said: "We have taken our first steps towards a regiment that can protect our borders and respond to natural disasters.





The four cadets will, upon completion of their training and commission - support commanding officer of the regiment, Colonel Ennis Grant.





Governor Dakin also revealed that the full time regimental sergeant major will be Colin Da Silva and the chief clerk, Colour Sergeant Joel Richards.





They will assume their appointment on Thursday, October 1.





Major John Galleymore has been appointed the first reservist. Galleymore will serve as Colonel Grants second in command.





"He brings much welcome UK Special Force experience with him, the governor said.





Advertisements for the recruitment of the marines, who will form the teeth of the TCI Regiment, will be open shortly. Both men and women are invited to apply.





"We look for reserve recruits from all walks of society and want to assemble the very best the country has to offer in terms of a balance between experience and youth, Dakin said.





He added that there will be a proper selection course where fitness, resilience and initiative will be prized.

"This is a regiment that will operate and be built on small teams of four, so there is great scope for leadership potential to be harnessed and developed, the governor stated.





It is hoped that the full regiment will become operational before the 2021 Atlantic hurricane season.




The Indian National Congress may agree to project Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader Tejashwi Yadav as their alliances chief ministerial candidate for the 2020 Bihar Legislative Assembly elections, according to a report by The Times of India.

Yadav, the son of former Bihar chief ministers Lalu Prasad Yadav and Rabri Devi, is currently leading the RJD. He had also served as the deputy chief minister of Bihar between 2015 and 2017 when his party was running the state government along with Chief Minister Nitish Kumars Janata Dal (United).

However, the report added that discussions are still on over how projecting Tejashwi Yadavs name as the chief ministerial candidate could affect caste-based political equations. It is also unclear if the Left front and other smaller regional parties such as Rashtriya Lok Samta Party (RLSP) would join the alliance and agree to Yadav being named their chief ministerial candidate.

RLSP chief Upendra Kushwaha had reportedly said on September 25 that he would not accept the leadership of Tejashwi Yadav in the alliance and that his party is keeping all options open. Kushwaha-led RLSP had quit National Democratic Alliance (NDA) ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls and contested the general election alongside RJD and Congress.

The report suggests that Congress could contest from 74 of the total 243 constituencies. The rest would be taken up by RJD and other allies. RLSP is currently preparing to contest all seats.

Also read: Elections | How a weak JD(U) and RJD could change the Bihars electoral landscape

This Mahagathbandhan is challenging Nitish Kumars JD(U) and its allies, including the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), who are aiming to retain power in the state.

The Election Commission announced dates for the polls on September 25. Voting will be held in three phases starting from October 28, amid the novel coronavirus pandemic. The counting of votes will happen on November 10.
The governments motion to dismiss the case against General Flynn. The case itself is sidebar to the Obama administrations effort to undermine the Trump campaign and Trump presidency, easily the biggest political scandal in American history. We have never seen anything like it.

Judge Emmet Sullivan continues to mull it all over. To assist in his deliberations, the government filed the 302 interview summary of former FBI case agent William Barnett. Barnett handled the counterintelligence investigation of Flynn and was thereafter assigned to Team Mueller. He speaks from inside the scandal.

Attorney General Barr ordered United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri Jeffrey Jensen to conduct a review of the FBI investigation that led to the case against Flynn. Barnett was interviewed by Jensen and others involved in the review. I have posted the governments filing with the 302 appended as Exhibit 1 below.

Sean Davis and Mollie Hemingway summarize the substance of the Barnett interview in the Federalist column Get Trump: FBI Whistleblower On Mueller Team Details Real Reason Flynn Was Targeted. Here is a slice:

After moving in 2016 to close the Flynn investigation for complete lack of any evidence of criminal wrongdoing, Barnett was instructed in early 2017 to keep it open and investigate Flynn for a Logan Act violation. The FBI didnt even have a code for the Logan Act, a never-used, centuries-old law prohibiting private citizens from corresponding with foreign governments. Flynn was not a private citizen, but the incoming National Security Advisor for President Trump when he made phone calls with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak, so even if the law were deemed constitutional, it would not have applied to Flynn. Barnett had to research the Logan Act, as he was unfamiliar with it, but did not see the Logan Act as a serious stand-alone charge. When Barnett pushed for a closing interview with Flynn in 2016, as part of the normal procedure for closing cases that were going nowhere, he was rebuffed. But when the FBI later interviewed Flynn, falsely conveying to Flynn that he was not a target of an investigation and not in danger of walking into a perjury trap, Barnett was cut out of the January 24, 2017, ambush interview of Flynn, and was not informed of its existence until it had already been conducted. Typically a line agent/case agent would do the interview with a senior FBI official present in cases concerning high ranking political officials, the summary of Barnetts interview noted. While Barnett at first thought the unusual move was part of an effort to close the investigation, he later realized otherwise. It was not the only time the case agent was cut out of the unusual activity going on in the probe to target Flynn. [N]either Barnett nor any other line agents were invited to attend meetings about the Flynn investigation, which was changed to being conducted from the top down, meaning direction concerning the investigation was coming from senior officials, Barnett said. He noted that former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe was personally directing the Flynn investigation. McCabe was later fired for repeatedly lying under oath about his leaks to the media. McCabe was referred for criminal investigation by the departments Inspector General Michael Horowitz. Barnett was willing to follow instructions being given by the Deputy Director as long as it was not a violation of law, the summary of Barnetts interview stated.

The hour is late and the time is short. We are long past the point where we can be shocked by the revelations, but it would be nice for some old-fashioned truth and consequences before the investigation is shut down.

Flynn filing 9/24/2020 by Techno Fog
- KeNHA said sections of the highway will be closed beginning Saturday, September 26, to pave way for the construction of Nairobi Expressway

- Waiyaki Way from Goodman Towers to Sanlam Towers which is about 500 metres will remain inaccessible until April 1, 2021

- Motorists from the city centre to James Gichuru Road to turn left into the Service Road before St Mark's footbridge and rejoin Waiyaki Way

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The Kenya National Highway Authority (KeNHA) has confirmed the normal traffic flow along Mombasa, Uhuru Highway all the way to Waiyaki Way will be disrupted.

In a notice to the public, the authority said sections of the highways will be closed beginning Saturday, September 26, to pave way for the construction of Nairobi Expressway.

READ ALSO: Nairobi: Woman dies after spending night at lodging with husband's brother

READ ALSO: You are the DP: Netizens ask Ruto what he's done for Kenya after poetic Kajiado speech

In particular, Waiyaki Way from Goodman Towers to Sanlam Towers which is about 500 metres will remain inaccessible until April 1, 2021.

The KeNHA Director-General Peter Mundinia advised motorists from the city centre to James Gichuru Road to turn left into the Service Road before St Mark's footbridge and rejoin Waiyaki Way after Mvuli road.

The pedestrians on the other hand, will be forced to use designated crossing in front of Park Inn Hotel.

READ ALSO: Nelson Havi curses Babu Owino days after being made Maragoli elder: "You'll not be re-elected

Sections of Waiyaki Way will be closed to pave way forNairobi Expressway construction. Photo: Africa Daily.

Source: UGC

READ ALSO: David Maraga rejects Malala's 3 goats donation, reminds senator he has case in court

"We apologise for any inconvenience that may be caused as we endeavor to improve the existing infrastructure along this critical section of the Mombasa  Nairobi Highway (A8 Road)," Mundinia said.

About a week Nairobi's recreational facility, Lunar Park, located at Uhuru Park was demolished to allow for construction of the multi-billion infrastructural project.

The government had in 2019 said the expressway will take 1.3 acres of the city park as it stretches along Waiyaki Way to James Gichuru Junction.

This is how the lower section of the expansive JKIA-Westlands expressway will look like once construction work is complete. Photo: KeNHA.

Source: UGC

"The portion being hived from Uhuru Park is an area of 1.3 acres along Uhuru Highway," said the roads agency via its Twitter handle.

Government Spokesperson Cyrus Oguna on his part said the piece of land that will be hived off the popular park is part of Uhuru Highway road reserve hence no part of the recreational centre will be affected as alleged.

"Concerns raised by Kenyans over Nairobi Expressway and its hiving off Uhuru Park have been raised by Kenyans. We wish to clarify that the 23 meters into the park are road reserve for Uhuru Highway, thus, Uhuru Park remains untouched," said Oguna.

The 18.5km road starts at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport and end at James Gichuru junction along Waiyaki Way in Westlands.

The construction of the double-decker highway was initially set to begin in August 2019 but was pushed to October due to financial related inconveniences.

The KSh 63 billion project for city dwellers is being funded through the Public-Private Partnership program where the contractor, China Road and Bridge Corporation will invest its own money and later recoup its investment from toll fees paid by motorists.

Motorists seeking to use the expressway will have to spend KSh 600 toll fee a day to be able to access the multi-billion infrastructural masterpiece upon its completion in 2021.

"KSh 600 a day for five days is KSh 3,000. So in a month you spend KSh 12,000, that is a bill and that is a bill for someone who can actually afford so that they are able to get off other right of way. Other people, many of you can run on matatus and their own cars," Transport Principal Secretary Paul Maringa said on October 31, 2019.

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The country's second-largest



paint maker said that despite the pandemic its capital expenditure for this fiscal remain unaffected and will be the same as last year.

The major investment will be in its upcoming Sandila plant near Lucknow of around Rs 260 crore and the plant was expected to be operational from 2022 onwards, a company official said on Friday.

The company was implementing a few strategies to narrow the gap with the market leader Asian Paints that commands about 50 per cent share in the paints industry.

"Yes, we love to gain further market share and close the gap between us and Asian Paints, and that is our endeavour. We have taken a lot of measures," Abhijit Roy, MD & CEO, said while replying to shareholders' questions during the 96th AGM of

"They (Asian Paints) are about three times our size and we are about 18-20 per cent and are quite hopeful that some of our strategies might work," Roy told reporters.

He said the company has taken some strategies to further scale up its distribution network to gain market share.

On business performance during the COVID period, he said upcountry was doing far better than the cities. "The rural markets are doing reasonably well. The tier-II, III, IV towns are doing reasonably well. What is affected is the cities and rightly so because of the fear of COVID...June onwards, we are growing very healthy. In June we had almost double-digit growth," the official said.

The company had recently roped in filmstar Akshay Kumar as brand ambassador to boost sales.

"This quarter (second quarter) itself you will see positive results and going forward we want to do even better," Roy told shareholders.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
After announcing that he had not pushed for it but that it had nonetheless been "appropriate," a reporter pointed out the obvious: "Yesterday she had your confidence and today you say it's the right thing she has resigned. What has changed?" "Well," replied Andrews, "the Minister has tendered her resignation ... All my Ministers have my confidence. Ms Mikakos is not a Minister any longer." So did Jobs Minister Martin Pakula and Police Minister Lisa Neville enjoy a similar level of tenuous confidence from their Premier? "Absolutely." Lisa Neville Credit:The Age And what if they too resigned for whatever similar shortcomings they were guilty of? Would they then lose his confidence? "2020 is a very strange year," Andrews said, "but I don't think I'll be getting into that sort of thing."

Strange indeed. The fact is that, if either of those two ministers were to jump or be pushed, it would most likely have happened on Saturday. That was the day to clear the decks. That they have survived until "good news" Sunday means they will live to fight another day. Loading Mikakos's demise had been inevitable from the moment Andrews told the hotel quarantine inquiry she was accountable for what had gone wrong. But the biggest sleight of hand relating to accountability involves Andrews himself. In the same line that damned Mikakos, he said, "as Premier and chair of the Crisis Committee of Cabinet, I regard myself as being ultimately accountable". It's a line he uses repeatedly in his public appearances too. But what does it actually mean?

In practice, it means he appears every day in front of the media. Every. Single. Day. And he answers every single question, regularly berating journalists for their hard-to-break habit of talking over each other to get their question in. Stage-four Victoria is the Daniel Andrews show. He is the best communicator in the government by far and one of the best in the country. His presence dominates the narrative of this crisis not just in the public eye, but in the internal forums of government. His office, his department, are similarly dominant. "This is the most centralised government I've ever seen," said one insider. So if the real decisions are being made in such a small circle, and Andrews assures us he is accountable, should he also quit? Would that, as he said of Mikakos, be "appropriate"? No way. "I don't run from problems and challenges. I've got a very important job to do ... and I'm going to get it done ... I am focused on getting on and making sure that we have got very positive news for people tomorrow," he said on Saturday.

Loading He wants us all focused on the future, not the past. He is also dropping broad hints about "truly unprecedented" spending for recovery in the October budget. Look over there at the good stuff, he's saying, not at the accumulating internal scars of sackings, humiliations and egregious mistakes. But as the inquiry has progressively laid bare the problems at the heart of the Andrews show, it's beginning to look like an outfit held together by spit, string, and the incredibly powerful presence of Daniel Andrews himself. The inquiry has illustrated that fact perhaps more clearly than anything else.
The Church of Iceland's new 'woke' ad depicting Jesus has sparked outrage

It featured a bearded Jesus with breasts, make up and a woman's dress

'The goal was to emphasise diversity, not to hurt people or shock them,' the church said in a statement

The Church of Iceland's new 'woke' ad welcoming people to Sunday School has sparked outrage after it featured a bearded Jesus Christ with breasts, makeup and a dress.

The advert, which apparently shows Jesus shaking his 'breasts' while dancing under a rainbow, appeared on the National Church's Facebook page on September 11.

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The advert has since been deleted from the Church's page, but will be depicted on buses in the Icelandic capital Reykjavik for at least another two weeks.

The Church of Iceland's new 'woke' ad welcoming people to Sunday School has sparked outrage after it featured a bearded Jesus Christ with breasts, makeup and a dress

The Church said in a statement: 'The 2020 Assembly of the National Church regrets that the picture of Jesus in a Sunday school advertisement has hurt people. The goal was to emphasise diversity, not to hurt people or shock them.'

Petur Georg Markan, media representative for the Church of Iceland, said that is positive for Jesus Christ to appear in different forms and that the church celebrates diversity.

Markan added: 'In this one, we see a Jesus who has breasts and a beard. We're trying to embrace society as it is. We have all sorts of people and we need to train ourselves to talk about Jesus as being 'all sorts' in this context.

'Especially because it's really important that each and every person see themselves in Jesus and that we don't stagnate too much. That's the essential message. So this is okay. It's okay that Jesus has a beard and breasts.'

However, he was also aware of the online backlash, adding: 'We know that not everyone agrees Christ should appear this way, and we do of course respect that.'

Markan said that the same artist who designed the ad will begin work on a new campaign: 'Soon, we'll be introducing more personifications where, for example, you'll see Jesus making a contribution to environmental issues.'

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The 'woke' church representative said the cost of the marketing campaign, designed to encourage youngsters to Sunday school, will be ISK 2 million (11,335).

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Grafarvogskirkja church minister Guorun Karls- og Helgudottir said: 'Each person interprets something in this picture. Some people interpret it as a trans Jesus, others as a woman. Some see Mary with a beard, and others see a genderqueer person. Views within the church are just as diverse as elsewhere.'

After its launch, many slammed the advert on social media.

One Facebook user said: 'There was a reason I left the National Church and found another Christian congregation.'

Another person wrote: 'Shame on the bishop!'

Other comments included 'tasteless' and 'particularly stupid'.

'The church should be ashamed for humiliating Jesus like this,' one person argued.
THE ISSUE:

Donald Trump says there will be no peaceful transfer of power, but "a continuation."

THE STAKES:

From our leaders to ordinary citizens, our nation must stand up to any attempt to subvert our democracy.

---

Incongruous as this may sound about a president who has, three years into his term, made more than 20,000 false or misleading claims and statements, when Donald Trump says he may not accept the results of the November election, Americans had best take him at his word.

Yes, we've been down this road with Mr. Trump before, ever since he railed in his 2016 campaign that if he lost it would show the system was "rigged." But there's a big difference now. He's not merely a blustering candidate; he's a blustering president, with real power. When he openly threatens our democratic process, we dare not shrug it off  none of us, from ordinary Americans to senators and representatives to Supreme Court justices to military leaders.

We should take it all the more seriously because Mr. Trump, having already spent close to four years trashing the norms and decencies of a system of government that has endured for 244 years as a model to the world, has shown an increasing willingness to abuse his power. He unleashed armed federal agents on peaceful protesters in our nation's capital and forced them, and church workers providing them relief, out of his path to a bible-brandishing photo op that he later used for a fawning video more suited to a petty dictator than an American president. He had federal forces attack protesters in Portland, Ore., defying local and state officials who asked him to stop his provocations. He has threatened to do the same in more American cities where mostly peaceful protesters are demonstrating over the abuses, and in some cases killings, of so many Black people by police.

Through Attorney General William Barr, he has corrupted the Justice Department, threatening protesters with charges of sedition, threatening cities with being labeled "anarchy communities" and losing federal funding if demonstrations get out of hand  or any other criteria Mr. Barr deems "appropriate." Will that include opposing Mr. Trump should he subvert the election?

And what's to stop him?

Certainly not Mr. Barr, who has removed officials whose adherence to the rule of law threatened Mr. Trump; who has interfered with the prosecution of Mr. Trump's loyalists; who proposes that taxpayers defend Mr. Trump even in private civil actions that have nothing to do with his official duties; and who, like the president, talks about Mr. Trump's opponents as enemies of the state.

Nor will it likely be the obsequious, complicit Senate Republicans who refused to convict Mr. Trump in his impeachment despite clear evidence that he had withheld military aid in order to extort a political favor from the president of Ukraine  even as that nation faces a threat from our common adversary, Russia.

Will it be the federal courts that Mr. Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have been feverishly packing with conservative judges, some of them clearly unqualified for the job? Will it be the U.S. Supreme Court, on which Republicans are rushing to fill a vacancy left by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg?

Many of Mr. Trump's defenders will no doubt say this is all much ado about nothing, and take glee in how he's just trolling and "owning the libs."

We don't buy it. Not when it comes to a president who lies multiple times a day as easily as most people breathe. Who separates immigrant children from their parents, cages them in hellish conditions and loses them in a system so they may never be reunited with their families. A president who fires the very officials whose job it is to keep his administration honest. A president who tried, and is still trying, to rig the census to his and his party's benefit, and keeps defying Congress through executive orders even as courts find his actions illegal.

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A president who, in a subversion of the Electoral College that the Founding Fathers created to keep would-be tyrants like Mr. Trump from attaining the presidency, is calling on Republican-led state legislatures to appoint electors who will be loyal to him no matter what the popular vote is.

And a president who is trying to push through a Supreme Court nominee and openly saying he needs a clear majority on the court to invalidate the results of any election he doesn't win. Listen closely to Mr. Trump himself: "We need nine justices. You need that. With the unsolicited millions of ballots that they're sending, it's a scam, it's a hoax, everybody knows that. So you're going to need nine justices up there, I think it's going to be very important. Because what they're doing is a hoax, with the ballots."

Listen even more closely to his answer on whether he will accept a peaceful transfer of power should he lose:

"We want to have  get rid of the ballots and you'll have a very peaceful  there won't be a transfer, frankly. There'll be a continuation."

Senate Republicans who have let Mr. Trump slide until now need to do better than state vaguely that the winner of the election will be the next president. They need to declare that they will see to it that the winner is fairly chosen, starting with insisting that Mr. Trump's Supreme Court nominee promise to not participate in any case that could decide who the next president is.

Every senator and representative must state unequivocally that they will not tolerate Mr. Trump's threatened manipulation of the election  and say what they will do to stop it.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff need to declare they will not allow the armed forces to be used against the American people.

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When he and Democrat Joe Biden debate Tuesday night, Mr. Trump needs to be confronted on his threats before the American people.

And every citizen needs to make a plan for how they can make a difference should Mr. Trump do exactly what he is threatening to do: destroy our democracy. Because on this point, we shrug him off at our nation's peril.
The 2020 Banff Centre Mountain Film Festival World Tour has gone virtual. In partnership with local host sites including Chippewa Nature Center, the Banff Centre is offering three programs highlighting films from the 2020 World Tour. Online program sales are available now through Oct. 17.

Each year in November, The Banff Centre hosts the Banff Centre Mountain Film Festival that showcases filmmaking talent from around the world and celebrates the spirit of outdoor adventure and mountain culture. The top films from that festival typically go on tour in over 550 locations and 40 countries.

The Chippewa Nature Center, which has been hosting the world tour since 2004, typically has sell-out audiences when the films play locally at Bullock Creek Auditorium. This year, like many happenings, events have gone online.

"While we love the opportunity to bring the community together to celebrate connections with the outdoors, this simply is not possible this year," said Jenn Kirts, director of programs at the nature center. "We are grateful that the Banff Centre has been diligent about finding a way to share the 2020 Banff Centre Mountain Film Festival World Tour with all of its audiences. We are hopeful that the online format enables more people to enjoy the films since we typically have a sell-out audience when we host it at the Bullock Creek Auditorium."

She is excited to see the films along with the rest of viewers.

"As host sites, we dont have the opportunity to preview films, so just like all of our viewers, I am excited to see them for the first time," Kirts said. "I am looking forward to the breathtaking images from films like Lhotse and Circle of the Sun, the heart-pounding adrenaline of high adventure films like The Flip and Gone Tomorrow: Kentucky Ice Climbing, and the human stories in films like The Running Pastor and The Motivator. Across the three programs, there really are films that will appeal to just about everyone."

Based on website traffic, social media, and phone calls, the community seems excited about the film festival, she said.

This year, the World Tour is virtual with three different film program lineups, and tickets are are $15 per program or $40 for all three programs, and are available at www.chippewanaturecenter.org. Once a ticket is purchased, people will have access to a single program for 72 hours and access to the three-program package for seven days, and may watch the programs as often as you like during that time. When your purchase is made through Chippewa Nature Centers website, 20% of your fee is donated to CNC.

Films are rated G except where noted.

Film Selections for Red Program

Good Morning (2018, France, 4 minutes): Every day, skier Richard Permin falls into his mundane morning routine. Right after getting out of bed, he clicks on his skis and rides down the snow-covered rooftops of Avoriaz.

The Motivator (2019, USA, 5 minutes): Filmmaker Aaron Hitchins turns his camera on the person who has motivated him to lead a life connected to the outdoors: his mother, Maureen.

Thabang (2019, South Africa, 13 minutes): Thabang Madiba somehow found his way into the world of trail running and in the last few years has become everyones favourite in the South African trail scene.

Camel Finds Water (2019, US, 9 minutes, Rated PG): Trevor found the hull of an abandoned fishing boat in a field. He brought it home and built it back to a sea-worthy state over the course of a summer. Then, he took it on its maiden voyage to British Columbia in search of waves.

Spectre Expedition  Mission Antarctica (2019, UK, 36 minutes, Rated PG - Coarse Language): 1,000 miles, 200+ kgs, 65 days, three mates, one mountain. Unsupported, using snow-kites to travel great distance, with massive loads at speeds up to 60 kmph this is the epic tale of Leo Houlding, Jean Burgun and Mark Sedons daring dream to reach the summit of the most remote mountain on Earth; The Spectre, Antarctica.

A Nordic Skier (2018, Lithuania, 5 minutes): The story of a man who uses every sense he has to travel on thin ice while Nordic skating in the Oslo region of Norway. He tells the story of how the little known sport of Nordic skating came to play a big part in his life.

The Long River Home (2019, USA, 20 min, Rated PG - war reference could trigger PTSD): U.S. veterans who were injured in war come together for another mission as they guide blind Navy veteran, Lonnie Bedwell, on a 14 day river trip in the Grand Canyon.

The Running Pastor (2019, USA, 9 minutes): Sverri is a local pastor and avid runner who uses his time on the trails to work through not only his own personal conflicts, but the conflicts of others he often is burdened with.

Myrtle Simpson: A Life on Ice (Tour Edit) (2019, U.S., 25 minutes): Myrtle Simpson - trailblazer, pioneer, adventurer, mountain climber, polar explorer, writer and mother. From Spitzbergen to Greenland, from the North Pole to the Highlands of Scotland, from New Zealand to Peru, Myrtle blazed her own trail. She experienced places most people only dream about, all while writing 13 books, collecting specimens for museum botanical collections and raising four children.

Hors Piste (2018, France, 6 min, animated): The two best mountain rescue workers of the region are ready for their new mission. Despite their professionalism and their determination, it will not go as planned.

Film Selections for Blue Program

Charge (2019, Canada, 5 minutes): Four top freeskiers and a World Champion drone pilot are dropped at Chatter Creek, B.C. for one week. Their instructions: charge as hard as you can everyday.

Bayandadai - Lord of the Taiga (2018, Spain, 11 minutes): From inside his yurt deep within the heart of the Taiga, an elder of the Dukhas tribe muses about the significance of life and death in the largest forest on Earth. He is the last of the great reindeer herders of the Taiga.

The Imaginary Line (2019, USA, 11 minutes): In an act of political solidarity, a team from Mexico and the U.S.A. assemble with the sole purpose of establishing a slackline that crosses the border between them. In a world that is constantly tearing us apart, they come together to cross an imaginary line and tell a different story.

Deer 139 (Tour Edit) (2019, USA, 44 minutes, Rated PG - Course Language, Nudity): Three women follow the 137 km migration path of a scruffy, pregnant mule deer doe and in the process, learn to see the world differently.

Billder (2019, Canada, 6 minutes, Rated PG): Billder tells the story of Bill McLane, a mountain bike trail builder. Well find out what trails mean to him and how his work impacts his community.

Hunza: Ski and Culture in Pakistan (Tour Edit) (2018, France, 33 minutes): Get on board with Sam Favret, Leo Slemett and Julien Herry as they set off on a vibrant freeriding and cultural adventure in the remote Hunza Valley, way off the beaten track.

Circle of the Sun (2019, Germany, 5 minutes): Steep mountains, the ocean, the sun and the aurora borealis. One rotation of the sun high in the Arctic on skis equals one day of magic.

Reel Rock 13: Up to Speed (2018, USA, 20 minutes, Rated PG - Coarse Language): When climbing was announced as part of the 2020 Olympics, it was a monumental occasion for the sport. But many climbers were shocked to learn that one of three combined events required to compete for a medal is...speed climbing.

Film Selections for Green Program

The Flip (2019, USA, 3 minutes): French Skydiver Remi Angeli must face his fears in order to explore new expressions of movement while BASE jumping in Mexico. On the other side of his fear he discovers life in its purest form.

The Ladakh Project (2019, Austria, 13 minutes, Rated PG): Seven days, three rivers, one woman. This is the story of Nouria Newmans solo kayak adventure in the Indian Himalaya.

Safe Haven (2018, USA, 8 minutes): Founded on the belief that everyone is welcome, Memphis Rox opened a climbing gym to challenge stereotypes and be at the center of the citys revitalization.

Into the Canyon (Tour Edit) (2019, USA, 45 minutes, Rated PG - Coarse Language, Violence): Pete McBride and Kevin Fedarko tell a story of extreme physical hardship where the bonds of friendship are stretched and the timeless beauty of the Grand Canyon becomes meditation and ultimately a cautionary tale for our complex relationship with the natural world.

Siblings (2019, Canada, 3 min): A short coming of age film that celebrates childhood and the relationship between siblings.

Lhotse (2019, USA, 23 min, Rated PG - Coarse Language): Its not always what we achieve that defines us, rather it is why we achieve such things that creates clarity in our existence. In 2018, Hilaree Nelson and Jim Morrison completed the first ski descent of the 27,940-foot Lhotse, the fourth-highest mountain in the world. This is their story.

Life of Pie (2019, USA, 12 minutes, Rated PG - Course Language): When Jen Zeuner and Anne Keller moved to the tiny, conservative high desert town of Fruita, Colorado almost 20 years ago, it was not on the map as far as mountain biking was concerned and they were on the fringe and a bit ostracized. Now theyre at the very heart and soul of the community.

Gone Tomorrow: Kentucky Ice Climbing (2019, USA, 20 minutes, Rated PG - Course Language): A bourbon-fueled ride deep into the bushy hollers of Appalachia with a crew of harmless misfits as they race to search out and climb new ice routes before theyre gone.

The Banff Mountain Film Festival World Tour is presented by Banff & Lake Louise and Rab, The Mountain People, with major partners Deuter, Clif, Mountain House, Oboz Footwear, Yeti, Buff and Sierra Nevada and supporting partners Petzl, World Expeditions, Kicking Horse Coffee, Lake Louise, Mammut, International Alliance for Mountain Film and MEC. The event is sponsored locally by Members First Credit Union, Little Forks Outfitters, Saginaw Basin Land Conservancy and Senator Jim and Marsha Stamas.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 19:09:27|Editor: huaxia

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PHNOM PENH, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- A 216-page book detailing Cambodian Prime Minister Samdech Techo Hun Sen's actions against the COVID-19 outbreak has been published, the author said on Saturday.

Entitled "Samdech Hun Sen: Cambodia's Elegant Hero Who Goes Against the Tide to Fight COVID-19," the book was penned by Hun Sen's advisers and members of the Khmer Writers Association (KWA) and a total of 2,500 copies in Khmer version were printed in mid-July.

Pov Sok, an advisor to the prime minister and member of the KWA, said the book featured Hun Sen's decisions, speeches and photographs related to his crusade against the pandemic as well as his art of leadership.

"We compiled the book as a history for humanity, and want to show that Cambodia had controlled the situation of COVID-19 better than others at the onset of the virus," he told Xinhua via telephone.

"We also want to highlight the unbreakable relationship and solidarity between Cambodia and China in the fight against the virus," he added.

Pov Sok said the book also depicted a photograph of Hun Sen shaking hands with Chinese President Xi Jinping while he made a special visit to Beijing in February during the early stage of the COVID-19 outbreak.

Also, the book described Hun Sen's humanitarian decision to allow MS Westerdam cruise ship, carrying more than 2,200 people in 41 nationalities, to dock at the Sihanoukville Autonomous Port after it had been turned away from several ports over fears its passengers could be carrying the virus.

"These are undeniable evidence to prove that Cambodia is a small country with a big heart, and we have conducted humanitarian work without discrimination against any nationalities," Pov Sok said.

He said the book also recorded prevention measures that Cambodia had taken to curb the pandemic effectively during the first wave of the disease outbreak.

According to Pov Sok, the book's English and Chinese versions will be available in late October or early November.

The Southeast Asian nation has seen success in controlling the spread of COVID-19. Cambodia has recorded a total of 276 confirmed COVID-19 cases to date, the Ministry of Health said on Saturday, adding that none have died and 274 have recovered. Enditem
U.S. President plans to announce conservative federal appeals court judge Amy Coney Barrett as his Supreme Court nominee, and he wants her confirmed by Senate before election

President Donald Trump plans to announce conservative federal appeals court judge Amy Coney Barrett on Saturday as his Supreme Court nominee, two sources said on Friday, as he moves to shift it further to the right and sets up a heated Senate confirmation fight with Democrats 5-1/2 weeks before the U.S. election.

If confirmed by the Senate, which is controlled by Trump's fellow Republicans, Barrett would replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a liberal icon who died at age 87 on Sept. 18. Barrett is a favorite of religious conservatives, a key Trump constituency, and he has asked the Senate to confirm her before the Nov. 3 election in which he is seeking a second term and Democrats are aiming to seize control of the chamber.

Barrett, 48, was appointed by Trump to the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2017. If confirmed to the lifetime post, she would become the fifth woman ever to serve on the high court while expanding its conservative majority to a rock-solid 6-3.

Her selection was viewed with alarm by liberal advocacy groups. Abortion rights groups have expressed concern that on the Supreme Court Barrett could help overturn the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion nationwide.

Catherine Glenn Foster, president and CEO of the anti-abortion group Americans United For Life, praised Trump for making a "brave and ambitious choice" and called Barrett "the best and most qualified successor" to Ginsburg.

The other finalist mentioned by Trump to fill the vacancy was Barbara Lagoa, a Cuban-American federal appeals court judge from Florida who he appointed last year and who potentially could have boosted his chances in the key election battleground state. Trump said he did not meet with Lagoa during a campaign trip to Florida. He met with Barrett on Monday.

Trump plans a formal introduction of his nominee at the White House on Saturday. Two sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed that Trump plans to nominate Barrett, but cautioned that he could change his mind. Trump told reporters on Friday he had made his decision, but declined to reveal it.

Barrett previously served as a clerk to conservative Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who died in 2016.

As an appellate judge, Barrett has staked out conservative legal positions on key hot-button issues in three years on the bench, voting in favor of one of Trump's hardline immigration policies and showing support for expansive gun rights. She also authored a ruling making it easier for college students accused of campus sexual assaults to sue their institutions.

Trump's nominee has what appears to be a clear path to Senate confirmation, with Republicans holding a 53-47 majority in the chamber and only two senators in his party indicating opposition to moving forward with the process.

Democrats have objected to the Senate acting on Trump's nominee in light of the decision by Republicans in the chamber in 2016 to refuse to consider Democratic President Barack Obama's nominee to replace Scalia after he died during a presidential election year.

GINSBURG HONORED

Ginsburg, a champion of gender equality and various liberal causes, made history again on Friday as the first woman and first Jewish person to lie in state in the U.S. Capitol. Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden attended the ceremony a day after Trump was greeted with jeers and boos by a nearby crowd as he visited Ginsburg's flag-draped coffin outside the Supreme Court building.

"If she is nominated and confirmed, Coney Barrett would work to dismantle all that Ruth Bader Ginsburg fought for during her extraordinary career," said Alphonso David, president of the Human Rights Campaign, an LGBT advocacy group. "An appointment of this magnitude must be made by the president inaugurated in January."

Trump this week said he believed the Supreme Court would be called upon to rule on the election outcome, something that has happened only once in American history, in 2000.

"I think it's very important that we have nine justices," Trump said on Wednesday.

Trump has repeatedly and without evidence said that voting by mail, a longstanding feature of American politics, could lead to a surge in election fraud.

THIRD TRUMP APPOINTEE

Barrett would be his third Supreme Court appointment. Like Trump's two other conservative appointees, Neil Gorsuch in 2017 and Brett Kavanaugh in 2018, Barrett potentially could serve for decades, placing a conservative stamp on Supreme Court precedent.

The court's decisions exert vast influence on American life, and a solidly conservative court could limit abortion rights, expand religious rights, strike down gun control laws and uphold new restrictions on voting rights.

On Nov. 10, the court is scheduled to hear arguments in a major case in which Trump and fellow Republicans are seeking to invalidate the 2010 Affordable Care Act, known as Obamacare. If confirmed by then, the nominee could cast a decisive vote.

The nomination could help Trump cement a key part of his presidential legacy - making the federal judiciary move conservative - while also energizing his core supporters ahead of the election.

The Senate under the U.S. Constitution is given the power to confirm or reject a president's judicial nominees. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has given a high priority to winning confirmation of Trump's conservative judicial selections.

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India has added more coronavirus cases in the past month than any other country during the pandemic. While much of the focus was on ventilators around the world during the earlier phase of the outbreak, the surge in India is now intensifying overall demand for oxygen and exposing the weak points in the system for getting it to hospitals.
Kolkata, Sep 26 : The West Bengal Special Task Force (STF) has arrested Samim Ansari, a migrant worker from Murshidabad district, on suspicion of terror links, police said on Saturday.

"West Bengal STF along with police held Ansari late Friday night on suspected terror links and in connection with arrests made by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) earlier on," Additional Director General of Police (STF) Vineet Goyel told IANS.

He said that NIA officials were likely to take Ansari (25) into custody for further interrogation.

A resident of Naodapara area of Jalangi, Ansari was arrested from his residence. According to police sources, he had close contacts with Al-Qaeda militant Al Mamun Kamal, arrested from the district last week.

Ansari worked in Kerala for around two years as a construction labourer but returned to his village a year ago, where he was living with his wife and family.

The NIA had conducted raids at multiple locations in Murshidabad district and arrested six persons in connection with terrorist activities linked to a Pakistan-sponsored module of Al-Qaeda. Those arrested were Najmus Sakid, Abu Sufiyan, Mainul Mondal, Leu Yean Ahmed, Al Mamun Kamal and Atitur Rehman.

Similar raids were also conducted in Ernakulam in Kerala where three others were arrested -- Murshid Hasan, Iyakub Biswas and Mosaraf Hossen.

The trio was picked from Mudikkal near Perumbavoor in Ernakulam district.
 Close Trump claims Black Lives Matter are destroying many Black lives

Donald Trump mocked a protestor while speaking at a rally in battleground Pennsylvania on Saturday night.

The president trails Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden in the Keystone State by 4.3 per cent, according to an average of polls tabulated by RealClearPolitics. But Mr Trump and his campaign aides say their polling, like in 2016, shows a far closer race there.

The incident comes after a progressive activist group of Democrat supporters announced they had purchased the internet domain name www.amyconeybarrett.com in an attempt to fight Ms Barretts nomination to the Supreme Court - a move which they say confirms Mr Trump's efforts to take over the US judicial system.

Mr Trump urged Republicans, who hold a 53-47 Senate majority, to confirm judge Barrett, a federal appeals court judge and a favorite of religious conservatives, by the 3 November election.

He has said he expects the justices to have to resolve the election in which he faces Democratic challenger Joe Biden.

The Supreme Court has only once in U.S. history had to resolve a presidential election, in 2000. Mr Trump also has declined to commit to a peaceful transfer of power if he loses the election.

"I look forward to meeting with the nominee next week and will carefully study her record and credentials," said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who has made confirming Mr Trump's judicial appointments a paramount priority. "As I have stated, this nomination will receive a vote on the Senate floor in the weeks ahead."

Judge Barrett is expected to begin meetings with individual senators on Tuesday. Mr Trump said the Senate Judiciary Committee, chaired by his ally Senator Lindsey Graham, would begin confirmation hearings on 12 October.

Like Mr Trump's two other appointees, Neil Gorsuch in 2017 and Brett Kavanaugh in 2018, judge Barrett is young enough that she could serve for decades in the lifetime job, leaving a lasting conservative imprint. Mr Trump's two previous appointments were surrounded by controversy.

The president was able to appoint Justice Gorsuch to fill the vacancy left by Scalia's 2016 death only because Mr McConnell refused to let the Senate consider Obama's nominee Merrick Garland because it was an election year, an action with little precedent in US history. Democrats now accuse him of hypocrisy.

Justice Kavanaugh was confirmed after a tumultuous confirmation process during which a California university professor accused him of sexually assaulting her in 1983 when both were high school students in Maryland. The justice denied the allegation and portrayed himself as the victim of an "orchestrated political hit" by Democrats.

Reuters contributed to this report. Check out The Independents live coverage below:
Even in a profession known for phoniness, Kamala Harris stands out as remarkably fake. We expect politicians to lie  "what a beautiful baby!"  but we also expect them to be reasonably skilled at it. Being unable to convincingly name a favorite thing takes a lot of experience in counterfeiting feelings.

Yet, yesterday, in the softest of softball interviews on CNN, where she was asked about her various "favorites"  roast chicken is her "go-to" dish to cook (as if she spends a lot of time in time in the kitchen wearing an apron that says "kiss the cook")  she stumbled and revealed that she only pretends to listen to rap music.

Of course, liking rap music is believed to be essential to forge an identity as somehow African-American when none of her ancestors ever lived in the United States. The closest her lineage comes to the experience of slavery is as slave-owners, according to her Jamaican father. Joe Biden's handlers chose her as his running mate only because her darkish skin tone was supposed to fool blacks into thinking she is one of them and feels the pain of slavery that lies a century and a half in the past.

Watch below as very friendly CNN interviewer Angela Rye asks her to name "the best rapper alive."

She answers, "Tupac" and gives that slightly hysterical laugh she uses all the time.

Rye screws up her face and seems genuinely taken aback, saying emphatically, "He's not alive!"



YouTube screen grab.

After a couple of seconds, anticipating a dodge, she adds, "You say he lives on..."

And then, perhaps realizing that she may have just revealed the awful truth about the bogus blackness, hastens to add, "Listen, West Coast girls think Tupac lives on."

Tupac Shakur was killed almost a quarter-century ago. Even stuffy old white guys like me know that he is dead, dead, dead.

I think the Trump campaign needs to paint Harris as both the real presidential candidate and as a transparent phony. Video ads showing her completely phony masquerade here can help turn young black males in particular against her.
Siegel saw three or four posts on the Nextdoor app and Facebook, and he says arguments would break out on the posts about whether patrons were being safe. In the end, he figures more people defended the restaurant than criticized it.
LOUISVILLE, Ky.  The state lawmaker behind a police reform bill known as "Breonna's Law" was back on the streets with protesters Friday after being arrested with a group of demonstrators the previous night.

Rep. Attica Scott, D-Frankfort, joined a few hundred others downtown for the third night of demonstrations after the state attorney general announced Wednesday that no charges would be brought against police for the killing of Breonna Taylor, a Black woman who was asleep in her home when officers came to her door.

"Every day this week, the numbers have grown, especially after the unjust arrests this week," Scott said Friday, referring to the arrests of herself and others. "Its beautiful, it's amazing and its what weve been pushing for months now: love, community and solidarity."

Image: People react after a decision in the criminal case against police officers involved in the death of Breonna Taylor, in Louisville (Eduardo Munoz / Reuters)

According to the arrest report, she was "part of a large group" ordered to disperse but that "failed to do so."

"Subjects caused extensive damage at multiple locations including setting fire to the Louisville public library," the report said.

Scott faced allegations of felony rioting, failure to disperse and unlawful assembly, according to the report. She disputed disputed the allegations and said she was an advocate for the library.

U.S. Rep. John Yarmuth, D-Kentucky, said on Facebook, "To accost, accuse, arrest, and charge her with setting fire to a library of all thingsapparently minutes before the curfew was even in effectis as stupid as it is untrue."

The Louisville Jefferson County Democratic Party called for an investigation into Scott's arrest. It said in a statement that Scott's adult daughter, Ashanti Scott, was also arrested Thursday night.

Taylor was killed In March when police executed a "no knock" search warrant at her apartment. Her boyfriend shot toward the door in fear and struck an officer. Police returned fire, killing Taylor.

On Wednesday, it was announced that a grand jury charged only one officer, who had fired into a neighbor's apartment, with "wanton endangerment."

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Demonstrators protested the decision that night when two police officers were injured in a shooting. On Thursday night as some protesters sought refuge at a church and police moved in to make arrests, Scott was taken into custody.

Scott introduced "Breonna's Law," a proposed bill that would require police to use body cameras when serving warrants and knock and verbally announce themselves during raids.

Image: People react after a decision in the criminal case against police officers involved in the death of Breonna Taylor, in Louisville (Eduardo Munoz / Reuters)

On Friday night, Tamika Palmer, Taylor's mother, was leading a group of protesters in the city center. Lonita Baker, an attorney for Taylors family, applauded the community for showing their support and for calling for justice.

Its what we needed, said Baker. When you see numbers like this come out, these people are going to turn into voting numbers.

Protester Nicole Aghaaliandastjerdi said she was protesting for Taylor's family.

I believe the community here is so strong, and we want Tamika Palmer and her family to know that we love her, she said.

The protest was declared unlawful, police launched flash-bang devices and people started to move out later in the evening. A 9 p.m. to 6:30 a.m. curfew was in effect through Monday morning.

Some demonstrators again moved toward the First Unitarian Church, where protesters successfully sought refuge Thursday night.

We will continue to show up as long as justice is not served, said demonstrator Reena Paracha. When justice is served, we will stop coming to the streets.

A Louisville police spokesman said there were 23 arrests Friday, and more details on those arrests were expected to be released Saturday.

Earlier in the day, a man who allegedly shined a laser pointer at a Louisville Metro Police Department helicopter shortly after midnight Friday was charged with violating federal law, prosecutors said.

Manuel Martin Salazarleija Jr., 25, of Louisville, told investigators he believed the aircraft was being used to monitor protests, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Western District of Kentucky and a criminal complaint.

The helicopter was in the area to monitor a vehicle fleeing the scene of a burglary at a Walgreens, officials said. Salazarleija used the laser pointer from the third-floor bedroom window in his home, officials said.

The officers suffered headaches that interfered with their ability to safely operate the helicopter, but both were OK, a police spokesman said.

Online court documents did not list an attorney for Salazarlejia.

Protests were also held in other cities.

In Oakland, California, police tweeted that bottles and cans had been thrown at officers as a crowd of more than 250 demonstrated. Police said that they used "minimal smoke" and made arrests for assaults on officers, but no damage to businesses was reported.

There were also protests in West Hollywood in the Los Angeles area and in San Diego. A spokesman for the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department said 10 people were detained in protests, but it not immediately clear if they were arrested.

Three people were arrested in San Diego police said, one for allegedly stealing a cell phone from someone recording protesters and two others for allegedly interfering in an arrest.

Chloe Atkins reported from Louisville and Dennis Romero from California.
Contributed Photo / Connecticut State Police

DARIEN  A Norwalk woman was charged Thursday in connection with a double-fatal crash on Interstate 95 that occurred last September, police said.

It was shortly after 6 a.m. Sept. 29, 2019, when a Norwalk woman driving a Volkswagen Passat took the Exit 10 off-ramp of I-95 north and veered off the road for an unknown reason, and slammed into a tree, police said.
A task force Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney assigned to reimagine public safety following months of unrest over police brutality has issued 16 preliminary recommendations.

While the initial 19-page document is subject to change pending a final report that is due to Stoney and Richmond Police Chief Gerald Smith on Nov. 5, the recommendations envision changes to how police use force, respond to people in mental health crises and interact with the public.

Stoney formed the advisory task force in July amid turmoil over the Richmond Police Departments response to nightly protests initially spurred by the Minneapolis police killing of George Floyd in late May. Protesters in Richmond and across the country called for police reforms, racial justice and more accountability for law enforcement.

Comprising nearly 40 members, the panel includes community members, academics, lawyers, social workers and law enforcement officials. The whole group and its three subcommittees have met regularly through the summer.

The task force recommends some changes protesters have called for over more than 100 days of action, such as the creation of a civilian oversight board with subpoena power and a system where social workers or mental health professionals respond in certain situations.

The report, however, does not address other items on a widely distributed list of demands, including dropping charges against all protesters, defunding the citys police department, releasing the names of all officers under investigation for use-of-force misconduct, and reopening the case of Marcus-David Peters, a Black schoolteacher who was killed by a Richmond police officer in 2018 while having a mental health crisis.

The panels use-of-force subcommittee, for example, notes that law enforcement historically has responded to non-criminal calls involving people experiencing homelessness or mental health crises, leading to situations that caused harm.

Responding to non-criminal calls, which lie beyond their training, can lead to unnecessary confrontations between the police department and the community and lead to community mistrust, the report states.

Similar to activists calling for the creation of a Marcus Alert, named for Peters, the panel suggested emergency calls for non-criminal matters should be handled by appropriate community members and professionals.

Other recommendations in the report include increasing the frequency of de-escalation training, making it easier for the public to find information about police department policies, focusing on the mental health of police officers, and creating new community engagement programs and initiatives.

In a news release Thursday, Stoney said he agrees with the recommendations in the report.

They propose systems-level changes for the undeniably systemic challenges we face, Stoney said. The members are pushing our city in the right direction when it comes to broadening the definition of public safety and innovating our policies and programs accordingly.

Smith, whom the city hired at the end of June following the ouster of former Police Chief William Smith and resignation of Jody Blackwell as interim chief, also responded positively to the recommendations.

I appreciate the comprehensive feedback and suggestions of this group of experts and community members, Smith said. Their attention to current policies and practices and innovative reform suggestions are a welcome starting point.
There are two diametrically opposite trends that are manifesting themselves in the Middle-East. One trend is progressive, reconciliatory, and stabilizing; the other trend is disruptive, expansionist (both in terms of territory and a fundamentalist, exclusivist, supremacist and sectarian ideology) and destabilizing. The first trend is represented by the Arab world, led by Saudi Arabia, UAE and their close allies. The second trend is reflected in the shenanigans of Turkey and Iran.

Ever since the Islamic Revolution in 1979, Iran has stood out as a defiant, often wayward power in the Middle-East. But now, there is another contender  Turkey - which is seeking to expand its footprint in the region, and in the process destabilizing it. In fact, while a lot of attention is focused on the disruptive activities of Iran, not enough is being said about the dubious role of Turkey in disturbing the delicate equilibrium in the region.

From a time when Turkey, as a member of NATO, and secular democracy, was seen as a pillar of stability in the Middle-East to now when its seen as an overbearing, obstinate, obnoxious country led by an Islamic megalomaniac like Recep Tayyip Erdogan who believes that being rude, offensive, supercilious with other countries and interfering in their affairs is the way to show that Turkey has arrived, it has been a steep fall.

Erdogan has all but destroyed democracy in Turkey with his authoritarianism. He has turned on its head modern Turkeys secular foundations by taking it towards undisguised Islamism. He has muzzled the media in Turkey, jailed opponents and crushed dissent.

The regime has brutalized minority ethnic groups like the Kurds, literally bombarding their homes and hearths. He has flirted with ISIS terrorists, and there are serious allegations that his family (his son) has profited from his association with ISIS.

Erdogan has blackmailed Europe by threatening to unleash waves of refugees, threatened war on a fellow NATO ally - Greece  interfered in the civil war in Libya, tried to flirt with the Muslim Brotherhood, even patronize them, to cause disturbances in the Arab World. He has riled Egypt because of his support for Muslim Brotherhood, encroached in Syria to prop up his own favorites, dared Russia by shooting down its aircraft, and then like a coward bent over backwards to appease the Russian President. He has tried to cock a snook at the US by entering into defense deals with Russia, despite being a member of NATO.

Erdogan has tried to confront Israel and like a total hypocrite criticized UAE and Bahrain for recognizing Israel and opening up diplomatic relations with it. Further in South Asia, in India, he has tried to interfere in India and has patronized Kashmiri separatists by giving them money, media access and even training. And all of this is being done while the Turkish economy has gone into a tailspin.

Given his megalomania and pretensions for reviving the Caliphate (of course anointing himself as the neo-Caliph), Erdogan has done everything possible to disturb the Middle-East just so he can re-establish Turkeys pre-eminence in the region.

The Turkish Empire was in decline for more than a hundred years before it disappeared in the early 20th century after the First World War seems to have been ignored by Erdogan and while he throws his weight around, he forgets that the world is no longer in the medieval ages where his antics could work.

Whatever Turkey has gained over the years has been because of the reforms that Kemal Ataturk initiated and the close association with the West, Erdogan now seems hell-bent on undoing for the sake of self-aggrandizement. What he is now trying to do is to reclaim the leadership of the Islamic world  part of his delusions of reviving the Caliphate.

The problem is that the world today is a lot more complicated than it was when the TV manufactured mythical hero of Erdogan, Ertugrul, laid the foundations of the Ottoman Empire. It seems that Erdogan has convinced himself that just like Ertugrul exploited the chaos of the 13th century to lay the foundation of his dynasty, Erdogan hopes to do the same by exploiting and if necessary creating chaos in the 21st century. His playbook isnt that complicated, even if his mind and calculations are quite convoluted, even sinister.

What Erdogan is playing for is the leadership of the Islamic world but this world revolves broadly around three axes. One axis comprises the Arab world led by Saudi Arabia, UAE and their allies. The second axis is Iran and the Persian/Shia segment of the Islamic world and the third axis revolves around Turkey and comprises the Turkic people. Then there are the outliers - the Pakistan type countries - which can follow one or the other but cannot lead the Islamic World.

Erdogan has to undermine the Arab and Persian axes if he has to lay the foundation of Turkey becoming the centre of the Islamic world again. He realizes that the Arab world today is rich and powerful. More importantly, it has powerful allies and friends. But he hopes to weaken the Arab states by exploiting their fault lines  internal divisions and power play by agitating the Arab street. This he believes is the biggest vulnerability and is precisely where he is focusing on.

For now, he is aligning with Iran, or at least making some common cause, but conflict is inbuilt in this equation. The Persians are loath to accept Turkic overlordship. Plus there are serious sectarian, ethnic, linguistic and cultural divisions between the Persian/Shia axis and the Turkic/Sunni axis.

Once Erdogan has destabilized the Arab World, he thinks he will be able to exploit Irans fault lines far more effectively than either the Arabs or the sole superpower - the US.

The support that the West will give to the Arabs can be countered by making a new alliance with countries like Russia, and to an extent, China.

The ferment in the region is seen as being conducive to Erdogans strategic game plan and he is all set to go all in to fulfil his ambition. Cut to the chase, Erdogan and Turkey are today playing the most destabilizing game in the Middle-East, by trying to get their fingers in every pie, exploit every fracture and light a fire everywhere there is some inflammable material available. Only through disruption, destabilization, dislocation and finally destruction and devastation can something new emerge in the Middle-East and when that happens, Erdogan will go down in history as the new Ertugrul, but if only wishes were horses.
Sources said that in his 21-minute speech, Modi will pitch for more transparency in the process of listing and delisting of terror entities and individuals by the UN sanction committees. Being one of the largest troops contributing nations to the UN, India will also seek to engage intensively in finalising of mandates for the UN peacekeeping mission.

Sources said continuing with active engagement on issues relating to sustainable development and climate change will be another priority for India. India will also highlight its role as a pharmacy to the world while elaborating on its contribution to global cooperation against Covid-19 by aiding more than 150 countries, sources said.

Indias role as a South-South development partner, especially in the context of the India-UN development partnership fund will also be explained at the summit.

Modis recorded speech at the UN follows Indias strong rebuttal to Pakistan PM Imran Khans speech at the forum on Friday. Khan had spoken about Indias internal affairs, including the issue of Jammu and Kashmir, during his pre-recorded video statement. First Secretary in the Permanent Mission of India to the UN, Mijito Vinito, walked out when Khan started his diatribe about India.

Later, Vinito delivered a scathing response to Khans incessant rant and venom, saying the only crowning glory that Pakistan has to show to the world for the last seven decades is terrorism, ethnic cleansing, majoritarian fundamentalism and clandestine nuclear trade.

This august forum witnessed a new low on its 75th anniversary. The leader of Pakistan today called for those who incite hate and violence to be outlawed. But as he went on, we were left wondering, was he referring to himself? Vinito said, making Indias Right of Reply.
By Trend

Georgia is a part of European civilization and therefore, the way of our countrys development is unchanged. This is European and Euro-Atlantic integration, Giorgi Gakharia, Prime Minister of Georgia said at the 75th Session of UN General Assembly, Trend reports citing 1TV.

According to PM, the European couse of Georgia is inked in Constitution and is not subjected to reconsideration.

Georgia is a part of European civilization and therefore, the way of our countrys development is unchanged. This is European and Euro-Atlantic integration and it is inked in Constitution and is not subjected to reconsideration.

Georgia signed Association Agreement with the European Union and visa-free regime and Free Trade agreements are in force. All this enables us to strengthen our European institutions, develop highest-standard infrastructure, empower small and medium-sized businesses, foster the adoption of modern technologies, and stand by Europe in dealing with challenges.

Georgia has been participating in international peacekeeping missions in various countries for years. Our soldiers are steadfastly keeping guard over global peace and stability. The Georgian Armed Forces are exemplary in the fulfillment of their duties at all locations. Thirty-two of them have fallen while accomplishing this honorable and difficult mission.

Today, we are an important player in ensuring global security as Georgias security is inseparable from global security; therefore, our contribution to the strengthening of Euro-Atlantic security is directly reflected on the strength and protection of our country, Gakharia said.

---

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
Some experts say the actual number of infections is higher than the official count. The garment industry says few workers in its factories have fallen ill thanks to precautions such as employing fewer people on the production lines and imposing safety guidelines. The government imposed a nationwide lockdown on March 26, and the garments sector was closed for nearly three months, reopening only gradually.
KYODO NEWS - Sep 25, 2020 - 14:39 | All, Japan, Coronavirus, World

Japan said Friday it has agreed with Singapore and Brunei to reopen their borders for newly arriving expatriates and other long-term residents from next Wednesday and Oct. 8, respectively.

Those eligible to travel will be allowed in on condition they self-isolate for 14-days after entering the respective countries to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus, according to the Foreign Ministry.

The two Southeast Asian countries will join seven other economies, including Vietnam and Thailand, with which Tokyo has established a travel corridor for long-term residents.

Japan currently bans in principle the entry of foreigners from 159 countries and regions.

"We see the resumption of new entries (of foreigners) to Japan as an extremely important issue," Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi told a press conference.

"The government as a whole is seriously considering how to restart travel while taking measures to prevent the spread of the coronavirus."

Japan already allows people on short-term business trips from Singapore to enter the country without the need to self-isolate, on condition they take pre-departure and post-arrival coronavirus tests, present an itinerary of their stay and take other steps to protect themselves and others from the virus.
The director of the Auschwitz Memorial appealed to Nigerias president on Friday to pardon a 13-year-old boy who was sentenced to 120 months of prison on blasphemy charges, even volunteering to serve part of the boys sentence.

Piotr Cywinski wrote to Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari about the case of Omar Farouq, who was recently convicted in a Sharia court in Kano State in northwest Nigeria after he was accused of using blasphemy in an argument with a friend.

The director of @AuschwitzMuseum wrote the President of Nigeria and asked him to pardon 13-year old Omar Farouq sentenced for 10 years imprisonment.



He declares he is ready to share part of the sentence.



'I cannot remain indifferent to this disgraceful sentence for humanity.' pic.twitter.com/EzVBjCzgcY  Auschwitz Memorial (@AuschwitzMuseum) September 25, 2020

Cywinski said that as the director of the site that preserves the remains of the German Nazi extermination camp, where children were imprisoned and murdered, I cannot remain indifferent to this disgraceful sentence for humanity.

Cywinski said that if the president couldnt give clemency, he would suggests that 120 adult volunteers from all over the world  myself personally among them  each serve a month in a Nigerian prison.

Regardless of what he said, he cannot be treated as fully aware and responsible, given his age, Cywinski wrote. He should not be subjected to the loss of the entirety of his youth, be deprived of opportunities, and stigmatized physically, emotionally, and educationally for the rest of his life.

The Auschwitz memorial site is located in southern Poland, which during World War II was under German occupation. The German forces killed 1.1 million people there. Most of the victims were Jewish, but others, including ethnic Poles, Soviet POWs and Roma, also lost their lives in large numbers there.
There are now eight cases of COVID-19 connected to schools in Niagara since students returned to class.

Late Sunday afternoon, Niagara Catholic District School Board said in a news release that an individual at St. Vincent de Paul Catholic Elementary School in Niagara Falls has tested positive for COVID-19.

As a result, students and staff were exposed to the coronavirus while this individual was infectious, the board said.

Saturday evening, the board issued a news release to say an individual at Canadian Martyrs Catholic Elementary School in St. Catharines tested positive.

The person, unknown if they are staff or a student, is in self isolation, said the board.

Staff from the school are working with Niagara Region Public Health and will fully comply with all requirements, the board added.

The schools principal has issued a letter to parents, it said.

In the same release, the board confirmed a case of COVID-19 has been connected to Holy Cross Catholic Secondary School.

According to the Catholic board, it has been determined there is no risk of exposure to the Holy Cross Catholic Secondary School community.

The individual in this case is also self-isolating at the direction of public health, the board said.

RELATED STORIES Niagara Region Third confirmed virus case found at Eastdale secondary in Welland

Three cases of the virus have been confirmed with individuals at Eastdale Secondary School in Welland, the most recent one announced by District School Board of Niagara Friday.

The first case at the east Welland high school was confirmed Sept. 18 and the second two days later.

Mary Ward Catholic Elementary School in Niagara Falls was the first school in Niagara to report an individual being infected with COVID-19, announced by Niagara Catholic on Sept. 17. Then on Wednesday, DSBN reported a case had been identified at William H. Merritt Public School on Linwell Road in St. Catharines.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) for the general debate in the 75th session of the General Assembly on Saturday. He is expected to highlight Indias priorities as a member of the Security Council during 2021-22 and urge for global action against terrorism, according to people familiar with the development.

The issues India will focus on during its stint as a non-permanent member of the Security Council include the 5-S approach of samman (respect), samvad (dialogue), sahyog (cooperation), shanti (peace) and samriddhi (prosperity). The prime minister is expected to focus on these in his speech, the people cited above said.

Strengthening of global action to counter terrorism is one of Indias priorities and this is expected to be reflected in the prime ministers speech, they said.

India will push for more transparency in the process of listing and delisting of entities and individuals by the UN sanction committees, they added.

The virtual assembly will broadcast PM Modis pre-recorded video statement at the UNGA hall in New York. He is scheduled as the first speaker of the assembly in the forenoon of Saturday.

India, one of the largest troop-contributing countries to the peace missions, will seek to engage intensively in finalising mandates for the UN peacekeeping mission, according to news agency ANI. It will also stress on issues relating to sustainable development and climate change.

The theme of the 75th UNGA is The future we want, the United Nations we need, reaffirming our collective commitment to multilateralism - confronting the Covid-19 through effective multilateral action.

(with agency inputs)
The bronze hues complement my hazel eyes and draw attention away from my mask. Credit:iStock

Omnilux Contour Face, $949. Credit:Jennifer Soo

Road Test

I am wanting to draw attention away from my face mask, so I opt for some extra eye drama.

The lowdown I have ventured out to the M.A.C store in Sydneys Bondi Junction to try an express make-up session, as I feel my eyes need a colour update with all this mask-wearing. Make-up artist Brinley suggests a bronze smoky eye and I vote yes to that. She starts by blending my lids with Prep + Prime 24-Hour Extend Eye Base. Next is Technakohl Liner in Brown Border just above and below my lash line, followed by three lush new bronze-y eyeshadows.
Boars Head displays a sign on its outer gate notifying law enforcement is does not consent to enforcement of the local mask mandate on Monday, Sept. 21, 2020 in downtown in Athens, Georgia. Athens Clarke-County has issued a mask mandate, but many bars have chosen to forgo enforcement on their property. (Photo/Julian Alexander, jalexander@randb.com)
Bill Barr

Bill Barr ABC

Legal experts are increasingly alarmed by Attorney General William Barr's efforts to help President Donald Trump win re-election.

The attorney general has joined the president in attacking voting integrity and civil rights demonstrators, and he has described his role in the election in explicitly religious terms that show Barr believes he represents "moral discipline and virtue" against "individual rapacity," reported The Guardian.

"His abuses have only escalated as we have gotten closer and closer to the election, and as the president has felt more and more politically vulnerable," said Donald Sherman, deputy director of the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. "I can't put it more plainly than this: The attorney general is a threat to American citizens having free and fair access to the vote, and is a threat to American having their votes counted."

Barr has recently asked federal prosecutors to consider charging protesters with sedition and designated New York City, Portland and Seattle as "anarchy" zones, which helps Trump whip up hysteria about public safety.

"I think this attorney general is demonstrably more committed to the political success of the president, and the president's political agenda than any attorney general in history I can think of," said Neil Kinkopf, a Georgia State law professor who worked in the Office of Legal Counsel under Bill Clinton.

Kinkopf testified against Barr during his 2019 confirmation hearing, when he warned senators the deeply conservative Washington veteran believed in giving the chief executive "breathtaking" powers.

"When I testified against him, I recognized how dangerous the unitary executive theory is," Kinkopf said. "But what I didn't appreciate, and I don't think anybody appreciated, was just how fully he would deploy that theory in advance not of rule-of law values, but in order to advance both the president's political agenda, and I think more deeply for Barr, his own social and religious commitments."

Story continues

The attorney general has accused Black Lives Matter protesters of fomenting chaos as part of a socialist revolution, and he has described himself as a bulwark in a battle between good and evil.

"The attorney general sees himself clearly as fighting culture wars that are to him moral and religious," Kinkopf said, "and those are deeper, I think, commitments for him than the commitment to federalism, and so to the extent that the balance of federal and state power gets in the way of achieving what he wants to achieve in the culture wars, he's willing to cast that aside.

"So if there weren't a culture war angle on it, I think he would take the position that states and local governments should be left to police their own communities, and the federal government should keep its nose out," Kinkopf added. "But because he sees something at stake in the current protests that jeopardizes what he feels as being the proper order of society, he's not troubled about using federal power to pursue what he views as being the right results."

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In a screen grab of a video, Sam Rainsy speaks to supporters from his home in Paris, France, Nov. 4, 2019.

Cambodian opposition leader Sam Rainsy vowed anew on Friday to return from five years of exile in France to press for democratic reforms in the Southeast Asian country, saying that an economic crisis has made it necessary to make a second attempt to go back after an abortive homecoming in November.

I will return to Cambodia to solve the economic crisis, the acting president of the Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP) said on an RFA Khmer Service talk show on Friday. [Prime Minister] Hun Sen doesnt know how to solve this crisis. He and his government dont know how to do it, he said.

Cambodias problems can be solved only if a democratic government is established and if power is returned to the people, Sam Rainsy said.

The country of 16 million has avoided a major coronavirus outbreak but faces difficult growth prospects as a result of the global and regional economic fallout from the pandemic.

The global shock triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic has significantly impacted Cambodias economy in 2020 at a time when Cambodia also faces the partial suspension of preferential access to the EU market under the Everything but Arms initiative, said the World Bank.

Sam Rainsy said he will ask the European Union to lift trade sanctions aimed at pressing Hun Sen and his ruling Cambodian Peoples Party (CPP) to address the countrys worsening rights record and end a long crackdown on the CNRP, NGOs, and the independent media.

He has resided outside Cambodia since late 2015, when while on an overseas trip, he learned through diplomatic channels that he faced imminent arrest after being stripped of parliamentary immunity and had to postpone his return.

Since then, authorities arrested CNRP president Kem Sokha on charges of treason in September 2017, and dissolved the party two months later over an alleged plot to topple Hun Sen. The ban on the political opposition paved the way for the CPP to win all 125 seats in parliament in the countrys July 2018 general election.



Sam Rainsy had tried to return on Nov. 9, 2019 to lead nonviolent protests against Hun Sen, urging Cambodian migrant workers abroad and members of the military to join him, but his plan to enter Cambodia from Thailand was thwarted when he was refused permission to board a Thai Airways plane in Paris.

He was later denied entry into Indonesia after making a brief visit to Malaysia.

Doubling down on arrests

Hun Sens response to last years return attempt was to double down on the crackdown on the CNRP and its supporters, arresting more than 100 party members for mobilizing to welcome Sam Rainsy back home, later releasing 76 of them on bail.

A provincial court in Cambodia sentenced seven CNRP activistsincluding a new motherto between five and seven years in prison Tuesday for treason for their plans to welcome Sam Rainsy last November. Four were sentenced in absentia.

But Sam Rainsy denied his earlier plan to return home to press for democratic reforms had been a failure, calling it a psychological and political success.

Hun Sen urged the Thai prime minister to block me from returning home and had even mobilized troops to stop me, but I am not afraid. I am looking for ways to return home soon, he said.

Even though Hun Sen is afraid of my shadow, I will go back and scare him to death, he added.

Speaking to RFA on Friday, CNRP Deputy President Eng Chhai Eang said that circumstances in Cambodia have changed since last year, and that protests in Thailand and that the growing unhappiness of Cambodias people will now support Sam Rainsys return.

Government spokesman Phay Siphan said however that Sam Rainsy seeks change in Cambodia through violence and not through the democratic process, adding that the opposition leader had consistently promoted disunity in Cambodia during every election.

Sam Rainsy has always sought to split Khmer unity. He has always said, Where there is Sam Rainsy, there can be no Hun Sen, Phay Siphan said.

Analyst Meas Nee told RFA on Tuesday that Sam Rainsys announcement is only a strategy to put pressure on Cambodias government.

Meas Nee said that the announcement will lead to more detentions of CNRP members, but will benefit the opposition party because it will result in criticism or possible sanctions over political arrests

In Phnom Penh, CNRP president Kem Sokha, waiting for his trial on treason charges to resume after a delay caused by the coronavirus outbreak, continued to receive foreign diplomats at his home despite warnings from the court that he was violating a court order banning him from political activity.



Writing on his Facebook page on Sept. 25, Kem Sokha thanked European Union ambassador to Cambodia Carmen Moreno who had visited to hold discussions following his participation in religious ceremonies and social activities with supporters in the provinces.

Assault victim files complaint

Also on Friday, a CNRP activists wife who was attacked by security guards during a recent protest in Phnom Penh called on the courts to free her husband, Sun Thun, and filed a criminal complaint against the guards who had attacked her.

Seng Chanthorn, the wife of CNRP activist Sun Thun, was admitted to the hospital with internal injuries after authorities from the citys Prampi Makara district threw her to the street, causing her to pass out, as they broke up the wives weekly Black Friday campaign demanding the release of 17 CNRP activists from Prey Sar Prison.

She said that one of the guards who attacked her had wanted to kill her, and demanded he be punished according to the law.

If he didnt want to kill me, he shouldnt have done it. I want the courts to prosecute [the attackers] and put them in prison, she said.

More than 25 CNRP wives and other supporters continued their weekly protest outside the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Friday as Seng Chanthorn handed her complaint to court officials.

Reported by RFAs Khmer Service. Translated by Samean Yun. Written in English by Richard Finney.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 19:15:36|Editor: huaxia

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KUALA LUMPUR, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Malaysia reported 82 new COVID-19 infections, the Health Ministry said on Saturday, bringing the national total to 10,769.

Health Ministry Director-General Noor Hisham Abdullah said in a press statement that three of the new cases are imported and 79 are local transmissions, mostly reported from the northern Borneo state of Sabah where a number of clusters had been identified recently.

The ministry said domestic travelers from Sabah would be screened for COVID-19 from Sept. 27 to Oct. 10 after 11 returnees from the state tested positive on Saturday.

Sabah held a state legislative assembly election on Saturday, with voters and politicians travelling between the Malaysian Peninsula to the state in the run-up to the polling day.

The Health Ministry also reported that 89 patients have been released on Saturday after recovery, bringing the total cured and discharged to 9,785, or 90.9 percent of all cases.

Of the remaining 851 active cases, eight are being held in intensive care and four of those are in need of assisted breathing.

No new deaths have been reported, leaving the total deaths at 133. Enditem
A man says he has been left devastated after a leading fertility clinic used his sperm against his wishes to father nine children with same-sex couples and single women.

Neil Gaskell told Care Fertility in Manchester  which describes itself as one of the worlds leading providers of IVF  that he wanted his sperm to go only to heterosexual couples when he agreed to become a donor in 2010.

But clinic officials were forced to confess that mistakes had been made when an official audit by the fertility regulator, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA), revealed five children had been born to three same-sex couples, including a set of twins, using Mr Gaskells sperm.

The 49-year-old was also told that he was the biological father to 13 children in total  including a further four born to three single women and four more to heterosexual couples.

Neil Gaskell (pictured with paperwork from his four-year legal battle) told Care Fertility in Manchester he wanted his sperm to go only to heterosexual couples when he agreed to become a donor in 2010

Mr Gaskell, who accepts his views will be divisive, was adamant any resulting children from his sperm should have the advantage of a father figure.

An official donor consent form made clear the restrictions he wished to place on his donation.

As a result of the blunders, the clinic  which has more than 20 units across the country  has now paid Mr Gaskell a five-figure sum following a four-year legal battle which was settled out of court.

In an interview with The Mail on Sunday, Mr Gaskell told how:

The clinic used his sperm to create 11 families when the HFEAs rules only permit a maximum of ten from a single donor;

He was told by the clinic he had Superman-strength sperm and was asked to become a donor to help others;

He was left shocked and numb to discover he had fathered 13 children via the clinic when he claims he was told it was more likely to be two or three;

Clinic staff initially told him there were 12 children but a further child came to light after a request for information to the HFEA;

His sperm had also been used to help single women conceive despite his belief that only families with a father figure would benefit;

A change in the law in 2005 means all the children have the right to receive information about their biological fathers  which means they can get in touch with Mr Gaskell when they turn 18;

The HFEA has confirmed the clinic should never have accepted Mr Gaskell as a donor because his views were contrary to the Equality Act, which states that donors and clinics cannot discriminate against protected groups.

Today, Mr Gaskell, from Manchester, is furious at what he describes as a huge betrayal. I accept that some people will find this uncomfortable and that people might think Im homophobic, or against the idea of single mothers, he told The Mail on Sunday.

But that couldnt be further from the truth. This wasnt about discriminating against same-sex couples, it wasnt for religious reasons and I dont accept that its bigotry. I think about these families  these children  every day, all the time.

But you cant argue with biology. It takes a man and a woman to create a child, and its my view that if children are being born with my sperm they must have a mother and a father.

After they returned to the UK in 2010 they decided to try for more, and approached Care Fertility in Manchester (pictured)

I worried about how theyd be brought up, whether theyd be bullied in the playground, or about having two mums. I didnt want that for my children. I accept thats going to be divisive, but its how I feel.

The bitter irony is Mr Gaskell and his former partner spent 14 years trying to conceive before they had their first child, following IVF treatment in Australia, in 2008.

After they returned to the UK in 2010 they decided to try for more, and approached Care Fertility in Manchester. When an initial round of IVF treatment failed, Mr Gaskell was approached by the clinic to become a donor.

In exchange, he and his ex-partner were offered a discount on their next IVF cycle by the fertility clinic  a common practice.

While it is illegal to pay egg or sperm donors more than their expenses, clinics are able to offer discounts on treatment. In Mr Gaskells case, it would reduce the cost of a round of IVF from 3,500 to 1,200.

Mr Gaskell says the clinics medical director in Manchester, Philip Lowe, told him he had Superman-strength sperm. He explained their motility was unusually high compared with normal sperm, and that I should consider becoming a donor, Mr Gaskell said.

The couple were keen to help other people in a similar situation to themselves and decided to take up the clinics offer.

While it is illegal to pay egg or sperm donors more than their expenses, clinics are able to offer discounts on treatment (file image)

When filling out the HFEA consent form in the clinic in April 2010, Mr Gaskell said he was told he could place restrictions on his donation.

The lady from the clinic, who filled in the form on my behalf, said some people want to put Not for same sex-couples. So I asked her to write that down.

Because the form also said that the donation would go to a maximum of ten families, I assumed that meant it would go to couples, not single women.

I wanted to protect the sanctity of my own family, my own children. If the donor-conceived children had a father figure, I thought it would reduce the chances of them making contact with me later on.

They may have a fantastic upbringing and be cared for deeply. But if they had same-sex parents, or a single mother, other kids might ask, Wheres your dad? Theyd be more curious about me.

In fact, the Equality Act  which came into law in October that year  prohibits discriminating against specific protected groups, including same-sex couples.

Mr Gaskells sperm was only used after this point  which, according to the HFEA, means he should not have been accepted as a donor as his restrictions breached their own code of practice and the law in place at the time.

In September 2016, Mr Gaskell was told there were 12 children  and that an audit by the HFEA had revealed that some had been born to same-sex couples.

The details emerged over the next few months and he eventually discovered the total was, in fact, 13.

It was life-changing  impossible to process. The betrayal of my wishes really got me, and the sheer number of children, he said.

Id gone 14 years believing I was never going to be a father only to eventually get three children of my own. Now I was being told I had 13 more.

The strain destroyed his relationship and the couple separated.

The clinic said: Errors are exceptionally rare and always reported to the regulator as well as informing anyone affected in an open, honest and transparent manner.

A HFEA spokesman said a full investigation had been carried out into Mr Gaskells case and lessons have been learned.
Amaravati, Sep 26 : Aimed at arresting the dwindling numbers of Punganuru cow, a dwarf bovine offering A2 milk rich in medicinal values and endemic to southern Andhra Pradesh, the state government has launched 'Mission Punganuru' recently.

"It is about a local breed which is almost dwindling. With modern technology, we are planning to improve the numbers of the breed so that we are able to get the multiplication rate over and above the normal rate," Animal Husbandry department special chief secretary Poonam Malakondaiah told IANS.

As part of the project, Malakondaiah said the department is working on breeding technology to produce more female Punganuru cows.

With a budget of Rs 73 crore for the mission, the senior IAS officer said the state government wants to reverse the neglect inflicted on this indigenous bovine breed all these years.

Even the National Bureau of Animal Genetic Resources, which deals with the genetics of different breeds in India has also categorised Punganuru as an endangered species as it numbers dwindled below 2,000 at one time.

She said Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy is very keen on promoting indigenous breeds.

"When we were promoting cows under any scheme, it was mostly about Jersey cows and others renown for maximum yield and being economical. But then, our own local breeds with good medicinal properties and dung best for organic farming were getting ignored and eroded," she observed.

Malakondaiah asserted that the state cannot allow genetic material to be eroded with that kind of negligence.

On achieving multiplication rates in Punganuru numbers, the animal husbandry department will set up Punganuru cow farms in each district, where the cow's milk will be collected and sold with departmental certification.

"Once this multiplication takes place, we are going to have in each district Punganuru cow farms, where milk collection centres would be created," she said.

Priced higher than regular milk with many takers, Punganuru cow milk is expected to compensate the farmers.

However, it will take time as the project stretches for a period of three years.

AP has already started 25,000 farmer training schools called 'Polam Badi', in which farmers will be taught about organic farming and best practices.

Elaborating on the dwarf cow, the department's director, T. Damodar Naidu, said Punganuru is the pride of Andhra Pradesh.

"Punganuru cow originated by virtue of the terrain it lives in, around Punganuru taluka of Chittoor district, abutting Madanapalle and Horseley Hills and Palamaneru," said Naidu.

In these elevated places, the dwarf cow, also known as big goat for its low maintenance cost, is famous for climbing small hillocks in search of fodder.

"It is called a big goat as far as its maintenance is concerned. So it consumes less feed when compared to a buffalo or cow. Its milk is just sufficient for the farmer's domestic needs and the calf," he said.

Amid all these benefits, the only disadvantage with the animal is its inability to be used for draught work by virtue of its dwarf size.

Unlike a regular cow or buffalo, Punganuru cow cannot be used to pull a bullock cart or plough a field but is reared only for its milk, rich in A2 protein.

Naidu said this disadvantage is negated by the low maintenance cost and 4-6 litres milk it offers in a day.

In comparison, a cross breed animal like Holstein or Jersey cow may offer more milk than a Punganuru but that fetches lesser money than the dwarf cow's milk.

A2 milk, especially from Gir or Ongole animals is being sold at a premium price of Rs 70-100 per litre, said Naidu.

Likewise, Punganuru milk is also being sold at around Rs 120-150 in Hyderabad, however, Naidu pointed out that Rs 70 - 100 cost per litre is a very good price to fetch for a farmer.

"So if you can promote a cow that gives 4-6 litres milk a day, it fetches Rs 280 on selling 4 litres, out of which the owner spends only a little money for its maintenance in the form of feed or concentrated powder. That means a profit of 200 per day, which is a lucrative proposition of 5 - 6k rupees per month,a said Naidu, extrapolating the economics of Punganuru.

Similarly, with a gestation period of only nine months, Punganuru cow can bear a calf in just 12-14 months, making it a good backyard investment for a household, he observed.

So with this motive, the government of AP wants to promote this breed by first multiplying it and then distributing.

For this multiplication purpose, the department will make use of IVF and embryo technology at Pulivendula in Kadapa district with academic support.

Simultaneously, steps will also be taken to encourage farmers in every district to start organic farming, which will take 2-3 years.

"So this panchagavya, divamrutam, dhanamrutam and kashaya concept can be made from the dung and urine of these cows. Punganuru cow also gives 3-4 litres of urine per day, which can be collected and marketed," he said.

Apart from Punganuru, the department also intends to raise some more indigenous cows which produce good amount of milk, and aligns with the call given by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to promote indigenous cow breeds, Currently, some people are buying Punganuru cow even at a price of Rs 2 lakh for fancy purposes, although it ranges between Rs 40,000 -50,000 rupees.

On multiplication, Naidu says a Punganuru cow price can come down to around Rs 30,000.

(Sharon Thambala can be contacted at thambalasharon@gmail.com)
By Express News Service

GUWAHATI: Opposition Congress in Assam has petitioned Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal urging him to retain certain chapters, pertaining to the policies and contributions of countrys first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, in the syllabi of classes XI and XII.

In a letter to Sonowal, leader of the Opposition and Congress MLA, Debabrata Saikia, urged Sonowal to instruct the Assam Higher Secondary Education Council (AHSEC) to retain the chapters.

To give relief to students in these difficult times of the Covid-19 pandemic, the AHSEC had taken a decision to drop the chapters on Nehrus policies, anti-Sikh riots of 1984, Ayodhya dispute, Gujarat riots, women empowerment, minority rights, Mandal Commission report, the first three general elections etc to reduce students load by 30%.

Saikia said while any move to ease the workload of students is welcome in the current abnormal situation, the choice of chapters for exclusion was questionable. He cited the instances of chapters relating to nation-building policies of Nehru, his foreign policy and the Garibi Hatao campaign initiated by Indira Gandhi.

Any unbiased person would concede that Pandit Nehru laid the foundation of modern India by laying emphasis on industrialization of the country via scientific technology. Similarly, Pandit Nehru had signed the Panchsheel Agreement with China and the neighbouring country had recently stated that it still wants bilateral ties based on that pact, the Congress leader wrote.

He asserted that Nehru continued to get global respect for spearheading the non-aligned movement during the Cold War. Even political opponents including Bharat Ratna Atal Behari Vajpayee and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh publicly acknowledged Nehrus unparalleled contribution to nation-building and the nurturing of democratic values, Saikia said.

He said it was important for students of the present generation to learn about the contributions made by Nehru.

...Everyone had noticed a concerted campaign by a certain section over the past few years to tarnish the image of Pandit Nehru and negate his contribution to the nation. There is a ground to suspect that this force is behind the AHSECs decision to drop chapters about Pandit Nehru from the curriculum, Saikia added.
Trump Calls for Honest Vote, Says He Wont Lose Unless They Cheat

President Donald Trump on Friday said he wants a friendly transition of power if he loses to Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden but told a rally that he wont lose the upcoming election unless his opposition cheats.

The only way that were going to lose is if theres mischief. Mischief, and it will have to be on a big scale. So, be careful. We do want a very friendly transition, but we dont want to be cheated and be stupid and say: oh, lets transition,' Trump said during an event in Newport News, Virginia.

Well go and well do a transition, and we know that there were thousands and thousands of ballots that made the difference through cheating. Were not going to stand for it, he added.

Democrats say Trump will refuse to leave office even if he loses, pointing to remarks like those that he made during the rally. The Senate unanimously passed a resolution on Thursday committing to a peaceful transfer of power.

Well see what happens, Trump told reporters in Washington earlier this week, when asked if he would commit to a peaceful transfer of power if he loses. He later said hed respect a ruling by the Supreme Court, if it came to that.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) responded in her weekly press briefing, saying she wasnt surprised because the President has been contemptible of science and governance but that she has confidence that the institutions in the country will ensure a peaceful transition.

Democratic presidential nominee in Washington to pay respects to late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, on Sept. 25, 2020. (Greg Nash/Pool/Getty Images)

Biden, appearing virtually on MSNBC on Friday night, called Trumps comments a typical Trump distraction.

This is trying to make everybody wonder whether or not the election will be legit, the Democrat said.

A Pentagon spokesman last month dismissed the idea that the military would involve itself in an election dispute.

Trump has repeatedly criticized the unprecedented transition to widespread mail-in voting, a method used only sparingly in many states in past elections.

Discarded ballots, many cast for the Republican, and trays of mail found in a ditch with absentee ballots are the latest cases promoted by Trump as evidence that the upcoming election will be chaotic, with uncertainty as to who actually won the presidency.

This is a disaster waiting to happen and the only hope we have reallyother than going through a long, unbelievable litigation at the end after its overbecause were going to win, were not going to lose this, except if they cheat, thats the way I look at it. But we cant let him cheat. We cant let him, its too much, Trump said, appearing to refer to Biden. Our country is at stake.

People who see anything untoward should report it to the authorities and law enforcement officials are watching all over the place, the president later said, adding that the results of the election could take months to confirm because of the surge in mail-in voting.
BEIJING, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- China's Supreme People's Court on Friday issued a guideline on the legal services provided by courts to add impetus to further opening-up.

With 17 articles in six parts, the document highlights the principle of equal protection, aimed at providing a market environment in which Chinese and foreign parties engage in fair and impartial competition and are equally protected by the law.

The litigants' rights to choose a competent court and the applicable laws and methods to deal with the dispute are guaranteed, according to the guideline.

To promote the modernization of the trial system for foreign-related commercial and maritime cases, the guideline demands that the courts precisely ascertain and apply international treaties, conventions and foreign laws to strengthen the international credibility of adjudication.

The newly released guideline calls for the appropriate handling of foreign-related commercial and maritime cases concerning cross-border trade, investment and shipping, as well as the COVID-19 epidemic.

It requires further integration of foreign-related trials and the building of intelligent courts. In the meantime, the document also urges the building of a litigation service platform for extraterritorial litigants and the further development of the China International Commercial Court.

In terms of intellectual property rights, the 17-article document stresses the need to implement the punitive compensation mechanism for intellectual property infringement cases.
Inspired by Ruth Bader Ginsburg's legendary career, these fifth graders want to rename a local middle school in her honor. (Photo: Ron Sachs/CNP/Getty Images)

An Oregon student has started a petition to have a new school renamed in honor of the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died on Sept. 18 at the age of 87.

On Monday, Ruby, a fifth-grade student at Bridger K-8 in Portland, Oreg., started a petition (with the help of her parents) on Change.org calling for Kellogg Middle School, which is currently being rebuilt as part of the 2017 Health, Safety and Modernization Bond, to change its name to honor Ginsburg.

In a letter posted to the Change.org page, Ruby called on district officials to consider the implications of the schools current name. Dear Portland Public Schools, I feel strongly that we should change the name of Kellogg Middle School to Ruth Bader Ginsburg Middle School, she writes. I feel this way because it is a new school so it should have a new name. We have a lot of schools (far too many, in my opinion) named after white businessmen. Lastly, if kids go to schools centered only on white males then kids who are not those two things may feel unimportant, or worthless even. I trust that you do not want kids to feel this way, so I hope you will take my ideas into consideration.

As of Friday, the petition had raked in over 1,000 signatures. The school, located in the Southeast region of Portland, is named after Joseph Kellogg, a famous steamboat captain and businessman who lived in the city during the mid 1800s.

Portland Public Schools did not respond to Yahoo Lifes request for comment and told Portlands KATU that it had not heard of the petition, but added: PPS is very committed to student voice and the renaming process. This summer we proposed a new process that aligns with our PPS Vision, our values, commitment to Racial Equity and Social Justice, and is culturally responsive.

According to a Facebook post made by Rubys mother, Rachael Waas Shull, its not the fifth-graders first time asking for the change. Last year, Ruby sent a handwritten letter to Portland Public Schools urging officials to rename the school after Ginsburg, but Portland Public School naming policy requires the namesake to be deceased at least three years, and Ginsburg was alive at the time. Following the legends death, Ruby renewed her fight.

Story continues

In an interview with Fox12, Ruby said that she has been inspired to keep up her fight by Ginsburgs own tenacity. "Ruth Bader Ginsburg's been my hero and idol. So it was really important to me to represent her. Also I knew Kellogg had, his name's Joseph Kellogg I believe, he hadn't really done anything important for the community and Ruth Bader Ginsburg has fought for equal rights for many people."

Yahoo Life reached out to Rubys parents and will update the article once we hear back.

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Local News, Arts & Culture, Press Releases

By sidjacobsonjcc Published: September 26 2020

The award-winning designer will be joined by Rosanna Scotto to discuss his memoir The Cobbler

Sid Jacobson JCC announces its 2020-2021 Spotlight Speaker Series will begin Tuesday, October 20, 7:30pm with Steve Madden in conversation with Rosanna Scotto, as they virtually discuss his memoir The Cobbler. The JCC will host three other writers throughout 2020 and 2021 as part of the virtual series including Bess Kalb, Cameron Douglas, and Alan Zweibel. Tickets for the full series and individual speakers are now on sale at sjjcc.org/culturalarts.

We have four spotlight speakers sharing their life experiences with us, says Elyse Ingber, Director of Performance + Visual Arts, Sid Jacobson JCC. Each with their own interesting journey, and we are excited to hear from all of them, starting with Long Islands own Steve Madden.

Everyone knows Steve Maddens name and his shoes, but few are familiar with his story. Madden is an entrepreneur, an award-winning designer, and a business titan. He is also a recovering addict and a devoted family man. Over the past thirty years, the provocative shoe designer built a booming brand and nearly lost it all to The Wolf of Wall Street, only to rebound by giving back and creating a global empire. In his new memoir, The Cobbler, Madden shares his experiences building his multi-billion dollar brand while being plagued by addiction, self-destruction, and an eventual diagnosis of ADHD.

Madden will be joined by Rosanna Scotto, co-host of Good Day New York. Scotto has won three Emmys for anchoring FOX 5 News at 10 and Good Day New York. She is the winner of the 1995 New York State Associated Press First Place Award for her report "New York Survival Guide" and also the winner of three other Associated Press First Place Awards, including two special Associated Press Award nominations. Born and raised in Brooklyn, Scotto lives in the New York area with her husband and their two children.

Tickets to the virtual event cost $20 and are now on sale at sjjcc.org/culturalarts. The first 50 registrants will receive a free gift bag. Copies of The Cobbler will be available at the JCC front desk for purchase for the insider price of $20.

The second Spotlight Speaker event will take place Thursday, December 3 with Bess Kalb, Emmy-nominated writer for Jimmy Kimmel as she discusses Nobody Will Tell You This But Me, her memoir of unforgettable heart-to-hearts, family secrets, and her signature wisdom. The Series will continue in 2021 with Cameron Douglas as he discusses his shocking and inspiring memoir Long Way Home on Tuesday, January 19 and concludes with the cultural memoir Laugh Lines, by Alan Zweibel, one of the first writers at Saturday Night Live, on Tuesday, March 17.

To purchase tickets or to read full descriptions of the authors and their books, visit sjjcc.org/culturalarts. For more information about the Spotlight Speaker Steve Madden virtual event, contact Elyse Ingber, Director of Visual + Performance Arts at 516.484.1545 ext. 144 or eingber@sjjcc.org.
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SC home sales slipped 4.2 percent in August

After rebounding over much of the summer from the spring lockdown, home sales across South Carolina slipped in August except along the coast.

During the eighth month of the year, 9,439 residential real estate properties changed hands in the Palmetto State, a drop of 4.2 percent over the same month last year, according to housing data from the South Carolina Realtors Association.

Coastal markets continued to do well, all with double-digit increases, including the Charleston area with a 15 percent jump in sales. Hilton Head saw a 33 percent surge in home transactions while Beaufort reported a 22 percent rise and Myrtle Beach reported 12 percent more sales.

Greenville showed a 2.5 percent drop in sales while Columbia reported a 6 percent decline and Spartanburg showed an 18 percent plunge.

For the year, home sales statewide totaled 63,807, a decrease of 5.7 percent, or about 3,800 fewer closings than during the first eight months of 2019.

With housing inventory down by 30 percent to 21,576 units in South Carolina and demand up, home prices continue to soar.

The median price in August jumped 13.6 percent to $252,000, up from about $222,000 in August 2019.

For the year so far, the median price is up 9.6 percent to $238,414, up from $217,500 during the January-August period in 2019. The national median home price is currently $304,100, according to the National Association of Realtors.

Looking ahead, uncertainty because of the pandemic and lack of homes continue to shadow the market.

"The demand is strong. The only thing slowing it down is the lack of inventory," said Owen Tyler, S.C. Realtors president and broker in charge at residential real estate firm The Cassina Group in Charleston. But, current monthly market indicators show the momentum continuing through fall."

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Atlanta-based builder Ashton Woods expects the first homes to begin rising in early 2022 on a 500-acre tract it purchased earlier this year in Watson Hill off Ashley River Road.

By the numbers

3: Number of new food venues debuting across the Charleston region. They include a pizzeria, bakery and a food truck-rooted brick-and-mortar restaurant.

4.5: Percentage of property tax rate hike Mount Pleasant Town Council approved Friday for residents and businesses of the state's fourth-largest municipality.

100: Millions of dollars planned for a proposed "ecotourism" resort on a coastal island in Beaufort County. A zoning board on Thursday unanimously denied the request after considerable opposition, including that of Gov. Henry McMaster.

480: Address on East Bay Street where developer Rivers Enterprises wants to update a mostly-vacant strip center behind South Atlantic Bank, including adding new storefronts on renovated buildings on the backside of the property facing Washington Street.

This week in real estate

+ Sinking land: Sea level rise is just part of Charleston's flooding problem. The ground underfoot is also sinking in a process called subsidence.

+ Flood czar: South Carolina lawmakers approve flood czar and resilience office, but funding won't come before 2021.

+ Tourism tax for flooding: A new statehouse bill headed to the governor's desk for his signature would allow local governments to use hospitality taxes to address flooding woes.

New Mount Pleasant office building 100% leased

Shared workspace firm Serendipity Labs opens in early October on two floors of the five-story new Portside office building overlooking Charleston Harbor at the base of the Ravenel Bridge in Mount Pleasant. The new structure in the Ferry Wharf development, which includes an Embassy Suites Hotel set to open in November, is 100 percent leased by a dozen different firms. Provided/Kris Decker/Firewater Photography

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Employees in the Alameda Health System  which largely serves minority communities  plan to begin a five-day strike on Oct. 7, the California Nurses Association announced Saturday.

In a release, the union said the strike authorization was spurred by concerns over patient safety during the pandemic, along with what it called punitive actions from management at the Alameda Health System that have hindered recruitment and the retention of registered nurses. The strike affects Alameda Hospital, San Leandro Hospital and Highland Hospital.

Hospital officials did not respond to a request for comments.

Emergency room staff has been cut, the release said, and severe staffing has left nurse managers doing the work of bedside nurses, the union said.

Our patients are some of the most marginalized people in our communities and we have an obligation to stand up for them and demand that the county provide us the tools we need to keep ourselves safe, our patients safe, and our communities safe, said Mawata Kamara, a nurse who works at San Leandro Hospital and is on the unions board of directors. We do not take lightly the decision to strike during a pandemic.

The union represents 150 registered nurses at San Leandro Hospital and 175 registered nurses at Alameda Hospital. Those 325 nurses have joined 3,000 technicians, housekeepers and food service workers from SEIU Local 1021 who passed a 98% vote to join the strike against the Alameda Health System.

SIEU Local 1021 represents more than 60,000 employees in Northern California, including nonprofits and other health care programs. Nurses at Highland Hospital, which are represented by SEIU Local 1021, also intend to strike. Also, 800 union health care workers in San Joaquin County have said that they will strike for similar reasons.

The Alameda Health System, or ACS, provides more than 200,000 patient hours annually  the bulk, or about 70%, are Black or Latino patients.

The system is in a crisis, said John Pearson, a Highland Hospital emergency room nurse. And it has been in crisis long before the COVID-19 pandemic.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

The release said that there has been a lack of proper isolation rooms for patients suffering from COVID-19, along with insufficient personal protective equipment for the staff, which has concerned nurses.

Employees who have tried to advocate for better safety have faced disciplinary action for doing so, and the association has filed charges with the Public Employment Relations Board over the matter, the release also said. That board governs the relationship between public employees and their employer.

We are putting our lives on the line coming to work, said Karen Rothblatt, a registered nurse who works at Alameda Hospital. As advocates for our patients, we are obligated to speak out.

Lizzie Johnson is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: ljohnson@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @LizzieJohnsonnn
In a shocking incident, four Delhi Police officers who confiscated 160 Kg of cannabis from a peddler in New Delhi allegedly reported only 1 Kg while selling off the rest.

The four cops including two sub-inspectors and two head constables from Jahangirnagar police station conducted a raid in which 160 kg marijuana was confiscated on September 11. The peddler was also arrested but police reported that the man was let off after giving a bribe of Rs 1,5 lakh. The bribe was allegedly given to settle the matter" outside the purview of the law.

According to a report in Hindustan Times, the peddler - named Anil - had procured the weed from Odisha. It also turned out that the cops had reported only 1 kg of the weed while allegedly selling off the rest of the 159 kg. The four cops have since been suspended for the act.

The incident comes in the wake of growing debate and investigation in the use of marijuana and its byproducts by Indian celebrities. The untimely and tragic death of Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput has led an investigation into a possible drug angle" in the case by the Narcotics Control Bureau. Bollywood actor Rhea Chakraborty has been arrested in connection with the case after the NCB found guilty of allegedly procuring cannabis for Rajput. Now, several leading actresses such as Deepika Padukone, Shraddha Kapoor and Sara Ali Khan are being questioned by the NCB.

The incident has opened up a Pandoras Box in Bollywood, with many calling for a second look at the criminalization of cannabis.

In 1985, India passed the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act in 1985 which criminalised cannabis in the form of buds (ganja) or resin (charas) while allowing the sale of bhang - a byproduct of cannabis that is still heavily consumed on festivals like Holi and Shivratri. The sale and regulation of the latter were left up to states to decide.
When black physician Tina Carroll-Scott started working at South Miami Children's Clinic, she said none of her black patients would consider getting a flu shot.

A complicated history with forced vaccinations and experiments had undercut trust of medical procedures and immunisation within black communities. For more than a decade, Carroll-Scott, the clinic's medical director, toiled to build a relationship with those in the diverse South Florida neighbourhood, where the majority of residents are Hispanic and nearly 14 per cent black and African American, according to US Census data.

"After being at the clinic for 13 years and educating patients about the flu vaccine and dispelling any myths they had about it," Ms Carroll-Scott said. "I've now gotten my patients to a point where they talk to me, and they're willing to take it."

But now, as the Food and Drug Administration and Centres for Disease Control and Prevention repeatedly assure the public that the vaccine for the novel coronavirus will be safe, indications that the review process may be undercut by politics has turned off people in minority communities to getting the vaccine when it becomes available - worrying physicians that communities disproportionately devastated by the Covid-19 pandemic are most at risk of being left out of immunisation efforts.

To assuage fears within minority communities, a panel of black doctors will vet the federal review of companies' vaccines, said Leon McDougle, president of the National Medical Association, the largest and oldest group of black physicians in the country.

"We have concerns," Mr McDougle told MSNBC on Thursday about the vaccine's review process. "There's been a cloud of political influence dating back to hydroxychloroquine  following that, convalescent plasma," he said, referring to the various treatment options promoted by Donald Trump and other government officials. "We want to be that nonpartisan, independent voice, speaking to the African American community and our physicians of the National Medical Association."

When asked what would happen if the panel does not approve a vaccine vetted by the FDA, Mr McDougle said that black doctors are trusted within their communities and if they don't believe in the safety and efficacy of the vaccine, "it's not going to move forward".

Mr McDougle told NPR that he spoke to members of Operation Warp Speed, the project working on a vaccine for the virus, to make the trial data on it publicly available.

The FDA referred the Post to its past statements about the review process when asked about the panel, including testimony by commissioner Stephen Hahn on Wednesday that its investigations into coronavirus vaccine candidates would be thorough.

"I want to assure you and emphasise every one of the decisions we have reached has been made by career FDA scientists based on science and data, not politics," Mr Hahn said. Hours later, Mr Trump hinted in his news briefing that he may not sign off on stricter review guidelines recommended by the FDA, calling the change "a political move more than anything else".

The National Medical Association is not the only group vetting the oversight of vaccines, as New York will also conduct a review, Democratic governor Andrew Cuomo announced on Thursday.

Additional checks by outside organisations can further the scientific process, according to Richard J Baron, the president and CEO of the American Board of Internal Medicine, which is based in Philadelphia. Mr Baron said any disagreements between the NMA and New York on the one side and the FDA and CDC on the other should raise concerns about the federal agencies.

"I would not lay the blame at the feet of the organisations that are trying to maintain a scientific approach," he said in an interview. "I would lay it down at the feet of the federal organisations that are chartered to oversee a scientific approach and don't seem to be demonstrating a public commitment to that."

Polls show Americans have increasingly expressed concern about a vaccine that is available within the year. Three-quarters of US adults surveyed by Pew Research Centre in September said it is at least somewhat likely that a coronavirus vaccine will be approved before it's fully known whether it is safe and effective.

The trust of a first-generation Covid-19 vaccine is significantly less among black Americans compared to White or Hispanic people: less than 30 per cent of black people said they would be willing to take the vaccine, as opposed to 51 per cent of white and 56 per cent of Hispanic people, an Axios-Ipsos survey in August found. The gap waned when those surveyed were asked about getting a flu shot.

Suma Vupputuri, an epidemiologist and research scientist for Kaiser Permanente, who studied the rates of flu vaccination across races, said oversight over the safety of a vaccine may be a more effective way to recruit black patients and garnering trust than a blind effort to disseminate a vaccine in black communities that is not safe.

"You almost go the other direction if you're trying to push a vaccine that may not be safe at a black community and if something does go wrong, and there are ill effects, then all of a sudden, all those good intentions went exactly in the opposite direction," Ms Vupputuri told the Post.

More black voices are needed in science, argued Kevin M Ileka in the Harvard Business Review, citing a recent racist suggestion by two French scientists that trials to determine the effectiveness of a tuberculosis vaccine against the coronavirus should take place in Africa.

Ileka, an analytical chemist at pharmaceutical company Bristol Myers Squibb, compared the proposal's apathy to black lives to the infamous Tuskegee Syphilis Study, where doctors beginning in the 1930s left hundreds of black men untreated with syphilis for four decades to evaluate how the disease ravaged their body even after penicillin was developed.

In South Miami, Ms Carroll-Scott informally surveyed her own patients about their likelihood of getting a coronavirus vaccine and found "a lot of the patients were concerned about the speed".

"Overwhelmingly the answer was no. I would say that that was the consensus. I don't think I had one patient who said that they would be willing to take this vaccine," she said.

Mr Trump's rhetoric calling for the speedy arrival of a vaccine has concerned patients, Ms Carroll-Scott said, as some worry that Mr Trump's priority is "reelection rather than a safe and effective vaccine".

"I think just the name, 'Operation Warp Speed,' invokes a lot of fear and suspicion," Ms Carroll-Scott said of the name given to the White House's efforts to scale up vaccination. "The education is paramount, and, unfortunately, this whole conversation with the vaccine and the pandemic, there's a sense of urgency, and I feel like we are behind the 8-Ball in terms of educating the community."

Ms Carroll-Scott said she welcomes the news of the NMA panel because the oversight may help to assure those most at risk of the virus's life-threatening symptoms.

"We are the trusted messengers in these communities," she said of black doctors. "And so if we're questioning things and not fully confident in this process, there's no way that we're going to be able to get our patients on board."

The Washington Post
A new report warns of 'significant disruption' if the UK government fails to strike a trade agreement with the EU before the end of the year. Photo: Alberto Pezzali/NurPhoto via Getty Images

The economic damage of a no-deal Brexit would be two to three times greater than COVID-19 over the long run, a think tank has warned.

A report by think tank UK in a Changing Europe warns of significant disruption if Britains government fails to strike a trade agreement with the EU before the Brexit transition period expires at the end of the year.

It sets out a string of potential headwinds facing the UK economy if no deal is reached, including:

UK manufacturers including carmakers risk becoming uncompetitive if likely EU tariffs force European importers to raise prices.

UK firms will face a full panoply of checks and formalities trading with the EU, with HMRC estimating a 15bn ($19bn) cost from filling in millions more customs declarations.

Just-in-time supply chains from retailers to carmakers to chemicals face disruptive border delays, risking cash-flow problems or pharmaceutical products becoming unusable.

Food price hikes are highly probable from new tariffs and other barriers to trade, in a damaging move for low-income households. One study cited suggested prices could rise by up to 4%.

The dairy sector in Northern Ireland faces severe disruption, with higher costs for exports to the Republic of Ireland for processing and then from Ireland to the UK market.

Older travellers may find it harder and more costly to travel, as European Health Insurance Cards will no longer be valid.

No agreement will be reached to preserve current access and co-operation on key sectors like aviation, transport, fishing, security and justice.

The UKs financial services sector may face new barriers to European trade if the EU does not give the UK the go-ahead on data adequacy or equivalence rules.

Watch: What is a no-deal Brexit and what are the potential consequences of it?

The report highlights analysis by the think tank and London School of Economics (LSE) academics on the economic hit to long-term GDP from the coronavirus and from a no-deal Brexit.

Story continues

The analysis said Bank of England forecasts suggest the economy will recover quickly over the next 18 months from the pandemic, and it will have few, if any long-term impacts on GDP despite the record decline in the second quarter.

READ MORE: Signs UK economic recovery fading as coronavirus 'suffocates' firms

By contrast the effects of Brexit are expected to emerge slowly, but to be permanent. It highlights the governments own analysis, which suggests a no-deal Brexit would wipe 7.6% off GDP compared to existing trade arrangements over a 15-year period.

Watch: What is a V-shaped economic recovery?

Many analysts are less optimistic than the Bank of England about the damage caused by COVID-19, however, and discussion by policymakers of a V-shaped recovery raised eyebrows.

Professor Anand Menon, director of UK in a Changing Europe, said: While the prime minister said no deal is a good outcome our report shows that it may lead to significant disruption and will have a significant negative economic impact.

As significant will be the political fallout of no deal, particularly with the UK and EU, but also inside the UK, particularly Northern Ireland, and internationally too.
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Linkedin Alya Nurbaiti (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, September 26, 2020 13:21 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c4767333 1 National Jokowi,COVID-19,#COVID19,COVID-19-in-Indonesia,Joko-Widodo,coronavirus,task-force,covid-19-task-force,satgas-covid-19 Free

President Joko Jokowi Widodo must take charge in handling the COVID-19 crisis in Indonesia as the country grapples with a consistent surge of daily coronavirus cases, an epidemiologist has said.

The President must directly lead COVID-19 handling, Pandu Riono of the University of Indonesia told the Jakarta Post on Saturday.

Pandu said that the current strategy, carried out under the national COVID-19 task force, had not been effective in curbing coronavirus transmission.

Read also: Top Indonesian doctor quits COVID-19 task force

Therefore, he argued, the President as the head of state must directly preside over COVID-19 management to help flatten the curve of transmission.

No country but Indonesia has established a COVID-19 task force. There should be no more task force. The government, with all its ministries, must take on the task in order to be effective, Pandu said.

This week, the country has seen an increase in COVID-19 cases on four separate occasions, including three consecutive days.

Indonesias daily case count first topped 4,000 on Sept. 19, before climbing to 4,176 on Monday, 4,465 on Wednesday, 4,634 on Thursday and 4,823 on Friday.

As of Friday, the countrys number of total infections since March was 266,845, with a total of 10,218 fatalities and 196,196 recoveries.
T he number of new coronavirus cases in the UK has soared by more than 6,000 for the fourth day running as the death toll rose by 34.

The Government said that as of 9am on Saturday, there had been a further 6,042 lab-confirmed cases of coronavirus in the UK.

The overall number of cases confirmed now stands at 429,277.

A further 34 people also died within 28 days of testing positive for Covid-19 as of Saturday, bringing the UK total to 41,971.

Separate figures published by the UKs statistics agencies show there have now been 57,600 deaths registered in the UK where Covid-19 was mentioned on the death certificate.

The figures differ from those released by devolved authorities every day.

Coronavirus hits the UK - In pictures 1 /81 Coronavirus hits the UK - In pictures A deserted Westminster Bridge PA A man wearing a face mask or covering due to the COVID-19 pandemic, walks past customers sat outside a restaurant AFP via Getty Images Boris Johnson addresses the nation on the Coronavirus lockdown Andrew Parsons Runners pass cardboard cutouts of Britain's Queen Elizabeth II and Prince William during the London Marathon in London AP An empty escalator at Charing Coss London Underground tube station Jeremy Selwyn Electronic bilboards displays a message warning people to stay home in Sheffield PA A sign is displayed in the window of a student accommodation building following the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Mancheste Reuters People take part in a 'We Do Not Consent' rally at Trafalgar Square, organised by Stop New Normal, to protest against coronavirus restrictions, in Londo AP People sing and dance in Leicester Square on the eve on the 10PM curfew Reuters Hearts painted by a team of artists from Upfest are seen in the grass at Queen Square, following the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Bristol Reuters Graffiti reads 'good luck and stay safe', as the number of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) cases grow around the world, under a bridge in London Reuters A sign is pictured in Soho, amid the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in London Reuters Prime Minister Boris Johnson gestures, during a coronavirus briefing in Downing Street, London AP A person runs past posters with a message of hope, as the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues in Manchester REUTERS Riot police face protesters who took part in a 'We Do Not Consent' rally at Trafalgar Square, organised by Stop New Normal, to protest against coronavirus restrictions in London AP An image of The Queen eith quotes from her broadcast to the UK and the Commonwealth in relation to the Coronavirus epidemic are displayed on lights in London's Piccadilly Circus PA Military vehicles cross Westminster Bridge after members of the 101 Logistic Brigade delivered a consignment of medical masks to St Thomas' hospital Getty Images Durdle Door in Dorset Reuters Captain Tom Moore via Reuters Mia, aged 8, and Jack, aged 5, take part in "PE with Joe" a daily live workout with Joe Wicks on Youtube to help kids stay fit who have to stay indoors due to the Coronavirus outbreak PA An NHS worker reacts at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital during the Clap for our Carers campaign in support of the NHS Reuters Goats which have taken over the deserted streets of Llandudno @AndrewStuart via PA Tobias Weller PA Novikov restaurant in London with its shutters pulled down while the restaurant is closed London Landscapes: Hyde Park and the Serpentine, central London. Matt Writtle A newspaper vendor in Manchester city centre giving away free toilet rolls with every paper bought as shops run low on supplies due to fears over the spread of the coronavirus PA Theo Clay looks out of his window next to his hand-drawn picture of a rainbow in Liverpool, as the spread of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continue Reuters A young man cuts another man's hair on top of a closed hairdresser in Oxford Reuters General view of the new NHS Nightingale Hospital, built to fight against the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in London via Reuters Jason Baird is seen dressed as Spiderman during his daily exercise to cheer up local children in Stockport, as the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues Reuters A woman wearing a face mask walks past Buckingham Palace Getty Images A man holds mobile phone displaying a text message alert sent by the government warning that new rules are in force across the UK and people must stay at home PA Medical staff on the Covid-19 ward at the Neath Port Talbot Hospital, in Wales, as the health services continue their response to the coronavirus outbreak. PA Prime Minister Boris Johnson taking part in a virtual Cabinet meeting with his top team of ministers PA A shopper walks past empty shelves in a Lidl store on in Wallington. After spates of "panic buying" cleared supermarket shelves of items like toilet paper and cleaning products, stores across the UK have introduced limits on purchases during the COVID-19 pandemic. Some have also created special time slots for the elderly and other shoppers vulnerable to the new coronavirus. Getty Images People on a busy tube train in London at rush hour PA Mia, aged 8 and her brother Jack, aged 5 from Essex, continue their school work at home, after being sent home due to the coronavirus PA Children are painting 'Chase the rainbows' artwork and springing up in windows across the country Reuters Social distancing in Primrose Hill Jeremy Selwyn A general view of a locked gate at Anfield, Liverpool as The Premier League has been suspended PA Homeless people in London AFP via Getty Images A piece of art by the artist, known as the Rebel Bear has appeared on a wall on Bank Street in Glasgow. The new addition to Glasgow's street art is capturing the global Coronavirus crisis. The piece features a woman and a man pulling back to give each other a kiss PA The Queen leaves Buckingham Palace, London, for Windsor Castle to socially distance herself amid the coronavirus pandemic PA A general view on Grey street, Newcastle as coronavirus cases grow around the world Reuters Matt Raw, a British national who returned from the coronavirus-hit city of Wuhan in China, leaves quaratine at Arrowe Park Hospital on Merseyside PA Britain's Chief Medical Officer Professor Chris Whitty (L) and Chief Scientific Adviser Patrick Vallance look on as British Prime Minister Boris Johnson gestures as he speaks during a coronavirus disease (COVID-19) news conference inside 10 Downing Street Reuters The ticket-validation terminals at the tram stop on Edinburgh's Princes Street are cleaned following the coronavirus outbreak. PA Locked school gates at Rockcliffe First School in Whitley Bay, Tyne and Wear PA A sign at a Sainsbury's supermarket informs customers that limits have been set on a small number of products as the number of coronavirus (COVID-19) cases grow around the world Reuters Jawad Javed delivers coronavirus protection kits that he and his wife have put together to the vulnerable people of their community of Stenhousemuir, between Glasgow and Edinburgh AFP via Getty Images A sign advertising a book titled "How Will We Survive On Earth?" Getty Images A man who appears to be homeless sleeping wearing a mask today in Victoria Jeremy Selwyn A pedestrian walks past graffiti that reads "Diseases are in the City" in Edinburgh AFP via Getty Images Staff from The Lyric Theatre, London inform patrons, as it shuts its doors PA A quiet looking George IV Bridge in Edinburgh PA A quieter than usual British Museum Getty Images A racegoer attends Cheltenham in a fashionable face mask SplashNews.com A commuter wears a face mask at London Bridge Station Jeremy Selwyn A empty restaurant in the Bull Ring Shopping Centre Getty Images A deserted Trafalgar Square in London PA Passengers determined to avoid the coronavirus before leaving the UK arrive at Gatwick Airport Getty Images

Earlier, NHS England said a further 20 people who tested positive for Covid-19 have died in hospital in England, bringing the total number of confirmed deaths reported in hospitals to 29,891.

The victims were aged between 43 and 96 and all had known underlying health conditions. The deaths were between April 3 and September 25.

Four other deaths were reported with no positive Covid-19 test result.

The deaths were between April 3 and September 25.

London on the coronavirus watch list

Four other deaths were reported with no positive Covid-19 test result.

A total of 714 people have tested positive for coronavirus in Scotland in the past 24 hours, the Scottish Government has announced  a new single-day record.

As of Saturday, 27,232 people have now tested positive in Scotland, up from 26,518 the day before.

This is 11.5 per cent of newly-tested individuals, up from 9.5 per cent the previous day.

Of the new cases, 290 are in Greater Glasgow and Clyde, 91 in Lanarkshire and 113 in Lothian.

No deaths of confirmed Covid-19 patients have been recorded in the past 24 hours and the number of fatalities remains at 2,510.

There are 99 people in hospital confirmed to have the virus, up by 10 in 24 hours.

Of these patients, 11 were in intensive care, the same as the day before.
Russian President Vladimir Putin takes part in a meeting with elected heads of Russian regions, via video link outside Moscow

By Tom Balmforth and Anton Kolodyazhnyy

MOSCOW (Reuters) - President Vladimir Putin called on Friday for an agreement between Russia and the United States to guarantee not to engage in cyber-meddling in each other's elections.

In a statement ahead of the U.S. presidential election on Nov. 3, Putin called for a reset between Russia and the United States and said he wanted an agreement between the two countries to prevent incidents in cyberspace.

"(I propose)... exchanging guarantees of non-interference in each other's internal affairs, including electoral processes, including using information and communication technologies and high-tech methods," he said.

Moscow's relations with Washington are at post-Cold War lows as the election looms.

U.S. intelligence agencies have concluded that Russia interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election with the aim of tilting it in Donald Trump's favour, including by hacking into the campaign of his rival Hillary Clinton. Moscow denies that charge.

Trump is currently campaigning for re-election against Democrat Joe Biden.

"One of the main strategic challenges of our time is the risk of a large-scale confrontation in the digital sphere," Putin said in the Kremlin statement.

"We would like to once again appeal to the United States with a proposal to approve a comprehensive program of practical measures to reset our relations in the use of information and communication technologies (ICT)."

He proposed the two countries reach an agreement to prevent major cyberspace incidents, something he compared to a 1972 U.S.-Soviet treaty reached at the height of the Cold War to prevent incidents at sea and in the air from escalating.

He also called for the two countries to fully restore communication lines between their respective agencies to discuss key international information on security issues.

Russia has denied it is attempting to interfere in the 2020 U.S. campaign, despite evidence to the contrary.

Story continues

Microsoft <MSFT.O> said two weeks ago that hackers linked to Russia, China and Iran were trying to spy on people tied to both Trump and Biden. Russia and China dismissed the allegations.

Reuters reported on Sept. 9 that Microsoft had alerted one of Biden's main election campaign advisory firms that it had been targeted by suspected Russian state-backed hackers. The Kremlin called the report "nonsense".

(Additional reporting by Anton Kolodyazhnyy; writing by Tom Balmforth; editing by Mark Trevelyan and Hugh Lawson)
Police arrested a 25-year-old woman in a hit-and-run incident during demonstrations in Buffalo earlier this week over a Kentucky grand jury's decision not to charge three police officers in the death of Breonna Taylor.

The Buffalo Police Department said it charged Joanna Gollnau, 25, of Buffalo, on Friday with felony reckless endangerment in the first degree and reckless driving for allegedly striking a bicyclist with her pickup truck during a protest in Niagara Square on Wednesday night.

MORE: Protesters hit by vehicles at Breonna Taylor demonstrations in Buffalo, Denver

The incident in Buffalo unfolded as protesters marched in the street near Niagara Square in the downtown area in the hours following the announcement of the grand jury's decision in the fatal Louisville police shooting of Taylor.

Graphic video taken by ABC affiliate station WKBW-TV in Buffalo showed a maroon and white king-cab pickup truck drive directly into a group of demonstrators who pounded on the side of the truck and yelled for the driver to stop just before a protester on a bicycle was hit. The footage shows the truck speeding away as protesters on foot gave chase.

***Warning: Graphic video*** our @wkbw photographer captured the moment a truck drove through a crowd of protesters and struck a person outside Buffalo City Hall. Important to note: police say the person struck has non-life threatening injuries. pic.twitter.com/Vo9IORTYoF  Ashley Rowe (@AshleyroweWKBW) September 24, 2020

Buffalo police officials said the driver was eventually stopped by officers and detained for questioning.

PHOTO: In this screen grab taken from a video, a car speeds past protesters in Buffalo, NY., Sept 23, 2020. (WKBW)

PHOTO: In this screen grab from a video, protesters run after a truck after sped through a crowd and hit a person during a protest outside City Hall in Buffalo, NY., Sept. 23, 2020. (WKBW)

The protester struck suffered non-life-threatening injuries and was taken to Erie County Medical Center for treatment, police said Wednesday night.

A spokesperson for Slow Roll Buffalo, a nonprofit community group of bicycle enthusiasts, said that the woman who was hit by the truck is a member of its board of directors. She is now home and feeling fine, the organization said on Friday.

Story continues

Buffalo Police Captain Jeff Rinaldo told WKBW that the department used video footage, including social media posts and city surveillance cameras, in its investigation. He told the station he was unsure of a motive, and that Gollnau has been cooperating with police. She is set to be arraigned on Nov. 3, according to WKBW.

A similar incident unfolded in Denver Wednesday night. Video taken by ABC affiliate station KMGH-TV in Denver showed a silver Volvo station wagon approach demonstrators marching in the street outside the state Capitol Building and then stopped. Several protesters were standing in front of the vehicle and banging on its hood as the car moved forward and accelerated, knocking one female protester to the ground, the footage showed. The driver sped away but was stopped by police and detained, police said on Twitter.

The two incidents came just hours after a Kentucky grand jury indicted former Louisville police officer Brett Hankison on three counts of wanton endangerment in the first degree in the shooting that killed Taylor, but neither he nor the other two officers involved in the fatal encounter were charged in her death.

The two hit-and-runs on Wednesday marked the latest in a series of incidents in recent months in which protesters have been struck while marching in demonstrations against police brutality and racial injustice. On July 4, a protester was killed and another was injured when a car barreled into a Black Lives Matter protest on a closed freeway in Seattle.

ABC News' Bill Hutchinson contributed to this report.

Woman charged with felony in Breonna Taylor protest hit-and-run originally appeared on abcnews.go.com
By Trend

Scientists from Uzbekistan are working to create the country's own vaccine against coronavirus, Trend reports with reference to the Ministry of Health in Uzbekistan.

According to the ministry, scientists are working in collaboration with the country's pharmaceutical companies.

The development of local vaccine will help the country not to depend on imports.The ministry further said the domestically made vaccine may be exported to other countries.

Earlier, Chief Sanitary Inspector in Uzbekistan Nurmat Otabekov said that the country is not working on creation of a vaccine. He emphasized that Uzbekistan will be purchasing vaccines according to WHO recommendations.

Meanwhile, head of the laboratory of the Agency for Sanitary and Epidemiological Welfare, Ibragim Mamatkulov, at a briefing at the Agency of Information and Mass Communications under the Administration of the President of Uzbekistan denied the widespread report in the Russian media that Russia would supply 35 million doses of 'Sputnik V' vaccine to Uzbekistan.

According to him, there were also proposals from Chinese companies to jointly conduct the third phase of clinical trials of vaccines in Uzbekistan. In particular, the Ministry of Innovative Development signed agreements with the authorized representative of the Chinese company Sinopharm - Yilin International Commerce LLC, as well as with Zhifei Longcom.

--

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden assured U.S. mayors on Saturday he would be an active partner in the White House in helping them respond to racial justice protests and the economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic.

"If I am elected, you will have direct access to the White House," Biden, who is challenging Republican Donald Trump in the Nov. 3 election, told the fall leadership meeting of the U.S. Conference of Mayors in a virtual address from his home in Delaware.

"It is all from the bottom up. It doesn't go from the top down," he said. "Whether your city is red or blue, I'm going to be there, I promise you."

Biden, who served as vice president under Barack Obama for eight years, said he spoke to more than 200 mayors to get their input during the Obama administration's recovery efforts after the 2008 economic crisis.

"That's the same approach we should be taking today," he said.

Biden leads Trump in national polls, although polls in crucial state battlegrounds show a much closer race as the two prepare for their first one-on-one debate on Tuesday.

Biden criticized Trump for failing to develop a national plan to attack the coronavirus, and for not working to bring together congressional leaders to negotiate a new relief package for cities and states. Formal COVID-19 relief talks have been stalled for weeks.

He also slammed Trump for his divisive rhetoric on the racial justice protests against police brutality playing out on American streets.

Trump, who has made law and order a principal theme of his re-election bid, has singled out Democratic-led cities such as Portland, Oregon, as "anarchist jurisdictions" that should have federal funding cut.

"It's the only strategy this president seems to know," Biden said. "We can disagree on policies, but we have to cooperate."

(Reporting by John Whitesides; Editing by Richard Chang)
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 22:19:36|Editor: huaxia

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Visitors tour the exhibition area of the 8th China Taobao Village Summit Conference in Suning County, north China's Hebei Province, Sept. 26, 2020. The 8th China Taobao Village Summit Conference was held in Suning on Saturday. The Taobao Villages are rural e-commerce hubs that feature Alibaba's logistics, service and training to encourage farmers to engage in online sales of farm produce and local specialties. With 17 Taobao Villages and 9 Taobao Towns, Suning has a total of over 21,000 e-commerce online stores, achieving a yearly revenue of nearly 10 billion yuan (about 1.47 billion U.S. dollars). (Xinhua/Zhu Xudong)
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 20:18:51|Editor: huaxia

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LONDON, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Britain welcomes China's recent announcement of becoming carbon neutral before 2060, British Environment Secretary George Eustice said on Thursday.

"The UK welcomes China's announcement this week on achieving carbon neutrality before 2060 and enhancing its own NDC (nationally determined contribution) -- so we look forward to hearing more and to working together," Eustice said.

"And we must also put our words into action -- and in this area the UK is keen to play its part, both at home and around the world," Eustice said in a statement during an online ministerial round-table meeting on biodiversity jointly held by China's Ministry of Ecology and Environment and Foreign Ministry on Thursday.

Eustice agreed that Britain and China should work together as incoming presidents for "ambitious, integrated outcomes" at the United Nations (UN) Biodiversity Conference COP15 to be held in the city of Kunming in southwestern China and the UN climate conference COP26 in city of Glasgow, Scotland next year, according to the statement released by the British Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

"At next year's conferences in Kunming and Glasgow, we have the opportunity to bring the world together to commit to reversing biodiversity loss, and to make protecting and conserving nature part of tackling climate change and poverty too," Eustice said.

Earlier this week, Britain's envoy for COP26, John Murton, said China's emissions promise could help the world avoid climate catastrophe.

"It's a really important thing that China has made this commitment as there's no way that the world would be able to meet Paris goals of keeping temperature rise to no more than 2C (degree Celsius) -- and as close to 1.5C (degree Celsius) -- if China hadn't made this sort of commitment," Murton told Sky News.

Murton said China's pledge is a "positive thing" for the COP26 conference as it could persuade other nations to make similar targets.

China aims to have CO2 emissions peak before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality before 2060, Chinese President Xi Jinping announced Tuesday.

Xi made the remarks during the general debate of the 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly via video link.

"China will scale up its Intended Nationally Determined Contributions by adopting more vigorous policies and measures," he said, calling on the international community to take decisive steps to honor the Paris Agreement on climate change. Enditem
S ixteen people have been arrested and nice police officers have been injured during clashes at the central London anti-lockdown demonstrations, the Metropolitan Police have said.

Thousands of people massed in Trafalgar Square on Saturday carrying a variety of signs, flags and placards to take part in a we do not consent rally.

None of the protesters appeared to wear face coverings or to social distance.

Officers clashed with crowds when they tried to shut the event down due to breaches of with social-distancing rules.

Bottles were thrown and police used batons against protesters, leaving some with visible injuries.

At least three protesters and one officer were treated by medical staff.

Trafalgar Square anti-lockdown protests 1 /21 Trafalgar Square anti-lockdown protests Trafalgar Square protest People take part in a 'We Do Not Consent' rally at Trafalgar Square in London, organised by Stop New Normal PA Trafalgar Square protest Police move in to disperse protesters in Trafalgar Square AFP via Getty Images Getty Images Getty Images Getty Images PA Trafalgar Square protest A woman falls as police move in to disperse protesters AFP via Getty Images Trafalgar Square protest British 'conspiracy theorist' David Icke, speaks at a gathering of protesters in Trafalgar Square AFP via Getty Images Trafalgar Square protest British 'conspiracy theorist' David Icke, speaks at a gathering of protesters in Trafalgar Square AFP via Getty Images Trafalgar Square protest A woman falls as police move in to disperse protesters AFP via Getty Images Trafalgar Square protest Protesters waved placards and signs AFP via Getty Images Trafalgar Square protest None appeared to be wearing masks and social distancing rules appeared to be ignored AFP via Getty Images Trafalgar Square protest A protester (R) gestures to a member of the media (L) as he complains about the wearing of a mask AFP via Getty Images Trafalgar Square protest Piers Corbyn, the brother of former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, at the rally PA Trafalgar Square protest Conspiracy theorist David Icke at the event PA Trafalgar Square protest A protester holds up an anti-Bill Gates placard AFP via Getty Images

Scotland Yard said that 16 people had been arrested following the demonstration, which moved from Trafalgar Square to Hyde Park.

A total of nine officers were injured, two of whom required hospital treatment, the force added.

Police arrest a protester / Getty Images

Arrests were for a variety of offences including breaching Coronavirus regulations, assaulting a police officer, public order offences and violent disorder.

Met Commander Ade Adelekan said: As the crowds began to swell in Trafalgar Square, it became impossible for people maintain social distancing and keep each other safe. Likewise, there appeared to be no efforts by organisers to engage with crowds and keep those assembling safe from transmitting the virus.

This lack of action voided the risk assessment submitted by event organisers the night before. Therefore, todays demonstration was no longer exempt from the Coronavirus regulations."

He added: I am very frustrated to see that nine officers were injured during clashes with a small minority of protestors. This is especially saddening in light of the injuries sustained by officers last weekend."

The Metropolitan Police said the protest was stopped because crowds had not complied with social distancing and risked spreading coronavirus.

Police clash with protesters / AFP via Getty Images

The force said demonstrators were asked to leave and warned that anyone who stayed could be subject to enforcement action.

Officers penned the crowd in Trafalgar Square and water was thrown at them by demonstrators, while crowds also chanted pick your side at the officers.

Police removed sound equipment from Trafalgar Square and several protesters were led away in handcuffs.

Another demonstrator was physically carried away from the scene by officers.

The force said: Crowds in Trafalgar Square have not complied with the conditions of their risk assessment and are putting people in danger of transmitting the virus.

A man is arrested by police officers during a "We Do Not Consent" anti-lockdown rally at Trafalgar Square / Getty Images

This has voided their risk assessment and we have informed the event organisers they are no longer exempt from the regulations.

We are now asking those in Trafalgar Square to leave. Officers will be engaging with crowds and informing them of this development.

By leaving now, you can keep yourself safe and avoid any enforcement action being taken by officers.

Earlier, police searched a man and confiscated a makeshift riot shield he was carrying.

The protest comes a week after a separate event which saw more than a dozen officers injured when a small minority targeted police and more than 32 arrests were made.

The Met said it had been engaging with organisers throughout the week to remind them of their legal obligations and explaining the events could be in breach of coronavirus regulations.

While protests are exempt from the rule of six in England, organisers must submit a risk assessment and comply with social distancing.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 26 September held wide-ranging talks with his Sri Lankan counterpart Mahinda Rajapaksa, covering the entire expanse of bilateral ties and with a focus on further expanding cooperation in key areas.

In his opening remarks at a virtual bilateral summit, Modi said that India has always given priority to Sri Lanka under its Neighbourhood First Policy and Security and Growth for All in the Region (SAGAR) doctrine. While speaking with Sri Lankan Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, PM Modi added that relations between India and Sri Lanka are thousands of years old.

PM Narendra Modi further said that he was confident that the massive electoral victory of the ruling party in Sri Lanka backed by the Rajapaksa government's policies will facilitate deeper cooperation between the two countries.

"An opportunity has come to begin a new chapter in India-Sri Lanka ties after your party's electoral victory. People from both the countries are looking at us with new hope and expectations," PM Modi said.

India announces grant of $15 mn for promotion of Buddhist ties

According to an Indian diplomat, PM Modi has announced a grant assistance of $15 million for the promotion of Buddhist ties between India and Sri Lanka. India will reportedly facilitate the visit of a delegation of Buddhist pilgrims from Sri Lanka in the first inaugural flight to Kushinagar in Uttar Pradesh.

Expressing gratitude, Rajapaksa said, "I express my gratitude for the way in which India worked for other countries during the coronavirus pandemic," and further added that the operation to douse off the fire on MT New Diamond ship provided an opportunity for greater cooperation between the two countries.

Rajapaksa was sworn in as Sri Lankan prime minister for a fresh term on August 9 after his party, the Sri Lanka People's Front, secured a two-third majority in the parliamentary polls.

It was Prime Minister Modi's first such virtual bilateral engagement with a leader of a neighbouring country. For Rajapaksa, it was the first diplomatic engagement with a leader of a foreign country after he was sworn in as prime minister.

It was learnt that the two leaders deliberated on a host of issues like ways to further deepen overall defence and trade ties as well as expansion of existing cooperation in several key areas.

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Remarkable new footage shows the Hindenburg Disaster in vivid color 83 years after it exploded mid-air and caused 63 near New Jersey.

More than 80 years after the Hindenburg Disaster became one of the most infamous aircraft failures in the world, a group have used artificial intelligence to improve and add color to the original news coverage that captured the crash.

Neural Networks and Deep Learning first shared the altered footage on their YouTube channel, as well as their Instagram page and Patreon, in February.

They used Gigapixel AI, a standalone application that uses artificial intelligence to improve images, and DeOldify, an open-source artificial intelligence tool for enhancing images.

In the video, the 804-foot-long zeppelin has just traveled nearly 4,000 miles across the Atlantic Ocean from Frankfurt, Germany, to the United States on May 3, 1937.

The massive airship, which had completed 63 successful trips, floated over New York City with relative ease as it prepared to touch down at its mooring mass at Naval Station Lakehurst in New Jersey.

LZ 129 Hindenburg (pictured) traveled from Frankfurt, Germany, with nearly 100 people aboard to the Naval Station Lakehurst in New Jersey in May 1937

 Slide me  Pictured: a side-by-side photo comparison showed how the footage had been altered by Neural Networks and Deep Learning to add spectacular color to 83-year-old footage

As the Hindenburg prepared to land at Naval Station Lakehurst in New Jersey, the airship exploded into flames and fell 200 feet from the sky

But suddenly, the Hindenburg erupted into into a horrifying inferno that quickly engulfed the airship in scalding flames and billowing dark smoke.

The hulking airship fell 200 feet from the sky onto the grassy fields below.

The colorized footage captured the sheer ferocity of the crash as the fire crawled along the Hindenburg's exterior and burned it to its bare bones. The Hindenburg eventually collapsed from the extensive damage.

Radio journalist Herb Morrison had arrived to report on the Hindenburg's landing, but when the Hindenburg went up in flames he famously exclaimed, 'Oh, the humanity!'

The colorized footage captured the sheer ferocity of the crash as the fire crawled along the Hindenburg's exterior and burned it to its bare bones

The Hindenburg eventually collapsed into itself after the inferno burned through much of its exterior covering and the interior of the airship

Pictured: Upgraded images from Neural Networks and Deep Learning show the Hindenburg Disaster in shocking detail and color more than 80 years after it crashed in New Jersey

The U.S. Commerce Department determined the accident was caused by a leak of the hydrogen that kept the airship aloft. It mixed with air, causing a fire

Firefighters and emergency crews approached the 'twisted, white hot,' steel as they attempt to save the 36 passengers and 61 crew members.

History.com reports that 13 passengers, 21 crew members and one civilian died that day as a result of the crash.

Many of the survivors suffered severe injuries from the crash and had to undergo additional medical treatment for months afterwards.

Just last year, the last remaining survivor of the Hindenburg Disaster died at the age of 90.

Werner Gustav Doehner passed away in Laconia, New Hampshire in November, more than eight decades after the German airship caught fire and was destroyed while docking in Lakehurst.

Doehner, who was just eight years old at the time of the crash, was on the airship with his parents and older brother and sister.

'He did not talk about it,' his son Bernie Doehner told The Associated Press on Friday, adding that his father took him to visit the naval station years later, but not the Hindenburg memorial, itself.

At the time of its completion in 1936, the LZ 129 Hindenburg was the largest aircraft ever built, and was the pride of Germany's Third Reich.

'It was definitely a repressed memory. He lost his sister, he lost his dad.'

Back in 2017, Doehner gave a rare interview with the Associated Press, recalling the moment flames began to flicker on top of the air ship as hydrogen, exposed to air, fueled an inferno.

A total of 13 passengers, 21 crew members and one civilian died that day as a result of the crash on May 3, 1937, at Naval Air Base Lakehurst in New Jersey

Doehner: 'I remember lying on the ground, and my brother told me to get up and to get out of there,' he recalled. Their mother joined them and asked a steward to get her daughter, whom he carried out of the burning wreckage'

Werner Gustav Doehner was the last surviving passenger from the Hindenburg Disaster before he passed away in November 2019. Pictured: Fire crews and witnesses watched at the Hindenburg burned

 Slide me  Pictured: a side-by-side comparison of photos shows the Hindenburg flying over New York City on its way to New Jersey in May 1937

'Suddenly, the air was on fire,' Doehner recalled.

'We were close to a window, and my mother took my brother and threw him out. She grabbed me and fell back and then threw me out,' he said.

'She tried to get my sister, but she was too heavy, and my mother decided to get out by the time the zeppelin was nearly on the ground.'

Doehner added: 'I remember lying on the ground, and my brother told me to get up and to get out of there,' he recalled. Their mother joined them and asked a steward to get her daughter, whom he carried out of the burning wreckage.

He would remain in the hospital for three months before going to another facility in New York City in August for skin grafts.

Pictured: the moment the Hindenburg went up in flames and crashed in New Jersey in 1937

The U.S. Commerce Department determined the accident was caused by a leak of the hydrogen that kept the airship aloft. It mixed with air, causing a fire.

'The theory that a brush discharge ignited such mixture appears most probable,' the department's report said.

Doehner and his family - who were German citizens - were on their way back to Mexico City, where his father was a pharmaceutical executive. Funerals were held for his father and sister there.

Doehner was born in Darmstadt, Germany, and grew up in Mexico City. In 1984, he moved to the United States to work for General Electric as an electrical engineer, according to his obituary. He also worked in Ecuador and Mexico. He retired from New England Electric System in Westborough, Massachusetts, in 1999.

He moved to Parachute, Colorado, in 2001. He and his wife of 52 years, Elin, moved to Laconia in May 2018.
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One hundred million people didnt show up to vote, and your obsession and willingness to invest tons of resources in the unicorn of an Obama-Trump voter is madness, Ufot said, referring to the eligible voters who did not vote in 2016. It is not a part of a strategy that is designed to animate and inspire the core of the Democratic Party and the Obama coalition, if you will. . . . Sticking to the same old tactics, sticking to the same old playbook, I dont know that thats a winning strategy.
By Trend

The Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) and Laxisam, one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in Uzbekistan, will supply Uzbekistan with up to 35 million doses of the world's first registered Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine, Trend reports referring to the press service of RDIF.

After receiving approval from the regulatory authorities of Uzbekistan, up to 10 million doses of the vaccine can be supplied to Uzbekistan in 2020, and up to 25 million doses are planned to be supplied in 2021.

The World Health Organization and leading medical specialists in the field of epidemiology of infectious diseases indicate that vaccination is an effective way to create sustainable immunity to prevent the dangerous disease COVID-19 in humans, said Chairman of the Board of Laxisam Group Shavkat Ismailov.

The delivery of the vaccine will ensure that medical specialists of Uzbekistan have an advanced tool to fight the new coronavirus infection, which allows them to form long-term immunity and protect citizens, as well as ensure the availability of a diversified portfolio of vaccines against coronavirus, said Kirill Dmitriev.

On August 11, the Sputnik V vaccine produced by the Gamaleya Research Institute of Epidemiology and Microbiology in Russia received a registration certificate from the Ministry of Health of Russia, becoming the first registered coronavirus vaccine in the world.

Currently, RDIF has received requests for more than 1.2 billion doses of the Sputnik V vaccine for 2020-2021. More than 50 countries of the CIS, Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America submitted applications. Earlier, RDIF announced the agreements reached with partners in Mexico for the supply of 32 million doses, and in Brazil and India (up to 50 and100 million doses, respectively)

RDIF was founded in 2011 to invest in the equity capital of companies primarily in Russia, together with leading foreign financial and strategic investors.

Laxisam for 26 years has been known as one of the largest suppliers and manufacturers of a wide range of medicines in the Uzbek market.

---

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Linkedin (Agence France-Presse) Tokyo  Sat, September 26, 2020 11:00 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c475e993 2 News Japan,travel Free

Japan will ease strict coronavirus border restrictions from October to allow more foreign nationals to enter, Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga said on Friday.

The country banned entry for most foreigners this year in the wake of the pandemic, but has been negotiating the gradual resumption of cross-border business travel.

"We will resume travel for all people -- whether Japanese or foreigners -- as much as possible, but excluding tourists, from next month," Suga said at a government coronavirus meeting.

Local media have reported that new overseas arrivals would be capped at 1,000 per day and the minimum stay would be three months.

Foreigners entering Japan must take a high-precision PCR coronavirus test and self-isolate for 14 days on arrival, reports have said.

The decision comes after a taskforce charged with finding ways to safely hold the postponed Tokyo 2020 Games proposed strict movement controls and repeated coronavirus tests for Olympic athletes.

Athletes may have to submit a detailed plan of their activities in advance -- and pledge to follow it -- or save their whereabouts on a "map app."

They may be required to test three days before leaving home, on arrival and during their stay, but they will be allowed to train during any quarantine.

Topics : Japan travel
Win or lose on Nov. 3, 2020, Donald Trump can set an excellent example by letting the National Archives retain and later provide access to all records created or received during his tenure as president of the United States. Thereafter, citizens and scholars can study these presidential records. After all, they are our property, and not that of any single president.

Unlike all presidents in office from 1955 onwards (when the Presidential Libraries Act was signed into law), Donald Trump entered the White House with a vast fortune, and a track record promoting and developing business ventures inside and outside the United States. Given his accomplishments as president, he and his family will only have more substantial profit-making opportunities when he leaves the White House.

The Trump family will later only be hurt, possibly grievously from a financial point of view, if they simultaneously get involved with a presidential library. Loved by many, but hated by denizens of the still lubricated deep state swamp, he will be relentlessly pursued by the very people who have let the Clinton family exploit their purported charity for personal and political gain since Oct. 23,1997.

Why?

Though the Clintons and other dynastic political families including the Bush and Obama clans profess otherwise, presidential libraries are public charities -- these are supposed to be governed by directors or trustees who are broadly representative of the public at large, and certainly not blind supporters of a president. These entities may not push or oppose a political candidate, nor may they promote or block legislation. Moreover, public charities may not, during their entire life create more than an insubstantial amount of "private gain" in total through their operation.

The Bill Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock, Arkansas

Photo credit: Thomas R Machnitzki, under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2

In financial terms, insubstantial has been held to be amounts of $1,000 or less. Here, private gain does not merely mean financial gain (unfairly and generously priced speech, book and film deals, or sweetheart investment terms) but any kind of advantage or edge created for insiders at the supposed charity. Most of all, public charities must actually exist. If they are nonprofit corporations, they must incorporate, then organize by adopting articles of incorporation and bylaws, and scrupulously follow all applicable laws, everywhere they operate or solicit donations.

In recent years, attorneys general in New York State have persecuted the Trump family for operating charities outside local law, even though no Clinton charities, and there are too many of these, have ever registered truthfully to operate and to solicit inside the Empire State.

Meanwhile many different lawyers and law firms have "studied" public filings of "The Clinton Foundation," identified glaring defects, but chosen to either look the other way, or in the name of DLA Piper in November 2015, to make manifestly false claims suggesting that the filings complied with applicable laws and regulations. Since Mar. 16, 2015, a number of concerned persons have documented massive, ongoing, illegal activities carried out in the name of "The Clinton Foundation" and others involving a supposed organization using Federal Employer Identification Number 31-1580204. Google searches, www.charlesortel.com, and @CharlesOrtel are good places to find perspectives on these apparent charity frauds.

After trying to stimulate interest in investigating and bringing to justice those responsible for directing the largest criminal fraud and corruption exercise ever attempted using charities in traditional media, I started cohosting podcasts with Hollywood veteran Jason Goodman in various formats under the www.crowdsourcethetruth.com umbrella. Our latest podcast is linked here. These cumulative efforts have triggered interest in many places inside and outside the United States. And now we wait to see whether authorities will do the right thing and demonstrate, via prosecutions and plea agreements that even, and especially, dynastic political families are subject to our laws.

Since November 1992, publicly available evidence shows that the Clintons have schemed with their supporters to monetize their "public service" using leaky charities that fail, lawfully, to account for their activities as is required. This abominable record is emulated by others in both parties and in many foreign nations.

America's founders did not throw off the yoke of monarchy to replace it with a new form of intolerant rule by unregulated, self-selected cultists in thrall to gauzy themes like "globalism," and unvetted schemes to address "inequality" and "climate change" chiefly by seizing wealth and income of the meek.

Intended to serve as archives and research facilities into the histories of presidents, presidential libraries in modern times have become vanity exercises through which corrupt interests can pay tribute to families seeking to rule, we the people using monuments to themselves. Given existing technology alone, libraries are becoming expensive anachronisms, that need to be heated, cooled, and maintained.

The 45th president should set another cutting-edge marker letting his records remain at the main National Archives complex. Then, after he leaves the White House he and his family can profit to their hearts' content, unfettered by the real conflicts of interest that come and should be prosecuted when merchants in misery like the Clintons (and others) milk public charities. illegally.

Charles Ortel is host of the YouTube series, Sunday with Charles. An archive of 263 episodes since June 2017 is found here.
Heavily-armed jihadists killed six members of a civilian militia pursuing them after an attack in Burkina Faso's east, a local mayor said Saturday.

Burkina Faso has been badly hit by jihadists who started making incursions from neighbouring Mali in 2015. More than 1,100 people have lost their lives and over a million have fled their homes.

On Friday, dozens of heavily armed jihadists raided the hamlet of Touldeni, located near Fada N'Gourma -- a major market town and regional centre about 220 kilometres (140 miles) east of the capital Ouagadougou.

"After this attack, several units of the Volunteers for the Defence of the Nation (VDP, a civilian militia group) engaged in cleaning up operations," the mayor of Fada N'Gourma, Jean-Claude Louari, said.

"Unfortunately one of these teams was ambushed leading to the deaths of six of its members. One of them is missing and two are wounded," he said.

No-one was killed in the Touldeni raid, he said.

The VDP, formed in November, comprises civilian volunteers who help the army in their uphill battle against the various jihadist groups operating in the country.

They receive 14 days' training and are then sent out on patrols and surveillance missions, equipped with light arms.

More than a 100 such volunteers have died since January.

Burkina Faso's military claimed to have "neutralised" -- a euphemism for having killed -- at least 26 "terrorists" between September 11 and 13 in two operations in the country's north.

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The top diplomat says Ukraine, Poland, and Lithuania offered mediation to Belarus within the framework of the Lublin Triangle interaction format, but the government in Minsk never responded to the proposal.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba believes that Alexander Lukashenko's choice to have Belarus side with Russia creates "immeasurable" risks for Ukraine.

"Now the biggest problem is the lack of concrete steps. Therefore, Belarus has essentially locked itself in. They have now rejected proposals for mediation," Kuleba said, speaking at Savik Shuster's Freedom of Speech panel show on Ukraine TV channel on September 25.

The minister stressed that the main task today is to set up mediation between the Belarus government and opposition.

"But Belarus turned it down. Ukraine offered mediation together with the states of the Lublin Triangle  Poland and Lithuania. The nearest neighbors are the two EU states, and one is not the EU. Silence," Kuleba said.

He also said that there is a proposal for neutral mediation on the part of the OSCE, but the Belarusian authorities are also silent on a joint proposal from the OSCE chair Albania and from Sweden, which will take the chair in the organization in 2021.

"Alexander Lukashenko has made his choice  he opted for Russia, for Vladimir Putin. And this means confrontation, which is a key point," Kuleba said.

Read alsoKuleba warns Russia against steps undermining Belarus sovereignty, destabilizing regionHe added that Ukraine is weighing all risks arising due to the strengthening of Russia's positions in Belarus.

"And we understand that if Alexander Lukashenko chose Russia, the risks for us become immeasurable, so we build our stance toward him accordingly," Kuleba stressed.

Belarus election: Reactions
Ghanaians woke up to the news of a widespread disturbance that reportedly was happening in the Volta Region of Ghana.

Trending topics on the go: How we write news at YEN.com.gh

In the early hours of Friday, September 25, 2020, a group of armed men believed to be members of the secessionist group called the Homeland Study Group Foundation caused a ruckus in selected places in the Volta region

The Homeland Study Group Foundation, based in Ho, the Volta regional capital, has been agitating for the secession of the Volta Region from Ghana.

The group wants the Volta Region to be an autonomous country known as the Western Togoland.

YEN.com.gh has compiled a list of all the activities carried out by these group of men that have made headlines.

Western Togoland brouhaha: 5 things gathered so far about their activities Source: Citinewsroom and Myjoyonline.com

Source: UGC

READ ALSO: Rawlings officially announces the demise of his mother Madam Victoria Agbotui

1. News of road blocks at Mepe on the Accra-Sogakope road and at Juapong

The road block left scores of commuters stranded on the Accra-Sogakope road. The group, believed to be the secessionist group, the Western Togoland, used heaps of sands to block the road at Mepe. They also resorted to burning tires in the middle of the road.

2. Attack on Mepe and Aveyime police stations

In the Mepe and Aveyime towns, the police stations were under attack by these group of armed men believed to be a part of the secessionist group of the Western Togoland.

At Aveyime, they attacked the officers on duty, stripped them naked and locked them in the cell. The group reportedly broke into the armory and stole all their weapons. They also took two cars belonging to the police service at the Mepe police station.

3. One person dead

In a bid to restore calm in the community, one person was gunned down in a shoot out by the military personnel.

The deceased has been identified as Emmanuel Kale. In a news monitored by YEN.com.gh, the deceased, 26-year-old, was described as a very calm and one from a very humble background, who would not involve himself in such acts of violence.

4. 31 people arrested

31 people believed to be members of the secessionist group were air lifted by the Ghana Armed Forces chopper to Accra for their involvement in the disturbances.

5. Kpone Power plant

At the Kpone power generation plant, a middle aged man, with name unknown was spotted on the dam attempting to cross. He was spotted with a flag of the Western Togoland Group. Security officials at the plant arrested him as well.

6. Volta Regional Minister claims he knew about their plans

The Volta Regional Minister, Dr. Archibald Letsa, revealed that security officials in the region were in the known of the plot by the Western Togoland secessionist group to cause a ruckus in the region.

He stated that based on an intelligence report they received on the groups plot a day earlier, security official quickly intervened.

In a news report filed by Citinewsroom, Dr. Letsa said the group had in their plan to target sensitive state installations and security operatives prioritised the protection of those installations to prevent worse things from happening in the region.

READ ALSO: Western Togoland: One dead, 25 others arrested over road blocks in Volta Region

In other news, former president, Flt Lt Jerry John Rawlings, has officially informed the general public of the demise of his mother, Madam Victoria Agbotui.

In a Facebook post sighted by YEN.com.gh, the former president confirmed that she died in the early hours of Thursday, September 24, 2020.

Rawlings, the Anlo State, as well as the Agbotui and allied families, expressed their heartfelt gratitude to all who have and still continue to mourn with them and express their sympathies.

READ ALSO: Western Togoland: Unidentified men attack police stations and steal weapons

Ghanaian multi-instrumentalist Dela Jackson has charged the youth in Africa to wake up | #Yencomgh

Share your stories and news by getting interactive on our Facebook page!

Source: YEN.com.gh
Chinese President Xi Jinping this week at the United Nations General Assembly sought to portray China as the responsible global stakeholder, in contrast to the U.S.

The big picture: China is happy to work within existing multilateral structures, as long as they don't stop Beijing from doing what it wants.

In his Sept. 23 speech, Xi extolled the World Health Organization, expressed "abiding commitment" to the UN charter, and warned against attempts to roll back globalization.

But China has also undermined the UN commitment to human rights, violated principles shared by World Trade Organization members, and ignored a major ruling from an international court at The Hague.

What he's saying: "Let us join hands to uphold the values of peace, development, equity, justice, democracy and freedom shared by all of us and build a new type of international relations."

Between the lines:

By "democracy," Xi means that a small number of countries  namely, Western democracies  shouldn't be able to dictate what less powerful but more numerous non-Western countries can do, especially within their own borders.

By "development," Xi is referring in part to China's emphasis on the "right to development," a euphemism meaning that governments with human rights or corruption problems should not be sanctioned or denied loans. He is also giving an implicit shout-out to China's Belt and Road Initiative, which builds infrastructure, and China's political influence, abroad.

When it comes to the United Nations, the Chinese Communist Party has worked particularly hard to undermine the organization's ability to call out or take action on human rights violations.

The bottom line: Xi envisions a world in which governments face no international scrutiny for how they treat their own people  and preferably, to quote a previous speech of his, one with China "closer to the center of the world stage."

Go deeper: A hinge moment for America's role in the world
Geneva, Sep 26 : The World Health Organisation (WHO) has warned that the global coronavirus death toll could cross the two-million figure before an effective vaccine is widely used.

Dr. Mike Ryan, the WHO's emergencies head, said the figure could be higher without concerted international action, reports the BBC.

The number of Covid-19 deaths is fast approaching one million -- nearly nine months after the outbreak started in China.

The Covid-19 infections continue to rise, with 32 million cases confirmed globally, led by the US and India.

The US, India and Brazil have confirmed the most coronavirus cases, recording more than 15 million between them.

Ryan also urged Europeans to ask themselves whether they had done enough to avoid the need for lockdowns.

"He questioned whether all the alternatives had been implemented, like testing and tracing, quarantine, isolation, social distancing, wearing masks and hand-washing," the report said late on Friday.

Virus infections continue to rise, with 32 million cases confirmed globally.

The start of a second surge of coronavirus infections has been seen in many countries in the northern hemisphere as winter approaches.

"Overall within that very large region, we are seeing worrying increases of the disease," Dr. Ryan said about the spike in cases in Europe.

"Lockdowns are almost a last resort -- and to think that we're back in last-resort territory in September, that's a pretty sobering thought," he told reporters at the WHO's headquarters in Geneva.

Asked whether two million fatalities worldwide was possible before a vaccine became available, Dr. Ryan said: "It's not impossible." "Unless we do it all, the number you speak about is not only imaginable, but unfortunately and sadly, very likely".

Earlier, Spain's capital Madrid brought another eight districts under tougher coronavirus restrictions, which now affect a million people in the city.

In France, staff from bars and restaurants in the southern city Marseille protested against the closure of their workplaces which was brought in on Saturday.

In the UK, tougher restrictions were announced in several regions as new daily infections went up.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
When the Domestic Violence Crisis Center was founded in 1980, its mission was simply survival for women.

Patricia C. Phillips  the DVCCs founder  accomplished that goal 40 years ago by any means necessary.

She would pick someone up in the middle of the night in her station wagon with her two children in their pajamas, said Executive Director Suzanne Adam.

She would drive them to Bridgeport, to Norwalk  she would get them to safety.

Phillips work encapsulates what the DVCCs mission looked like during its infancy, when the understanding of domestic violence was much different than it is today. Back then, domestic violence was understood to be a private affair.

More Information Hotline If you or someone you know needs help, call DVCC's 24-hour hotline at 888-774-2900. Gala The Domestic Violence Crisis Center will hold a virtual gala to mark its 40th anniversary on Oct. 3. For information see https://www.dvccct.org/ See More Collapse

In the 1980s, police officers didnt always go out to a domestic violence dispute because it was a family affair, a family problem, said Adam.

Now, the DVCC works alongside the police to connect victims with the care that they need. Entering into partnerships with police departments in Stamford and Norwalk  which the center did in the early 2010s  is one of the many ways it has grown in the decades it has been in existence.

Helping clients navigate financial abuse and manipulation was another.

Kimberly Donovan, the DVCCs housing and financial advocacy manager, sees finances as one of the most insidious vehicles for abuse. Sometimes, it can happen in secret.

One of my first cases, Ill never forget it, there was a woman that had $20,000 in credit card debt, that she had no idea about, said Donovan. The abuser just took her Social Security number and opened up credit cards.

Financial abuse happens in other ways, too. Donovan said sometimes a victim might not know the PIN number to a joint account, to prevent her from accessing money. Or a victim might be kept out of financial decisions that impact the family.

Donovan works primarily with clients to create financial plans; she ensures that victims know their credit scores and where important financial documents can be accessed to help them regain agency in their lives.

Her work is an example of how the centers mission has grown in sophistication over the past 40 years.

Agency is a big part of the work Legal Services Manager Lauren Moreno does for the DVCC, especially during court appearances. Moreno communicates with the Department of Family Services and local police to advocate for victims and their safety, and helps them navigate a legal system that can seem overwhelming to new participants, particulalry those who have suffered trauma.

We basically are the victims voice when all these decisions are made at the arraignment, said Moreno.

Now, as the agency enters its 40th year in lower Fairfield County, Adam said the DVCC strives to ensure that every person in the communities it serves  which include Stamford, Norwalk, Darien, New Canaan, Weston, Westport and Wilton  understands there is help ready for them.

Were here to meet you  this community  where youre at. Were also here to help our community to grow in awareness and education and inform one another so we really can support one another, said Adam.

The DVCCs connections in its communities has served it well during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, a time when victims may be stuck at home with an abuser, unable to escape for long enough to call the centers hotline.

What we found at the beginning of the pandemic was not an increase of new services or new clients reaching out to us, but an increase of those already connected to us, an increase in counseling and advocacy, said Adam.

Some clients have called from bathrooms. Others reached the DVCC by pretending that they were speaking to a childs teacher.

No matter the method, the experience showed agency leaders what they knew already from research and history: Those exposed to resources will use them, and making victims and potential victims aware of nearby domestic violence services is essential to keeping them safe.

The Connecticut Coalition Against Domestic Violences 2017 Lethality Assesment Program report found that when domestic violence advocates were connected with victims at the time of a crisis, rates of homicide decreased.

Victims were not there when something worse happened, said Adam. They were taken out of the situation or informed about safety choices that could help.

Awareness about the problem in general has grown tremendously over the past 40 years.

After headlines appeared about the potential impact of the pandemic on domestic violence sufferers, Adam said she was fielding phone calls left and right from community members concerned for the DVCC and the people it serves.

People were coming out of the woodwork and asking, Are the people you help OK? said Adam.

She thinks that would not have happened a decade ago.

We really are just hitting the tip of the iceberg, of our ability to ride this wave of new awareness to create safer communities, said Adam. Not only for our kids or our community down in lower Fairfield County, but across the state of Connecticut and this nation.
Ginny Weds Sunny, starring Yami Gautam and Vikrant Massey, is set to premiere on Netflix on 9 October.

A versatile mix of new content is ready to hit streaming platforms next month. While Ginny Weds Sunny is a romcom, Sound of Metal is a musical drama. Truth Seekers, on the other hand, is a horror-comedy series.

Here's a look at the trailers that have recently debuted.

Ginny Weds Sunny

The trailer of Yami Gautam and Vikrant Massey's upcoming film Ginny Weds Sunny has released.

The official synopsis of the movie reads, Living with her matchmaker mother in Delhi, Ginny is set up with Sunny, who has given up on the idea of love and just wants to get married and settle down. But, the match is not that simple, as Ginny meets Sunny, theres a lot more that comes to the fore than previously imagined in this tale of love, life, weddings, and music.

Puneet Khanna has directed Ginny Weds Sunny, penned by Navjot Gulati and Sumit Arora. Produced by Soundrya Production, Vinod Bachchan, the movie also features Ayesha Raza, Suhail Nayyar, Isha Talwar, Rajeev Gupta, Menka Kurup, Mazel Vyas and Gurpreet Saini.

Ginny Weds Sunny is set to premiere on Netflix on 9 October.

Sound of Metal

Riz Ahmed's upcoming movie Sound of Metal sees him play a drummer who begins to lose his hearing.

Ahmed plays Ruben, a punk-metal drummer who begins to experience intermittent hearing loss during a series of adrenaline-fuelled one-night gigs. "When a specialist tells him his condition will rapidly worsen, he thinks his music career  and with it, his life  is over. His bandmate and girlfriend Lou (Olivia Cooke) checks the recovering heroin addict into a secluded sober house for the deaf in hopes it will prevent relapse and help him learn to adapt to his new situation. But after being welcomed into a community that accepts him just as he is, Ruben has to choose between his equilibrium and the drive to reclaim the life he once knew," reads the official synopsis.

Sound of Metal is slated to release in select US theatres on 20 November and on Amazon Prime Video on 4 December.

Truth Seekers

Truth Seekers follows Gus (Nick Frost) and Dave (Simon Pegg), two part-time paranormal investigators, who team up to uncover and film ghost sightings across the UK, sharing their adventures on an online channel for all to see.

"However, as they stake out haunted churches, underground bunkers and abandoned hospitals with their array of homemade ghost-detecting gizmos, their supernatural experiences grow more frequent, more terrifying and even deadly, as they begin to uncover a conspiracy that could bring about Armageddon for the entire human race," official logline of the show read.

Truth Seekers will begin streaming on Amazon Prime Video from 30 October.
New Delhi

Isher Judge Ahluwalia, 74, arguably Indias most famous female economist, who was till recently serving as the chairperson of the Delhi based think-tank ICRIER died on Saturday. She was suffering from brain cancer.

Ahluwalia is survived by her husband Montek Singh Ahluwalia, former deputy chairman of the Planning Commission and their two sons. Ahluwalia recently published her memoir Breaking Through, a testament of a career that broke many glass ceilings.

After starting her career at the International Monetary Fund, Ahluwalia returned to India where she authored two landmark booksIndustrial Growth in India: Stagnation since the Mid-Sixties and Productivity and Growth in Indian Manufacturing. She was a professor at the Centre for Policy Research, and then director, and later chairperson, of ICRIER. Over the last decade and a half, she has built ICRIER into a leading global think tank.

Yamini Aiyar who is currently heading CPR tweeted: She was the first female scholar at CPR in the 1980s and paved the path for generations of us. Proud to be leading an institution that was once her home.

Ahluwalia has served as Chair of the Board of the International Food Policy Research Institute and the Chair of the High-Powered Committee on Urban Infrastructure Services set up by the Government of India in 2008. In later part of her life, she has written extensively on challenges relating to sustainable urbanization with special focus on delivery of clean drinking water and solid waste management.

She is a graduate of Presidency College and Delhi School of Economics, and received her PhD from Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dr Ahluwalia is also a recipient of the Padma Bhushan.

Former finance minister P Chidambaram tweeted: Deeply saddened and shaken by the passing away of Dr Isher Ahluwalia, a close friend for nearly 25 years. She was a distinguished economist whose life, work and contribution to economics are beautifully captured in her recently published autobiography, a must read for every student of economics.

Former union minister and Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said: Isher Ahluwalia who just passed away, was one of Indias distinguished economists, a MIT PhD, and author of an influential book Industrial Growth in India. She built up ICRIER, a fine economic think tank. She had her own distinctive identity apart from being Monteks wife.
WARSAW, Poland - The three parties in Polands conservative coalition government signed a new coalition agreement on Saturday, putting aside disagreements sparked by a power struggle.

However, they gave no details about the agreement and took no questions from journalists, leaving lingering uncertainty about how the Cabinet will look in practice after an expected reshuffle.

Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the head of the senior party, Law and Justice, told reporters in Warsaw that he and the leaders of two junior parties reached an agreement that would allow them to govern together for three more years, until the next scheduled general election.

Amid the crisis, Law and Justice had warned it might try to govern without them, as a minority government, or even call for early elections.

But on Saturday Kaczynski declared: We have a good future ahead of us.

He signed the deal alongside the the hard-line justice minister, Zbigniew Ziobro, who heads a right-wing party, United Poland, and Jaroslaw Gowin, leader of the more moderate conservative group, Agreement.

Gowin said that pluralism had always been the strength of the coalition but also internal unity.

Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, who was also present, expressed satisfaction that unity and stability were being preserved.

Tensions have been building for some time in the coalition over ideological issues as Ziobro has pursued a hard line against LGBT rights and threatened to withdraw Poland from an international convention protecting women from domestic violence.

Polish political commentators say theres also a power struggle between Ziobro, 50, and Morawiecki, 52, for eventual control of Polands political right as Kaczynski, who is 71, prepares to withdraw from front-line politics.

Kaczynski did not address claims made days earlier that he would also formally join the government as a deputy prime minister.
The latest coronavirus news from Canada and around the world Saturday. This file will be updated throughout the day. Web links to longer stories if available.

5:00 p.m.: Five employees and two patrons at the popular Toronto pub Yonge Street Warehouse near Ryerson University have tested positive for COVID-19.

Toronto Public Health issued a warning Saturday about a potential exposure between Sept. 10 and Sept. 17. Approximately 1,700 people may have been at the pub during this period of time, the news release reads.

Those who may have been to that location during that week have been asked to closely monitor for COVID-19 symptoms for two weeks after their visit.

Due to the recent surge in COVID-19 cases, Ontario has closed strip clubs and moved last call at bars and restaurants to 11 p.m.

CF Markville Mall in Markham is also reporting that two employees have tested positive for COVID-19.

The first case involves a Best Buy employee, who was last in store on Sept. 16. The second is an employee at Old Navy who was last in store on Sept. 17.

Appropriate deep cleaning measures are being taken according to a statement by Cadillac Fairview.

2:39 p.m.: Manitoba reported 65 new cases in the province on Saturday, its second-highest daily total ever. With seven recoveries and no new deaths, the active case total rose by 58 to 545.

The capital, Winnipeg, received 56 of the new cases, which has 456 active cases  83 per cent of the provinces total.

2:18 p.m.: Florida reported 107 new coronavirus deaths on Saturday, a day after Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis announced he was lifting restrictions on restaurant capacity.

The state also reported 2,795 new confirmed cases of COVID-19, bringing its total since the pandemic began to just under 699,000. Overall, 14,190 people have died in Florida during the pandemic, including 168 non-residents.

Florida has had the third-most confirmed COVID-19 cases of any state, trailing only two larger states, California and Texas.

On Friday, DeSantis issued an order allowing restaurants throughout the state to immediately reopen at full capacity. The order prevents cities and counties from ordering them to close or to operate at less than half-capacity unless they can justify a closure for economic or health reasons.

DeSantis also banned local fines against people who refuse to wear masks.

2:17 p.m.: A Major League Soccer game on Sunday between the Colorado Rapids and Sporting Kansas City has been postponed because of the coronavirus.

The league said Saturday one player and three staff members of the Rapids tested positive on Thursday and Friday. All other members of the Rapids show no symptoms, have tested negative and are following league protocols.

A make-up date has not yet been announced.

1:14 p.m.: Toronto Police reported an anti-mask protest convening at citys Yonge-Dundas Square on Saturday afternoon. Dozens of demonstrators could be seen in a photo posted on Twitter by the police service, which said that officers were on the scene but everyone has the lawful right to peacefully protest and officers will be in the area for the safety of everyone.

Later in the afternoon, Mayor John Tory put a statement out on Twitter, saying people are always free to protest in a democracy but the people organizing these protests are trying to spread ridiculous and inaccurate information that, if believed, puts peoples lives at risk. I trust our public health officials.

And I trust the people of Toronto will make the right choice between advice offered by our best medical experts as opposed to baseless propaganda put forward by an eccentric collection of protesters, he wrote on Twitter.

12:52 p.m.: Quebec reported 698 new cases of COVID-19 on Saturday, the highest single-day tally since May.

Health authorities say 272 of the new cases  or 39 per cent  were reported in Montreal, with 106 in Quebec City and 99 in the Monteregie region. The provinces total of active cases stands at 4,524.

The health ministry also reported seven new deaths (raising the provinces total to 5,821), all of which occurred between Sept. 19 and 24.

The province says it completed 33,148 tests since the last daily report. Some 217 patients in the province are hospitalized with the coronavirus, an increase of 18.

12:41 p.m.: London police clashed with demonstrators on Saturday as they broke up a protest in Trafalgar Square against limits on everyday life as the government tries to stem a sharp rise in infections.

Police and protesters were injured when officers moved in after three hours of speeches in front of thousands of people who packed the iconic square in London waving placards opposing mandatory vaccinations, mask requirements and limits on civil liberties.

Police said they intervened because the demonstrators refused to comply with the very social-distancing rules they were there to protest. Officers removed sound equipment, bottles were thrown and police drew their batons in confrontations with protesters.

The demonstration was held as Parliament prepares to review COVID-19 legislation and the government imposes new restrictions to control the disease.

The government earlier this week ordered a 10 p.m. curfew on bars and restaurants nationwide, along with tougher mask requirements and increased fines for non-compliance. It has also banned most social gatherings of more than six people, but there is an exemption for protests as long as organizers submit a risk assessment and comply with social distancing rules.

10:52 a.m.: Toronto Public Health says it has ordered the closure of three King Street restaurants that failed to take necessary COVID-19 precautions, including by serving buffet-style food and requiring staff to work while ill.

The establishments  named as entertainment-district steakhouse MARBL, Mexican eatery Caza Mezcal, and sprawling craft-beer purveyor King Taps  were shut down on Friday night. A fourth unnamed venue is in the process of being served, according to the City of Toronto.

In an Instagram post last night, MARBL said it would be closed for the weekend due to unforeseen circumstances. Earlier this summer, the restaurant attracted criticism  and an investigation from the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario  when a video appeared to show a crowded indoor party that violated COVID-19 regulations. Last week, a staff member tested positive for the virus, according to CP24.

10:47 a.m.: New York state on Saturday reported more than 1,000 new cases for the first time since early June. Governor Andrew Cuomo reported 1,005 cases as the New York City battles outbreaks in Brooklyn and Queens.

10:18 a.m.: Ontarios Health Minister Christine Elliott tweeted Saturday that the province is reporting 435 new cases of COVID-19 since Fridays update, after more than 43,200 tests were completed. Locally, there are 131 new cases in Toronto with 110 in Peel and 45 in Ottawa.

The provinces number of active cases stands at 3,996  four times its totals from mid-August.

Sixty-four percent of the new cases are in people under the age of 40. The number of cases in hospital has increased by 13 to 100 and there are 28 in intensive care, up by three; however, there were no new deaths on Saturday, leaving the provinces total at 2,837.

The previous days numbers from the province were 409 cases from more than 41,800 tests, including 204 new cases in Toronto with 66 in Peel and 40 in Ottawa.

9:51 a.m.: Thousands gathered Saturday in Londons Trafalgar Square to protest lockdowns and social-distancing rules.

The police warned demonstrators in advance to follow the social-distancing rules. The demonstration came as Parliament was preparing to review COVID-19 legislation and the government was imposing new restrictions to control the disease. Some lawmakers have criticized the government for implementing the rules without parliamentary approval.

The demonstration came a week after a similar event during which thousands of people crowded into the iconic square. Police say several officers were hurt during that event when a small minority of protesters became violent.

Britain has Europes worst death toll from the pandemic, with nearly 42,000 confirmed deaths tied to COVID-19. New infections, hospitalizations and deaths have all risen sharply in recent weeks. New rules have included early closing of pubs, similar to a rule imposed in Ontario on Friday.

9:23 a.m.: An online survey of Albertans who have reached out for help during the COVID-19 crisis suggests the pandemic is taking a toll on mental health, with increased signs of obsessive behaviour, stress and depression.

We did not expect people to be experiencing this level of anxiety, depression or stress, said Vincent Agyapong, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Alberta and co-author of a newly published paper in Environmental Research and Public Health.

In late March, the researchers contacted about 33,000 Albertans who subscribed to Text4Hope  a government initiative that sends out a daily supportive text message written by mental health professionals. They asked subscribers to complete a survey that contained standard measures of anxiety, depression and obsessive behaviour.About 6,000 people responded.

The survey found that about 60 per cent of respondents had become worried about dirt, germs and viruses since the COVID-19 outbreak. About 54 per cent had begun washing their hands very often or in a special way that could be considered a symptom of obsessive compulsive disorder.

Nearly 50 per cent were considered probable candidates for anxiety disorders and more than 40 per cent were likely to be clinically depressed. Almost 85 per cent of respondents reported moderate to high stress.

Agyapong is cautious about the results. The survey sample isnt representative of the Alberta population. Its not diagnostic, but it is indicative, said Agyapong.

8:47 a.m. India reported 85,362 new coronavirus cases in the past 24 hours with infections slowing down this month.

The Health Ministry raised the nations confirmed total to more than 5.9 million on Saturday. It said 1,089 more people died in the past 24 hours, for a total of 93,379.

Authorities have decided to hold the first legislative election in Bihar state since the pandemic. Nearly 72 million people are eligible to cast votes during three days beginning the end of October with social distancing restrictions.

The average new cases in India have fallen by around 7,000 daily in the past week, after reaching a record of 97,894 on Sept. 16. However, authorities are preparing for a major religious festival season beginning next month that generally sees huge congregations in temples and shopping districts.

8:29 a.m. Crews and Tangos, a popular drag bar in the Church and Wellesely area, released a statement on Instagram last night that said a customer and a performer have tested positive for COVID-19.

Both individuals were at the bar on Friday, Sept. 18. The customer was in attendance from 8:30 p.m. to 11:00 p.m.

In the post, the bar urges customers that were at the bar between Sept. 18 and Sept. 20 to get tested for the COVID-19 to help prevent virus spread.

Read more: Toronto drag bar Crews and Tangos says customer, performer tested positive for COVID-19

7:45 a.m. Despite the steep rise in COVID-19 cases in recent weeks, Ontario has not returned to Stage 2 partial economic lockdown.

In his national address Wednesday, Justin Trudeau, the prime minister, made it official that the long-dreaded second wave of the pandemic has arrived.

And in extending federal pandemic income supports into next summer, Trudeau warned us to dig in for at least another year of pandemic conditions.

You can be sure that Ontarios Doug Ford and his fellow premiers will reimpose Stage 2 lockdowns at the earliest sign that the pandemic could once again rage out of control.

We will take every step necessary (to control the pandemic), Ford said last week, including further shutdowns.

Read more from Star business columnist David Olive: Why Ontario has not returned to Stage 2  and how we can make sure it doesnt happen

7:30 a.m. As he ponders his half-filled Richmond Hill fitness studio, Alex Kucharski gets shivers down his spine.

Another lockdown would be disastrous for our industry, said Kucharski, owner of F45 Training Jefferson.

As gym and yoga studio owners, restaurateurs and retailers see the rising weekly COVID-19 numbers across Ontario, they worry about the return of more restrictions. On Friday, the province ordered bars and restaurants to stop serving alcohol at 11 p.m. and close by midnight, and many fear that more clampdowns are on the way.

Read more from Star business reporter Josh Rubin: Im terrified: Bar, restaurant and gym owners say they wont make it if theyre forced to close again

12:36 a.m. The health minister in Australias Victoria state has resigned in the fallout from an inquiry into why security guards were used instead of police or the military at quarantine hotels. Lapses in security at the hotels were given as the major reason for a second wave of COVID-19 cases.

Victoria reported just one more coronavirus death as Melbournes new case average continued to fall. The death took the state toll to 782 and the national figure to 870. There were 12 new cases, while Melbournes 14-day average fell again on Saturday to 23.6.

Melburnians, who have been in lockdown for more than a month, are waiting for the easing of restrictions on Monday. Its expected to include a staged return to school for some students and outdoor gatherings of five people from two households.

Health Minister Jenny Mikakos on Saturday issued a statement confirming her resignation, just a day after Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews gave evidence to the inquiry and pointed partial blame at Mikakos for her role in the bungled quarantine program.

I am disappointed that my integrity has sought to be undermined, she wrote in a one-page statement. I have never shirked my responsibility. She said she also plans to resign from Victoria Parliament.

Mikakos appears to be taking the blame when no one else would. After six weeks of hearings into the hotel inquiry, it was still not known who made the decision to use security guards instead of police or soldiers, which were used in other Australian states.

Sept. 25, 2020 news

6:10 p.m.: Ontarios regional health units are reporting another day with more than 500 new confirmed and probable COVID-19 cases, according to the Stars latest count.

As of 5 p.m. Friday, the health units had reported another 515 cases in the last 24 hours, in line with a trend that has seen the rate of new infections grow at an accelerating pace since early August.

The provinces seven-day average for new cases is now at 430 new cases daily, slightly less than double what the health units were reporting 11 days ago on Sept. 14. Earlier this week, that average was growing slightly, on pace to double about every nine days.

Ontario last saw such rapid exponential growth before the pandemics first peak in the spring. Although Ontario is still well below that peak level  about 600 infections a day, reported in late April  the current rate of case growth, if sustained, would see the average eclipse that rate by early October.

Friday saw significant case totals reported across the province: Toronto reported 236 new cases, its most for any single day since mid-May; Peel Region reported 98; York Region added 44; Ottawa 41; Waterloo Region 18; Halton Region 19; Middlesex-London 14 and the Eastern Ontario Health Unit 10.
The mayor of the northwestern Italian city of Sanremo announced Thursday the city would play a big role in the next edition of the China Flower Expo, to be held next May to July in the Chongming District of Shanghai.

Mayor Alberto Biancheri announced the plan after a visit from Zhu Yuhua, president of the China-Italy Association of Shanghai.

Sanremo, located on the Italian coast near the border with France, is nicknamed "The City of Flowers." Each year one of the city's main avenues is filled with flowers and floats made of millions of flowers that are driven around the city as part of a special Flower Carnival celebration, each year with a different theme.

Discussions of the city's participation dated back to last year during talks aimed at strengthening cultural ties between the two countries.

In addition to Sanremo's participation in the China Flower Expo, the agreement announced Thursday provides for commercial, cultural, and tourist-related ties between Chongming of Shanghai and SanRemo, a city of around 45,000 residents.

"Our participation is a subject of great pride for Sanremo," Biancheri, the mayor, said.

The China Flower Expo takes place in the Chongming District of Shanghai, itself renowned for the flowers that grow in the area. The expo is among the world's most important flower events, covering an area of more than 10 square kilometers and hosting more than 3 million visitors each year. At next year's event, a part of the expo grounds will be set aside for displays from Sanremo.
Iranian President Hassan Rohani told Iranians in a televised speech on September 26 to direct their anger over the impact of sanctions at Washington.

Rohani accused the United States of savagery for imposing the sanctions, including new ones announced this week.

With their illegal and inhuman sanctions, and terrorist actions, the Americans have inflicted $150 billion of damage on the people of Iran, Rohani said.

Rohani said the sanctions had prevented the purchase of medicines and food. Such humanitarian supplies are theoretically exempt from U.S. sanctions, but many companies fear breaking the rules and avoid transactions with Tehran.

We havent seen such an extent of savagery, Rohani said. "The correct address for all crimes and pressure against the dear Iranian people is Washington, D.C., the White House.

A new round of sanctions announced on September 21 applies to people and entities involved in Iran's atomic activities or its missile and conventional weapons programs.

They are part of an offensive by the Trump administration that rests in part on a "snapback" clause from the 2015 nuclear agreement between Tehran and world powers that the United States abandoned two years ago.

Washington added more sanctions on September 24 when it blacklisted judges and entities over violations of human rights, including a judge it said was involved in the case of an Iranian wrestler sentenced to death.

Tensions between Washington and Tehran have soared since President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew from the nuclear deal.

Iran has breached the central limits of the 2015 nuclear deal, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which has accused it of obfuscating and making misleading statements about past nuclear activities. Iran has insisted it is not pursuing nuclear weapons.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on September 21 that Washington is determined to keep up its "maximum pressure" effort until Iran is willing to conclude a comprehensive negotiation that addresses the regimes malign behavior."

He added that the United States is always open to diplomacy with Iran, but Iran must respond with diplomacy, not with more violence, bloodshed, and nuclear extortion. Until then, maximum pressure will continue."

In his televised speech, Rohani reserved his harshest criticism for Pompeo, saying that while he presents himself as the minister of foreign affairs, he is in reality the minister of crimes."

With reporting by AFP and Reuters
He certainly is not going to want to be in dissent with the three liberals, said David A. Strauss, a law professor at the University of Chicago.

The chief justice has the power to assign the majority opinion, to himself or to an ally, but only when he is in the majority. To keep that power, he would have good reason to tack right.

Between the assignment power and how good he is at writing opinions, Professor Strauss said of the chief justice, he can push decisions to be more to his liking in the majority than if he were writing a dissent.

In the coming weeks, months and years, the Supreme Court may be called upon to weigh issues as varied and weighty as the presidential election, the fate of affirmative action, the structure of the administrative state and the role courts can play in addressing climate change. Judge Barrett had not written major opinions in any of those areas, and, in any event, the views expressed by appeals court judges do not always predict their positions when they are elevated to the Supreme Court.

Here is a look at some of Judge Barretts views in major cases on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit and what they suggest about her impact if she is confirmed.

Abortion

Judge Barrett has considered three laws restricting abortions from her home state, Indiana. In all three cases, she expressed misgivings about earlier rulings from appeals judges that had struck down the laws.

In one case, her court let stand a ruling that threw out a law tightening the requirements for notifying the parents of minors seeking abortions. Judge Barrett was on the losing side, joining an opinion that the ruling was premature and that the law should have been allowed to go into effect to assess its actual impact.
This article will be updated throughout the week with coronavirus case counts and other need-to-know information about the pandemic in San Antonio.

Backlog of cases: A backlog of 2,794 coronavirus cases reported Sunday pushed the total number in Bexar County since the start of the pandemic to 57,145, according to the San Antonio Metropolitan Health District.

September 26

One new death: The San Antonio Metropolitan Health District reported one death and 100 new cases of COVID-19 on Saturday. That pushes the death toll in Bexar County to 1,074 and the count of positive test results to 54,295 since the novel coronavirus pandemic started in mid-March.

September 25

The number of coronavirus cases in San Antonio rose by 224 Friday, tipping the countys total since the start of the pandemic above 54,000. Mayor Ron Nirenberg reported no new deaths. The countys death toll stands at 1,073, while the number of total cases is 54,195.

September 24

Five more COVID-19 deaths: The Metropolitan Health District reported 177 new cases of the novel coronavirus in Bexar County Thursday, 22 more than the 155 reported Wednesday. Five deaths that occurred within the last two weeks also were reported Thursday, bringing the citys death toll to 1,073.

September 23

COVID-19 numbers update: Metro Health officials reported no new coronavirus-related deaths on Wednesday, as cases and deaths overall continue a steady, downward trend in San Antonio.

There were 155 new coronavirus cases, a slight uptick from the weekend  which officials said could be due to the Labor Day holiday  but still a far cry from the reports of over 1,000 new daily cases that occurred earlier in the summer.

Mass weekly testing begins: It was the first day of a new routine at Somerset Independent School District: a mass testing for the coronavirus developed by Community Labs, a San Antonio-based nonprofit that promises the ability to process thousands of tests a day, with results available within 24 hours. The Southwest Bexar County school district agreed to demonstrate the system in hopes the pilot program would speed the return to classroom learning at its seven schools.

September 22

COVID-19 numbers update: Six more people in San Antonio and Bexar County have died of the novel coronavirus, the most in nearly two weeks, officials said Tuesday.

September 21

COVID-19 numbers update: The risk level for coronavirus entered the safe zone in San Antonio on Monday, allowing for the reopening of various city services and facilities, at least on a limited basis.

September 20

COVID-19 numbers update: The city reported a backlog of 2,473 COVID-19 cases Sunday, bringing Bexar Countys total since the start of the pandemic to 53,341, according to the Metropolitan Health Districts daily coronavirus update.
Zelensky: State should provide treatment for cadet injured in plane crash, make amends to those who lost their relatives

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky insists on the need to pay compensation to the families of those killed in a military plane crash in Kharkiv region.

"The state should provide treatment for the injured cadet and make amends to those who have lost their loved ones. Ukraine does not forget its heroes," Zelensky wrote on Facebook on Saturday.

The President also insists on conducting an objective and unbiased investigation into the causes of the plane crash.

"We have lost young cadets and experienced military men, who had their whole life ahead and, I am sure, more than one combat victory. It is difficult to find words to express the pain of this loss. It is difficult to find the right phrases to comfort the parents, wives and children of the dead servicemen. The whole country will be in mourning today with their families. I signed a decree declaring September 26 the day of mourning," Zelensky added.

As reported, at about 20:50 on September 25, on the Kyiv-Kharkiv-Dovzhansky highway, a plane crash occurred. During planned training flights, an AN-26 military aircraft fell and caught fire, which was landing at the airfield of a military unit in the town of Chuhuiv, Kharkiv region.

There were 27 people (20 cadets and seven officers of the Kharkiv University of the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine named after Kozhedub) on board. Twenty-six people died. One cadet is in the hospital in a moderate condition.
Late an afternoon of August at Incheon Airport in the Republic of Korea (RoK), a repatriation flight operated by Vietjet Air took off, carrying Vietnamese citizens home.

Babies and their companions land at Cam Ranh Airport, Khanh Hoa Province.  Photos tuoitre.vn

There have been dozens of similar repatriation flights taking off over the past few months from all corners of the world to rescue Vietnamese nationals from COVID-19 hot spots. But this flight was a special one.

Twenty four passengers on board were babies aged from 18 months to five years old who were heading home without their parents.

Due to difficulties posed by the pandemic, a lot of couples have been forced to send their children home while they stay on in the RoK to complete their labour contracts.

The biggest difficulty we faced after deciding to send my daughter back to Vietnam was finding someone who agreed to accompany and take care of her during the flight, Hoang Van Lam, a Vietnamese labourer working in the RoK, told Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper.

Lam was lucky to find Nguyen Thi Ut, a woman hailing from southernmost province of Ca Mau whose labour contract had expired so she was returning to Vietnam.

When the flight took off, the anxious parents watched as the plane disappeared into the sky, and then spent the next few hours worrying as they waited for confirmation the flight had landed in Vietnam, Lam said.

Four hours later, we [Lam and his wife] were relieved to see our daughter on the phone with her grandmother after the flight landed at Cam Ranh Airport in central Khanh Hoa Province. It was also the first time my mother had met my baby in person.

Ut, who took care of the baby during the flight, said: When the flight was taking off, the baby was scared of the loud noise coming from the aircraft's engines. Thanks to the assistance of the aircrew and my experience, she calmed down and it was easier to look after her after that.

Explaining the reason for sending his daughter home, Lam said he and his wife had gone to the RoK to work where they had met, got married and had a baby.

Since the pandemic broke out, our life has changed. We didnt have time to take care of our baby so we had to send her home. Our labour contracts are still valid. We will try to work and send money home so that our parents can raise her, Lam said.

To qualify to send infants home, Vietnamese parents in the RoK have to present the babys birth certificate, health check certificate and a document authorising someone else to accompany the baby on a repatriation flight.

Lam and his wife had to ask for assistance from the Vietnamese Embassy in the RoK and contacted people who were qualified to take the repatriation flights such as Vietnamese workers whose labour contracts had expired and Vietnamese students in the RoK in order to seek help.

Luckily for like us, many Vietnamese people in the RoK were ready to lend a hand, Lam said.

Babies in quarantine camps

After being delivered home to Vietnam, Lam's daughter was put in quarantine with her relatives at a military training centre in Khanh Hoa Province.

The military officers had arranged a separate area for the special little citizens. Every room was equipped with kettles, water buckets, wet towels and a separate clothes drying area.

Internet connections were always available so that parents living overseas could call and see their babies every day.

Tran Thi Hong Nhung from Ha Tinh Province, who has been taking care of her nephew at the quarantine site, said the babies had their temperatures measures twice a day. Thanks to the help of the military officers, my nephew has got used to staying at the camp and no longer cries like he did on the first days.

A military officer measures the temperature of a baby at the camp.

Lieutenant Colonel Nguyen Anh Duong, the leading military officer at the quarantine camp, said the babies were too young to know how to protect themselves from the pandemic, so health checks were strictly controlled.

Menus for the babies are carefully prepared with enough nutrition, and the dishes are changed every day. Officers on duty visit each room to remind people it's time to wake up or go to sleep, rather than setting an alarm that would startle the babies.

Some caregivers at the camp had not met their young charges before, so for them 14 days in quarantine with the babies was a memorable period.

Le Thi Lien, a caregiver, wanted to take photos of every moment with her grandchild at the camp.

Flying back home without their parents and being under quarantine during the pandemic are experiences these children should remember. I want to save these moments so when they grow up they will know the world was in the grips of a pandemic, but my grandchild and other people were repatriated by the Government and received care at the quarantine sites, she said.

Successes from such "special repatriation flight" helped concerned parties to take further efforts to carry out the second flight with 53 kids on board heading home from RoK early this month. VNS

Minh Chien

Repatriation continues to ensure no one is left behind Government is making good on its pledge that no one will be left behind as it repatriates hundreds of Vietnamese citizens from all over the world.
New Delhi, Sep 26 : : After wide-spread violence ravaged the national capital and led to death of 53 people and colossal property destruction, the Delhi government has settled over 1,661 claims sought by riots victims amounting to over 21 crore.

According to data in the charge sheet filed by the Delhi Police in a riots case, the government has disbursed a total of Rs 21,93,29,050 rupees till now. About 1,661 claims of the victims have been settled, while 185 are still pending.

The Sub-District Magistrate of Seelampur has settled claims of Rs 7,69,81,637, while Sub-District Magistrate of Yamuna Vihar, Karawal Nagar, Shahdara have disbursed Rs 5,95,16,284, Rs 6,49,67,539 and Rs 1,78,63,590 to the riot victims, respectively.

Pursuant to the riots, the government had promised to extend compensation up to Rs 10 lakh in cases of death, Rs five lakh for permanent incapacitation, Rs two lakh for serious injuries, Rs 20,000 for minor injuries and Rs 5,000 for animal loss.

The city government had also promised Rs five lakh for complete damages to residential units, Rs 2.5 lakh in case of substantial damages and Rs five lakh in case of uninsured commercial units.

The details are a part of the voluminous charge sheet filed by the police against 15 accused under various sections of UAPA, Indian Penal Code, Arms Act and Prevention of Damage to Public Property Act on September 16.

According to the chargesheet, clashes between the citizenship law supporters and protesters had spiraled out of control, leaving 53 people dead and 748 people injured.

The police, which is probing the conspiracy angle in the case, has named Tahir Hussain, Safoora Zargar, Gulfisha Khatoon, Devangana Kalita, Shafa-ur-Rehman, Asif Iqbal Tanha, Natasha Narwal, Abdul Khalid Saifi, Ishrat Jahan, Meeran Haidar, Shadab Ahmad, Talsim Ahmad, Saleem Malik, Athar Khan and Mohammed Salim Khan in the charge sheet.

Aakanksha Khajuria can be contacted at akanksha.k@ians.in

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Two weeks after questioning him, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Saturday sent a notice to Bineesh Kodiyeri, Kerala CPI(M) secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnans son, under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act and frozen all transactions of his properties.

Trouble began for Kodiyeri after Bengaluru drug racket accused Anoop Mohammad gave a statement to the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) in which he mentioned his name. He said Bineesh Kodiyeri, second son of Balakrishnan, had helped him a lot in his business venture. Later his name also figured prominently in the call list of Mohammad.

Kodiyeri later admitted that he knew Mohammad and helped him in opening a hotel in Bengaluru but he was not aware of his alleged drug dealings. However, later the ED found that two shell companies floated by Kodiyeri, B Capital Solutions and B Capital Forex, were allegedly involved in many shoddy deals. Floated in 2015, both firms had failed to file tax returns and other formalities and the ED suspects these firms were floated for alleged money laundering and hawala transactions. The ED had questioned him for over 11 hours in Kochi on September 9.

The notice sent by the ED deputy director in Kochi stated that no transaction of immovable assets should be carried out without prior permission of the investigating agency. The ED has also asked the state registration department to file details of all his properties. It is also probing his source of income and investments. Besides ED, there are reports that that he may be summoned to Bengaluru by the NCB.

During investigation into the gold smuggling case, the ED has found that there is a close link between the smuggling and psychedelic drug cases. The smuggling case came to light on July 5 after 30 kg gold was seized from a consignment that came in the name of the United Arab Emirates consular office in Thiruvananthapuram. And the drug surfaced on August 28 after the arrest of Anoop Mohammad and two others in Bengaluru.

There are also allegations that Kodiyeri helped Swapna Suresh, the main accused in the gold smuggling case, to flee from the state after the seizure of the gold. Later customs also found that one of those arrested in the gold smuggling case K T Ramees was in touch with drug racket accused Anoop Mohammad. The alleged involvement of the party secretarys son has invited enough embarrassment for the ruling party and the secretary distanced himself saying, Parents cant be held responsible for grown up childrens doings.

Soon after the gold smuggling surfaced, chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan had written a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeking a detailed central agency probe. Now at least five central agencies are probing the smuggling and related cases-- the letter has put the CM in a tricky situation as most of those interrogated are close to the government-- former IAS officer M Sivsanakar, CMs former IT fellow Arun Balachandran, state higher education minister KT Jaleel and party secretarys son Bineesh Kodiyeri are among them.

The partys youth wing Democratic Youth Federation of India said the BJP government at the Centre was using central agencies to weaken a democratically-elected government. But the opposition Congress and BJP say central agencies came only after the CMs letter. Having taken a big bite, the ruling party is in a position to either swallow or vomit it out, say political observers.

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Queensland Education Minister Grace Grace has defended her department's continuing commitment to education following an LNP announcement that it would hire more teachers and teacher aides for state schools.

Ms Grace described as "lacklustre" the LNP's plan to hire an extra 3350 teachers and 760 teacher aides in the next four years if it wins government in next month's state election, believing it fell short of Labor's promises.

Queensland Education Minister Grace Grace says the LNP plan amounts to a cut of about 650 teachers over four years.

Opposition Leader Deb Frecklington made the $1.05 billion commitment on Saturday and said it was in addition to previously announced policies to declutter the curriculum and install airconditioning in every state school classroom.

"The LNP will invest in education and get back to basics in schools as part of our economic recovery plan," she said.
The newly sworn in President of Malis transition government Bah Ndaw has praised the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) mediator and former Nigerian President, Goodluck Jonathan for the role he played towards restoring normalcy in Mali, following a protracted socio-political crisis in the country.

Mr NDaw stated this on Friday in Bamako at the inauguration of the Transition Government even as ECOWAS gave the indication that it would only lift sanctions on Mali after a new Prime Minister has been appointed to run the government of the administration.

Speaking on Mr Jonathans activities as ECOWAS mediator in Mali, the interim President thanked the former President for his deep involvement and encouragement towards resolving the crisis in Mali.

He said: My gratitude goes to ECOWAS for its constant concern for our country. I also thank ECOWAS mediator, former Nigerian President Dr. Goodluck Jonathan for the wise advise he has been giving to his Malian brothers and sisters since June this year. He is one of us now.

I welcome his presence and I would like to assure him of the determination of the Malians to lead a stable, peaceful and successful transition, under the agreed conditions and deadlines.

I assure him (Jonathan) and ECOWAS that I am ready to make any sacrifice that will bring peace to Mali and make my country recover from its challenges. I will organise election on schedule and will not go outside the letters of the Transition charter.

Sanctions

Meanwhile, there are strong indications that the sub-regional body will not lift the sanctions imposed on Mali until the leaders of the country comply with the decisions taken by the Heads of State and Government at the meeting held in Accra, Ghana, last week.

Mr Jonathan, stated this at a press briefing in Bamako on Friday, stressing that the sanctions will not be lifted unless the new administration appoints a prime minister to run the government.

A communique issued after a two-day visit to Bamako by the mediation team said: Concerning the sanctions, in conformity with the decisions of the ECOWAS Heads of State and Government, following the swearing-in of the President of the Transition, they will be lifted once a civilian Prime Minister is appointed. A report on this issue will be submitted to the Chairman of ECOWAS.

It stated further that the delegation demanded the immediate release of civilian and military personalities of the former regime who have been in detention since August 18, 2020.

One of them is the immediate past Prime Minister Boubou Cisse who Mr Jonathan and other members of his delegation visited in detention at the Kati Barracks last Thursday.

The communique said further: The Mission recalled the importance and the urgency of appointing a civilian Prime Minister, Head of Government, who will be responsible for conducting, under the authority of the President of the Transition, the various reforms of the inclusive national dialogue and preparing for the forthcoming presidential and legislative elections.

The Mission also reiterated the importance of obtaining the final and official version of the Transition Charter, taking into account the decisions of the ECOWAS Summits of Heads of State and Government.

These decisions included the demand for the dissolution of the military administrative body known as the CNSP, the ban on the Vice-President in charge of Security and Defence, from replacing the President of the Transition, as well as commitment to the agreed 18 months duration for the transition Government.

While in Mali the mediator inaugurated a newly established ECOWAS Monitoring Committee on the situation in Mali which comprised of the mediator himself, chairperson of ECOWAS Council of Ministers, President of the ECOWAS Commission, special representatives of both the United Nations and the African Union as well as ECOWAS representative in Mali.
DUBAI: Iran and Iraq on Saturday pledged to improve border cooperation and boost trade between the two neighbours that has been hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic.

We remain committed to increasing political, economic and cultural cooperation between the two countries," President Hassan Rouhani told visiting Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein, according to a government website.

Hussein called for implementing bilateral accords in areas including border cooperation, transportation and trade between the two countries, the website said.

The pandemic has led to border closures and disruptions to trade and visits by millions of pilgrims and tourists.

Iran, which shares a long border with Iraq, has been the epicentre of the virus in the Middle East but the spread has also accelerated in Iraq.

Iran is one of Iraqs biggest trading partners. Both countries economies are in crisis. Iran continues to suffer from U.S. sanctions and Iraqs economy has been battered by years of wars, sanctions and an Islamist insurgency.

Tehran also used to meeting to denounce the U.S. military presence in the region.

We consider the presence of American forces in the region, whether in Iraq, Afghanistan or the southern states of the Persian Gulf, to the detriment of security and stability in the region," Rouhani said.

Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor
A new feature the Registry of Motor Vehicles implemented to minimize health risks during the pandemic will remain in place through October.

On Wednesdays next month, more than a dozen service centers will open only to residents 75 and older who are required by law to renew their licenses in-person.

All services for the exclusive hours will be available by appointment only, with reservations open at mass.gov/rmv or at aaa.com/appointments for AAA members. Eligible patrons who have a license or ID card that expires in October will receive renewal reminders, the RMV said in an information flyer.

Service centers with designated hours for 75-and-older customers are in Brockton, Danvers, Fall River, Greenfield, Lawrence, Leominster, Marthas Vineyard, Nantucket, New Bedford, North Adams, Pittsfield, Plymouth, Revere, South Yarmouth, Springfield, Watertown and Worcester
The Bachelor's Locky Gilbert and Irena Srbinovska stepped out for a romantic picnic on Saturday.

The couple couldn't keep their hands - or lips - off each other as they enjoyed lunch in a Sydney park.

Irena and Locky shared a passionate kiss as they spent quality time together, just two days after the show's finale aired.

Get a room! The Bachelor's Locky Gilbert and Irena Srbinovska couldn't keep their hands off each other as they enjoyed a romantic picnic date in Sydney on Saturday

Smooch: Irena and Locky shared a passionate kiss as they spent quality time together, just two days after the show's finale aired

The brunette beauty wrapped her arms around her man while she pulled him in close during the outing.

The couple laughed and chatted as they soaked up the sun and enjoyed a light meal in the park.

The lovebirds packed on the PDA as they shared a smooch while sitting on a lounge under a tree.

Keeping him close: The brunette beauty wrapped her arms around her man while she pulled him in close during the outing

Lunch date: The couple laughed and chatted as they soaked up the sun after enjoying a meal in the park

Happy in love: Locky wrapped his arms around Irena shortly after they arrived to the park

Irena looked stylish in blue jeans, a white jumper and white sneakers for the romantic afternoon.

The nurse styled her long locks straight, and let her natural beauty shine, opting for a neutral palette of makeup.

Meanwhile, Locky wore comfortable blue jeans, a black T-shirt, sneakers and a black cap for the outing.

Lovebirds: The couple packed on the PDA as they shared a smooch while sitting on a lounge under a tree

Stylish: Irena looked stylish in blue jeans, a white jumper and white sneakers for the romantic afternoon

Irena and Locky are now officially out of hiding after The Bachelor grand finale aired on Thursday night.

A conflicted Locky chose Irena as his winning contestant after telling Bella Varelis he couldn't see a future with her.

'Irena, every time I'm with you... I feel so safe and protected, and it's kind of weird, 'cause I'm a pretty big dude, and not many people can make me feel like that, but just when I'm with you, I feel so calm and comfortable,' he told Irena.

Beauty: The nurse styled her shoulder-length locks straight, and let her natural beauty shine, opting for a neutral palette of makeup

Comfort: Meanwhile, Locky wore comfortable blue jeans, a black T-shirt, sneakers and a black cap for the outing

Sparks: At one point, the couple embraced each other before sharing another kiss during their picnic

'When I think about our future together, I'm so excited and I can't wait to just travel the world and make all your dreams come true.

'Irena, I'm so in love with you. And I can't wait to spend the rest of my life with you.'

Moments earlier, he had delivered the bad news to runner-up Bella - despite having told her beforehand that he was 'falling in love' with her.

It's official! Irena and Locky are now officially out of hiding after The Bachelor grand finale aired on Thursday night

Special bond: A conflicted Locky chose Irena as his winning contestant after telling Bella Varelis he couldn't see a future with her

Love: 'Irena, every time I'm with you, I feel so safe and protected. It's kind of weird, because I'm a pretty big dude, and not many people can make me feel like that,' he told the nurse

On Friday, the lovebirds revealed they are still dating, and planning to live together in the same city.

'The plan is that I'm moving over to Perth,' a smiling Irena said on The Project.

In an interview with Who magazine, the happy couple also revealed the codenames they used to communicate with each other while the show was airing.

Happy in love: While walking through the park, Irena and Locky glanced into each other's eyes

Next step: On Friday, the couple revealed they are still dating, and planning to live together in the same city

Connection: The couple cuddled each other closely as they spent quality time together

Happy: Locky and Irena couldn't wipe the smiles off their faces as they laughed and joked

'Mine was as simple as Roger Roger and it had a smiley face,' Locky said, referring to the moniker he used to save Irena's number in his phone.

'And Locky was under Doug in my phone,' Irena revealed.

'Douglas is Locky's middle name so that's where I got it from and no one picked up on that!' she explained.

Romantic afternoon: The pair looked to be very much in love as they relaxed on the lounge

Special names: In an interview with Who magazine , the couple revealed the codenames they used to communicate with each other while the show was airing
TORONTO, Sept. 25, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- MediPharm Labs Corp. (TSX: LABS) (OTCQX: MEDIF) (FSE:MLZ) (MediPharm Labs or the Company) a global leader in specialized, research-driven pharmaceutical-quality cannabis extraction, distillation and derivative products, today announced it has entered into a new white-label supply agreement with DanCann Pharma A/S (DanCann Pharma). The company will be serviced by both GMP approved facilities, MediPharm Labs Inc. and MediPharm Labs Australia Pty Ltd (MediPharm Labs Australia). This marks MediPharm Labs third supply agreement for the export of finished products to Denmark expanding its revenue opportunity in an emerging medicinal cannabis market.



DanCann Pharma is a medical cannabis company focused on discovering, developing, manufacturing and commercializing new therapeutic cannabinoids in a wide range of disease areas. DanCann Pharma manufactures and imports prescription (Rx-pharmaceuticals) and over-the-counter (OTC) pharmaceuticals focused on pain patients with alternative needs and management to handle their illness, covered by the Danish Pilot Program for medical cannabis  with future targets for further and new patient groups and segments.

We continue to build our presence and reputation as an Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient supplier in emerging markets such as Denmark where we are qualified by our GMP-certified production capabilities for medicinal, wellness and adult use applications, said Pat McCutcheon, CEO, MediPharm Labs. We are pleased to be adding a healthcare focused company like DanCann Pharma to our growing customer portfolio as they look to develop new and innovative medical cannabis products in therapeutic areas we believe will drive additional growth opportunities in a young market like Denmark and the rest of Europe.

Under the agreement, which has an initial two-year term, MediPharm Labs will supply a full range of specially formulated CBD and THC cannabis oil products that will be white-labeled for distribution.

At DanCann Pharma our vision is clear, to improve the health and quality of life for patients facing challenges and while working to create new cannabis- and cannabinoid-based pharmaceuticals for the future. Our focus on differentiated innovative drug administration systems will enable us to create a leading Scandinavian cannabis- and cannabinoid-based company, said Jeppe Krog Rasmussen, Founder and CEO, DanCann Pharma. Pharmaceutical cannabis- and cannabinoids are an important and exciting industry showing signs of strong growth, increasing interest, and rising popularity - an extremely powerful combination and foundation for industry pioneering companies in Europe. We are very excited about this collaboration with MediPharm Labs, and look forward to soon being able to deliver products to the many Danish, and in the future, Scandinavian patients who seek alternative treatment who have not been successful with conventional medicine.

About Denmarks Medical Cannabis Market

Denmark launched its four-year medical cannabis pilot program on January 1st, 20181. Post-harvest Good Manufacturing Processes (GMP) is required for distribution of medical cannabis products in Denmark2.

Through the program, physicians can prescribe medical cannabis for all purposes and are guided by recommendations in four areas: pain caused by multiple sclerosis, pain caused by spinal cord damage, side effects from chemotherapy treatment and neuropathic pain that is due to brain, spinal cord or nerve damage3. The guidelines published by the Danish Medicines Agency are based on an extensive review of literature as well as assessments of: cannabis schemes in the Netherlands, Canada and Israel; previous cannabis drug approvals in Europe and the US; and scientific evidence by the National Academy of Sciences (USA, 2017).

Denmark granted patients legal access to cannabis-based medicinal products two years ago as part of a four-year pilot program. The program provides patients with safe product access and national health authorities with patient data that they can use to understand usage and efficacy. According to information complied by New Frontier Data and the Danish Ministry of Health, over 2,100 patients (primarily women between the ages of 42-64) received cannabis-based medicinal products from 429 prescribing doctors under this program in 2019.

About DanCann Pharma A/S

DanCann Pharma A/S was founded in 2018 and is a Danish pharmaceutical biotechnology company powered by cannabinoids. The Company is focused on discovering, developing, manufacturing, and commercializing of novel cannabinoid therapeutics in a broad range of disease areas. During the summer 2018, the Company was licensed as one of the first companies in Denmark to handle and cultivate medical cannabis through the Development Scheme.

About MediPharm Labs Corp.

Founded in 2015, MediPharm Labs specializes in the production of purified, pharmaceutical quality cannabis oil and concentrates and advanced derivative products utilizing a Good Manufacturing Practices certified facility with ISO standard built clean rooms. MediPharm Labs has invested in an expert, research-driven team, state-of-the-art technology, downstream purification methodologies and purpose-built facilities with five primary extraction lines for delivery of pure, trusted and precision-dosed cannabis products for its customers. Through its wholesale and white label platforms, they formulate, consumer-test, process, package and distribute cannabis extracts and advanced cannabinoid-based products to domestic and international markets. As a global leader, MediPharm Labs has completed commercial exports to Australia and is nearing commercialization of its Australian Extraction facility. MediPharm Labs Australia was established in 2017.

For further information, please contact:

Laura Lepore, VP, Investor Relations

Telephone: 705-719-7425 ext 1525

Email: investors@medipharmlabs.com

Website: www.medipharmlabs.com



CAUTIONARY NOTE REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING INFORMATION:

This news release contains forward-looking information and forward-looking statements (collectively, forward-looking statements) within the meaning of the applicable Canadian securities legislation. All statements, other than statements of historical fact, are forward-looking statements and are based on expectations, estimates and projections as at the date of this news release. Any statement that involves discussions with respect to predictions, expectations, beliefs, plans, projections, objectives, assumptions, future events or performance (often but not always using phrases such as expects, or does not expect, is expected, anticipates or does not anticipate, plans, budget, scheduled, forecasts, estimates, believes or intends or variations of such words and phrases or stating that certain actions, events or results may or could, would, might or will be taken to occur or be achieved) are not statements of historical fact and may be forward-looking statements. In this news release, forward-looking statements relate to, among other things, the successful performance of the agreements and shipping of products thereunder as planned; additional growth in Denmark and Europe; and developing new and innovative medical cannabis products in therapeutic areas. Forward-looking statements are necessarily based upon a number of estimates and assumptions that, while considered reasonable, are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors which may cause the actual results and future events to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Such factors include, but are not limited to: general business, economic, competitive, political and social uncertainties; the inability of MediPharm Labs to obtain adequate financing; the delay or failure to receive regulatory approvals; and other factors discussed in MediPharm Labs filings, available on the SEDAR website at www.sedar.com. There can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on the forward-looking statements and information contained in this news release. Except as required by law, MediPharm Labs assumes no obligation to update the forward-looking statements of beliefs, opinions, projections, or other factors, should they change.

All information contained in this press release with respect to DanCann Pharma was supplied by DanCann Pharma for inclusion herein.

1 Medicinal Cannabis Pilot Program. Retrieved: https://laegemiddelstyrelsen.dk/en/special/medicinal-cannabis/citizens/medicinal-cannabis-pilot-programme/

2 The Medical Cannabis Market in Denmark & Europe. Retrieved: https://www.openaccessgovernment.org/the-medical-cannabis-market-in-denmark-europe/80721/

3 The Danish Medical Cannabis Pilot Programme: Putting the Patient First. Retrieved: https://www.healtheuropa.eu/the-danish-medical-cannabis-pilot-programme-putting-the-patient-first/92991/
The Chattanooga Police Department announces that due to COVID-19, Chattanoogas annual National Night Out is cancelled. But community members and police working together is still on, officials said.In Chattanooga, National Night Out is traditionally held the first Tuesday of October. Neighborhoods and the CPD organize events that help residents and officers get to know one another better, build community spirit and encourage neighbors to work together to decrease crime in their neighborhoods."We arent able to gather in large groups this year, but we can still check in on our neighbors, support neighborhood associations and engage with CPD officers patrolling the neighborhoods throughout the city," officials said."Consider hanging out in your front yard and striking up a socially distanced conversation with neighbors. Think about hosting/co-hosting with neighbors a Front Porch Lineup with CPD Officers. These public lineups are a unique practice CPD created to give community members a chance to tell officers what they see in their neighborhoods, ask questions, and build rapport and familiarity with one another."If you or your neighbors plan to be outside and would like an officer to drive by your home between 6-8 p.m. on Oct. 6, contact Sgt. Wayne Jefferson by Oct. 1. If you would like to host a Front Porch Lineup on Oct. 6 or any other day of the year, contact the captain of the sector where you reside. That information can be found at http://findyourofficer.chattanooga.gov/."Taking the time to establish relationships with one another can create a friendlier, safer community," officials said.
(Natural News) Twenty-eight people were arrested the other day in Delaware as part of Operation No Mas, a law enforcement operation that successfully seized enough illegal fentanyl to kill 750,000 people, or roughly 75 percent of Delawares total population.

Reports indicate that the FBI and Delaware State Police (DSP) jointly apprehended the suspects, who altogether are being charged with 252 different felonies. These include criminal racketeering, conspiracy, drug dealing and a number of other charges, officials indicated.

Luis Renteria, who owned properties both in Delaware and Pennsylvania, is accused of being the drug trafficking ringleader, with association operations in both California and Florida.

Included in these results was the largest fentanyl seizure by Delaware law enforcement in the states history, making a major dent in the supply of fentanyl that would have been distributed on the streets of Newark and surrounding areas, announced Jennifer Boone, special agent in charge of the FBIs field office in Baltimore.

Alone, the quantity of fentanyl seized could have killed thousands and thousands of people.

Lt. Robert Jones of DSP, who also helped conduct the sting, indicated in a statement that 750,000 lives could have been lost due to all this fentanyl, which is no longer on the streets. Fentanyl, by the way, now surpasses heroin as being the leading cause of overdose deaths in the United States.

Sources of supplies for the Renteria organization were located in numerous states including California, Pennsylvania, and Florida, Jones stated, noting that Renteria now faces up to 30 years in prison if convicted.

George Floyd was unable to breathe due to fentanyl overdose

Delaware Attorney General Kathleen Jennings joined in on the fun with her own announcement suggesting that Operation No Mas is helping to save lives by pulling not just fentanyl but also cocaine, heroin, drug money, and guns from the streets of America.

The actions of these narcotics enterprises have ripples stretching across our region and at times across the nation, she added, making no mention of Big Pharmas deadly narcotics enterprises, which remain fully legal.

Disrupting them helps disrupt a drug trade that I and everyone else here today can attest breeds violence in Delaware and elsewhere.

George Floyd, by the way, had taken fentanyl prior to his arrest, hence why he was unable to breathe long before Derek Chauvin had him pinned on the pavement.

The source of most of the illegal fentanyl that plagues our streets is China, it turns out, which makes the communist regime complicit not just in Floyds death but also the deaths of many others who have overdosed in recent years.

According to a 2018 report put out by the U.S.-China Economic Security Review Commission (USCC), China remains the biggest supplier of fentanyl, with many of the drugs kingpins being Chinese citizens.

In case you are unfamiliar with it, fentanyl is 50 times more powerful than heroin and a full 100 times more potent than morphine. As little as two tiny milligrams is enough to kill a person, and some 31,000 people in the United States are known to have died from the drug.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says that fentanyl is by far the deadliest synthetic opioid on the streets today. It is responsible for most of the overdose deaths that get reported to the agency, which is why law enforcement is ramping up efforts to seize it.

Sadly, if cannabis (marijuana) was fully legal and widely available to all who need it, opioid-related overdoses and deaths of all kinds would plummet, research indicates.

The latest news about deadly drugs like fentanyl can be found at Addiction.news.

Sources for this article include:

TheEpochTimes.com

NaturalNews.com

NaturalNews.com
Bengaluru, Sep 26 : On the last day of the Assembly session on Saturday, the Karnataka Assembly was witness to unruly scenes when the Congress members tore up papers and staged a walkout over the Land Acquisition Bill in the morning and another walkout over the APMC Bill in the evening.

Both bills were taken up for discussion on the last day of the House. The amendments to the Land Reforms Act and APMC were later passed in the house.

Launching a scathing attack on the ruling party, KPCC President D.K. Shivakumar asserted that the Congress party had firmly opposed the proposed amendments and hit out at the ruling BJP saying it wanted to enslave farmers.

"These Bills will sound death knell for farmers. Farmers' lands will be taken away. It is a very bad amendment that they have brought. They have brought amendments to buy lands from the farmers. They want to keep the farmers as slaves, therefore we are opposed to this," he charged prior to the walkout.

Piloting the land eforms Bill, Revenue minister, R. Ashoka said that the Bill would help youngsters who are keen to take up farming as their profession. "The main objective of this Bill is to help our state's people who want to take up farming. Nearly 11 lakh hectres of land is identified as fallow land. If we get proper technology and interested youngsters can cultivate this," he argued.

At this juncture, angry Congress party members tore a copy of the Bill and staged a walkout under the leadership of Siddaramaiah.

While during the discussion on the APMC amendment bill, Leader of the Opposition Siddaramaiah charged that APMC bill was primarily aimed at helping rich corporates rather than farmers, while JD(S) leader, H.D. Kumarswamy alleged that through these Bills the Union government wants to scuttle the federal system in the country. "This (APMC) Bill is a case in point, where the Union government wants to completely dismantle our federal system. Their first onslaught was in the form of implementing the GST," Kumarswamy observed.

Training his guns on the ruling party, Siddaramaiah questioned that at present the APMC markets across the Karnataka earn revenue of Rs 600 crore for the state but by agreeing to bring in this (APMC) Bill, the state will lose this revenue once for all. "How are you going to bring back this revenue? First you want to kill these markets and probably want to sell those properties to private players as well," he alleged.

Joining the debate, independent MLA Sharat Bacche Gowda too endorsed these views and stated the BJP-JDU coalition government in Bihar dismantled the APMCs in their state in 2010 and farmers of that state are still struggling to find proper markets. "In search of proper markets, they are travelling as far as Punjab or Haryana to sell their products. We should stop this," he appealed.

Co-operation minister, S.T. Somashekar asserted that the Bill was not aimed at disbanding existing markets but to create new markets. "Farmers can sell their products wherever they wish. The opposition is misleading the people," he alleged.

Upset over these remarks, both Congress and JD(S) staged a walkout, but the ruling party passed these Bills through voice voting.

Farmer groups have been protesting against amendments to the Land Acquisition Act and the Agricultural Produce Market Committee (APMC) Act proposed by the state government. The groups have also called for a Karnataka bandh on Monday.
PRISTINA -- The deputy head of the Kosovo War Veterans Association, Nasim Haradinaj, has been transferred to a war crimes tribunal in the Netherlands, the Kosovo Specialist Chambers said on September 26.

According to the arrest warrant, Haradinaj is suspected of intimidating witnesses, retaliation, and violating the secrecy of proceedings by releasing confidential information, including the names of witnesses.

The Kosovo Specialist Chambers said Haradinajs initial appearance before a judge in The Hague would be announced in due course.

Haradinaj was arrested on September 25 in the Pristina suburb of Pejton. Moments before the arrest, Haradinaj said to the media that he does not recognize the Specialist Chambers and the Specialist Prosecutor's Office (SPO), according to RFE/RL's Balkan Service.

The SPO said that the European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX) and the Kosovo police provided operational and logistical support in Haradinaj's arrest.

Haradinajs arrest followed that of Kosovo War Veterans Association head Hysni Gucati, who was transferred to The Hague on September 25.

The Kosovo Specialist Chambers at The Hague is mandated to investigate and prosecute suspects in war crimes committed during Kosovo's 1998-99 uprising against rule from Belgrade.

Gucati was taken into custody on an arrest warrant and transfer order issued by a pretrial judge of the Kosovo Specialist Chambers.

Witnesses said Gucati was handcuffed by masked police officers at the association's Pristina office on September 25 and taken away in a EULEX police car.

Gucati was arrested on suspicion of criminal offenses "against the administration of justice, namely for intimidation of witnesses, revenge, and violation of the secrecy of the procedure," the SPO said.

The War Veterans Association represents former fighters from the Kosovo Liberation Army (UCK), the ethnic-Albanian separatist militia group that fought against Belgrade's forces in Kosovo's 1998-1999 war for independence.

Gucati and his aides have published dozens of court documents in recent weeks with the names of suspects, witnesses, and civilians allegedly murdered during the war, which eventually led to Kosovo's independence from Belgrade in 2008.

The War Veterans Association has claimed that they received the documents from an anonymous source.

Tome Gashi, a lawyer for the War Veterans Association, said Gucati was "never interviewed on war-crimes charges and, based on the documents we saw, he may have been arrested on obstruction of justice charges."

Christopher Bennett, spokesman of the prosecutor at The Hague-based tribunal, said earlier this week that releasing the documents would undermine "the proper administration of justice" and would be a criminal act.

The Kosovo Specialist Chambers also said on September 26 that Salih Mustafa, who was arrested by the SPO on September 24, will make an initial court appearance on September 28.
SAO PAULO, Sept 24 (Reuters) - Brazilian development bank BNDES is asking other JBS SA shareholders to support taking legal action against the meatpackers' executives and controlling shareholders for losses they allegedly caused to the company, according to a securities filing by JBS on Wednesday.

BNDES, which holds a 21.32% stake in the meatpacker, required JBS on Sept 21 to call a shareholder meeting to discuss the matter, according to documents filed by JBS.

BNDES said in the letter sent to JBS that it intends to discuss in the meeting plea bargain and leniency deals signed by the company's controlling shareholder J&F Investimentos SA in 2017, in which its founders Joesley and Wesley Batista confessed to running a political bribery ring in Brazil.

The development bank said that the plea bargain deal unveiled wrongdoings that caused losses to JBS. On Sep 6. 2017, JBS said in a securities filing that it was part of the leniency deal signed by J&F.

Now, BNDES said it plans to discuss with JBS's shareholders a potential legal action to urge the meatpacker's executives and controlling shareholders to take responsibility for the losses.

J&F and the Batista brothers did not immediately comment on the matter.

(Reporting by Carolina Mandl Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)
A twin who was told he was infertile after being diagnosed with testicular cancer within just days of his brother is celebrating the birth of his 'miracle' baby.

Sean Collard and his twin Ryan were given the devastating news they both had the same condition in 2017 in a cruel twist of fate that left them both believing they were unable to have children.

The office worker, of Hetton, Tyne and Wear, was told by doctors that he had been left infertile after undergoing vigorous chemotherapy, and had accepted that he may never fulfil his dreams of being a father.

But now the 26-year-old has welcomed his newborn son, Lucas, on September 15, after his partner of five years Sophie Campbell fell unexpectedly pregnant just 14 months after he was given the all clear.

A twin who was told he was infertile after being diagnosed with testicular cancer within just days of his brother is celebrating the birth of his 'miracle' baby. Pictured, Sean Collard with his partner of five years Sophie Campbell and their newborn

Sean Collard and his twin Ryan (pictured left to right) were given the devastating news they both had the same condition in 2017 in a cruel twist of fate that left them both believing they were unable to have children

The office worker (pictured with his newborn), of Hetton, Tyne and Wear, was told by doctors that he had been left infertile after undergoing vigorous chemotherapy, and had accepted that he may never fulfil his dreams of being a father

Sean said: 'Becoming a dad is the best feeling ever. There was a time when I never thought I'd be able to have a family but Lucas is our little miracle.

'Finding out was a huge shock but at the same time it was great news. I was told that my fertility could possibly come back at some point but it was so early that I hadn't yet had the test to determine it.'

The family's nightmare with cancer began in September 2017 when Ryan, a primary school teacher, started experiencing blackouts.

The diagnosis came at such a late stage that he started chemotherapy near his home in London the very next day and didn't have the opportunity to bank any of his sperm.

It was while visiting his brother in hospital in London that Sean started experiencing symptoms himself, and just 20 days later he received the terrible news that he too had cancer.

But now the 26-year-old has welcomed his newborn son, Lucas, on September 15, after his partner of five years Sophie Campbell fell unexpectedly pregnant just 14 months after he was given the all clear. Pictured, Sean visiting Ryan in hospital

Sean (pictured left with Ryan) said: 'Becoming a dad is the best feeling ever. There was a time when I never thought I'd be able to have a family but Lucas is our little miracle'

'It was just an horrendous time for both of us,' said Sean. 'My cancer was caught at an early stage so it looked a lot bleaker for Ryan and he had to have stem cell treatment, but we got through it together.'

Sean was able to bank sperm before starting treatment - but hasn't had to use it and has since offered to be a donor for his twin, though Ryan and his girlfriend Sophie Huggett are currently undecided about their future family plans.

'It is bittersweet because Ryan loves kids and he would love to be a dad himself, but his fertility hasn't returned and we don't know if it ever will,' said Sean.

'Initially once you've had treatment you are infertile and there's a risk that fertility won't come back.

The family's nightmare with cancer began in September 2017 when Ryan, a primary school teacher, started experiencing blackouts. Pictured, Sean with Lucas

The diagnosis came at such a late stage that he started chemotherapy near his home in London the very next day and didn't have the opportunity to bank any of his sperm. Pictured, Sean, Lucas and Sophie

It was while visiting his brother in hospital in London that Sean started experiencing symptoms himself, and just 20 days later he received the terrible news that he too had cancer. Pictured, Sean, Sophie and Lucas

'That was massively scary for me. I've always wanted to have a family and Ryan and I both grew up wanting what our parents had with us.

'Aside from hearing that you can't be cured, being told you can't have kids is one of the biggest worries. I couldn't imagine my life without them.

'I know I had frozen my sperm but you only get two free goes on the NHS and if it hadn't worked it would have been expensive. We had no guarantees we would had been successful.'

Tragically, Sophie, 25, who is unemployed, experienced a miscarriage in 2019, and the couple feared that damaged sperm could have been the cause.

WHAT ARE THE SIGNS OF TESTICULAR CANCER? During the early stages, testicular cancer typically presents as a hard lump or swelling in a testis. The lump is usually painless and can vary considerably in size but is typically the size of a pea and located on the front or side of the testicle. Not all individuals with testicular cancer will present with a lump in their testicles. Any enlargement or change in the way the testicle looks or feels

A sensation of heaviness in the scrotum

A dull ache in the testicle, lower abdomen (stomach) or groin region

A collection of fluid in the scrotum. Symptoms can be subtle and therefore easily missed which is why it is so important to familiarise yourself with how your testicles feel when they are healthy. If the cancer is not detected early, it may spread to other parts of the body and you may develop symptoms in parts of the body other than the affected testicle. These include: Back pain

Shortness of breath

A decreased libido

Fatigue

A cough

Swelling and tenderness in the chest However the good news is testicular cancer is very treatable, with around a 95 per cent cure rate. Source: The Josh Carrick Foundation Advertisement

Sean (left) was able to bank sperm before starting treatment - but hasn't had to use it and has since offered to be a donor for his twin, though Ryan (right) and his girlfriend Sophie Huggett are currently undecided about their future family plans

'It is bittersweet because Ryan loves kids and he would love to be a dad himself, but his fertility hasn't returned and we don't know if it ever will,' said Sean. Pictured, Ryan in hospital

'Luckily we didn't have to go down the road of IVF because we conceived again naturally, but I'd have done whatever it takes,' Sean added.

Lucas arrived weighing a healthy 7lb 5oz on September 15, though it wasn't until a day later that Sean was finally allowed to meet his son because of coronavirus restrictions in Sunderland Royal Hospital.

'It was overwhelming to hold him,' said Sean. 'He was absolutely perfect and I'm still on a high. It's just an incredible feeling. I want to start trying for more straight away, though I don't know what Sophie would have to say about that.'

In 2019 Sean and Ryan set up a charity called Cancer Lads to raise awareness of testicular cancer and encourage men to check for symptoms.

Tragically, Sophie, 25, who is unemployed, experienced a miscarriage in 2019, and the couple feared that damaged sperm could have been the cause. Sean pictured with Ryan, right

'Luckily we didn't have to go down the road of IVF because we conceived again naturally, but I'd have done whatever it takes,' Sean (pictured with his mother and brother) added

In 2019 Sean and Ryan (pictured together) set up a charity called Cancer Lads to raise awareness of testicular cancer and encourage men to check for symptoms

And it's something that Sean is painfully aware of after having a son himself.

He said: 'It's been fantastic for us to have a little boy but I'm always going to worry, especially with Ryan and me both getting it, it's obviously a strong gene.

'It's something I'll speak to the specialists about and when Lucas is older we'll have that conversation.'

Now Sean is looking forward to Ryan being able to visit baby Lucas once coronavirus restrictions are relaxed.

'Ryan is going to be the best uncle ever,' he said. 'Seeing them together is going to be incredible.'
There's barely a week until Kyrgyzstan conducts parliamentary elections, and although campaigning only officially started on September 4, there has been plenty of intrigue and scandal, in addition to some encouraging developments.



By The Numbers



The Central Election Commission released some interesting figures about the electorate on September 24.



There are 3,523,532 eligible voters in a population of around 6.3 million. That's an increase of 762,235 people, or nearly 28 percent, on the 2.76 million who were eligible in 2015.



Kaktus.media reported that the over-18 portion of the population has grown by just 9 percent since 2015.



The use of something called "Form No. 2" has been a source of controversy since before campaigning started. First used in 2011, it is a document to facilitate voting particularly among internal migrants by allowing them to vote in whichever polling district is most convenient, so long as they register there in advance.



There have been numerous accusations that parties and individual candidates are paying people to register and vote in specific districts.

There are some 482,000 Form No. 2 voters registered for the October 4 elections, 32,000 of whom are Kyrgyz nationals casting ballots outside the country.



That leaves 450,000 inside the country who are not voting in their district of residency.



Election commission head Nurjan Shayldabekova said around 10 percent of voters used Form No. 2 in the 2015 parliamentary elections. She did not explain how that figure climbed to nearly 13 percent for these elections.



Eighty-five of the 120 deputies in the current parliament are seeking reelection.



The two largest parties in parliament -- the Social Democratic Party of Kyrgyzstan and Respublika-Ata-Jurt -- have splintered, and the Onuguu-Progress party, which had the fourth-highest number of seats in parliament is not participating in these elections. So most of those 85 lawmakers are now spread out among 16 parties taking part in the October 4 vote.

There are some 1,900 candidates on party lists, but the actual figure has decreased as some chose to pull out and a few others were disqualified.



The Political Fight



The election commission disqualified two candidates on September 24 for their roles in a large brawl between supporters of two different political parties.



Shukurullo Fayzullaev of the Birimdik party and Ilhom Mananov of the Mekenim Kyrgyzstan party were both barred from further participation in connection with a fight that erupted in the Aravan district of the southern Osh Province during a campaign event organized by Mekenim Kyrgyzstan on September 20.



Birimdik and Mekenim Kyrgyzstan are both seen as pro-government parties. The fight allegedly started when a member of Mekenim Kyrgyzstan made disparaging comments about a Birimdik candidate.



Twelve people were hospitalized. So far, four people have been detained.

"We should first think about the safety of citizens," election commission member Tynchtyk Shaynazarov said after the disqualifications were announced. "It's a good thing no one was killed. Imagine what a disgrace it would be in front of the entire world if in Kyrgyzstan people killed each other over 100 votes."



There was another incident in the village of Alysh, in Naryn Province, on September 21 when 25-year-old Altynbek Asekov, a campaigner for the Respublika party, was reportedly attacked by members of the Mekenim Kyrgyzstan party.



Tynchtykbek Altymyshev, a candidate from the Respublika party, posted a photo on his Facebook page of Asekov after the incident.

There are several versions of what led to the beating, and police have charged Mekenim Kyrgyzstan supporters with hooliganism.



On September 21, a Mekenim Kyrgyzstan candidate, a former speaker of parliament who was subsequently convicted of abuse of office, was meeting with voters in the Alai district of Osh Province when someone in the crowd asked Akhmatbek Keldibekov what he had done that would qualify him to be a deputy.

The conversation reportedly became testy when the topic of the Ata-Meken party and its leader, Omurbek Tekebaev, who was a key figure in orchestrating Keldibekov's removal as speaker of parliament in 2011, came up.



"Don't get carried away, boy, don't make me mad," Keldibekov warned, adding, "I've beaten the crap out of people like you."



Mekenim Kyrgyzstan is likely to win seats in parliament, but it's anyone's guess as to what sort of coalition they might join.



Where Did Aybek Osmonov Go?



Aybek Osmonov and his brother Nurbek were cofounders of the Mekenim Kyrgyzstan party, but Aybek left the party and formed the Yyman Nuru (Ray of Faith) party in anticipation of these elections.



But by August 14, the party had said it was under pressure. It didn't identify the source of that pressure, and Yyman member Nuru Mikhail Khalitov said at the time that any members "who have something to lose...can leave the party."

Aybek Osmonov was first to go on August 18, without citing a reason.



On September 6, a fire broke out at the Kyrgyztekstil textile plant in Osh, burning it to the ground. The plant belonged to Kaganat Invest, which is owned by Nurbek Osmonov.



On September 23, there were reports that Aybek had fled Kyrgyzstan amid purported pressure from the Matraimov family.



Raimbek Matraimov is a former deputy chief of Kyrgyzstan's Customs Service who featured prominently in a detailed report from the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), Kyrgyzstan's independent news outlet Kloop.kg, and RFE/RL's Kyrgyz Service, known locally as Azattyk.

He is also widely rumored to be a supporter of the Mekenim Kyrgyzstan party, for whom his brother Iskender is a candidate.



Later on September 23, Aybek Osmonov posted on Facebook that he was in Bishkek and included a video of himself in the city center. He said he had briefly left Kyrgyzstan but never had any intention of leaving the country permanently.
Tory rebels have won a vote on the 'rule of six' after 40 MPs wrote to Boris Johnson as PM signals climbdown in row over imposing Covid restrictions without Parliament's consent.

The backbenchers yesterday urged Mr Johnson to be 'smart' and give into their demands for a vote on new lockdown rules as he was told 'controlling the lives of 65million people by fiat is not sustainable'.

The vote is scheduled for October 6 and if it fails to pass Parliament the rule will be abolished.

Sir Graham Brady, the chairman of the 1922 Committee of Conservative backbenchers, had tabled an amendment which would require a vote to be held on any new restrictions 'as soon as reasonably practicable'.

Sir Graham has the public backing of at least 40 of his fellow Tory MPs with the rebels hoping the amendment will be put to a vote next Wednesday.

However, they are urging the Government to back down before that point and to accept that MPs should be given a say on whether new rules should be imposed.

Boris Johnson is under mounting pressure from Tory MPs to grant Parliament a vote on any new lockdown measures

Mischievous Tory MPs are said to have nicknamed Professor Chris Whitty and Sir Patrick Vallance 'Witless and Unbalanced' after they suggested the UK could face 50,000 daily coronavirus cases by mid-October

It comes amid growing Tory anger at Professor Chris Whitty and Sir Patrick Vallance after the Government's two top scientists set out a doomsday scenario at the start of the week of the UK facing 50,000 new daily cases of coronavirus by mid-October unless drastic action was taken.

National debt hit ANOTHER record high of more than 2 TRILLION at the end of August National debt hit another record high at the end of August as it continued to climb above 2 trillion as Tory MPs demanded the Government set out how the UK will pay for the coronavirus crisis after Rishi Sunak's latest business bailout. The Chancellor yesterday unveiled his Winter Economy Plan which included a wage subsidy Jobs Support Scheme to replace furlough as well as further VAT cuts for the hospitality and retail sectors and the extension of emergency loan schemes. The Office for National Statistics yesterday revealed public sector debt continues to rise above 2 trillion Economists estimated the giveaway could cost 5 billion, potentially taking the total cost of the Government's Covid-19 support to approximately 200 billion. Mr Sunak hinted that tax rises will eventually be required to get the public finances back on an even keel as he said he will have to make 'difficult decisions' in the future. But Conservative backbenchers want ministers to urgently set out their plan for paying the money back as they warned the Government it cannot 'keep kicking it into the long grass'. The scale of the Government's coronavirus spending was illustrated in stark terms this morning after the Office for National Statistics said the UK's national debt had hit a record 2.024 trillion at the end of August. That figure is almost 250 billion more than it was at the same time last year as borrowing hit 101.9 per cent of gross domestic product after 36 billion was borrowed by the public sector in August alone. Advertisement

The Telegraph reported some Tory MPs have nicknamed the Chief Medical Officer and Chief Scientific Adviser 'Witless and Unbalanced', accusing them of 'scaremongering'.

Meanwhile, ministers have been forced to deny claims of a rift between Mr Johnson and Rishi Sunak after the Chancellor said yesterday it was time to 'live without fear' in comments which appeared to contradict the PM's new coronavirus crackdown.

There is increasing concern among Tory MPs about the way in which the Government is handling the coronavirus crisis.

Sir Graham has previously accused Mr Johnson of 'ruling by decree' by imposing restrictions on daily life without asking Parliament for permission.

His amendment is designed to grant MPs a vote on any new measures and with more than 40 Tories publicly backing the move and more expected to break ranks in the coming days the Government could be in danger of having its working majority of 85 overturned.

The rebels want the plans to be voted on next Wednesday when the Government asks Parliament to renew its coronavirus powers for another six months.

However, there are major questions over whether Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle will select the amendment amid claims it would not be legally binding on ministers.

Pressure is mounting on the Government to give in on the issue before a potentially damaging vote could be held.

Signatories to Sir Graham's plans include Tory former leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith and former Brexit secretary David Davis. Opposition MPs have also signalled their support for the move.

Mr Davis told The Telegraph: 'The smart sense is for the Government to give Brady and all of us what we are after.

'It is a very unwise Conservative government that lets rebellion led by any chairman of the 1922 Committee go the distance.'

Sir Graham said he hoped the level of support for his plans will persuade Sir Lindsay to allow a vote on the amendment to take place.

Senior Conservative MP Tom Tugendhat, the chairman of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee, yesterday urged the Government to 'enter this conversation' on the plans in order to avoid a rebellion.

He told the BBC's Radio 4 Today programme: 'You can give various blanket permissions in emergency ways but that doesn't mean you don't have to come and ask for permission as soon as is practical.

'The Government needs to enter this conversation and let's see where this conversation goes because what we've seen in the last six months, when we voted in the Coronavirus Act about six months ago, nobody expected it to last this long.

'It's quite clear that there's at least another six months of it as the Government has announced and it may indeed be longer than that depending on whether a vaccine comes or not, so the idea that we can have a permanent state where the Government is making emergency decisions for people and effectively controlling the lives of 65 million people by fiat is not sustainable.'

Senior Tory Tom Tugendhat said 'making emergency decisions for people and effectively controlling the lives of 65 million people by fiat is not sustainable'

A Number 10 spokesman said: 'We understand MPs and their constituents will be concerned about coronavirus, that is why we continue to work closely with MPs to ensure they are able to hold the Government to account.'

The row between Tory MPs and Number 10 came as ministers were forced to deny claims of a rift between Mr Sunak and Mr Johnson.

Some interpreted Mr Sunak's statement yesterday that the nation must learn to 'live without fear' as contradicting the Prime Minister's move to impose new restrictions to slow the spread of Covid-19.

The Chancellor's remark that 'our lives can no longer be put on hold' as he detailed his latest emergency jobs package was also welcomed by Tory backbenchers uneasy over fresh restrictions.

But Chief Secretary to the Treasury Steve Barclay told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: 'The Prime Minister and the Chancellor are working extremely closely together and I think you can see that in the dovetailing of measures.'

He said there is a need to work 'in tandem between both the health measures announced by the Prime Minister and those of the Chancellor'.
On Thursday evening, Spains Socialist Party (PSOE)-Podemos coalition government sent police to brutally assault demonstrators in Madrid protesting its herd immunity policy. As protests spread across Greece and the PSOE-Podemos government threatens to deploy 7,500 troops to Madrid amid a Europe-wide resurgence of COVID-19, this crackdown is a threat aimed at the entire working class.

On Thursday evening, a protest of around 300 demonstrators gathered at a health care centre in the working class neighborhood of Vallecas. They were protesting a restriction of mobility and reduction of activity order designed by the right-wing Madrid regional government of Isabel Ayuso and the national PSOE-Podemos government. The order affects 37 Madrid districts housing 850,000 people, most of them working class neighborhoods worst-hit by the virus.

The demonstration was one of the dozens organised over the last week, some gathering thousands, amid mounting social anger against the herd immunity policies of the Spanish ruling class, which have led to the deaths of nearly 50,000 people and over 700,000 infections.

The Madrid restriction order has nothing to do with a health care policy aimed to stop the spread of the virus by ensuring social distancing and letting non-essential workers shelter at home. It requires residents to continue to report to work or school, though 90 percent have a daily commute taking them outside the targeted districts. It has legitimately provoked widespread anger at an order that will not halt the spread of COVID-19 but imposes restrictions exclusively targeting working class areas, whereas in fact a nationwide shelter-at-home order is necessary.

Podemos officials in Madrid have cynically postured as sympathetic to this social anger. Podemos Madrid region spokesperson Isabel Serra joined the small protest Thursday.

When 50 young protesters left and marched towards the regional parliament, however, they were suddenly confronted by 30 national police vans from the anti-riot squad. The policewhich just months ago allowed far-right protesters to march in the affluent neighborhoods to protest during the strict lockdownviolently dispersed the protest, leaving six injured and arresting three.

One 18-year-old protester told El Salto: We werent doing anything, we were just shouting, werent the protesters in [the wealthy neighborhood of] Salamanca shouting? But they came and started beating us with their truncheons. They have opened my friends head, they have split my ear.

All those arrested are less than 20 years old. A fourth, age 17, was beaten and arrested outside the police station when he inquired about his arrested friends.

This brutal crackdown exposes the cynicism of Podemos, whose officials postured as sympathetic to the protests only to launch a brutal police assault on them shortly afterwards. In fact, Podemos had signaled that it was preparing such a crackdown the day before.

Over the last week, small-scale protests had begun breaking out, with calls of Ayuso resign! and This is not confinement, this is segregation. These protests were backed, and at times called, by organizations heavily influenced by Podemos, like the Madrid Regional Federation of Neighbourhood Associations (Federacion Regional de Asociaciones Vecinales de Madrid, FRAVM).

On Wednesday, however, Podemos, its split-off Mas Madrid, and Spains largest trade unions, CCOO and UGT, decided to call off a demonstration Sunday expected to receive wide support.

In a joint statement they suddenly declared that the epidemiological situation makes it difficult to carry out mass demonstrations. They proposed symbolic, decentralized actions in different areas of Madrid instead. A Podemos faction dissatisfied with the decision, Izquierda Revolucionaria (Revolutionary Left), reported that Podemos sent a message to different organisations and social movements proposing protests reduced to 50 people in six parts of the city, to which they would give no publicity, according to this message.

The next day, Defence Minister Margarita Robles announced that the PSOE-Podemos government is preparing to send 7,500 troops from the Military Emergency Unit, the Parachute Brigade, the El Goloso military base, the Air Force and the military health unit to Madrid. The regional Madrid government had only requested the support of 130 soldiers to assist in contact tracing. However, Robles said, The Armed Forces are ready in 24 hours to do whatever it takes . whatever Madrid Region asks us, if we can do it, we will do it.

Hours after Robles announcement, the PSOE and Podemos threw police against the protesters.

This is a warning to workers and youth in Spain and internationally, about the middle-class populist organizations that the ruling elite has for decades built up as the left. Rooted in affluent layers of academia and the union bureaucracy and theoretically grounded in postmodernism, they are indifferent to and contemptuous of the democratic rights and even the lives of working people.

Predictably, Anticapitalistas, a petty-bourgeois tendency that helped found Podemos but left the PSOE-Podemos government in May this year, is sowing illusions in Podemos. Even as the left populist party mobilizes the army to force workers to continue working through the pandemic, it issues appeals designed to provoke expectations that Podemos will suddenly turn to the left.

Advising the government, Anticapitalistas calls on Podemos to avoid provoking a political break by sections of workers to the left of Podemos. Podemos, they say, should take good note: if they do not break with the PSOE after today's police assault, they will have crossed a red line that much of their social base will find difficult to understand. We directly urge Podemos  to publicly condemn the assault (including Podemos ministers within the Council of Ministers), to resume Sundays call and provide resources so the people below can express themselves.

Their statement makes no reference to the EUs criminal herd immunity policy, the danger of military dictatorship, or the austerity measures being prepared by the government. According to El Pais , which saw the latest draft rules for Spain to receive 60 billion in pledged EU bailout funding, the EU is demanding labour and pension reform, tax increases and cuts to unemployment benefits. The PSOE and Podemos are already actively working on these.

Instead, Anticapitalistas proposes that civil society organisations call for a general strike, limited to Madrid, to force Ayuso to resign. This means installing a regional government in which Podemos members like themselves would have a better chance of obtaining posts.

Events are confirming the warnings made by the WSWS about Podemos. Five years ago, as Podemos supported the EU austerity policies of its Greek ally, Syriza, the WSWS wrote: Looking out at the population from the Moncloa Palace through multiple lines of riot police, a Prime Minister Iglesias would be as terrified of the workers as Tsipras or Spains current prime minister, Mariano Rajoy.

The WSWS also warned in June, as Anticapitalistas left the PSOE-Podemos government, that this group was being sent out of Podemos to serve as a paid agent of the Spanish capitalist state, intervening on social media and in protests and strikes hostile to Podemos to spy on and strangle them. These warnings have been vindicated.

What is emerging is an explosive confrontation between the working class and all factions of the bourgeoisie.

Workers in Spain and internationally face the task of making a complete political break with left populist parties like Podemos. This means building workplace safety committees independent of the unions and a revolutionary, Marxist and internationalist, that is, Trotskyist, alternative to the left populistssections of the International Committee of the Fourth International in Spain and around the world. Only such organisations can lead a scientifically-grounded fight against the virus, by general strike action to bring down these governments and transfer power to the working class.
Around the world, the Communist rulers of China are planting flags with the speed of a Victorian adventurer claiming lands and seas that others once thought their own or neutral.

Using debt instead of gunboats, the Chinese are tying new nations into their own imperial order.

It looks like Barbados may be the latest trophy in Beijings imperial string of pearls.

Last week, the island announced that, after nearly 400 years, the monarchs of Great Britain would no longer rule over them. Not that this Queen ever really did.

Chinese President Xi Jinping with the Duchess of Cambridge and Queen Elizabeth II at a state banquet at Buckingham Palace, London, during the first day of his state visit to the UK in 2015

As a constitutional monarch, Queen Elizabeth has never exercised any power over the 300,000 inhabitants.

Barbados is, and has been for decades, an independent constitutional realm and a democracy in the Commonwealth.

So why the change? What has triggered the Barbadians to find a new head of state and end the symbolic rule of the worlds most respected head of state?

If theres one thing we know for certain, its nothing the Queen said or did that triggered the change. In fact, its nothing the British Government did either.

The move were seeing has everything to do with a new scramble for power. The Great Game has given way to the Great Gamble as countries are taking loans from Chinese state banks and betting they can pay them back before the default clauses come due.

The Queen and Prince Philip bid farewell to Chinese President Xi Jinping and his wife Peng Liyuan at Buckingham Palace in 2015

Ports, stadia, roads and railways are being built on the never-never with the firm expectation that the loan will never be called in.

But like the Pied Piper, the lure of free money is masking a hidden agenda  this isnt about development, its about domination.

Around the world, were beginning to see the real cost of cheap loans. Its true the Sri Lankan government werent asked to abide by any good governance principles when they signed for the loans that built the port at Hambantota, as more principled lenders might have demanded. But that didnt mean the money came without strings attached.

Unlike a World Bank loan, or UK development aid, there was no renegotiation when they defaulted. It triggered immediate repossession. China secured a 99-year lease on a major Indian Ocean harbour.

The same has happened in countries around the world as debt is cheaper than gunpowder  a Chinese invention, of course  and much more effective. Chinese bankers and their cheap cash loans are doing the work once carried out by Royal Navy officers and company men on sloops and frigates sailing out of London and Amsterdam.

Queen Elizabeth ll inspects a guard of honour as she arrives in Barbados on October 31, 1977

Theres no shortage of flattery, of course. Last year, Prime Minister Andrew Holness of Jamaica signed up to Beijings Belt and Road Initiative  a series of vast infrastructure projects financed with Chinese cash  and was given the all-star treatment at the Shanghai trade forum.

A few years earlier, it had been Freundel Stuarts turn. Barbadoss then prime minister signed up to the scheme, known as the new silk road, and even discussed co-operation with the Peoples Liberation Army.

China is attempting what the Soviets failed to achieve with guerrillas and revolutionaries. Theyre trying to rewrite the global operating system. And theyre succeeding. International co-operation from trade to technology doesnt just happen, its organised.

Groups with dreary names meet in dull rooms to discuss regulations for everything from the wavelengths of radio communications to the naming of websites. Its not exciting but it matters.

Until now, this has been based on principles that we wrote. British lawyers, insurers and bankers were the inky lifeblood of the empire and the rules they scribbled underwrote global trade.

Chinese President Xi Jinping with the Duchess of Cambridge at a state banquet at Buckingham Palace, London

Their principles of individual rights, privacy, and the rule of law they encoded into our way of life still dictate the way we work. Chinas Communist rulers have taken against such principles, and the international rules-based order they make possible.

Beijings new colonists have no time for independent actors on the world stage, seeing central control as the key to success. And thats a challenge to us all. Because its not just those who have agreed to bow to the new Emperor who will live with the change.

We are all under the shadow of a new throne. China is looking to replicate its own repressive system of internal command and control on a global scale. Just as their 34 provinces (35 with Taiwan) must obey the rules of the General Secretary of the Communist Party, so the new colonial outposts must vote as directed too.

In just a few years, China has gone from leading one UN agency to four  and their decisions are being felt.

Take the case of one of them, the 155-year-old International Telecommunication Union.

This recently discussed moving away from the Western distributed network model for the internet, over which the state has little power, to one based around capital cities around the world  reflecting the authoritarian outlook of its Chinese Secretary-General Houlin Zhao.

India is in no doubt what all this really means  Chinese princes are threatening their borders once again. And we should wake up, too. So, what should we do about it? How do we avoid another imperial clash or  worse  conquest?

We can learn from our past. Just as we built the biggest empire the world has ever known, we dismantled it too.

We know that the principles we encoded into the post-war treaties and institutions have helped nations to succeed and determine their own futures.

They prevented Soviet expansion and helped bring about the longest period of peaceful global growth in history. We can do that again.

We need to bring people together under the rule of law and the principles of individuality, sovereignty and freedom.

And if were going to disentangle Chinas debt traps, well need generous support for real projects, and well have to stop corrupt profits  and those who control them  from hiding in British jurisdiction.

Foreign policy, from the Indian Ocean to the Caribbean is not just about foreigners. Its also about us and protecting our values and interests. Its also about remembering what matters and letting our friends know we care.

Today, in Bridgetown, Barbados we should remind our Caribbean cousins that a constitutional monarch, particularly under our peerless Queen, is the best defence against tyrants that we know.

Boris warns of Chinese chokehold: PM launches new drive against Beijing's 'expansionism' among poorer countries after China 'placed pressure on Barbados to remove the Queen as its head of state

By GLEN OWEN FOR THE MAIL ON SUNDAY

Boris Johnson has ordered diplomats to launch a new drive against Chinese expansionism after Beijing was accused of placing pressure on Barbados to remove the Queen as its head of state.

The island is one of dozens of countries which form part of Chinas Belt and Road Initiative, under which Beijing lends money to poorer countries to help them to fund critical infrastructure projects such as ports and high speed rail lines.

With China able to seize control of the finished project if the countries default  and frequently demanding preferential terms in trade deals as a condition of the loans  it has led to what one No 10 source described as a Chinese chokehold over much of the developing world.

Mr Johnson, who fears that the economic damage caused by Covid-19 will make countries even more vulnerable to domination, is to demand that China is more transparent about its financial dealings with other countries.

Boris Johnson has ordered diplomats to launch a new drive against Chinese expansionism after Beijing was accused of placing pressure on Barbados to remove the Queen as its head of state. Pictured: Chinese President Xi Jinping with Queen Elizabeth II at a state banquet at Buckingham Palace, London, during his state visit to the UK in 2015

Barbados, which gained independence in 1966, announced last week that it would become a republic in 2021: Governor-General Dame Sandra Mason said that the time has come to fully leave our colonial past behindBarbadians want a Barbadian Head of State.

US intelligence, which has been shared with the UK, has indicated that pressure was brought to bear on Barbados by its Chinese paymasters to cut their colonial ties.

Tom Tugendhat, Tory chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, says that the incident showed how the Chinese are tying new nations into their own imperial order by deploying debt diplomacy.

Writing in todays Mail on Sunday, he says: Barbados may be the latest trophy in Beijings imperial string of pearlsthe Great Game has given way to the Great Gamble as countries are taking loans from Chinese state banks and betting they can pay them back before the default clauses come due.

A No 10 source has described China's 'Belt and Road' initiative as a 'chokehold' on the developing world

He adds: We should remind our Caribbean cousins that a constitutional monarch, particularly under our peerless Queen, is the best defence against tyrants.

Figures seen by the MoS have revealed for the first time the true scale of Chinas reach over poorer countries, with money owed to China accounting for nearly one third of some countries GDP.

Pakistan is top of the list of recipients, with Islamabad owing China a total of 27 billion. The most leveraged country is Cambodia: the 5 billion it owes accounts for 29.5 per cent of GDP.

Other major recipients include Laos, with 26.1 per cent of GDP, Zambia with 23.4 per cent, Ethiopia with 17.7 per cent, and Belarus with 13 per cent.

Mr Johnsons new drive marks a sharp change of policy from previous Tory Governments: Theresa Mays Chancellor, Philip Hammond, pushed for Britain to fully endorse Chinas global investment drive.

A No 10 source said: As coronavirus devastates developing countries, many are finding themselves in a Chinese chokehold as a result of the huge debts they owe'

Mr Hammond complained recently about an outbreak of anti-Chinese sentiment in the party after Tory MPs objected to technology firm Huawei being given a key role in building the UKs 5G network.

And in 2017, the year after leaving Downing Street, David Cameron announced that he was helping to set up a $1 billion UK-China Fund to seek opportunities for co-operation between the two countries in technology.

A No 10 source said: As coronavirus devastates developing countries, many are finding themselves in a Chinese chokehold as a result of the huge debts they owe.

The Belt and Road Initiative is an expansionist Chinese Marshall Plan  for instance Beijing is funding a high speed rail line in Laos which is costing the equivalent of more than a quarter of the countrys GDP.

'China is doing this in the least transparent way  providing high-interest and unsustainable loans collateralised against countries natural resources. They are in danger of being forced to sell out future generations to meet their present debts.

The source added: As a member of both the UN Security Council and G20, China needs to step up to its obligations and end its chronic lack of transparency.

Charlie Robertson, the author of The Fastest Billion: The Story Behind Africas Economic Revolution and an expert on Chinese debt diplomacy, said: China is doing what Britain did in the Victorian era  exporting its savings to other countries as an exercise in global domination.

It has inevitably led to conspiracy theories about China hoping that the countries will default so they can seize critical infrastructure.
The 10pm curfew seems ridiculous  it's not as if the virus has a watch and only transmits at certain times, is it?

A new 10pm curfew for pubs, bars and restaurants was introduced last week in England, Wales and Scotland as part of a package of new Covid-19 regulations.

The hope is that the measure will help reduce social contact between people and slow the spread of the virus.

But as pictures have surfaced of large groups spilling out on to streets at 10pm  and crowding on to public transport  experts have questioned the logic.

Some have rightly pointed out that the virus can spread at any time, day or night. Others have warned that drinkers will go out earlier, or head back to friends' houses after closing time, where they are less likely to abide by social distancing.

A new 10pm curfew for pubs, bars and restaurants was introduced last week in England, Wales and Scotland as part of a package of new Covid-19 regulations

Dr Stephen Griffin, associate professor in the school of medicine at the University of Leeds, is not convinced the curfew will be effective.

He said: 'It runs the risk of compressing activity and having people leave at a single time in large numbers.'

Dr Jennifer Cole, biological anthropologist at Royal Holloway, University of London, is more hopeful.

'The more drunk you are, the less inhibited and less risk-averse you are,' she says.

'Closing the bars and restaurants at 10pm simply keeps people more sober.

'It gives them plenty of time for a meal, or a quick drink with friends after work, but means they are likely to be sober enough to remember to put on a face covering on the train or bus home, and to be careful around elderly relatives when they get home'.

Did the local lockdowns work? The new national measures seem to mimic those in areas with fast-rising cases like the North West.

Although the UK avoided a national lockdown in the summer, smaller areas have been subject to stricter rules.

Data from Leicester and Greater Manchester  where local rules were imposed  give some idea of whether these restrictions worked.

From the end of June, Leicester residents from more than one household could not gather indoors, and shops, pubs and restaurants remained closed. Cases fell between June and July from 140 per 100,000 people to just 50  and continued to fall even as pubs, restaurants, gyms and beauticians were gradually reopened throughout August.

However, they have risen again in recent weeks, in line with the rest of the country.

In Oldham, Greater Manchester, cases initially dropped from about 100 per 100,000 to 60. But they have also since risen again.

Experts say it is too early to tell if the curfews applied almost two weeks ago to parts of the North East have had an effect on the number of cases and spread of infection.

Overall, it seems that local lockdowns did help slow the rate of infection.

Paul Hunter, professor of medicine at the University of East Anglia, says: 'The problem is you can never really be 100 per cent sure that something you have introduced has slowed cases, or caused a decline.

'But I think without doing anything, cases in Oldham would have accelerated more rapidly.'

He added that problems with the NHS test and trace service could have limited the effectiveness of the measures.

Paul Hunter, professor of medicine at the University of East Anglia, says: 'The problem is you can never really be 100 per cent sure that something you have introduced has slowed cases, or caused a decline'

Why are our borders still open?

At this stage of the pandemic, closing borders would have only a limited impact on the UK's case numbers.

In February and March, there was significant debate about whether to halt international travel, and evidence has since suggested that the majority of UK cases were brought in from Europe  mainly Spain and France.

Perhaps then, before cases were widespread, closing the borders could have changed the course of the pandemic.

But the UK is in a very different position now, with the virus well-established across the country.

'If we banned international travel today, it probably wouldn't have any dramatic discernible effect,' says Professor Hunter. 'Yes, it would stop new cases coming into the country. But cases are accelerating anyway.

'Once you have got a disease circulating in a country, banning international travel basically doesn't do much.'

So, is this the second wave of Covid-19 or not?

There's no doubt that the UK is seeing a steep rise in the number of people testing positive for Covid-19.

In recent weeks, the numbers have started to climb rapidly. The fear  as outlined in a public broadcast last week by Sir Patrick Vallance, the Government's Chief Scientific Adviser, and Professor Chris Whitty, Chief Medical Officer for England  is that these cases will grow uncontrollably. This is likely to have an effect on hospital admissions, which are already starting to creep up, and deaths. The number of Britons in hospital with the virus has risen by more than 50 per cent since last week.

In their address, Sir Patrick and Prof Whitty warned that the number of people infected could double every seven days, leading to as many as 50,000 cases per day by mid-October. But some experts say this prediction is implausibly quick.

In the meantime, Imperial College London data suggests a doubling of infections every seven to eight days. This was based on 136 positive tests from 150,000 swabs between August 22 and September 7.

Critics say this is too low a number of positive tests to reliably compute trends  and that it may not reflect the current picture.

'Some people say it's not a second wave, because actually, the first wave never went away,' says Paul Hunter, professor of medicine at the University of East Anglia. 'The fact is, we are seeing a major resurgence of the infection, and whether it's part of the first wave or second  those are purely words.'

It's important to remember, though, that we are not in the same place as we were in the spring. At the peak of the pandemic, the Government reported there were more than 6,000 daily infections, but the true number is estimated to have been much higher.

Experts at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine say it may even have topped 100,000 in March. Back then, only some people with symptoms  mainly those in hospitals  were being tested.

So while the two 'waves' may appear alarmingly similar on a graph, it's not accurate to compare them at all. The rise in cases now is an early warning  one which we did not have the benefit of at the start of the year  that the virus is spreading. And it gives the Government, and population, time to act.

Prof Hunter says new measures introduced last week should help slow the rise in infections, and stop cases rising so steeply. But he adds: 'I personally doubt that they will, by themselves, reverse the epidemic this side of Christmas.'

Cases of Covid have risen steeply in France and Spain but Italy, pictured, which was hit harder than most European countries in March, appears to have things under control

France and Spain are seeing a second wave  why isn't Italy too?

Cases of Covid-19 have risen steeply in France and Spain, with both reporting more than 10,000 new infections a day. Meanwhile Italy, which was hit harder than most European countries in March, appears to have things under control.

While the number of infections there has been creeping up, levels have remained fairly consistent over the past month, and not topped 2,000. It is faring better than the UK too.

Last week, Boris Johnson suggested the difference was because Britain was 'a freedom-loving country'. But Italy's President Sergio Mattarella hit back, saying Italians 'love freedom, but we also care about seriousness'.

Exactly why France, Spain and the UK are faring so differently to Italy is not clear. But experts say it could be that Italian rules on mask-wearing in public are strictly adhered to and enforced by police and officials.

The country is also offering rapid Covid-19 tests at some airports. And although they are less accurate than the one used in the UK, they can provide a result in 30 minutes.

Italy's test and trace system is also thought to be working well. However, it is too soon to suggest that the country will escape unscathed this time.

Has the virus mutated, making it more  or less  dangerous now?

Every time a virus infects a person, it makes new copies of itself to attack other cells, and during this process mistakes can be made that result in changes.

In fact, most of the time, mutations don't make much difference to how the virus behaves. Sir Patrick said the virus that causes Covid-19 had 'genetically moved a bit' but stressed this had not changed its ability to infect people or cause disease and death.
The Daily Beast

Moab PoliceBrian Laundrie scrawled messages in a notebook admitting that he killed his girlfriend Gabby Petito, the FBI said in a statement Friday as they announced that their investigation into the couples deaths was now closed. The notebook was found alongside Laundries remains in a wooded area in Florida in October, weeks after police say he killed Petito while they were traveling the country in a van.The FBIs primary focus throughout the investigation was to bring justice to Gabby and he
Three men have been arrested on charges of abducting a 35-year-old man, beating him to death, and throwing his body in a canal in Haryana allegedly over 4,000 that he owed one his killers, police said Saturday.

The arrested were identified as prime accused Valik Kumar alias Bhanu,31, Pintu Kumar,27, and Anil Kumar alias Annu,26. They were arrested by a crime branch team from Bawana area Friday, said deputy commissioner of police (crime) Monika Bhardwaj. A Santro car that the three had used in the crime was also recovered, the DCP said.

The man, identified by his first name as Irshad, was missing since September 2 after he left his home in outer Delhis Narela with Bhanu, the prime accused.

Police said on September 11, Irshads wife filed a missing person complaint at the Narela Industrial Area police station and alleged that he was last seen on September 2 with Bhanu. A kidnapping case was registered. During the probe, the police found out that Bhanu was helping the woman search for Irshad. They collected information about Bhanu and learnt that Irshad had to pay 4,000 to him for meat that was supplied to Irshads shop.

We suspected Bhanus involvement in Irshads disappearance, and investigators kept a watch on him through physical and electronic means. Once his role was confirmed, Bhanu was arrested and his interrogation led to the arrest of his two accomplices, said a police officer associated with the case, requesting anonymity.

During the interrogation, the officer said, Bhanu told the police that he was into the business of supplying raw meat. and Irshad owed him 4,000. On September 2, Bhanu went to Irshads home in his Santro and picked him up saying that Irshad should work for him if he was not in the position to repay the amount.

Bhanu took Irshad to a poultry farm in Narelas Block B where his two associates were already present. Bhanu started beating Irshad with sticks and also punched him. When Irshad fell unconscious, the trio abandoned him and left in the car. Irshad succumbed to injuries at the spot and the trio returned the same night, transported Irshads body in the car and threw it into a canal near Halalpur village in Haryanas Sonepat district, the officer said.

Two days later, on September 4, Irshads body was fished out from the canal in Delhis KN Katju Marg area . The KN Katju Marg police registered a murder case and cremated the body after 72 hours as the dead mans identity could not be ascertained. They, however, clicked photographs and preserved the clothes which eventually were shown to Irshads family members, who identified the body as that of Irshads, the police said.
When the teachers at St Andrews Primary return to school next month, their first task upon welcoming back the students will be assessing if they have been set back socially and emotionally in their time away.

During a series of half-hour one-on-one sessions, the teachers will weigh up each childs mental wellbeing and state of social disconnection after months of remote learning.

Paul Wakeling, principal St Andrew's Primary School with Savannah, 6. Credit:Paul Jeffers

Our focus at the start of term four will first be social and emotional, principal Paul Wakeling said. Some of our kids, we won't have seen them for 15 weeks, so itll be pretty much getting them on-site and touching base with each child as to where theyre at."

Those sessions will not only guide how each student is cared for in term four, but also who their classmates will be next year.
Police officers arrive to pay their respects at the custody center where a British police officer has been shot dead in Croydon, south London, Britain, on Sept. 26, 2020. (Simon Dawson/Reuters)

Suspect in Fatal UK Police Officer Shooting in Critical Condition

The 23-year-old suspect in the fatal shooting of a British police officer inside a police station remains in a critical condition in hospital and has not yet been spoken to, a senior officer said on Saturday.

Matt Ratana, a 54-year-old custody sergeant who was originally from the Hawkes Bay area of New Zealand, was shot dead in the early hours of Friday by a man who was handcuffed. The man is then believed to have turned the gun on himself.

Deputy Assistant Commissioner Stuart Cundy told reporters he had recovered the gun, plus CCTV and body-warn video taken at the time of the shooting. Our specialist investigators are carefully reviewing all of that footage, he said.

The incident has been referred to the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC), which said the suspect had been arrested for possession of drugs and ammunition.

The man was handcuffed to the rear before being transported to Croydon Custody Suite in a police vehicle where he was escorted into the building, it said in a statement.

The handcuffs remained in place while officers prepared to search him using a metal detector, the IOPC said. At that point, shots were fired.

The killing of an officer is rare in Britain and the murder drew condolences from the prime minister and other senior politicians.

By Kate Holton
Robert Pattinson has admitted to enjoying the idea that he could mess up The Batman.

The Tenet actor will star as the superhero in Matt Reeves take on the DC superhero, which is scheduled for release in October 2021.

Speaking to Total Film magazine, Pattinson described Reevess interpretation of the character as incredible, and admitted that he enjoyed the pressure of playing such a well-loved character.

"There's a slightly different feeling when you know loads and loads of people are going to watch something you're working on, he said.

I weirdly enjoyed it during Twilight, the idea that you can mess it up. I guess I felt confident. I wanted to be on the big stage.

Actor said he feels similar pressures to that he felt filming Twilight (AFP via Getty Images)

Pattinson has previously discussed his unconventional approach to playing Batman, revealing in May that he had no plans to work out for the role.

I think if youre working out all the time, youre part of the problem, he said. You set a precedent. No one was doing this in the 1970s. Even James Dean  he wasnt exactly ripped.

Production on The Batman resumed last week after the actor reportedly tested positive for coronavirus. Filming had only just started again at the time after the crew were forced to take a six month hiatus during lockdown.

The film will also star Colin Farrell as Penguin, Paul Dano as Riddler, Zoe Kravitz as Catwoman and Andy Serkis as Alfred Pennyworth.
Courtesy: Kraft Heinz

This year is clearly taking its toll on everyone, as evidenced by Kraft thinking we all want a nice warm bowl of pumpkin spice mac 'n' cheese right now.

Now, I love mac 'n' cheese as much as the next person, and I consider it the perfect comfort food dish.
This article by Paul Szoldra originally appeared on Task & Purpose, a digital news and culture publication dedicated to military and veterans issues.

The Navy is considering opening tattoo parlors on its bases at "multiple locations," including Naval Base Guam and Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii, a Navy official said Friday.

News of the plan comes a few weeks after the official opening of a tattoo studio on Nellis Air Force base in Las Vegas, the first on a U.S. military base.

"The Navy Exchange Service Command has never operated or provided a vendor space for a tattoo parlor," said spokeswoman Courtney Williams. "However, over the past couple of years, NEXCOM has been diligently researching and working closely with [Navy medical officials] to identify appropriate protocols and locations for potential tattoo parlors on Navy installations."

Indeed, the Navy has "multiple locations in the hopper," according to Williams, though plans have not yet been solidified or officially announced. The Navy is currently eyeing its Pacific outposts in Guam and Pearl Harbor for its first tattoo shops, with the expectation they will be open for business in about a year.

"Things are still getting ironed out. But we are definitely heading down that path," Williams said. "And Popeye was a sailor, right?" she added with a laugh.

Much like the Air Force version at Nellis, Williams said the expectation is for the Navy to locate its studios inside the "mini-mall" of the Navy exchange, where you can find shopping, barbershops, and other concessions.

Tattoo culture often goes hand-in-hand with military life, perhaps more so in the Navy, where sailors sometimes staved off "boredom during long hours at sea" by doubling as tattoo artists, according to Naval History and Heritage Command.

Indeed, Norman Collins, the man behind the iconic "Sailor Jerry" brand of tattoos, was artistically inspired by his travels to China and Japan while in the Navy, and even today sailors can be found sporting a number of classic ink designs to mark significant events in their careers, including a "shellback" design to mark the crossing of the equator, or crossed anchors to show pride in their job as boatswain's mates, which direct and supervise maintenance duties on a ship, according to Military.com.

"I think this is a great opportunity and a nod to American tattooings roots in the Navy," said Shawn VanDiver, a Navy veteran with "sleeve" tattoos on both arms.

"Its 2020 and getting away from a puritan view of what is good for sailors, and instead creating safe, affordable spaces for them to do the things theyre going to do anyway will result in much better outcomes."

The Navy is the least restrictive service branch when it comes to tattoos. While other branches have outlawed sleeves or required tattoos to be small, the Navy in 2016 updated its policy to allow more ink so they wouldn't "miss opportunities to bring in talented men and women willing to serve," according to All Hands, the Navy's official magazine.

The 2016 update gave the okay for one small neck tattoo and removed size restrictions for tattoos on the arms and legs. Still, some restrictions remained in place: "no tattoo located anywhere on the body can be prejudicial to good order, discipline, and morale, or be of a nature that brings discredit upon the naval service."

This article originally appeared at Task & Purpose. Follow Task & Purpose on Twitter.

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 The Navy has a 650-round ammo backpack that looks like it's straight out of Predator

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 Meet the Army 3-star general whos way better at social media than you are
Climate change is not the most urgent issue facing Canadians at this moment and Environment Minister Jonathan Wilkinson can live with that  for now.

Were in the middle of a pandemic. Were not at the end of it, and were probably going to be in this for some time, Wilkinson said in an interview this week. That has to be the governments first priority.

Wilkinson sat down to talk to me a day after his governments speech from the throne and a day before the global day of climate action, which was a major event during last years federal election. But 2020 is not 2019, not even for the minister in charge of wrestling with that other global crisis hanging over Canada.

If Canada wasnt sitting at the precipice of a second wave of COVID-19, Wilkinsons climate-change plans would likely have been front and centre of the governments agenda as it was laid out this week. He is still busy working on those plans, he says, but all the talk of a green recovery  still a hot topic as recently as last month  was basically too much, too soon in the context of a pandemic.

All that green-recovery talk, says Wilkinson, got a little bit ahead of the Canadian public in terms of where we were at.

Being an environment minister is all about choosing your battles, even in non-pandemic times, and Wilkinson says nothing has changed or wavered in terms of his governments commitment to meeting its climate-change goals.

Although the throne speech didnt contain any immediate measures to lower the temperature of the planet, Wilkinson believes its possible to lower the temperature of the debate in Canada over climate change  even in Alberta and Saskatchewan, where antipathy to Justin Trudeaus government runs high.

I do believe that there are pathways to engage Alberta and Saskatchewan in a more constructive conversation around climate and how that can work for them from an economic perspective, he says. While theres certainly economic anxiety in those two provinces around the energy issue, I do think that there are opportunities for better conversation than perhaps weve been having.

Wilkinson doesnt spell out exactly how that will work, but this isnt his first time at the centre of federal-provincial tension. Long before he was a minister in Trudeaus government, he worked in the government of Saskatchewan, as a special adviser to premier Roy Romanow during the intense days of constitutional negotiation in the 1990s. This is actually where our paths crossed many years ago, when I was covering those talks as a reporter on that long-running national-unity drama.

That full immersion in federal-provincial tension has made Wilkinson a little skeptical about all these claims, revived by Conservatives this week, that Canada has never been so divided. He remembers the 1992 Charlottetown accord, which he helped negotiate, as a pretty divisive and polarizing moment in the nations history.

People who think that in Canada, theres ever been a time where everybodys happy, the provinces are always happy with the federal government and vice versa . I dont remember any time like that, he says.

What he does regret is how political debate since then has become even more binary, always reduced to either/or choices. Action on climate change is a perfect example  always pitted against the resource industry as a binary choice. Now, in 2020, its climate change versus the pandemic, as though government cant walk and chew gum at the same time, as Wilkinson puts it.

He does believe there are ways in which the pandemic may have made Canadians more acutely aware of their vulnerability to big global forces, and how their own behaviour and choices are connected to the overall health of the nation and planet. I asked Wilkinson whether the government had learned anything during the pandemic about how to nudge the citizenry. Just as we are wearing masks and washing our hands in 2020, could another kind of individual citizen action take root  this time to combat climate change  once the pandemic has passed?

Yes, Wilkinson said, though he didnt get specific. There will be elements of the (climate-change) plan that will provide choice for Canadians about taking action in their own daily lives.

While it might be a stretch to call that a silver lining to the pandemic, there is a way to see this crisis as a training ground for another one looming in the not-so-distant future. Wilkinson doesnt mince words when asked to compare COVID-19 to climate change in that respect.

We know climate change is sitting out there. It is not going farther away, its coming closer, he said, and without some action, it will be far more significant than the effects that weve seen from COVID-19.

But first we have to get through the pandemic.

Susan Delacourt is an Ottawa-based columnist covering national politics for the Star. Reach her via email: sdelacourt@thestar.ca or follow her on Twitter: @susandelacourt

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By Trend

Azerbaijani Ambassador to Russia Polad Bulbuloghlu visited Russias Saint Petersburg city and met with Governor Alexander Beglov during the visit, Trend reports citing the Azerbaijani Embassy in Russia.

During the meeting, the sides discussed issues related to preparation for Azerbaijan's participation in the 9th St. Petersburg International Cultural Forum, which will be held on November 12-14, 2020.

This year, Azerbaijan will partake in this international event with a special "guest" status.

The sides also exchanged views on the further development of humanitarian and cultural ties, the export of agricultural products from Azerbaijan to St. Petersburg and other issues of mutual interest.

---

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-27 00:22:23|Editor: huaxia

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LAGOS, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Babagana Umara Zulum, the governor of the restive northeastern state of Borno on Saturday expressed sadness over the killing of 11 security personnel in an ambush.

The personnel, including eight policemen and three civilian joint task force members, were ambushed on their way to Baga town.

Baga, Borno's largest fishing community in the shores of the Lake Chad with waterways to neighboring countries, is considered strategic to Boko Haram's operation.

The governor said he shared the grief of families of these 11 priceless heroes to whom the state shall remain grateful and urged all stakeholders to remain committed to ongoing peacebuilding efforts.

Baga town was displaced by the Boko Haram militants 21 months ago, with most of the residents taking refuge in Monguno and Maiduguri. Enditem




Haiti - FLASH: D-16, Everything about the next official exams and remedial courses





Friday, September 25 in a press conference, the Ministry of National Education informed that it had decided to propose, this year for the official exams, of "reduced" tests which will only relate to the minimum program distributed in schools after the resumption of school activities on August 10 and that the text of the exams will really be accessible to all, explained Louis Fritz Dorminvil, Departmental Director of the West, stressing that for the only department of West already 145,000 candidates are registered. The candidate registration process is continuing and will end on October 5.



Ms. Nadine Henry, Director of Fundamental Education agrees, affirming that the exam texts will not be difficult and encouraging students to consult the Ministry's PRATIC internet platform on: pratic.menfp.gouv.ht which contains the main educational content on basic programs nearly 40 courses and secondary related to these levels of exams nearly 70 courses.



The Ministry justifies these measures by the Covid-19 health crisis and the strike of teachers in public schools who have not yet announced the resumption of school activities and continue to demand a salary increase.



For the exams which will begin on October 12 with the tests of the 9th year, Louis Fritz Dorminvil specified that to take into account this difficult school year, 40 hours of remedial lessons for the 9th year and final students will be taught in the ten school departments by experienced teachers to allow students to better participate in the tests



These classes will start on Monday September 28 and end on October 10.



For the West and for secondary schools, these courses will be given at the Marie-Jeanne and Cent cinquantenaire high schools. For grade 9 students from the north of Port-au-Prince, lessons will be given at the Toussaint Louverture high school and for those from the south of Port-au-Prince in the Republique des Etats-Unis and Colbert Lochard schools among others.



Exam schedule :

- Examinations of the 9th Fundamental Year (AF): October 12 to 14, 2020

- Examinations of Normal Teachers' Schools (ENI): October 12 to 15, 2020

- Examinations of Family Education Centers (CEF): October 12 to 15, 2020

- Traditional secondary school leaving exams (Philo) and (renovated, NS4): October 19 to 22, 2020 (for new and failed students)

- Anticipated French tests for NS3: October 23, 2020 (morning).



See also :

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-31818-haiti-flash-state-exams-revised-calendar-key-dates.htmlc



S/ HaitiLibre


















Microsoft is no stranger to Windows source code leaks, but a new incident might just provide insights into its history. Bleeping Computer and ZDNet report that a 4chan user has posted whats believed to be source code for Windows XP Service Pack 1, Windows 2000, and Windows Server 2003. The files were circulating privately for years, according to the leaker, but are only becoming publicly available now  and they include some early work on Windows XP.

The Verge noted that the code includes multiple unreleased themes from XPs early development (when it was nicknamed Whistler), including a theme that conspicuously imitates parts of Apples Aqua design language from OS X (now macOS). This seems to have been a placeholder for developing the theme engine and clearly never shipped, but it does highlight the fierce rivalry between Apple and Microsoft at a time when the tech industry was still computer-centric.

Weve asked Microsoft for comment, although it already said it was investigating the matter. The Verge claimed the code was legitimate, with Ronin Dey and others also supporting those beliefs (via Windows Central).

One version of the code leak also includes code for MS DOS, Windows CE, Windows Embedded and Windows NT, although those arent believed to be new leaks. Experts talking to ZDNet believed the new leaks came from academia, which has long had access to Windows source code to help bolster its security.

This wont necessarily lead to security issues on par with the WannaCry ransomware attack. While WannaCry exploited Windows XP flaws, the campaign succeeded in part due to poor security policies. No amount of source code will change that, especially if it doesnt include later XP releases. Microsoft also ended regular support for Windows XP in 2014, limiting any help to organizations with special contracts. Windows XP has been vulnerable for years, and this isnt likely to make the situation worse.
A federal judge has asked the U.S. government whether it will delay an upcoming ban on the viral video-sharing app TikTok or defend its policy in court over the weekend. It's the latest development in the TikTok saga which has ramped up tensions between China and the U.S. and led to a complicated and fluid deal for the social media app, owned by a Chinese parent company ByteDance. Here's a rundown of where we are right now in this story which is constantly changing.

Why is there a deal?

Washington maintains that TikTok, under ByteDance's ownership, represents a national security threat because American user data could be sent back to China. This is a claim that TikTok has repeatedly denied. On Aug. 6, U.S. President Donald Trump issued an executive order banning transactions with TikTok in 45 days. Trump has previously said the app needs to be sold or it will be banned in the U.S.

Who's buying TikTok?

A new U.S.-based company called TikTok Global will be set up with Oracle holding a 12.5% stake and Walmart owning 7.5%. The board of TikTok Global will consist of four American citizens and ByteDance founder Zhang Yiming. This is where it gets messy. ByteDance says that it will own 80% of TikTok Global and that company will be a subsidiary. Oracle contests that ByteDance will have "no ownership" of TikTok Global. The concrete terms of the deal have not been made public but that will be key.

What is Beijing's role?

Trump said this week that ByteDance "will have nothing to do with it. And if they do, we just won't make the deal." Meanwhile, Beijing will likely need to green light the deal. ByteDance has applied for an export license with the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Commerce and is awaiting a decision. It's unclear what exactly ByteDance has applied to export given it has previously said it will not transfer technologies or algorithms to Oracle as part of any deal. However, the Chinese technology firm did say that Oracle could inspect its source code. In August, China updated its export restrictions list to include technologies "recommendation of personalized information services based on data analysis." While ByteDance wasn't named, this was seen to relate to the core recommendation algorithm that makes the app suggest videos to users. All eyes will be on whether Beijing gives approval for this and the actual terms of the deal.

Will TikTok be banned?

TikTok was set to be banned from being distributed by U.S. app stores on Sept. 20. But as a deal got closer, that ban was delayed by a week and is set to come into effect end of the day on Sept. 27 in the U.S. Earlier this week, TikTok sought an injunction to stop this from happening. On Thursday, district judge Carl Nichols told the U.S. government to either delay a ban, or file their response to TikTok's complaint by Friday afternoon U.S. time. If the latter happens, there will be a hearing on the weekend before the ban is set to come into effect.

What does China say about all this?
Linda was only half-joking when, in 1990, she famously said we dont wake up for less than $10,000 a day. Naomis former agent, Carole White, would later say it was more like 300,000 a job. The money girls amassed fortunes and forged partnerships with the biggest fashion and beauty brands  Chanel and Revlon  but also Pepsi. Forbes did its first-ever celebrity 100 list in 1999 and on it there were five models: Claudia Schiffer, Cindy Crawford, Christy Turlington, Niki Taylor and Kate Moss, says Natalie Robehmed, market analyst and former editor of Forbes annual wealthiest models list. Over the years, some of those people dropped off, but some are still making big money. People like Naomi became iconic  she can speak to people across generations and she has a different kind of star power. The fans, Claudia remembers, were as enthusiastic as any who would have pledged allegiance to the Backstreet Boys at the time. It was insane, she says. Like being a rock star. You couldnt get to your car. We had security at every fashion show  even employed to guard my underwear! When I was out on the runway Id come back and my underwear would constantly be gone. Part of the appeal of the Supers was that they came as a gang. While they operated as individuals, they were also friends. Claudia was synonymous with Guess Jeans and Chanel, while Naomi was with Azzedine Alaia and Yves Saint Laurent, and Christy with Calvin Klein. But they might equally be found doing group shoots for Vogue, joining forces for a Versace campaign or starring together in George Michaels Freedom video. The unity made them at once likeable and untouchable.

The group of girls I started modelling with, and continue to over the years, are unique in their physicality and mentality. Everyone came from different backgrounds and everyone worked really hard, says Helena of the way each managed to find her place in the industry. We also are a very tight-knit and supportive group of girls, with each other and with our families. Claudia agrees. We were on the cover of every magazine and in every campaign. We lived and breathed it and we developed unprecedented control over our careers. Although we could be competitive, there was a lot of camaraderie between us too. We looked out for each other and we werent afraid to speak up. If somebody had a bad experience, we would call everyone and say, By the way, this just happened. We thought, We have the power all together and we should use it, because this is wrong. We made things change. Loading The Supers have always been masters of their own PR. When the social-media era arrived in the early 2010s, it bore a new generation of Insta girls  Gigi Hadid, Kendall Jenner, Karlie Kloss. These were models with digital personas, negotiating even bigger pay cheques thanks to having their own ready-made audiences to post ads to. Their arrival changed the rules, filling the market with new personalities. Some 1990s names bowed out, but the biggest stars adapted and seized the opportunity. Its impossible to talk about models and whats happened in the last 30 years without talking about Instagram, says Robehmed. Often when we think of supermodels we think of them walking the runway, but thats not actually where the money is for them. The biggest money-making campaigns

now are the huge deals across print advertising, video and social media.

Claudia lists current modelling, design and curation projects with Etre Cecile and Bordallo Pinheiro, in addition to being the face of Chanels new J12 watch. Ive never worried about being relevant, she says. Nor have I been one that craved the limelight or to be the centre of attention, and my husband is very similar. I love what I do, but I value my privacy and Im in a very fortunate position to be able to concentrate on collaborations Im passionate about. Fundamentally the industry is the same, its just grown enormously, she says. There are more collections, the pace is faster and social media has had a huge impact. Its been great for marketing fashion and beauty products, as well as providing a very effective way to manage your own exposure, which you see particularly with the big models of today. What was great in the 90s, though, was not to feel the pressure to share everything with everybody; you could still have a private life and create a mystique. I miss that clear line of the public figure versus the private one. However, I do love sharing fashion moments of my life on Instagram. These women still suck the air out of the room. Today, theyre still beloved because fashion loves reinvention and nostalgia, not to mention these women still look incredible. Derek Blasberg, head of fashion at YouTube and a journalist who has been friends with Naomi, Christy and Cindy for over a decade, convinced Naomi to start a YouTube channel giving her the chance to put out her own message and share glimpses of a highly entertaining lifestyle with her fans. From her trolley dash at Whole Foods, to her airport routine video, in which she thoroughly disinfects her first-class plane seat prior to take-off, her dry sense of humour has endeared her to new audiences, clocking up more than 20 million views.

Of course, Naomi has had other offers to open her life, says Blasberg. But I think what appealed to her about YouTube was the ability to be in control. She is her own producer, director, editor. She decides what to post and when to post it. I reckon Naomi has always wanted to be a TV host but, being a supermodel and all, shes never been in one place long enough. Until the COVID-19 crisis. For three weeks in April, she did a daily live show from her New York apartment. I should mention: Naomi was on time to every single live show. As much as people love to see new content created by the original Supers, there is also fresh appetite to look back at major moments from the past. Instagram fan accounts such as @The90sSupermodels, with hundreds of thousands of followers, are like shrines to those 1990s Versace catwalk appearances and now-vintage covers. It helps, of course, that the Supers have aged gloriously. The legendary parties and champagne breakfasts have long since been replaced by expensive wellness practices  in keeping, really, with fashions overall switch to a cleaner image. Ask any supermodel about their beauty secrets and theyll say they exercise every day, apply organic creams religiously (Claudias choice is Bamford) and drink lots of water. But theyll also say that its about attitude, not age. These women still suck the air out of the room, says Blasberg, a self-confessed eternal superfan. Christy Turlington is still the most beautiful woman in whatever room shes in. Today, theyre still beloved because fashion loves reinvention and nostalgia, not to mention these women still look incredible. To this day, when Naomi turns the corner and comes out on a runway, boom! You feel electricity.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-27 04:20:46|Editor: huaxia

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TRIPOLI, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- The Defense Ministry of Libya's UN-backed government on Saturday condemned the clashes that erupted on Friday in east of the capital Tripoli between two armed groups.

"The clashes that broke out earlier at Friday dawn between two battalions in Tajurea (eastern Tripoli) is an act that violates the security of the Libyan state and threatens the safety of civilians," the ministry said in a statement.

"We continue to enforce the law on everyone, in respect to the sacrifices of our people and their quest to build a civil democratic state," the statement said.

The statement also confirmed that all forces of the Defense Ministry "answer to the supreme leader of the Libyan army."

According to local media, clashes erupted earlier on Friday between two armed groups in Tajoura of eastern Tripoli.

Local residents said that heavy explosions and gun firing could be heard loudly in large parts of eastern Libya, causing panic in the area.

The UN-backed government's Minister of Defense, Salah Addin Al-Namroush, confirmed that the two groups have been dismantled and their leaders were referred to investigation by the military prosecutor.

The United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) on Friday expressed concern over clashes, stressing the urgent need for reform of the Libyan security sector.

Libya has been suffering escalating violence and unrest ever since the fall of the late leader Muammar Gaddafi's regime in 2011. Enditem
Amy Coney Barrett during a Senate confirmation hearing to be a U.S. circuit judge on Aug. 4, 2017. (Screenshot via Senate TV)

Who is Amy Coney Barrett, Trumps Expected Supreme Court Pick?

Federal judge Amy Coney Barrett, who currently serves on the Chicago-based 7th Circuit Court of Appeals, is expected to be President Donald Trumps next Supreme Court nominee.

Barrett is on a shortlist of five women the president was considering to nominate to replace late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Judge Barbara Lagoa of the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals has also been confirmed by Trump as another top contender.

Trump plans on announcing his choice at 5 p.m. Eastern Time on Saturday.

Barrett, 48, earned her J.D. at Notre Dame Law School in 1997. She served as a clerk in 1997-1998 for Judge Laurence Silberman of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals and later as a clerk in 1998-1999 for the late Justice Antonin Scalia, who died in 2016.

After her clerkships, she was an associate at law firm Miller, Cassidy, Larroca & Lewin in Washington, D.C. for a year, and later moved to Texas-based firm Baker Botts in 2000, before leaving for academia.

In 2002, she became a professor at Notre Dame Law School, where she taught constitutional law, the federal courts, and statutory interpretation. She was named distinguished professor of the year three times, according to SCOTUSblog.

Barrett was appointed by Trump and confirmed by the Senate 55-43 to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in 2017. At the time, every full-time member of Notre Dame Law Schools faculty signed a strong letter of support (pdf) for her nomination, as did every law clerk who served a U.S. Supreme Court justice during the term that Barrett clerked for Scalia (pdf).

Barrett is a Roman Catholic. At her confirmation hearing, Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee questioned her over her Catholic faith in fulfilling the judicial role.

The dogma lives loudly within you, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said. And thats of concern when you come to big issues that large numbers of people have fought for years in this country. Feinstein also indicated that she was worried that Barrett may ignore Supreme Court precedents on issues such as abortion.

Barrett said she would respect Supreme Court precedent.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) attends a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington on June 16, 2020. (Tom Williams/Pool/AFP via Getty Images)

A number of past cases and writings provide insight into Barretts stance on various issues, from abortion, to the death penalty, to immigration, and gun rights.

For example, Barrett was questioned at her 7th Circuit confirmation hearing about an article she co-wrote in 1998, titled Catholic Judges in Capital Cases. The article discussed Catholics moral and legal obligations when asked to rule in a death penalty case. It stated, The prohibitions against abortion and euthanasia (properly defined) are absolute; those against war and capital punishment are not.

There are two evident differences between the cases. First, abortion and euthanasia take away innocent life. This is not always so with war and punishment, read the article, which Barrett wrote with former Notre Dame law professor John H. Garvey, who now is the president of the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C.

If one cannot in conscience affirm a death sentence the proper response is to recuse oneself, the law review article also said.

Catholic judges must answer some complex moral and legal questions in deciding whether to sit in death penalty cases. Sometimes (as with direct appeals of death sentences) the right answers are not obvious. But in a system that effectively leaves the decision up to the judge, these are questions that responsible Catholics must consider seriously, the article concluded. Judges cannotnor should they try toalign our legal system with the Churchs moral teaching whenever the two diverge. They should, however, conform their own behavior to the Churchs standard. Perhaps their good example will have some effect.

When asked about the article, Barrett said, Its never appropriate for a judge to impose that judges personal convictions, whether they arise from faith or anywhere else, on the law. She also said later at the hearing that her views on abortion or any other question will have no bearing on the discharge of my duties as a judge.

When Justice Anthony Kennedy retired in 2018, Barrett was among the top contenders for the Supreme Court seat vacancy, which was ultimately filled by Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

Barrett and her husband have seven children, two of whom are adopted from Haiti. Her husband, Jesse Barrett, serves as an assistant U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Indiana.

If Barrett is confirmed, she would join Trump appointees Gorsuch and Kavanaugh to form a 6-3 majority in the Supreme Court of justices who were appointed by Republican presidents.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said after Ginsburgs death on Sept. 18 that a vote will be held on the Senate floor for Trumps nominee.

McConnell has not said yet whether the vote will take place before or after the Nov. 3 election.

Late Friday, amid multiple media outlets, all citing anonymous sources, reporting that Trump was planning to nominate Barrett, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) announced that the Senate was going to begin a thorough review of Judge Barretts nomination.

I look forward to meeting with her in the coming days as the Judiciary Committee prepares for her confirmation hearing, Cornyn announced.
By Elizabeth Kwiatkowski, 09/25/2020



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Elizabeth Kwiatkowski is Associate Editor of Reality TV World and has been covering the reality TV genre for more than a decade.

star Henry Rodriguez says he doesn't believe his wife Christina was ready for marriage after ending a long-term toxic relationship only eight months prior to the start of the extreme experiment.Henry, a 35-year-old clinical recruiter from Arabi, LA, and Christina, a 30-year-old flight attendant from Houma, LA, were matched by experts Dr. Pepper Schwartz, Dr. Viviana Coles and Pastor Calvin Roberson to wed on Season 11 of the Lifetime reality series.During Wednesday night's episode of : Unfiltered, Henry watched back a clip in which Amani warned Christina that Henry had said impatience is "a dealbreaker" for him in relationships. Christina was upset because she had never heard that from Henry directly."Henry, is it really only Christina's impatience that is stopping you two from getting intimate or is there something else we're just missing?" Unfiltered host Jamie Otis , who starred on Season 1 of , asked Henry."You know, the impatience is a big factor because it was a red flag pretty early on," Henry responded."Probably the biggest thing for me up to this point is the fact that I had a number of my guests during my wedding come up to me and [say] they talked to some of her guests and the main thing they talked about was that eight months ago, she was in a toxic relationship -- a long-term relationship -- with this guy in California.""I mean, even if it was a five-year healthy relationship, I'd question how ready you are to marry a stranger eight months later," he admitted.Although Henry and Christina got off to a rough start to marriage because their dynamic was initially awkward and uncomfortable, the pair bonded when Henry taught Christina how to play gold and she in turn took him to a salsa-dancing class.Henry told several of his co-stars in a recent episode that Christina looked "sexy" while showing off her salsa moves.Jamie therefore asked Henry if his attraction was growing towards Christina at this point in the experiment."Yeah, I definitely think the salsa class helped. She took charge. She was, like, really confident during it," Henry shared."In dancing, you know, I'm the one that should be taking charge, but clearly I struggle with that -- not just on the dance floor," said Henry, who previously voiced on Unfiltered that he's been attracted to aggressive women in his past."But yeah, I definitely think it's, you know, an attractive trait."Christina also admitted during last week's episode she was starting to like her husband at this point in the process."Every day, I see something new about Henry that makes him more and more adorable," she said on the show.When asked how Christina's sudden onset of feelings made Henry feel, Henry joked on Unfiltered, "Warm and fuzzy on the inside.""I mean, we had fun. But at that time, the gravity of everything just felt like it was on my shoulders. And so, you know, it was a struggle and I was hoping that when we came back to New Orleans, things would improve a little bit.""And it feels like we're starting to get to know each other a little bit more. And yeah, hopefully the more she gets to know me, the more she likes me!" Henry added.Christina, an adventurous flight attendant, and Henry, a quiet and reserved gentleman who had never left the United States, found themselves trying to force a connection after their wedding, and Christina has been shown begging Henry to talk to her, open up, and initiate physical intimacy to progress their relationship.When the pair met with Pastor Cal in a recent episode for a counseling session, Henry admitted his past relationships moved faster because "a certain type of chemistry just existed."Pastor Cal told Henry that sassy Christina has some "fire in her gut" and "a little diva to her" that he could benefit from, but Henry was hung up on the fact Christina allegedly had the tendency to be very impatient and rude to the show's production team.Since Henry was so standoffish and guarded, Christina confronted her husband about his intentions three weeks into their marriage."Do you even see a future with me?" asked Christina, who was very disappointed in Henry's lack of communication with her. "I need to know if you're not into me.""If you're asking me to make a decision right now, like, no," Henry replied."Then why even stick around?" Christina asked."If I'm going to make my choice now, then I don't see the point of the process. We have a lot of differences , like, the way we live," Henry shared, adding, "I don't know [if I can get over that], but I'm willing to try, even though it doesn't seem like it."As Christina slowly proved she could be more patient, Henry revealed he was finally starting to feel chemistry with his wife and could see "a lot of potential" between them.Henry therefore found it easier to open up and be vulnerable with his wife, and Dr. Viviana asked the couple to express themselves both physically and emotionally whenever possible.Viviana didn't want to see the couple get stuck in the friendzone., so she asked both of them not to hold back.During the latest episode of , Henry took offense when Christina said a man with a lack of confidence is a dealbreaker for her (considering Henry clearly struggles in that area), but she vowed to help take Henry out of his "unconfident world."Interested in more news? Join our Married at First Sight Facebook Group
BILLINGS, Mont.  A federal judge ruled Friday that President Donald Trumps leading steward of public lands has been serving unlawfully, blocking him from continuing in the position in the latest pushback against the administrations practice of filling key positions without U.S. Senate approval.

U.S. Interior Department Bureau of Land Management acting director William Perry Pendley served unlawfully for 424 days without being confirmed to the post by the Senate as required under the Constitution, U.S. District Judge Brian Morris determined.

The ruling came after Montanas Democratic governor in July sued to remove Pendley, saying the former oil industry attorney was illegally overseeing an agency that manages almost a quarter-billion acres of land, primarily in the U.S. West.

Todays ruling is a win for the Constitution, the rule of law, and our public lands, Gov. Steve Bullock said Friday. Environmental groups and Democratic lawmakers from Western states also cheered the judges move after urging for months that Pendley be removed.

The ruling will be immediately appealed, according to Interior Department spokesman Conner Swanson. He called it an outrageous decision that is well outside the bounds of the law, and he said the Obama administration had similarly filled key posts at the agency with temporary authorizations.

The agency will abide by the judges order while the appeal is pending, officials said. It will also have to confront questions over the legitimacy of all decisions Pendley had made, including his approval of land use plans in Montana that Morris said Pendley was not authorized to make.

The land bureau regulates activities ranging from mining and oil extraction to livestock grazing and recreation. Under Trump, it has been at the forefront in the administrations drive to loosen environmental restrictions for oil and gas drilling and other development on public lands.

Pendley has been one of several senior officials in the Trump administration running federal agencies and departments despite not having gone before the Senate for the confirmation hearings that are required for top posts.

Last month, the Government Accountability Office, a bipartisan congressional watchdog, said acting Department of Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf and his acting deputy, Ken Cuccinelli, were improperly serving and ineligible to run the agency under the Vacancies Reform Act. The two have been at the forefront of administration initiatives on immigration and law enforcement.

Trump agencies have defended the skipped deadlines for Senate hearings for administration nominees, saying that the senior officials involved were carrying out the duties of their acting position but were not actually filling that position, and thus did not require a hearing and votes before the Senate.

Pendley had been formally nominated by Trump to direct the land bureau in July, after being given temporary authorizations to the acting position several times by Interior Secretary David Bernhardt.

But the nomination was withdrawn earlier this month after the confirmation process threatened to become contentious, potentially disrupting key U.S. senate races in Montana, where Bullock is seeking to unseat incumbent Republican Steve Daines, and Colorado, where Republican Sen. Cory Gardner is being challenged by former Gov. John Hickenlooper.

Pendley continued to hang on to the post despite the withdrawal, under an arrangement that Pendley himself set up months ago. In a May 22 order, Pendley made his own position, deputy director, the bureaus top post while the directors office is vacant.

After establishing that succession order, Pendleys actions included approval of two sweeping land resource management plans in Montana that would open 95% of federal land in the state to oil and gas development, attorneys for Bullock contended in court filings.

Administration officials had insisted in public statements and court filings that Pendley was not in fact the acting director, but rather exercising the authority of the director.

Morris rejected the administrations argument, saying they were evasive and undermine the constitutional system of checks and balances.

Under the federal defendants theory, a president could ignore their constitutional appointment responsibility indefinitely and instead delegate authority directly or through cabinet secretaries to unconfirmed appointed officials. Such an arrangement could last for an entire presidential administration. In fact, the case before the Court presents that scenario, he wrote.

The bureaus holdings are sweeping, with nearly 1 out of every 10 acres nationally under its dominion, mostly across the U.S. West.

Pendley was a longtime industry attorney and property rights advocate from Wyoming who had called for the government to sell its public lands before joining the Trump administration.

After joining the government, he declared that his past support for selling public lands was irrelevant because his boss, Bernhardt, opposes the wholesale sale of public lands.

Trumps actions to bypass the confirmation process has raised serious questions about the legitimacy of people in acting roles.

The GOP-led Senate typically is falling short of the votes needed from its ranks to confirm some of Trumps choices. But as Trump bypassed the chamber, chipping away at its advise-and-consent role, the Republican leadership has also allowed the acting positions to stand.

Shortly after the GAO questioned the DHS officials, Trump formally nominated Wolf to the secretary post. A hearing was held last week in the Senate on his nomination, but its unlikely Wolf will be confirmed before the election.

Copyright 2020 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

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She recently said she feeling 'confident' since undergoing a breast augmentation.

And Georgia Harrison looked nothing short of sensational as she made her way to brunch with her friend and fellow TOWIE alum Fran Parman on Saturday.

The former Love Island contestant, 25, and her pal were seen looking typically stylish as they headed for brunch at Ours restaurant.

Wow! Georgia Harrison looked nothing short of sensational as she made her way to brunch with her friend and fellow TOWIE alum Fran Parman on Saturday

Georgia showcased her surgically-enhanced assets in a plunging black crop top, which also displayed her washboard abs.

The reality personality teamed her top with a pair of tan leather trousers and a pair of Yves Saint Lauren black heels, featuring the brand's logo.

She wore her highlighted locks in a bouncy blown out style and featured a neutrally-toned pallet of make-up, including a slick of lip gloss.

Girls' day out: The former Love Island contestant, 25, and her pal were seen looking typically stylish as they headed for brunch at Ours restaurant

The Ex On The Beach star shielded her eyes from the autumn rays in a pair of square shades, while also accessorising with a gold chain and clutch bag.

Meanwhile, Fran, 29, looked equally glamorous in a white polo neck which she tucked into a leather mini skirt and a pair of heeled boots.

She layered her ensemble with a cream coat, and styled the look with a gold chain necklace and a pair of circular shades.

Glam: Georgia showcased her surgically-enhanced assets in a plunging black crop top, which also displayed her washboard abs

It comes after Georgia revealed she already feels 'so much more confident' with her new boobs, and said she had the operation after her 3.5stone weight loss left her with sagging skin and stretch marks.

The television personality told Closer magazine: 'I'd see myself on TV wearing swimwear and think, "Oh, my boobs don't look good", and it made me feel very self-conscious.'

Georgia went on to say she would limit what she would, only opting for padded tops or tops with high necklines.

Style: Meanwhile, Fran, 29, looked equally glamorous in a white polo neck which she tucked into a leather mini skirt and a pair of heeled boots

Explaining why she had surgery, the reality star said: 'I'm around 8.5st now, but when I was about 19 I was nearer 12st and my boobs were a lot bigger, I was working abroad and had a really unhealthy lifestyle, and I'd drink and just eat junk.

'But when my weight dropped a bit, so did my boobs, it looked like there was space to fill. I also had a problem with inverted nipples that I wanted to fix.'

Georgia first found fame with a brief stint on The Only Way Is Essex in 2014, before becoming a household name with an appearance on 2017's Love Island.

The bubbly reality star then gained an American fanbase when she starred in series 33 of The Challenge in 2018, reaching the final and finishing in eighth place.

The Challenge saw reality stars from around the world come together to compete in a series of physical and mental challenges in the hope of the scooping prize money.
The Motor Accident Claims Tribunal (MACT) has awarded compensation of Rs 18 lakh to the family of a Bihar man who was killed in a road accident in December 2019.

The claim was filed by Rambha Devi, 42, wife of the deceased, Rameshwar Sah, his five children, and parents, Dhuniya Devi, 59, and Shankar Sah, 59.

The family had complained that Rameshwar Sah died due to the negligent and rash driving of truck owner and driver Ashok Kumar, resident of Hamirpur district, Himachal Pradesh.

However, as the trucks insurer, National Insurance Company Limited, Chandigarh, agreed to pay a compensation of Rs 18 lakh to the claimants within 30 days, the petition was allowed partly.

A sum of Rs 18 lakh is hereby awarded as compensation in favour of the claimants, which shall be paid by the insurance company within 30 days from today, failing which the compensation amount shall carry interest @9% per annum from the date of filing of petition till actual payment, the court observed.

Compensation amount shall be shared by the claimants  the deceaseds wife, five children and parents  in the ratio of 30:10:10:10:10:10:10:10, it added.

on amount shall be shared by the claimants in the ratio of 30:10:10:10:10:10:10:10, it added.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 04:51:37|Editor: huaxia

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LAGOS, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- Nigerian police on Friday confirmed an attack in which at least five people were killed by gunmen in the Vwang district of Plateau state.

One other person was severely injured after the gunmen opened fire on residents late Thursday, said Edward Egbuka, police chief in charge of the state.

Egbuka, who described the killing as an ugly trend, said it has posed a serious setback to the peace efforts in the state.

"This is a setback to the peace efforts that all stakeholders, the police, the military, and state government, have been trying to manage," he said.

The police said an investigation has been launched to apprehend the gunmen. Enditem
Jonathan V. Last of the Bulwark has laid out a nightmare scenario regarding the Supreme Court: If President Donald J. Trump appoints a conservative justice, that justice gets confirmed, and then in a few months that justice is asked to rule on the election of Donald J. Trump to remain the president: huge nightmare. On Saturday, Trump is expected to nominate conservative 7th Circuit Court of Appeals judge Amy Coney Barrett to fill the late Ruth Bader Ginsburgs seat on the high bench. The rest of the nightmare coming true is not implausible.

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Last joined me on The Gist on Thursday (before Barrett was reported as Trumps pick) to discuss the all-too-possible bleak future he lays out in his piece and what may or may not be done to prevent it. A portion of our interview is transcribed below; it has been edited and condensed for length and clarity.

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Mike Pesca: When you wrote this piece about the legitimacy of the Supreme Court just a couple of days ago, it was premised on ways that mostly Republicanseither in the Federalist Society or in the Senatecan thwart what now seems clear to be an eventuality: a Republican Senate taking up a potential justice nominated by Donald J. Trump. Is it too late to avoid this nightmare scenario?

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Jonathan V. Last: Its never too late until it happens. So I wrote that piece just a couple hours after the word broke that Ruth Bader Ginsburg had passed on. And it was not clear that [Senate Majority Leader Mitch] McConnell would have the votes then. And it was not if you remember for the first hour or so, it wasnt even really clear that Republicans would do this. It wasnt clear that they would push ahead.

Once it was signaled that they would push ahead, it wasnt clear that maybe they wouldnt just announce a nominee, but then [just] say this is who the nominee is, and well let the voters decide. And by Tuesday morning this week I believe McConnell claimed to have had the votes for it. We heard that Martha McSally and Cory Gardner were going to be two fists in on this; Mitt Romney was going to be in. [Lisa] Murkowski and [Susan] Collins were going to be against, to try to protect [Collins] Maine seat.

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If you wanted to try hard to be optimistic about it, the only thing you could say is, Well, this would be better than doing it in a lame duck session after they lose the Senate and the White House. That would have been worse. But thats as close as you get to optimism. Its really bad. Its bad for everybody. Its going to be bad for whoever the nominee is. Its going to be bad for the institution of the Supreme Court. Its going to be bad for everyone in America who wants a system of government that is capable of functioning in a reasonably competent and coherent way over the long term.

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So Ill relay to my listeners the key sentence in your piece: If Trump and Republicans replace Ginsburg, it will destroy the remaining public legitimacy of the Supreme Court. Full stop. I wonder if this is true in an election case, in the case of Donald J. Trump v. Joe Biden, or Donald J. Trump v. the United States, or Donald J. Trump v. Florida. But will the court be destroyed if the court isnt asked to rule on the election of Trump?

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I think so. Yeah. I mean, there is more destroyed and less destroyed, right? Its a sliding scale. This morning the piece is out in the Atlantic where Barton Gellman has spoken to some legal advisers connected to the Trump campaign, one of which tells him the following. This is a quote: The state legislatures will say, All right, weve been given this constitutional power. We dont think the results of our own state are accurate. So heres our slate of electors that we think properly reflect the results of our state. 

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What hes talking about is sending a different slate of electors to the Electoral College in battleground states where Republicans control the state legislature. If we wind up in a Bush v. Gore, but instead a Trump v. Bidentype situation, [that] is the most likely scenario for the Supreme Court having to rule on it.

If thats where we are, then were already a failed state. I mean, if you get to the point where the president of the United States is telling state legislatures controlled by his party to send competing sets of electors to the Electoral College, and you have two groups of people showing up demanding that theyre the real people representing Wisconsin, or the real people representing Florida, this is not what happens in stable democracies. It simply isnt.

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If it doesnt come to thatif Joe Biden appears to win by so much on Election Day, maybe this wont even be a play available to them. If they think they have the votes in the legislatures of Michigan and Pennsylvania, but turn out not to, maybe this wont happen. If its close enough for the Trump administration or a Trump campaign to pursue suits, but the lower courts smack them down regularly and dont agree with them, maybe we avoid that, too, right? Maybe we avoid the court having to rule on this. In that case, what does that say about the legitimacy of the court or if we are living in a failed state?

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Yeah, well, in that case, were not at failed-state levels. Were merely at a level where the Supreme Court is going to come to be regarded just like every other branch of government. Which compared with the failed state thing sounds pretty attractive. Youd say, Wow, it could be worse. But its not attractive. Its not attractive at all.

Weve done this weird thing over the years where we have really altered the balance of power constitutionally. Weve expanded the power of the executive branch, weve expanded the power of the judicial branch, and [weve] shrunk the power of the legislative branch. Which is probably pretty bad for us long term. But even as thats happened, the judicial branch has still been regarded pretty widely as being legitimate. People look at it and they say, OK, I may not like this ruling. I may think that I would like this ruling to be changed at some point, but at least Im going to respect that this ruling is the law of the land. And it has been arrived at by a legitimate manner.

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If there is a 5 percent chance that America could wind up like Hungary, thats a big fing deal.  Jonathan V. Last

And what Mitch McConnell and the Senate Republicans have done here is really just break that. I dont think theres any other way to say that. And to be very clear if they had voted on Merrick Garland and then decided to vote on this nominee now, I think that would basically be fine. If they had taken the tack they took on Garland and not held a vote and then not held a vote now, that would have been fine. You can make constitutional arguments for one of those eventualities over the other as being preferable, but so long as there some basic consistency, you could say, OK, this might be suboptimal, but its not the end of the world. Doing this with a swing seat [though], the only remedy winds up being a wholesale reform of the court. And reforming the court just because we live in the worst of all possible timelines is likely to take the form of attempted reforms, which will continue to escalate the problem.

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And this is why the idea of expanding the court by another, what, three justices or six justiceshowever many more justices you want to put onI think winds up continuing down the very dangerous road that were on. And the much better way would be to find a mechanism which would allow us to de-emphasize the importance of the court, to make it less of a flashpoint and make it so that we dont have to have total war every time theres a Supreme Court nomination.

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And the obvious answer for that, I think, is to regularize the termsso the Supreme Court terms are 18 years. You have a regular schedule; this way even a two-term president doesnt get to have a majority of appointees on the court at any one time. But Ive given up on hoping that anything good can ever happen in the world we live in.

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Well thats good; that at least protects yourself.

When we talk about the legitimacy of the court, Gallup last did polling in 2019. So what they ask is how much trust and confidence do you have inand they go through the different branches. So the executive branch in 2019 polled at cumulative 55 percent expressing not much or no confidence at all in the executive branch. The legislative branch, 61 percent no confidence at all or not much confidence in the legislative branch, deservedly I would say. The judicial branch was at only 31 percent no confidence. They were at 69 percent having a great deal of confidence or a fair amount of confidence.

So if it becomes seen as illegitimate, what does that really mean? Does that mean that the judicial branch numbers become the legislative branch numbers? Does that mean something other than the perception of the average American? Or does that mean, even if people dont have confidence, as in the president and the legislature, both those branches still have the means to execute their policy.

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But the courts and the Supreme Court are fairly dependent, not just on the perception of legitimacy, but on the perception of the other two branches of their legitimacy. Otherwise we get into the situation where its, Mr. Taney has made his ruling; now let us see him enforce it.

Yeah. I think thats right. And weve already seen this with the legislative branch. Look at the way the Trump administration has just simply refused to comply with directives from the legislature, right? Refusing to send witnesses and then saying, well how are you going to do that? Youre going to have the sergeant of arms go and rouse people up off the street and bring them in to testify?

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Why wouldnt you wind up at a point where the Supreme Court could make a ruling, and the chief executive who happens to also be the commander in chief could then say, No, were not going to do that. Would you put that past Donald Trump? I sure wouldnt. And legitimacy is one of these things that sounds like just this gauzy, gooey abstraction, and you dont really understand how important it is until its gone, because its the foundation of everything. It is the consent of the governed.

And once it goes away, you cant put it back together again. I talk about us as a failed state, and were not yet. Its important to say that this isIm catastrophizing a little bit only because Im looking down the road to say that you can see how this happens. And even if you dont think its likely to happen, you look at it and you say, Look, we are unlikely to wind up like Hungary. [But] if there is a 5 percent chance that America could wind up like Hungary, thats a big fucking deal.

Yeah.

This is a state of affairs that we have not had in America in 140 years. To go from a 0 percent chance to a 2 percent or a 5 percent chance should scare the living crap out of everybody.

Listen to this full conversation between Mike Pesca and Jonathan V. Last below, and subscribe to The Gist on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. Join Slate Plus, and enjoy ad-free episodes of the show.
Tamika Mallory, the co-founder of the Women's March, has harshly criticized Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron, comparing him to 'sell-out N**roes' who participated in the trans-Atlantic slave trade.

Mallory spoke at a press conference in Louisville, Kentucky on Friday, where she blasted Cameron over a grand jury's decision not to directly charge officers in Breonna Taylor's killing.

'Daniel Cameron is no different than the sell-out N**roes that sold our people into slavery and helped white men capture our people to abuse them and to traffic them,' she said. 'That is who you are Daniel Cameron.

'You are a sell-out, and you were used by the system to harm your own mama, your own black mama,' she continued. 'We have no respect for you, no respect for your black skin because all of our skinfolk ain't our kinfolk and you do not belong to black people at all.'

'Daniel Cameron is no different than the sell-out N**roes that sold our people into slavery,' said Women's March co-founder Tamika Mallory at a press conference on Friday

Cameron is Kentucky's first black attorney general, and is considered to be a rising star in the Republican party. He was included on President Donald Trump's shortlist of potential Supreme Court nominees, and praised by the president, who said he handled the Taylor case 'very well'.

On Wednesday, Cameron announced the grand jury findings in Taylor's March 13 death. She was fatally shot by police during a drug raid, after cops returned fire when her boyfriend shot at and struck one officer.

Cameron presented the evidence to a state grand jury, which found Taylor's shooting death justified. The grand jury indicted one of the three officers who opened fire for wanton endangerment, over alleged wild shots that entered a neighboring apartment.

Mallory pointed out that Cameron announced the grand jury finding on September 23, the same date that in 1955 an all-white jury acquitted two defendants in the murder of Emmett Till, a black boy who was lynched in Mississippi.

On Wednesday, Cameron announced the grand jury findings in Taylor's March 13 death. The grand jury did not directly charge officers with her killing

'Now I don't know if it's just that Daniel Cameron is stupid or that he is very, very, very clear about history and made a decision to wait six months and come forward with this announcement, this garbage that we received on the exact same day that Emmett Till's family received the same results,' she said.

A spokesperson for Cameron's office said that he understands that the outcome of the grand jury proceedings was not what protesters had hoped for.

'Regarding today's statements at the press conference, everyone is entitled to their opinion, but prosecutors and Grand Jury members are bound by the facts and by the law,' the spokesperson said in a statement.

'Attorney General Cameron is committed to doing everything he can to ensure the integrity of the prosecution before him and continue fulfilling his ethical obligations both as a prosecutor and as a partner in the ongoing federal investigation.'
By Trend

The US embassy in Azerbaijan urges US citizens to reconsider non-essential travel outside of the Azerbaijan's Absheron Peninsula due to heightened tensions and recent violence along portions of the Azerbaijan-Armenia border, Trend reports with reference to the embassy.

"The US embassy in Baku has instructed US embassy employees and their family members not to travel outside of the Absheron Peninsula. The US citizens throughout Azerbaijan are encouraged to continue to monitor local news reporting for any new developments. The US embassy encourages US citizens to exercise caution in public spaces and avoid any public demonstrations that develop. The embassy will continue to monitor the security situation and provide additional information as needed," the embassy said.

--

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
WHO gives nod to Bharat Biotech's Covaxin for emergency use listing

Days after recommending booster dose, INSACOG says more experiments needed to assess its impact

3 volunteers to get 1st dose of Covishield during trials in Mumbai today

India

oi-Briti Roy Barman

Mumbai, Sep 26: Three volunteers will get the first doses of Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine candidate 'Covishield' on Saturday at Mumbai's King Edward Memorial (KEM) Hospital.

"Three participants were screened after obtaining their consent...they did not have comorbidities," KEM hospital's Dean said.

On Saturday, more people will be screened which will take the number of volunteers to 23, BMC stated.

UN Summit hope for COVID-19 vaccine made available, affordable to all countries

BYL Nair Hospital has announced that from September 28, it will also embark on trials and administer the first doses to eligible volunteers. Currently, the process of screening suitable volunteers is underway, hospital authorities said.

Covishield has been developed and is being tested by researchers at Oxford University and is being made and manufactured by the Pune-based Serum Institute of India (SII).

The ethics committee had on Tuesday given the hospital the green signal to start the screening of registered volunteers and so far, 13 volunteers have been screened.

"We will administer the first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine to the three volunteers on Saturday, following which they will have to remain in hospital for two hours, to check whether they develop complications," Additional Municipal Commissioner Suresh Kakani said.

Those vaccinated would be checked regularly and would be administered the second dose within 29 days.

In the meantime, 10 more volunteers would be screened on September 26 and with this, the number of volunteers would increase to 23.

Deepika Padukone questioned in drug probe | India tears into Pakistan | Oneindia News

"We will check how they have responded after the inoculation and test them for antibody titre. We will keep checking them over a period of time, to observe how long the antibody cover is available and how the person responds with the cover," Kakani added.

Last week, the Drugs Controller General Of India (DCGI) had given SII the nod to conduct Phases 2 and 3 of the human clinical trials of Covishield in India.
Whenever I think of Mrs Thatcher I come back to that picture, the one of her wandering across an industrial wasteland. It must be the northerner in me, but I cant forget how the iconic photo was accompanied by not much at all. The emptiness of the landscape was matched by her sheer absence of a shared understanding and compassion, call it empathy.

She had many qualities but Thatcher failed to see beyond the demon she held responsible for the desolation: the trade unions. Defeat them, the prime minister reasoned, and all would be well: Britain would go on to prosper, its economy would flourish, hidden entrepreneurs would come to the fore and shine.

Hammer them, she certainly did. And while in many respects her crusade was brave and correct  the country really was being shackled  once victory had been secured, it was accompanied by nothing. Unforgivably it was followed by neglect.
By Elizabeth Kwiatkowski, 09/26/2020



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Elizabeth Kwiatkowski is Associate Editor of Reality TV World and has been covering the reality TV genre for more than a decade.

star Tarik Myers ' brother Dean Hashim is going to be a father!Dean, a 40-year-old from Virginia Beach, VA, and his girlfriend Rigin Bado from the Philippines are expecting their first child together, according to Celeb Magazine.A source close to Dean told the magazine, "Fans of likely remember Dean Hashim for his brother, Tarik... Dean made many appearances on the show and also appeared with Tarik on Pillow Talk.""Fans were highly disappointed when they left the show, as they were one of the fans' favorites to tune in for. While they haven't been seen on TV in a bit, there is some exciting news for Dean. Specifically, Dean and his girlfriend Rigin have a baby on the way!"The source added Dean's alleged baby on the way is exclusive news and has not been made public yet."No one knows this information yet, as the couple has been keeping their lips sealed, aside from close friends and confidants," the source explained."They haven't revealed their gender yet -- or even confirmed this news publicly -- but we are 100 percent certain she is pregnant and that the couple have a baby on the way. This is definitely an exciting time for Dean and Rigin."Dean allegedly refused to comment when contacted on the pregnancy report rather than issue a denial, which adds to the likelihood the source has spilled accurate information.Dean memorably expressed skepticism over the intentions of Tarik's Filipina fiancee Hazel Cagalitan and whether they'd have a successful relationship and future together on : Before the 90 Days' second season.Presumably due to his outspoken and charismatic personality, Dean appeared on : Pillow Talk with Tarik and also gave fans an update on his love life during an episode of : Self-Quarantined earlier this year.On the Self-Quarantined special that aired back in May, Dean explained that he became familiar with the Philippines through Tarik's relationship with Hazel and so he signed up for an international dating app on the lookout for an international romance of his own.Rigin said she had been talking to several American men on the dating website but Dean ended up stealing her heart due to his sense of humor. She called him "a good partner.""After five months of talking, I flew to the Philippines to meet Rigin about a year ago. The plan was to stay down here for 10 days, but I ended up staying here for good," Dean revealed.SoapDirt reported in April 2019 that Dean had bought a condo in Cebu City, but he and Rigin reportedly upgraded recently in order to have more room for their growing family.The Celeb Magazine source revealed, "Dean recently moved into a six-bedroom home in the Philippines. Obviously, with all this room, him and Rigin will have lots of room for their new baby to run around and enjoy."Dean may have found a job in the Philippines because on : Self-Quarantined, Dean explained he and Rigin were living off his disabled veterans' pension, which wasn't a lot.But Dean noted the U.S. dollar is "very strong" in the Philippines.Dean claimed Rigin didn't ask him for money when they first met but that changed as they got more serious.Dean said he wasn't going to let Rigin take advantage of him, but she insisted to cameras she just wanted to help her family.Finances and communication were points of contention between the couple on the special, and Rigin also apparently got in the way of Dean's relationship with Tarik."To keep it 100 with you, he really doesn't support my life, man, out here. He had a really big problem with me coming out here," Dean said on the show."I think Tarik approves of my relationship with Rigin but doesn't approve of the way I went about my relationship... He didn't like [me moving to the Philippines.]"However, Rigin gushed about how she and her boyfriend were growing closer as they quarantined together and learning new things about each other every day.Want more spoilers or couples updates? Click here to visit our homepage!
Urging the global community to collectively fight against terrorism, organised crimes and several illegal activities, Nepal's Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli on Friday called for an early conclusion of a Comprehensive Convention on International terrorism (CCIT).

The global community needs to unite against the transnational problems such as terrorism, organised crime, illicit financial flows, human and drug trafficking. Nepal condemns terrorism in all its forms and manifestations; or other activities inflicting pain and suffering to the innocent people. We call for an early conclusion of a comprehensive convention against terrorism, Prime Minister Oli said at the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA).

Proposed by India in 1996, the CCIT provides a legal framework which makes it binding on all signatories to deny funds and safe havens to terrorist groups. India has been pushing for the early adoption of the CCIT at the United Nations but the convention continues to remain a draft due to a lack of consensus.

READ | Nepal Urges SAARC Nations To Convene 19th Summit Soon; To Collectively Fight Coronavirus Pandemic

Nepal PM addresses COVID-19, other ongoing issues

During his speech at the UNGA, KP Sharma Oli further stressed upon a host of ongoing issues including COVID-19, climate crisis, human rights and also the rising world military expenditure. The Nepal PM further noted the fallouts of the pandemic on public health, livelihoods of people and the economy. He called for smooth and affordable access to anti-COVID vaccines once they are developed.

"What matters most in the ongoing health crisis is an easy, smooth and affordable access by all to anti-COVID vaccines after they are developed; sharing of knowledge and experiences; and provision of timely supply of medical equipment and medicines," Oli said.

READ | Pakistan PM Imran Khan Fearmongers Over Kashmir's Domicile Law At UNGA; India Walks Out

Expressing concerns over the worsening humanitarian conditions in Libya, Syria and Yemen, the Nepal PM called for peaceful resolution of all conflicts, led by the citizens of the countries.

"We would like to see peace and stability in the Middle East with a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine, living side by side in peace and security with secure and recognised international borders based on relevant United Nations resolutions," he said.

KP Oli also discouraged the arms race, weaponisation of outer space, and cyber warfare, stating that it inflicts a huge cost on humanity. "In 2019, the world military expenditure amounted to US dollar 1.9 trillion. Even a fraction of those resources could bring respite to the millions of people suffering from poverty, hunger, and deprivation," he added.

READ | Palau President Hails India At UNGA For invaluable Support' To Fight COVID-19

READ | Why Turkey Strongman Erdogan's Swipe Against India At UNGA Is Plain Political Opportunism

(Image credits: ANI)
By Express News Service

MUMBAI: The Serum Institute of India (SII) has asked the Centre if they will have Rs 80,000 crore in their kitty to buy and distribute the Oxford Covid-19 vaccine next year.

Adar Poonawalla, CEO of SII which is producing the potential coronavirus vaccine with Oxford University and British pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca, raised the question on Twitter Saturday: Quick question; will the government of India have Rs 80,000 crores available, over the next one year? Because that's what @MoHFW_INDIA needs, to buy and distribute the vaccine to everyone in India. This is the next concerning the challenge we need to tackle.

Quick question; will the government of India have 80,000 crores available, over the next one year? Because that's what @MoHFW_INDIA needs, to buy and distribute the vaccine to everyone in India. This is the next concerning challenge we need to tackle. @PMOIndia  Adar Poonawalla (@adarpoonawalla) September 26, 2020

He further says, I ask this question, because we need to plan and guide, vaccine manufacturers both in India and overseas to service the needs of our country in terms of procurement and distribution.

The central health ministry official was surprised by the tweet of Poonawlla. They said that they have not received any official proposal from the Serum Institute of Indian regarding mass production, procurement, and distributions of the vaccine. "We are also clueless about this tweet," they said requested anonymity.

When contacted, Adar Poonawalla's office refused to elaborate on the intention behind sharing this information in the public domain. "Whatever Mr Poonawalla wanted to say, he had tweeted it and that is only information from their side."

More than 150 potential vaccines are being developed and tested globally. Candidates from Moderna Inc, Pfizer Inc, and AstraZeneca Plc are already in late-stage trials.

Earlier, SII was asked by the drug regulator to pause the Oxford vaccine trial in India after an adverse reaction was reported abroad.
Marc Winter assaulted his wife Selina at their home in Whitely Bay last year

He served with Northumbria Police until 2016 and Leicestershire Police before

A judge said he would have been sent to prison immediately if not for his career

A 'highly decorated' former police inspector left his wife with bleeding on the brain after he smashed her over the head with a prosecco bottle.

Marc Winter, 58, viciously attacked his wife Selina, also a police officer, last year in their home in Whitley Bay, Tyne and Wear.

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He hit her 'four or five' times over the head at their bungalow after they went out for a drink and she collapsed unconscious after getting out of the house, a court heard.

Winter who served with Northumbria Police for 23 years and Leicestershire Police before that, pleaded guilty to causing unlawful wounding.

A judge at Newcastle Crown Court said only his career as a police officer, which ended in 2016, saved him from going immediately to prison.

Former Northumbria Police inspector Marc Winter, 58, viciously attacked his wife Selina, also a police officer, last year in their home in Whitley Bay, Tyne and Wear

Mrs Winter said in a victim impact statement that her life had changed considerably following the attack by the person she loved and trusted and was still suffering pain from her injuries months later and had lost some hair.

She said she was suffering daily headaches, fatigue, insomnia and dizziness and was unable to drive for six months due to her injuries.

Mrs Winter added: 'I can't believe my husband could do this to me after 15 years.

'As a police officer of 12 years, I have responded to many domestic incidents and spoken to victims and perpetrators but I'm struggling to come to terms with being on the other side and being a victim myself.

'I feel like I'm looking in on someone else's life. I've had 12 years of self-defence training and I did nothing. That's proving hard to come to terms with.

'Over the last 12 years I have responded to several violent incidents but I've never felt as frightened or fearful as I did on that day.

Click here to resize this module

'I genuinely thought I was going to die. I know how lucky I am to be here and able to type this victim personal statement.'

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The court heard the couple, who are no longer together, had been partners for nearly 15 years and were married for four.

On August 23 last year, they went to a local pub around 5.30pm and left around 10pm, stopping on their way home to buy a bottle of prosecco and some food.

When they got home, they were watching TV and Winter brought up the subject of marital difficulties they were having, which Mrs Winter did not want to discuss.

She said Winter 'would not let it drop' and she tried ignoring him.

Mrs Winter said the empty or almost empty bottle of Prosecco was on the coffee table in front of the sofa.

Judge Amanda Rippon at Newcastle Crown Court said only Winter's career as a police officer, which ended in 2016, saved him from going immediately to prison

She said: 'I suddenly felt a hard blow to the right side of my head. He was then over me and I felt four or five blows across my head.'

Mrs Winter said they felt like full force blows and she saw he was using the bottle to hit her.

Winter told her 'this is the only way this is going to end'.

Mrs Winter added: 'It was like he just lost it for a couple of minutes.'

He let her get up but then blocked her from getting out of the front door.

Mrs Winter, bleeding from a head wound, struggled with her husband to try to get out and cried out for help from neighbours.

She eventually got out, with nothing on her feet, but was unable to rouse any neighbours to help.

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She made it back to the pub, where she collapsed on the floor, losing consciousness twice, and paramedics arrived to take her to hospital.

Ian West, prosecuting, said her hair was covered in blood and stuck together and a CT scan revealed bleeding on the surface of the brain.

She also had grazes to her head.

When Winter was arrested, he claimed: 'I've been hit over the head with a glass and acted in self-defence.'

In police interview, he declined to answer questions.

Winter pleaded guilty to unlawful wounding and was sentenced to two years suspended for two years and must do 120 hours unpaid work.

Judge Amanda Rippon told Winter: 'You were protecting and serving the public for going on four decades and this is an ignominious end to what was a character properly described as not just good but exemplary.

'Instead of protecting, you injured. Instead of serving, you harmed.

'I need to make it clear, this is an exceptional course I'm taking because when a husband picks up a bottle and hits his wife over the head multiple times, they generally go straight to prison.

'The only reason I've told you I would not send you to prison is because of the life you led up until August last year.'

Jane Waugh, defending, said Mrs Winter has now moved to Turkey while on maternity leave with her Turkish partner

She said: 'He is not trying to say what she suffered at his hands was not a terrible ordeal or that she didn't suffer pain afterwards.'

Miss Waugh said Winter is attending counselling with a psychotherapist.

The court heard he was in the army before joining the police and had PTSD.

Character references spoke of him as being hard working and professional and someone who cared about the public and his family.

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Winter worked for Leicestershire Police from 1988 until 1993 and Northumbria Police from 1993 until 2016.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday made a strong pitch for Indias inclusion as a permanent member of United Nations Security Council (UNSC) as he asked how long will his country be kept out of the decision-making structures of the global body.

The Prime Minister said every Indian aspires for Indias expanded role in the United Nations as they see the countrys contribution while addressing the virtual 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA). His address in Hindi was a pre-recorded video statement which was broadcast at the UNGA hall in New York as it is being conducted mostly virtually amid the coronavirus pandemic.

WATCH | PM Modis veiled terror jibe at Pak, China at UNGA; seeks UNSC seat: Full speech

Today, the people of India are concerned whether this reform process will ever reach its logical conclusion. For how long will India be kept out of the decision-making structures of the United Nations? PM Modi asked at UNGA.

It is a fact that the faith and respect that the UN enjoys among the 1.3 billion people in India is unparalleled, he pointed out.

When we were strong, we were never a threat to the world. When we were weak, we never become a burden on the world. How long would a country have to wait particularly when the transformational changes happening in that country affect a large part of the world? he said in his nearly 22-minute speech.

This is a country, which has hundreds of languages, hundreds of dialects, many sects and many ideologies. This is a country, which was a leading global economy for centuries and also one which has endured hundreds of years of foreign rule. How long would a country have to wait particularly when the transformational changes happening in that country affect a large part of the world? he asked.

He also referred to Indias contributions to about 50 UN peace missions over the decades.

India has always given priority to the welfare of the whole world. India is the country, which sent its brave soldiers to about 50 peacekeeping missions the world over to keep the peace. India is that country, which in the course of maintaining peace, has lost the maximum number of its brave soldiers Today every Indian, while seeing the contribution of India in the United Nations, aspires for Indias expanded role in the United Nations, he said.

Barring China, all other four permanent members of the UNSC have expressed support for Indias candidature for a permanent seat in the security council.

PM Modis speech came ahead of India taking a seat at the powerful UN Security Council as an elected non-permanent member for two years from January 1, 2021. India will focus on the 5 S approach of samman (respect), samvad (dialogue), sahyog (cooperation), shanti (peace) and samriddhi (prosperity) during its stint as a non-permanent member of the Security Council.

Need for change

He also said that the United Nations need to change its reactions, arrangements and appearance to stay relevant. Today we are in a different era all together... There is a big question in front of the whole world community that whether the institution that was formed under the circumstances of that time is still relevant today, PM Modi said during his address.

If we evaluate the achievements of the United Nations in the last 75 years, many achievements are seen. There are also many examples, which raise the need for serious introspection in front of the United Nations, Modi said. Reform in the responses, processes and in the very character of the UN is the need of the hour, he added.

He also said India is proud to be one of the founding members of the global body.

Pakistans response

PM Modis speech came after his Pakistani counterpart Imran Khans reference to Kashmir and criticism of the Indian government in his address to the UN General Assembly. Khan had on Friday made repeated references to India and the Kashmir issue in a pre-recorded video statement. The Pakistani leader had called on the world community to prosecute Indian personnel allegedly involved in state terrorism and crimes against humanity in Jammu and Kashmir.

India had dismissed Khans reference, saying the neighbouring countrys unrelenting support to terrorism poses a threat to global security. The Indian delegate present in the General Assembly, Mijito Vinito, first secretary at the Indian mission to the UN, had walked out as Khans video statement was being played.

India subsequently exercised its right of reply to respond to Khans speech. Let me assert here loud and clear: The union territory of Jammu and Kashmir is an integral and inalienable part of India. The rules and legislation brought in the union territory of Jammu and Kashmir are strictly internal affairs of India, Vinito, said.

The only dispute left in Kashmir relates to that part of Kashmir that is still under illegal occupation of Pakistan. We call upon Pakistan to vacate all those areas that it is in illegal occupation of, Vinito, a diplomat from the 2010 batch of the Indian Foreign Service (IFS), said. Vinito said Khans address marked a new low on the 75th anniversary of the UN.

The theme of the debate for 2020 is - The Future We Want, the UN We Need: Reaffirming our Collective Commitment to Multilateralism.
Reform in the responses and the processes, and in the very character of the United Nations (UN) is the need of the hour and India cannot be kept out of the body's decision-making structures for long, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said during his address to the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on September 26.

"Today, people of India are concerned whether this reform-process will ever reach its logical conclusion. For how long will India be kept out of the decision-making structures of the United Nations?" PM Modi said during his address.

Talking about the COVID-19 pandemic, PM Modi said that as the largest vaccine producing country in the world, India's capacity will be "used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis".

ALSO READ: Indian delegate walks out of UN General Assembly during Pakistan PM Imran Khan's speech

"In India and in our neighbourhood, we are moving ahead with phase 3 clinical trials in India. India will also help all the countries in enhancing their cold chain and storage capacities for the delivery of the vaccines," the prime minister said.

"India is that country, which in the course of maintaining peace, has lost the maximum number of its brave soldiers. Today every Indian, while seeing the contribution of India in UN, aspires for Indias expanded role in the United Nations," PM Modi said.

The prime minister also said that when India was strong, the country was never a threat to the world.

"(And) when we were weak, we never became a burden. Ideals on which the the UN was founded and India's very own fundamental philosophy have much in common. Within the halls of the UN, one has often heard the words, the world is one family. We treat the whole world as a family," PM Modi said, adding that during the COVID-19 pandemic, India's pharma industry has sent medicines to over 150 countries.

ALSO READ: The winds at the UN General Assembly are not in favour of India

"Starting from January next year, India will also fulfil its responsibility as a non-permanent member of the Security Council. India will always speak in support of peace, security and prosperity," PM Modi said.

India will take over the non-permanent member position at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) from January 2021 for a period of two years.

"Over the past few years, with the mantra of Reform-Perform-Transform, India has brought about major changes in the lives of crores of Indians. These experiences are as useful for many countries of the world as for us," the prime minister said, adding that India is moving forward with the vision of 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat'.

"A self-reliant India will also be a force multiplier for the global economy," the prime minister said.

The prime minister also said that the challenges of 21st century are different from those of 1945 and the world today is facing newer problems.

"If we were to make an objective assessment of the performance of UN over the last 75 years, we see several stellar achievements. But at the same time, there are also several instances that point to the need for a serious introspection of the work of the United Nations," PM Modi said.

"Several terrorist attacks shook the world and rivers of blood have continued to flow by. In these wars and in these attacks, the people who died, they are people just like you and me," the prime minister said.

"Where is the United Nations in this joint fight against the pandemic? Where is its effective response?" PM Modi said.

The UN General Assembly this year is largely being held online due to the coronavirus pandemic. Majority of world leaders are delivering pre-recorded speeches at the summit in New York.
(Photo : Kon Karampelas/Unsplash) New TikTok Challenge proves to be fatal (Photo : Johnson and Johnson) Benadryl Challenge

The Food and Drug Administration has released a warning against overdosing of Benadryl, a popular over-the-counter allergy drug, as a TikTok challenge led to teenage deaths.

The FDA posted the statement on its website on September 25 that they are investigating reports about teenagers who ended up in hospitals after doing the "Benadryl Challenge" challenge and if additional adverse cases have been reported. The drug can trigger seizures, serious heart problems, coma, or even death, so authorities advise parents and consumers to take the medicine out of children's sight and reach.

What is Benadryl Challenge?

The Benadryl Challenge is one of the new challenges in the TikTok platform where in the audience is urged to take high doses of Benadryl to induce hallucinations. Health officials warn this is highly dangerous and could even be fatal.

In Fort Worth, Texas, medical officials also issued a warning against other teens putting their health in danger with the challenge. This follows as three teens were admitted in Cook Children's Medical Center within a week in July after taking large doses of Benadryl.

One of the patients took 14 pills in the evening of Memorial Day as she was inspired by TikTok videos showing teens hallucinating after ingesting high doses.

Meanwhile, in Oklahoma, the death of 15-year-old teen in August was reported to be related to the challenge, although the cause of her death is yet to be revealed.

The "Benadryl challenge" proved to be highly risky, if not the most dangerous trends launched in TikTok.

In an email sent to CBS MoneyWatch, a TikTok spokesperson said that the social media company does "not allow content that encourages, promotes or glorifies dangerous challenges that might lead to injury."

While the TikTok spokesperson has not yet seen the Benadryl challenge, he said that they "actively remove content that violates our guidelines and block related hashtags" to halt further participation among TikTok users.

Benadryl has 'adverse effects'

Johnson & Johnsons, maker of Benadryl, wrote on its website that misuse and abuse of the drug can have "serious side effects with potentially long-lasting or even life-threatening consequences."

Officially called as diphenhydramine, Benadryl provides temporary relief on sneezing, runny nose, itchy throat, and watery eyes, and other symptoms of upper respiratory allergies. The recommended dosage is only "one to two 25 mg tablets every four to six hours," although it should not exceed six doses in 24 hours.

UMass Memorial Medical Center director of the medical toxicology division Dr. Kavita Babu told Yahoo Life that the said dosage is for adults while younger kids may have low doses, depending on their weight. Dr. Babu also said that even safe doses can even "have adverse effects like sedation, dry mouth, and difficulty urinating" while warns of additional side effects may include upset stomach, dizziness, and loss of coordination.

"You're going to feel like death"

Meanwhile, some of those who participated I the challenge shared new TikTok videos to shed light on the effects of taking too much Benadryl and they warn teens against trying it.

In one video with caption "I had to go to the hospital and almost died," the user advised teenagers not to even try participating in the challenge. TikTok user Levi said that after he took too many Benadryl, he felt like the walls look like static and "bugs are crawling up your skin" the whole time. "You're going to sweat; you're going to feel like death. Don't f**king do it," he added.

Read also: Meet Marques Brownlee! YouTube's Biggest Solo Tech Reviewer with MKBHD Podcast and Million in Everything

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RTHK: Johnson looks to appoint BBC critics for media roles

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson wants to appoint two Brexit-backing critics of the BBC to important roles in the media, including one as chairman of the publicly owned broadcaster itself, the Times reported on Saturday.

The newspaper said Johnson had asked Charles Moore, a former editor of the Daily Telegraph, to become the chairman of the BBC and wanted Paul Dacre, a former editor of the Daily Mail, to be chairman of media regulator Ofcom.

"This is part of a process of the prime minister putting allies in key positions," the newspaper quoted one source close to Johnson as saying.

Moore and Dacre both led right-wing dailies and have accused the BBC of a left-wing bias and a willingness to go beyond its core remit of providing public service broadcasting. The BBC has denied the criticism.

The BBC is widely respected globally but it has clashed with members of Johnson's governing Conservative Party who accuse it of being out of touch with the country, particularly over Britain's departure from the European Union.

Ofcom regulates the British media industry, including the BBC. (Reuters)

This story has been published on: 2020-09-26. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
WASHINGTON, Sept. 26, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- President Donald Trump tonight nominated Judge Amy Coney Barrett of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit to the United States Supreme Court to replace the late-Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg. The following statement in response to the appointment may be attributed to Kelly Shackelford, President, CEO, and Chief Counsel for First Liberty Institute:



President Trump has nominated a judge to the Supreme Court who we are confident will protect the religious freedoms and constitutional rights of all Americans. Judge Barretts record demonstrates her commitment to the Constitutions text and its purpose. Judge Barrett understands that government exists to protect the God-given rights of the people and the Constitution exists to prevent government from infringing on those rights. She will make an excellent Supreme Court Justice, and we expect the Senate to confirm her without delay.

About First Liberty Institute

First Liberty Institute is the largest legal organization in the nation dedicated exclusively to defending religious freedom for all Americans.



To arrange an interview, contact Lacey McNiel at media@firstliberty.org or by calling 972-941-4453.
SPRINGFIELD  Illinois taxpayers could see a 20% income tax hike if voters dont approve of Gov. J.B. Pritzkers fair tax constitutional amendment in November.

Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton said on a conference call Thursday that the state would have to raise income taxes by $4 billion, more than the income tax amendment would have brought in before the Pritzker administrations shutdown orders amid the pandemic.

To adequately address the budget crisis under our current tax system, lawmakers will be forced to consider raising income taxes on all Illinois residents by at least 20% regardless of their level of income, Stratton said. We all know that our middle and low-income families cannot withstand a 20% tax increase and it will only serve to deepen the dramatic inequities that we already see across the state.

A 20% income tax increase would put the states income tax rate at 5.94%. This would also be the highest personal income tax rate in Illinois history. In 2011, lawmakers increased the income tax to 5% and allowed part of it to sunset before raising it again to 4.95% in 2017.

Stratton stressed that an income tax increase of that proportion would hurt the states economy, already ailing from the pandemic and deepen the dramatic inequities that we already see across the state.

If approved, the progressive income tax amendment would increase taxes on those earning more than $250,000 to 7.75%. It would scale up to 7.99% at income more than $1 million, also retroactively taxing all lesser income at that higher rate once the filer earns that much.

On Friday, House Republican Leader Jim Durkin, of Western Springs, and Deputy Leader Tom Demmer, of Dixon, held a virtual news conference accusing the Pritzker administration of threatening a massive tax increase across the board if voters do not approve the amendment.

Pritzker said Republicans were taking Strattons comments out of context. He repeated the argument he has often made that the state was suffering from a structural budget deficit, even before the pandemic, and there are only a certain number of ways to address that.

One, he said, would be to raise the current flat rate by a full percentage point, to 5.9 percent. Another would be to cut state spending by 15 percent across the board, which he said would result in large property tax increases statewide to fund public schools.

The third choice, he said, is the proposed amendment that would raise taxes on people earning more than $250,000, about 3 percent of the states population, while leaving tax rates the same or cutting them for the other 97 percent.

And the best direction that we should go to deal with this is to make sure that were asking those who are most able to step up to pay to do so  those are the wealthiest in our state  and thats the direction that I think we ought to go. And thats what the lieutenant governor was talking about.
Mumbai, Sep 26 : The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) on Saturday questioned Bollywood divas Deepika Padukone, Sara Ali Khan, Shraddha Kapoor for several hours in a drugs case in connection with the death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput.

Besides the three actors, the NCB also questioned Deepika's former manager Karishma Prakash. According to NCB sources, Deepika and Karishma were "evasive" on alleged procurement of drugs as was indicated in an alleged chat of October 2017.

Deepika, who arrived at the NCB office before 10 am at the agency's guesthouse in Colaba area, left around 3.30 pm. Even Karishma, who deposed for the second time on Saturday at 10.45 am, left around 3.30 pm.

The NCB has got the details of the chats of Deepika and Karishma from October 2017 wherein the two were discussing drugs and planned to meet at Club Koko.

Deepika and Karishma were summoned by the NCB after their names came to the fore in the drug-related case.

Meanwhile, Shraddha, who appeared at the NCB office around 11.45 a.m., left the NCB office in the Ballard Pier area at 6 p.m.

Sara, who arrived at the NCB office around 1 p.m., was questioned for over four and half hours.

Shraddha's name came to the fore after her alleged chat with Sushant's former manager Jaya Saha asking for CBD oil came to the fore and also that she visited Pawna resort along with Sushant.

Meanwhile, troubles for Sara mounted after Sushant's girlfriend Rhea Chakraborty, during one of the television interviews, claimed that the late actor caught the habit of smoking marijuana while shooting for Kedarnath. Sara starred with Sushant in the film.

Deepika was summoned on Wednesday when she was in Goa for the shooting of a film. She arrived in Mumbai on Thursday and was set to appear on Friday. But on the request of Deepika's legal team, the NCB postponed it to Saturday.

The NCB had recorded the statement of actor Rakul Preet Singh and Karishma on Friday.

Commenting on the questioning of three actors by the NCB, Jaikush Hoon, a noted criminal lawyer said the main focal point of NCB questioning with the actors revolves around six aspects i.e. "procurement, payment, involvement, partner in crime, consumption and lastly the place of consumption".

Hoon said, in case, if they render cooperation to the agency with the ongoing investigation, the NCB could book them for an offence punishable under section-8(c), 20(b)(b), 22(A), 27(b) of NDPS Act, 1985. "In case if they don't cooperate with the probe then section-8(c), 20 (b)(c),22(b), 22(c),27(a) and 28,29,30 of the same act would apply," he added.

The NCB registered a case after the Enforcement Directorate (ED) registered a case of money laundering into the death of Sushant and then found the alleged chats on drugs on the phones of Rhea, her brother Showik and Sushant's house manager Samuel Miranda.

The ED then wrote to the NCB to probe the drugs case. After registering the case, the NCB questioned several people and arrested Rhea, Showik, Miranda, Sushant's personal staff Dipesh Sawant and 16 others.

The NCB has also questioned Sushant's former manager Shruti Modi, Dharma Productions former executive producer Kshitij Prasad Ravi, Kwan Talent Management Agency CEO Dhruv Chitgopekar, noted producer Madhu Mantena Varma and several others in the case so far.

The CBI and the ED are probing separate cases in connection with the death of Sushant, who was found dead on June 14 at his Bandra apartment.

Latest updates on Sushant Singh Rajput Death Mystery
History might as well be the middle name of the late Justice Ruth Baden Ginsburg as she continues to make history even in her death.

Ginsburg is honored as the first woman to lie in state at the U.S. Capitol, and the catafalque used for her coffin is the same one that was hastily made for no other than President Abraham Lincoln after his assassination in April 1865.

A catafalque is like a decorated wooden framework used to support a distinguished person's coffin during a funeral or while lying in state.

Lincoln's catafalque is a base made of rough pine boards nailed together measuring 7 feet, 1 inch long, 2 feet, 6 inches wide, and 2 feet high, while the attached base is 8 feet, 10 inches long, 4 feet, 3 inches wide and 2 inches tall. A black cloth covers it.

This same catafalque is often used for most memorial services at the Capitol, and it was last used for Rep. John Lewis in July.

Ginsburg's flag-draped casket was transferred by motorcade across the street to the Capitol from the Supreme Court, where she had laid in repose for two days at the top of the Supreme Court's front steps.

Ginsburg succumbed to pancreatic cancer last September 18. She was 87 years old.

Aside from being the first woman to lie in state at the Capitol, she is also the second Supreme Court justice accorded that honor. The first was former Chief Justice William Howard Taft, who also served as the U.S. president from 1909 to 1913.

Members of the Congress, friends, family, and top military officials have gone to the Capitol to pay their respects to the cultural icon - a woman who changed American law and the perceptions of a women's power.

Both presidential nominees, President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden, were among those who paid their respects along with their respective wives, First Lady Melania Trump and Jill Biden.

Biden was the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee when Ginsburg was confirmed 27 years ago this month. He said that they had wonderful memories together.

Sen. Kamala Harris, Biden's vice presidential running mate, also paid her respects and said that Ginsburg cleared a path for women in civic life.

Harris noted that Ginsburg made America see what leadership looks like, in the law, and in terms of public service. Harris added that Ginsburg also broke many barriers, and she did this intentionally, knowing that women like her could follow in her footsteps.

As the first Jewish woman to lie in state at the Capitol, Rabbi Lauren Holtzblatt of the Adas Israel Congregation in Washington said that Ginsburg changed the course of American law brick by brick and case by case. And today, the rabbi said she makes history again.

Ginsburg will be buried at the Arlington National Cemetery next week. She will be laid to rest beside her husband, Martin, who passed away in 2010. An interment ceremony will also be held then.

Check these out:

Ginsburg Makes History, First Woman to Lie in State at U.S. Capitol

Second Stimulus Checks: Families Can Get as Much as $4,400 as Early as October 12

Trump to Name Amy Coney Barrett as Supreme Court Nominee
LOS ANGELES, CA / ACCESSWIRE / September 26, 2020 / Compare-autoinsurance.org (https://compare-autoinsurance.org) has launched a new blog post that presents some unexpected factors that affect the costs of car insurance and what drivers can do to pay less on their premiums.

For more info and free car insurance quotes, visit https://compare-autoinsurance.org/why-did-the-price-of-car-insurance-went-up-and-what-drivers-can-do-to-take-control.

It can be frustrating for drivers who have no claims to get a car insurance renewal and see the price go up for no apparent reason. There are many factors that can make the price of car insurance increase. Some factors are related to the things that revolve entirely around the policyholders' situation, the elements within their control. Other factors are beyond the policyholder's control.

Some of the most common factors that can lead to an increase in insurance are the following:

Claims history and driving record.

History of convictions or driving violations.

Change of ZIP code.

New drivers added to the policy.

Cancellation of home policy, or other policy causing the loss of the multi-policy discount.

The removal of a vehicle from the policy, causing the loss of the multi-car policy discount.

Change of employment, causing the loss of a group or professional discount.

Certain medical conditions.

Mistakes made by insurance companies.

Changes to the payment plan fees or structure on the insurance plan.

Factors that raise the premiums and are beyond the driver's control are the following:

Liability claims paid out by the insurance company. If the previous year(s) showed a steady increase in the amount the insurers have been paying on claims, then they can make some adjustments.

Collision, vandalism, or increased claims in the area. Sometimes due to changes in traffic patterns, weather patterns, or if areas become more congested over time, or a variety of other factors, an area may start to see increased claims. In these cases, the insurance providers will adjust their rates.

A rise in car theft rates in the area. Car thefts impact both new and old cars and every time the annual reports of top stolen vehicles come out; insurance companies are sure to take note. Drivers who own models of cars that are likely to be stolen should consider adding anti-theft devices or vehicle engraving and get a discount to offset the increases.

Uninsured drivers. The nationwide rate for drivers without insurance increased from 12.3 percent in 2010 to 13 percent in 2015. Insurance providers pay billions of dollars each year on the claims made on uninsured drivers. To offset these costs, insurance companies will raise the premiums to all policyholders.

Increased repair costs. Newer cars have sophisticated devices and gadgets that are expensive to repair or to replace. Also, some policyholders own older vehicles that have parts that are more difficult to be found on the market.

Credit scoring or underwriting changes. Sometimes, new factors are introduced into the calculations of insurance rates. In some cases, the files are not updated to include all the discounts and changes since the last renewal, and this can lead to a rise in premiums. One example is credit scoring. Most insurance companies use the credit score to determine insurance rates. A bad score will lead to higher insurance costs.

General underwriting rate increase. If an insurance company experiences overall losses that exceed their expectations, or if they have not reviewed their policyholders' rates for several years, then they will increase the rates to remain profitable.

Story continues

To save money on insurance, policyholders should get the help of their insurance agents or brokers. To check from where the increase is coming for, policyholders can ask their agent to quote another car in place of your own, if they think the vehicle is the reason for the increase. If the policyholders think it's about the area where they live, their agents can simply get a quote with a changed ZIP code. Agents can also help by checking other insurance companies for better deals.

For additional info, money-saving tips and free car insurance quotes, visit https://compare-autoinsurance.org.

Compare-autoinsurance.org is an online provider of life, home, health, and auto insurance quotes. This website is unique because it does not simply stick to one kind of insurance provider, but brings the clients the best deals from many different online insurance carriers. In this way, clients have access to offers from multiple carriers all in one place: this website. On this site, customers have access to quotes for insurance plans from various agencies, such as local or nationwide agencies, brand names insurance companies, etc.

"There are many drivers who are shocked to see that their insurance went up, even though they have no claims. The reasons for the increase are multiple, but luckily drivers can offset the increase with the right strategies," said Russell Rabichev, Marketing Director of Internet Marketing Company.

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View source version on accesswire.com:

https://www.accesswire.com/607927/Factors-and-Events-That-Increase-Car-Insurance-Costs




Production on the long-awaited scripted Tiger King TV series is set to begin early 2021.

And according to the Courier Mail, the show will be filmed in Brisbane, which will add millions to Queensland's economy.

Two other shows, including one with Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson, will also film in the state over the next 18 months as part of a $19.5 million deal that the Australian Government made with NBCUniversal's Universal Studio Group.

Coming soon: Production on the long-awaited scripted Tiger King TV series is set to begin production in Brisband early next year. (Pictured: Joe Exotic)

Federal Arts Minister Paul Fletcher said the productions will add $140 million into the local economy and create jobs for 1,000 cast and crew members and 2,000 extras.

'The productions will provide invaluable opportunities for Australian cast and crew, create a pipeline of work for local post-production, digital and visual effects businesses, and engage workers in sectors such as construction, transport, accommodation and hospitality,' he said.

Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk also said that Queensland is 'one of the safest places in the world to film'.

Economy: Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk (pictured) also said that Queensland is 'one of the safest places in the world to film'

In August, NBCUniversal Television and Streaming issued a straight-to-series order for Joe Exotic, starring Kate McKinnon as Carol Baskin, in a cross-platform deal.

The limited series will debut on NBCU's broadcast network NBC, cable network USA Network and new streaming service Peacock in what Deadline called, 'an unprecedented rollout.'

It was first announced back in November 2019, months before Netflix's Tiger King became a worldwide phenomenon, with McKinnon attached to both star and executive produce.

Star power: In August, NBCUniversal Television and Streaming issued a straight-to-series order for Joe Exotic, starring Kate McKinnon (pictured) as Carol Baskin, in a cross-platform deal

The title role of Joe 'Exotic' Schreibvogel has not yet been cast at this time.

The series will be based on the true events following Carole Baskin (played by McKinnon), 'a big cat enthusiast, who learns that when fellow exotic animal lover Joe 'Exotic' Schreibvogel is breeding and using his big cats for profit, she sets out to shut down his venture, inciting a quickly escalating rivalry.'

The show's official description adds that Carole, 'has a checkered past of her own' and that 'Joe will stop at nothing to expose what he sees as her hypocrisy.'
BEIRUT - A car bomb killed at least seven civilians in a Turkish-controlled area of northeastern Syria on Saturday, Syrias state-run news agency and a war monitor reported.

SANA said the blast went off at the southern entrance to the city of Ras al-Ayn. Turkish troops and allied Syrian fighters captured the area last October when Ankara invaded northeastern Syria to drive away Syrian Kurdish fighters from the shared border.

Ankara views the Kurdish fighters as terrorists for their links to a Kurdish insurgency inside Turkey. The fighters had however partnered with the U.S. against the Islamic State group.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Syria war monitor, said seven people were killed and ten of others were injured in the car-bomb explosion near the industrial area in the south of Ras al-Ayn city.

No further details were immediately available.

Nearly half a million people have been killed in Syrias nine-year war which began as a popular uprising against the rule of Syrian President Bashar Assad and turned into an armed insurgency following a brutal crackdown.
Marseille has been left 'astonished' after it was plunged into a second lockdown amid a sharp rise in coronavirus cases across France.

The strict new rules have angered local officials who said they had not been consulted as authorities put the country's second city on maximum alert.

The move, which was announced by health minister Olivier Veran on Wednesday, will see all restaurants, bars and gyms in Marseille close from Saturday for at least two weeks.

Crowds of local business owners took to the streets on Friday to stage a protest against the new measures.

It comes after France set a daily record with more than 16,000 new Covid-19 cases in 24 hours amid warnings that Britain could follow in its footsteps.

Marseille has been left 'astonished' after it was plunged into a second lockdown amid a sharp rise in coronavirus cases across France (crowds pictured protesting against new measures)

Marseille Mayor Michele Rubirola said that she had not been consulted about the decision to enforce a second lockdown in the area - which left her 'astonished and angry'.

'The Marseille town hall was not consulted. Nothing in the health situation justifies these announcements,' she wrote on Twitter.

She added: 'I won't allow the people of Marseille to become the victims of political decisions that no-one understands.'

Benoit Payan, Marseille's first deputy mayor, also criticised the restrictions and asked the French government for a 10-day reprieve to show that the city's own measures were working.

He said: 'Once again our territory is being sanctioned, punished, singled out. Our city has been put in virtual confinement without anyone having been consulted.

'The statements [from the government] are irrational. Marseille deserves better than being beaten down, or of serving as an example.'

Renaud Muselier, president of the regional council that includes Marseille, added that the closures amounted to a 'collective punishment'.

He took to Twitter and said: 'This decision is unilateral, ill-conceived and unfair.'

But Mr Veran responded to the criticism by stating that the measures had been put in place to protect public health.

He also claimed that city officials were given notice of the announcement in advance.

Owners of restaurants, cafes and other businesses in Marseille took to the streets on Friday to stage a protest against the new measures.

The strict new rules have angered local officials who said they had not been consulted as authorities put its second city on maximum alert (mobile coronavirus testing facility in Marseille)

Owners of restaurants, cafes and other businesses in Marseille took to the streets on Friday to stage a protest against the new measures (pictured)

'There is no question that you will suffer the consequences of these health measures,' prime minister Jean Castex told a Marseille restaurant owner who called into France 2 television.

He said that affected businesses would be exempt from some charges, and a partial unemployment scheme would be extended until the measures are lifted.

He also called on all French citizens to show 'responsibility' in the face of the rising case numbers.

'What I don't want is that we go back to March,' he said, referring to one of the strictest national lockdowns in Europe in which French people were required to fill out forms to leave their homes.

Castex also admitted that he has not downloaded his own government's StopCovid contact tracing app.

'Yes I am pushing the French to use it, but I do not,' he said on France 2, explaining that he no longer takes the metro since becoming PM in July.

Bernard Marty of the UMIH union, which represents the hospitality sector, warned of 'insurrection,' with several restaurant owners vowing to ignore the closure orders.

France has been hit by a second wave of coronavirus sweeping across the country.

It recorded 16,096 new cases on Thursday which blew away the previous record of 13,498 set on Sunday which now brings France's total to nearly half a million infections.

While the true number of infections was likely higher in the first wave - limited testing meant the high-water mark in the spring was only 7,578 cases - the latest rise has brought an uptick in deaths while more than 1,000 people are in intensive care for the first time since June.

France's total number of infections is now 497,237 in the second-largest outbreak in Western Europe, behind Spain.

That total has doubled in the last month as a summer lull gave way to a resurgent spread of the virus in August and September.

Britain's top scientific advisers have pointed to the rebound in France and Spain as a sign of things to come if the UK does not bring its own resurgence under control.

INTENSIVE CARE CASES: French ICU wards are treating more than 1,000 people for the first time since mid-June

France has been hard-hit by the second wave of coronavirus in Europe, along with Spain (this map shows the recent number of cases per 100,000 people, with higher figures in darker colours)

While deaths are well below the peak of March and April, France is now seeing dozens of hospital deaths per day compared to only a handful in late July and early August.

Hundreds of people are being admitted to hospital with Covid-19 every day, with more than 6,000 patients currently on coronavirus wards.

Of the current hospital patients, more than half are aged 70 or over, with more than 2,000 of them in their 80s or 90s.

More than 1,000 people are in intensive care for the first time since early June, although capacity has doubled to around 10,000 since before the pandemic.

Emmanuel Macron's government has also limited public gatherings to 10 people in cities including Paris, Bordeaux and Lyon.

Mayor Anne Hidalgo of Paris, which will see its gyms and other indoor sporting facilities closed as well, said she had lodged a formal protest.

'How will the fact that we can no longer exercise help us, while sport is an important part of keeping us healthy with strong immune systems?' Hidalgo asked on France 3 television.

Paris hospital authority AP-HP said Thursday that an influx of coronavirus patients was forcing it to start cancelling non-emergency surgery starting this weekend.

The number of coronavirus patients in Paris hospitals had more than doubled in three weeks, from 150 to 330, and would probably reach 600 by month's end, said deputy director Francois Cremieux.

The number in intensive care have followed a similar upward curve, from 50 three weeks ago to 132 on Wednesday and likely more than 200 by next week, he said.
Naravane said India had given a fitting response to the (Chinese) conspiracy of attempting to unilaterally change the status quo along the contested Line of Actual Control (LAC) where India and China have been locked in a standoff for over eight months. I want to assure the country that the sacrifice of the Galwan braves will not go in vain, he said.
Page Content

On September 25th, 2020, Prime Minister Silveria E. Jacobs raised the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) flag. On this commemorative day, the SDG flag is being raised throughout the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The Government of St. Maarten remains committed to the Sustainable Development Goals agenda. This agenda serves as a tool for development for St. Maarten and the rest of the world. Furthermore, the SDG day is an opportunity to show-case and appreciate organizations and persons that contribute to the sustainable development of St. Maarten. As such, the St. Maarten Development Fund (SMDF), K1 Britannia, UNESCO and former BAK program manager for SDGs, Ms. Loekie Morales were presented with certificates of appreciation for their outstanding contribution to the SDGs for St. Maarten. Government will continue to acknowledge and support efforts by civil society as their contribution to St. Maarten are boundless.




Minister of Finance Ken Ofori- Atta, has appeared before the National House of Chiefs to brief members on the concept and benefits that Ghana would derive from the Agyapa Royalties deal.

The move formed part of a broader stakeholder consultation being undertaken by the Ministry to explain the rationale behind the deal, which has generated huge controversy since Parliament approved the deal.

The Minister who was in the company of a team of officials from the Ministry told the House that the Agyapa deal was in the best interest of Ghana and must be supported by all stakeholders.

An elaborate powerpoint presentation which contained details of the transaction was done by a Deputy Minister for Finance, Charles Adu Boahen.

Mr Ofori-Atta said the Agyapa deal was an attempt to look at equity without putting pressure on the treasury and saving the country from adding to the debt stock in the governments investment drive.

He said the government intends to keep about 20 percent of the capital raised for further acquisitions of mining opportunities around the continent to grow the royalty company into the largest in the world.

The Minister said apart from raising capital for infrastructural development upfront under the Agyapa deal, Ghana would become a shareholder of a much larger company depending on how the market performs.

It offers us an incredible opportunity to re-imagine ourselves, and rebuild our country to bring the Black Star to where it should be, he opined.

He said it was important to leverage on our gold resources to change our fortunes as a nation by participating in the capital market in the West which would yield returns far more than here.

Nananom, physical metal gold in the capital markets we trade 500 times more than that so the real money is not only physical, but positioning Ghana to be able to participate in where the value addition is he stated.

Members of the House took turns to ask relevant questions concerning the transaction, which were responded by the Minister and his team.

Some of them raised concerns about why the Ministry failed to engage them before taking the deal to Parliament despite being custodians of the land with vested interest in mineral royalties.

President of the House, Togbe Afede XIV, charged the Ministry to take a second look at the two seats reserved for the Minerals Income Investment Fund (MIIF) on the Board of Agyapa Mineral Royalty Company.

He argued that as the majority shareholder of the company, its representation on the Board should not be less than five out of the nine-member board.

---GNA
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TROY  It is often a mistake to assess a verdict from a distance. If you're not sitting in the courtroom for the day-by-day of a trial, it is difficult to evaluate whether the evidence warranted a conviction.

So I'll resist the temptation to decry the acquittal of former Rensselaer County District Attorney Joel Abelove on perjury and official misconduct charges related to the police shooting of Edson Thevenin four years ago. I didn't attend the trial. I didn't hear what the judge who exonerated Abelove heard.

But I'll note that most everything about the handling of the shooting stinks to high heaven. It is evidence not only of a broken system, but of widespread rot.

It stinks, for example, that Abelove rushed the case to a grand jury just FIVE DAYS after the killing and granted the patrol sergeant who shot the Black DWI suspect immunity for his testimony. The decision meant Abelove couldn't have prosecuted Sgt. Randall French no matter what the grand jury decided.

It stinks that the grand jury was not shown photos of the bullet holes in Thevenin's windshield, which revealed the central claim of the shooting false. If French's life was endangered because Thevenin had pinned him with the car, as Troy police contended, the entry points of the gunshots could not have varied so widely. A forensic analysis would later show French was in motion.

It likewise stinks that, as a detailed report from former Attorney General Eric Schneiderman later found, officers on the scene ignored evidence and "grossly mishandled" witnesses who contradicted what quickly became the official narrative. "Get the f*** out of here," witnesses were told.

It stinks that Abelove was acquitted by the very judge, Jonathan Nichols of Columbia County, who dismissed the same charges two years ago because he believed the attorney general's office was overstepping its jurisdiction  a decision unanimously reversed on appeal, allowing the case against Abelove to continue.

If you were a defendant, wouldn't it be nice to know your judge viewed the charges against you so skeptically? Wouldn't that lead you to conclude, as Abelove did, that you'd be better off putting the judge in charge of the verdict instead of a jury?

It stinks that Mayor Patrick Madden participated in this dishonesty from the start. Even now, Madden refuses to release findings by an outside investigator apparently hired by the city to contradict Schneiderman's report and the police department's own internal investigation, which was damning.

It stinks that voters ignored Madden's disqualifying conduct and reelected the Democrat anyway.

And yes, it is beyond inexcusable that Thevenin fled a traffic stop at 3 a.m. on a Sunday morning, leading officers on a chase that ended in a crash. That decision put this whole sordid mess into motion.

We can believe Thevenin didn't deserve to die for that decision. But we can't really know whether French feared for his life when he fired eight times at the DWI suspect. While most of us slept in comfort that April morning, Thevenin forced the officer into making an impossibly difficult split-second decision.

Maybe Abelove was right to believe the patrol sergeant deserved the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he was right that the evidence didn't support criminal charges against French, who recently died of COVID-19. On that point, the Schneiderman report later concurred.

But Abelove should have been presented his decision to the public after a thorough investigation and with a full and honest accounting of the facts. We deserved that. The truth is what the public always deserves.

Instead, we were fed a rushed investigation and a hurried exoneration based on an obvious falsehood that nobody contradicted  not former Chief James Tedesco, who immediately and forcefully declared the shooting warranted; not Madden, who bathes his cowardice in legalese; and certainly not Abelove, who wants us to believe he's been victimized.

"This was a political hit job from the start," the Republican Abelove, in private practice since losing a 2018 reelection bid, said Friday on WGDJ radio. "When they saw an opportunity to try to take me out, they took it."

I've used this space to call out bald political bias in the attorney general's office, including Letitia James' attempt to shutter the NRA. But Abelove's self-important grandiosity strikes me as laughable.

We're to believe Schneiderman and James care so much about the DA's office in a small, upstate county that they lusted to take down the mighty Abelove? With all due respect, he was never that important.

The trial is over now. Abelove's acquittal means he can move on with his life. I wish him no ill will.

But this isn't over for Troy, which faces a civil lawsuit filed by Thevenin's family. This ugly tragedy waits for a resolution. The stench lingers.

cchurchill@timesunion.com  518-454-5442  @chris_churchill
By Josh Smith

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea said on Sunday it is searching for the body a South Korean official killed by its troops, but warned that South Korean naval operations in the area threatened to raise tensions by intruding across a disputed sea border.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un issued a rare apology on Friday for the fatal shooting of the South Korean fisheries official in North Korean waters, according to Seoul.

South Korea's military has accused the North's soldiers of killing the man, dousing his body in fuel and setting it on fire near the sea border.

After South Korean President Moon Jae-in convened a ministers' meeting to discuss North Korea on Sunday, the presidential Blue House reiterated calls for Pyongyang to allow a joint investigation into the killing. It urged the restoration of military communication hotlines that the North severed earlier this year as relations soured.

North Korean state news agency KCNA called the killing an "awful case which should not have happened" but accused South Korean naval operations near in the area of crossing into North Korean waters.

"We urge the south side to immediately halt the intrusion across the military demarcation line in the west sea that may lead to escalation of tensions," KCNA said.

A spokesman for South Korea's Ministry of National Defense had no immediate comment on the North's accusations.

The South has been searching only in waters south of the Northern Limit Line, a contested sea demarcation between the two Koreas that dates to the end of the 1950-53 Korean War, South Korea's Yonhap news agency said, quoting an unnamed coast guard official.

South Korea has mobilised 39 vessels, including 16 naval ships, and six aircraft for the search, which continued on Sunday despite the North Korean complaints, Yonhap said.

North Korea was beginning its own search operation to recover the body, KCNA said.

"We also took more necessary security measures in order to make sure that no more incident spoiling the relations of trust and respect between the north and the south would happen in any case," the report added, without elaborating.

(Reporting by Josh Smith; Editing by Sandra Maler and William Mallard)
To further the objectives of Policy and become a major player in global innovation, India on Saturday entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Denmark in the field of Intellectual Property (IP) Cooperation.

The Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) signed the MoU with the Danish Patent and Trademark Office.

Earlier, the Union cabinet had given the approval for signing the MoU with Denmark in the field of IP Cooperation.

"The two sides will draw up Biennial Work Plan to implement the MoU which will include the detailed planning for carrying out of the co-operation activities, including the scope of action," an official communique said.

"This MoU will go a long way in fostering the cooperation between India and Denmark, and provide opportunities to both countries to learn from the experience of each other, especially in terms of best practices followed in the other country. It will be a landmark step forward in India's journey towards becoming a major player in global innovation and further the objectives of Policy, 2016," it added.

--IANS

rv/sn/arm

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
In route news, Hawaiian Airlines joins United in offering COVID-19 testing; the state of Hawaii offers more details on preparations for Oct. 15 reopening; JetBlue will begin new transcontinental routes, including one from San Francisco; Alaska Airlines sets new California routes, including one from San Jose; Palm Springs emerges as one of airlines hottest destinations this winter; Delta extends perks for SkyMiles and Sky Club members; Emirates scraps winter schedule to SFO; American adds Mexico routes; and El Al faces an ownership controversy.

As the travel industry gears up for the reopening of Hawaii to visitors Oct. 15, Hawaiian Airlines has matched United in announcing a program to facilitate the COVID-19 testing that travelers will need to get around the island states mandatory 14-day quarantine. Hawaiian said it is partnering with a firm called Worksite Labs to provide drive-through COVID-19 tests to its customers, initially through labs located near San Francisco International and Los Angeles International airports, with more testing locations coming soon at its other U.S. mainland gateways.

Hawaii will require travelers to get a test no more than 72 hours before departure and to show a negative result upon arrival in order to be exempted from the quarantine. Travelers who dont have their results by the time they land will have to quarantine until the results come in. Hawaiian Airlines said its SFO and LAX testing sites will use Droplet Digital PCR shallow nasal swab tests, which are approved by the Hawaiian state government. It promises results within 36 hours for a $90 test, or day-of-travel express service for $150.

United Airlines, as we reported earlier this week, is teaming up with GoHealth Urgent Care to offer its Hawaii passengers on-site COVID-19 tests in SFOs International Terminal, with results in 15 minutes for a $250 fee. Or passengers can opt for a mail-in process using a self-administered sampling kit from a firm called Color. That requires a longer lead time and costs $80 plus shipping fees.

Hawaii officials said the state has lined up partnerships with Kaiser Permanente and the CVS pharmacy chain to provide the necessary pre-departure testing on the mainland, but with the new rules taking effect in less than three weeks, the state and its partners have yet to provide details about exactly how that program will work and what it will cost. Hawaii Lt. Gov. Josh Green, the states point man for the testing plans, said this week that in addition to the standard deep nasal swab tests, Hawaii will also accept results from Abbott Labs Abbott ID Now test, which uses a swab from the front of the nose and produces results in less than 15 minutes.

Green also said that in addition to CVS, Walgreens has now agreed to provide testing for the states visitors  again, with no details yet. And he said the state is negotiating with a firm called Vault that produces COVID-19 saliva tests. Oddly, Green also said that United Airlines is going to be offering tests at Los Angeles International  although the airline announced its testing plan for SFO, not LAX. There are still unanswered questions about the states testing requirements  e.g., how old does a traveler have to be to require a test? Exactly what kind of documentation is required to prove a negative test result? The latest information bulletin from Hawaii Gov. David Ige says that upon entry to the state, travelers must provide written confirmation from a state-approved COVID-19 testing facility. How do you know which facilities are state-approved? And what constitutes written confirmation  a printout, an email, a text? It will be interesting to see how all this plays out as Oct. 15 approaches.

Hartford, Connecticuts Bradley International Airport (BDL) is roughly halfway between JetBlues hubs at Boston (101 miles) and New York City (121 miles), but JetBlue believes thats far enough away to merit its own transcontinental airline service. So on Dec. 18, JetBlue will begin new non-stop service from Hartford (BDL) to San Francisco, Los Angeles and Las Vegas. (And on Nov. 19, it will launch non-stops from Hartford to Cancun, Mexico.) Its just the latest step in an ongoing buildup of new routes by JetBlue, many of them in and out of California. The BDL-SFO route was served by United in 2017-2018; American has suspended its LAX-Hartford service, but is due to bring it back in November.

JetBlue characterized the four new Hartford markets as some of our largest leisure destinations. It also noted that last week, the state of Connecticut amended its travel advisory so that all arriving travelers can avoid the mandatory 14-day quarantine if they can show a negative COVID-19 result from a test taken within 72 hours of arrival.

Some new California routes were also announced this week by Alaska Airlines, including two out of Los Angeles and three from Palm Springs. On Dec. 17, Alaska will introduce twice-daily E175 flights between Mineta San Jose and Palm Springs, a route that it gave up in 2009 but now will operate year-round. On the same date, the carrier will start up year-round daily flights linking LAX with Reno (a route that Delta will add Nov. 20), and seasonal service through April 12 between Palm Springs-Reno (five days a week), Palm Springs-Boise (daily) and LAX-Cancun (daily). All the routes will use E175s except Cancun, which gets a 737.

At the same time, Alaska said it will increase frequencies Dec. 17 on three routes out of LAX, including Salt Lake City and Guadalajara (both going from one daily flight to two) and Boise (from one a day to three). Like JetBlue, Alaska has also been building up its LAX presence; the new flights beginning in December will give it a total of 14 new LAX routes this year.

Palm Springs is getting very attractive to airlines this fall and winter as they focus on leisure markets. Alaskas three new routes there in December are part of that carriers ongoing expansion at PSP that by January 2021 will also include five daily flights to San Francisco, four to Seattle, two to Portland and one to Everett, Wash. (Paine Field). Also jumping onto the PSP bandwagon this fall and winter are Delta, launching daily LAX-PSP E175 flights on Nov. 20; American, due to begin weekly Saturday service Dec. 19 between Philadelphia and PSP; JetBlue, which will start twice-weekly PSP-Ft. Lauderdale flights Dec. 18; Boutique Air, due to begin small plane turboprop flights Oct. 1 from PSP to Los Angeles and Phoenix; and Southwest, which recently announced its intention to add Palm Springs to its route map later this year, but without mentioning specific routes.

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Besides LAX-PSP, Delta has another new intra-California route coming up. On Nov. 20, it will begin a daily E175 roundtrip between LAX and Fresno, a route that it pulled out of 21 years ago. Elsewhere, Delta plans to kick off a pair of routes to the northwest from its Atlanta hub on Nov. 20, with daily 737-800 flights to both Boise and Spokane.

Given the sorry state of air travel this year, Delta is adopting some further extensions of benefits for its SkyMiles, Sky Club and American Express Card members. The carrier said this week that members of its airport Sky Club program who were active on March 1 of this year will have their memberships extended through June 30, 2021. An extension through Dec. 31, 2021, now applies to the expiration of $100 flight credits earned by SkyMiles AmEx Gold cardholders; unused companion certificates held by Platinum and Reserve cardholders; and Sky Club guest passes held by Reserve cardmembers. Effective on domestic routes for all SkyMiles members, the carrier is eliminating the $150 redeposit fee to cancel an award ticket and the $150 reissue fee to change an award ticket. Changes and cancellations made within 72 hours of departure will no longer mean the loss of miles on domestic award tickets. Click here to see a full listing of all the changes.

Need an island getaway? One of the few destinations where Americans can still travel is French Polynesia, and United just announced a fare sale for its daily flight from SFO to Papeete, Tahiti. Customers who book by Oct. 8 for travel through the end of February could find roundtrip economy fares starting at $713 from San Francisco and $832 from other West Coast cities via SFO.

Emirates

Weve reported previously that Dubai-based Emirates planned to cut back its San Francisco schedule to three to five flights a week this winter, but Emirates is constantly revising its schedules (as are many international airlines these days), and in its latest changes this week, it plans to eliminate San Francisco flights for the winter season, which runs from Oct. 25 through March 27. Emirates is also pulling the plug on Dallas/Fort Worth flights for the winter season. American Airlines plans to increase service to Mexico Dec. 18/19, when it will begin four flights a week from Phoenix to Loreto and three a week from PHX to La Paz, as well as weekly flights to both destinations from Dallas/Fort Worth.

Israels El Al Airlines, which has been grounded for months, now expects to start flying again in October, including six weekly flights to Tel Aviv from New York JFK using a 787-9. However, El Als operational future could be impacted by a controversy about its ownership. In a new public share offering, a company called Kanfei Nesharim Aviation bought a controlling 43 percent stake in the airline. That company is owned by a 27-year-old named Eli Rozenberg, an Israeli immigrant and citizen whose father is Kenny Rozenberg, a wealthy American who operates a chain of nursing homes. The airline alleges that the money for the El Al stake came from the American father  who is not an Israeli citizen  which would not be legal under Israeli law.

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A giant bronze statue of Nelson Mandela overlooks a big black tarpaulin tent that has become a fixture on the emerald lawns of the South African president's office in Pretoria.

The tent houses campaigners from the Khoisan indigenous people -- South Africa's first inhabitants, whose presence in this country has been dated by archaeologists to thousands of years.

For the past two years, the activists have been camping outside the seat of government, demanding the official recognition of their languages and to negotiate land ownership.

They also want the word "coloured" -- the mixed-race tag they have been carrying since apartheid and which is still largely used in official documents -- to be abolished.

The group came here in 2018, walking 1,000 kilometres (620 miles), in a bid to secure an audience with the authorities.

"We will wait here until we have what we came for," said one of their leaders, who calls himself King Khoisan South Africa.

Union Buildings is an imposing 110-year-old structure that has housed colonial, apartheid and democratic leaders including Mandela and now President Cyril Ramaphosa.

White perspex placards in front of the tent bear various messages.

Khoisan activists have been camping outside South Africa's seat of government for the last two years. By Phill Magakoe (AFP)

One has inscriptions in Afrikaans saying Ramaphosa doesn't give a damn -- "We have been here for more than one year and what does he do? Nothing!"

Ramaphosa last year signed into law the Traditional and Khoi-San Leadership Act, which grants more autonomy to the Khoisan community.

But some of the Khoisan remain unsatisfied, and see the law as the starting point for a constitutional and cultural struggle.

But how many Khoisan there are, in a population of 59 million, is unclear -- and their identity is also a subject of debate.

"We talk about Khoi herders and San hunter-gatherers, but archaeologically it's hard to tell them apart," explained Tammy Reynard, curator of the Origins Centre at the University of the Witwatersrand.

Language and land

As South Africa marks its heritage month in September while trying to recover from a coronavirus pandemic lockdown, communities such as the Khoisan have been reflecting and questioning their fractured identity.

The Khoisan have been referred to in the past as "Bushmen" -- and when the Dutch settlers landed in South Africa in the 17th century, they called them Hottentots, a word derived from the famous clicks in their languages.

In one of the grimmest episodes of colonial times, a Khoisan named Sarah Baartman was taken to Europe in the early 19th century by a British doctor and paraded as an anatomical freak -- the "Hottentot Venus," who people could see and touch for a fee.

A member of the Khoisan community speaks before joining a protest march under the banner of "#Put South Africans First" in Pretoria. By Phill Magakoe (AFP)

Abused and sick, she died in poverty, and her remains were displayed in a Paris museum. They were returned to South Africa in 2002 and buried with honour in the Eastern Cape. Her tale is described in "Black Venus," a 2010 French film directed by Abdellatif Kechiche.

"Classified coloureds want to know who they are -- they are coming together like it never happened before," said Anthony Philip Williams, founder of Indigenous First Nation Advocacy SA.

The virus "lockdown put a magnifying glass on the inequality that we have inherited," said Denver Toroga, a Khoisan-language activist and poet.

"But I think it also helped us go beyond the need to acquire wealth and seek a different type of cultural wealth."

One of the Khoisan languages, which is written as "N|uu," is listed by UNESCO as facing extinction, with just three fluent speakers still remaining.

In a speech marking the country's heritage day on Thursday, Ramaphosa said the nation "is steadfastly protecting" that and other indigenous languages.

For many campaigners, land is the key.

The much-publicised issue of handing back farmland taken during white supremacy must include restitution for the Khoisan as well as for black communities, said King Khoisan.

"You cannot talk about identity outside of land," said Williams.

"We must engage government for what is called a negotiated settlement," he said.

"A part of that settlement must be the land that we access, that we can live on, where we can produce and use it for cultural purposes, for access to the resources. The resources of this land belong to our forefathers."
New Delhi, Sep 26 : Amid the ongoing farmers protest across the country over the controversial farm Bills, the Congress on Saturday upped its ante against the Modi government over the three labour Bills describing them as "anti-labour" and said these legislations have removed the security net for workers.

Addressing a virtual press conference, Congress leader Mallikarjun Kharge slammed the government and said, "The government's claim that the laws will increase ease of doing business is false. They have weakened trade unions and finished the security and safety for the workers." The Congress leader said that states' powers have been usurped by the central government with these laws. "These codes are anti-worker, anti-labourer and it is important to agitate against them. All parties must oppose these laws. The Modi government only listens to corporates and after these laws it will not listen to trade unions," he said.

His remarks came after the Parliament on Wednesday approved the three labour codes that will remove impediments to winding up of companies and allow firing of staff without government permission in firms with up to 300 workers from the existing 100.

Meanwhile, Congress spokesperson Pawan Khera attacked the government alleging that the government is betraying the interests of different sections one after another. Khera said that even as the issue of injustice to farmers was ongoing across the country, the government has now betrayed workers.

"The government made the excuse while bringing in the new labour laws there will be ease of doing business and it will be beneficial for all. But if you look at the laws it is clear that there is no protection and relief for workers in these laws," Khera said.

Slamming the government, Khera accused that it is in the DNA of the government to set aside democratic principles and force its decisions on the people. Even Indian National Trade Union Congress president G. Sanjeeva Reddy alleged that in these legislations there is no provision for safety and security of workers.

Reddy said that it will protest and struggle against these anti-labour and anti-trade union laws. He claimed that these laws have been brought to strengthen and help the capitalists and corporates and not the workers. He further noted that under the new provisions, the workers will not be able to go on strike or raise their voice against unjust practices.

The Rajya Sabha on Wednesday passed by voice vote the three labour codes on industrial relations, social security and occupational safety amid a boycott by opposition parties, including the Congress and the Left, over the suspension of eight MPs.
The leaders of Kisan Mazdoor Sangharsh Committee, which is spearheading the Rail Roko agitation in Punjab, have accused Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) of indulging in politics over the ongoing farmers protests against agricultural reforms.

Akali Dal is not taking an unequivocal stand. Theyre trying to remain part of the alliance and doing politics, general secretary of the committee Sarwan Singh Pandher said, as reported by ANI

Shiromani Akali Dal is the oldest ally of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance. Despite the partys alliance with ruling BJP, SAD chief Sukhbir Singh Badal has been criticizing the passage of the three farm bills, passed in Parliament in the recently concluded monsoon session. On September 17, Harsimrat Kaur stepped down as the Union food processing minister protesting the farm bills.

On Friday, both Badal and Harsimrat took part in chakka jam (road blockade) at Lambi in Muktsar district.

A SAD delegation had also met President Ram Nath Kovid on September 21, requesting him to not give his nod to the farm bills.

The farm bills--Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020 the Farmers Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020 and the Farming Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020 -- have been passed by the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha. They now await President Ram Nath Kovinds assent to become law.
I grew up in London, Ontario  not in the traditional sense, but it was the university community that shaped the most formative years of my life. For the past four years, this place has been a source of friendship, comfort, community and pride for me. Its a place that made my degree so much more than a piece of paper, a place that became the home away from home that I never knew I needed.

With university students recent return to school, cities across the country are experiencing an influx of COVID-19 cases, fueled by crowded bars and house parties. This recent spike is a clear indication that the pandemic is far from over. Community members are growing increasingly scared  and I cant really blame them. Students are an incredible cohort of people, but sometimes we dont take our impact on our university communities as seriously as we would in our hometowns.

As we head into the last weekend of September  a weekend that has traditionally garnered thousands of students to an unsanctioned Fake Homecoming street party on Broughdale Ave.  we must remember that we have a responsibility to take care of a community that has provided us with so much.

And trust me, I do get it. It has been a long six months since our world turned upside down, and this fall is a far cry from the Septembers we are used to. Back to school season usually brings a comforting familiarity as we bump into old friends downtown and connect with new ones at late-night afterparties. But this is not about us. We are living through one of the most defining moments of our time  in the coming weeks, our actions will determine the wellbeing of our communities for years to come.

Our actions will have an impact on our fellow students too. Those who spent all summer working to pay their tuition, those who head back and forth from their hometowns to take care of their immunocompromised family members, and those who isolated themselves for two weeks after their cross-continent flight to keep our cities safe.

It is about our professors and administrators  who adapted to the ever-changing circumstances of last semester to keep classes going, who worked tirelessly this summer to adjust to the new realities of teaching, who are so excited to welcome their incoming classes back with the same enthusiasm as they have always had. This is about our public health workers, our seniors, our local business owners, our bus drivers, our neighbours, their loved ones, and each other.

The list goes on. However, what I hope to convey is that we are a part of an ecosystem and organism much bigger than ourselves. We are a part of a community that has shaped who we are and who we will become  one that was here long before we got here and one that will be here long after we depart to our next destination. We need to start taking responsibility for our collective health and safety. Lets stay in our social bubbles, stop hosting parties, and get tested when we have symptoms. Our choices matter  and over the next few weeks, they will speak volumes to what students are capable of. Students have the power to change the world, and now more than ever we have a chance to prove it.
DOHC

Back in 2015, the motorcycle realm was delighted with the arrival of a new player on the scene. Tamarit Motorcycles debuted with as many as five magnificent projects that served to let everyone know they arent messing around. Over the years, the Spanish firm amassed an impressive selection of no less than 52 custom entities. Besides constructing some of the raddest one-off two-wheelers youll ever come across, the Elche-based company also prides itself with a delicious inventory that hosts over 170 aftermarket components manufactured in-house.One things for sure; these moto specialists are no amateurs! Their stunning one-off machines guarantee to soothe the soul of even the most pretentious rider out there. In case this stirs your curiosity, Tamarits majestic undertakings can all be admired on their social media profiles. But first, lets take a minute to drool over one such masterpiece, namely a 2008 model in Triumph s iconic Bonneville lineup thatll certainly raise your pulse.Ill have to point out the obvious and say the 08 Bonneville is one hell of a donor. It is powered by a viciousparallel-twin behemoth, with a generous compression ratio of 9.2:1 and a truly humungous displacement of 865cc. At around 7,200 rpm, this fiendish piece of air-cooled machinery is capable of producing up to 66 bhp, along with a feral torque output of 52 pound-feet (70 Nm) at 6,000 revs. A five-speed gearbox transmits the engines unholy force to Bonnies 17-inch multi-spoked rear wheel by means of a chain final drive.The powertrain is hugged by a tubular steel cradle frame, which rests on a set of 41 mm (1.61 inches) forks at the front, coupled with fully-adjustable dual shock absorbers and a double-sided swingarm on the opposite end. Up front, stopping power is taken care of by a single 310 mm (12.2 inches) disc and a two-piston caliper, accompanied by a 255 mm (10 inches) brake rotor and a two-piston caliper at the rear. Triumphs marvel has a dry weight of only 451 lbs (205 kg), while its wheelbase measures just over 59 inches (1501 mm).To have this bad boy stand out as a genuine one-of-a-kind creature, Tamarit Motorcycles kicked things off by browsing their very own catalogue for an array of custom modules thatll have it look the part. These include a fresh tail section, open side panels and a tiny front fender, as well as a hand-crafted belly pan and one tasty leather saddle. Additionally, you will notice a classic-style fairing that brings about a vintage aesthetic.The firm consulted Motogadgets range for a complete LED lighting package and installed a pair of Victory Classic TT tires to keep things looking retro. Oh, and of course, there are aftermarket clip-on handlebars that round out the new appearance. To wrap it all up, the rew applied a timeless blend of metallic black and silver paintwork, complemented by discrete golden accents.Right, now that weve come to the end of this Bonnevilles story, Ill be heading over to Tamarits Facebook and Instagram profiles to please my eyes with some of their other spectacular works of two-wheeled art, and Id encourage you to do the same. These ravishing beauties will leave you speechless!
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A section of shareholders of Lakshmi Vilas Bank who are unhappy with the way it is managed and the sharp deterioration in its finances opposed the appointment or re-appointment of seven directors and auditors at the lenders Annual General Meeting (AGM) held on September 25.

The list of directors who attracted the ire of some shareholders include Managing Director and CEO S Sundar, who was appointed as the interim MD of the bank in January, people familiar with the matter told Moneycontrol.

The shareholder vote reflects the unhappiness with respect to the way this management has been conducting the operations of the bank, said one of the institutional investors at LVB, which has also been grappling with governance issues and soaring bad loans and a negative return on assets for two successive years.

All the people Moneycontrol spoke to did not want to be named citing sensitivity of the matter.

N Ramanathan, Company Secretary of LVB and Muthusamy, JMACS Associates (Scrutinisers), refused to comment on this story. An email sent to Sundar seeking a response remained unanswered at the time of filing this story.

LVB has been in dire need of capital and has been scrambling to find a buyer. The private lender is in talks with Clix Capital for a merger and secure the much-needed capital. On September 15, LVB gave the first confirmation to its investors that the bank may be past the worst phase and this time a deal may happen.

At the AGM, done through videoconferencing due to COVID-19, some shareholders also contested the appointment or re-appointment of N Saiprasad as Director, Gorinka Jaganmohan Rao as Non-Executive Independent Director, Raghuraj Gujjar as Non-Executive Non-Independent Director, KR Pradeep as Non-Executive Non-Independent Director, BK Manjunath as Non-Executive Independent Director, and YN Lakshminarayana Murthy as Non-Executive and Independent Director.

The shareholders also voted against the re-appointment of statutory auditors (P Chandrasekar LLP, Chartered Accountants) and branch auditors. Branch auditor is appointed in consultation with the statutory auditor. Since the appointment of statutory auditor is opposed, the appointment of the branch auditor is also opposed.

An email sent to statutory auditors seeking response on the matter remained unanswered till the time of filing this story.

According to the March quarter figures, LVB has a capital adequacy ratio (CAR)  a measure of the financial stability of a lender  of just 1.12 percent as on March 31 as against the RBI requirement of 8 percent. Similarly, the Tier I and II components of CAR stood at a negative 0.88 percent and 2 percent, respectively.

Gross non-performing assets (NPAs), or bad loans, as on March 31, stood at 25.39 percent compared with 23.27 percent a year ago.

In the absence of an immediate capital infusion, there is no way the bank could have survived, said a senior banker with a private bank. He didnt want to be named.

In the March quarter results notes, under the head 'material uncertainty related to going concern', the banks auditors had outlined the severe financial situation the company is going through and indicated that any chances of survival depend on capital infusion.

LVB has been incurring losses for the past 10 quarters and the RBI initiated Prompt Corrective Action (PCA) in September 2019, which inter alia prescribes the bank to bring in additional capital, restrict further lending to corporates, reduce NPAs, and improve the Provision Coverage Ratio to 70 percent.

The distressing finances require the bank to take effective steps to augment its capital base in 2020-21. We were informed that the bank routinely evaluates its capital raising options, the auditors said.

On the proposed merger with Clix, LVB informed the stock exchanges that the two companies have substantially completed the mutual due diligence for a merger. Both companies are now on to the next stage of discussions. The news enthralled the investors who rushed to buy the share of the bank on September 16 morning.

LVB looked to merge with Indiabulls Housing Finance last year but the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) opposed the deal without offering a reason.

But with Clix, investors are hopeful because the deal has progressed past the due diligence. Clix Capital, founded by Pramod Bhasin, who previously headed BPO company Genpact, has deep pockets and boasts a track record in financial services that is sufficient enough to impress the regulator.

Clix Capital offers various types of loans. Bhasin acquired the business in 2016 from GE Capital. Private equity firm AION Capital Partners is a significant shareholder in the company.
Choplin said the toll lane proposal and Purple Line are different projects entirely. On the toll lane project, she said, the state would reach a predevelopment agreement with the chosen companies. The state would then work with the companies, utilities, other state agencies and communities to refine construction cost estimates, reduce impacts and ensure the necessary right of way is included, she said.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 06:24:15|Editor: huaxia

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A customer tries a traditional pastry of a time-honored brand in Fuzhou, southeast China's Fujian Province, Sept. 25, 2020. (Xinhua/Song Weiwei)

He said that bilateral trade reached 10 billion U.S. dollars in the first seven months of this year and China's direct investment in Ireland increased by 40 million U.S. dollars in the first half of this year, more than doubled on a year-on-year basis.

Besides, TikTok has recently announced to invest 500 million U.S. dollars to set up its European data center in Ireland, he added.

DUBLIN, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- Trade between China and Ireland has maintained a very positive momentum despite the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, said Chinese Ambassador to Ireland He Xiangdong while addressing a virtual China Ireland business conference on Friday.

He said that bilateral trade reached 10 billion U.S. dollars in the first seven months of this year and China's direct investment in Ireland increased by 40 million U.S. dollars in the first half of this year, more than doubled on a year-on-year basis.

Besides, TikTok has recently announced to invest 500 million U.S. dollars to set up its European data center in Ireland, he added.

The logo of TikTok is seen on a smartphone screen in New York, the United States, Aug. 30, 2020. (Xinhua/Wang Ying)

All these "inspiring facts" have demonstrated "the momentum of stable growth of China-Ireland economic exchanges" despite the impact of the pandemic, the ambassador noted.

According to He, economic recovery, an ever-deepening friendship between China and Ireland, and a more open China will provide a powerful impetus, a solid foundation and a broader platform for the further development of bilateral economic cooperation.

"There is a good chance that economic, trade and investment links between China and Ireland will continue to boost with great stability, strong resilience and vast potential," he said.

The Chinese ambassador made the remarks while speaking at the Virtual China Ireland Business Summit 2020, an annual event organized by Asia Matters, a Dublin-based think tank, in partnership with Cork City Council, Cork County Council and Cork Institute of Technology.

During the two-day event, which ended on Friday, government officials, business leaders and experts from China, Ireland and other countries held an in-depth discussion and exchanged views over a number of issues relating to the cooperation between China and Ireland in the fields of economy, trade, tourism, higher education, agrifood, technical innovation, etc.

People walk past a closed bar in Dublin, Ireland, Sept. 16, 2020. (Xinhua)
Dubai, Sep 26 : A stranded Indian visitor, who came to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on a visit in 2006, is finally going to return home on Saturday 14 years later after fines worth 511,200 dirhams were waived off, a media report said.

"I cannot wait to see my family," Baskari Raghavlu, 41, hailing from Andhra Pradesh, told Gulf News on Friday.

Raghavlu came to the UAE on a visit in 2006 and soon after landing, tragedy struck.

He was injured in a road accident while travelling in his company vehicle.

For four years, he tried to get compensation from the company where he worked and even hired a lawyer, who took his passport.

"I don't know where the lawyer is and where my passport went. And all this happened in a month's time of my coming to the UAE. I did not know where to seek help. I kept waiting for the lawyer to help me out," Raghavlu told Gulf News.

He said during one of the amnesty programmes by the UAE government, Raghavlu managed to secure an outpass to leave the country, but did not have money for his flight ticket.

Social worker Sheela Thomas said she found Raghavlu in a desperate state.

"He was struggling for accommodation. He was living off the generosity of some other blue collar workers... He just wanted to return home and see his daughter for the first time in his life. I then took up his case," she told Gulf News.

Thomas added that Raghavlu's overstay fines have been cleared and that she bought a ticket for him for a flight to Mumbai on September 26.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Photo: (Photo : stevepb on Pixabay)

A gifted boy has already started his sophomore year, majoring in aerospace engineering at Chattahoochee Technical College. He is just 12 years old.

He learned sign language before he could verbally communicate

According to 11Alive, Caleb learned sign language even before he could start uttering words to communicate. By nine months old, he can already do sign language of more than 250 words, his mom, Claire, said. He was just 11 months old when he already learned to speak and read.

Caleb's dad, Kobi, explained that as they started interacting with other parents, and after having other children, they realized how exceptional Caleb was given that they had no other frame of reference.

By the age of two, he can already read the United States Constitution. Caleb then continued to amaze his parents, milestone after milestone. At age three, he learned other languages - Spanish, Mandarin, and French, and he also qualified for MENSA.



He would not join MENSA, though, until he was five. He would then be the youngest African-American boy to be accepted to the program.

"I'm ready for college"

Caleb is indeed special, moving quickly from elementary to middle, and then high school. The fact that it became so easy, it started to bore him. "Mom, I'm bored," his mom recalled him saying, "this is not challenging." He thinks that it is not helping him grow in his learning and that he thinks he is ready for college.

Thus, at 12 years old, Caleb started his sophomore year at Chattahoochee Technical College in Marietta, Georgia. When asked what it was like being a college freshman at his young age, he said that it was exactly how he expected it to be like If he were 18 or older.

His dad accompanies him on campus because Caleb is still a minor. Thus, it felt like going back to college for Kobi, too, although this time, he is not his son's study-buddy. Kobi said Caleb far surpassed him in math that he can't help him anymore. "Seriously!" he exclaimed, "He is in calculus two now."

Not many gifted Black-American students get the opportunity

It appears that being gifted really runs in the Andersons family as their two other children, Aaron and Hannah, are also following in Caleb's footsteps. However, Claire's concern is that some people have a negative perspective when it comes to African-American children. There are more like Caleb out there than other people might think, she said. Sadly, these children don't have the same opportunity or resources.

In an article published by The Conversation, black and Hispanic students are underrepresented in gifted programs. U.S. Department of Education data says that black and Hispanic students makeup 40 percent of public school students across the U.S. but makeup only 26 percent of students enrolled in gifted programs.

The report first points to the differences in academic achievement across demographic groups as the possible reason for the low rates. However, another study revealed two other contributors. First, black students tend to be less likely to attend schools that offer gifted programs than white students. Second, black students assigned to a white classroom teacher tend to be less likely to be assigned to gifted programs than those assigned to a black teacher.

You can read more of the study here.

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During the early pandemic cycle in the world, there was an astronomical rise in consumer purchases led by news cycles and lockdown announcements. As a result of economic activities getting unlocked amidst a prolonged crisis timeline than initially anticipated, Nielsen has come up with a framework Covid-19 Future Consequences, which finds out that purchasing habits are being driven by external factors and socio-economic circumstances  now and in the future.

According o the Nielsen report, there are four emerging patterns that are reflected in the global COVID-19 framework being driven by re-openings of businesses and economy, lifting of restricted living conditions and concerns about economic downturn and macro factors.

Also read: Nielsen Compass: A World-Leading And Powerful Campaign Outcomes Database

Basket reset: What consumers will buy

Homebody reset: Where consumption will happen.

Rationale reset: Why do consumers make purchases

Affordability reset: How much will consumers spend

The four identified facets of behavioral reset offer valuable insight into how prolonged COVID-19 impact will transform consumer and related business decisions moving forward.

Key Consumer Behavioural Shifts Driving Future Consumption Pattern

When we consider India within this framework, we see clear evidence of the basket reset, weighted by the affordability reset. The tension in the consumer basket is that they are trying to reconcile the old needs with the new ones; the health/ hygiene and product value proposition competing with each other, remarked Diptanshu Ray, Lead, Retail Intelligence, South Asia, Nielsen Global Connect.

FMCG Growth in Asian Markets Impacted by Severity of Pandemic & Reliance on Traditional Trade

While studying the performance of the FMCG industry among Asian countries, Nielsen found that there were two differentiators:

a) spread of pandemic especially as markets moved in unlock phase, and b) contribution of traditional trade channels to total FMCG value sales.

South Korea and China had flattened the curve of new cases from May to July and they have just around 30% of total FMCG sales coming from traditional trade channels. These countries clocked a decent growth (4%) in FMCG sales in the January-July period of 2020 over the same period of last year (SPLY). Taiwan also had a remarkable industry growth (6%) in the same period, despite having a significant (67%) contribution of traditional trade channels. However, the pandemic spread was checked in Taiwan with the least number of cases (20 per million) until May 2020  the number went up just by one per million over the next two months.

On the other hand, markets like India and Indonesia have high dependence on traditional trade channels and witnessed a much faster spread of the pandemic in June-July. Both these markets had negative FMCG industry growth in the January-July period vis-a-vis the same period last year. The Philippines, too, had a negative industry growth in the 2020 calendar so far despite having significant contribution from organised trade; but the pandemic spread was very fast, causing a blow to the industry growth.

With Unlock, Indian Macros Show Restrained Revival

India had one of the longest and strictest lockdowns in the world. Most key macro indicators were in the red through the early days of the lockdown. Post June, unemployment levels and number of closure days in a month for FMCG outlets has gone back to pre-COVID times. However, underemployment rates are reported to have gone down with the hardest hit jobs were that of professionals, viz. Engineers, Accountants and Teachers. Likewise, stores have not been opening for the whole day period that they were. These reflect in the overall economic progress and in GDP numbers. Restrictions during the lockdown period brought in significant impact to economic activities in all spheres of life and industry in the country. Non-essential indices (Lubricants, White Cement, White Cement Putty, Spirits (alcoholic beverages, etc.) dipped significantly during the lockdown, gaining gradually but still to reach pre-COVID levels. On the contrary, with the unlock, the FMCG consumption witnessed an early rebound in the months of June and July. This was on the back of suppressed demand during the lockdown period, and reflected more prominently in non-food categories beyond essential baskets. With the pent up demand satiated in June-July, August has seen a muted performance for the industry. As the industry is evolving, consumers have shifted their preferences when it comes to price tiers, pack sizes and product assortment. Manufacturers and retailers, on the other hand, are guided by the consumer perception and behaviour and are strategising to adapt to the cautious revival of the industry.

Bharat Driving Strategic Priorities

FMCG consumption was the hardest hit in bigger cities in India during the lockdown period, the impact was the least in Indias villages that retail close to 40% of industry sales. Nielsens analytics solutions of E-commerce channels show the same phenomenon reflecting in different sectors beyond FMCG as well, where there is an increasing contribution of lower town classes to overall E-commerce in the period of May to August vis-a-vis pre-COVID levels.

In this evolving Unlock situation, Nielsen reached out to 14 corporate leaders from leading Indian manufacturers and retail giants in the month of September. The survey brings in detailed insights around the current market situation, its impact on their businesses, their coping mechanisms and strategy for the upcoming months

This increased focus on Middle India & Rural was also reiterated as the majority of CXOs (connected in September 2020) claim that they are increasing focus on Middle India and Rural markets over the next 6 months.

Affordability: Consumers seek Value Proposition as Wallets Shrink

There is a visible sign of consumers either downgrading to more affordable (Mass & Popular) offerings or shifting towards value for money large packs. Also, private label share going up in Modern Trade Brick & Mortar channel and Regional players performing better than the national players during the COVID period hint at affordability reset in the play.

Prioritisation of Items by Manufacturers & Retailers Leading to an Optimised Store Shelf

Retailers are rationalising assortment by operating with fewer items to focus investment and shelf space on fast moving items. This strategy of assortment rationalisation is echoed by the industry leaders also  36% CXOs Nielsen talked to stated their plan to rationalise consumer offerings in the next six months.

Innovation: Shifted to Focus on Current Market Needs

Focussed innovation is another trend in sight. There is a significant increase seen in the number of players entering the Health & Hygiene basket with categories such as Hand Sanitizers, Hand Washes, and Antiseptic Liquids. Similarly, in-home cooking basket (Ketchups, Jams, Cheese, Milk powders, etc.) are gaining prominence and are witnessing increased innovation in the market. Contrary to this, out of home consumption categories such as salty snacks and chocolates; and Beauty Basket (Skin Care, Lipstick, and Fragrances) have had fewer new players entering the market in the last few months. The CXO connections also corroborated this fact.

E-commerce FMCG Continues to Hold on to recovery

As the FMCG industry in India is seeing a cautious recovery, E-commerce channel with a small base (3% of total FMCG sales) has shown resilience against the tough times.

The E-Commerce channel is seeing a sale triggered cautious recovery. The shoppers today are anticipating and holding back their purchases for sale periods. While some categories such as home appliances are seeing a pent up demand in lieu of safety and personal home convenience. We believe the festive season will see a big release of this pent up demand with e-commerce players gearing up for the upcoming sale season, noted Kunal Gupta, Lead, Consumer Intelligence, South Asia, Nielsen Global Connect. In the e-commerce space, major categories such as fashion witnessed a restrained recovery and there has been greater demand for mobile, home appliances & electronics online during the unlock period. This is a result of pent up demand from lockdown, coupled with recent sales by e-commerce players. The steep jump in sales by 1.3X times during the freedom sale in August indicates consumer sentiment towards deal seeking and price consciousness.

Restrained spending during lockdown is enabling consumers to prioritise spending on categories to improve quality of living at home. This is indicated by the steep increase in sales of categories like televisions, water purifiers, washing machines, and grooming devices too. Work and education from home has led to an increase in sales of laptops for consumers.

Mobiles continue to enjoy nearly half of the share (48%) of online sales and smartphones with price range >15K range have doubled in this period indicating consumers need for staying connected with uninterrupted access to media and communication.

There is a steady adoption for FMCG online with first-time shoppers increasing month on month to 36%. The consumer spends and basket sizes are continuing to expand online.

Less than Rs 500 Fashion/ Apparels have grown by 28% and now contribute to 40% of the category as shoppers lower spends from Rs 1,000 or more. This is resulting in slow recovery despite the slight boost from the sale period in June.

CXO Speak About Strategy Shifts

With the lockdown easing up, challenges that businesses were faced with are seeing some respite, as claimed by industry leaders in a study undertaken by Nielsen in the second half of September 2020. Bringing production up-to-speed, difficulty in sourcing raw materials, challenges to get products to retail outlets, limited opening hours/ store closure were the key challenges faced during the lockdown. With the economy unlocking, some of the big challenges that keep the leaders worried are the limited opening hours of outlets in a day and decline in consumer demand.

Majority of the corporate leaders are now optimistic of an improved business environment, with two-thirds anticipating a positive impact on their businesses over the next four months, that is, rest of the calendar year 2020  incidentally this period coincides with the festival season in India.

In this constantly evolving situation, new consumer needs have emerged that businesses are continuously working to address the same. Some of these emerging consumer trends are increased adoption of e-commerce and seeking products delivering protection for self and family from germs/ bacteria. Apart from these, consumers are actively looking out for safety and hygiene practices at various consumer touchpoints.

These consumer needs are resonating with corporate leaders, who are crafting strategic actions, viz. increased engagement and investments on expanding digital footprint, reprioritisation of capacity to rationalise product mix, and review communication strategy to convey safety/ health/ hygiene benefits.

Companies need to address emerging health and safety trends of the consumers. As consumers are more homebound and relying more on online services, increasing digital and online investments could be beneficial. Companies unable to provide products that can fit the adjusted wallet and price sensitivities may ultimately lose long-term traction with core users. With dynamic times, it will be critical for manufacturers and service providers to be close to the changing consumer trends and behaviour and adjusting strategies accordingly.
Dre Miller, an activist with one of the organizing groups, said the groups had been approached by city officials asking them not to go forward because of the possibility of conflict. But he said the group took precautions, including setting up a car caravan to minimize chances of conflict as ralliers departed. And by sticking to their goals of highlighting the history of racism in the neighborhood where the Proud Boys had scheduled their rally, he said, the gathering was one of the most peaceful he had been to in recent weeks.

Our Black organizers are going to stick together and stick to the message, he told the crowd.

The Proud Boys chairman, Enrique Tarrio, said he was grateful that the police presence  estimated by the Oregon State Police at 500 officers  had kept the groups apart.

We got all of our speakers on stage, we got to say what we wanted to say, we did what we wanted to do, and now were out of town, Mr. Tarrio said on Saturday afternoon.

Political and law enforcement officials had expressed fears that Saturdays competing events could become violent, as they have in weeks and years past, especially with gunshots fired recently by both sides on the streets of Portland and the tensions of a presidential campaign.

But what was setting up to be a violent showdown in the middle of downtown Portland began to change when the Proud Boys altered their plans, moving their rally to a relatively remote park on the northern edge of the city, while groups such as Rose City Antifa announced that they would gather at a different park miles away.
Seventy monkeys escaped their enclosure in Takagoyama Shizen Zoo in Futtsu City last June. The authorities arrested a 16-year-old high school boy for vandalism and apparently allowing the monkeys to escape. The zoo caretaker found a large gap in the monkey's age, and the wire mesh had been cut with a sharp tool.

A zoo caretaker found a hole within the enclosure, and the wire mesh had been cut with a sharp tool. The police are also investigating the boy's friends for possible involvement in the incident as a surveillance camera caught the boy's friend's car in the camera. The boy was arrested on Wednesday and said he found the tool on the way to the zoo.

READ NEXT: Reverse Zoos: These Wildlife Zoos Allow Caged Humans to Feed Animals

Recapturing the Monkeys

The monkeys are now living in the mountains around the zoo. Park attendants are leaving the doors open and placing food in the enclosure in an attempt to recapture the monkeys. The monkeys would reportedly come down from the mountains and approach attendants asking for food.

The park is about 6,800 square meters and the monkeys used to roam more freely, but after Typhoon Faxai in 2019 brought down the fences, around 100 monkeys escaped to the wild.

Between January and February of this year, most of the monkeys had been recaptured, and the zoo started the reconstruction of the enclosure. However, since the monkeys escaped again in June, the park officials will have to capture them all over again.

READ NEXT: [WATCH] Female Biker Attacked by Bison for Getting Too Close to Herd

Other Animals Escaped from Zoo Stories

The Takagoyama Shizen Zoo is not the only zoo to have a problem with jailbreak residents, other animals also escape from zoos all over the globe. Here are some of the stories:

Jaguar Escape in Audobon Zoo kills eight other animals

In 2018, a male jaguar escaped from its enclosure At Audubon Zoo and mauled other animals, killing eight of them. The jaguar killed five alpacas, an emu, and one fox. The jaguar was captured and returned to its cage after being sedated by the zoo's vet team. It was unclear how the animal escaped, but zoo officials found that the roof may have been 'compromised."

Lynx was shot and killed in Wales

Lillith, a young lynx, was shot and killed after escaping from her enclosure for a zoo in Wales. She was on the run for two weeks until she was spotted in a residential area when authorities ordered her shot. The zoo became under investigation for improper enclosures and handling and was eventually petitioned for the shutdown.

More than 150 Rhesus monkeys escaped Long Island Zoo

In 1935, 150 Rhesus monkeys escaped the zoo for several days. There are many conflicting stories about how it happened. However, most reports agree that the monkeys escaped while the monkey's keeper was doing his regular cleaning duties.

A flamingo escaped from a zoo in Kansas and found the love of his life

An African Flamingo broke out of his enclosure in 2005 from a zoo in Kansas. However, the search operation failed to find the bird. Eight years later, bird watcher Neil Hayward spotted the flamingo in Texas's Gulf Coast and had found himself a partner, another flamingo who escaped from the Mexican Nature Reserve years earlier. When the Kansas zoo was informed about the missing bird's whereabouts, the zoo wished the flamingo luck and allowed the bird to stay in the wild.

READ NEXT: Giant Panda Gives Birth at Smithsonian National Museum

Check out more news and information on Endangered Species on Nature World News.
Premier Daniel Andrews has revealed that Health Minister Jenny Mikakos told him in a text message that she had decided to resign.

The Victorian leader fended off tough questions when he fronted the media on Saturday, only hours after Ms Mikakos abruptly stood down as a minister and a member of parliament.

Mr Andrews told reporters she made the right decision and he thanked her for her service.

'I did not speak with the Minister before she resigned and I have not spoken to her since,' Mr Andrews said.

'She sent me a text. She has resigned. She is no longer a Minister.

'I want to take this opportunity to thank her for her dedicated service, for her hard work. I'm grateful to her for her contribution to the parliament and to the people of Victoria and to our party, and I wish her well for the future.'

'I believe that was the appropriate course of action for her to take.'

Scroll down for video.

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has revealed that Health Minister Jenny Mikakos told him in a text message that she had decided to resign

Mr Andrews named mental health minister Martin Foley as Ms Mikakos' replacement.

His praise came after Ms Mikakos posted to Twitter that her integrity been 'undermined' and that she could no longer serve in the Premier's Cabinet.

The ugly, public break-up, comes as pressure mounts on the government over their handling of the state's quarantine hotel blunder.

But Mr Andrew's did his best to side-step questions regarding his role in the quarantine saga and remains adamant he will not be following suit, and has no plans to resign in the midst of the public health crisis.

Premier Andrews gave evidence yesterday at an Inquiry examining who gave the order to outsource private security guards in the state's hotel quarantine program.

He told the hearing he did not know but regarded Ms Mikakos 'accountable for the program', which has led to a surge in coronavirus cases and a statewide lockdown.

Less than 24 hours after the premier made his comments, Ms Mikakos walked out on the job, becoming the first domino to fall in the under siege Cabinet.

On her way out the door she did not hesitate to take one final swipe at Mr Andrews, saying she too wanted to know who was responsible for the hotel disaster.

At an inquiry in the bungled quarantine program on Thursday, Ms Mikakos (pictured taking the oath) recalled she did not know private guards were enforcing the scheme until late May

Mr Andrews named mental health minister Martin Foley (pictured) as Ms Mikakos' replacement

'I have never wanted to leave the job unfinished but in light of the Premiers statement to the Board of the inquiry and the fact that there are elements in it that I strongly disagree with, I believe that I cannot continue to serve in his Cabinet,' Ms Mikakos said in a statement on Twitter.

'I am disappointed that my integrity has sought to be undermined.

'I have today written to the Governor of Victoria to resign my commissions as a Minister effective today. I will also be resigning from the Parliament.'

Pressure on Ms Mikakos mounted after her testimony to the inquiry on Thursday was conflicted by Mr Andrews' on Friday.

Ms Mikakos told the hearing that 'to the best of her recollection' she did not know private guards were enforcing the scheme until late May when the Rydges hotel suffered a coronavirus outbreak.

But a video of a press conference on 29 March - two days after the quarantine scheme was announced - shows Ms Mikakos standing alongside jobs minister Martin Pakula as he said: 'Passengers returning will now undergo mandatory two-week quarantine at those Melbourne hotels with security guards in place.'

A Four Corners investigation showed some hotel security guards (pictured) fell fast asleep in the corridor of an undisclosed Melbourne hotel

On Friday Premier Daniel Andrews told the inquiry he regarded Ms Mikakos 'accountable' for the hotel quarantine program.

The virus escaped from hotel quarantine in late May and sparked the state's second wave which has seen more than 700 deaths.

The Victorian government has faced criticism for not accepting ADF troops and instead using private security guards, some of whom flouted social distancing rules and failed to properly wear PPE, witnesses told the inquiry.

Ms Mikakos said she was 'not part of the decision-making process' to use private security guards.

'With the benefit of hindsight, there are clearly matters that my department should have briefed me on,' Ms Mikakos said in her resignation letter.

'Whether they would have changed the course of events only the Board and history can determine.

'For three months I had looked forward to learning who made the fateful decision to use security guards. Victorians deserve to know.'

Members of Victoria Police patrol in Elsternwick Park on September 19, 2020 in Melbourne

But while Ms Mikakos acknowledged she is responsible for her department and that 'the buck stops with me'.

She also said 'it is not her responsibility alone' and does not believe her actions contributed to the second wave of cases which have ravaged the state.

When Mr Andrews was asked by by reporters if he had any plans to step down himself in light of the debacle, he emphatically said 'no'.

'I don't run from problems and challenges. I've got a very important job to do, which is to continue to get these case numbers down and then to begin the biggest recovery project that our state has ever seen,' he said.

'This is a one-in-100-year event. So my answer to your question is no, I have an enormous amount of work to get done, and I'm going to get it done. Because that's what I do. I get things done.'

In the past 24-hours Victoria recorded 12 new cases of COVID-19 and one death.

There are currently 444 active cases in the state and the state's death toll has now climbed to 782.
Editorials represent the institutional view of the newspaper. They are written and edited by the editorial staff, which operates separately from the news department. Editorial writers are not involved in newsroom operations.
The efforts of Brazils ruling elite to reopen schools amid the catastrophic spread of the COVID-19 pandemic are being met with a growing wave of resistance from education workers. On Thursday, teachers in the state of Pernambuco, in northeastern Brazil, voted massively in favor of a strike against the return of on-site classes.

Teachers strike against starvation wages in Recife, capital of Pernambuco, in March of this year [Source: Facebook]

Brazil has recorded close to 4.7 million coronavirus cases and more than 140,000 deaths. Roughly 30,000 new cases are being reported daily.

At the beginning of the week, Pernambucos coalition government of the Brazilian Socialist Party (PSB) and the Maoist Communist Party of Brazil (PCdoB) announced a sudden reopening of schools in the state, beginning next week. Angered by this decision, some 2,000 educators participated in an online meeting of the Union of Education Workers in Pernambuco (SINTEPE) and 94 percent voted in favor of the strike.

The decision to strike was reported with enthusiasm by workers on social media. One of them said: The voice that echoed today in the meeting was historic, greater than any note or pronouncement by governmental leaders. In the face of the participation of each education professional today, it is easy to see that we have an overwhelming majority, and it is a fact that the teachers say NO to on-site activities!

SINTEPE, however, is already preparing to conciliate with the government and indicating its plans to betray the strike. The president of the union, Fernando Melo, declared that workers dissatisfaction was related to the way in which the announcement of the return was made and to the conditions in the schools that they understand as unsafe. And he said that the realization of the strike will depend on a meeting between the union and the government, scheduled for next Monday, and on a new vote following that.

The reopening approved by the PSB/PCdoB government in Pernambuco is aligned with the homicidal policy promoted not only by Brazils fascistic President Jair Bolsonaro, but by their political partners in the Northeastern states, such as the governor of Maranhao, Flavio Dino of the Maoist PCdoB, and the governor of Ceara, Camilo Santana of the Workers Party (PT), who have already approved the reopening of part of the schools. In Maranhao, at least seven private schools were closed with COVID-19 infections after they were reopened by a decree of Flavio Dino authorizing their return.

The actions of Pernambuco educators, on the other hand, follow other recent strike votes by Brazilian educators in the states of Parana and Amazonas, and by civilian teachers of the Military College of Rio de Janeiro, who prevented its reopening last week.

In Manaus, capital of Amazonas, the Union of Education Workers of Amazonas (SINTEAM) kept teachers inside deadly classrooms for weeks, even with coronavirus outbreaks being reported in dozens of schools, before calling a meeting that voted in favor of a strike. But only a few days later, SINTEAM buried the strike arguing that the government could legitimately cut the strikers salaries and the courts could fine the union.

After the unions betrayal, the governor of Amazonas, Wilson Lima of the Christian Social Party (PSC), announced this week the expansion of the reopening of schools, even in the face of increased COVID-19 infections and hospitalizations, which he hypocritically attributes only to crowds in bars, and not to hundreds of thousands of students in classrooms.

In Parana, the government of Ratinho Junior of the Social Democratic Party (PSD), seeking to pave the way for the reopening of schools, announced on Thursday that teachers will receive absences and cuts in their salaries if students do not attend their online classes at Google Meet. The government has provided neither computers nor internet to students and teachers. Outraged, the educators demanded on social media that the strike start immediately, and not wait for a government decree to reopen classrooms.

On Wednesday, the government of Minas Gerais authorized the resumption of in-person classes from October 5 in private and municipal schools throughout the state. On the same day, Minas registered 133 COVID-19 deaths, more than three times the previous days toll. Teachers on social media denounced the United Education Workers of Minas Gerais (Sind-UTE/MG) union for blocking a meeting to take a strike vote and for directing educators to trust in the courts to block the governments decision.

Brazilian educators are demonstrating an immense willingness to fight against the homicidal campaign to reopen schools and are finding broad support in the working class as a whole. This is part of a global wave of resistance among educators and youth against these same policies being implemented by the ruling classes in all capitalist countries.

To advance this struggle, however, it is necessary to confront the reactionary structure of the unions that, in alliance with the governments, turn against the workers, seeking to isolate them locally and repress their strikes or lead them to defeat. Workers need to form new democratic organizations that are suited to the demands of the objective situation, a network of rank-and-file educators committees throughout Brazil and the world that allow the unification of these strikes to defend the lives of educators, students and their families and defeat the murderous policy being advanced in the interests of the capitalist oligarchy.
(Newser)  A bank manager discovered a 9.07-carat diamond at a state park in southwestern Arkansas after thinking the precious gem was a piece of glass, the AP reports. Kevin Kinard of Maumelle found the second-largest diamond in the 48-year history of Crater of Diamonds State Park on Labor Day, according to a news release from Arkansas State Parks. Kinard said he and his friends hauled sifting equipment to the state park in Murfreesboro. Kinard noted that he's been visiting Crater of Diamonds regularly since he was a kid but had never stumbled upon a diamond until Sept. 7. "I only wet sifted for about ten minutes before I started walking up and down the plowed rows," he said. "Anything that looked like a crystal, I picked it up and put it in my bag."

story continues below

While searching in the southeast portion of the 37.5-acre diamond search area, Kinard scooped up a marble-sized crystal that had a rounded, dimpled shape. "It kind of looked interesting and shiny, so I put it in my bag and kept searching," Kinard said. "I just thought it might've been glass." Several hours later, Kinard said he and his comrades stopped by the park's Diamond Discovery Center, where park workers identify visitor findings and register diamonds. Upon having his finds assessed, an employee informed Kinard he had discovered a diamond. "I honestly teared up when they told me," Kinard said. "I was in complete shock!" People notes that the diamond's value is unclear, but a 3.03-carat gem found in 1990 was worth $34,700so Kinard's is "likely worth thousands more."

(Read more diamonds stories.)
Ongoing works at Kilbride Lane are the 'elephant in the room', said Cllr Rory O'Connor at a recent meeting of Bray Municipal District.

'We need to find a solution,' he said.

A spokesman for residents of Clover Hill had communicated with members of the council asking that as works come to a close, walls facing Clover Hill be painted and planting done in the space between estates.

Two bungalows in the new development will face into a cul-de-sac in Clover Hill, they said.

According to the housing report, power and water is currently being brought to the units before the final finishing of the units starts.

Additional ground workers are present on site to assist in the delivery of footpaths, roads and green spaces.

The contractor has limited the number of trades on site due to social distancing as required by Covid-19 guidelines. Due to supply chain issues, temporary closures, and having to limit the numbers of personnel on-site due to Covid-19, the project completion date is now December 2020.

'We need to find a solution as a group,' said Cllr O'Connor. He said that there are cuts to the estate. 'Are there any cuts to any other estates?' According to the communication given to members, the council had told the spokesman that due to higher costs there was less available for such works.

Cllr Dermot O'Brien said that there was a resolution made at a previous district meeting, that a meeting should happen between residents of Clover Hill and council officials.

That did not occur due to the pandemic. Cllr O'Brien said that there is a lovely, vibrant community in the area. He said that they have had five years of inconvenience.

'There is a worry that the finish of the Kilbride Lane development won't complement and integrate with Clover Hill,' said Cllr O'Brien. 'I think it is doable. To say that it is not within our remit, power or competence to do something would be strange.'

Cllr Joe Behan welcomed in his opening remarks regarding the housing report that so much progress has been made on different housing schemes in the area. 'Ard Na Greine looks like it's starting in September, there is public consultation for Cedar court and Jameson Court in Kilmacanogue is nearly finished, as is Kilbride Lane,' said Cllr Behan. 'After many years of waiting it is great to see progress on schemes,' he said.

Cllr Behan said that Covid-19 intervened after it was agreed a meeting should take place between housing staff and residents of Clover Hill. 'I regret the fact that a meeting didn't take place and I would still like to see it take place,' he said.

'There has been a lot of disquiet on that cul de sac,' said Cllr Behan. He said that issues have included breaking of the rules when it came to times of work, and the way the road was cleaned up and reinstated.

'What's left now is the integration of the side of the development facing Clover Hill,' said Cllr Behan. 'We need to try to ensure it's done the best way possible for the community in Clover Hill and the two people in those houses.'

He said that the council have made an argument that they have to cut costs. Cllr Behan said that a part eight had been passed on the project. 'So we might vote for something but if money gets tight the officials have the power to cut something out?'

Cllr Behan said that the finishing touches should be done and in agreement with the residents if possible.

'The officials should meet representatives of the residents,' he said. 'I don't think it's acceptable that the works - railings, planting and paintings - can't be done.'

Cllr Melanie Corrigan said that she feels very strongly that it needs to be sorted. 'Cost cutting is very unfair on people in a family oriented area who have put up with works going on,' she said.

Leas-Cathaoirleach Cllr Aoife Flynn Kennedy, who was chairing last Tuesday's meeting, commended the housing department on all the works done. 'It is a lengthy process, perhaps too long. A lot of these projects have been in the pipeline for many years. Now we can start taking people off the housing list.'

Housing administrative officer Triona Irving said that she would pass those compliments on to the housing department. She said that all allocations have been done for Jameson Heights in Kilmacanogue, and people were delighted to receive their letters.

Ms Irving said that she could bring any specific questions to the director of housing regarding Kilbride Lane, and the director would respond to the members. 'I gather that it's to do with the finish of the development and the integration of both communities,' said Ms Irving. 'We can certainly ask him to look at it and come back with full details.'

Cllr Dermot O'Brien asked that it be done in consultation with the community. 'They have ideas and are willing to be involved.'

District Manager Lorraine Gallagher said that's where the impasse is. She said that the Part Eight process includes public consultation, which is key to the process, and that's when anything like that should be addressed.

Cllr Joe Behan said that the request is quite specific - that walls facing clover hill be painted and plants be planted. 'They are not impossible requests,' he said. 'Unless the Wicklow County Council housing director has set his face against any kind of compromise,' he said. 'I hope that's not his attitude.'

He said that Bray Municipal District has a housing function. 'It was fought for long and hard before amalgamation,' said Cllr Behan. 'As part of that the director should come to some of these meetings. We passed a motion months before covid that the housing director should meet the residents. I don't want to be pushed aside with a second hand message.

'I might not agree with everything the residents have said, particularly about council officials,' said Cllr Behan. 'But they are correct in saying that we as councillors if we are worth anything, should be able to uphold a commitment made.'

Members agreed to seek a response from the director of housing regarding meeting representatives of residents of Clover Hill, perhaps over Zoom.
Page Content

The Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies inaugurated its ninth conference on democracy issues and democratization under the title The Constitutional Question and Democratic Transition, held in cooperation with the Arab Association for Constitutional Law on September 24-29, 2020. Mehdi Mabrouk, Director of the Arab Center branch in Tunis, addressed the opening session of the conference and observed that more than one reason justifies selecting the constitutional issue as a topic of scientific study of the utmost currency and timeliness, most notably that constitutions in our Arab countries are - in a strange paradox - one of the catalysts of revolutions and uprisings on the one hand, and one of the reasons for their faltering and failure on the other. Notwithstanding the different approaches and the multiple viewpoints observable in the conference papers, most of the countries that have gone through these stalled transitions have witnessed important constitutional trajectories in which sometimes new constitutions were drawn up, or new draft constitutions, or sometimes old constitutions were amended so that some of the protesters aspirations, needs and desires (both among elites and broad social groups) such that the emergent constitution appeared to be a close contract between the ruler and the ruled, in which the nature of the state, the pillars of the political system, the distribution of powers and the relationship between them were determined  in addition to the rights and duties that not only determine the citizens citizenship, but also complete her humanity. Mabrouk noted that comparative experiences in building constitutionalism confirm that the constitution cannot be not a ready-made prescription for solving all the problems and issues from which national groupings suffer. Rather, it is a complex construction that reflects the various social forces and wills that make writing and drafting a constitution a challenging process that reflects not only the balance of power, but the accumulated culture of elites and socio-cultural nature of societies as well, in addition to their political and constitutional heritage.



Conference Coordinator and Democratic Transformation project director Abdel-Fattah Mady then welcomed and thanked the attending Arab and foreign researchers and experts for their participation in the conference via Zoom and the Arab Centers social networks. He expressed his gratitude towards the referees and supervisors for their moderation of remote-conferencing sessions via social media. He emphasized that the topic of the conference covered a broad scope of research that encompassed extended stages, some of which precede the writing of the constitutions themselves, with others arriving later in this process. All stages involve a multiplicity of issues, such as: political consensus and political, social and economic contexts; the formation of constituent bodies; the relationship of temporary or small constitutions to permanent constitutions; dealing with the legacy of old regimes; assessing the roles of local and external experts; constitutional enforcement guarantees; stabilizing and bolstering constitutional democratic systems; addressing the deficiencies of representative democracy; and success guarantees in divided societies.

Mady referred to the process of research submissions management, whereby studies received by the scientific committee were then subjected to the Arab Centers arbitration process and rules, in order to ensure scientific rigor and enhance the contribution to Arab knowledge production and its products  noting that the committee had received more than 70 research papers, with 54 papers of these were judged. Subsequently 22 papers passed the next stage, following the committees reception of more than 106 arbitration reports. He concluded by noting that there are many topics that still need further research and study, including how to control the relevant concepts, especially those relating to a democratic constitution and associated concepts, in addition to researching the interactions that took place between the perceptions of different Arab parties, the limits to the external role, as well as methods of activating constitutions and ensuring guarantees of their continuation.

Experiences in Yemen, Iraq, Algeria

Following the opening session, two sessions were held via Zoom, both including some of the most prominent Arab experts to take part in putting forth a new constitution following 2011 or to be linked directly to that process. The first session, headed by Khaled Ziade, director of the Arab Centers Beirut branch, saw testimonies solidifying the experiences of Yemen, Iraq, and Algeria with constitutional reform and its relation to democratic transition. It was attended by Professor of Sociology at Taiz University in Yemen Olfat El-Dabie; Professor of political science at the University of Baghdad Nadeem Al-Jabiry and Professor of Common Law at University of Tebessa, Amar Boudiaf.

El-Dabie offered a proposal outlining the Yemeni experience post-2011, relating to the attempt to procure a new democratic constitution, while working within the transitional justice and national reconciliation team at Yemens Conference of National Dialogue. El-Dabie opened her testimony with the outcomes of the Gulf Initiative and the legal and political framework for compromise after the February Revolution of 2011. She stressed that the conference adopted the slogan the people will write their constitution as a result of this initiative, in an attempt to ensure wide-ranging participation from all segments of Yemeni society in the forging of the countrys new constitution. The impacts of increased popular awareness of the constitutions importance included the formulation of a document of guarantees in support of carrying out the agreements to which discussants agreed, and the establishment of the constitutional committee that produced a draft in accordance with the outcomes of the National Dialogue. It was received by the national committee for monitoring the execution of the dialogues outcomes, who then reviewed it to ensure its adherence to the documents authority, in preparation to put it to a popular referendum after the National Committees consolidation. However, this constitution has stalled in light of political discord and the deterioration of the situation the point of civil war. This draft constitution, El-Dabie emphasized, is still the best text to encompass Yemenis prospects for change and, if adopted, to strengthen the possibility of democratic transition in the future. This is in addition to the rights and freedoms it mentions, especially those of women and youth, as well as the guarantees it sets to prevent a return to authoritarianism.

Nadeem Al-Jabiry, on the other hand, explored the political and intellectual dimensions of the writing of the permanent Iraqi constitution of 2005, first stressing that the goal of putting forth a constitution established for post-occupation democracy was beset by complications in light of a significant deterioration in the Iraqi states capabilities and the decomposition of its military and national security institutions. Al-Jabiry outlined the many appearances that contributed to defeating the purpose of creating a constitution, namely the elites lack of a viable political project and the domination of sectarian customs and inclinations, to say nothing of its inability to break free of its authoritarian heritage. He demonstrated how the national transitional organization formed a committee for constitution writing, in accordance with power-sharing agreements between the elements of society, wracked by structural disorder as well as a weakness in the authority represented by the state administration law for the transition phrase imposed by the occupation. Moreover, Al-Jabiry clarified that foreign interventions and conflicts between political camps have led in turn to a curtailment in the impact this constitution might have. Nevertheless, the 2005 constitution, in his opinion, gained relative success in organizing the political process between 2006-2010; however, it appeared the complete opposite from 2010-2020 where its weakness became clear as a result of the transformation of the conflict in Iraq from political, fought over power and influence, to a social conflict revolving around taking control of land and people.

As relates to the link between the Algerian popular movements demands in 2019 and the current preliminary efforts to implement the proposed constitutional amendments, Amar Boudiaf explained that the peaceful popular movement, launched in February 2019, solidified a number of demands which defined the characteristics of the new constitutional proposal, including the issue of determining the presidential termsconsidered to be the demand that relates to the spark that set off the popular uprising, inasmuch as it related to preventing the reelection of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika. Boudiaf addressed the provisions within the new project that achieve independence for essential institutions such as the judiciary and parliament, in addition to incorporating the rights and freedoms that form the foundation of democracy, and the reform of political institutionsmost especially an independent committee to carry out elections. In the end, he emphasized several recommendations related to the meaning of the document, linking it to the popular movements demands in such a way as to strengthen the power of the people to affect change and democratic transition.

The Cases of Sudan, Libya, Syria, and Morocco

During the second session of Arab experts, chaired by Haider Saeed, Director of Research at the Arab Center and Editor-in-Chief of the journal Siyasat Arabiya, four testimonies were presented that crystallize several Arab experiences in constitutional transformation: Sudan, Libya, Syria, and Morocco. The session included the Sudanese lawyer and human rights defender Nabil Adib Abdullah, who headed the investigation committee into human rights violations during the Sudanese protests; the Libyan lawyer Mohamed Abdelkader al-Tumi, a member of the founding body to draft the constitution in Libya; the Syrian lawyer and professor of public international law at Qatar University Mohamed Hosam Hafez; and Professor of Higher Education at the University of Mohammed V in Rabat and former member of the Constitutional Council and the Constitutional Court of the Kingdom of Morocco, Mohamed Aterguine.

In his intervention, Nabil Abdullah reviewed the developments of the constitutional issue in the Sudanese situation since the ouster of President Omar al-Bashir, also reviewing constitutional developments prior to 2011, especially the declaration of the Sudan Interim Constitution of 2005, a fruit of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement signed with the Sudan People's Liberation Movement. He showed how this constitution bore a contradiction between a text suggesting the possibility of democracy on the one hand, and the reality of the authoritarian experience on the other. Abdullah indicated that the overthrow of al-Bashir by the armed forces placed de facto authority in the hands of the military council, with a promise of it remaining only a transitional period, after which the reins of power would be handed over to an elected legitimate authority. In this context, Abdullah presented the transitional dilemma of holding elections without reforming the legal system and liberating the judicial and executive authorities from the control of the former regime, which entailed violating the will of the people. Abdullah also pointed out the balance between the de facto authority lying in the hands of the army and the authority delegated by the people to the Forces of Freedom and Change, effectively authorizing conduct, in the language of the jurists, and leading towards consensus. Finally, the handover of power was carried out according to a constitutional document between the two parties and reflecting realities while defining the structures of government and their powers during the transitional period to ward off intrusion into public freedoms.

Mohamed Abdelkader al-Tumi presented a presentation on the constitutional experience in Libya after 2011, highlighting the formation of the founding body to draft the constitution by electing 60 members from the three regions (Tripoli, Cyrenaica, and Fezzan) to represent the components of Libyan society in their cultural and linguistic specificity, explaining the defect in such a configuration, namely the conditions set by the Constitutional Declaration for the approval of the draft constitution. This posed a challenge for the completion of the project within the specified period that the constituent body was faced with. The conditions for its approval constituted a clear impediment, considering the climate of conflicting views between political currents as well as security concerns and political turmoil. al-Tumi also presented the contents of the draft constitution, touching upon the issue of the referendum in the constitution. He concluded by noting that the Libyan draft constitution has not yet seen the light of day because of political division and regional and international interference in Libyan affairs.

From another standpoint, Mohamed Hosam Hafez assessed the constitutional issue in Syria and its impact on the ongoing conflict since 2011, explaining the reasons why demands for changing the constitution did not occupy a very prominent position throughout the conflict: the priority was placed upon achieving a political transition. Hafez provided an explanation for the constitutions low status in the political process derived from the two factors of representation and legitimacy as they are characterized in totalitarian regimes: the Syrian regime built its legitimacy on foundations that are not governed by constitution and law; rather, it has used electoral processes and referendums as a cover for repressive practices that are at their core unconstitutional practices. Hafez expected that political conflict over the constitution and its provisions would likely arise following the current regime, a surmise based upon discussions that took place in past years within the Syrian opposition. He called for close attention to be paid to the referential aspects of the constitutional issue in the Syrian political context, highlighting the import of discussions and outputs of Syrian-Syrian dialogues on constitutional issues, especially given the formation of the so-called Syrian Constitutional Committee.

Mohamed Aterguine presented the role of the constitutional judiciary in Morocco, especially regarding its jurisprudence in matters of positive discrimination. In relation to the Moroccan constitution, he emphasized the role played by open writing in expanding the space for the constitutional judge to clarify and interpret the constitutional document, offering as an example the text of the Moroccan constitution and related documents regarding non-discrimination on the basis of gender: Does the establishment of a mechanism for positive discrimination in the representation of women in the House of Representatives contradict the prohibition of discrimination, and with the constitutional principle of equality? Aterguine asked: is it possible to achieve unity between these constitutional principles? Such questions were posed to the Moroccan constitutional judge, in a context of pressure, contradictory demands, and within a political situation in which everyone demanded a democratic interpretation of the constitution! Aterguine explained the regulatory controls that the legislator employs within his discretionary power, limited bound by the constitutions supremacy and the jurisprudence of the constitutional judiciary.

Each session was followed by comments and questions from conference attendees on Zoom and via social networks, relating principally to discussing the consensuses that took place in various cases and the extent to which they constituted truly major consensuses, as well as the various ways of addressing the legacy of previous regimes and confronting the obstacles arising from those regimes: arbitration of power, force of arms, and external interference in resolving political conflicts and disputes. Discussions for the day concluded with: the issue of possible guarantees that can reflect the demands of the people and their perceptions of the dominant political forces, as evidenced by experience in the two waves of popular revolutions erupting in 2011 and 2019; mechanisms for enforcing constitutions and avoiding their remaining mere texts that have no effect on reality; the roles of external actors; and how best to benefit from other experiences.


Charlie Teo's 'miracle girl' has had her disease 'removed' following another -successful operation from the acclaimed neurosurgeon - after her cancer returned for the third time.

Milli Lucas was hit with the devastating news in April that her cancer had come back after Dr Teo wiped out 98 per cent of the growth on her brain stem following a life-saving procedure in Sydney in June 2019.

Milli and her father Grant Lucas travelled from Perth to Sydney so Dr Teo could perform an eight-hour operation on April 8 - after after doctors in Western Australia again refused to carry out the procedure amid fears of paralysis or even death.

The family posted another update to Milli's blog 'Team Millstar' on Friday, revealing she was back in Sydney with the renowned neurosurgeon.

Milli Lucas (pictured) underwent another surgery with Dr Charlie Teo in Sydney

'Milli is currently in Sydney with her man Charlie again,' the update read.

'She had surgery on Monday and the disease was removed.'

Milli went back into surgery on Tuesday to 'release pressure'.

The 13-year-old remains in ICU and has another operation on Monday.

Milli (left) was hit with the devastating news in April that her cancer had come back after Dr Teo (right) wiped out 98 per cent of the growth on her brain stem following a life-saving procedure in Sydney in June 2019

'We ask that you keep her in your thoughts and further updates will be provided when possible,' the blog post said.

'In true Milli words: ''See you soon mate''.'

Milli's story made headlines last year after generous family, friends and strangers raised more than $170,000 to help pay for the life-saving operation.

Many doctors declined to perform the operation on Milli - who was told she had just 12 weeks to live - as the tumour was in a high risk 'no go zone' of the brain.

However, Dr Teo offered to do the procedure, in which he was able to successfully remove 98 per cent of her tumour before she travelled to Germany to get rid of the remaining two per cent.

Milli's story made headlines last year after generous family, friends and strangers raised more than $170,000 to help pay for the life-saving operation

Milli incredibly returned to school just weeks after her surgery.

The schoolgirl's rare condition puts her at risk of developing various types of cancer, which has also affected her older sister Tess, her mother and cousin Beau.

Her older sister Tess was also diagnosed with brain tumour but she has since been given the all-clear, while their mum - who has a family history of cancer - underwent a double mastectomy after she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2016.
Paul Reid said the country should avoid knocking down the youth of Ireland amid concerns of further restrictions following a growing number of Covid-19 cases.

It emerged during the week that people aged 15 to 34 account for 40% of Covid-19 cases in the past two months, despite accounting for just a quarter of the population.

On Friday, acting chief medical officer Dr Ronan Glynn and his Northern Ireland counterpart, Dr Michael McBride, made a specific appeal to teenagers and people in their 20s and 30s in Co Donegal and Londonderry to reduce their social contacts.

Young people have made this country an even better place to live, in my book. Marriage equality, climate change awareness & much more, all enabled by them. Again we put a weight on their shoulders to help us with #COVID19. Let's not knock, but galvanise them once again.@HSELive Advertisement  Paul Reid (@paulreiddublin) September 26, 2020

Donegal moved to risk level three of the Governments plan to deal with Covid-19 following advice from the National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET).

The restrictions will last for three weeks.

The chief medical officers said they were concerned about the significant proportion of cases in young people in Donegal and Derry, and asked teenagers and those in their 20s and 30s in particular to reduce their social contacts.

On Saturday, Mr Reid tweeted: Young people have made this country an even better place to live, in my book.

Marriage equality, climate change awareness and much more, all enabled by them.

Again we put a weight on their shoulders to help us with Covid-19. Lets not knock, but galvanise them once again.

The Government has also imposed country-wide level three restrictions on colleges, which will see most lecturers moved online.

Higher education institutions are to adopt the same health measures already in place in Dublin for the next two to three weeks.

Minister for Further and Higher Education Simon Harris said on Friday that colleges and libraries will remain open.

Taoiseach Micheal Martin voiced concerns earlier this week about the 18 to 34 age bracket, particularly as many students return to third-level colleges.

Mr Martin said college life will not be normal for students.

The Department of Health confirmed an additional 326 cases of Covid-19 on Friday.

No new deaths due to the virus were reported.
Bank union AIBEA has urged governor Shaktikanta Das to intervene into the affairs of which it alleged is "heading into wrong direction".

The All India Bank Employees' Association (AIBEA) in a letter to the governor has claimed that the bank is looking to change its business profile, expand network in northern India and hire senior people on contractual basis at high remuneration which could land it into problems.

The bank returned to profits two years ago after posting losses for five years, the AIBEA noted in the letter.

Few years ago, particularly around 2008 to 2012, this bank was facing a lot of problems regarding its performance and was making losses. It made losses of more than Rs 850 crore during that period, the AIBEA said in the letter to Das.

In the name of modernising the bank, the then top management of the bank brought it to serious problems and virtual mess.

With the intervention of the RBI, change in top management, strengthening its capital base, inducting some reputed people on the board of directors of the bank among others helped it make a turnaround and now the bank has come into profit, AIBEA General Secretary C H Venkatachalam said.

After making losses for continuously for five years the bank is making profit for last two years and continuously for eight quarters. The profit for 2019-20 at Rs 65 crore, is the highest since the bank's inception nine decades ago, the AIBEA mentioned.

"In the beginning of this year, the top management has changed and in the recent months we are concerned to observe that perhaps the bank once again heading in the wrong direction.

"If Reserve Bank of India does not effectively intervene in the affairs of this bank now, once again the bank will run into problems," the AIBEA claimed.

The bank union said that instead of consolidating the gains and further strengthening the bank, it is observing that efforts are on to change the business profile which are bound to land the bank into difficulties.

The 93-year old Thrissur-based is a small-sized private bank and in later years, it grew presence in other states also.

"A lot of branches were earlier opened in north Indian states and the bank got into problems due to inadequate control and supervision. Hence, the situation arose, including in the view of the RBI, and these decisions had to be reviewed and bank has already close many of those branches.

"But we learn that attempts are again being made to open more branches in northern states," said the bank union.

Customers of have regained their confidence on the bank and any reversal of the same would be "suicidal", AIBEA said, urging the that "RBI's role in the board of directors of the bank should be reviewed as otherwise would become answerable if things go bad".

Besides, the cost to income ratio of the bank is already high and there is imperative need and necessity to improve the ratio substantially, it added.

AIBEA said it has also learnt about efforts at the bank to appoint large number of sales and senior executive on contractual and cost to company basis at much higher remuneration which will land the bank in a catastrophe and financial burden.

"We apprehend the bank cannot bear and afford at this juncture. In view of the these, we seek your personal and urgent intervention in the affairs of the bank to ensure that the bank once again does not face any bad weather," AIBEA said in the letter.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Tobaccowala Joins Trendline Board

Marketing strategist and business leader Rishad Tobaccowala has joined the Board of email consulting and professional services firm Trendline Interactive.



Trendline's almost 200 employees help clients to identify, execute, and measure ideas to drive business value. The company is headquartered in Austin, TX and Guelph, ON (Canada) with offices in Atlanta, GA, Chicago, IL, and Portland, OR.



Tobaccowala is a Senior Adviser to the Publicis Groupe - previously its Chief Growth Officer and Chief Strategist - and a renowned speaker and author: his most recent book, Restoring the Soul of Business: Staying Human in the Age of Data, highlights the importance of empathy in a technological age. He holds a BS in Mathematics from the University of Bombay and an MBA in Marketing and Finance from the Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago. He says of the appointment: 'I'm not here to change Trendline, I'm here to help the organization think differently about growth and reach its full potential'.



Trendline CEO Morgan Stewart comments: 'Continuous innovation has been a core tenant at Trendline since the beginning, and we've always sought out the most talented collaborators. When it comes to talent and forwardthinking, there are few individuals as respected as Rishad Tobaccowala. He is truly a pioneer in the field of digital marketing, and we are honored to have him on our board of directors'.



Web site: www.trendlineinteractive.com .




WHO designates new Covid-19 strain as variant of concern, names it Omicron

'Omicron' is potentially more contagious than previous variants of the disease: WHO chief scientist

Omicron probably in most countries, spreading at unprecedented rate: WHO

COVID-19 death toll could hit 2 million before vaccine in wide use globally: WHO

India

oi-Briti Roy Barman

New Delhi, Sep 26: The global death toll from COVID-19 could double to 2 million before a successful vaccine is widely used, an official at the World Health Organization said on Friday.

"Unless we do it all, (2 million deaths) ... is not only imaginable, but sadly very likely," Mike Ryan, head of the UN agency's emergencies programme, told at a briefing.

The number of deaths about nine months since the novel coronavirus was discovered is nearing 1 million.

"We are not out of the woods anywhere, we are not out of the woods in Africa," said Ryan.

He said young people should not be blamed for a recent increase in infections despite growing concerns that they are driving its spread after restrictions and lockdowns were eased around the world.

"I really hope we don't get into finger wagging: it's all because of the youth," said Ryan. "The last thing a young person needs is an old person pontificating and wagging the finger."

Rather, indoor gatherings of people of all ages were driving the epidemic, he said.

The WHO is continuing talks with China about its possible involvement in the COVAX financing scheme designed to guarantee fast and equitable access globally to COVID-19 vaccines, a week after the deadline for committing passed.

"We're in discussions with China about the role they may play as we go forward," said Bruce Aylward, WHO senior adviser and head of the ACT-Accelerator programme to back vaccines, treatments and diagnostics against COVID-19.

Deepika Padukone questioned in drug probe | India tears into Pakistan | Oneindia News

Talks with China also include discussion of the world's second-largest economy potentially supplying vaccines to the scheme, he said.

The UN agency published on Friday draft criteria for the assessment of emergency use of COVID-19 vaccines to help guide drugmakers as vaccine trials reach advanced stages, said WHO assistant director-general, Mariangela Simao.

The current number of COVID-19 indected people is 32.4M worldwide with US contnuing the worst-hit with 7.05M cases and 203K death followed by India and Brazil with 5.9M and 4.69M positive cases respectively.
There are now more than 100 students on the waiting list for a desk. Most of the requests come from parents, but guidance counselors and teachers have also requested desks for students. Some teachers have even asked for their own desks, Jessica Berrellez said. The Berrellezes said it was a bit overwhelming to keep pace when the project started to gain steam, but they said it feels great to be in a position to help.
Bengaluru, Sep 26 : A start-up incubated at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Equine Biotech, has developed an indigenous RT-PCR diagnostic kit for accurate and affordable diagnosis of Covid-19.

"The biggest advantage of Equine Biotech's 'Global TM diagnostic kit' is that it takes just around one-and-half hours to confirm the presence of SARS-CoV-2 in samples," an IISc release said.

Equine Biotech founder and Department of Biochemistry Professor Opal Taut said that the test kit based on Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) is considered the gold standard for Covid-19 diagnosis.

He said the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) had approved that for use in authorised diagnostic labs.

According to him, ramping up testing in the country was crucial for tracking and controlling the spread of this infectious disease.

"India has the second highest reported cases in the world, with more than five million cases. Therefore, India needs home-grown diagnostics kits that can easily be mass produced and made accessible to a larger population. But so far, only a few Indian companies have developed reliable and accurate RT-PCR kits; most kits used widely are imported and therefore expensive," he said.

He said that the kit was an easy-to-use, multiplex RT-PCR kit with 100% specificity. "Its run time is relatively short compared with kits available elsewhere." The professor claimed that the company was currently seeking to license its test kit and work with med-tech companies and other industries for its mass production, marketing and distribution.

Equine Biotech has 30 years of experience in working on infectious diseases, including zoometric diseases.

It has previously developed diagnostic tests for screening livestock, especially cattle and horses, for blood parasitic diseases such as trypanosomiasis, trichomoniasis, theileriosis and babesiosis.
WASHINGTON - Twice, Raymond Jefferson's service to his country left him in pain, agony and facing years of recovery.

The first time was in 1995. The West Point grad was an Army officer in Okinawa for Special Forces training. When he realized a defective hand grenade was about to blow, he cupped it in his hand and held it against his leg so the shrapnel would not hit his comrades.

Jefferson lost all five fingers on his left hand.

Another explosion 16 years later was even more unexpected. Two subordinates at the Labor Department, where he was the assistant secretary for the Veterans' Employment and Training Service (VETS), accused him of procurement improprieties. An inspector general's report substantiated the allegations, including that he directed government business to associates.

Jefferson, then a rising star with master's degrees from Harvard's Business School and its Kennedy School of Government, was forced to resign. Not only did that end his prestigious career as a Senate-confirmed, Obama administration political appointee, but the damage to his reputation has followed him since.

Then, after eight tough years, the inspector general exonerated Jefferson.

Following long, dogged and costly work by Jefferson's legal team, Scott S. Dahl, Labor's inspector general until June, reversed a predecessor's earlier findings in an extraordinary Sept. 26, 2019, letter to Jefferson. Regarding each of four accusations against Jefferson, Dahl wrote: "This allegation is not substantiated."

That same day, a letter from Milton A. Stewart, a Labor deputy assistant secretary for operations, said if former department officials had the information now available they would not have pushed Jefferson from office in July 2011.

Stewart's letter says, "DOL never took disciplinary action against you." Yet the letter says that Jefferson was asked to resign. Furthermore, the deputy secretary at the time, Seth Harris, first placed Jefferson on administrative leave, then gave Jefferson four hours to quit or be fired, without allowing him to defend himself, according to a court document filed by Jefferson's lawyer.

With no apology, with no consideration of the way Jefferson's forced resignation wrecked his life, Stewart said we "consider this matter closed."

But how can it ever be closed for Jefferson?

The son of public servants, the grandson of household servants, his case demonstrates the long-lasting trials that await people, in this case a federal employee, who are accused without substantiation. It's worse in magnitude when the damaging accusations are trumpeted by a senator and articles linger online, including in The Washington Post, the New York Times and Wikipedia, as happened to Jefferson.

"I looked at that and I was in shock," he recalled about a newspaper article announcing his forced resignation.

Nothing compares to having "your name just destroyed, your reputation just completely demolished in writing and especially when you know it's not true," Jefferson said in a series of sometimes tearful interviews by Zoom, email, text messages and phone from Singapore. "I've struggled over the years to say which was worse, having my hand blown off or going through this. . . . I think going through this was worse."

Unlike civil servants, political appointees like such as Jefferson can be fired at will. They have no agency due process rights that allow them to challenge management actions against them. Jefferson spent his life savings - at least $400,000, he said - to fight in federal court, beginning with a complaint filed in July 2014.

The Labor Department and its Office of Inspector General violated his constitutional rights by pushing him out "on false grounds and publicizing their bogus findings without due process of law," one of Jefferson's briefs alleged. The case was settled with the exoneration letters but no monetary award for Jefferson, said his lawyer, Peter C. Choharis. The government agreed to pay some of his legal fees.

Jefferson's exoneration, which has not previously been reported, led his former VETS chief of staff, Amit Magdieli, to "reflect a bit on how many more careers were jeopardized in a similar way," Magdieli said by email. "Ray is a good man. Ray was able to prove his innocence - but it took nearly 10 years and came about through a singular tenacity and at enormous personal financial cost. Most don't have the stamina or means to do so."

Jefferson is now 54 and president of a global leadership consultancy based in Singapore.

Scott Gould, a former deputy Veterans Affairs secretary who worked with Jefferson, noted the parallels between when Jefferson lost his job and the period after Jefferson lost his fingers yet "had the grit and determination to figure out how he's going to rebuild his life. And it took pretty much that same level of grit and determination to get his reputation back."

Even knowing the risks of being a political appointee, Jefferson would like to serve in another administration, Gould said, adding that desire "is pretty revealing of his character."

Jefferson's January 2018 brief alleges that the two people who worked for him at VETS and accused him of misconduct had performance problems.

The complaint also alleged that the Office of Inspector General hid information favorable to Jefferson. It said there were 11 instances where the inspector general's office "hid facts that decimated" an accuser's credibility because "the only thing they had to 'substantiate' " certain allegations was the accuser's statements.

The inspectors "invented a false motive for Jefferson to steer contracts" and "manipulated both the documentary evidence and witness statements to misrepresent the facts," the brief added. Another brief, in November 2017, said inspectors "violated their own rules more than a dozen times."

Top Labor Department officials took the inspector general's report and quickly moved against Jefferson. The day after Harris, the former deputy secretary, received the inspector general's report, Jefferson alleged that Harris gave Jefferson a redacted version and placed him on administrative leave.

"This was the first time that Jefferson learned that he had been accused of wrongdoing and that OIG (Office of Inspector General) had been investigating him," according to Jefferson's complaint.

Days later, Jefferson and his lawyer met with Harris by phone, asked for the complete report and for an opportunity to refute its errors and the charges.

"Harris responded by telling Jefferson that he had four hours in which to resign or be fired," Choharis alleged in the complaint. "When Jefferson's lawyer protested that Jefferson had a due process right to notice of the charges against him and a fair opportunity to be heard to refute them, Harris told Jefferson: 'You have no due process right!' "

Jefferson was out, submitting his resignation on July 26, 2011, while thinking he could reverse this sudden, error-fueled Twilight Zone-like mystery within a few days.

"At that moment, Jefferson became the highest-ranking member of the Obama Administration forced to resign under a false ethics scandal," the complaint alleged. "Jefferson had never before been disciplined or even accused of impropriety in any of his previous positions in the public or private sectors." Among his many accomplishments, he had been a White House Fellow and a Fulbright Fellow. VETS' achievements under his leadership were chronicled in a book on government leadership.

Three former inspectors general agreed that it is rare for one to reverse a report's findings. Glenn A. Fine, who formerly headed inspector general offices at the Departments of Justice and Defense, said his staff "normally allowed subjects of substantiated investigations of misconduct to respond to the report and to provide any additional information for us to consider," because that's fair to the individual and provides "a check to ensure that the OIG has considered all the information and gets the conclusions correct."

I. Charles McCullough III, a former intelligence community inspector general, said he expects "the relevant congressional committees will show great interest [in Jefferson's case], and will likely want to conduct their own inquiry."

Jefferson's hope to quickly reverse his demise was naive. His nightmare lasted not a few days, but 2,984 - from the day of his resignation to the day of his exoneration. It was a horrible time for a person who recalls the day his presidential appointment was announced as "a beautiful moment . . . that was a highlight of my life."

Former senator Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., asked the inspector general to conduct the investigation after receiving a letter from a person who worked for Jefferson.

McCaskill, Harris and Dahl did not reply to questions submitted by email. Current officials in the Labor Department and its inspector general's office had no comment, nor did the Justice Department, which handled Jefferson's lawsuit against the government.

When Jefferson quit, McCaskill, then chairwoman of the Senate subcommittee on contracting oversight, issued a news release that cited the inspector general's findings and said Jefferson "circumvented rules and regulations to secure government contracts for friends and colleagues." She quoted a passage from the report that said he had a "pattern of conduct . . . which reflects a consistent disregard of federal procurement regulations, federal ethics principles, and the proper stewardship of appropriated dollars."

The Post quoted her saying "this is the kind of boondoggle that taxpayers have every right to expect would come to a screeching halt."

Words like these haunt Jefferson to this day, despite his exoneration a year ago. He knows his hope for another presidential appointment could be hampered, because, as Choharis told the court, Jefferson "cannot escape the calumny" of false accusations.

But he has waged a fight, worthy of the Green Beret team leader he was, to make that escape. His battle for exoneration was one step. Changing the false narrative soiling his name is another.

In addition to earlier lost job opportunities, recently he discussed potential membership on a high-powered board of a nonprofit organization promoting veterans. He told an organization official about the allegations and his exoneration letters.

The official believed his innocence, according to Jefferson, but cited his "reputational risk" still driven, a year after his exoneration, by the allegations whenever he is Googled.

"There's no counter story," the official told Jefferson.

Until now.
Elle Macpherson has come under fire by health experts for promoting a 'toxic' and 'fatal' substance, colloidal silver, that can permanently turn the skin blue.

As reported by The Sunday Telegraph, the Australian supermodel, 56, promoted a recipe to 'take one drop of coated silver in water each day' on Instagram on Friday.

Professor of medicine John Dwyer told the publication this week: 'It's ineffective and dangerous, and anyone who uses it is foolish and has been poorly advised.'

Australian supermodel Elle Macpherson (pictured), 56, has come under fire for promoting colloidal silver - a 'toxic' and 'fatal' substance that can turn the skin blue

Colloidal silver is a liquid containing tiny silver particles, that is often used to treat burns, skin wounds and infections.

Products containing colloidal silver can be purchased as homeopathic remedies or dietary supplements in the United States and Australia.

However, it is mostly used for medical purposes.

As reported by The Sunday Telegraph, Macpherson promoted a recipe to 'take one drop of coated silver in water each day' on Instagram on Friday (pictured)

Colloidal silver is a liquid containing tiny silver particles, that is often used to treat burns, skin wounds and infections. Products containing colloidal silver can be purchased as homeopathic remedies or dietary supplements in the United States and Australia

On her Instagram Stories on Friday, Macpherson encouraged her followers to 'take one drop of coated silver with water each day'.

The entrepreneur, nicknamed 'The Body' by Time Magazine in 1989, went on to describe silver as 'one of the noble and sacred metals'.

One side effect however of colloidal silver, is that it can result in argyria - a condition where the skin permanently turns a grey or blue shade.

Professor Dwyer told The Sunday Telegraph that colloidal silver 'can be toxic' and to not rely on celebrity health recommendations.

The entrepreneur, nicknamed 'The Body' by Time Magazine in 1989, described silver as 'one of the noble and sacred metals'

Macpherson is the co-founder and creative director of the company WelleCo, which sells 'alkalising' nutritional supplements

'All this nonsense is going on and far too many people think they are getting the good oil from celebrities and that has influence,' he said.

Biochemist Dr Darren Saunders also supported Dwyer's comments in The Sunday Telegraph article.

Daily Mail Australia has reached out to Macpherson for comment.

Macpherson, who is based in Miami, is the co-founder and creative director of the company WelleCo, which sells 'alkalising' nutritional supplements.

She is known to promote her many health and beauty practices on Instagram, such as regular lymphatic drainage and infrared sauna treatments.
Thirteen of New Jerseys 21 counties saw coronavirus spread in the past week, including Ocean County, which led the state in the diseases growth.

Ocean County added 9.1 new infections per 10,000 residents from Sept. 16 to Sept. 23, a rise of 52% compared to the week before. It was followed by Gloucester County at 7.3 new infections per 10,000 people and Monmouth County at 5.1 new infections per 10,000 people.

The three counties have seen a cluster of new cases recently, and all three were highlighted Friday by Gov. Phil Murphy and his administration as potential hotspots that the state was monitoring. That came as New Jersey remains on a better footing than the United States as a whole, with the state recording 3.6 new cases per 10,000 residents, compared to a national rate of 9.1 new cases per 10,000.

Its fair to say we got a few counties that are rising to a level of concern, Murphy said at a news briefing, pointing particularly to Ocean County, where the state has dispatched additional contact tracers and 6,000 more coronavirus test kits.

This is clear evidence that we are not out of the woods yet, Murphy said.

State official have complained that house parties in Monmouth County have spurred the spread of the virus there. Ocean and Gloucester have recently seen coronavirus positivity rates that, if they were a state, would place travelers from them on New Jerseys 14-day quarantine list.

New Jersey has been gradually reopening since being devastated this spring when the pandemic first swept the country. More than 16,000 New Jersey residents are believed to have died in the outbreak, with deaths peaking in April and now regularly in the single digits each day.

Still, the disease is spreading in New Jersey. The weeks figures were a 12% increase in new infections from the prior week, with just eight counties seeing declines in the number of new cases.

They included Gloucester, which had an even higher rate of new infections earlier this month, when it added 9.7 cases per 10,000 people from Sept. 9 to Sept. 16. The others were Hunterdon, Cape May, Mercer, Somerset, Passaic, Middlesex and Salem.

With Monmouth and Gloucester counties, state officials have pointed to social gatherings as the driver of the new caseloads, with Gloucesters tied to on- and off-campus student housing at Rowan University.

In Ocean County, cases have been growing by 100 to 150 a day, and at least half of those are in Lakewood, said Health Commissioner Judith Persichilli.

Lakewood is the countys largest township and is home to a sizable Orthodox Jewish community that is now observing the High Holy Days of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. Its public school system is also among those in New Jersey that have resumed full-time classroom instruction.

On Friday, Murphy said he is sure there is some amount of connection between the rise of cases and religious worship, even as he pushed back against those who would draw prejudicial conclusions from that.

I dont want anybody, I dont want a speck of anybody, in this state saying, Hey, its because of them,' or whatever, Murphy said.

The state has already sent additional contact tracers to Ocean County, and Persichilli said more will be deployed next week. She praised the cooperation of Lakewoods religious and community leaders, saying she had just gotten off a phone call in which they asked, What more can we do? and How can we cooperate?

Theyre just as interested as anyone to protect the community that theyre in service to, Persichilli said.

Our journalism needs your support. Please subscribe today to NJ.com.

Riley Yates may be reached at ryates@njadvancemedia.com.
A Kochi court on Friday found an Indian national trained by ISIS in Iraq in 2015 guilty of hatching a criminal conspiracy to wage war against the Indian and Iraqi governments.

Subahani Haja Moideen, a resident of Kerala and the kingpin of ISIS activities in South India, was arrested in 2016 from Tamil Nadus Tirunelveli district in connection with the bust of an ISIS terror cell that was planning to carry out attacks at public places and eliminate certain prominent personalities.

Moideen is convicted under IPC Sections 120(B) (Criminal Conspiracy), Section 125 (waging war against Asiatic power in alliance with the Government of India) and Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, Section 20 (Punishment for being a member of terrorist gang or organisation). The Special Court also held him guilty under Section 38 (Offence relating to membership of a terrorist organisation) and 39 (Offence relating to support given to a terrorist organisation).

The court will announce the quantum of punishment to Moideen on Monday.

ISIS-module busted in Kerala and Tamil Nadu led to the arrest of Subahani Haja Moideen

Subahani was arrested on October 3, 2016, by the National Investigation Agency after police busted an ISIS-inspired module and arrested 6 people from Kerala and Tamil Nadu. The youth arrested were reportedly collecting explosive to execute their nefarious designs in India.

Five of them were arrested while conducting a meeting Kanakamala hilltop, Kannur District, Kerala. The sixth accused was arrested from Kuttiyadi in Kozhikode district. Those arrested were identified as Manseed alias Omar Al Hindi (30), a resident of Kannur, Abu Basheer alias Rashid (29) from Coimbatore, Swalih Mohammed T alias Yousuf (26) from Thrissur, Safwan P (30) from Mallapuram Kerala, Jasim NK (25) alias Kozhikode and Ramshad Nageelan Kandiyil alias Aaamu (24) from Kozhikode.

The police secured vital information from the arrested youth that led to the arrest of Moideen from Tamil Nadus Tirunelveli district. He had fled to Tamil Nadu from Kerala after the National Investigation Agency arrested 6 of his associates for having suspected links to ISIS.

Subahani knowingly and intentionally became the member of ISIS

During the interrogation, Moideen confessed of having served in Iraq for the Islamic State. He said that he was radicalised and indoctrinated on social media following which he told his parents and wife of going to perform Umrah. However, he went to Istanbul instead and crossed over into the ISIS-controlled region of Iraq to fight for the terror outfit.

Subahani joined that ISIS and waged a war against the Government of Iraq, an Asiatic country having ties with India. It is for this reason that NIA invoked Section 125 of the IPC against the terrorist, which is a very rarely invoked section that deals with waging war against an Asiatic country.

ISIS terrorist Subahani had got training in using lethal weapons such as the Russian-made heavy machine gun called Dushka and grenade launchers. He was among the few Indians to have gotten tough battle training in Iraq to wage Jihad.

However, he told his ISIS handlers of he could not cope with the gruesome nature of terrorism in Iraq after he saw two of his friends reduced to ashes in a shell attack. He was jailed for deserting ISIS and remained incarcerated for 55 days. Subahani was subsequently transferred to Turkey from where he contacted his family with the help of Indian consulate.

Once he was back in India and settled, he once again contacted ISIS handlers over the Internet and was planning to carry out attacks in India. He was tasked with the responsibility of building the ISIS terror cell and spreading the terror network of the organisation in the Indian subcontinent. He was planning to collect explosives and precursor chemicals from Sivakasi to conduct the attacks but was arrested by the NIA just in the nick of time.

Source : OpIndia
Indias iCreate signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on innovation with Israels Start-Up Nation Central, an independent non-profit organisation, on September 22. Dr Ron Malka, Israel Ambassador to India, said that the MoU was signed at the same spot where Prime Ministers Narendra Modi and Benjamin Netanyahu inaugurated iCreate, an acronym for International Centre for Entrepreneurship and Technology.

Prime Ministers @narendramodi & @netanyahu inaugurated #India's leading start-up incubator iCreate in 2018. Today, 2 years later, we signed on the very spot where they stood, a MoU on #innovation between #Israels Start-Up Nation Central & iCreate. #GrowingPartnership  pic.twitter.com/GvhB5WW4qk  Ron Malka  (@DrRonMalka) September 22, 2020

Malka said in a statement that they have closed a circle by signing the MoU after the circle was started in 2018 when PM Modi and Netanyahu inaugurated the important incubator, iCreate. He stressed that the agreement is an important milestone in the growing innovation collaboration between Israel and India and stands in line with the visions of the Prime Ministers.

Together, both countries continue to form partnerships and collaborations in technology and innovation to solve a range of global issues like COVID-19, renewable energy and more, implementing high-end technologies like AI, big data analysis and more, he added.

Earlier today, Israeli Ambassador to India met Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani ahead of the signing of the MoU. Taking to Twitter, Malka said that he had a productive meeting with Rupani where they discussed the important agreement on innovation and more ways to advance the ongoing India-Israel cooperation.

Read: Moroccans Protest In Rabat Over UAE, Bahrain's Normalisation Of Ties With Israel

Read: PM Modi Extends New Year Greetings To Israeli Counterpart Netanyahu, Jewish Community

Start-up incubator

iCreate is an autonomous centre of Excellence which is home to imaginative and innovative brains and has the capacity to house 100 incubates concurrently working on 40-50 projects. The primary goal of the Centre is to help create a large number of quality entrepreneurs by a new ethos wherein people could understand and encourage entrepreneurship as a preferred career option.

According to the Centre of Excellence, it facilitates "Next Generation Entrepreneurship" that blends creativity, innovation, engineering, product design and leverages emerging technologies to evolve out-of-the-box applications. The Centre also engages with the government to help evolve enabling policies.

In its vision, iCreate has mentioned on its website that it plans to tie-up with similar institutions around the globe and network with their resources, mentors and educators. The latest MoU with Start-Up Nation Central on the similar lines of the organisations vision. Start-Up Nation Centrals purpose is to facilitate partnerships leading to innovative solutions for difficult problems.

Our main purpose is to help Israeli innovation to succeed, by leveraging our in-depth and expansive knowledge of the ecosystem, says Start-Up Nation Centrals website.

Read: Start-ups To Soon Start Getting Capital From Uttar Pradesh Startup Fund

Read: 'Start-ups Incubated By DST Generated 65,864 Jobs, Created Around Rs 27,262 Cr Wealth'

(Image credit: Twitter / @DrRonMalka)
Shiromani Akali Dal leader Harsimrat Kaur Badal on Saturday attacked the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), which is led by the BJP, for ignoring the woes of farmers after her party pulled out of the coalition at the Centre over three agriculture sector related bills.

If Pain & Protests of 3 cr punjabis fail to melt the rigid stance of GoI, its no longer the #NDA envisioned by Vajpayee ji & Badal sahab. An alliance that turns a deaf ear to its oldest ally & a blind eye to pleas of those who feed the nation is no longer in the interest of Pb, she tweeted.

If Pain & Protests of 3 cr punjabis fail to melt the rigid stance of GoI, it's no longer the #NDA envisioned by Vajpayee ji & Badal sahab. An alliance that turns a deaf ear to its oldest ally & a blind eye to pleas of those who feed the nation is no longer in the interest of Pb. https://t.co/OqU6at00Jx  Harsimrat Kaur Badal (@HarsimratBadal_) September 26, 2020

The SAD leader also attached a tweet by Sukhbir Singh Badal, her partys president and husband, announcing the snapping of ties with the NDA.

Also read: Snapping over two-decades-long ties, SAD pulls out of NDA over farm bills

Harsimrat Kaur Badal had resigned as the Union minister earlier this month to protest the passage of the farm bills in Parliament.

As it pulled out of more than two-decade-old ties with the Bharatiya Janata Party, the SAD accused the NDA of continued insensitivity to Punjabi and Sikh issues on late Saturday. Shiromani Akali Dal core committee decides unanimously to pull out of the BJP-led #NDA because of the Centres stubborn refusal to give statutory legislative guarantees to protect assured marketing of crops on #MSP and its continued insensitivity to Punjabi and #Sikh issues, Sukhbir Singh Badal tweeted.

Sukhbir Singh said that the SAD will continue to stand by its core principles of peace, communal harmony and guard the interest of Punjab and Punjabi in general, and Sikhs and farmers in particular. The decision on farm bills, Badal said, has been taken in consultation with the people of Punjab, especially the partys workers and farmers.

One of NDAs oldest allies, SAD has been up in arms against the recently passed farms bills by Parliament. The legislations are yet to be signed by the President Ram Nath Kovind to clear the final hurdle. After the Presidents assent, the bills will be recognised as laws in the country.
The fate of the Morrison government's controversial university funding reforms could hinge on the support of Senator Jacqui Lambie or Centre Alliance's Stirling Griff, with the bill's passage poised to be decided by a single vote.

A snap senate inquiry returned its verdict on Friday, recommending the bill be passed without amendment but urged the government to commit to reviewing the bill two years after it commences.

Tasmanian Senator Jacqui Lambie could decide the fate of the government's university funding reforms. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

However, there was considerable dissent among the inquiry's six members. Labor Senators Louise Pratt and Deborah O'Neill and Greens Senator Mehreen Faruqi opposed the findings, forcing Liberal Senator James McGrath to use his position as chair to determine the majority verdict.

Senators Lambie and Griff, who are yet to reveal how they will vote on the Job-Ready Graduates bill, are expected to come under intense lobbying from all sides, as the government seeks to push the bill to a vote as early as budget week on October 6.
President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev expressed condolences to Volodymyr Zelenskyy, President of Ukraine.

"Dear Mr. President,

I was deeply saddened by the news of multiple casualties as a result of the crash of a military aircraft in the Kharkov province.

It is due to this tragedy that on my own behalf and on behalf of the people of Azerbaijan, I offer my profound condolences to you and the families of the victims and wish a speedy recovery to the injured," the message said.
Delhi Chief Minister on Saturday wrote to Union Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar, recommending scaling up the use of a low-cost technology developed by scientists at the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI) here to deal with

IARI scientists have developed a chemical that decomposes stubble and turns it into manure. There is no need for farmers to burn stubble, Kejriwal said.

Experts at the institute have developed what they call as decomposer capsules. Just four capsules can be used to prepare 25 litres of a solution, using some jaggery and chickpea flour, enough to cover one hectare of land.

Scientists say reduces soil fertility by killing the good bacteria present in it. But if the crop residue can be turned into manure, the use of fertilizers can be reduced, the letter read.

Kejriwal said this method can be a good solution to the problem of stubble-burning and the city government is going to use it at a large scale to ensure there are "absolutely no farm fires" in the capital.

He recommended Delhi's neighbouring states should be encouraged to use it as much as possible.

I understand that there is not much time left this year. But if we come together, we will be able to stop to some extent. Farmers in the neighboring states should be encouraged to use this technology as much as possible, he said.

Kejriwal acknowledged the Centre and states' efforts to reduce stubble burning, but said the focus has been on crop residue management through machinery.

The Centre has been providing subsidy on farm equipment, still farmers are required to spend a lot of money from their own pocket, he said.

There are a lot of farmers who do not have machines to manage crop residue. They burn it instead. This method (decomposer capsules) can reduce the use of fertilizers and increased crop production, which is a win-win situation for farmers, he said.

The chief minister also sought time from the Union minister to discuss the issue with him.

Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh attract attention during the paddy harvesting season between October 15 and November 15.

Farmers set their fields on fire to quickly clear off the crop residue left behind after harvesting and before cultivating wheat and potato. It is one of the main reasons for the alarming spike in pollution in Delhi-NCR.

Last year, Punjab produced around 20 million tonnes paddy residue. Farmers burnt 9.8 million tonnes of it.

Farmers in Haryana burnt 1.23 million tonnes out of the 7 million tonnes of paddy residue produced.

Despite a ban on stubble burning in Punjab and Haryana, farmers continue to defy it as there is a short window between harvesting of paddy and sowing of wheat.

The high cost of manual or mechanical management of straw is a major reason why farmers choose to burn it.

State governments are providing 50 to 80 per cent subsidy to farmers and cooperative societies to buy modern farm equipment for in-situ management of paddy straw, installing paddy straw-based power plants and running a massive awareness campaign against stubble-burning.

But these measures are yet to make any significant impact on ground.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
L ondoners descended on Oxford Circus for an "impromptu party" on Friday night as the second 10pm curfew turfed crowds onto streets.

Footage posted on social media showed huge crowds dancing and bumping into each other as loud music blared, with seemingly no social distancing in sight.

Chattering crowds filled thoroughfares and spilled onto roads in the West End as the sweeping curfew, introduced in a bid to tackle the surging rates of coronavirus, was implemented for the second night running.

Journalist Charlie Haynes tweeted: "Oxford Circus has turned into an impromptu party," adding: "It really is packed here".

Crowds spilled onto streets in Soho last night / PA

Others posted footage of heaving Tube stations on the Piccadilly Line as drinkers headed home at the same time.

It came as London was made an area of concern, with all 33 boroughs put on the national Covid-19 watchlist.

Under the new regulations certain businesses like restaurants and pubs must close between 10pm and 5am and must operate table service only.

This also applies to places like social clubs, casinos, bowling alleys, bingo halls, amusement arcades and other indoor leisure facilities.

Some had warned of the 10pm cut-off becoming a pinch point for crowds to assemble, with similarly busy scenes pictured in Soho on Thursday night. Wales has allowed drinkers a 20 minute window to finish up after 10pm to stagger leaving times.

The packed scenes sparked fury online. "We'll be in full lockdown next week," one Twitter user wrote.

Another agreed, raging: "That's exactly why we (London) will be in full lockdown by next Friday with bars completely shut. All because people cant take some personal responsibility!"

Others branded the crowds "irresponsible", "insane" and "selfish covidiots".

Professor Graham Medley, an expert on the Governments scientific advisory committee (Sage), claimed he had never heard of the curfew being discussed during the panels meetings.

There were busy scenes in Soho last night / PA

His comments come after another Sage member, Professor John Edmunds, said the 10pm curfew was fairly trivial and said that it will have a very small impact on the epidemic.

The measures in England are less draconian than Scotland, where households are banned from mixing indoors.

Soho's streets were busy last night as Londoners were turfed out of pubs / PA

But the latest local lockdown curbs in Wigan, Stockport, Blackpool, Leeds, Cardiff and Swansea mean a quarter of the UK population - 17 million people - are now under tighter restrictions.

Boris Johnsons latest coronavirus crackdown, announced earlier this week, have seen the number of shoppers and diners slump by around a fifth in a hammer blow for central Londons painful recovery from lockdown.

Figures seen by the Standard show that the 10pm curfew for restaurants and pubs, combined with the advice to work from home had an immediate impact that will heighten the threat to West End and City businesses.

On Wednesday, the day after the Prime Minister announced the measures in a sombre televised address, the number of people in the West End was down 18 per cent on the same day last week, in one of the biggest falls ever recorded.

In Piccadilly Circus, a global emblem for the vitality of London, footfall was down 26 per cent according to figures from the Heart of London business group.
Video of former Vice President Joe Biden jokingly calling Air Force troops 'stupid b*****ds' during a 2016 speech has resurfaced after conservatives blasted a brief clip of the speech.

Biden, who was President Obama's Vice President at the time, had been with his wife giving a speech to 1000 members of the 380th Air Expeditionary Wing on March 7 2016 in Abu Dhabi, according to the Daily Beast.

Jill Biden had offered her remarks before the former vice president was introduced by 1st Lt. Karen Johnson, who he had nominated to attend the U.S. Air Force Academy when he was still a Delaware senator.

It was then that Biden cracked his joke.

Biden, who was Vice President at the time, had been with his wife giving a speech to 1000 members of the 380th Air Expeditionary Wing on March 7, 2016 in Abu Dahbi

'I have incredibly good judgment,' he said to the crowd. 'One, I married Jill. And two, I appointed Johnson to the academy. I just want you to know that. Clap for that, you stupid b*****ds.'

Several service members chuckled at the joke as the crowd lightly applauded for Biden.

He continued: 'Come on, man. Man, you are a dull bunch. Must be slow here, man. I don't know.'

Biden did sing praise for Johnson and all the other service members who took the time to hear him and Jill speak.

The joke was made after 1st Lt. Karen Johnson, who Biden nominated to attend the U.S. Air Force Academy when was still a Delaware senator, introduced him to the audience

'I have incredibly good judgment,' he joked. 'One, I married Jill. And two, I appointed Johnson to the academy. I just want you to know that. Clap for that, you stupid b*****ds'

'I want to thank Brig. Gen. Orcutt for welcoming me and my family here today,' he said. 'I know your ops tempo out here is pretty high and you got better things to do than come see Jill and me, but we never pass up an opportunity wherever we are around the world to try and see our warriors.'

Biden would then assert that the armed forces were crucial in the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.

'We are taking the fight to (ISIL) now, and pursuing all those who would do harm to America,' Biden said. 'You are the instrument in a strategy to reclaim territory that they have taken and destroy their financial assets. We have to squeeze the heart of (ISIL) in Iraq and Syria so they can't continue to pump their poison into the region and the rest of the world.'

In his closing remarks, Biden once again offered words of support for the armed forces.

Joe Biden would offer praises for the military in his remarks, which have recently resurfaced because of conservative pundits

'You're the finest generation of warriors the world has ever, ever known,' he concluded.

Clips of Biden's joke has been circulating heavily as conservative pundits slam him as being 'hypocritical.'

The former Vice President recently released an ad critical of Donald Trump, after the president allegedly made remarks describing soldiers and those killed in combat as 'losers' and 'suckers.' Trump denies the allegations.

Biden campaign spokesperson Andrew Bates explained in a statement to the Daily Beast that the comments were made to 'jokingly encourage the audience to clap' for Johnson.

'Vice President Biden was jokingly encouraging the audience to clap for an airwoman on the stage, and a number of service members can be seen laughing and smiling at the comment. Seconds before, he praised them for 'the incredible sacrifices [they] make for our country,' Bates said.
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TROY, N.Y.  The Rensselaer County Regional Chamber of Commerce has received the Chuck Steiner Memorial Chamber of the Year Award, from The Business Council of New York State, Inc. The announcement was officially made ahead of the Councils annual meeting next week.

Established in 2010 in memory of former regional Chamber executive, Chuck Steiner, the Chamber of the Year award honors one outstanding chamber organization in New York State that displays a positive social conscience and commitment to pro-business activities within their community and the state.

The award also requires the recipient to have an established reputation for delivering a high level of programs and services in their community, while remaining active in state and local business advocacy.

On behalf of our board of directors and staff, our Chamber is incredibly grateful to receive this immense honor from The Business Council of New York State, Kate Manley, president of the Rensselaer County Regional Chamber of Commerce exclaimed.

Since 1900, our Chamber has been established as a timely resource and staunch advocate for our local business community. With the obvious challenges presented by this year, we are even more driven by the needs of our member businesses to advance the economic prosperity of our region, Manley noted.

The Rensselaer County Regional Chamber of Commerce has been a great partner and member for close to 70 years, Heather Bricetti, President & CEO of The Business Council of New York State Inc. said.

Through a continued investment into their members and area businesses, the Chamber helps promote a friendly and positive business climate that benefits the entire region. From the top down we congratulate the entire staff on this well-deserved award, Bricetti added.
After murdering his entire family over nine hours in their Markham home the day before they would have discovered his lie about graduating from university, Menhaz Zaman told online friends what hed done.

Ive just slaughtered my entire family and will most likely spend life in jail if I manage to survive, Zaman told a friend from Minnesota on the messaging app Discord. His friend asked where he was and urged him to turn himself in.

Im at home, Zaman wrote. Killed my dad last. The shaking has stopped.

The messages sparked desperate international attempts by his friends to alert local authorities, leading York Regional Police to arrive at the Markham home the next day to arrest Zaman.

On Thursday afternoon, Zaman, 24, pleaded guilty to the second-degree murder of his mother and the first-degree murder of his father, grandmother and sister in a Zoom court appearance in which he appeared by video link from the Central East Correctional Centre.

In a soft but clear voice, Zaman admitted he first murdered his mother, Momotaz Begum, 50, in their home on Castlemore Avenue at about 3 p.m. on July 27, 2019.

According to an agreed statement of facts, he then plotted to kill the rest of his family. An hour later he killed his grandmother Firoza Begum, 70. He then waited several hours for his younger sister Malesa Zaman, 21, to come home from work at Food Basics. In that time he napped and played video games, according to the agreed facts.

At 11 p.m. he killed his sister. Finally, he killed his father, Moniruz Zaman, 59, a Beck taxi driver who arrived home around midnight.

The deaths of Malesa  who was studying science at university and, according to Toronto Life, dreamed of being a neurosurgeon  and her parents and grandmother shocked their friends and the local Bangladeshi community. Moniruz and Momotaz had just marked their 25th wedding anniversary and their son had given a speech celebrating them at the party.

According to the agreed statement of facts read by the Crown, Zaman messaged Devonte Nicholson, a friend from Minnesota at 11:54 p.m. through the messaging app Discord and said: Ive just slaughtered my entire family and will most likely spend life in jail if I manage to survive. I hope I made you laugh at one point or another. I hope you remember the good times. I will miss you all.

Zaman also sent his friend photos of four people with blood on their necks. A bloody knife was next to one of the people, described by Nicholson as an elderly lady.

A police investigation revealed hed been leading a double life, the Crown said. His parents believed he was due to graduate from an engineering program at York University on July 28, 2019. In reality, he had failed out of Seneca Colleges electronics engineering technology program after a year, in 2014-15. He had been pretending to go to classes but was really spending his time at the mall and the gym, and at home gaming.

In messages with another friend, Maroon Ayoub, on the day of the killings, Zaman said: I know I am a pathetic coward sub-human. I will be turning myself in.

He said hed been planning the murders for three years.

Ayoub, who lives in Israel, asked why.

Zaman explained he started skipping classes in his first year of university and had to repeat courses. It is here in second semester I started getting depressed and became an atheist and ultimately created this plan. So for three years Ive been telling my parents I go to uni when actually I was just hanging out at the mall four days a week.

Zaman said he did this because I dont want my parents to feel the shame of having a son like me. I choose to kill them instead out of cowardice. Due to me being an atheist I believe this is the only life we get. I know it might sound confusing but whats done is done and what has been planned has been concluded. Im sorry if this makes you upset. Please try to remember the good times.

On July 28, 2019, Toronto police informed York Regional Police that theyd received information that someone may have slaughtered their entire family. Zamans friend Nicholson from Minnesota had called the Toronto police non-emergency line  he believed Zaman lived in Toronto  and told them of the messages Zaman sent through Discord. The Toronto police cybercrime unit contacted Discord to track the IP address Zaman was using. They were able to link it to the Castlemore Avenue home in Markham and informed York police.

When the police arrived at the home the day after the killing, Zaman peered out from an upstairs window. He came down and opened the front door. He was detained while the house was searched.

Police found four bodies in the home  Zamans mother and grandmother together in the master bedroom, his sister in the guest bedroom and his father in his sisters room. He had struck each of them on their heads, most likely with a crowbar, and then cut their throats while they were on the ground, according to the agreed statement of facts.

Zaman was arrested and charged with four counts of murder. He admitted to police that he killed his family but did not provide a motive or explain how he had done it.

Reached on Thursday, Ayoub said the murders are rarely discussed within the Discord chat group where Zaman had been a member.

Him getting locked up is what he aimed for after all, and its whats going to happen, Ayoub said in a private Discord message.

Lets not forget that according to him, he truly believed that his family dying is better than them meeting his reality, which only existed in his head. His own projections, his own lack of understanding that his reality is not necessarily true, fuelled his ill idea.

A sentencing hearing is set for Oct. 26, when victim impact statements will be given. The Crown and defence are expected to provide a joint submission for sentencing. A first-degree murder conviction carries an automatic sentence of life with no chance of parole for 25 years but the parole ineligibility periods can be longer for multiple counts of murder.

Zaman is anxious to move on and hopes to be sentenced as soon as possible, his lawyer Adele Monaco said in the hearing.

With files from Wendy Gillis

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The state on Saturday reported 20,419 Covid-19 infections and 430 deaths, taking the tally and toll to 1,321,176 and 35,191 respectively.

Mumbai logged 2,282 new infections and 44 deaths, taking the case count to 196,585 and toll to 8,750.

The overall case fatality rate (CFR) of the state stood at 2.66%, second-highest in the country after Punjab, and much higher than the national rate of 1.59%. Of the 430 deaths on Saturday, 227 were from the past two days, 110 from over the past week and remaining 93 were from the period before it, according to the health department.

Across the state, number of cases dropped to 133,161 this week (September 20-26), from 150,250 last week (September 13-19). The fatalities have come down to 2,520 from 3,101. The case fatality rate (CFR), too, dropped to 1.89% this week from 2.06% last week.

However, 30,778 fewer Covid-19 tests had been conducted this week. From 6,21,307 tests between September 13 and 19, the number of tests reduced to 5,90,529 in the week ending September 26.

Pune remained on top of the daily caseload list by reporting 3,324 cases (1,796 in city, 1,390 in rural parts and 1,138 in Pimpri-Chinchwad) and 90 deaths.

Nashik clocked 1,595 new cases and 17 deaths, while the states second capital, Nagpur, reported 1,635 new cases and 15 fatalities. Sangli, Kolhapur and Solapur, three western Maharashtra districts, continued with high number of cases with 779, 678 and 703 new cases respectively.

The Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) clocked 4,819 (23.6% of total state cases) new cases and saw 110 deaths (25.58% of deaths in the state).

On the heels of the spike in Covid-19 cases over the Past few weeks and a day after state crossed its grim 1.3 million mark, Maharashtra crossed the mark of 1 million recovered patients after 23,644 new recoveries were reported on Saturday. At the recovery rate of 76.94%, after the total recoveries of 10,16,450 till date, the state has 2,69,119 active patients across the state. Further, as of Saturday, 158,749 patients have been recovered and discharged post Covid-19 treatment in Mumbai. The citys recovery rate is 80.75%. There are 28,691 active cases in Mumbai and fatality rate is 4.45%. One hot spot that has shown signs of drastic improvement  Dharavi  recorded 14 new Covid-19 cases on Saturday. Dharavis tally is 3,123, of which 2,662 have been discharged.

Chief minister Uddhav Thackeray held review meetings with officials from various districts with a high number of Covid cases. District authorities were told to strictly implement lockdown norms and personal hygiene protocols. He has also directed district authorities to increase testing and early detection of patients to ensure arrest of the spread and keeping the fatality rate low.

My Family, My Responsibility drive is being implemented effectively across the state. This will help us in tracing the patients early and treat them without wasting time. Countries like United Kingdom are witnessing emergence of the second wave of the infection after rolling out unlocking measures. Youngsters have started moving out freely in the process of earning their bread and butter and for their families. This has led to the risk of infection for elderly people at home. The appropriate Covid-19 behaviour, which includes use of masks and social distancing, should be strictly followed. The administration can impose heavy fine for the violations of such protocols, Thackeray said.

Thackeray held review meetings with the districts in Marathwada, Vidarbha and north Maharashtra. The district collectors and municipal commissioners have been directed to increase number of tests and trace high/low-risk contacts of cases early to contain the spread. He said while the states test rate per million population was more than 45,000 in some of the districts it is much low. Thackeray had held review meetings with officials from other two divisions  Konkan and Pune  on Friday. About 93% of the states caseload is from 20 districts, which have been identified by the Centre. The districts are being focused upon by the state government. If the cases and fatalities in these districts are arrested, the overall state percentage will automatically improve, said an official from the health department.

Water supply and sanitation minister Gulabrao Patil, who is also the guardian minister of Jalgaon, said that the aggressive tracing of contacts in his district has helped them in treating patients early. During the My Family My Responsibility drive we have identified 8,000 infected people who are being treated according to the protocol. Our case fatality rate (CFR) has now reduced to 2.47%, which used to be over 6% two months ago and even the caseload has reduced significantly over the past from their doorsteps, he said.

After announcing to increase the daily testing rate to 1.5 lakh, state tested 95,888 samples in last 24 hours with a positivity rate of 21.29%. State has 1,945,758 people in home quarantine, while 30,571 are institutionally quarantined.

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An accused murderer was found unfit to stand trial while the victims family was barred from the courtroom.

The sister of Michel Pilon was made to sit in a different courtroom, down the hall, to watch the critical hearing on a video screen. Despite a request by the Crown, Lynn Bartlett was told she couldnt bear witness to her big brothers case because of COVID-19 restrictions.

I feel like I should be able to be there in that room, to be there for Michel, she said. I want the accused to see me. I want the jury to see me.

Though there were empty seats in the courtroom  physcially distanced from the jurors who were scattered about  Bartlett, detectives, the media and other observers were put in a separate room to watch a grainy video feed that, at times, couldnt be heard.

It feels like Im not a part of it, says Bartlett, who has travelled from her home in Kitchener for every court date since her brother was killed almost two years ago.

Staff at the John Sopinka Courthouse said jury trial protocols during the pandemic are directed by the Ministry of the Attorney General.

The ministry did not provide a comment.

The treatment of Michels family was the most disturbing event in a court process that was highly unusual because of COVID and the rare circumstances of the case.

George Opassinis is accused of killing Michel, 53, who was found dead in his apartment at an affordable-living building in November 2018. Michel used a wheelchair.

Michel was born weighing less than a pound, says his sister, and he struggled all his life. He was a physically small man who needed hip surgery. Yet he was loud and and funny and generous.

Our family misses him dearly.

Opassinis was originally charged with first-degree murder but was about to stand trial on second-degree murder when he began acting strangely in the courtroom earlier this month.

He wore two pairs of eyeglasses, one on top of the other. He lay down in the prisoners box and ranted loudly.

His ramblings were about a machine he believes is at the Hamilton-Wentworth Detention Centre which can read his thoughts and is depositing molecular dust in his brain.

If the homicide detectives would just use the machine to read my mind, they would know I am innocent, he said to no one in particular during one of his appearances.

He has also referred to Michel as my best friend.

His behaviour led assistant Crown attorney Fraser McCracken and defence lawyer Barry Fox to agree that Opassinis needed to be examined by a doctor to determine if he is mentally fit to stand trial.

In this case however, the decision about fitness ultimately resided with a jury.

Because Opassinis was committed to a jury trial, and because a finding of fit or unfit is considered a verdict, only a jury could make that determination, according to the Criminal Code of Canada.

So a jury was selected for this one-day fitness hearing.

It was the first jury verdict since March when the coronavirus state of emergency shut down the courts.

Justice Toni Skarica explained to jurors that fitness to stand trial is about the here and now and not the accuseds state of mind at the time of the offence.

Whether the accused is fit to stand trial has nothing to do with whether the accused is guilty or not guilty, Skarica said.

The accused must be mentally present and able to fully participate in his trial so that it is fair, said the judge.

There are three ways an accused can be unfit for trial: by having a mental disorder; by not understanding the nature or consequences of their trial; or by not being able to communicate with their lawyer.

Dr. Gary Chaimowitz, head of forensic psychiatry at St. Josephs Healthcare, was the only witness called.

Chaimowitz evaluated Opassinis during a 25-minute video meeting on Sept. 14 while the accused was in jail.

He said Opassinis behaved much like he had in court. As Chaimowitz testified, Opassinis continuously interrupted, shouting Quack! and referring to the thought machine.

Chaimowitz said that during the assessment, Opassinis wore two sets of glasses, spoke rapidly and loudly, and was agitated about the machine.

The doctor testified Opassinis likely has schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder. With medication, he may be fit to stand trial in 60 days.

In response to the Crown, Chaimowitz addressed the issue of malingering  the faking of an illness.

Though accused try to fake a mental illness from time to time, few get away with it. Chaimowitz said it is unlikely Opassinis is malingering.

Chaimowitz concluded Opassinis is unfit to stand trial.

The Crown and defence urged the jury to return with a verdict of unfit.

In less than 15 minutes, thats what the jury did.

I agree with that verdict, Skarica said.

Opassinis had no reaction.

He will be sent to the secure forensic unit at the West 5th campus of St. Joes to begin treatment immediately, under a court order. It is hoped he will be well enough to continue with pretrial motions in late November. His trial is rescheduled for January.

Bartlett is pleased.

I want him to have a fair trial. I hope medicine will help him come back to that day because only two people know what happened  him and my brother.
When President Nana Akufo-Addo announced to the whole world measures his country will put in place to ensure Covid19 does not be imported into Ghana, he was very emphatic by ensuring that those measures which would receive presidential order would be enforced to the latter.

Being the first in sub-Saharan Africa to put in place effective testing process for travellers to Ghana and getting results in less than 20 minutes, Nana Akufo-Addo was praised by his peers across the African continent and indeed across the world.

The testing measures put in place include the following:

All Travellers to Ghana must have a PCR Test not more than 72 hours of boarding the Aircraft to Ghana and must hold PCR test certificate which would be verified by Ghanaian authorities should there be a hint of fraud. The President was very emphatic in his broadcast of these orders which would apply to all, including returning Ghanaian citizens, holders of Resident Permits of Ghana and bonafide visitors and diplomats. All nationals including Ghanaian citizens and those with resident permits of Ghana must have a PCR Test (plus certificate from a laboratory recognised by the Government of Ghana) but paid for the test by the individual who wish to travel out of the country. Nana Akufo Addo also stated that those Ghanaian nationals and Resident Permit Holders would be Exempted from having a TEST AT KOTOKA INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT which carries a mandatory charge of $150 USD. Nana Akufo-Addo, the President of Ghana, was very clear of this executive order which he broadcast to the people of Ghana and indeed the world, including the major airlines that flies to Ghana.

As already stated above, President Akufo-Addos announcement was hailed across the African continent as innovative and was swiftly replicated by many countries, including majority of the countries in sub-Saharan Africa who also started to open their air space, using Ghanas model of testing air travellers to ensure Covid19 would not be imported into their countries and the African continent.

This writer who is national of United Kingdom, but in addition, holds a Ghanaian passport as dual national (because his late parents were Ghanaian citizens), flew to Accra on 6th September 2020, by following all the above Covid19 protocols and the directions of the airline (British Airways), Ghana Government executive directions, by having a PCR Test done in London, within 72 hours of traveling to Ghana and in possession of PCR Test Certificate.

When this writer arrived at Accra Kotoka International Airport, Accra, Ghana, he went through the Covid19 procedure and paid $150 USD for the test at the airport. This writer tested negative at the airport and was allowed to continue with his journey in-country.

On 20th September 2020, this writer had another Covid19 travel Test at Lancet Medical Laboratory at East Legon, Accra, Ghana. The certificate was issued on 21st September 2020 and on 22nd September 2020 (for 2 days) this writer travelled to Abuja, Nigeria, aboard Africa World Air Flight No AW 260, to attend an important meeting with a company that has a business contract with the company that this writer works for. At Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, Nigeria, this writer was again exempted by the Nigerian NCDC personal and was admitted into Abuja, Nigeria, because he had a valid PCR certificate that was issued by Lancet Medical Lab in Accra, Ghana, that was less than 72 hours.

On 24th September 2020, the writer, (after his meeting in Abuja on 23rd September 2020) made a returned journey to Ghana through Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, Nigeria. At the airport, again this writer was exempted because his journey falls within the 7 days exemption and was allowed to board the aircraft, African World Air Flight Number AW 251 from Abuja to Accra.

On arrival at Kotoka International Airport, Accra, Ghana, the Ghana Covid19 Health Officials at KIA ask this writer to pay $150 USD to have another Covid19 test. Despite protestations and PROVE OF EVIDENCE, INCLUDING A YOUTUBE OF THE PRESIDENT OF GHANAS DIRECTIVE AND GHANA COVID19 WEBSITE STATEMENT, which stated clearly that those holding Ghanaian passport and returning residents, including foreign diplomats who have travelled out of Ghana for less than 7 days are exempted, they still persisted this writer to pay $150. As a matter of fact, there were about five of two sets of officials along the way to the passport control who stopped this writer from ascertaining if he is indeed exempted from paying the $150USD for second Covid19 test. Some of the passengers who witnessed the protestations of this writer gave their telephone numbers to this writer as witnesses of the argument that ensued between this writer and the Covid19 Officials at KIA who were mostly interested in getting arriving passengers to pay for Covid19 test. When this writer demanded to see the HEAD OF THE HEALTH AT KOTOKA INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, those officials, including other personnel at the airport declined.

This question this writer needs an answer for, is the Government of Ghana aware of the harassment of Ghanaian Citizens to pay the Covid19 test who are returning residents and diplomats after travelling out of Ghana for less than 7 days? This is a very serious issue, which this writer deemed as FRAUD being committed in the name of the Government of Ghana, unless and until the Ghana Government comes out to either DENY OR CLARIFY all the anomalies raised above by this writer, this would be seen by many as fraud. The above story is not misrepresentation but true facts of what happened at Ghanas Kotoka International Airport in the evening of 24th September 2020 when this writer returned to Ghana aboard Africa World Air AW 215 from Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, Nigeria. CCTV at the Covid19 section of the Kotoka International Airport would vindicate this writer, should any of the officials denies this assertion.

Peter Jeffrey

cc: [email protected]

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High-profile barrister Michael Mansfield is to lead legal teams involved in possible court action over the Government's Internal Markets Bill.

Belfast-based O Muirigh Solicitors, along with Hampshire law firm Hackett and Dabbs, have been instructed to consider legal action in Belfast and London over planned new laws which could override parts of the UK's Withdrawal Agreement with the EU.

Padraig O Muirigh, director of O Muirigh Solicitors, said: "The Internal Markets Bill is a direct challenge to the rule of law and the British government's obligations under public international law.

"The Irish Protocol found a way maintaining a frictionless border in Ireland which is a key component of the peace process and the proposals in this Bill, if enacted, could jeopardise the gains made by the Good Friday Agreement.

"We have been instructed by citizens from unionist and nationalist backgrounds, in particular, concerned members of the business sector and residents of the border communities who will be adversely affected by the creation of a hard border on the island.

"These citizens do not intend to stand idly by whilst the rule of law and the fragile peace process is undermined and will not hesitate to challenge the British government if the Bill is passed in its current form."

Yesterday it emerged Downing Street has dropped suggestions that Brussels could block food exports from Britain to Northern Ireland as it signalled optimism over trade deal negotiations with the EU.
Spain faces unusual problem: how to spend billions in crisis funds FILE PHOTO: The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, in Madrid

By Belen Carreno

MADRID (Reuters) - After securing a generous portion of European Union recovery funds for the coronavirus crisis, Spain faces an unlikely problem -- how to make use of all the money, government sources told Reuters.

"This is not a crisis of dough (money), it is a crisis of ideas," one of the sources said, referring to concrete investment projects to help the economy out of a record recession.

In a country that has not managed to approve a full-year budget since 2016 because of a prolonged political paralysis, the need to suddenly absorb extra cash is a challenge, said the sources.

Spain has been hit particularly badly by the pandemic. It has recorded more than 640,000 COVID-19 cases, the highest number in Western Europe, and the disease has killed more than 30,000.

The economy slumped 18.5% in the second quarter, a contraction exceeded in Europe only by Britain.

To help Spain recover, it will receive around 140 billion euros ($166 billion) in grants and loans out of the EU 750-billion-euro coronavirus recovery package.

That includes 43 billion euros in grants in the next two years alone - equivalent to about 8% of annual expenditure.

"Spending that money is not easy," a second government source said. Four sources close to the management of the funds said there were concerns and some anxiety about how to set up the machinery to take on this amount of liquidity.

Another source with direct knowledge of the management of the funds said the main projects to receive the funds had already been earmarked and that Spain would certainly comply with deadlines and requirements imposed by Brussels.

SANCHEZ'S OFFICE SUPERVISING IMPLEMENTATION

The European Commission has recommended EU governments spend money from the recovery package on green energy, transport and investment in digitalisation.

Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, who fought hard at an EU summit in July for the recovery fund to be approved, has put his office in charge of supervising the implementation of the recovery plan, with an advisory group made up of corporate executives to be set up, another source said.

Story continues

Economy Minister Nadia Calvino is also closely involved as she is finalising a reform plan to be presented to Brussels by Oct. 15, which must outline the main projects eligible for the EU money.

"Right now the challenge is how the money that arrives will be fully applied, and there will have to be projects with a lot of absorption (investment take-up)," said Jose Moises Martin, director of Red2Red consultancy that caters to public authorities.

Aside from the recovery funds, Brussels has approved a 21 billion euro soft loan for Spain to finance employment support schemes, which should alleviate pressure on the Treasury, which has been borrowing for months for this purpose.

A source close to the budget ministry said revenues had recently been better than expected, and September debt issuance has slowed down from the previous months.

But on Wednesday the central bank cut its 2021 growth forecast to 4.1%-7.3%.

Its chief economist, Oscar Arce, said that under the best-case scenario, EU funds could boost medium-term GDP growth by two percentage points, but success would hinge on choosing the right investment projects.

(Reporting by Belen Carreno; Editing by Andrei Khalip and Timothy Heritage)
New Jersey is close to repealing a controversial law that prevents families on welfare from receiving a larger stipend if the mother gives birth while she is receiving cash assistance.

Both houses of the state Legislature passed a bill Thursday that would repeal what is known as the family cap law  so named because the sponsors intended to discourage women on public assistance from having additional children. It now moves to Gov. Phil Murphy who must decide whether to sign it into law.

Studies have shown the law had little impact on pregnancy and abortion rates. Family advocates argue it deprived basic essentials to the 20,000 children born to families on welfare since the law was enacted in 1992. When it was enacted, the law held back an additional $64 a month per child.

This harmful policy denies critical increased assistance to our very low-income families in our state, harming the familys ability to provide for basic needs with the addition of a new baby, Renee Koubiadis, executive director of the Anti-Poverty Network of New Jersey told the Assembly Budget Committee on Tuesday.

Both the Assembly Budget Committee and the Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee advanced the bill (A-3292) on Tuesday, clearing the way for Thursdays full house votes.

In national data, this type of policy has been shown to harm families of color disproportionately, Koubiadis added. Coming out of the last few months to rebuild our state back better, reducing racial disparities should be at the forefront in our minds and in our actions.

The bill, if enacted, would add at least $1.1 million to the budget, according to a fiscal estimate by the nonpartisan Office of Legislative Services. The figure may be higher if the pandemic results in more people seeking help from Work First New Jersey, the states public assistance program. In July, 10,100 households were enrolled in Work First, up 14% from the previous July, according to Department of Human Services data.

.New Jersey was the first state to enact the family cap law. Under President Clintons welfare reform law, states were permitted to enact their own version of the cap. The law is still in effect in 13 other states, according to Pew Charitable Trusts.

The ACLU, the ACLU of New Jersey, the NOW Legal Defense and Educational Fund, and the law firm of Gibbons, Del Deo, Dolan, Griffinger & Vecchione filed a class-action lawsuit against the state to overturn the law, but the state Supreme Court ruled in the states favor in 2003.

The Democratically controlled Legislature twice passed a repeal of the law during Gov. Chris Christies tenure but the Republican governor vetoed it. Even with Democrat Murphy taking office in 2018, the bill repealing the law never gained traction in the Assembly during 2018-19 legislative session.

Proponents tried a different approach by including language in the FY19 and FY20 budgets that eliminated the family cap for those fiscal years. But the law itself remains intact, even as states like Massachusetts and California have repealed their laws in recent years.

Under current law, many children are not counted and families are made more vulnerable without the additional assistance they need, Sen. Ronald Rice (D-Essex), a sponsor of the bill, said following the 25-14 vote on Thursday. By removing the family cap, our state can work towards reducing the high childhood poverty rates in New Jersey and better support our families to working to achieve financial stability.

The Assembly passed the bill by a 55-19 vote with four abstentions, which count as no votes.

Since New Jersey enacted family cap rules in 1992, an estimated 20,000 children have been prevented from receiving benefits," Assembly sponsors Valerie Vainieri Huttle (D-Bergen) and Verlina Reynolds-Jackson (D-Mercer, Hunterdon) said in a joint statement. The purpose of Work First NJ is to 'help lift people out of poverty and become self-sufficient; the family cap policy works against this mission.

Our journalism needs your support. Please subscribe today to NJ.com.



Susan K. Livio may be reached at slivio@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @SusanKLivio.
Dil Bechara, the last film of late actor Sushant Singh Rajput completed two months of its release recently. The film was premiered on July 24. Commemorating the day, films lead actress Sanjana Sanghi took to social media to share a post in the loving memory of SSR.

In the caption, Sanjana wrote, #2MonthsOfDilBechara 2 months since you all made our labour of love yours forever. 2 months since you endowed upon us a lifetime of endless love. Thank you for letting art touch you, heal you, and elate you. Its what it was meant to do. The journeys been anything but easy. #ThinkingOfYou #Sushant #InLovingMemory GratitudePeaceStrengthPositivity (sic)."

View this post on Instagram A post shared by Sanjana Sanghi (@sanjanasanghi96) on Sep 24, 2020 at 8:48am PDT

Directed by Mukesh Chhabra, Dil Bechara" is a remake of the 2014 Hollywood hit The Fault In Our Stars", which is based on John Greens 2012 bestseller of the same name.

Dil Bechara also features Sahil Vaid, Swastika Mukherjee, Milind Gunaji and Saif Ali Khan. The music is by AR Rahman. Disney+ Hotstar had decided to make the film available for free viewing to all, as a mark of respect to the late Sushant.

Dil Bechara revolves around two characters, Kizie and Manny. While Kizie has thyroid cancer, Manny had osteosarcoma. The journey that they take together as they help each evolve and embrace lifes imperfections is the driving force of the narrative.
Fifteen years after business-meets-reality show The Apprentice first graced UK screens, the Lord Sugar-fronted series continues to attract audiences in their droves. "Someone who was two or three years old when the series started is now 18," remarks Lord Alan Sugar. "I said last year that I wanted to do 20 years. We would have been doing series 16 this year and I was happy to do four more. But, of course, it is the BBC who will decide if they wish to do it."

Now, with filming for the show's 16th series postponed due to Covid-19, viewers are set to relive some of the most impressive - and disastrous - television moments of all time courtesy of new six-part series The Apprentice Best Bits.

And, as the name would suggest, there are plenty of memorable moments to look back on.

The UK version of the hit show followed close behind the original US Apprentice format - hosted by a now-US president renowned for his hiring and firing - guiding a carefully selected group of candidates through a series of tasks that test every ounce of their business acumen.

"If you recall initially, the prize was to work for me," recalls Lord Sugar (73). "After series six, I said it wasn't working out properly, because it was very difficult to find a position for someone where there weren't any positions available. I changed it to going into partnership with a winner and that has been very successful."

Yet, aside from the prize, it's a format that has remained largely unchanged over the years. So, what is it about The Apprentice that keeps the viewers coming back for more?

THE VIEWERS KNOW BEST

"We all have an idea for a business - or we all think there's a secret businessman in us - and we like to see the decisions that people make and how they make them," declares Lord Sugar's loyal boardroom adviser, Baroness Karren Brady (51).

"Most of us spend lots of time shouting at the television and saying, 'I would have done it differently!' I think it's the prize, it's the process, it's people really enjoying watching the candidates make their decision."

Together with fellow hawk-eyed adviser Claude Littner, the business-minded pair act as Lord Sugar's eyes and ears throughout the gruelling 12-week interview process.

"The Apprentice captures buying, selling, tough negotiations, interviews - a whole host of things which I think play into what today's young people are aspiring to," says Littner.

"Nowadays, because jobs are hard to come by and because of advances in technology, I think more people are deciding that the best way forward is to actually start their own business.

"The show is a combination of great fun and the fact everyone thinks they can do better than the apprentices."

THE GRUELLING INTERVIEWS

"The last five people go into the interview process and the purpose is for those to go through their business plans with my experts," says Lord Sugar.

Nearing the final hurdle of the competition, this stage is known for sending even the most confident candidate into a blind panic.

"It's also the only time the candidates aren't in a team, can't hide behind someone else, can't blame someone else," notes Littner.

"Whether they've got the strength of character, the overall willingness to start a business, get the investment and work with Alan Sugar. For me, that's the most defining moment really, because people can talk the talk but that doesn't mean to say they can walk the walk."

Offering cringeworthy sequences and laugh-out-loud moments in equal measure, it's no wonder this element of The Apprentice has remained unchanged for so many series.

"It must be the most terrifying job interview process on television," says Baroness Brady, matter-of-factly. "There's this classic one where Solomon (Akhtar), one of the candidates, comes in for his interview with Claude and Claude sends him out because all he's done is issue pictures of sail boats.

"There's no information in the business plan. And he gets so flustered that he tries to leave through a window because he can't find the door. There's only one door in the whole room, but he couldn't find it, so he's just sort of banging. And, honestly, I was literally laughing out loud."

THE INTERNATIONAL TASKS

The Apprentice's diverse range of tasks - from selling goods on market stalls through to creating and promoting luxury events - have become a mainstay of the show.

"The tasks are designed to see a person's organisational qualities, sales technique, presentation ability, creativity and logistical qualifications. You've got all those elements - that's what all the tasks are about and what I am looking for," says Lord Sugar.

However, it's the show's international travel element that proves the biggest draw for many viewers.

With candidates packing their bags and heading off to far flung corners of the world, the international tasks plunge candidates into high-pressure situations in alien environments.

"The foreign tasks are one of the things that make the programme exciting for the candidates and viewers," notes Lord Sugar. "Last year, they went to South Africa. It was a great task."

"They cover everything," seconds Baroness Brady. "We've been from Winston Churchill's bunker in Dover through to the Tower of London; we've been all over the world - from New York and Dubai."

THE COMEDIC (AND OFTEN CRINGEWORTHY) CANDIDATES

The Apprentice's diverse range of candidates and their constant desire to stand out from the crowd never fail to entertain. So much so, The Apprentice Best Bits dedicates an entire episode to the show's larger-than-life characters. "We sat down and looked at which outstanding characters we needed to bring in," says Lord Sugar. "Paul Torrisi rolled straight off my tongue. In later years, we had last year's candidate, Thomas Skinner. If you sit down and think about it, there have been some great characters."

The Apprentice Best Bits, BBC One, Thursday, 9pm
Mumbai:

Filmmaker Anurag Kashyap has attacked online bullies in an emotional Facebook post, saying he has "zero political affiliation" but does not see anything wrong in posing questions to the government.

Kashyap is one of the most vocal celebrities and recently he came out in support of Sanjay Leela Bhansali after the director was attacked by a fringe Rajput group on the set of "Padmavati" in Jaipur.

In a Facebook post, the 44-year-old helmer wrote that he has always taken stand for issues he strongly believes in and he will continue to raise his voice for what he feels is right.

"It does not matter what you say or do, attack me physically or verbally, I will voice what I feel. You mobs don't scare me, my voice will always rise over your screaming and shouting, I embrace my truth and I do not fear accusations," Kashyap wrote.

The "Raman Raghav 2.0" director said such factions who employ violence to express their disapproval have no entitlement to the work which he does.

"I will succeed or fail but both the success or failure, in whatever measure they come will be mine. I have been taught to engage and question those that govern us and I have been doing that since I was a student and V P Singh was the PM, followed by Congress and now BJP.

"I have been taught that your PM is the head of the state or country, who you can question, seek answers, argue with but never fear him, because you chose him and he represents your well being. If one has to fear him than that's sad. Respect can not be demanded it's commanded. It's earned. It does not deter me from asking and engaging," he said.

Kashyap added that he has been taught that "your PM is the head of the state or country, who you can question, seek answers, argue with but never fear him." The director said he believes in the constitution and he will exercise all his rights whenever he wants despite the many oppositions.

"I have zero political affiliation. So all of you are welcome to say, scream shout whatever you want. I believe in my constitution, my rights, my liberties and I will take them and exercise them when I deem fit. So thank you for all this intense passionate love that you send my way, you are not going to stop me.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.
The Baloch Human Rights Council (BHRC) and the World Sindhi Congress (WSC) on Friday, held a joint protest outside the UN building at the Broken Chair in Geneva against Pakistan's human rights violations. The protest was conducted during the 45th session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) against the institutionalised state violence and other forms of socio-economic and political suppression of the Baloch and Sindhi people by the Pakistan military.

Human Rights defenders from various nationalities including Pashtuns and Kashmiris participated in the protest and expressed solidarity with the Baloch and Sindhis. These supporters also suffer at the hands of the military establishment of Pakistan.

READ | Police block route of protesters in Louisville

Switzerland: Baloch Human Rights Council & World Sindhi Congress held a joint protest outside the UN building at the Broken Chair in Geneva during 45th session of UNHRC against 'state violence' & 'forceful disappearance' of Baloch people in Pakistan. pic.twitter.com/CV5Ab86KYS  ANI (@ANI) September 25, 2020

READ | Belarus authorities detain top opposition leader's lawyer amid anti-government protests

Protestors demand UN intervention

The protestors called the United Nations and the International community to intervene in the matter and to live up to their mandate and commitments without any hindrance and political pressures and make Pakistan which is a signatory to various human rights instruments to end its genocidal policies in Balochistan and Sindh.



The protestors raised slogans like "Stop Abducting Baloch People", "Pakistan Stop Baloch Genocide", "Stop Abducting Sindhi People". They also displayed different roller banners highlighting the various violations of human rights in Balochistan and Sindh by Pakistan. "The perpetrators of crimes against humanity in Balochistan must be tried in the International court of justice" one of the protest banners read.



A memorandum documenting some of the major human rights issues requiring urgent attention was also submitted to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights by the BHRC representatives, following the protest.

The protest was led by the Secretary-General of the BHRC, Samad Baloch, and those who addressed the protest included the Secretary-General of World Sindhi Congress (WSC) Dr. Lakhu Luhana, Kaihan Mashriqwala leader of the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM) Italy and a human rights defender Anila Gulzar.

READ | Egyptian police disperse rare, small protests; 10 arrested

READ | Kentucky lawmaker arrested during protests in Taylor case

(With inputs from ANI)
Student admissions: Ed.Ministry passes the baton to principals View(s):

The task of selecting students for admission to intermediary classes in national schools ,which was carried out earlier by the Education Ministry, is to be transferred to the principals of those schools.

This move comes after the Education Ministry ordered all admissions to intermediary classes to be stopped with immediate effect. The intermediary grades include all grades, excluding grades one, five, six and 11.

A discussion was held on Thursday with the principals of selected national schools in Colombo, to address the issues faced due to student admissions to intermediary classes and the proposed new selection process.

According to the new plan, the existing vacancies in the intermediary classes would be advertised on the Ministry website and in newspapers, and all eligible students would be able to apply for admissions.

Depending on the vacancies available, criteria would be drawn up to admit students. Thereafter admissions would be made after the Education Ministry approved the list. Those who were unable to gain admission would be able to make an appeal to a Ministry review committee.

However, an Education Ministry official said there would likely be issues as there was a quota system in place for public sector employees, judges, doctors, Education Ministry staff and teachers on transfer, so they could admit their children to national schools when they were to be transferred.

The decision to introduce the new system was also expected to hold up the admissions of students whose applications were pending.
BOAO, Hainan, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- China's nucleic acid testing capacity has hugely improved, which is the key to the epidemic response in the coming autumn-winter season, a health official said Friday.

"It is essential to apply the successful experience gained in the first half of this year to the prevention and control of the epidemic in autumn and winter," Jiao Yahui, an official with the National Health Commission, said at a conference in Boao in south China's Hainan Province.

With regular prevention and control measures in place, the principle of early detection, reporting, quarantine and treatment should be maintained, while the nucleic acid testing capacity should be enhanced to ensure early detection of the virus, Jiao said.

Jiao also stressed the need to further improve the disease control system, build a strong public health system, and leverage the strength of traditional Chinese medicine in fighting the COVID-19 epidemic.
Vikas Singh, the lawyer representing Sushant Singh Rajputs father in his case against Rhea Chakraborty, has said that the family is disappointed that the investigation has been derailed. What began as a probe into the circumstances leading up to Sushants death on June 14 has transformed into an investigation into an alleged drugs subculture in the film industry.

"The family feels that the investigation is going in such a way that the truth is not coming out. The NCB (Narcotics Control Bureau) case has become like the Mumbai Police investigation, all stars are now being called. The people called in and not are a part of a syndicate and not distributors. It is just a Mumbai Police type of investigation. Sushant's case has taken a back seat," the lawyer said in a Thursday press conference, according to ANI.

"The family feels that the probe is being taken in a different direction. All attention is being diverted towards the drugs case. AIIMS doctor told me that Sushant's death was by strangulation," he added. Vikas Singh had made this claim in a tweet as well, but Dr Sudhir Gupta, the panel chief of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) forensic team conducting an examination of Sushants death, has rejected these claims. He told Times Now, No conclusion or conclusion opinion of homicide or suicide could be made by seeing ligature marks and scene of occurrence. Its difficult for doctors and next to impossible for general people, needed solely internal link discretion and forensic interpretation.

Vikas Singh said that the Central Bureau of Investigation probe in the case is not on track. "Why is CBI converting this to murder from abetment? The investigation is not on track. I will not say I am not happy with CBI, but it's the lack of importance that the case is getting is what I am worried about. The forensics response of the AIIMS should be made public that is what will satisfy the family," he said.

"Today, we are helpless as we don't know in which direction the case is going. Till today, CBI has not done a press briefing on what they have found out. I am not happy with the speed at which the case is going," he added.

Also read: AIIMS panel chief on claims of Sushant Singh Rajputs family lawyer that actor was strangulated: Cant make opinion by seeing marks

The NCB on Wednesday had summoned actors Deepika Padukone, Sara Ali Khan, Shradha Kapoor, Rakul Preet Singh, fashion designer Simone Khambatta and celebrity manager Shruti Modi for the ongoing case.

Actor Rhea Chakraborty, who was arrested in the drug case, is in judicial custody that has been extended till October 6. The NCB had launched an investigation after it received official communication from the Enforcement Directorate (ED), in which there were various chats related to drug consumption, procurement, usage and transportation.

(with agency inputs)

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michael barbaro

From The New York Times, Im Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. Today: With 36 days to go until the election, Amy Coney Barrett has been nominated as the next Supreme Court justice of the United States. And President Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have vowed to get her confirmed before Americans go to the polls. My colleague, Adam Liptak, on what it all means for the court and the future of American law. Its Monday, September 28.

archived recording (donald trump) I stand before you today to fulfill one of my highest and most important duties under the United States Constitution, the nomination of a Supreme Court justice. [APPLAUSE]

michael barbaro

Adam, it has happened. And so I wonder if you can tell us about the announcement that was held over the weekend?

adam liptak

So on Saturday, there was a ceremony at the Rose Garden at the White House that was, in one sense, ordinary. It was the announcement of a Supreme Court nominee. But in another sense, quite extraordinary, at least as a matter of timing.

archived recording (donald trump) Over the past week, our nation has mourned the loss of a true American legend. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg was a legal giant and a pioneer for women.

adam liptak

It happened just eight days after the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and just weeks before a presidential election. So you had the president trying to convey a kind of business as usual attitude, even as were hurtling toward something very different from the ordinary Supreme Court nomination.

archived recording (donald trump)  laws. And there is no one better to do that than Amy Coney Barrett. [APPLAUSE] archived recording (amy coney barrett) Thank you very much, Mr. President.

adam liptak

So President Trump introduces his nominee, Judge Amy Coney Barrett, and her husband and her seven children 

archived recording (amy coney barrett) Emma, Vivian, Tess, John Peter, Liam, Juliette and Benjamin.

adam liptak

Two of the children are adopted from Haiti. One has special needs. And that was a charming tableau at the White House, and a reminder in part that Judge Barrett is only 48. And if confirmed, shed be the youngest Supreme Court justice.

archived recording (amy coney barrett) Should I be confirmed, I will be mindful of who came before me.

adam liptak

She talked about Justice Ginsburg.

archived recording (amy coney barrett) Particularly poignant to me was her long and deep friendship with Justice Antonin Scalia, my own mentor.

adam liptak

She talked about the friendship between Justice Ginsburg and Justice Antonin Scalia, for whom Judge Barrett had clerked.

archived recording (amy coney barrett) These two great Americans demonstrated that arguments, even about matters of great consequence, need not destroy affection.

adam liptak

And Judge Barrett wrapped up by saying that she wanted to be a justice for all of the American people.

archived recording (amy coney barrett) If confirmed, I would not assume that role for the sake of those in my own circle and certainly not for my own sake. I would assume this role to serve you, and faithfully and impartially discharge my duties under the United States Constitution.

michael barbaro

Well, lets talk about what we do know about the kind of justice that Judge Amy Coney Barrett would be. Tell us her story.

adam liptak

So she was born and raised in New Orleans in a religious Catholic family. Attended Rhodes College and Notre Dame Law School. Had a stellar academic record. And although Notre Dame is not typically a feeder into judicial clerkships, she got a very high profile judicial clerkship on the D.C. Circuit, the federal appeals court in Washington. And it was after that clerkship on the federal appeals court that she made the most important professional move of her life, when she was hired for that clerkship with Justice Scalia.

michael barbaro

So shes now working at the Supreme Court. So tell us about working for Scalia.

adam liptak

Its the most prestigious credential in American law. Justice Scalia was a giant of conservative jurisprudence. He worked closely with his four law clerks. But everyone said Amy Coney was his favorite. And she, then and now, adopted his jurisprudential philosophies, ones that generally lead to conservative results, and ones that were pioneered by Justice Scalia.

michael barbaro

What do you mean pioneered?

archived recording (ronald reagan) My fellow Americans, Ive said on several occasions that I wouldnt comment about the 

adam liptak

Well, the conservative legal movement in the Reagan administration in the 80s was very frustrated by what it saw as the excesses of the Warren court 

archived recording (ronald reagan) For my entire political life, Ive spoken about the need for the Supreme Court to interpret the law, not make it.

adam liptak

 in taking what they said was a kind of freewheeling attitude toward the Constitution, and finding or inventing rights in the Constitution for criminal defendants, for abortion.

archived recording (ronald reagan) Too many theorists believe that the courts should save the country from the Constitution. Well, I believe its time to save the Constitution from them.

adam liptak

And they needed a theory to constrain judges.

archived recording (ronald reagan) During my presidency, I proudly appointed two new justices who understand that important principle, Justice Sandra Day OConnor and Justice Antonin Scalia.

adam liptak

And the theory has two basic prongs.

archived recording (antonin scalia) I am one of a small but hardy breed of interpreters left in the world who are called a textualist, or originalist.

adam liptak

One is textualism, which is about federal statutes, and means to read federal statutes according to their plain words.

archived recording (antonin scalia) People ask me, when did you become a textualist? What caused you to become a textualist? You know, when did you begin eating human beings? You know, as though its some weird thing. You know? I mean, when did you begin to become not a textualist? You have a text. You should read the text. I  [LAUGHTER] [APPLAUSE]

adam liptak

And then, when you move to the Constitution, the restraining theory was called originalism. And originalism means to recover the original meaning of the Constitution as understood by the people who drafted and ratified it.

archived recording (antonin scalia) We try to figure out what it meant when it was adopted.

adam liptak

And there too, Scalia would say, if the Constitution doesnt speak to an issue, judges arent meant to interpret it to find rights that didnt exist there. And the Warren court had gone astray, he said.

archived recording (antonin scalia) You want a right to an abortion? Its in there! You want a right to die? Its in there! Whatever is good and true and beautiful, never mind the text. Its irrelevant.

adam liptak

He would say the same thing about finding a right to same sex marriage. He would say those are not things for judges to decide. Those are things for, in a democracy, the people to decide through their state legislatures.

archived recording (amy coney barrett) But his rationale for that was democracy. That this is the enacted text, it went through the process of ratification or a constitutional amendment to become a law, and if we change the law now to comport with our current understandings or what we want it to mean, then it ceases to be the law that has democratic legitimacy.

michael barbaro

So as a student and a disciple of Scalias, Amy Coney Barret is identified with this judicial approach  textualism, originalism.

adam liptak

Very much so, and she talks about it at great length in her writings, in her judicial opinions and in her public appearances.

archived recording (amy coney barrett) So Justice Scalia resisted the notion that the Supreme Court should be in the business of imposing its views of social mores on the American people. He thought that things that the Constitution didnt declare off limits were up to the people to decide.

michael barbaro

And so how do we see this play out in Amy Coney Barretts career?

adam liptak

After the clerkship, she briefly practices at a prestigious Washington law firm. But she fairly quickly goes back to Notre Dame, where shes a professor and a distinguished one, beloved by her students, winning all sorts of awards, and where she continues to work on these projects about the nature of originalism, the connection between originalism and precedent. And she comes to the attention of conservative legal groups, notably The Federalist Society, and to the Trump White House. And in 2017, President Trump nominates her to the federal appeals court in Chicago, the United States Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit, where she has now participated in hundreds of decisions.

michael barbaro

So I want to come back to this work that she did on the connection between originalism and precedent. But first, tell us about a case that she was involved in on the federal court on the 7th Circuit that helps us understand how she applies Justice Scalias philosophy.

adam liptak

So a case that jumped out at me was one in which she dissented. It involved a guy named Ricky Kanter, who got himself in some trouble for Medicaid fraud. He apparently was billing for shoe inserts that he wasnt supposed to be billing for. And hes convicted of a felony. Goes on to lead a blameless life and wants to get a gun. But theres a federal law and a Wisconsin law that says former felons are not allowed to carry guns. And he challenges these laws. And the court on which Judge Barrett sits, 2 to 1, says the laws are fine. The laws do not offend the Second Amendment. Judge Barrett decides shes going to have a hard look at the historical evidence. And she and her law clerks do what critics might call law office history. Real historians arent particularly crazy about judges doing history. And comes to the conclusion that the founding generation had views about this, and would allow restrictions, but only for violent felonies. Therefore, she would have allowed this guy to get a gun. And whats interesting about it is not so much the result, but her commitment to the methodology of trying to unearth what is surely a difficult task of what was the view at the time about nonviolent felonies like Medicaid fraud in, you know, a generation that would have no idea what youre talking about when you made that statement.

michael barbaro

So here you have Amy Coney Barrett applying this originalist approach. And its interesting, Adam, because you talked about how this approach began as a response from conservatives, to perceived liberal judicial activism and justices looking for rights that arent actually in the Constitution. But going into historical documents to look for views that the founding fathers held that also arent actually in the Constitution, that starts to feel like its own form of conservative judicial activism, right?

adam liptak

Yeah. There are two different interpretive methodologies, to be sure. But theres something similar going on. I agree with you.

michael barbaro

So with all this in mind, Adam, how are you thinking about Amy Coney Barrett taking the seat of Ruth Bader Ginsburg. I know much has been made about the fact that a conservative jurist with open opposition to abortion is taking the place of a woman who has spent her entire career as a pretty liberal-minded champion of womens rights and who is a supporter of abortion rights. But it sounds like youre also saying they just have literally opposite philosophical and legal approaches.

adam liptak

So you have to take into account that Justice Ginsburg was a beloved icon. And theres something a little  Im not sure what the word for it is, but superficial, say  for the notion that since she was a woman, she had to be replaced by a woman. And yet President Trump has said just about as much, when on an earlier go around he said he was saving Judge Barrett for the departure of Justice Ginsburg.

michael barbaro

Hm.

adam liptak

It reminds you of the replacement of Justice Thurgood Marshall, who was in many ways like Justice Ginsburg. She was a litigator on behalf of womens rights, the greatest in our history. He was a litigator on behalf of racial equality, the greatest in our history. And yet he is replaced by Justice Clarence Thomas, who is Black, but is his ideological opposite. And we seem to be in a situation now where Justice Ginsburg is likely to be replaced by a woman, but also her ideological opposite.

[music]

michael barbaro

Youre saying that it seems not at all to be a coincidence that in both cases, these judges who changed the course of history for Black Americans and for women were replaced by justices whose identities matched the justices whose seats they were filling, but everything about their judicial philosophy was different. And their rulings on the court may end up undermining the very work that those justices careers were about.

adam liptak

It sure looks that way, doesnt it?

michael barbaro

Well be right back. So lets turn to the next couple of weeks and what it might mean to have Judge Amy Coney Barrett on the high court. And just to get this out of the way, is there any reason to believe that she will not be confirmed?

adam liptak

Theres no reason to think shes not going to make it. I mean, something could come up. But at the moment, the Republicans have the votes and the timetable looks like she can be confirmed before the election.

michael barbaro

OK. So what will that mean for the make-up and the dynamics of the Supreme Court?

adam liptak

So theres two ways to think about it, Michael. The first one is a little simpler. And that is, if you put Judge Barrett on the ideological array on the court  you can imagine the court from left to right, from Sotomayor on the left to Thomas on the right. You plop her in. Shes probably to the right of Gorsuch and Kavanaugh. And that makes Justice Kavanaugh, rather than Chief Justice Roberts, the justice at the ideological center of the court, and who might be, in some situations, the swing justice on the court. Under this simple-minded theory, it moves the court slightly to the right.

michael barbaro

Mhm.

adam liptak

But theres a second way to think about it, which is that its a dynamic process. And the chief justice is not going to lightly give up his ability to shape the court. And Chief Justice Roberts, as a consequence, although he has occasionally  and I stress, very occasionally  joined what was a four-member liberal wing to create a majority for a liberal result, he cant do that anymore with a three-member liberal wing. If he goes with the three-member liberal wing, he will be in dissent in a 5-4 decision. Thats not going to be attractive to him. More attractive to him is to stay with his usual allies where he can use his distinctive power as chief justice to shape, maybe moderate the results. So theres some reason to think, some substantial reason to think that adding Judge Barrett to the court will shift the chief justice slightly to the right.

michael barbaro

So youre saying the chief justice will be less inclined to side with and work with the liberal justices, because mathematically, the question becomes, whats the point? But where does that leave the chief justices determination, which you have described many times on this show, to have the Supreme Court be seen as an apolitical body by using his vote to sway the whole court? It would seem like he would inevitably have to kind of cede that role.

adam liptak

Yeah. It would withdraw a tool from his toolbox and that will be frustrating to him. If he wants to singlehandedly show that the court is non-partisan, apolitical, its going to be harder for him to do that in this new configuration.

michael barbaro

Well then, lets talk about the issues that are most top of mind for Americans when it comes to what it will mean to have Amy Coney Barrett sitting on the Supreme Court. And lets start, of course, with abortion. What can you tell us that will help us understand what to expect here once she is on the court?

adam liptak

President Trump has vowed to put justices on the court who will overrule Roe. Opponents of abortion are very enthusiastic about Judge Barrett. They think shes a homerun. There is zero question that she is personally opposed to abortion.

archived recording  that Im asking what your belief is about the effect of overturning Roe v. Wade. Would you agree with me that it would have a massive disruptive effect on the lives of countless Americans? archived recording (amy coney barrett) Well, Senator, I dont think I ought to express personal opinions for the reason why nominees have done that, for the same reason that nominees have given in the past.

adam liptak

Though she hasnt directly said in public that she wants to overrule Roe.

archived recording (amy coney barrett) As you say, Roe has been affirmed many times and survived many challenges in the court. And its more than 40 years old. And its clearly binding on all courts of appeals. And so its not open to me or up to me. And I would have no interest in, as a court of appeals judge, challenging that precedent. It would bind.

adam liptak

If its true that she thinks, as Justice Scalia does, that the constitution has nothing to say about abortion, the question youre left with is: Does she think its the sort of precedent that should not be overruled, even if she thinks its wrong? Which she almost surely does. And there, shes done some writing which suggests, at least, that in the hierarchy of precedents which are more open to being overruled than others, Roe is among those thats more open to be overruled because its been so controversial for so long.

michael barbaro

And this brings us back to you telling us that, at Notre Dame, Amy Coney Bennett was writing about the relationship between originalism and precedent. Are you saying that what you just described is her view of that relationship? That theres a kind of hierarchy involved that makes some big cases more open to overruling?

adam liptak

Yes. I do think that. I think that she thinks that the Constitution is more important than judicial decisions. And I also think that she thinks that some precedents are less worthy of respect than others, and that Roe falls into the less worthy of respect category.

michael barbaro

So for the many, many people for whom I imagine this will be the most pressing question on their minds and with this nominee, are you expecting that Roe v. Wade will be challenged in the near future, a future where presumably Amy Coney Barrett is on the bench? And if so, are you expecting that Barrett would vote to overturn it?

adam liptak

I think the day will come, but not particularly soon, when the court is asked to confront the question of overruling Roe. In the short term, I think the Court is more likely to restrict and chip away at and hollow out the right to abortion and make it harder for women in red states to get abortions. Should the day come when the question is squarely posed to the Court, and I think Chief Justice Roberts will do what he can to push that day back, Id be very surprised if she did not vote to overrule Roe.

michael barbaro

Wow. I think, Adam, that the next big issue on peoples minds is the Affordable Care Act, for which theres a case already before the court. And I know that that case involves the constitutionality of the individual mandate. What can we expect there with an Amy Coney Barrett as justice?

adam liptak

Yes. So that case will be argued a week after Election Day. If the current timetable holds, Judge Barrett will be on the court. She has been critical of the 2012 decision, which upheld the constitutionality of the individual mandate, which required people to buy insurance or pay a penalty. Now the new case involves different issues. And I dont think her vote is particularly predictable. And I dont think the courts outcome is particularly predictable. To be sure, if you still had Justice Ginsburg on the court, you would have the same five justice coalition who saved the individual mandate in 2012. But the question in the case is convoluted enough and kind of a stretch that I dont know that you wont have a lopsided majority, even of a conservative court, rejecting much of the latest challenge.

michael barbaro

Finally, Adam, lets talk about the Supreme Court and the election itself. The president has said that if he loses in November, he may not accept the results. In fact, he may challenge them. What would it mean to find the United States in a Bush v. Gore-like situation, where the Supreme Court is asked to weigh in on the results of the 2020 election, perhaps decisively, with a new justice who is literally days old in the job, and who was rushed through by the sitting president, despite lots of opposition and despite polling that shows that a majority of Americans didnt think it should have happened on this timetable?

adam liptak

So we dont know what the case would look like, what the legal issues would be. They could come from anywhere in the nation. But I agree with you, Michael, that some election-related case is sadly likely to reach the Supreme Court.

michael barbaro

Wow.

adam liptak

Here, I think, most of the justices will join Chief Justice Roberts in really wanting to maintain the legitimacy of the Supreme Court and not hand a victory for political reasons to President Trump, who had just appointed a third justice to the court. So I think all Americans can be hopeful in the Supreme Court will try hard that that case, when it arises, will be decided on strictly legal grounds.

michael barbaro

Hm. But what youre saying is its very conceivable that a justice just appointed by this president may be asked to vote as a justice on a case that could determine whether or not he stays president?

adam liptak

At her confirmation hearing, Judge Barrett is certain to be asked whether shes going to recuse herself from such a case.

michael barbaro

Mhm.

adam liptak

The answer will be very interesting. I imagine shell duck it. But there would be something a little odd about someone arriving at the court in these circumstances voting in a case of that significance.

michael barbaro

Adam, how are you generally thinking about the historic nature of all of this? You are a actual lawyer. Youre a student of the Supreme Court. You have talked about the Warren court, the conservative response to that, these various kind of cycles and eras in the history of the court. What does the nomination and the likely confirmation of Amy Coney Barrett mean to you?

adam liptak

I think its terrible for the Court. I think Justice Scalias death shaped the last election. And the Senate Republicans refusal to even hold hearings for President Obamas nominee, Merrick Garland, was terrible for the court. I think this is terrible for the court. Its a real argument in favor of term limits or mandatory retirements. The fact that two elections in a row are being shaped by the untimely deaths of towering figures in American law just doesnt make any sense.

michael barbaro

And why is that? Why is it so terrible for the court?

adam liptak

The court tries hard, sometimes it fails, but it tries hard to make legal decisions, not partisan political decisions. And in order for it to maintain the respect of the American people, it needs to be seen that way. And now, in the coming weeks, were going to be told over and over again, and not without reason, that the court is a political institution because of the way the Senate is going to treat this nomination.

michael barbaro

But Adam, hasnt that ship sailed? I mean, didnt that ship sail when Democrats treated Robert Bork the way they treated him? Didnt that ship sail when Clarence Thomass hearings devolved into what they devolved into? Didnt that ship sail within the past few years when the Senate wouldnt even hear, as you said, a Democratic presidents nominee? I mean, weve talked about this in the past. The court has become a politicized body, despite its best intentions. So is this just not the kind of logical conclusion of all that?

adam liptak

I guess youre right, Michael. But only months ago, at the end of the last term, where the court did seem to have found its way into a balanced approach to many kinds of cases, and its public approval ratings went up as a consequence, and it tried to reclaim some of its legitimacy in the aftermath of the brutal Kavanaugh hearings, it may be that this is just another one of a series of blows to the court. But this close to an election, in the face of what many people describe as rank hypocrisy among Republicans who took the opposite approach four years ago, its just not good for the court.

michael barbaro

A provocative question, but should Amy Coney Barrett, should the court ask that we respect the majority of Americans and wait for the next president to proceed with this process?

adam liptak

I dont think theyre capable of doing that.

michael barbaro

Mhm.

adam liptak

And Im not sure that that itself doesnt have a political valence. Judge Barrett will be asked how she feels about the rush. And I imagine shell say, thats not my job. Thats your job, Senate. You guys are in charge of the politics. Im in charge of the law.

michael barbaro

You all have gotten us to where this all is. Its your problem.

adam liptak

Thats right. Yeah.

michael barbaro

Well, Adam, thank you very much. We appreciate it.

adam liptak

Thank you, Michael.

michael barbaro

Over the weekend, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Lindsey Graham, said that confirmation hearings for Amy Coney Barrett will begin on October 12. Well be right back. Heres what else you need to know today. A Times investigation based on tax return data for the president and his businesses over two decades found that he paid just $750 in federal income taxes during the year that he won the presidency, and the same amount during his first year in the White House. The president, who has broken tradition and refused to disclose his taxes, paid no federal income tax in 10 of the past 15 years, mostly because his businesses reported losing more money than they made.

archived recording On The New York Times story, though, you have to understand that when Americans read that you may have paid only a few hundred dollars in federal income tax per year, that seems very low for someone who is a billionaire. So how much  archived recording (donald trump) Well, basically theyre saying [INAUDIBLE] nothing. archived recording 1 [INTERPOSING VOICES] archived recording 2 Can you give people an idea of how much you actually are paying? archived recording (donald trump) Yeah. Basically  well, first of all, Ive paid a lot. And Ive paid a lot of state income taxes too. The New York State charges a lot. And I paid a lot of money at state.

michael barbaro
SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador - El Salvadors next ambassador to Washington is someone President Donald Trump might remember from his days as a beauty pageant boss.

A photo circulating on social media Friday showed a smiling Trump locking arms with Milena Mayorga and two other contestants - Miss USA and Miss Guatemala - on the sidelines of the 1996 Miss Universe pageant, where she was a top 10 finalist. Trump at the time was owner of the pageant.

Mayorga, 44, was appointed Thursday night by President Nayib Bukele as El Salvadors next ambassador to the U.S.

Shes a political neophyte with no previous diplomatic experience, having been elected to congress for the first time in 2018.

But shes well known to Salvadorans for years as a popular TV host.

Mayorga garnered the presidents attention after denouncing corruption in her conservative ARENA party, which as the dominant force in congress has blocked Bukeles agenda. She later quit the party.

As ambassador, shell face an uphill battle trying to repair deteriorating relations with Republicans and Democrats in Congress who have increasingly voiced concern that Bukele, although highly popular, is overstepping his authority and threatening checks and balances in the small Central American country.

While Bukele has endeared himself to Trump by backing his hardline immigration policies, hes faced criticism among human rights and pro-democracy activists for defying El Salvadors supreme court and congress.

On Thursday, six Republican congressmen led by David Royce of Ohio and Mario Diaz Balart of Miami wrote a letter to Bukele expressing concern about what they called El Salvadors slow but sure departure from the rule of law and norms of democracy that our hemisphere has fought so hard to preserve.

The letter provoked an angry response on national TV from Bukele, who dismissed the letter - which followed similar complaints by Democrats - as the work of a small group of lawmakers that dont represent even 3% of the entire U.S. Congress.

Getting congressmen to write a letter is the easiest thing in the world, Bukele said.

Criticism of Bukele stems from his repeated defiance of congress and the supreme court.

In February, he sent heavily armed soldiers to surround the congress to pressure lawmakers into approving a loan to fund a fight against gangs. Then in April, Bukele ignored several rulings by El Salvadors supreme court striking down strict measures that led to the detention in crowded quarantine centres of hundreds of people accused of breaking the coronavirus lockdown rules.

He also recently attacked one of Central Americas most independent investigative news outlets, El Faro, after it uncovered evidence that the government had been secretly negotiating with jailed members of MS-13, which is considered a terrorist group in El Salvador.

Throughout the confrontation, hes maintained strong support from the Trump administration and U.S. Ambassador Ronald Johnson. Bukele last year signed a bilateral agreement that would allow the U.S. to send asylum seekers from other countries to El Salvador. The policy had not been implemented before the pandemic.

In August, his government signed a $450,000 contrac t with a well-connected Washington lobbyist, according to U.S. Department of Justice filings. Bukele claims to have annulled the contract with the Sonoran Policy Group without having disbursed any funds.

Mayorga has generated controversy inside El Salvador for honouring on social media the deceased military commander behind the 1981 raid on the village of El Mozote, a gruesome low point during the countrys long civil war. Almost 1,000 people, including farmers and children, were killed by U.S.-trained counterinsurgency troops during a hunt for leftist guerrillas.

Some people never die, they just convert into myths and legends, she wrote in a 2018 tribute to army Col. Domingo Monterrosa on the anniversary of the commanders birth. Monterrosa was later killed when a guerrilla bomb destroyed the helicopter he was travelling in.

Mayorga was a top 10 finalist at the 1996 Miss Universe won by Alicia Machado, a former Miss Venezuela who campaigned against Trump in the 2016 campaign. Machado accused Trump of labeling her with a sexist nickname  Miss Piggy  that caused her shame and humiliation after she was crowned Miss Universe.



Goodman reported from Medellin, Colombia.
Even as the Narendra Modi government hopes to see a tremendous response for its production linked incentive (PLI) scheme for greenfield bulk drug manufacturing projects, the domestic pharmaceutical industry fears that the incentives alone may not be enough to ward off Chinese imports that turned manufacturing of several key bulk drugs unviable in the first place.

"The scheme seems to be encouraging and there is a possibility that people will come forward with a positive state of mind. But, apprehensions remain. First of all, there is a very strong chance that China may dump these products at a much lesser price once India starts production. Unless countered with very quick anti-dumping measures, it may turn the production of such items unsustainable for Indian industry. There is a need for a written assurance from the government that quick action by way of anti-dumping investigations and anti-dumping duty will be taken in such cases" says BR Sikri, Chairman of Federation of Pharma Entrepreneurs (FoPE).

Also read: Push to made-in-India bulk drugs, medical devices to provide 2.55 lakh jobs

He said concerns have been flagged and the government is seriously considering the industry proposal to provide additional protection. The PLI package announced in July for 53 bulk drugs (raw materials for medicine production) offers financial incentives to domestic manufacturers based on sales for 41 specific products (which cover all 53 bulk drugs that are heavily import-dependent) in a graded manner for six years.

The government will select two to four companies for each product, depending on the bids manufacturers offer. The deadline to apply is November end.

Sikri also said the industry is doubtful if the entire quantum of incentive announced by the government will be available to the manufacturer due to conditionalities attached to the scheme. "Though the government is saying there is a 10 percent incentive for chemical synthesis products and 20 percent incentive for fermentation-based products, the actual incentive for at least some products maybe 4 percent or less," Sikri said.

Also read: Govt may hike customs duty on import of APIs by 10-15% to boost local production

"For instance, the current market rate of Meropenem, one of the products in the list, is Rs 68,000 per kg. The scheme stipulates that the industry sets up a unit of 10-tonne annual capacity to avail concessions under the scheme. Theoretically, if I produce and sell 10 tonnes of Meropenem, my turnover is going to be Rs 68 crore annually. Hence, according to the scheme, I am eligible for 10 percent of the turnover or Rs 6.8 crores as an incentive," Sikri said.

He added that it's where it hurts. "The fine print of the PLI scheme puts a limit for incentive, which is either Rs 2.5 crore or 10 percent of the turnover, whichever is less. There are many products where the issue is similar. It erodes the attractiveness of the scheme," he adds.

The industry is also worried that the sale price (based on which the cost calculation happens) remain frozen upwards once you quote a price at the time of applying for the scheme. "Tomorrow, if the price goes down, the government will give less incentive, but if it goes up, the incentive will continue to be decided based on the declared price," he said.

Also read: $1.5 billion impact! Coronavirus lockdown, supply disruptions badly hit pharma exports

This is also a problem as the cost of inputs remains dynamic, he added. "How can I factor in the changes in chemical prices, other inputs, power tariffs, manpower cost, and economic circumstances of the future while quoting the price? In short, there are impractical and unrealistic demands too. The overall enthusiasm will receive a big boost if the government looks at such operational issues," Sikri said.

According to FOPE Chairman, the existing manufacturers have the capacity and technology to produce some of these products on the list immediately. "All that the government needs to do is put a condition that whatever such companies are manufacturing today, that should not be discontinued. A declaration that the company is producing so and so products...so and so capacity...and it will continue. Any additional capacity within the existing infrastructure, used for the production of the items in the PLI list, should be incentivised. Among the chemical synthesis products, 60 to 70 percent products can be manufactured from tomorrow if that happens," he said.

Sikri points out the members of apex industry associations like IDMA (Indian Drug Manufacturers Association) and BDMA (Bulk Drug Manufacturers Association) have informed that they are willing to start production. However, it is not viable today because they can't match the costing of Chinese imports.

"The PLI scheme, no doubt, is a timely decision and Atma Nirbhar Bharat scheme will give a chance to our industry to shine. The overall industry seems to be happy, it's just that if the government can give incentives for existing manufacturers, India's self-reliance in bulk drugs will improve tomorrow itself," he adds.

Also read: Coronavirus: Pharma to get Rs 10,000 crore boost; 3 'Bulk Drug Parks' to be built
MEXICO CITY, Sept 23 (Reuters) - Mexico's tax chief on Wednesday said officials have reviewed several hundred big companies this year in their push to boost tax collection, of which only two firms initially refused to pay.

Compared with all of 2019, large taxpayers this year through August have already increased their tax payments by over 60% to reach 155 billion pesos ($7 billion).

Raquel Buenrostro, head of the SAT tax authority, said the improved collection was significant given the pandemic's toll on business in Mexico, the country with the lowest tax intake in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

She also said that authorities had reviewed only 627 large companies so far, leaving room to squeeze more taxes from over 11,000 remaining firms that report annual income above 1.52 billion pesos and have yet to face scrutiny.

Walmart Inc's Mexico unit and Coca-Cola bottler Femsa have recently paid hundreds of millions of dollars after resolving tax disputes.

Of the 627 companies - which span sectors including energy, telecommunications and finance - only two refused to pay during administrative review with the SAT, Buenrostro said. Their cases were escalated to the fiscal prosecutor's office, which has threatened to bring criminal charges with jail time against suspected tax dodgers, including executives and tax attorneys.

"Two (companies) were sent to the fiscal prosecutor, that didn't want to pay," Buenrostro said at President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador's regular news conference, without naming the firms or clarifying whether they faced criminal charges.

"We report what the contributor did, and it's the fiscal prosecutor who determines if (the company) did or did not meet obligations in supposed fraud," Buenrostro said. She added the two were among 15 companies with large tax debts. Lopez Obrador had previously threatened to publicly expose the 15 if they did not fix their tax situations.

Of the other businesses on the list, Buenrostro said 12 had paid or were doing so in installments, and only one was still under review. ($1 = 22.0983 Mexican pesos) (Reporting by Daina Beth Solomon and Raul Cortes Fernandez in Mexico City Editing by Matthew Lewis)
If you want a guide to the latest trends in China's stock market, the must-have items for stylish and moneyed young women provide some of the best clues.

Chinese fashionistas are luxe-brand enthusiasts who still love Louis Vuitton bags.

They also favour trainers from Li-Ning, the upmarket Chinese sportswear line founded by the Olympic gymnast of the same name. The company's shares have doubled since March.

Land of opportunity: But taking a bet on China is a strategy best suited to those who can be phlegmatic about geo-political tensions and can afford to take some risk and a long-term view

Electric cars from Nio  whose founder William Li is known as China's Elon Musk  are another status symbol.

Kweichow Moutai is the chic supplier of spirits, while Nongfu Spring is the expensively hip mineral water.

Nongfu Spring shares soared on their stock market debut earlier this month.

Since March, Kweichou Moutai shares have risen by 64 per cent, while Nio's US-listed shares have advanced from less than $2 to $18, driven by the rush to benefit from the changing tastes of the more prosperous members of China's 1.4bn population.

This mini-cultural revolution has been accompanied by other shifts.

Catherine Yeung, investment director at Fidelity International, which runs the China Special Situations trust and the China Consumer Fund, says: 'Households which ordered all their lockdown meals from Meituan Dianping, a delivery service, have carried on doing so.' Meituan's shares, which were HK$72 in March, are now HK$232.

But should UK investors back these trends by moving into funds that invest in such businesses, and also have stakes in Chinese internet giants?

Such is the confidence in enterprises that the Witan Pacific Trust, now managed by Baillie Gifford, is having a makeover.

The Baillie Gifford China Growth Trust is to focus solely on listed and unlisted Chinese shares.

However, taking a bet on China is a strategy best suited to those who can be phlegmatic about geo-political tensions and can afford to take some risk and a long-term view.

This month, China's retail sales  which have lagged behind the recovery of the wider economy  returned to growth for the first time since the coronavirus outbreak. At the same time, the trade war between the US and China is intensifying.

With the US election 39 days away, a row is raging over Tik Tok, the Chinese video app which faces a US ban over security concerns.

Chinese fashionistas are luxe-brand enthusiasts who still love Louis Vuitton bags (pictured)

This may be averted if tech group Oracle and supermarket giant Walmart acquire a holding in Tik Tok. But the Chinese press has decried the deal and Bytedance, Tik Tok's owner, is not happy.

Also facing White House disapproval are the internet titans, the $698billion Alibaba and Tencent, worth $616billion.

The latter holds data on US citizens through its gaming arm which has bought into businesses like Epic, creator of Fortnite. And, of course there is the row over Huawei, the Chinese telecoms behemoth.

The US stance on China will remain hardline if Joe Biden wins the election, especially in areas such the alleged abuses towards Uyghur Muslims in the Xinjiang province.

But these concerns have not much held back Tencent, whose shares have jumped from $42 to $65 since March.

Alibaba's price has increased from $176 to $270, thanks in part to the imminent stock market debut of Ant, the payments business.

Jian Shi Cortesi, manager of GAM's China Evolution fund, says: 'When the world goes back to normal post Covid-19, a large part of these changes will be here to stay. Chinese consumers will again go to London and Paris to buy global luxury brands.'

Darius McDermott of FundCalibre says: 'If you invest in China, you are investing in a multi-decade story in which people move from villages into cities and start acquiring things like fridges. In the second phase, they acquire more luxury goods. It's a trend that is likely to continue.'

Profiting from this may require patience, which is a Chinese virtue.

The likes of Alibaba and Tencent make up a mere 5 per cent of the world's stock markets. The US accounts for about 54 per cent. The story may just be beginning.
A view of the debris and remains of the An-26 military plane which crashed on Friday night in the town of Chuguyiv close to Kharkiv, Ukraine, on Sept. 26, 2020. (Emergency Situation Ministry via AP)

Ukraine Plane Crash Death Toll Rises to 26, With One Survivor

MOSCOWSearchers combing the area where a Ukrainian military aircraft crashed found two more bodies Saturday, bringing the death toll to 26. One person survived.

The plane, a twin-turboprop Antonov-26 belonging to the Ukrainian air force, was carrying a crew of seven and 20 cadets of a military aviation school when it crashed and burst into flames Friday night while coming in for landing at the airport in Chuhuiv, about 400 kilometers (250 miles) east of the capital Kyiv.

Two people initially survived the crash, but one later died in a hospital. No cause for the crash has been determined.

Wreckage of an An-26 military plane seen after it crashed in the town of Chuguyiv close to Kharkiv, Ukraine, late Sept. 25, 2020. (Kharkiv Regional State Administration via AP)

Flowers lay at the scene where the An-26 military plane crashed on Friday night, in the town of Chuguyiv close to Kharkiv, Ukraine, on Sept. 26, 2020. (Emergency Situation Ministry via AP)

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy declared Saturday to be a day of mourning for the crash victims and ordered that flights of An-26 planes be halted pending investigation into the cause of the crash.

Zelenskiy, who visited the crash area Saturday, called for a full assessment of the condition of the countrys military equipment. Prime Minister Denis Shygal called for an official report on the crash by Oct. 25.

Yesterday we lost young cadets and experienced military men, who had their whole lives and, I am sure, more than one military feat ahead of them, Zelenskiy said in a statement released by his office. The whole country will mourn today with their families.

Deputy Defense Minister Igor Starobinksy said the families of the dead would each be paid compensation of about 1,500,000 hryvna ($56,000).

The An-26 is a transport plane used by both military and civilian operators. Nearly 1,400 of the planes were manufactured from 1969 to 1986, according to the companys website. Defense Minister Andrei Taran said the plane that crashed was built in 1977.

An An-26 chartered by a contractor for the World Food Program crashed on Aug. 22 while taking off from Juba in South Sudan, killing seven people.

The crash was the second large air disaster to afflict Ukraine this year. In January, a Boeing 737 belonging to Ukraine International Airlines was shot down shortly after takeoff from the airport in Tehran, Iran, killing all 176 people aboard.

The plane was shot down by Irans Revolutionary Guards amid high tensions after the United States killed a top general in a drone strike.
(Newser)  New York City has been slowly reopening since June, with schools set to welcome back many in-person students next week and restaurants opening for indoor dining at the end of September, per Gothamist. But despite this staggered return to some form of normality, certain parts of the city are now being eyed for possible new shutdowns due to a flouting of COVID-19 health guidelines. In particular, city officials say there's been a concerning uptick in virus cases in sections of Queens and Brooklyn, where positivity rates have reached 6%a significant difference from the 1% to 2% rate most of the city is seeing, NBC New York and the New York Times report. "This may be the most precarious moment we are facing since we emerged from lockdown," Dr. Dave Chokshi, the city's health commissioner, said at a Brooklyn presser on Friday. Many of the areas with spikes are neighborhoods with large populations of Orthodox Jews, where many don't wear face masks or do social distancing.

story continues below

The Times notes there's also a deep general distrust among Hasidic Jews toward Mayor Bill de Blasio, and an alignment with President Trump and his attitudes on mask wearing. The city's health department says if these areas don't start adhering to the health guidelines by Monday, fines may be issued, schools and businesses may be closed, and gatherings may be limited. Meanwhile, a study from Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health and the city's health department has found that New York City's lockdown from March through June, including school shutdowns and stay-at-home orders, led to a 70% decrease in the spread of the coronavirus. The research, was has yet to be peer reviewed, also found the use of face masks led to a 7% dip in transmission during the first month of their mandated use. That drop was up to 20% in adults 65 and older, the Washington Post notes. (Read more New York City stories.)
Gov. J.B. Pritzker said his second-in-commands threat of a 20% income tax hike is just one of the options the state may see if voters refuse to approve a graduated income tax amendment in November.

Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton, the final speaker of a video conference call held by supporters of the progressive income tax amendment, said lawmakers would have no other choice but to hike the states income tax by 20% if voters dont approve of Pritzkers signature initiative in November.

To adequately address the budget crisis under our current tax system, lawmakers will be forced to consider raising income taxes on all Illinois residents by at least 20%, regardless of their level of income, she said. We all know that our middle- and low-income families cannot withstand a 20% tax increase and it will only serve to deepen the dramatic inequities that we already see across the state.

Pritzker was asked about her comments Friday.

There are three choices that people have, he said. Either youre going see a 20% increase meaning one full percentage point increase in order to cover that structural deficit  by the way, that structural deficit was there under my predecessor, a Republican, Gov. Bruce Rauner. Either that, or youre going see a 15% cut in government, in our budget, which would significantly reduce education funding at the state level, increase property taxes in the state, and would reduce public funding for our safety, all of which we need to address.  The best direction that we need to go is to make sure that were asking those who are most able to step up to pay to do so.

Illinois Republicans pounced on the ultimatum Friday, saying voters arent sold on Pritzkers signature achievement and his administration is getting desperate.

The intimidation and scare tactics used yesterday against Illinois citizens, employers, employees and retirees are a clear sign of desperation by the governor, the lieutenant governor, and Speaker Mike Madigan because their tax hike amendment is failing and the election is around the corner, said House Minority Leader Jim Durkin, R-Western Springs. To threaten Illinois citizens, with a smile on her face, saying if you dont pass this tax amendment, were going to impose a 20% income tax increase against you. We will punish you for not following us speaks volumes about how this amendment is failing and Democrats are getting desperate.

As of Friday, lawmakers havent filed any legislation that would explicitly raise the personal income tax rate by 20%.

An income tax increase of that magnitude would put the states income tax rate at 5.94%. This would also be the highest personal income tax rate in Illinois history. In 2011, lawmakers increased the income tax to 5% and allowed it to sunset before raising it again to 4.95% in 2017.

Despite knowing the pandemic would dent the states revenue, Pritzker enacted a $43 billion budget that relies on bonds to cover debt and the uncertain prospect of federal aid.

If approved, the progressive income tax amendment would allow lawmakers to tax incomes at different rates, even tax the same dollar more than once via things like surcharges.

Lawmakers approved an initial plan, should the amendment pass ballot muster, to increase taxes on those earning more than $250,000 to 7.75%. It would scale up to 7.99% at income over $1 million, also retroactively taxing all lesser income at that higher rate once the filer earns that much.
The NCB summoned Deepika Padukone, Shraddha Kapoor and Sara Ali Khan today to record their statements in drug investigation linked to Sushant Singh Rajput's death case.

Deepika Padukone has left Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) office in south Mumbai after recording her statement in the drug probe linked to Sushant Singh Rajput's death, as per a tweet by News18.

The same tweet stated the actress was questioned for over five hours by the probe team.

Padukone, Shraddha Kapoor and Sara Ali Khan, who had been summoned by the NCB's probe team on Wednesday, recorded their statements on Saturday for the investigation.

According to an NCB official, the Mumbai police deployed adequate security outside the NCB office.

Deepika's manager Karishma Prakash, who was questioned by the team on Friday, was also asked to remain present for further questioning on Saturday, he added.

Prakash's WhatsApp chats included conversations about drugs with one D and the central agency wanted to find out who this person was, the NCB sources had said earlier.

The NCB team also got important information about the case during the questioning of Rajput's talent manager Jaya Saha, the official said.

"The actors' names had surfaced during the interrogation of some accused in the case," he said.

Actors Sara Ali Khan and Rakul Preet Singh's names cropped up during the questioning of Rhea Chakraborty, Rajput's girlfriend who has been arrested by the NCB in the drugs case along with over a dozen others.

Rakul Preet Singh recorded her statement on Friday. She was questioned for about four hours.

Dharma Productions' executive producer Kshitij Ravi was also questioned by the NCB on Friday.

There were reports that Deepika's husband actor Ranveer Singh has asked the agency whether he can be present during his wife's interrogation. However, the NCB on Friday clarified that they have not received any such request.

The NCB began the inquiry after a drug angle came to light in connection with Rajput's alleged suicide.

Rajput (34) was found hanging in his apartment in suburban Bandra on 14 June.

(With inputs from Press Trust of India)
A federal judge on Thursday ruled that counting for the 2020 census would continue extending the deadline until Oct. 31.

The Census Bureau will comply with the Courts order and continue our Nonresponse Followup Operation (NRFU), read an online statement by the Bureau.

Q&A with Mayor Andrew Mitcham: Jersey Village continues forward trajectory during pandemic

Our office of general counsel is evaluating the ultimate impact of the order on the 2020 Census. Field staff have been instructed to continue with current operations until updates can be provided, it said.

Its a date that census officials had anticipated back in June.

The deadline was originally July 31, but theyve extended the self-respond deadline to Oct. 31, said Terry Bennett with the U. S. Census Bureau back in June.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Trump administration must honor its own pandemic-era census deadline, federal judge rules

More Information AREA RESPONSE RATES CITY S-R RATE INTERNET 2010 RATE Fulshear 81.2% 78.3% 61.0% Houston 58.0% 48.6% 63.5% Jersey Village 76.5% 70.6% 74.6% Katy 73.5% 67.2% 71.9% Missouri City 79.3% 72.7% 75.4% Rosenberg 64.6% 51.5% 66.3% Spring Branch 52.4% 42.7% 58.2% Stafford 62.1% 56.7% 69.4% Sugar Land 80.9% 76.0% 79.1% Tomball 65.4% 55.7% 65.1% West University Place 82.4% 77.8% 81.7% WANT TO FOLLOW THE NUMBERS? If you have an interest in how your community is participating in the 2020 Census, here's how: 1. Go to 2020Census.gov 2. Hover over the first tab, Get The Facts and go to the bottom of the list and click on Response Rates. 3. That takes you to the interactive map. You now have access to every state, city, county and tribal nation throughout the U.S. 4. Interested in your community numbers? Click on state and enter Texas. Then go to city and click on the city you're interested in the drop-down menu. There are two lines at the bottom: the response rate and the rate of participants using the internet to submit their information. REGISTER HERE: Toll-free numbers to complete the census: ENGLISH 844-330-2020 SPANISH 844-468-2020 Or go to 2020census.gov See More Collapse

The decennial quest for counting and obtaining information from residents in the United States slowed significantly in April and officials point to the coronavirus pandemic as the major distraction.

Bennett was emphatic on the postponement being derived from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Back in June, field representatives began their door to door quest throughout the northwest Harris County area including Cypress, Jersey Village and Tomball.

They were required to wear protective masks and only knocked on doors and left packets for homeowners who hadnt filled out the questionnaire.

All eight regional census offices were opened slowly through the summer after being closed due to the coronavirus pandemic.

We are being cautious, and safety is a priority, she said.

The response rate across the country is 66.3 percent, but Texas falls behind the national average with 62.0 percent, ranking them 38th in the nation for total self-responded.

The Census Bureau continues to progress with an estimated 97 percent of all households enumerated.

In Jersey Village, City Manager Austin Bleess is encouraged by the citys response rate thus far. The city has a 76.5 percent self-response rate with 70.6 percent of that coming from online users on computers, tablets, or their cell phones.

It exceeds the citys 2010 self-response numbers of 74.6 percent by nearly two percent as of Friday.

Weve used a number of ways to reach our residents, Bleess said. Those included information in the monthly newsletter the Jersey Village Star, email updates, website, and social media presence.

Weve also created a quick link on our mobile app for people to complete the census questionnaire from there, he said.

The city manager also said it has been discussed during the regular meetings of the city council.

Despite the challenges presented by the coronavirus, citizens continued to respond.

Weve had a great response rate so far. We feel that early on the pandemic made it a bit easier to complete the survey online, since many people are working remotely, he said.

Entering the final month of census counting the city is prepared to launch a campaign to get to the finish line.

We are planning a social media push and will use other events coming up to remind people about the census, Bleess said.

The home-rule charter community is just over 3.43 square miles and in 2010 had an Anglo population of 86.6 percent, with 7.3 percent Hispanic or Latino, 5.09 percent Asian, 4.1 percent African American, 0.1 percent Native American, and 0.06 percent Pacific Islander. The median income per household in 2010 was $68,431.

The census helps guide us in our future planning for the city, the city manager said.

As part of our current process in updating our comprehensive plan, we are looking at demographic data that is available. When the census numbers come out, that will help us to better understand where our residents are at in their life stages, along with all the other great information the census collects, he said.

Some $1.5 trillion is divvyed out amongst the 50 states, Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia and for each community throughout the nation to receive their fair share, an accurate accounting is necessary.

It really helps us drive towards the future ensuring that we are meeting the needs of our residents, he said.

Bleess said they werent satisfied with the numbers and will continue to push the questionnaire.

We would love to get our participation rates over the 90 percent threshold for self-response. It will take more communication efforts to get there, he said.

He said over the next four weeks they will push information out through all of their available platforms including their regular events like the farmers market.

We wont do anything too special or crazy, he said.

dtaylor@hcnonline.com
Footy-mad Victorians hoping to make it to this year's AFL grand final in Brisbane can give up now or risk a fine.

The Health Department has confirmed no one can leave the state for the purposes of fun, even if they happened to live within 5km of the airport.

Howard Springs has been described as being a holiday camp you can't leave, but most are upbeat about the facilities. Credit:Ben Sale

Many have already left COVID-era Victoria for the Northern Territory, which is welcoming travellers from Australian hotspots so long as they quarantine for 14 days in a secure workers village in Darwin's rural area at a personal cost of $2500.

People are then free to travel through the Northern Territory or cross the border into Queensland, which will host the AFL grand final on October 24 at the Gabba.
SCHENECTADY  In one of the first court cases since New York legalized disclosure of police misconduct records, a judge on Wednesday gave the city police union a week to refine their arguments for why part of the personnel record of a police officer involved in a controversial incident should be blocked.

State Supreme Court Justice Mark Powers noted in court the Police Benevolent Association wants the city to redact any information about complaints about Officer Brian Pommer that were unfounded, unsubstantiated or that did not lead to discipline. Over the summer, Pommer was seen in a video that appeared to show the officer kneeling on the neck of a man he was arresting.

The union also wants the city to withhold information about cases in which he was exonerated of wrongdoing and bar the release of any documents that resulted in Pommer receiving a "counseling notice."

It is unclear if Pommer has ever faced internal discipline, and the nature of what any "counseling notice" is is unknown. Powers has sealed most of the legal papers filed in the case, leaving few clues about the nature of complaints the PBA hopes to shield from public view.

The city on Wednesday filed new legal papers under seal and Powers gave the union a week to respond to them. The judge is expected to issue a written decision after he meets with the two sides on Oct. 13.

The union sued the city earlier this month in the hopes of convincing a judge to carve out some exceptions to the repeal of a state law known as 50-a that shielded police disciplinary records from public disclosure. Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo signed the repeal on June 12, just weeks after the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police.

In July, the Times Union filed a request for Pommer's personnel records, including any information related to his July 6 arrest of Yugeshwar Gaindarpersaud, who was suspected of vandalizing a neighbor's car on North Brandywine Avenue. Pommer initially approached Gaindarpersaud in front of Gaindarpersaud's home, but the 31-year-old man ran into his backyard where he was tackled by Pommer. Albany Proper, a local website, and the Daily Gazette made similar records requests.

Videos of Gaindarpersaud's apprehension by the officer triggered demonstrations in the city and prompted an internal investigation of the encounter by the police department. The Schenectady County district attorney's office also is investigating the incident. Neither agency has released its findings.

The city was preparing to comply with the newspaper's request to see the personnel file when the union went to court earlier this month to block disclosure of the documents.

The PBA's attorney, Jack Calareso, and Schenectady's attorney, Corporation Counsel Andrew Koldin, both appeared in court Wednesday but neither spoke. Powers said the union argues the disclosure of Pommer's record would be an "invasion of privacy." But the judge also acknowledged the Times Union and the public had a "stake in the controversy."

A similar case is playing out in New York City where a federal court judge last month lifted a restraining order that barred the city's police watchdog agency, the Civilian Complaint Review Board, from releasing police disciplinary records. But a federal appeals court last week agreed to keep the records secret while it weighs an appeal from the city's public safety unions.

Even before arguments got underway in Schenectady, demonstrators rallied outside the courthouse. Nearly a dozen were in court for the brief proceedings and afterward expressed concern part of the records could be redacted.

Gaindarpersaud, who has accused Pommer of kneeling on his neck and punching him several times during the skirmish, has been charged with criminal mischief and resisting arrest, both misdemeanors. He is free pending a future court appearance.

Earlier: Video shows Schenectady officer kneeling on man's neck

Schenectady chief: Breathing of man arrested never impaired

Schenectady: Police can't put knee on neck, head of suspects

Mayor directs police brass to weigh discipline in arrest case

Neighborly dispute at the root of Schenectady police incident

Demonstrators at Schenectady City Hall demand justice after video shows police knee hold on man

Video: More scrutiny over Schenectady arrest case

Gaindarpersaud's father videotaped the confrontation, footage that appeared to show Pommer kneeling on Gaindarpersaud's neck. The video, shared with the Times Union and other media outlets, drew comparisons to the killing of Floyd, who died May 25 after a Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin kneeled on his neck for nearly nine minutes.

The police department later released footage from Pommer's body camera which showed Gaindarpersaud running from the officer when Pommer tried to discuss the vandalism complaint. On that recording, Pommer can be seen punching Gaindarpersaud several times in the ribs while Gaindarpersaud squirmed on the ground.

Police Chief Eric Clifford insisted the videos did not show Pommer kneeling on Gaindarpersaud's neck but rather on his head. Within days, the police department announced a policy prohibiting officers from kneeling on a person's head or neck.

Schenectady Mayor Gary McCarthy raised concerns about the events leading to Gaindarpersaud arrest and directed Clifford and Public Safety Commissioner Michael Eidens to consider possible discipline based upon any department policies that may have been violated.

It is unclear if Clifford or Eidens followed through.

On Wednesday, dualing demonstrations were held outside court - with some protesters demanding an end to police brutality, while others argued police were unfairly maligned. There were tense moments with supporters of both causes yelling at each other on the sidewalk.

Civil rights activist Jamaica Mills was among those who urged the crowd to keep fighting for justice and called for the court to make Pommers file public.

On the other hand, an emotional William Tryon told reporters he wanted to let law enforcement know they were appreciated. He said he supported the release of disciplinary records but only if the officer's conduct was criminal.

Paul Nelson contributed to this article.
With contactless delivery to curb the spread of coronavirus, she added, you can't tell servers...
Veteran poet, lyricist and screenwriter Javed Akhtar on Friday took a jibe at news television channels that have been highlighting a house party organised by Karan Johar last year. A video of the party has gone viral on social media.

Akhtar tweeted from his verified account, noting how television channels were more concerned about Johars house party of last year instead of talking about the controversial farm Bills passed recently by Parliament.

If Karan johar had invited some farmers too for his party, life would have been easier for our TV channels. They would not have had to choose between farmers protest and Karans party! It seems that Karans do is the second most favourite PARTY of our channels," Akhtar tweeted.

If Karan johar had invited some farmers too for his party life would have been easier for our TV channels.They would not have had to choose between farmers protest and Karans party!. it seems that Karans do is the second most favourite PARTY of our channels Javed Akhtar (@Javedakhtarjadu) September 25, 2020

Celebrities spotted at the party, as spotted in the video, include Bollywood stars Deepika Padukone, Ranbir Kapoor, Vicky Kaushal, Shahid Kapoor, Varun Dhawan, Malaika Arora, and Arjun Kapoor, besides filmmakers Zoya Akhtar and Ayan Mukerji.

It is being speculated that the celebrities seen in the old house party video were high on drugs. The video, which surfaced for the first time last year, has resurfaced on news channels after the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) started summoning Bollywood celebrities including Deepika Padukone and her ex-manager Karishma Prakash for questioning for alleged drug links. Others who have been on the NCB radar are actresses Sara Ali Khan, Rakul Preet Singh and Shraddha Kapoor.
The head of the NHS in England has hit out at drugs firms which try to price-gouge taxpayers.

Sir Simon Stevens claimed one company was attempting to raise the cost of a medicine for mental health disorders by 2,600 per cent.

The firm, Essential Pharma, raised the costs of lithium carbonate tablets from 3 to 87 in 2016.

They have since withdrawn one of their other products which means the NHS may be forced to switch to this more expensive version.

Sir Simon called for it to be made illegal for bad apple companies to hike their prices arbitrarily.

Sir Simon Stevens claimed Essential Pharma was attempting to raise the cost of a medicine for mental health disorders by 2,600 per cent

He also claimed up to 50,000 patients could be affected by the move.

Essential Pharma owns the rights to two other brands of lithium carbonate and the costs to the NHS for the drug are now likely to rise from 2million to 17million.

The tablets are used to treat bipolar disorder and depression and the health service could be forced to ration them or switch to less effective alternatives if it cannot negotiate a lower price.

Speaking at the Health Service Journals virtual Integrated Care Summit yesterday, Sir Steven explained how the NHS frequently negotiated with drug firms to lower their fees.

He added: You do occasionally get the one bad apple  which isnt the same as the whole barrel.

'There is a case, unfortunately going on right now, where we have a company, Essential Pharma, who are trying to jack the prices of a longstanding medicine for people particularly with bipolar disorder.

This is them just using the cover of coronavirus to try and price gouge British taxpayers, in a way which is also introducing clinical risk for vulnerable patients, and it is completely unacceptable.

So I hope where we find those isolated examples... we can take action.

'If there needs to be a change of the law to make that happen perhaps that is something that could be included in the forthcoming NHS bill.

Essential Pharma, raised the costs of lithium carbonate tablets from 3 to 87 in 2016 (stock photo)

An Essential Pharma spokesman said: We have sought to minimise disruption to patients and to allow time for the transfer to suitable alternative lithium products by providing an extended notice period of such discontinuance.

Mental health experts say lithium carbonate is the gold standard treatment and patients should ideally keep taking it.

Scientists believe that it helps strengthen nerve cell connections in the regions of the brain responsible for regulating mood, thinking and behaviour.

Essential Pharma owns one of the most widely-used brands of lithium carbonate which currently costs 4.02 for a pack of 100 tablets.

But the company  owned by a Swiss private equity firm  recently said restrictions on permitted pricing of this brand, Priadel, meant it was no longer viable.

They held talks with health officials to negotiate a higher price but chose to pull the brand altogether.

Supplies will likely run out by April. Patients will likely be switched to other brands of lithium carbonate, such as the one Essential Pharma raised the price of in 2016.
Superdry's founder and boss Julian Dunkerton shelled out around 1.36million on shares this week.

Dunkerton, 55, hoovered up about 1m shares in multiple transactions for between 136p and 139p each.

He now owns 19.7 per cent of the retailer, which he co-founded in 2003.

Earlier this week Superdry reported a 167million loss in the year to the end of April.
(Newser)  Ahead of the first debate-stage matchup between President Donald Trump and his Democratic challenger Joe Biden, each campaign is promising a stark contrast in policy, personality, and preparation, the AP reports. Trump has decided to skip any formal preparation. And while Biden's team believes the significance of the debate may be exaggerated, the Democratic nominee has been aggressively preparing to take on the president. Biden's campaign has been holding mock debate sessions featuring Bob Bauer, a senior Biden adviser and former White House general counsel, playing the role of Trump, according to a person with direct knowledge of the preparations granted anonymity to discuss internal strategy. A few details:

story continues below

Bauer has not actually donned a Trump costume in line with Trump stand-ins from previous years, but he is representing his style and expected strategy. "I'm sure the president will throw everything he can at (Biden). My guess is that they're preparing for thatbombarding him with insults and weird digressions," said Jay Carney, a former aide to Biden and President Obama.

Those with knowledge of Bidens preparations suggest he will not take the fight to Trump if he can avoid it. But on Saturday, at least, he was on the attack when he discussed his strategy on MSNBC, saying "the people know the president is a liar" and "he doesn't know how to debate the facts, because hes not that smart."

Trump has not been doing any formal preparation, according to aides and allies who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations. No set has been constructed and aides refused to say whether anyone is playing Biden.

Trump and Biden are scheduled to meet on the debate stage for the first time Tuesday night at Case Western Reserve University and the Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio. The 90-minute event moderated by Fox News host Chris Wallace is the first of three scheduled presidential debates.

(Read more Election 2020 stories.)
Even for a news junkie, tracking the news in 2020 has been dispiriting at times. That's why it was so refreshing to read about what happened when the Valdez family in Roy, Utah took the time to get to know Derlin Newey, the elderly man who delivered their Papa John's pizza.

The Valdezes are a young Hispanic couple in Roy, a mid-sized community north of Salt Lake City, raising a little girl. They have a substantial following  over 53,000 people  on their TikTok channel. One of their great loves is Papa John's pizza in Roy.

Somewhat unusually, their pizza delivery guy, instead of being a teenager or a 20-something guy, is Newey, an elderly man. Whenever he showed up with their pizza, he cheerfully greeted them, asking, "Hello, are you looking for some pizza?"

Eventually, the Valdezes started asking for Newey by name when they ordered a pizza. They also started recording his deliveries for their TikTok fans, and Newey's good cheer pleased everyone.

During the course of the videos, the Valdezes and their followers learned that Newey is 89 years old. The general feeling was that it was sad that Newey was still working up to 30 hours a week selling pizza. "Somebody at that age should not be working that much," Valdez told KSL.com, the local news channel.

The Valdezes decide to use their TikTok channel to raise money for Newey. They expected they'd get a few dollars into the Venmo account they set up. They were way off. The Valdezes ended up collecting over $12,000 for Newey.

With the promise that they would bring him a "Hello, are you looking for some pizza?" t-shirt, the Valdezes had gotten Dewey's address. They showed up at his small home the other day with the t-shirt, a check for $12,069, and a camera crew.

This is the point when you get to watch the video. You might want to have a hankie nearby:

As you saw, Newey wasn't delivering pizzas just to get out of the house. He was doing it because he couldn't manage on his Social Security check. That's why he started crying when he saw the generous gift the Valdezes handed him.

Carlos Valdez knew the right thing to say:

"This couldn't have gone any better," said Valdez. "He needed this. I'm just glad we could help him. We just need to treat people with kindness and respect the way he does. He stole our hearts."

I've posted this story for a couple of reasons. First, during an endlessly upsetting year, it's delightful to write about nice people being kind. Kindness is an incredible social lubricant.

Second, this is a story about Americans. It's not a story about a Hispanic family and a white man. It's a story about a kind, thoughtful young couple who wanted to help out an elderly man who faced life's challenges with fortitude and good humor.

Or, as Carlos said, "we just need to treat people with kindness and respect the way he does." That's how we in America should see each other  as people, not skin colors, or genders, or whatever other nasty little tribal divisions the Democrats insist on imposing on us.

Americans' natural inclination is to reach out and care for one another. Sure, there are unkind or even racist people out there, but so what? They're anomalies. Most of us are Mr. and Mrs. Valdez or Mr. Newey, people living their lives with smiles and making a difference through innate generosity of spirit.

When you watch Antifa and BLM stirring up hate and acting violent, remember that these awful people are not who we are. Do what the Valdezes did: be kind to someone. Through your action and the other person's response, you'll be reminded what America is really about.

Image: The Valdezes deliver a check to Derlin Newey. Screen grab from KSL.com News.
The Maharashtra government has banned the sale of loose cigarette and beedis. The consumers will now have to buy the whole packet of these items. The reason cited is these single stick loose cigarettes or beedis do not have the specific health warning on it which is in the public interest. The State government has issued a notification in this regard, in the public interest. This has been issued under subsection (2) of section 7 of the cigarette and other Tobacco Products (prohibition of Advertisement and Regulation of Trade and commerce Production, supply and Distribution) Act, 2OO3 (Act No. 34 of 2OO3).

However, this has not gone well with both the consumers and the traders.

Not everyone can afford to but the whole packet, our sales will decrease, said a vendor who has a shop in Parel.

Sayed Mehboob who is regular smoker said that such warnings hardly deter him. Regular smokers will smoke irrespective of any warning, said Sayed. The state governments move may even backfire as those who smoke one daily will be tempted to smoke more if he/she is given the full packet, he added.

Many have called it a gimmick saying that the state does not have the mechanism to check the traders and it was just an eyewash.

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A new study has found that the popular dinosaur species from the Jurassic Park movies known as the Spinosaurus was an aquatic creature, contrary to the paleontologists theories that the extinct reptile were land dwellers. Scientists investigated 1,200 thousand fossilized teeth, excavated from the Kem Kem river system bed where the creature was largely found. The research led to the discovery that the gigantic dinosaur species was in fact a "river monster. In a study published in the scientific journal Cretaceous Research, scientists say that the fossilized teeth of the species revealed that the creature, the giant antagonist predator, had a marine lifestyle.

[Spinosaurus, whose tail is shown here in an artists illustration, was well-adapted for aquatic life, a new study suggests. Along with its long, narrow jaws and conical teeth, the dinosaur had a unique, paddlelike tail. Credit: Davide Bonadonna/ Science Journal]

The species of the dinosaur Spinosaurus Aegyptiacus was made famous by the BBC documentary Planet Dinosaur and Jurassic Park III where the creature was portrayed surviving on land. However, a team of researchers from the University of Portsmouth stated that the 15 meters long, the six-tonne humongous creature was found in the river that flowed alongside the Sahara Desert 100 million years ago.

From this research, we are able to confirm this location as the place where this gigantic dinosaur not only lived but also died. The results are fully consistent with the idea of a truly water-dwelling river monster, professor of Palaeobiology at the University of Portsmouth, David Martill said in the research.

This comes, as earlier, scientists found that the sharp-toothed Spinosaurus were excellent swimmers and their fossils suggested that the carnivorous dinosaur actually had a tail and preyed on fish, other dinosaurs, and pterosaurs, as per the research published in the scientific journal Nature.

Read: Evidence: Species That Roamed With Dinosaur Survived Mass Extinction Due To 'hibernation'

Read: Armoured Dinosaur 'Scelidosaurus' Finally Gets Recognised And A Place On 'family Tree'

[An amateur fossil hunter first recovered pieces of Spinosaurus in 2008, in the Kem Kem region of southeastern Morocco in the Sahara. Credit: Diego Mattareilli/ Science Journal]

45 percent dental remains at water system

Mesozoic-Era creatures fossil remains accumulated from the site of an ancient river bed in Morocco earlier, also suggests that the species were water-dwelling reptiles. The huge number of teeth we collected in the prehistoric river bed reveals that Spinosaurus was there in huge numbers, accounting for 45 percent of the total dental remains. We know of no other location where such a mass of dinosaur teeth have been found in bone-bearing rock, Professor of Palaeobiology, Martill said in the research.

Spinosaurus teeth, relative to other dinosaurs, is a reflection of their aquatic lifestyle. An animal living much of its life in water is much more likely to contribute teeth to the river deposit, Professor Martill said in the research.

Earlier this year, the scientists uncovered a 95-million-year old Spinosaurus tail which was two-foot-long with an unusual paddle shape. Speculating, the species was likely propelled out of the water depths of the rivers, the researchers speculated that it was aquatic. The new study confirms that the non-avian dinosaur species was in fact aquatic.

[Paleontologist Diego Mattarelli (shown) sits in Morocco next to two unearthed fossils, pieces of a Spinosaurus tail. The two tail bones (the drumstick-like shapes at right) each show central, squarish vertebrae with a projecting neural spine. Credit: Gabriele Bindellini/Science Journal]

Read: UK Scientist Discovers Dinosaur Fossil While Running Along Shore Of Eigg Beach

Read: New York: One Of The Largest Known T-rex Skeleton Set To Be Auctioned Next Month
Defendants have used in commerce, and continue to use in commerce, the likeness, reputation, and image of Evel Knievel in the film Toy Story 4 through Defendants depiction of Duke Caboom, and has exploited the same connection through marketing, promotion, advertising, and sales of Toy Story 4, and in connection with the manufacturing, distribution, marketing, advertising, promotion, and sales of the Duke Caboom action figure, all without the consent or approval of K&K.

K&K is seeking a big payout, including actual damages, compensatory damages, statutory damages, and profits stemming from [Disneys] unlawful conduct, as well as an award of exemplary/punitive damages owing to Disneys willful appropriation and/or infringement, and a reimbursement of its attorneys fees.

Unsurprisingly, Disney disagrees. The claims are without merit and we intend to defend against them vigorously in court, said a spokesperson.

Cosmetic differences notwithstanding  Knievel, who died in 2007, was American, whereas Caboom is proudly Canadian  the resemblance between the two figures hasnt passed unnoticed. Much coverage of the film pointed it out. A typical example is Matt Zoller Seitzs review for RogerEbert.com, which describes Caboom as a Evel Knievel-styled motorcycle rider who describes himself as the greatest stuntman in Canada.

These kinds of lawsuits are common in the business. Case in point: earlier this year, Disney and Pixar were sued by artist Sweet Cicely Daniher, who alleged that Pixar stole her unicorn artwork idea for its film Onward.
Daiichi Sankyo will strive to further enhance its business platform in Asia

Daiichi Sankyo Company, Limited has announced the establishment of DAIICHI SANKYO VIETNAM COMPANY LIMITED, as a wholly owned subsidiary.

Japanese firm Daiichi Sankyo established a representative office in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, in 2014, to provide support activities for the sale and promotion of its pharmaceutical products, such as Cravit.

In order to better respond to the changing business environment of the pharmaceutical industry in Vietnam and to strengthen its business operations, focusing on forthcoming products, Daiichi Sankyo has established a local legal entity to conduct sales activities.

Daiichi Sankyo will strive to further enhance its business platform in Asia while contributing to the healthcare in the country through Daiichi Sankyo Vietnam.

[Corporate Profile of New Subsidiary in Vietnam]

1Corporate Name: DAIICHI SANKYO VIETNAM COMPANY LIMITED

2Date of Establishment: September 18, 2020

3Legal Representative: Yukinori Tominaga (General Director)

4Business Category: Wholesale of household goods etc.

5Capital: USD $8 million
The Plainview City Council extended the Disaster Declaration to Oct. 8 and adopted the Governors Executive Orders GA-30 and GA-31 at Tuesdays City Council Meeting.

The Executive Order GA-30 & GA-30 changes include:

Business establishments may operate at up to 75 percent of the total listed occupancy of the establishment including:

a. Retail establishments

b. Dine-in restaurants

c. Office buildings

d. Manufacturers

e. Museums and libraries and

f. Gyms and exercise facilities and classes.

There is no occupancy limit for the following establishments that operate with at least six feet of social distancing between work stations:

cosmetology salons, hair salons, barber shops, nail salons/shops, and other establishments where licensed cosmetologists or barbers practice;

massage establishments and other facilities where licensed massage therapists or other persons licensed or otherwise authorized to practice; and

other personal-care and beauty services such as tanning salons, tattoo studios, piercing studios, hair removal services, and hair loss treatment and growth services.

Relatives and friends are able to visit nursing homes, state supported living centers, assisted living facilities, or long-term care facilities as determined through guidance from the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC).

Social distancing of 10 or less people is still required and those who are 65 years and older or those with compressed immunome systems are asked to stay home as much as possible.

A copy of the Governors Executive Order GA-30 and GA-31 and City Council Mayoral Order can be found at www.plainviewtx.org and click on the blue box COVID-19 Information.

For more information, contact Jack McCasland at the Plainview / Hale County Health Department at (806) 293-1359 or visit the website: www.plainviewtx.org/COVID19.
President Donald Trumps potential nominee to the Supreme Court previously rejecting the idea of former President Barack Obama filling a vacancy during an election year that she said could dramatically flip the balance of power in a recently-resurfaced interview.

The interview shows Amy Coney Barrett, a federal judge who sits on the Seventh Circuit, discussing the former presidents nomination of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court in 2016 following the death of the late Justice Antonin Scalia, a conservative stalwart.

Ms Barrett suggested in the interview with CBS News that she was against the idea of Mr Obama selecting Mr Garland, often considered an apolitical nominee and centrist judge, because he was not a conservative like justice Scalia.

Were talking about justice Scalia, the staunchest conservative on the court, Ms Barrett said in the interview, a clip of which went viral this week after it was reported that she was a top choice to the nations highest court.

Were talking about him being replaced by someone who could dramatically flip the balance of power on the court, she continued. Its not a lateral move.

The comments gained renewed backlash throughout the week against Ms Barrett, who previously was featured on the presidents shortlist of potential Supreme Court nominees before the death of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who passed away on Friday at the age of 84.

Justice Ginsburg, one of the most liberal Supreme Court justices and a trailblazer for civil, womens and LGBTQ+ rights, died from metastatic pancreatic cancer after battling multiple bouts of cancer over the course of her life. She had previously called Mr Trump an aberration and vowed to stay on the court until 2021.

In a statement dictated to her granddaughter just days before her death, the Supreme Court justice said: My most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed."

Mr Trump declined to honour that wish, along with his Republican allies on Capitol Hill who have mostly said they will support any nomination he puts forward to fill the vacancy just six weeks ahead of the next presidential election.

Ms Barrett has been at the White House on multiple occasions and meeting with the president, according to multiple reports, though he is also still considering several other nominees.
By David Shepardson and Nandita Bose

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump met with nine Republican state attorneys general on Wednesday to discuss the fate of a legal immunity for internet companies after the Justice Department unveiled a legislative proposal aimed at reforming the same law.

Trump met with attorneys general from Arizona, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, South Carolina, Texas, Utah and West Virginia.

Also Wednesday, the Justice Department, which is probing Google for potential breaches of antitrust law, held a call with state attorneys general's offices to preview a complaint to be filed against the search and advertising giant, perhaps as soon as next week, according to two sources familiar with the matter.

It is normal for the department to seek support from state attorneys general when it files big lawsuits.

Critics have accused Google, owned by Alphabet Inc <GOOGL.O>, of breaking antitrust law by abusing its dominance of online advertising and its Android smartphone operating system as well as favoring its own businesses in search.

The Justice Department is expected to wait at least another week before filing the lawsuit as states review its case and decide whether to join, people familiar with the matter said.

The White House said the legal immunity discussion involved how the attorneys general can utilize existing legal recourses at the state level - in an effort to weaken the law known as Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which protects internet companies from liability over content posted by users.

After the meeting, Trump told reporters he expects to come to a conclusion on the issue of technology platforms within a short period. It was not immediately clear what conclusion he was referring to.

He said his administration is watching the performance of tech platforms in the run-up to the Nov. 3 presidential election.

"In recent years, a small group of powerful technology platforms have tightened their grip over commerce and communications in America," Trump said. "Every year countless Americans are banned, blacklisted and silenced through arbitrary or malicious enforcement of ever-shifting rules," he added.

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Trump, who himself frequently posts on Twitter <TWTR.N>, said Twitter routinely restricts expressions of conservative views.

Earlier on Wednesday, the Justice Department unveiled a legislative proposal to reform Section 230. It followed through on Trump's bid earlier this year to crack down on tech giants after Twitter Inc placed warning labels on some of Trump's tweets, saying they have included potentially misleading information about mail-in voting.

The Justice Department's proposal would need congressional approval, and is not likely to see action until next year at the earliest. Unless the Republicans win control of the House of Representatives and maintain control of the Senate in the November elections, any bill would need Democratic support.

The Justice Department proposal primarily states that when internet companies "willfully distribute illegal material or moderate content in bad faith, Section 230 should not shield them from the consequences of their actions."

It proposes a series of reforms to ensure internet companies are transparent about their decisions when removing content and when they should be held responsible for speech they modify. It also revises existing definitions of Section 230 with more concrete language that offers more guidance to users and courts.

It also incentivizes online platforms to address illicit content and pushes for more clarity on federal civil enforcement actions.

Attorney General William Barr said in a statement the administration was urging "Congress to make these necessary reforms to Section 230 and begin to hold online platforms accountable both when they unlawfully censor speech and when they knowingly facilitate egregious criminal activity online."

The Internet Association, which represents major internet companies including Facebook Inc <FB.O>, Amazon.com Inc <AMZN.O> and Google, said the Justice Department's proposal would severely limit peoples ability to express themselves and have a safe experience online.

The group's deputy general counsel, Elizabeth Banker, said moderation efforts that remove misinformation, platform manipulation and cyberbullying would all result in lawsuits under the proposal.

(Reporting by David Shepardson and Nandita Bose in Washington; Additional reporting by Jeff Mason, Diane Bartz and Eric Beech in Washington, Karen Freifeld in New York, Paresh Dave in Oakland, California, and Ayanti Bera in Bengaluru; editing by Jonathan Oatis and Leslie Adler)
Using the long-range wide-body airliner Airbus A350, flight No VN417 took off from Incheon International Airport in the RoK, bringing back about 100 passengers, mostly returning Vietnamese and Korean investors and experts.



Earlier in the morning, the outbound flight carried 164 passengers from Hanoi to Seoul.



The RoK is among the six destinations in Asia with which the Vietnamese Government has decided to resume international flights since the country sealed off its borders on March 22, in addition to Japan, China, Taiwan (China), Laos and Cambodia, which have the COVID-19 situation under control.



Illustrative image (Photo: Vietnam Airlines)



Vo Huy Cuong, Deputy Director of the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam (CAAV), said the flight is a trial to see the air transport sectors operation and capacity in receiving international passengers.



This marks a milestone in Vietnams air link resumption, as part of the Governments dual goals of developing the economy while safely managing the risks of COVID-19 in the new normal.



The resumption of flights received a warm welcome from Vietnamese citizens in the RoK as well as Korean people, particularly business people and investors.



The flight is operated under strict health protocols to prevent the spread of coronavirus, and its success highlights the effective coordination between the airline, the airport, and health agencies.



Before boarding, passengers must obtain proof of negative SARS-CoV-2 tests (using PCR diagnostics) from certified health authorities three days prior to departure, confirmation of quarantine accommodation in Vietnam, and mandatory installation of Vietnams contact tracing app Bluezone and self-completing health status app Vietnam Health Declaration on their mobile devices.



After the flight, the passengers will be tested for COVID-19 in Vietnam. If the results return positive, they will be transported to a local health facility to be isolated and treated. If the results come back negative, they could continue to quarantine in registered hotels or other accommodations and they would be tested again on the sixth day after entry or when suspect symptoms manifest.



With a negative result on their second test, they would be allowed to travel to their residence to self-isolate to complete the 14-day quarantine and follow the anti-pandemic measures.



The aircrew underwent health examination and would also be quarantined for 14 days.



The aircrafts passenger sections and cockpit will be sterilised.



Vietnam Airlines is working to resume international flights in line with the Governments directions and approval from foreign authorities.



Meanwhile, the Korean Government announced on September 24 that air routes between Incheon and Vietnams Hanoi and HCM City will be reopened this month, with two flights a week./.
Bengaluru, Sep 26 : Leader of the Opposition, Siddaramaiah on Saturday agreed to Karnataka Speaker Vishweshwara Hegde Kaageri's suggestion to vote on the no-confidence motion moved by him two days ago through voice vote.

As the House session commenced, Karnataka Assembly speaker Kaageri asserted that he would not allow the Covid-19 patients to take part in voting. "I am fully against this. I will not allow this at any cost. I need both ruling and opposition parties to support this. If we do not agree to voice vote, it will be inhumane on our part to call Covid patients to vote," he said.

At this juncture, Siddaramaiah intervened and asserted that he himself had undergone Covid treatment sometime ago, and he too is not in favour of allowing Covid patients (MLAs) to come and vote. "Therefore, I have decided to agree to the speaker's suggestion. Let us not be inhuman, let us opt for voice voting," he said.

Hearing this, several members from the ruling party told Siddaramaiah that this (moving no-confidence motion) must have been discussed when both Karnataka chief minister B. S. Yediyurappa and Siddaramaiah tested Covid positive and were admitted to the same hospital.

Countering them, Siddaramaiah asserted that he had never indulged in adjustment politics. "I always had a high regard for Yediyurappa. I am probably the first Leader of the Opposition to wish him on his birthday," he said.

In the 225 member Assembly, the ruling BJP has 116 MLAs plus the Speaker, while the Congress has 67 members, and the JD(S) has 33 MLAs, vacant 4, nominated and BSP one each and two independent MLAs.

It is almost a foregone conclusion that the ruling BJP will win the floor test as the JD(S) had clearly indicated on Friday that it may not be part of the Congress plans to move the no-confidence motion.
OLIVIER DOULIERY/AFP via Getty Images

President Donald Trump nominated federal judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, pending approval by the Senate.

"I fully understand that this is a momentous decision for a president, and if the Senate does me the honor of confirming me, I pledge to discharge the responsibilities of this job to the very best of my ability," said Barrett, who could become the youngest member of the Supreme Court. "I love the United States and I love the United States Constitution. I am truly humbled by the prospect of serving on the Supreme Court. I would not assume that role for the sake of those in my own circle and certainly not for my own sake. I would assume this role to serve you."

Barrett also shared remarks about the late justice, Ruth Bader Ginsburg. "Should I be confirmed, I will be mindful of who came before me," she said. "She not only broke glass ceilings, she smashed them, and for that, she has won the admiration of women across the country."

Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

In his nomination speech, Trump called Barrett a "woman of unparalleled achievement, towering intellect, sterling credentials and unyielding loyalty to the Constitution."

The Republican-led Senate is expected to quickly vote and approve Barrett's nomination after Trump urged the GOP lawmakers to appoint his nomination without delay" following the death of Ginsburg.

Republicans currently hold a 53-47 majority in the Senate and enough lawmakers in recent days have signaled they'll vote in support of Trump's nominee, despite Democratic outcry that doing so would be hypocritical

RELATED: Donald Trump Nominates Amy Coney Barrett to Supreme Court 8 Days After Ruth Bader Ginsburg's Death

OLIVIER DOULIERY/AFP via Getty Images

The 48-year-old judge is seen by both Republicans and Democratic lawmakers as a social conservative who interprets the law by its original text, perhaps a byproduct of her time clerking for late conservative Justice Antonin Scalia, who was known for the same legal style.

Story continues

An "originalist" in that sense, legal experts and lawmakers believe Barrett could have a great impact on potential rulings for issues such as abortion rights and on the Affordable Care Act.

Trump, 74, has made it a point to target both issues during his presidency and appointing Barrett would swing the court towards a 6-3 conservative majority, with Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Stephan Breyer as the three remaining liberal-leaning members of the court.

Amy Coney Barrett meets Donald Trumps two main litmus tests: She has made clear she would invalidate the A.C.A. and take health care away from millions of people and undermine a womans reproductive freedom, Nan Aron, the president of the progressive judicial advocacy group Alliance for Justice, told The New York Times this week.

University of Notre Dame Amy Coney Barrett

Beyond the bench, Barrett is a mother of seven children and is married to private attorney Jesse Barrett. They live in South Bend, Indiana, where Barrett taught at the University of Notre Dame's Law School for 15 years, before becoming a judge.

If confirmed, Barrett would be the only justice on the current court who did not graduate from an Ivy League law school.

Trump appointed Barrett to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit court in Chicago in 2017 following her teaching career and then considered for the Supreme Court to fill Justice Anthony Kennedy's seat when he retired in 2018.

Trump ultimately went with Justice Brett Kavanaugh and reportedly told others in his administration that he was "saving" Barrett as his pick to fill Ginsburg's seat.

She stands for all the things Ruth Bader Ginsburg was against, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer told Yahoo News recently. And so many things that the vast majority of the American people are against.

RELATED: Ruth Bader Ginsburg Makes History One Last Time as Joe Biden, Kamala Harris Pay Their Respects

Supreme Court Justices

Barrett is a devoted Catholic and a member of an Indiana-based Christian community group called People of Praise, which says its members "should always follow their consciences, as formed by the light of reason, and by the experience and the teachings of their churches."

The nominee's faith was once the center of a tense moment during her vetting process in 2017 to become a federal judge, when Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein told her, "The dogma lives loudly within you, and that's of concern."

Barrett, according to the Associated Press, replied that she does take her faith seriously, before adding: "I would stress that my personal church affiliation or my religious belief would not bear in the discharge of my duties as a judge.
26.09.2020 LISTEN

There is a dire need to change our governance system to ensure transparency for the betterment of this nation, other than that Ghana will continue to be in hardship if its current system of governance, where presidents are elected on partisan lines is not diametrically changed.

To begin with, Ghanas prosperity lies in electing an independent person as president. An Independent president would serve the interest of the country 10 times much better than a president elected on a partys ticket.

However, mealy-mouthed and maverick politicians are inundated on our mediums with nebulous manifestos and political discussions without any implementation to solve our problems, I would entreat the populace to advocate for an independent president who would champion any Ghanaian who had the competence and the capacity to stand as an independent presidential candidate. It is up to us to support any man or woman who will stand as an independent presidential candidate.

Now, changing power from one political party to another is not the optimum solution to Ghanas problem.

In view of this, both NPP and NDC had become complacent because they knew that they were the only substitutes the country had. Both NPP and NDC would not offer any better alternative ways in solving Ghanas challenges, and that the two parties were different sides of the same coin.

Therefore, Ghana needs a third political force to change the status quo where the electorate had to choose between the NDC and NPP. Having a third political force did not mean going for another minor political party and that Ghanas predicament had been created by the two political parties.

Moreover, Ghana should not be only NPP and NDC or any other political party. Ghanas problem is political parties why because they are in power to serve the interest of their party rather than the state, they first consider the interest of the party than the state in their decisions.

Ghanas problems, including political vigilantism, had been left unattended to because of political influence, should an independent person who had no links with any political party be elected as Ghanas president, political vigilantism would become a thing of the past because such a president would not owe any allegiance to such groups.

Frankly speaking, party politics is fuelling vigilantism in Ghana because they have the support of the parties, both NPP and NDC could not do away with political vigilantism because they all benefit from it. Vigilantism will be dead under an independent president and would also enjoy the best of ideas from both the majority and minority in parliament because all the MPs would offer their genuine support.

Both NPP and NDC government had created ministries which were of no use to the development of Ghana but just to satisfy their interest and being parsimonious as well. Because of the partisan nature of the countrys governance system, there were no proper checks and balances from the arms of the government. The president would always have the support of the majority because all that the majority wanted was to maintain the executive.

It is time Ghanaians take the bold decision to change both the NPP and NDC for an independent person as president. Enough is enough. Ghana must find the courage to say enough is enough to both NPP and NDC.

EDWARD FRIMPONG, TELEPHONE:+233243651928 LOCATION: ACCRA, GHANA.
Once again, the implementation of a new computer system designed to make the unemployment compensation benefits delivery system more user-friendly is being kicked down the road again.

The latest go-live date for the project that will change how Pennsylvanians file for and claim benefits was set for Oct. 5. Now thats been pushed back to a date uncertain.

This project, which began 15 years ago to replace a now half-century-old mainframe, has cost taxpayers nearly $200 million, not counting the maintenance costs associated with keeping that mainframe operational.

Last week, state Labor & Industry Secretary Jerry Oleksiak acknowledged to the House Labor & Industry Committee that Pennsylvanians deserve for this years-long investment to bear fruit but said the pandemic that has caused record-high unemployment compensation claims. That, in turn, has diverted staff and attention away from the project to assist with processing the high number of claims.

On Thursday, the department announced it was at the recommendation of state legislators, stakeholders and the U.S. Department of Labor that the switchover to the new system should be delayed to avoid potentially disrupting people who are relying on unemployment compensation.

For the many Pennsylvanians out of work because of COVID-19, the unemployment compensation system is providing a lifeline and crucial benefits that claimants need for food and housing during this unprecedented time, Oleksiak said in a statement. "While we are prepared to transition to the new system, with the advice and recommendations from our communities, businesses, and legislative partners, we have decided to temporarily hold the launch.

At a House Labor & Industry hearing about the project last week, lawmakers questioned the departments readiness to proceed with the Oct. 5 go-live date since staff training had only just begun, there had been no public or employer education about it, and the system itself hasnt been sufficiently tested. Oleksiak declined to say at that point the project would be delayed.

Members of the Benefit Modernization Advisory Committee, a panel the Legislature created to monitor the project, agreed the project was not ready to be switched on. Two of its committee members  Geoff Moomaw and Julia Simon-Mishel  both told lawmakers at that hearing they foresaw trouble ahead if the department moved forward with the Oct. 5 conversion.

Rep. Cris Dush, R-Jefferson County, who has served on the labor & industry committee for six years, said its frustrating to see how this project continues to get delayed. He said earlier this year, Oleksiak repeatedly told lawmakers the projects was on track to be launched this fall.

Im tired of the empty promises, Dush said.

IBM, was originally hired to create the system, was fired after it ran $60 million over budget and was nearly four years behind schedule. Then a new vendor was hired Geographic Solutions Inc., in 2017 with an anticipated original completion date of April 2019. But Oleksiak said Geographic Solutions has been pulled off the modernization project several times this year to build new systems to deliver pandemic-related jobless benefits, contributing to the modernization projects delay.

Fortunately, Dush said the benefits modernization contract with Geographic Solutions is performance-based so it doesnt get paid until certain benchmarks are completed.

Now, instead of busting the budget, he said, theyre busting the time line.

According to the Labor & Industry news release, the department will work with legislators and others to determine the appropriate time to launch the new UC system.

Jan Murphy may be reached at jmurphy@pennlive.com. Follow her on Twitter at @JanMurphy.
Photo: Contributed

Health questions, or questionable health?

If youre wondering, "Is there something I can do to reverse/reduce disease and improve my immune system?, the answer is yes.

Not sure about you, but I can't remember any time in recent memory that's had us asking more health questions than we have these past eight months of 2020.

The real question here is, are people asking the right questions when it comes to creating or improving their own personal health?

Since COVID numbers first started going up back in the spring, doctors and scientists have been looking at why some people were at greater risk for contracting the virus than others.

During the last six months, experts have pretty much all agreed that people with what's known as, co-morbid conditions, are most at risk. Perhaps you've heard this term on the news, but if not, here's what it means.

According to the CDC's website, co-morbidity simply means:

... more than one disease or condition is present in the same person at the same time. Conditions described as co-morbidities are often chronic or long-term conditions. Another definition by Brittanica says this, Co-morbidities tend to increase a person's need for health care and the cost of care, while decreasing the person's ability to function in the world... COVID or not, co-morbidities are not anyone's first choice to have to deal with. And yet they are rampant in our society and have been for some time.

Examples of co-morbidities include overweight/obesity, diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure/hypertension, cancer, infectious diseases, psychiatric disorders, substance abuse, anxiety disorder, eating disorders.

A study published in the European Respiratory Journal earlier this year concluded that:

Among laboratory-confirmed cases of COVID-19, patients with any co-morbidity yielded poorer clinical outcomes than those without. A greater number of co-morbidities also correlated with poorer clinical outcomes. A thorough assessment of co-morbidities may help establish risk stratification of patients with COVID-19 upon hospital admission.

And yet, even with experts agreeing on it, news media reporting on it, and papers being written on it, the questions seem to revolve only around how to effectively keep someone with co-morbid conditions away from anyone or anything that may directly or indirectly come in contact with the virus.

While this is important for compromised individuals when dealing with COVID  or any contagion for that matter - we should also be asking questions like, Is there anything I can do to reverse/reduce ______ (insert condition) or What's the best way to strengthen my immune system?

According to the above-mentioned paper, people who contracted COVID-19 who also had high blood pressure/hypertension or diabetes yielded the poorest outcomes. The good news is, these two co-morbidities are lifestyle diseases.

Lifestyle diseases are just that, the result of the lifestyle a person has chosen to live. Food, drink, exercise (or not), stress, etc., all contribute. And making changes in those areas can go a long way to reversing/reducing these conditions and improving immune function in the process.

Some countries have even decided to take action in an effort to get a handle on some of these co-morbid conditions. Mexico is one of them. The Washington Post published a story in August showing several Mexican states banning junk food sales to children.

As with the sale of cigarettes and alcohol, kids 18 and under are now prohibited from also purchasing highly processed, high sugar-content foods.

Thats a wise move considering these food-like substances are devoid of any real nutrition, loaded with empty calories, cause massive blood sugar and insulin spikes, subsequent visceral (belly) fat storage, and result in, among other things, diabetes and high blood pressure. And yes, even among children.

Mexican government officials are looking at the pandemic as a chance to change public health policies and come out the other side with a plan to restore health. I like it.

You can reverse or reduce a lifestyle disease and/or strengthen your immune system, by thinking like Mexico.

Replace the white in your life (sugar, starches, soda, juice, processed items, fast food) with whole foods (brightly coloured fruits and veggies, healthy fats, lean meats and lots of water)

Add vitamins, minerals and phytonutrients to bolster immune function

Increase fibre for digestion and elimination to help flush out toxins, and when eaten in smaller portions throughout the day stabilizes blood sugar, allowing the body to release stored fat and effectively reducing blood pressure and reversing diabetes.

Although we may not be able to do much about the COVID numbers, we can absolutely take an active role in improving our own personal health. Try it. What have you got to lose except a few extra pounds and the complications that go with it?

Looking to connect with people working on creating healthy habits? Join the 8 Weeks is All it Takes group on Facebook.
Jammu, Sep 26 : Pakistan army on Saturday targeted Indian positions by using small arms and mortars on the Line of Control (LoC) in Jammu and Kashmir's Rajouri district, officials said.

"At around 11.15 a.m. today, Pakistan initiated unprovoked ceasefire violation by firing with small arms and shelling with mortars along the LoC in Nowshera sector of Rajouri district," Defence Ministry spokesperson Colonel Devender Anand said.

"Indian army is retaliating befittingly," he added.

Pakistan has been violating the bilateral ceasefire agreement signed by India and Pakistan in 1999 with impunity since the beginning of this year.

At least 24 civilians have been killed and over 100 injured in more than 3,186 ceasefire violations by Pakistan on the LoC since January 2020.

The frequent cross border shelling has brought insurmountable suffering into the lives of thousands of people living along the LoC in Jammu and Kashmir.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 06:33:25|Editor: huaxia

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The casket of late U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is carried by a honor guard up the steps of the U.S. Capitol, where it will lie in state, in Washington, D.C., the United States, on Sept. 25, 2020. (Photo by Ting Shen/Xinhua)

WASHINGTON, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- The late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg laid in state at the U.S. Capitol on Friday, becoming the first woman in the country's history to be honored this way.

Politicians, military leaders, and Ginsburg's family and friends were among those who paid respects in front of her flag-draped casket placed in the Capitol's Statuary Hall.

"It is my sad honor to welcome so many who loved Justice Ginsburg to this celebration of her life here in the United States Capitol," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a statement, calling her "petite in size, monumental in impact."

2020 Democratic presidential nominee and former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden also attended the ceremony to honor the legendary jurist.

Biden noted that he was the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee during Ginsburg's confirmation process when she was nominated by then President Bill Clinton in 1993.

"It was like when I met her when I did her hearing. I was the chairman of the committee when she was confirmed," Biden said of Ginsburg. "Wonderful memories."

Bryant Johnson, Ginsburg's personal trainer, did three push-ups to pay tribute to the liberal icon, who was consistent in her workouts and became an unlikely fitness role model.

U.S. President Donald Trump paid his respects to Ginsburg on Thursday when she laid in repose at the top of the steps of the Supreme Court building, where tens of thousands of public mourners lined up to bid their farewell.

Lying in state is a tribute reserved for distinguished government officials and military officers, when their caskets are displayed in the Capitol or a government building, either in Washington, D.C. or at the state level. Lying in repose is the tradition in which remains of the deceased is made available for public viewing in a building other than the U.S. Capitol.

A renowned champion of women's rights, Ginsburg died last week at the age of 87 due to complications related to metastatic pancreas cancer. She was the second woman appointed to the highest court in the United States.

Ginsburg will be laid to rest at Arlington National Cemetery, which is across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C., according to the Supreme Court.

Trump will name Ginsburg's replacement on Saturday afternoon, with multiple media outlets reporting on Friday that he will pick Amy Coney Barrett, a conservative judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, to fill the seat.

Any Supreme Court nominee needs to be confirmed by the Senate with a simple majority vote. Republicans, who have a 53-47 advantage in the chamber, appear to have enough votes to approve Trump's candidate despite fierce pushback from Democrats.
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Anti-lockdown protesters today clashed with police after at least 15,000 demonstrators descended on Trafalgar Square as part of a rally against coronavirus measures in the UK.

Attendees of the 'We Do Not Consent' rally ditched their masks as they crammed into the London square this afternoon, despite Metropolitan Police pleading with people to stick to Britain's coronavirus rules.

Crowds, who were also warned violence would not be tolerated, carried placards reading 'is this freedom?' and 'end the crazy rules' as they flocked to protest against restrictions set out by Boris Johnson.

Sixteen people were arrested during the demonstration - which later moved to Hyde Park - and nine police officers were injured with two rushed to hospital.

Piers Corbyn, 73, brother of former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, was among the crowd alongside conspiracy theorist David Icke, 68, who has made a series of false claims linking Covid-19 to 5G technology.

Demonstrators ditched their masks and ignored social distancing as they shouted 'we will win' and waved flags, before police shut them down because crowds 'have not complied with the conditions of their risk assessment'.

Trafalgar Square has a maximum capacity of 20,000 people and photographs showed crowds almost filling the area as they stood shoulder to shoulder to protest against Britain's increasingly stricter lockdown rules.

In contrast, last month's protests had around half today's turn-out - at around 10,000 people.

Skirmishes broke out between protesters and police later in the day, with those in attendance chanting 'shame on you' - shoving at officers as they passed through the crammed crowd.

Pictures show a woman appearing to be knocked to the ground as a struggle broke out behind her, while one man chanted with blood pouring out of his head.

In a statement, Scotland Yard said the breach had 'put people in danger of transmitting the virus' which voided their risk assessment and left those at the event 'no longer exempt' from Covid-19 restrictions.

'We are now asking those in Trafalgar Square to leave,' the force said. 'Officers will be engaging with crowds and informing them of this development. By leaving now, you can keep yourself safe and avoid any enforcement action being taken by officers.'

In other coronavirus developments today:

Scientists are considering a plan to ask everyone over the age of 45 to shield to stop the spread of Covid-19;

Britain has been warned to expect 100 coronavirus deaths a day within the next three to four weeks;

Government sources claimed Boris Johnson's 10pm pubs curfew was based on 'back of a fag packet calculations' and 'NOT advocated by SAGE';

The restrictions imposed in March could kill 75,000 in five years, including 31,000 deaths not related to Covid, according to documents submitted to SAGE;

Unions call for in-person university classes to be suspended as 3,000 students are placed in lockdown;

MailOnline analysis reveals Britain's outbreak began to surge after 'Super Saturday' reopening;

Sadiq Khan calls for Londoners to be stopped from visiting friends and family.

A injured policeman is helped away after police clashes with demonstrators during a 'We Do Not Consent' rally at Trafalgar Square in London

Skirmishes broke out between protesters and police later in the day, with those in attendance chanting 'shame on you' and shoving at officers as they passed through the crammed crowd

Demonstrators ditched their face masks and ignored social distancing measures as they shouted 'we will win' and waved flags, before Metropolitan Police arrived to shut down the event as crowds 'have not complied with the conditions of their risk assessment'. Pictured: Police today

At least 15,000 protesters have descended on Trafalgar Square and Hyde Park in London as part of an anti-lockdown demonstration

Crowds of people, with many recording, mingle with Metropolitan Police officers in central London during the demonstration

The Met also confirmed that ten people had been arrested following demonstrations with four officers injured - two requiring hospital treatment.

The rally comes as almost 18million Britons - a quarter of the population - will be living under tighter coronavirus restrictions by 6pm tomorrow, after the UK announced a record 6,874 new cases in the last 24 hours.

Those in Leeds were banned from mixing with other households at home or in pubs, bars, restaurants and parks from midnight, as Wigan, Stockport and Blackpool also saw draconian measures brought into force.

Households in the Welsh town of Llanelli are set to be banned from entering each other's homes and gardens from 6pm today, with the nation's two biggest cities of Cardiff and Swansea to follow suit in the next 24 hours. Residents will also be banned from entering or leaving the areas without a 'reasonable excuse'.

Britain recorded 24 deaths today in a preliminary count as the UK's fatality number continues to creep upwards. NHS England announced 20 deaths, while three were recorded in Wales and one in Northern Ireland. None were recorded in Scotland.

Walking wounded were pictured at the demonstration after a number of violent clashes broke out. One man, right, was arrested by police officers

A woman and child cry as a man escorts them away from the crowd in central London. Reports suggest tear gas had been used

Demonstrators were threatened with batons as police officers raised their weapons into the air to try to force the crowds to move on

A police officer puts up their hand as they attend the demonstration in the capital this afternoon. They were also armed with batons

Metropolitan Police disperse crowds in Trafalgar Square, London at the 'We Do Not Consent' mass rally this afternoon

A woman falls to the ground near policemen as officers moved in to disperse protesters in Trafalgar Square, London today

Attendees of the 'We Do Not Consent' rally gathered earlier today after a quarter of Britain's population was put under some form of lockdown

Virus conspiracy theorist Piers Corbyn, the brother of former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, was spotted among the crowds

Police officers used aggressive tactics including shouting and using their batons to attempt to control the swelling crowds

A group of police officers crowded a woman as they placed her under arrest during the demonstration earlier today

A police officer went without a face mask as she fought against the mass crowds alongside her colleagues in the force

Crowds, who were also warned that violence would not be tolerated at the gathering, carried placards reading 'is this freedom?' and 'end the crazy rules' as they flocked to central London for the demonstration

Riot police clashed with protesters who took part in a 'We Do Not Consent' rally at Trafalgar Square, organised by Stop New Normal, to protest against coronavirus restrictions

The Met also confirmed officers had been injured 'while engaging' with demonstrators, some of whom opted to move to Hyde Park rather than disperse

People dressed as Boris Johnson and Matt Hancock take part in a 'We Do Not Consent' rally at Trafalgar Square in London, organised by Stop New Normal, to protest against coronavirus restriction

Britain recorded 24 deaths today in a preliminary count as the UK's fatality number continues to creep upwards. Pictured: Protesters in Trafalgar Square

Skirmishes broke out between protesters and police, with those in attendance chanting 'shame on you' and shoving at officers as they passed through the crammed crowd

Today's 'We Do Not Consent' rally, organised by Stop New Normal, comes just a week after a protest against mass coronavirus vaccinations, which saw more than a dozen officers injured when a 'small minority' targeted police. Some 16 arrests were made.

The Metropolitan Police said it has been engaging with today's organisers throughout the week to remind them of their legal obligations and explaining the events could be in breach of coronavirus regulations.

While protests are exempt from the rule of six, which is in force in England, those in charge must submit a risk assessment and attendees must comply with social distancing.

Police said some organisers had done so but where this had not happened the Met will 'increase their engagement and encourage attendees to disperse'.

They added that enforcement 'remains a last resort but will be undertaken if required'.

It is understood police had searched a man and confiscated a makeshift riot shield earlier in the day.

Commander Ade Adelekan, who is leading the Met operation, said while there is 'great frustration' at the regulations, a large midday protest could put the health of protesters and their contacts at risk.

He said: 'I know there is great frustration to these regulations but they have been designed to keep everyone safe from what is a lethal virus.

'By flagrantly gathering in large numbers and ignoring social distancing, you are putting your health and the health of your loved ones at risk.'

The crowds have been urged to abide by coronavirus restrictions and warned that violence will not be tolerated at the event

British conspiracy theorist David Icke (right) is also at the 'We Do Not Consent' rally at Trafalgar Square in London, organised by Stop New Normal, to protest against coronavirus restrictions

Crowds, who were also warned that violence would not be tolerated at the gathering, carried placards reading 'is this freedom?' and 'end the crazy rules' as they flocked to central London for the demonstration

Pictured: Demonstrators place banners around Trafalgar Square during the demonstration today, including a posted reading: 'For a world in chaos, what does the future hold?'

One held a sign reading 'Did anyone see a pandemic?' while others decalred 'Who needs speech laws? People who have lost the debate'

Thousands of protesters are seen crammed beneath Nelson's Column in Trafalgar Square to protest against coronavirus restrictions

Piers Corbyn speaks at the gathering in central London this afternoon as thousands gather without masks to protest the UK's coronavirus restrictions

He added: 'Last weekend it was highly disappointing to see that a small minority of demonstrators targeted officers with violence.

'Some 15 officers were injured during this protest, with more than 32 arrests being made during the course of the day. I will not tolerate a repeat of this behaviour this weekend and officers will respond quickly to any scenes of violence.'

It is estimated close to 15,000 protesters have gathered inside Trafalgar Square today, as photographs show the space nearing its 19,999-person capacity.

The rally, which protests the government's coronavirus lockdown measures in London, comes as close to 18million Britons will be living under tighter coronavirus restrictions by 6pm tomorrow, after the UK announced a record 6,874 new cases in the last 24 hours.

Those in Leeds, Wigan, Stockport and Blackpool were banned from mixing with other households at midnight yesterday, while households in the in the Welsh town of Llanelli are set to be banned from entering each other's homes and gardens from 6pm today.

The nation's two largest cities, Cardiff and Swansea, will follow suit in the next 24 hours. Residents will also be banned from entering or leaving the areas without a 'reasonable excuse'.

It comes after lockdowns were already imposed in large swathes of the North East and North West of England.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock said there had been an 'acceleration of Covid-19 cases across the country, especially in the North West and the North East'.

'Working alongside our scientific and public health experts and local leaders, we are prepared to take swift and decisive action to reduce transmission of the virus and protect communities,' he said.

'I recognise the burden and impact these additional measures have on our daily lives but we must act collectively and quickly to bring down infections.'

It was also revealed today that top scientists advising the Government on coronavirus measures have considered a plan to ask everyone over the age of 45 to shield.

It was suggested those over 45 were at greater risk from the virus, and more likely to die from it, so could be 'segmented' from the rest of the population. The suggestion, revealed in papers from the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE), was eventually advised against, as it was considered unlikely to be successful.

The crowds (pictured) have been urged by police to abide by coronavirus restrictions and warned that violence will not be tolerated at the event

The protest (pictured) comes after it was announced almost 18million Britons will be living under tighter coronavirus restrictions after the UK announced a record 6,874 new cases in the last 24 hours

Thousands of people gathered in Trafalgar Square with placards as they protested against the coronavirus lockdown

It is thought that there are 15,000 protestors gathered at the event today. Trafalgar Square can hold 30,000 people at full capacity

At least 15,000 anti-lockdown protesters have crammed into Trafalgar Square as a quarter of Britain's population is put under some form of lockdown

The demonstrators, who did not wear face masks, shouted 'we will win' as they waved flags and placards carrying various slogans

The crowds have been urged to abide by coronavirus restrictions and warned that violence will not be tolerated at the event. It is thought that earlier in the day police searched a man and confiscated a makeshift riot shield that he was carrying

Friday saw another 6,874 Covid-19 cases recorded, meaning the seven-day rolling average is 54 per cent higher than it was a week ago. MailOnline analysis shows this is the sixth consecutive day the average compared to the week before has risen

However, it is being kept under review, and news of it follows a similar option drawn up by officials to potentially target over-50s with another lockdown.

The minutes of the 48th meeting of the Sage scientists, held on July 23, state: 'Although under-45s are at less risk from Covid-19, including lower risk of death, they are nonetheless at some risk and long-term sequelae (consequences) are not well understood.'

Who is David Icke? The conspiracy theorist who once claimed he was the son of God David Icke is the notorious conspiracy theorist who often makes headlines for his controversial comments. Born in 1952, the 68-year-old former professional footballer has written more than 20 books and once tried his hand at punditry and sports reporting. In 1991, he appeared on Sir Terry Wogan's TV chat show where he declared himself as the son of God in a now-infamous clip which he describes as a 'defining moment'. It was from here that he began writing his books and making bold predictions including that the world would end in 1997. Other bizarre claims he have made include that the royal family are lizards. Icke also believes that an inter-dimensional race of reptilian beings called the Archons has hijacked the earth and is stopping humanity from realising its true potential. The 68-year-old has said that the universe is made up of 'vibrational' energy, and consists of an infinite number of dimensions that share the same space, just like television and radio frequencies, and that some people can tune their consciousness to other wavelengths. Most recently, he has suggested the coronavirus is linked to the 5G mobile network, a claim which has never been backed up by science. Advertisement

The document adds: 'Around two-thirds of people in the UK live in a household which includes one or more individuals aged 45 and above. Any segmentation based on this age threshold would therefore affect most households.'

The 'segmentation' looked at would have involved those over 45 shielding, which early in the pandemic meant staying at home, and avoiding unnecessary contact with others.

Minutes from July 16 note there is likely to be 'merit' in segmenting society by age, particularly 'to vulnerable people and those likely to have more contact with vulnerable people'.

It continues: 'Data shows that people tend to have more contacts with others around their own age, but also have a significant number of contacts with those 20-30 years older and younger than themselves (likely to mainly be contacts between parents and children).

'There are also significant levels of contact between grandparents and children.'

Figures reveal that children and those aged below 45 are at far lower risk of dying from coronavirus than those aged over 75.

Office for National Statistics data reveals only four Covid-19 deaths were recorded in children aged one to 14 years old in England and Wales, or less than 0.01 per cent of the total. And 574 have been recorded in those aged 15 to 44, or 0.96 per cent of the total.

In comparison, 39,058 people aged 75 and over have died from the virus, or 65 per cent of the total.

The difference led a scientific paper published in Nature in July to conclude that those aged 80 and over are more than a hundred times more likely to die from the virus than patients aged 40 and below.

Despite the gap in risk of death, however, there have been warnings over long Covid, or where symptoms persist after the disease subsides, which could already affect more than 60,000 people in the UK.

Also today, Professor Graham Medley, who sits on the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE), warned Britain could be struck with 100 deaths a day in three to four weeks.

He arrived at the figure assuming a virus death rate of one per cent and 10,000 new infections being reported every day, adding the triple-figure toll was 'inevitable' as the virus remains dangerous to the community.

'Even if (the death rate) is 0.8 per cent, which I think would be a great success in terms of treatment, it still means that we are going to see deaths increase,' he told BBC Radio 4.

At the height of the pandemic between April 2 and 18 Britain was recording in excess of 800 deaths a day, while recording around 4,000 positive cases a day.

But testing capacity was far behind demand, meaning the vast majority of cases were missed. The Covid Symptom Study app, which has 4.2million contributors, has suggested that at this time there were as many as 100,000 new infections a day - pointing to a death rate of 0.8 per cent.

The World Health Organisation says the death rate from coronavirus stands between 0.5 and one per cent, based on available data.

Health chiefs are reportedly mulling over plans to make facemasks compulsory in most places of work, in an attempt to curb the spread of the virus. Office workers are expected to be exempt from the measures when sitting, but will be required to wear a mask when in corridors, lifts or communal areas.

The demonstrators, who did not wear face masks, shouted 'we will win' as they waved flags and placards carrying various slogans

One protestor spotted among the crowd held a cardboard placard that read: 'The Ultimate Fight Against Injustice'

At least 15,000 protesters have descended on Trafalgar Square and Hyde Park in London as part of an anti-lockdown demonstration

Thousands take part in a 'We Do Not Consent' rally at Trafalgar Square, organised by Stop New Normal, to protest against coronavirus restrictions

Britain's coronavirus R rate could now be as high as 1.5, government scientific advisers warned on Friday after rises in all regions of the country

As cases continue to mount London has been placed on the national lockdown watchlist because of a spike in cases and hospital admissions, as the capital's R rate ticks up to between 1.2 and 1.5 - the same level seen in the North West, North East and the Midlands, which have all been stung by additional Covid-19 measures.

London mayor Sadiq Khan has already called for a ban on people mixing in each other's households, claiming in a conversation with the Prime Minister that 'if you go too late, we will be in a North East, North West, Birmingham-type situation'.

What are the new restrictions and when do they come into force? England: Leeds, Stockport, Wigan and Blackpool were subject to the following additional restrictions from midnight. Household's banned from mixing with other household's in private homes or gardens Wales: Llanelli will be subject to these restrictions from 6pm today. Cardiff and Swansea will have the same measures imposed at 6pm tomorrow. People cannot enter or leave the lockdown areas without a 'reasonable excuse'

Residents cannot visit each other's private homes or gardens

They will also be banned from mixing with other households in pubs, bars or restaurants Advertisement

Around 1,700 students in Manchester have been ordered into isolation after 127 tested positive for the virus at the Birley campus and Cambridge Halls at Manchester Metropolitan University, as the rate of spread in the city climbs to 185.6 per 100,000 from 93.2 a week ago.

Number 10's expert panel SAGE also warned the reproductive rate of the virus may be as high as that for the UK overall. It is the advisory body's highest projection since it began tracking how quickly the disease was growing back in June and is slightly up on last week's estimate of 1.1 - 1.4.

If the R rate - the number of people each infected patient passes the disease on to - remains above one, then the outbreak will continue to grow and cases will keep surging, running the risk that local Covid-19 outbreaks spiral out of control into regional and even national problems.

Mr Hancock said the strict lockdown measures are in line with those seen in Leicester, where they have successfully quelled a surge in cases, and the West Midlands.

'This will be difficult news for the people living in these areas, profoundly affecting their daily lives,' he said. 'These decisions are not taken lightly, and such measures will be kept under review and in place no longer than they are necessary.'

The tightened restrictions come after a surge in cases in the areas. The latest seven-day Covid-19 rate in Leeds was found to be 113.3 per 100,000 people, according to Government figures, while Leeds director of public health Victoria Eaton said there was an 8.4 per cent positive test rate.

The seven-day rolling average in Blackpool has risen from 48.8 per 100,000 a week ago to 69.6 per 100,000 on Friday, the Government's coronavirus dashboard shows. The rate in Wigan has risen to 122.6 per 100,000 people, while in Stockport it is up to 77.4 per 100,000 people.

On Thursday, Cardiff Council leader Huw Thomas said the capital had seen 38.2 cases of Covid-19 per 100,000 people over the past five days. Swansea's rate is 49.8.

Over the past seven days Cardiff's positivity rate has hit 3.8 per cent, exceeding the Welsh Government's 'amber' threshold of 2.5 per cent - part of its 'traffic light road map' strategy for managing the pandemic.
One of the lecturers who redefined the teaching of Science in University of Ghana goes on retirement this year.



J. P. Adjimani was until his retirement a senior lecturer at the Biochemistry Department of University of Ghana.



He will be remembered as one of the few who broke the barrier between lecturers and students. A friend of all students, he lent a helping hand to most students, especially the weak ones. He can be credited as one of the lecturers whose office was open to all students at all times.



Fondly called by his students as "Dr. Adji", the academic retired from teaching in July 2020. His influence on his students has been overwhelming as many recount how their perception about life was changed after their encounter with him.



He has mentored several scientists and changemakers all over the world who attribute their success to him. For decades, his unique style of teaching has helped raise a generation of scientists who are doing great in various capacities.



J. P. Adjimani returned to Ghana from USA and started teaching in the Biochemistry Department on 10th July, 1992. He bows out after 28 years of teaching Science in a very creative way.



He has summarized his life story in his autobiography, THE FEAR OF FAILURE, which is due to be released this October.

Source: graphic.com.gh









Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority.

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Three people have been confirmed dead as a truck fell into the Epe River from Berger Bridge late Friday night.

As at Friday night, the number of people in the six tyres truck were uncertain as rescue officials could do nothing this Saturday morning.

Dr Femi Oke-Osanyintolu, Director General, Lagos State Emergency Management Agency, LASEMA, had said the Agency received information late last night of an accident involving a Volvo tipper that fell off the Berger bridge in Epe into the Epe river.

Upon arrival at the scene of incident, it was discovered that the six (6) Tyre Truck was loaded with Sand .The number of people in the truck was unknown.

Since it was the late hours of yesterday night, a combined team of Agency responders, Marine Rescue Unit, Nigeria Police and Local Divers have been carrying out Search and Rescue operations.

No deaths or casualties confirmed at present, he had said.

However, on Saturday, Oke-Osanyintolu confirmed that three adult male were brought out of the River dead.

The six (6) Tyre Truck has been located and retrieved along with the bodies of three adult male.

A combined team of Agency responders, Marine Rescue Unit (LASWA & LASEMA), Nigeria Police and Local Divers have been carrying out Search and Rescue operations, he said.

He said further search by a team of police and LASEMA was still on.

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BASL says 20As presidential immunity clause an affront to Rule of Law View(s):

No person should be above the law and to grant absolute immunity to the President as proposed under the 20th Amendment to the Constitution runs contrary to all known principles of the Rule of Law, the Committee appointed by the Bar Association of Sri Lanka (BASL) to study the 20th Amendment has observed in its report.

In its observations on Clause 5 of the Bill, which deals with Immunity of the President, the Committee notes that the President in particular being the repository of substantial powers under the Constitution should be held accountable for the exercise of those powers in accordance with the Constitution.

No person is above the law and to grant absolute immunity from suit is contrary to all known principles of the Rule of Law. If the public do not have access to remedy a grievance against the unlawful exercise of powers by all powerful President the only remedy will be to take arms against the State, the report states.

Moreover, the President is not exempted from the obligations to respect, secure and advance fundamental rights. As such, depriving the citizens of a remedy when the President violates fundamental rights is inimical to the Rule of Law. Nevertheless, we are mindful that certain powers of the President should not be justiciable and a suitable exception should be carved out, it further asserts.

The Committee has also firmly opposed the amendment proposed to remove the restriction imposed on dual citizens to qualify to contest election. To permit a person who is also a citizen of another country to be elected to Parliament is not only a surrender of sovereignty but is contrary to national interest and indeed a threat to security of the nation, the report warns.

The BASL Committee, however, states the President should be vested with the power to appoint the Chief Justice, the President of the Court of Appeal and every other Judge of the Supreme Court and the Court of Appeal, provided the appointments are subject to approval of the Parliamentary Council comprised of MPs proposed under 20A. It has also recommended that appointment of the Attorney General, the Auditor General and the Secretary General of Parliament should be made by the President nominating the name of individual to the Parliamentary Council, and for the appointment to be made by the President subject to the approval of the Parliamentary Council.

The BASL had earlier appointed a Special Committee of 15 persons to study the draft 20A and submit its recommendations. Nihal Jayamanne PC was initially invited to the Committee, but declined the invitation to chair or participate in the Committee. L.M.K. Arulanandam PC was then appointed as the chairman of the Committee.

Several other members, namely Ikram Mohamed PC, Anura Meddegoda PC and Ravi Algama also declined to be in the Committee.

The report was placed before the Bar Council of the BASL on yesterday (26) for consideration.
Gothic Gin signs deal with major US distributor Southern Glazer

Up-and-coming American spirits brand Gothic Gin has landed a major contract with globally renowned distributor Southern Glazer's Wine & Spirits.

The contemporary-style gin, which is inspired by balmy nights in Barcelona, Spain, will initially go on sale in South Carolina with plans to launch in more states should it be well received.

Scoring a listing with Southern Glazer, which has a presence in 44 US states, the District of Columbia and Canada, is a major milestone for Gothic Gin and could vastly accelerate its expansion in its home country and beyond.

The gin has already won international plaudits: it was named the United States country winner in the Contemporary Gin category at the World Gin Awards 2019 and 2020, and is the Australian Gin Society's 'Gin of the Month' for October 2020.

Gothic Gin founder and avid traveller Chris Klug studied viticulture, brewing and distillation before deciding to try and make his own gin. The idea for his brand was born in the Gothic Quarter of Barcelona, where he began studying gin making and eventually perfected his recipe.

Recently Chris has been exploring uses for his gin in mixology, and has published a number of recipes which showcase his spirit.

26 September 2020 - Bethany Whymark
Health Ministry Director-General Noor Hisham Abdullah said in a press statement that four of the new cases are related to foreigners imported and 107 are local transmissions, most from the eastern state of Sabah, where a state Assembly election will take place on Saturday, the Xinhua news agency reported.

Kuala Lumpur, Sep 25 (IANS) Malaysia reported 111 new Covid-19 infections, the health ministry said on Friday, bringing the national total to 10,687.

Noor Hisham urged voters in Sabah to conduct the voting while observing the standard operating procedure issued by the health authorities.

Health authorities also detected one new case cluster, traced to the crew of a ship docked in the southern Johor state, with two testing positive so far.

Another 30 patients have been released after recovery, bringing the total cured and discharged cases to 9,696, or 90.7 per cent of all cases.

Of the remaining 858 active cases, four are being held in intensive care units and three of those are in need of assisted breathing.

No new deaths have been reported, leaving the total deaths at 133.

--IANS

rs/
A young couple from Australia have spoken how they quit their full-time corporate office jobs to pursue their own business selling luxury pre-owned designer handbags online.

Alex and Angela Leung, 35 and 32, from Melbourne, started the brand The Purse Affair in early 2017 after deciding to quit their day jobs in product management and accounting.

Before launching the business, Angela was looking for a way to supplement her love for luxury handbags and started buying and selling the luxurious products on social media.

After noticing she was able to trade the bags online and generate a profit, the pair started the online businesses and have developed a large following of customers across Australia and overseas.

Their impressive collection features a vast range of designer products by leading names, including Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Saint Laurent, Gucci, Prada, Dior and Hermes.

The pair strive to be the number one trusted online retailer in Australia to shop for second hand designer handbags.

Alex and Angela Leung (pictured), from Melbourne, started the brand The Purse Affair in early 2017 after deciding to quit their day jobs in product management and accounting

The business now has a strong social media following and customers from around Australia and the world purchase the luxury designer bags (pictured)

As Angela was an accountant by trade, she knew how to manage revenue, secure new products each week and make a profit after the re-sell.

Soon after launching, the couple decided to use a portion of their financial savings to purchase several bags to resell on the market under their new business name.

When they began three years ago there was a huge gap in the Australian market for second hand designer bags, as there were few retailers offering this service.

'At the time in Australia, there weren't many businesses and competitors who were doing the same thing we were - but we knew people would be interested,' Alex told FEMAIL.

Before launching the business, Angela (pictured) was looking for a way to supplement her love for luxury handbags and started buying and selling the luxurious products on social media

The business now sells a vast range of designer goods by leading names, including Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Saint Laurent, Gucci, Prada, Dior and Hermes

Alex said when they began three years ago there was a huge gap in the Australian market for second hand designer bags, as there were few retailers offering this service

PRICE DIFFERENCES WHEN BUYING A DESIGNER BAG SECOND HAND The Purse Affair selling prices compared to retail prices: Chanel Classic Flap Jumbo currently retailing $11,780 RRP, the brand sells this for $8,500 in near new condition - save nearly 30 per cent off Saint Laurent Sac De Jour $3,835 RRP, the brand sells this in excellent condition for $1800 - save over 50 per cent Celine Luggage Mini Size Tote $4,050 RRP, the brand sells this in excellent condition for $1800 - save 56 per cent 'We obtain rare special pieces such as Birkins and Kellys are regularly on display at our showroom,' Alex said 'We would be one of very few places if not the only place in Australia you can see a Black Gold Kelly in size 25 28 and 32 all at the one spot.' Advertisement

'Selling second hand designer bags is a proven model that has worked overseas, and we knew it would work here,' Alex said.

'We noticed a lot of people were buying from overseas or sending their bags to sell overseas, which we thought is crazy because not only do you risk losing the bag along the way but you need to pay more.

'You often spend 15 per cent shipping to America and risk spending 15 per cent coming in to Australia from overseas.'

These further costs can add up when purchasing handbags that cost thousands of dollars.

'Selling second hand designer bags is a proven model that has worked overseas, and we knew it would work here,' Alex said

HOW TO SPOT A FAKE DESIGNER HANDBAG Serial number: All designer handbags are made with a serial number inside - this code is often neat and hard, not weak and faint Inspect the shape and material: Designer bags are made using high quality craftsmanship and materials While fake bags may replicate the look of a designer bag, they don't replicate the high quality and feel of the bag Check the stitching: Inside the bag should be well made, tight and neat Ask for the original receipt if possible: The receipt for a designer handbag is always stamped and is proof of authentication Advertisement

The brand currently has more than 34,000 Instagram followers as well as customers from across Australia and the world

Since 2017 the pair have spent little money on marketing and instead made a name for themselves through word of mouth and by speaking to others through the online communities.

They currently have more than 34,000 Instagram followers as well as customers from across Australia and the world - last year 30 per cent of the brand's customers were from America.

In 2018 the brand hired a photographer to take high quality images of the bags to use for the website and Instagram page, while in 2019 the couple hired another two staff members overseas as part of the authenticity team.

'We focus highly on trust and ethics; we have a high attention to detail to ensure customers are more than happy with their purchase and guarantee authentic items,' Alex said

'We focus highly on trust and ethics; we have a high attention to detail to ensure customers are more than happy with their purchase and guarantee authentic items,' Alex said.

'Buying a second hand designer bag can be difficult for the customer - but we focus a lot on trust to ensure the customer feels secure purchasing our bags.'

Before any item is posted online, it's checked by at least two 'highly trained authenticators' who specialise in named brands.

Every product is thoroughly checked to ensure it meets the manufacture's standard of high quality.

The stamping, stitching, hardware, authenticity stamps, date codes, serial number and materials are all checked in detail.

The pair strive to be the number one trusted online destination in Australia to shop for second hand designer handbags

The business grows more than 200 per cent every year, with an increase in demand as more shoppers find the brand online

The business grows more than 200 per cent every year, with an increase in demand as more shoppers find the brand online.

This year, despite the coronavirus pandemic, the brand has boosted further in sales.

'We don't know why exactly, but the theory is as more people are working from home this year and aren't going on holidays, they are spending their money on other more expensive items for themselves,' Alex said.

While they knew self-employment was a risky decision, the pair don't regret quitting their full-time jobs and aim to grow the business further.
Looking for a new Netflix series to binge? Oscar-winner Hilary Swank stars in this cathartic, compelling sci-fi drama about the first manned mission to Mars.

As tenacious NASA Commander Emma Green, she heads an international crew, along with veteran Russian cosmonaut/engineer Misha Popov (Mark Ivanir), Chinese chemist Wang Lu (Vivian Wu), Ghanaian-British botanist Kwesi (Ato Essandoh) and second-in-command Ram (Ray Panthaski), the ships Indian doctor.

As the episodes unfold, each astronaut has his or her own personal backstory. Emmas involves her supportive husband, NASA scientist Matt Green (Josh Charles), and 15 year-old daughter Lexi (Talitha Eliana Bateman), who will face unexpected challenges during Emmas three-year mission.

Perfectly timed during this worldwide pandemic, the initial 10 episodes capture our current anxiety and paranoia, as viewers can identify with the isolation and poignant emotional dilemmas faced by Atlas crew members who communicate with loved ones via video chat/cellphones/texting although theyre millions of miles away.

While these people are working towards a goal together, they also have this gravitational pull to Earth, explained Swank. All of us having these families made it a love story.

Its definitely a character-driven, family/workplace epic, involving love and loss, faith and religion, making the perilous space journey a very real experience. Created by Andrew Hinderaker from an Esquire article by Chris Jones about the strains on the astronauts personal lives, each segment presents new challenges.

Weightlessness plays a pivotal part. Since it was obvious that the extensive wire-work would be physically grueling, particularly on the glutes and abs, the actors attended a few weeks of arduous stunt boot-camp in Vancouver, where the series is filmed.

In addition, Swank spent time training at NASAs Johnson Space Center in Houston, meeting astronaut Karen Nyberg, who spent 180 days in space; Swank also chatted with Jessica Meir, who was onboard the International Space Station at the time.

On the Granger Gauge of 1 to 10, the first season of Away is an engaging 8. It has all the right stuff.

Susan Granger has been an on-air television and radio commentator and entertainment critic for more than 25 years. Raised in Hollywood, Granger appeared as a child actress in movies with Abbott & Costello, Red Skelton, Lucille Ball, and Lassie. She currently resides in Westport.
A far-right rally at a North Portland city park and simultaneous demonstrations opposing it placed the city on high alert Saturday as the events unfolded. But there were no large clashes between dueling protesters or with police as of 9 p.m. and participants in the various events disbanded hours earlier.

Several hundred people affiliated with Proud Boys, a loosely organized, far-right group designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a hate group, rallied at Delta Park for several hours in the late morning and early afternoon. As rally-goers departed, police cited three participants on weapons charges and announced they were investigating an assault on a person who was punched, pushed and kicked in the face while live-streaming the event.

Gov. Kate Brown, citing her state of emergency order, shifted law enforcement command over Saturdays events to state police and the Multnomah County Sheriffs Office.

Both agencies and Portland police said officers' main goal was to keep the far-right demonstrators apart from opposing ones and they succeeded to a huge degree, mostly because neither side tried seriously to approach the other. Instead, leaders and participants at all events encouraged those in their camp not to engage with the opposition.

The anti-Proud Boys groups converged at three other North Portland locations: a Vanport historical marker a half-mile away, at Peninsula Park three miles away and then, later in the day, at Irving Park in Northeast Portland. Police estimated turnout at Peninsula Park numbered at least 1,000 at the peak of the event.

The last time far-right rally-goers and left-wing Black Lives Matter and anti-police violence protesters held simultaneous events in Portland, the results were tragic: A backer of the right-wing Patriot Prayer movement was shot dead in the streets of downtown Portland by a man who allied himself with Black Lives Matter and anti-fascist causes.

24 Counter-demonstrations at Peninsula Park, Irving Park and Vanport historical marker opposing Proud Boy rally at Delta Park Sept. 26, 2020

This story was updated continuously throughout Saturday. Live updates have now concluded.

9 p.m.: A growing crowd of left-leaning protesters amassed downtown for nightly protests against police violence. The crowd periodically chanted Black Lives Matter and Breonna Taylors name.

Police issued an audio warning to protesters who were blocking Southwest Third Avenue, citing some protesters setting fires. Independent reporter Cory Elia, who was on scene, reported seeing a flag burned. Shortly after, around 9:15 p.m., officers rushed into the crowd and appeared to make at least one arrest.

There was no obvious sign that Proud Boys or other group had organized and turned out in opposition of the protest.

7 p.m.: Although most of the days planned protests had ended, it remained unclear whether any of the groups planned to formally reconvene at night.

5:30 p.m., Counter-protesters, Irving Park: Speeches continued into the evening as about 150 people remained on the Irving Park field.

One speaker, Lynn James, implored attendees to take action. Weve been given this opportunity to make a difference, James said. And we need to make it count.

4:30 p.m., police response: Mass demonstrations in North Portland on Saturday occurred without serious violence and drew a collective crowd of more than 2,000, according to law enforcement officials.

Chris Liedle, a spokesman for the Multnomah County Sheriffs Office who is speaking on behalf of the special unified command arranged by Brown, said law enforcement officers wanted to thank people for demonstrating peacefully and for honoring and respecting others' rights to free speech. He said officers made traffic stops near Delta Park and said officers had confiscated paintball guns, baseball bats, shields and firearms during one stop. He said more information will be released at a later time.

Liedle said officers estimated as many as 1,000 people turned out at the largest counter-protest at Peninsula Park. Liedle said officers believed a similar number turned out the Proud Boys rally at Delta Park.

Several Oregonian/OregonLive journalists, however, estimated the group size at 800 or fewer.

Those demonstrations were over by 4:30 p.m., Liedle said, and a few hundred people remain at Irving Park, including a handful of people carrying rifles. One person in the group also carried the Pan-African flag. Ogun Ture came with an automatic rifle and a tactical vest. He told a group of reporters his firearm was unloaded and for protection, not confrontation.

Were just out here for community safety, Ture said. Were just out here to show force.

Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler issued a statement after the events wound down championing the law enforcement response, saying the largely peaceful events were "testimony to the collaborative planning and preparation Portland Police did with our local, state and federal partners.

As the evening unfolds, I urge people to remain peaceful, he said. We will do everything possible to hold those who break the law accountable. Violence is not welcome in Portland. Wheeler also thanked the community for respecting others' rights under these extraordinary circumstances.

3:30 p.m., Proud Boys, Delta Park: An hour after most Proud Boys supporters cleared out, Portland police pulled over at least one vehicle, a pickup truck, about two blocks south of the park. The occupants had been at the earlier rally in support of Proud Boys.

Police retrieved an arsenal of weapons from the truck, including baseball bats, paintball guns and shields. Three people were cited, one for carrying a weapon in public and two for possessing a loaded firearm, Lt. Leo Besner said.

3:15 p.m., Counter-protesters, Irving Park: Protesters who originally gathered at the Vanport historical marker reconvened at Iriving Park, five miles away in Northeast Portland, for another series of speeches by Black leaders.

A few hundred people joined in the event.

Letha Winston, whose 27-year-old son Patrick Kimmons was killed by Portland police in 2018, took the mic around 4 p.m. She noted that the two-year anniversary of her sons shooting by filthy, lowlife scumbags was in four days. She talked about victims of other police violence and told people to press for police abolition.

This is what a revolution looks like, my brothers and sisters! she said.

2:45 p.m., Counter-protesters, Peninsula Park: The park rally ended with a message to stay on alert for Proud Boys members throughout the day and evening.

A Democratic Socialists of America co-chair, Olivia Katbi Smith, encouraged people to keep combating fascism. Now is not the time to see the challenges ahead of us as too grave or too difficult. Now is the time to find courage, she said. The fight is getting harder, but we will not surrender.

Hundreds of people remained in the park after the rally ended, but most left within an hour.

State police said someone threw a rock at a police car as the trooper made a traffic stop three blocks from the park on Rosa Parks Way. Police did not say whether a protester was tied to the demonstration.

Portland police reported that around 5 p.m., they found a bucket filled with rocks and another contained liquid-filled condoms near the park. But again, they did not say it was tied to the demonstration.

2:15 p.m., Proud Boys, Delta Park: Portland police announce they are investigating an assault on a person of color who was live-streaming video at the Proud Boys rally. They ask for eyewitnesses to help them solve the kicking and pushing attack on the individual, which was caught on video.

State troopers said they made an arrest in a separate assault at a convenience store near the park. They did not disclose any details about what happened, or whether it was connected to any protest activities.

1:30 p.m., Counter-protesters, Peninsula Park: After the rain cleared, demonstrators took to the park stage. Hip-hop artist Mic Crenshaw spoke to a crowd of at least 1,000. He walked the audience through his history battling neo-Nazis in Minneapolis as a youth, drawing cheers when he criticized what he described as right-leaning law enforcement.

Crenshaw said the far-rights attempts at provocation would not work. I want them to understand that when they come here with their violence, its not going to work out.

The speakers stood behind a sign that said, Everyday antifascist.

Demetria Hester, a leader of Moms United for Black Lives, a Black-led mothers protest group, launched a chant of Black Lives Matter, then brought the audience back to the roots of the movement. She requested a moment of silence for Breonna Taylor.

We will not stop, and the world knows it. Why do you think Trump is afraid? Because black lives matter, Hester said, launching the call-and-response that has for months turned audiences into participants.

1:30 p.m. Counter-protesters, Vanport marker and Proud Boys, Delta Park: The opposing rallies ended at the same time. People at the Black-led Vanport rally boarded cars and buses to leave the site. Civilians directed traffic from the parking lot, including police vehicles.

Meanwhile, police prepared for the Proud Boys demonstrators to leave Delta Park. Officers posted at the two exits of the park, blocking the north side. Police directed all drivers to exit south, then north on to Interstate 5.

Proud Boys members began leaving in cars and trucks flying Trump flags. Some people climbed into a truck bed, many carrying paintball guns. As one truck drove out of Delta Park, the occupants in the back of the pickup yelled You guys matter! to officers standing by their cars at park exit.

Many Proud Boys members said they planned to gather at a private barbecue in Vancouver, closed to media.

State troopers said they cited one driver near the Delta Park for failing to display a license, and a second driver for obscuring the license plate numbers. Some people at the Proud Boys event were using tape to cover their license plate numbers.

1 p.m., all locations: Rain started to fall at all three rallies, most heavily on the Peninsula Park crowd. People sought shelter under trees. Speeches carried on at the other two sites until around 1:15 p.m. Both the Proud Boys rally and the Vanport demonstration ended at the same time, a half-mile apart.

12:45 p.m., Proud Boys, Delta Park: The rally continued as people cheered speakers advocating for President Donald Trump, criticizing Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler and leading chants against anti-fascists.

On Wednesday, Proud Boys international chair Enrique Tarrio told The Oregonian/Oregonlive that he expected as many as 2,000 people to attend.

The actual crowd size was about 500. Of the people who did arrive, at least half wore tactical gear or carrying weapons ranging from handguns to paintball guns. Few had face masks.

Maureen Peltier, who supported the 2016 takeover of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, was at the rally. She said the people traveled as far away Texas, Tennessee, Missouri and Mississippi for the event.

She said she attended because of the killing of Aaron Jay Danielson, a Patriot Prayer member shot Aug. 29, in downtown Portland by a man who self-identified as an anti-fascist who said he did security for Black Lives Matter protests.

There seems to be a population of corrupt citizens violating the rights of other citizens, and I oppose that, Peltier said.

At the rally, Joe Biggs, a Proud Boys organizer, repeated orders to the crowd not to engage with counter-protesters. Biggs said police had told him antifa were trying to enter the park.

Some people in the crowd separately continued to force suspected antifa out of the park.

A supply truck arrived to deliver plastic white shields as defensive weapons. The truck was affiliated with American Wolf, a Washington far-right group that has regularly traveled to Portland this summer.

12:30 p.m., Counter-protesters, Vanport historical marker: A couple hundred people listened to a series of speakers discuss the history of Vanport and its historical significance to the Black community.

A couple hundred people listened to a series of speakers discuss the history of Vanport and its historical significance to the Black community on Saturday, Sept 26, 2020.

Mark Jackson, assistant pastor of Oasis of Praise International Ministries, addressed the crowd in rousing words and tone. Black people who came to Portland in the 1940s to work its thriving ship building industry were forced to live in the historic Vanport community, in housing built and designed to last only temporarily, Jackson noted.

Portland didnt want us to remain here, but were still here, he said. Because we are here, we must be concerned and we must be committed to elevate our voices and to mobilize like never before. We must be courageous and we must be determined that Oregon will change on our watch.

His remarks drew loud applause and cheers of support. Vanport was built in just 110 days and housed 40,000 people, he added, emphasizing how much can be accomplished in a short time when there is enough determination.

Andre Miller, who is Black, said his parents and grandparents were affected by the floods. His father was born three years before.

He grew up to be a Black Panther here in Portland, Oregon, and thats why I take of (being) a Black leader here, Miller said.

12:15 p.m., Counter-protesters, Peninsula Park: More than 300 people have converged near Black Lives Matter banners. Police remained on the streets next to the park and arrested at least one person on the perimeter of the event.

Evan Burchfield, 34, co-chair the Democratic Socialists of America, which helped organize the event. Burchfield said DSA often talks with PopMob PDX and Rose City Antifa to make big decisions when far-right groups are in town. They separately discussed things with their members and decided they wouldnt go north to Delta Park, primarily because they believed Proud Boys came to fight.

If they want to come to us, they can," Burchfield said.

11:45 a.m. Proud Boys, Delta Park: A Proud Boys crowd formed around a single person in all-black gear, whom people believed was antifa. The person was wearing a motorcycle helmet with a sticker that said, No justice, no peace, a common chant at nightly protests to end police violence.

As people tried to march that person out of the park, some members of the crowd also grew hostile toward reporters. This is our safe space, and I think its time we kick you out, a woman yelled at a National Geographic journalist.

Soon after, most peoples attention turned to a rally, set up in front of a giant American flag.

11:30 a.m., Counter-protesters, Peninsula Park: Dozens of people collected in opposition of the Proud Boys demonstration. Organizers of this event, namely PopMob PDX, have said they do not plan to march to Delta Park nearly three miles away.

Still, as counter-demonstrators started to gather at Peninsula Park, so did Portland police. State, county and local officials have said they will work to to keep the groups apart. Multnomah County said officers confiscated a wooden shield from one person at the park. Homemade shields are a common sight at nightly protests organized by leftist groups, which often clash with police.

11 a.m., Proud Boys, Delta Park: Several hundred people affiliated with Proud Boys have amassed in the park. Some demonstrators are carrying guns, baseball bats, magazine clips, knives or batons. Militia members armed with different types of weapons are also posted throughout the park. One asked to check the credentials of Oregonian/OregonLive journalists.

Many of the protesters wore clothing or flew flags in support of President Donald Trump and police.

Some Portland police officers stood in uniform at the north and south ends of the park.

Linda Winieki, of nonprofit Love Talks Baby, set up a tent near the north entrance of the park to help people who are homeless, who may be displaced by the days protests.

We came here today because we stand for peace, trying to set an example for all the activist groups, she said. Were here as a safe group for anyone who wants a hate-free zone.

10:30 a.m., Counter-protesters, Vanport historical marker: Counter-protesters, organized by a Black-led group, began to gather a half-mile away from Delta Park. Organizer Chrissy Wood, 33, said she and other leaders had no plans to interact directly with the Proud Boys.

Instead, the rally at Vanport is meant to reflect on the history of the area, which a community flooded out in 1948. At the time of the flood, about a third of the developments residents were Black. The Portland areas overall African American population was around 6%. Wood said the family of one event organizer lived in Vanport before the floods.

We are here to own this space, and recognize the city of what it was to the city, said Wood, with J.U.I.C.E. PDX. Were trying to bring that awareness to here in a non-violent way.

She said protesters would then leave on buses to go to a separate North Portland park, and from there, march to a Black-owned business.

9:30 a.m., Proud Boys, Delta Park: State troopers started to stage in Delta Park as Proud Boys members began to stream in. A block away, a construction sign displayed a flashing message, Hate has no place here. Black lives matter.

Oregon State Police Supt. Travis Hampton promised a massive influx of Oregon state troopers to keep Proud Boys separate from any opposing demonstrators. Hampton said state police would be saturating North Portland.

Most stores and restaurants near Delta Park closed. Wooden pallets block the entrance to Walmart, next to the park. The entrance to a furniture store across the street is covered with plywood. Private security guards are patrolling the area.

Prior to Saturdays events:

Local and state leaders expressed serious concern about the intentions of the Proud Boys. A poster circulated for Saturdays End Domestic Terrorism rally encourages people to "do it for Jay. Aaron Jay Danielson, a Patriot Prayer member, was shot and killed Aug. 29 in Portland by self-described anti-fascist Michael Reinoehl, who was killed by police days later in Washington.

Danielsons killing followed a mobile Trump rally that streamed into downtown Portland. Some participants clashed with left-leaning groups. Portland police have come under criticism for historically failing to keep the groups apart. Police have blamed a lack of officers to adequately cover the events.

Portland has a long history of bloody clashes between far-right and far-left groups, although they have happened with increased frequency since the 2016 election, most notably organized by Patriot Prayer.

Hampton had expressed reserve earlier in the week about helping Portland, citing Mayor Ted Wheelers ban on tear gas. With state and county law enforcement in charge, officers will be able use gas.

State police also arranged for some Portland officers to be federally deputized. Wheelers chief of staff, Kristin Dennis, said planning for the event has brought together local, regional and state agencies, as well as private groups. Theres been a lot of people trying to figure out how can we use the limited city resources that we have to keep people safe, Dennis said.

-- Maxine Bernstein, Noelle Crombie, Shane Dixon Kavanaugh and Fedor Zarkhin

Everton Bailey Jr., Mark Graves, Dave Killen, Sean Meagher, Beth Nakamura, K. Ramboand Andrew Theen of The Oregonian/OregonLive contributed to this report, which was updated throughout Saturday.

Subscribe to Oregonian/OregonLive newsletters and podcasts for the latest news and top stories.
An occasional roundup of unusual OPP news releases:

The roundup is opening a large bag of lunacy this week, starting in Wasaga Beach where police shot a dog after its owner allegedly sicced it on firefighters.

The fire department responded to a pre-dawn blaze on Sept. 18.

Initial information was received that a party was interfering with firefighters, police said.

The subject at the scene released a dog he reported to be trained to attack at the responders. An officer discharged rounds from his firearm to stop the aggressive dog, described as possibly a German shepherd mix.

The dog survived. A Wasaga Beach man, 57, was charged with assault with a weapon, uttering threats and mischief.

Assault with a ... snow brush

An enraged driver used a very Canadian weapon  a snow brush.

Police were called to a road rage incident in Goderich on Sept. 20.

Upon speaking with the victim police learned the accused took exception with the victims driving and began honking at him because he was slow to respond to a green light, OPP said.

When both drivers parked their vehicles in a parking lot, the accused proceeded to approach the victim holding a snow brush in a threatening manner. The accused also threatened the victim before he took off.

A Goderich man, 57, was charged with assault with a weapon and uttering threats.

Bad chicken

In Norfolk County, teenagers played chicken with a driver.

The man, 56, was driving down Norfolk County Road 23 in Houghton, 20 kilometres from nowhere, on Sept. 13 at 8:17 p.m., when he spotted five teens sitting in the middle of the road. He took evasive action to avoid hitting them.

It appears that the teenagers would sit in the roadway and move at the last minute as vehicles approached, ultimately playing chicken with the motoring public, OPP said.

This not only put their lives in danger, it also puts unsuspecting drivers and passengers in the vehicle in danger. No injuries were reported as a result of this incident and police are encouraging all parents and caregivers to speak to their children about this dangerous game that could have life-ending consequences.

That sinking feeling

Officers rescued a man inside a car sinking in Lake Temiskaming, 160 kilometres north of North Bay.

On Sept. 10 at 1:30 a.m., police saw the car 50 feet from shore.

While the officers were speaking to the driver, the vehicle began to fill with water and quickly became submerged, OPP said. The officers jumped into the water and rescued the lone occupant from the cold water.

No one was injured.

The driver was apprehended under the Mental Health Act and transported to hospital, police said.

No word on how the car wound up in the lake.

Get a hobby!

A lengthy campaign of harassment has apparently ended after police arrested a teen in Port Dover on Sept. 20.

It was determined that unknowns have been attending a residence on a weekly basis for the past six months and have been banging on windows and doors and then running away, OPP said.

These occurrences were happening in the earlier morning hours which startled the elderly residents.

A boy, 14, was arrested for trespassing at night.

Dispute heats up

An ongoing dispute between neighbours in Prescott, 100 kilometres northeast of Kingston, heated up (and then cooled down) on Sept. 19 at 1:30 p.m.

Police arrested an individual for assault after they sprayed their neighbour with water from a hose, OPP said. Both neighbours are men.

Gone camping

Apparently nothing is safe from thieves in Norfolk County.

On Sept. 21 a 29-foot camping trailer was stolen from the front lawn of a residence in North Walshingham, near Turkey Point. Next theyll steal the house.

Anyone who sees the stolen Outback Sydney Edition trailer can call police at 1-888-310-1122.
Park Bo Gum is making waves in the K-drama world with his incredible role in "Record of Youth." He is considered one of the top Hallyu stars that have influenced and spread the Korean wave internationally. Not only is he an immensely talented actor but also a musician. He even has his albums!

There isn't anything that he can't do. He is also really popular for always perfecting the CFs that he is a part of. No one can miss his unmatched charm even when he is advertising a product to the public.

Here is a list of Commercial Films that Park Bo Gum has been a part of. The list has been compiled with the help of Park Bo Gum's fan page, BOGUMMYDAY!

1. Nongshim Noodles 2012



In April 2012, Park Bo Gum appeared as the fresh-faced youth with a sweet musical romance with IU over a bowl of noodles.

2. Sony MDR 2013

In October 2013, Park Bo Gum appeared in the SONY Music Deserves Respect CF.

3. Lotte World 2015



In March 2015, Lotte world did a TVC with Park Bogum with a magical adventure!

4. Sunkist 2015



Aug 2015, Sunkist chose Park Bo Gum as their brand model.

5. T.I For Men F/W 2015



In Oct 2015, Park Bo Gum modelled for T.I For Men's Fall | Winter collection.

6. GIRLS' EDUCATION for Olive Young

In 2015, Park Bo Gum appeared in a bright campaign for furthering girls' education.

7. K-SWISS 2016



In January 2016, K-Swiss released a tie-in TVC with Park Bo Gum's character Choi Taek playing baduk but mentally dreaming of a fresh new attitude to the beautiful game.

8. Pelicana 2016



In January 2016, Pelicana chose the buddies - Choi Taek and Dong Ryong from Reply 1988 to become their new endorsers.

Clips from the drama was cut first to start off their campaign.

9. G9 2016

On 19 February 2016, news reports said that G9 ( Gee-ku ) had appointed rising stars Park Bo Gum and Kim Go Eun as their new models, and produced a series of fun TVC and print ads.

10. TNGT



On 1st March 2016, TNGT announced that their new model is Park Bo Gum. The brand brought out a more mature and smouldering side of him that fans adored.

11. LLang

Park Bo Gum also did a TVCF for Llang Red Ginseng haircare.

12. J.ESTINA 2016



3 FEB 2016, J.estina announced the news to turn Park Bogum into their prince for the [ Timeless Momentum ] CF series with Kim Yuna.

13. Montbell 2016



On 22 March 2016, news outlets reported that Montbell had chosen Park Bo Gum as their new brand ambassador.

14. LG Saffron

April 25, news media announced Park Bo Gum as one of LG's new CF stars for a household product .

In May 2016, LG released some squee-worthy TVCs with Bogummy blowing kisses and teaching about fabric care!

15. Domino's Pizza 2016



Park Bo Gum along with best friend Song Joong Ki promoted Domino's prawn pizza in 2016, leading to some of the cutest CFs.

16. Coca Cola 2016



On December 21, 2016, it was announced that Park Bo Gum will now be endorsing Coca Cola!

17. LG Aura 2017

Park Bo Gum was ever so charming in this CF for fabric softeners.

18. Ghana Chocolate 2017

Park Bo Gum became the first male endorser ever for Ghana chocolate ever since its launch in 1977.

19. Nescafe Crema 2017

Who wouldn't wanna go on a date with Park Bo Gum to a cafe? That was the image he portrayed on Nescafe's Crema's CF.

20. ACE bed 2018

Park Bo Gum looked comforting and full of bright energy in this CF and he has remained the model for Ace Bed till 2020.

Which of the actor's TV CF is your fave? Comment below!

YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE: "18 Again" and "Zombie Detective" Premieres Collide With "Record of Youth" and "Do You Like Brahms" on Monday-Tuesday Slot
Find all of the most important pandemic education news on Educating N.J., a special resource guide created for parents, students and educators. As schools reopen across N.J., we want to know what is and isnt working. Tell us about it here.

Administrators at the New Jersey Institute of Technology got the call Sept. 16 they were hoping wouldnt come: their new wastewater testing program found traces of the coronavirus in the sewage from Cypress Hall, a dormitory.
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A Ukrainian air force cadet today told how he was the miracle lone survivor in a plane crash in which 26 died when he felt he was 'in a computer game'.

Vyacheslav Zolochevskyi stayed alive despite a fireball explosion when an Antonov An-26 military aircraft with a 'faulty engine' came down one mile short of its airfield.

New footage has emerged showing the moment the military craft slammed to earth and exploded into flames.

After the crash Zolochevskyi looked round to see his friend covered in flames and tried to put out the inferno.

Vyacheslav Zolochevskyi (pictured) is the lone survivor of the crash after an Antonov An-26 military aircraft with a 'faulty engine' came down one mile short of its airfield

Fellow cadet Nikolai Mikitchenko (pictured) died earlier today as he became the 25th victim of the air crash

Head of Kharkiv administration Oleksiy Kucher, who spoke to the cadet in hospital, said: 'He said it was like a computer game, that when he got to his feet, he saw his friend burning.

'And he was actually helping to put out the flames on this guy who was also brought into hospital.'

The cadet he tried to save - named Nikolai Mikitchenko died today, the 25th victim of the air crash.

Kucher said the miracle survivor - in his early 20s - 'doesn't remember everything, he lost consciousness at some point.

'After he regained cam roundhe began to put out the flames on his colleague.

'He survived while being inside the plane. But physically he is in a satisfactory state.'

His mother Irina Zolochevskaya told how she feared he had died.

She said: 'He is alive. He jumped [out of the plane], he managed to survive

'When I heard about the catastrophe, and read it was training flights for cadets, I didn't know what to do.I was afraid that my son was gone too.'

Military doctor Eduard Khorshun said: 'His condition is medium grave. There is no threat to life, his condition is stable.'

One of two military cadets who survived the tragic plane crash near Kharkiv in the Ukraine yesterday after they jumped out of the plummeting aircraft has died

At least 22 people including military cadets were killed and two others seriously injured on Friday when a Ukranian air force plane crashed near Kharkiv in the east of the country

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky (pictured), who arrived at the crash site, declared September 26 a national day of mourning for the victims of the crash

Crash site: The remains of the Ukrainian military aircraft which crashed on Friday killing most of the passengers on board, some of which were cadets

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, who arrived at the crash site, declared September 26 a national day of mourning for the victims of the crash.

The transport plane was carrying a total of 28 passengers when it crashed and burst into flames in the town of Chuhuiv in Ukraine.

Deputy Interior Minister Anton Gerashchenko said: 'Twenty-two people died, the search for two other people is continuing'.

The transport plane was carrying a total of 28 passengers when it crashed and burst into flames in the town of Chuhuiv in Ukraine

Deputy Interior Minister Anton Gerashchenko said: 'Twenty-two people died, the search for two other people is continuing'

Wreckage of an AN-26 military plane seen after it crashed in the town of Chuguyiv after it crashed and burst into flames on Friday night

The transport plane was carrying a total of 28 passengers when it crashed, including 21 military students and seven crew, he said.

'It's a shock,' he added. 'At the moment it's impossible to establish the cause' of the crash.'

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he would travel to the region on Saturday.

'We are urgently creating a commission to investigate all the circumstances and causes of the tragedy,' he wrote on Facebook.

Firefighters at the crash site of the Antonov An-26 plane on Friday night as they desperately tried to extinguish the flames

It took firefighters about an hour to put the burning wreckage of the plane out

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he would travel to the region on Saturday. 'We are urgently creating a commission to investigate all the circumstances and causes of the tragedy,' he wrote on Facebook

The Antonov-26 transport aircraft crashed at around 8:50 pm local time (5.50GMT), two kilometres from the Chuhuiv military air base, the emergency services said

The town of Chuhuiv is around 30 kilometers southeast of Kharkiv and 100 kilometres west of the front line with the pro-Russian separatists

Pictured is a Slovak AIrforce Antonov AN-26 troop carrier aircraft (the same type which crashed last night in Ukraine)

The Antonov-26 transport aircraft crashed at around 8:50 pm local time (5.50GMT), two kilometres from the Chuhuiv military air base, the emergency services said.

The plane caught fire after the crash and was extinguished after one hour.

The town of Chuhuiv is around 30 kilometers southeast of Kharkiv and 100 kilometres west of the front line with the pro-Russian separatists.
During the New Rules segment of Fridays episode of Real Time, Bill Maher urged voters to turn out in such huge numbers in November, that it will be difficult for Trump to steal the election  and he took a moment to call out Green Party voters for their role in spoiling the 2016 election.

Or as he put it, when explaining how the 2016 election handed Republicans three Supreme Court picks, I hope you enjoy carrying your rape baby to term. You can name it Jill Stein.

New rule: power is like owning rabbits. The more you have, the easier it is to get a lot more, Maher said at the top of the bit.

Mahers point was that power begets power, and when people lose it, youve not only lost that fight, you made it harder to win the next one. Thats how power works.

Also Read: Bill Maher Says Amy Coney Barrett Is 'a F--ing Nut'

Maher noted how Democratic election losses have translated to a huge number of right-wing judicial appointments. Trump has appointed a quarter of the entire federal bench, and unlike his wives, thats for life. In Florida, the people voted to restore voting rights to ex-felons, but thats not really gonna happen because Trump appointed five of the six appeals judges who found a way to undo that, and as is so often the case, make it harder for Democrats to vote. Which means more Republican senators who appoint more conservative judges. Power is a perpetuating cycle, like when terminators build more robots.

Maher also mocked Democrats who, in response to the rush by Republicans to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg despite their assertions in 2016 that it is wrong to name Supreme Court nominees in an election year, have called out Republicans for their hypocrisy. They said one thing when it was Obama, now theyre saying the complete opposite, how do they sleep at night? Ill tell you how: like a baby. Because like a baby, they have no morals, Maher said.

The only rule Republicans play by  is the people who win make the rules. Power talks, losers walk, he continued.

Story continues

Also Read: Maher Jokes the Only Thing Trump and FDR Have in Common Is 'Difficulty Walking' (Video)

Maher then expressed his concern that Democrats dont really have any options left to stop Republicans from replacing RBG, and that, as a result, if Trump contests the election result and it goes to the Supreme Court, hell be able to stay in office even if he loses the election.

Thats when Maher got to the matter of third party voters in 2016. How different it all could have been. Not to relitigate old wounds, but all the Hillary equivocators from 2016, the people who said she was racist, not really that different from Trump. The ones who voted third party, the ones who stayed home because, you know, the lesser of two evils. Sorry, but you all have to eat it one more time, he said.

Brief sidenote: Trump lost the popular vote by nearly three million in 2016. And the election turned on extremely narrow results in three key swing states  Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin  where, in each case, Green Party candidate Jill Steins vote total was larger than Trumps very narrow margin of victory over Clinton. Ever since, critics have contended that Stein spoiled that election, and as evidence, they note how in 2016 Stein campaigned largely against Clinton specifically, asserting without evidence that Hillary was actually to Trumps right, while her supporters argued that a Trump victory would be better in the long term for left-wing interests. Of course, the Green Partys most frequent line of attack was to complain that voting for a Democrat is settling for the lesser of two evils.

Also Read: Trump Administration Revoked Award for Female Journalist Who Criticized Him, Says Watchdog

Back to Maher:

Because oh how I would love me some of that Hillary evil right now. You know, the evil where liberals would currently have a six-to-three majority on the court, Maher continued. The evil where people wouldnt be facing having their health care taken away or their right to vote, or where America wasnt sliding into autocracy  Lets look at the alternative universe if a few more people in 2016 had told themselves, Yeah, shes not my favorite but you only get two choices in our system. Its probably better to make sure this sane, competent person gets in as opposed to a malignant narcissist.'

In that universe, were still in the Paris Climate Accord, and Irans nuclear program is still frozen and maybe so is Greenland, Maher added. There have been none of the rollbacks on clean air and water. Dreamers dont have to worry about getting tossed out of the only country theyve ever known. William Barr is just a right-wing crank self-publishing a book on our moral decline. And Brett Kavanaugh is drinking from home.

Its a wonderful world, this world. People hearing the words pee tape only think of R. Kelly, Maher joked.

Maher went on, noting that in that alternate universe, now-iconic symbols of the Trump era like so-called pussy hats dont exist and that when it comes to the response to COVID-19, I think Hillary would have done a little better than, Let them drink bleach.'

The Supreme Court hears oral arguments to overturn Obamacare on November 10. Once this new justice is seated, Obamacare is likely gone, and after that, Roe v. Wade. So I hope you enjoy carrying your rape baby to term. You can name it Jill Stein, Maher said as he wound the bit up. Yes, Joe Biden is far from a perfect candidate and I have serious doubts theyll ever let him take office. But giving him a vote total so huge it will be hard to ignore is the very last Hail Mary pass we have.

Read original story Maher Blames Jill Stein Voters for Trump: I Hope You Enjoy Carrying Your Rape Baby to Term (Video) At TheWrap
Heavily pregnant Married At First Sight star Jules Robinson is set to give birth to her first child in the coming hours.

But it seems the 37-year-old mother-to-be is patiently waiting until the very last minute to make her way to the maternity ward.

She shared an Instagram video of herself shuffling her way to the couch and 'laying patiently.'

Ready to give birth! Heavily pregnant Married At First Sight star Jules Robinson (pictured) looked exhausted after shuffling her way to the couch in a video she shared on Saturday, as she prepares to give birth to her first baby in the coming hours

Her clip featured commentary from Cathy Freeman's gold medal 400 metre sprint in the 2000 Olympics.

She jokingly compared her shuffle to the Olympian's iconic win and wrote in the caption: 'My shuffle, slide that gets me around in the evening, here you have it.'

'What a champion. What a relief,' she added.

'What a champion': Her clip featured commentary from Cathy Freeman's gold medal 400 metre sprint in the 2000 Olympics in which she jokingly compared her shuffle to the Olympian's iconic win. She quipped, 'My shuffle, slide that gets me around in the evening'

Soon: Jules also revealed to a fan in the comments section that she was experiencing Braxton Hicks, which are contractions that come and go in preparation for giving birth and are sometimes called 'false' or 'practice' contractions

Jules also revealed to a fan in the comments section that she was experiencing Braxton Hicks.

Braxton Hicks are contractions that come and go in preparation for giving birth and are sometimes called 'false' or 'practice' contractions, according to Pregnancy, Baby and Birth.

It comes after Jules treated herself to a blowout at a salon, ahead of the big day.

'One more me day!' On Friday, Jules (pictured) treated herself to a glamorous blowout before getting ready to give birth to her first child

Reality TV love: Jules and her husband Cameron met on season six of Channel Nine's Married At First Sight, which was filmed in late 2018 to early 2019

She beamed in the selfie, which was shared to Instagram, and wrote in the caption: 'Didn't think this would happen!

'One more me day!', she added, implying it would be her last day to pamper herself before her child's arrival.

Jules and her husband Cameron met on season six of Channel Nine's Married At First Sight, which was filmed in late 2018 to early 2019.

They officially tied the knot in November 2019 in a lavish ceremony in Sydney. The pair announced they were expecting in April 2020.
FLAMBOYANT businessman Wicknell Chivayo, accused of bribery emanating from the Gwanda solar deal that he signed with the Zimbabwe Power Company (ZPC), will now stand trial on November 24 after the High Court dismissed his bid to except to the charges.

Chivayo, who is jointly charged with former ZPC chairperson Stanley Kazhanje, approached the High Court on review after the Harare Magistrates Courts dismissed his application for exception to the charges.

Chivayo and his company Intratrek are accused of having bribed Kazhanje to make decisions in their favour.

The State, represented by Brian Vito, claimed that sometime in 2013, ZPC called for bids for the construction of the Gwanda Solar Project plant and Chivayos company, Intratrek, applied.

It is alleged that on October 22, 2015, the ZPC board held a meeting where Kazhanje allegedly directed management to proceed in signing a contract with Intratrek Zimbabwe.

Further claims are that the following day, a contract was signed between ZPC and Intratrek Zimbabwe.

On January 21, 2016, Chivayo allegedly transferred $10 000 from Intratrek Zimbabwes bank account into Kazhanjes personal Barclays Bank account. It is alleged that after the payment, Kazhanje influenced the ZPC board to pass resolutions in favour of Chivayo and Intratrek in connection with the ZPC contract.

Chivayo, however, said his company participated in a public tender and won, before being awarded a contract.

He said that following certain breaches, Intratrek sued for specific performance in the High Court in a process which stalled the works.

Chivayo told the court that they were first charged with fraud and placed on remand, with the High Court stating during the bail hearing that the States case was patently weak and did not disclose an offence.

At the High Court, Kazhanje argued that the State was attempting to charge him twice for one offence having been previously convicted for concealing the bribe to his principals.

4He had objected to pleading to the current bribery charge. However, the High Court dismissed his objection. Daily News
Juan Ameri. Capture from Flipboard



An Argentine lawmaker has resigned after being caught on a live camera caressing his partner before appearing to partially pull down her top and kiss her breast during a virtual session of the country's lower house of Congress on Thursday.



The lower house of deputies said in a statement on Twitter early on Friday that it had voted to accept the resignation of Juan Ameri, a representative from the northern province of Salta in the ruling coalition.



During a special meeting of the country's deputies, with a few lawmakers in physical attendance but most others appearing via large screens in the chamber, politician Ameri appeared on a screen sitting with his partner, before performing the lewd act.



Shortly after the incident, which went viral and sparked outrage in Argentina, lawmakers voted to suspend Ameri while a panel was convened to decide his final sanction. It later accepted his resignation.



Virtual meetings amid the coronavirus pandemic have tripped up lawmakers before. In June, Ireland's Luke Ming Flanagan appeared to be wearing no trousers as he discussed policy matters with his European Parliament peers.



Ameri, in comments to local radio, said that he felt bad about what had happened, adding that his internet connection had been poor and that he had been caught in an intimate moment unawares. The ruling Frente de Todos coalition said in a statement that the incident had shown a lack of respect for the Argentine people and the legislature, and had called for a strong sanction.



"As representatives of the people we cannot allow irresponsibility of this magnitude," the party said before Ameri's resignation was confirmed. (Reuters)


But Biden must not revert to old bad habits, including that hair sniffing business. Such behavior might be disturbing in a president, but so far, the American people, with the help of the media, have kept the Biden sniffing thing out of their minds.
Well-known economist and Padma Bhushan awardee Isher Judge Ahluwalia died on Saturday after battling brain cancer for nearly a year.

She was married to Montek Singh Ahluwalia, a former Deputy Chairperson of the Planning Commission. She would have turned 75 on October 1. The couple has two sons -- Pavan and Aman.

Isher Ahluwalia was Chairperson of the think-tank Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER) for 15 years and had stepped down last month due to ill health.

She had wide experience in the fields of economic growth, productivity, industrial and trade policy reforms, and urban planning and development.

At ICRIER, Isher Ahluwalia led a major research and capacity building programme on the challenges of urbanisation in India. In 2009, she was awarded Padma Bhushan by the President for her services in the field of education and literature.

Punjab Chief Minister Amrinder Singh said Isher Ahluwalia was one of Indias most distinguished economists We had the privilege of having her as Vice-Chairman of State Planning Board in my last term.

Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, Chairperson and Managing Director of Biocon, twitted: Isher Ahluwalia, my dear dear friend and a brilliant remarkable intellectual economist, passed away after a brave battle with cancer. My deepest condolences to Montek Singh Ahluwalia and his sons Pavan and Aman in the family.




The remains of 117 Chinese soldiers killed in the 1950-53 Korean War were placed in caskets Saturday to be sent back to their homeland the next day, according to the defense ministry.







In 2014, Seoul pledged to repatriate the remains of fallen Chinese soldiers in a symbolic gesture of friendship, and 599 sets have since been returned, including 10 last year.







This year's repatriation ceremony will take place at Incheon International Airport, west of Seoul, Sunday, according to the ministry.







Of the total, 103 sets were excavated from Arrowhead Ridge inside the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) that bisects the two Koreas. Since last year, South Korea has been carrying out demining and excavation operations on the hill, the site of one the fiercest battlefields during the war.







Other remains were uncovered in other parts of South Korea and later identified as those of Chinese soldiers.







During the war, China fought alongside North Korea against the U.S.-backed Allied forces. Nearly 1 million Chinese soldiers are believed to have died, been wounded or remain missing, according to Seoul government data.







Along with the remains, 1,368 items believed to belong to Chinese troops will also be returned, according to the ministry.







The repatriation was supposed to take place around March or April but was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. (Yonhap)


MINNEAPOLIS  Over three months ago, a majority of the Minneapolis City Council pledged to defund the citys police department, making a powerful statement that reverberated across the country. It shook up Capitol Hill and the presidential race, shocked residents, delighted activists and changed the trajectory of efforts to overhaul the police during a crucial window of tumult and political opportunity.

Now some council members would like a do-over.

Councilor Andrew Johnson, one of the nine members who supported the pledge in June, said in an interview that he meant the words in spirit, not by the letter. Another councilor, Phillipe Cunningham, said that the language in the pledge was up for interpretation and that even among council members soon after the promise was made, it was very clear that most of us had interpreted that language differently. Lisa Bender, the council president, paused for 16 seconds when asked if the councils statement had led to uncertainty at a pivotal moment for the city.

I think our pledge created confusion in the community and in our wards, she said.

The regrets formalize a retreat that has quietly played out in Minneapolis in the months since George Floyd was killed by the police and the ensuing national uproar over the treatment of Black Americans by law enforcement and the country at large. After a summer that challenged societys commitment to racial equality and raised the prospect of sweeping political change, a cool autumn reality is settling in.

National polls show decreasing support for Black Lives Matter since a sea change of good will in June. In Minneapolis, the most far-reaching policy efforts meant to address police violence have all but collapsed.
Image: Twitter/@PIB_India

With senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders like Ram Madhav, P Muralidhar Rao, Anil Jain and Saroj Pandey relieved from the party's office bearers' responsibilities, it is possible that a reshuffle within the government is likely and some of these leaders might be included in the Cabinet, news agency ANI reported.

Sources told the news agency that a Cabinet rejig may take place in the next few weeks or after the Bihar Assembly polls, which are scheduled for October end, with results expected on November 10.

According to the report, leaders from states like West Bengal, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala are likely to be included in the Cabinet since these are the states where the BJP hopes to expand its base in future.

Moneycontrol could not independently verify the report.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi may also rejig the portfolios of several of his ministers, sources told the news agency. Some of the ministers are holding a clutch of portfolios, and these may be handed over to the newly inducted ministers, the news agency reported.

Earlier on September 26, the BJP announced new office bearers of the party, with leaders like former Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Raman Singh and party spokesperson Baijyant Jay Panda appointed as National Vice-Presidents.

The list of eight general secretaries, a crucial organisation position in the party as they are the link between state and central leadership, has five new faces with Bhupender Yadav, Arun Singh and Kailash Vijayvargiya being retained.

Dushyant Kumar Gautam, D Purandareshwaei, CT Ravi, Tarun Chugh and Dilip Saikia are the new choices as general secretaries.
New Delhi: Actor Ayushmann Khurrana is going through a massive physical transformation for his next, a progressive love story being directed by Abhishek Kapoor. He is currently in Chandigarh going through intense training sessions to become a cross-functional athlete and he has been hiding his change on social media. Ayushmann has flown his personal trainer Rakesh Udiyar to Chandigarh to achieve his desired physique.

"Ayushmann has been extremely regimented about his training routine and he has now flown his trainer Rakesh to Chandigarh so that he can achieve the physique for the film. Its literally a race to the finish now. Rakesh understands Ayushmann thoroughly, having worked with him for years and he has been extremely clued in about this films look. Ayushmann has to flaunt a certain physique on the screen that he has never attempted and Rakesh has been guiding him through the journey", adds a source.

The source adds, Rakesh was previously training him virtually given the pandemic but now Ayushmann has flown him to Chandigarh. After self-quarantining and going through COVID-19 test which has come negative, Rakesh is pushing Ayushmann to pump iron through face to face sessions. The next few weeks will be excruciating for him but as the saying goes no pain, no gain! Ayushmann is hell-bent on getting a certain physique and Rakesh understands his intention. He will push him hard to ensure that Ayushmann gets the body he wants to make audiences believe that he can be a cross-functional athlete.

When contacted, his trainer Rakesh confirmed the story by saying, Yes, Im in Chandigarh right now. Training is underway. He, however, did not divulge any more details on the same.

In addition to prepping for his film, the young icon recently joined hands with UNICEF and has joined them as a celebrity advocate for ending violence against children in India

Earlier this week, Ayushmann also featured on TIME 100s most influential people' list 2020. He was the only Indian actor featured on the list alongside Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Sundar Pichai CEO of Google, London-based Indian-origin doctor Ravindra Gupta and Bilkis - Dadi of Shaheen Bagh.
New review launched into NHS gender identity services, puberty blockers, hormones

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A new independent review has been launched into Britain's National Health Service regarding gender identity services for young people and children.

The NHS said Tuesday that Dr. Hilary Cass OBE, who is the former president of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, will lead a wide-ranging review examining several dimensions of such services, including how and when referrals are made to specialists and how clinical decisions are made pertaining to treatment of gender dysphoric patients.

The review will additionally establish "workforce recommendations for specialist healthcare professionals and examine the recent rise in the number of children seeking treatment."

The Gender Identity Development Service for Children and Adolescents is managed by the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust. The London-based Tavistock clinic has come under considerable scrutiny this year amid allegations that minors were being rushed into medicalized gender transition and that the physical and psychological risks were not explained.

Keira Bell, a detransitioner in her 20s who underwent hormonal transition as a teenager and then went on to have her breasts amputated, joined a lawsuit against the clinic early this year, saying she was harmed.

"The news of this review has come as a surprise as it was unexpected and it covers the same issues my proposed court case was going to raise," Bell said in a Tuesday update on her crowdfunding page.

"This type of case is front-loaded and my legal team had worked hard to prepare evidence that raised concerns about the [memorandum of understanding], the default approach of positive affirmation [of trans identity] that it created and the dangers associated with the lack of therapeutic work to address the reasons why a young person has gender dysphoria."

She added: "In the light of the decision of the NHS to conduct a thorough review of practice at GIDS my lawyers have advised me that my case would be unsuccessful. Judicial Review is a legal remedy of last resort and there is an alternative remedy that it going to explore my concerns  namely the NHS review of GIDS."

The case against the Tavistock clinic that pertains to informed consent and was brought by whistleblower psychologist Sue Evans is reportedly still going forward and will occur on Oct. 7 and 8.

The independent review includes an examination of the issues surrounding children and young people who are given puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones.

Earlier this year, the NHS quietly removed language from the transgender guidance section of its website claiming that drugs used to arrest the pubertal processes in trans-identifying youth were "fully reversible."

The updated guidelines noted that little is known about the long-term side effects of hormone or puberty blockers in children suffering from gender dysphoria.

"Although the Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) advises this is a physically reversible treatment if stopped, it is not known what the psychological effects may be," the new guidelines read.

"It's also not known whether hormone blockers affect the development of the teenage brain or children's bones. Side effects may also include hot flushes, fatigue and mood alterations."

The doctor leading the review welcomed the process.

"It is absolutely right that children and young people, who may be dealing with a complexity of issues around their gender identity, get the best possible support and expertise throughout their care, Cass said in a statement.

This will be an inclusive process in which everyone will have the opportunity to make their views known. In particular I am looking forward to hearing from young people and their families to understand their experiences."

Dr. Michael Brady, the National Adviser for LGBT Health stated: Every child matters and children and young people who are exploring their gender or experiencing gender dysphoria, including those who are trans or non-binary, deserve the very best from the NHS."
By Reslic, aka Re Silc, a Naked Capitalism reader

July 14,2014. It was the day I found Naked Capitalism and was greeted by Yves on the web site with a Happy Bastille Day! I was finishing out a cabin we had built on our part of an old farm in southwestern Vermont, and was surfing the net and watching a bit of Le Tour over a recuperative beer that night. Im pretty much an addict of reading a wide range of material from welding and art, to financial news, with Middle Eastern geopolitics in between.

Wow, I was blown away by the selections that day on Naked Capitalism. A leadoff about adaptive and selective seed abortion, which reveals complex conditional decision making in plants, followed by a Chuck L-sourced link from the BBC on the future  the ultimate comeback: bringing the dead back to life. I continued on and became more and more interested, as I hit the down arrow. More great stuff from the UK Telegraph on the worldwide debt surge; news on Gaza, Iraq; Edward Snowden condemning the UKs emergency surveillance bill in the Guardian; a section on imperial collapse watchnow were talking. It was my kind of website; all ending in an antidote du jour by furzy mouse of some sleeping squirrels?????

I bookmarked the link and continued with my beer and the next day with my DIY projects. I sort of tuned out for a week, but upon my return to my retirement gig at UNC Chapel Hill, and sitting in an endless, boring, dean-led meeting about nothing of substance, I opened my laptop and my cursor gravitated to the saved Naked Capitalism link. I have no idea what happened in the rest of the meeting but thank God it was large enough for me to hide in the back and become addicted to the best website with commentary and links on the most important subjects on this planet. Whether you got hooked quickly like me, or gradually came to appreciate the unique perspective Naked Capitalism offers, be sure to chip in at the Tip Jar! Every contribution, from $5 to $5,000, helps keep this site lively and relevant.

Since that time late in July 2014, I have enjoyed being part of the Naked Capitalism community, one where the group continues to focus, dig down and understand the who, what, where on our global challenges, across a wide range of topics and which Naked Capitalism shows are linked up in some manner. Not that it has all the answers, but it gives one the power of reality to generate some damn good questions on a whole bunch of complex topics. Where else will you find how rainfall in rural Syria affects immigration in Germany and trade with USA USA.

I have not met other Naked Capitalism aficionados in person, but I picture them as smart, opinionated, but open to discussion, having a good amount of empathy and on a life-long learning path. Naked Capitalism is a crucial link for me to fulfill that same flow and goal. I have spent countless hours surfing around the web in search of stories of interest, stories I can learn from, stories that have personal utility to me, or that I can send to friends. Nowhere can you find the breadth of information on the topics that have, are, and will affect you and yours more than on Naked Capitalism. Were all busy, were all pressed for time and attention. To be an informed citizen, a fully functioning human on this planet, there is no better source of informational sustenance than Naked Capitalism. Where else can you can eat and drink from the smorgasbord of stories that are dished up twice daily by the Naked Capitalism crew. Your one-stop URL that examines statements and ideas from many sources, so you can better generate your own thoughts on the matter at hand. So please, donate now! The Tip Jar tells you how.

I was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Bahrain and then became a CPA and U.S. Foreign Service Officer. When you spend a lot of time overseas, you become part of a small community and you observe lots of different communities from many other cultures. You realize that successful communities, ones that prosper and grow, ones that can learn, adapt, and address issues in the most efficient and effective manner, have everybody involved and invested in that community. You cannot be a slacker, you cannot be a free rider if the group, and ultimately you personally, are to prosper.

The same situation exists for the Naked Capitalism community. If you value the reading experience and information you get from the best damn website on the planet, then step up now. Show your appreciation. Show how you value all the hard work in putting this food for your mind on the table day after day. So time for you to invest. Especially if you are doing well these days. Give whatever you can, whether its $5, $50, or $5000, via our Tip Jar. Even a small donation helps. And you can also contribute by encouraging people you know and meet to check out Naked Capitalism. Some will be hooked the way I was.

Thats my spiel for Y-O-U supporting Naked Capitalism. I went to the same junior college as Burt Reynolds and Lt. William Calley, so please excuse my above rambling prose, and go right now to the Tip Jar to send a few Jerome Powell bucks, Euros, Pounds, Dinars, Renminbi, or pieces of eight to Naked Capitalism today.
Dhaka, Sep 26 : Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will virtually address the 75th session of the UN General Assembly (UNGA) on Saturday, during which she highlight a numbr of issues, including the Covid-19 pandemic, Rohingya crisis and climate change.

"The Prime Minister is scheduled to deliver her pre-recorded country statement at the UNGA general debate in the UN Headquarters approximately at 10 a.m. New York time (8 p.m. Bangladesh time) tomorrow," The Daily Star newspaper quoted Hasina's Press Secretary Ihsanul Karim as saying here late Friday.

Hasina will deliver the speech in Bengali like in the past, following in the footsteps of Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Karim added.

Bangabandhu made history by delivering the first Bengali speech at the 29th UNGA on September 25, 1974.

At a virtual press briefing earlier this week, Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen had said that the Prime Minister will highlight matters related to the global Covid-19 situation, equal distribution of potential vaccine and pandemic impact on migrant workers and remittance, as well as climate issues as Bangladesh is the current chair of the Climate Vulnerable Forum (CVF). The Daily Star reported.

Momen said that Hasina will urge the international community to continue their stand and efforts in resolving the protracted Rohingya issue in line with her four-point proposal that she had placed before the 74th UNGA last year regarding a durable solution of the crisis.

Besides, he said, the premier will also highlight Bangladesh's successes in SDG implementation, establishing women empowerment and rights, poverty elevation, anti-terrorism and anti-drug trafficking activities, economic advancement, sustainable democracy and good governance and maintenance of world peace.
Security forces in Colombia have rescued an Australian model held captive for two weeks by a kidnapper who had demanded a $US30,000 ($A34,600) ransom.

Perth woman Bobbi April McGeachin, 22, was rescued from a home in the exclusive resort town of El Rodadero, near Santa Marta on Colombia's Caribbean coast, after a tip-off from Australian officials.

McGeachin had been able to raise the alarm with her family, via the internet and they contacted Australian authorities.

Members of Colombia's anti-kidnapping squad and other agents rescued her on Monday, and arrested a woman over the kidnapping.

Colombian army spokesman General Manuel Guzman said McGeachin had been invited to the country by her captor.
Google is celebrating its 22nd birthday with a special Doodle.

The search engine was founded in September 1998 by two PhD students, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, in their dormitories at Californias Stanford University.

Having developed a search algorithm known as Backrub two years earlier, Page and Brin chose the name Google for their new project because it recalled the word googol  a mathematical term meaning 10 raised to the power of 100.

At a time when the World Wide Web was still in its infancy, Page and Brins lofty goal was to organise the worlds information and make it universally accessible and useful.

Although initially overshadowed by rival search engines such as Yahoo and Ask Jeeves, Google has grown to become the worlds most popular website, with more than 63,000 searches made every second.

The best Google Doodles Show all 50 1 /50 The best Google Doodles The best Google Doodles Mister Rogers Google Doodle celebrating children's TV presenter Mister Rogers Google The best Google Doodles Lucy Wills Google Doodle celebrating haematologist Lucy Wills Google The best Google Doodles Falafel Google Doodle celebrating falafel Google The best Google Doodles St George's Day Google Doodle celebrating St George's Day Google The best Google Doodles James Wong Howe Google Doodle celebrating Hollywood golden age cinematographer James Wong Howe Google The best Google Doodles Seiichi Miyake Google Doodle celebrating Seiichi Miyake, developer of tactile paving Google The best Google Doodles Walter Cronkite Google celebrates US broadcast journalist Walter Cronkite's 100th birthday The best Google Doodles Lantern Festival 2016 Google celebrates the last day of the Chinese New Year celebrations with a doodle of the Lantern Festival Google The best Google Doodles Google Doodle celebrating Sergei Diaghilev Google Doodle celebrating art critic Sergei Diaghilev Google The best Google Doodles George Boole Google marks mathematician George Boole's 200th birthday The best Google Doodles Sergei Eisenstein Google Doodle celebrating soviet film director Sergei Eisenstein Google The best Google Doodles 41st anniversary of the discovery of 'Lucy' Google marks the 41st anniversary of the discovery of 'Lucy', the name given to a collection of fossilised bones that once made up the skeleton of a hominid from the Australopithecus afarensis species, who lived in Ethiopia 3.2 million years ago The best Google Doodles Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Google celebrates physician and suffragist Elizabeth Garrett Anderson 180th birthday The best Google Doodles Sir William Henry Perkin Google Doodle celebrating chemist Sir William Henry Perkin Google The best Google Doodles Nelly Sachs Google Doodle celebrating poet and playwright Nelly Sachs Google The best Google Doodles Thanksgiving 2018 Google Doodle celebrating Thanksgiving 2018 Google The best Google Doodles Nigerian Independence Day Google Doodle celebrating Nigerian Independence Day Google The best Google Doodles Mary Prince Google Doodle celebrating abolitionist Mary Prince Google The best Google Doodles Father's Day 2016 Google celebrates Father's Day The best Google Doodles Ebenezer Cobb Morley Google Doodle celebrating "father of football" Ebenezer Cobb Morley Google The best Google Doodles Octavia E Butler Google Doodle celebrating science fiction author Octavia E Butler Google The best Google Doodles Tamara de Lempicka Google Doodle celebrating painter Tamara de Lempicka Google The best Google Doodles Johann Carl Friedrich Gauss Google Doodle celebrating mathematician and physicist Johann Carl Friedrich Gauss Google The best Google Doodles Fanny Blankers-Koen Google Doodle celebrating Dutch Olympic gold medalist Fanny Blankers-Koen Google The best Google Doodles John Harrison Google Doodle celebrating clockmaker John Harrison Google The best Google Doodles Guillermo Haro Google Doodle celebrating astronomer Guillermo Haro Google The best Google Doodles St. David's Day Google Doodle celebrating St. David's Day Google The best Google Doodles Carter G Woodson Google Doodle celebrating Carter G Woodson, a pioneering African-American historian Google The best Google Doodles St Andrew's Day Google Doodle celebrating St Andrew's Day Google The best Google Doodles Gertrude Jekyll Google Doodle celebrating horticulturist Gertrude Jekyll Google The best Google Doodles Children's Day 2017 Google Doodle celebrating Children's Day 2017 Google The best Google Doodles Studio for Electronic Music Google Doodle celebrating the Studio for Electronic Music Google The best Google Doodles Olaudah Equiano Google Doodle celebrating abolitionist Olaudah Equiano Google The best Google Doodles Fridtjof Nansen Google Doodle celebrating Norwegian explorer Fridtjof Nansen Google The best Google Doodles Ladislao Jose Biro Google celebrates Ladislao Jose Biro's 117th birthday The best Google Doodles Amalia Hernandez Google Doodle celebrating ballet choreographer Amalia Hernandez Google The best Google Doodles Dr Samuel Johnson Google Doodle celebrating lexicographer Dr Samuel Johnson Google The best Google Doodles British Sign Language Google Doodle celebrating British Sign Language Google The best Google Doodles Eduard Khil Google Doodle celebrating baritone singer Eduard Khil Google The best Google Doodles Fourth of July Google Doodle celebrating Fourth of July Google The best Google Doodles Victor Hugo Google Doodle celebrating author Victor Hugo Google The best Google Doodles Google Doodle celebrating Giro d'Italia's 100th Anniversary Google Doodle celebrating Giro d'Italia's 100th Anniversary Google The best Google Doodles Google Doodle celebrating St. Patrick's Day Google Doodle celebrating St. Patrick's Day Google The best Google Doodles Google Doodle celebrating St. David's Day Google Doodle celebrating St. David's Day Google The best Google Doodles Steve Biko Today's Google Doodle features anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko Google The best Google Doodles The history of tea in Britain Google celebrates the 385th anniversary of tea in the UK The best Google Doodles Nettie Stevens Google celebrates geneticist Nettie Stevens 155th birthday The best Google Doodles William Morris Google celebrates English polymath William Morris' 182 birthday with a doodle showcasing his most famous designs Google The best Google Doodles Professor Scoville Google marks Professor Scovilles 151st birthday The best Google Doodles Sophie Taeuber-Arp Google marks artist Sophie Taeuber-Arp's 127th birthday

The verb google, meaning to search for something online, has become so widely used that it was added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary and Oxford English Dictionary in 2006.

The date of Googles birthday has changed over the years without much explanation. Until 2005 the website celebrated its birthday on September 7, supposedly marking the day it became an incorporated company.

But the company actually filed incorporation papers on September 4, 1998, though it has never used this date as its birthday. Since 2005 it has marked its birthday on September 8, September 26 and, more recently, September 27.

When is Googles birthday? Im not sure even we know, wrote Google employee Ryan Germick in 2013, adding: Still, while theres some differing opinions about when to bust out the candles and cake, one fun fact is that our first Doodle was posted even before Google was officially incorporated (30 August, 1998 vs 4 September, 1998).
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-25 04:09:21|Editor: huaxia

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A staff member disinfects the Square of Amir Abdul Qader at the center of Algiers, Algeria, Sept. 24, 2020. Algeria on Thursday reported 179 new COVID-19 cases, the lowest daily tally since June 29, bringing the total infections to 50,579, the Algerian Ministry of Health said. (Xinhua)

ALGIERS, Sept. 24 (Xinhua) -- Algeria on Thursday reported 179 new COVID-19 cases, ther lowest daily tally since June 29, bringing the total infections to 50,579, the Algerian Ministry of Health said.

It also announced five new fatalities from the coronavirus, leading the death toll in the North African state to 1,703.

Meanwhile, 116 more patients were discharged from hospitals, bringing the total number of recoveries to 35,544.

Algerian Health Minister Abderrahmane Benbouzid on Thursday ruled out the immediate reopening of Algeria's borders which have been closed for more than six months.

He explained in an interview with local media that some countries with close contacts to Algeria, such as France, are experiencing a new wave of COVID-19 outbreak. He stressed that the objective of the state is to protect the health of Algerian citizens.

Algeria, which reported the first COVID-19 case on Feb. 25, has been resuming economic and commercial activities since June 7 as part of its efforts to return to normal life.

China and Algeria have offered mutual help in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.

In early February, Algeria sent medical donations to help China combat the coronavirus. China sent two batches of medical aid to Algeria on March 27 and April 15, respectively.

A Chinese medical team arrived in Algeria on May 14 for a 15-day mission to help fight the coronavirus by sharing China's experience in curbing the spread of the contagious disease.
ERPM exams not held for more than a year; Medical graduates distraught View(s):

Around 1000 foreign medical graduates, who returned to Sri Lanka to pursue a career in medicine and serve their country, said an undue delay of conducting the mandatory Examination for Registration to Practice Medicine (ERPM) by the Sri Lanka Medical Council (SLMC) violated their fundamental rights. They said the exams had not been held for more than a year.

The graduates with medical degrees from universities recognised by the SLMC, are eligible to sit for four part examination after they submitted their degree certificates and relevant documents.

The SLMC was vested with powers to conduct each part of the examinations at least twice a year. The last ERPM (part A&D) exams were held in July 2019. The graduates said since then exams had not been held, citing pending legal cases in the Supreme Court where the SLMC was appointed as one of the respondents.

In June this year, it was revealed by the Registrar of SLMC through a Right to Information (RTI) application filed by affected students that six court cases were pending in court, and the graduates were assured that once the cases concluded, exams would be conducted.

On July 23, the Supreme Court gave separate verdicts, favourable to the foreign medical graduates, outlining the fact that according to the Medical Ordinance of Sri Lanka, there was no minimum A/L requirement for practicing medicine in Sri Lanka. The court said the SLMC was operating outside its rights in imposing arbitrary requirements upon foreign medical graduates.

Following the court verdict, the SLMC released a notice calling all eligible candidates to apply for the ERPM Part A and D. The period for applying for the exam was from August 24 to September 4. Later the SLMC issued another notice which said the closing date for applications had been extended indefinitely. They did not give any reasons for this change.

Though no answer was given in writing, speaking to some officials of the SLMC led us to reliably suspect that there is some internal strife within the SLMC over the verdicts of the Supreme Court, and his has resulted in the exam being delayed indefinitely, One of the graduates said.
By PTI

MUMBAI: Actress Deepika Padukone was on Saturday questioned here for five hours by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) probing the alleged Bollywood-drug nexus linked to film star Sushant Singh Rajput's death case, an official said.

Sources said that Padukone was confronted with her manager Karishma Prakash during questioning. "Prakash's WhatsApp chats, including purported conversations about drugs with one 'D', are on the radar of the anti-drugs agency," sources had said.

ALSO READ| NCB arrests Dharma Productions employee Kshitij Ravi Prasad in Bollywood drug case

Padukone, who reached the NCB guest house in Colaba in south Mumbai around 9:50 am, left around 3:50 pm, a police official deployed outside the guest house said. After questioning, both Padukone and Praksh were allowed to go home around 3:40 pm, NCB sources said.

#WATCH Actor Deepika Padukone leaves from Narcotics Control Bureau's (NCB) Special Investigation Team (SIT) office after almost five hours#Mumbai pic.twitter.com/VLuTHNQv9h  ANI (@ANI) September 26, 2020

Prakash first came out of the guest house, followed by Padukone. They left in their cars separately, the police official said. Media personnel were present in large numbers outside the barricaded area near the guest house.

There were reports that Padukone's husband and actor Ranveer Singh had asked the NCB if he could also remain present during her questioning. However, the NCB had on Friday clarified that it did not receive any such request.

ALSO READ| Agencies 'pressed' for 'pre-planned result' in Sushant case: Rhea Chakraborty's lawyer

The NCB is also questioning actresses Shraddha Kapoor and Sara Ali Khan at its office separately in connection with the alleged drug nexus. The federal agency had arrested actress Rhea Chakraborty, her brother Showik, and some suspected drug peddlers, earlier.

Rajput (34) was found hanging in his apartment in suburban Bandra on June 14.
Amid the protracted Sino-India stand-off in eastern Ladakh, 131 young soldiers joined the prestigious Ladakh Scouts regiment in Leh on Saturday.

A defence spokesperson said, An attestation parade was held on Saturday at the Ladakh Scouts Regimental Centre, Leh, to mark the entry of 131 well trained recruits into the Ladakh Scouts Regiment. Due to the ongoing pandemic, the ceremony was conducted without the presence of the recruits parents and in accordance all norms and advisories. Leh sub-area deputy general officer commanding Brig Arun CG reviewed the attestation parade, the defence spokesperson said.

The soldiers, hailing from all regions of Ladakh, took an oath to serve the nation.

Congratulating the soldiers, Brig Arun CG said, He exhorted young soldiers to continue to strive hard in pursuit of excellence in all spheres of profession and take a solemn vow to uphold the sovereignty of the nation against all odds in the true spirit, signified by the ethos of the Indian Army, said the spokesperson.

The young riflemen were awarded medals for their outstanding performance during training. On June 15, at least 20 Indian soldiers had laid down their life in the line of duty while combating Chinese troops at Galwan valley.
Researchers have investigated, at great lengths, both the experiences of women and LGBTTQ+ individuals in public spaces. As authors of this piece, we have often experienced the impacts of sexual harassment, discrimination and prejudice in city spaces first-hand.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 26/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Researchers have investigated, at great lengths, both the experiences of women and LGBTTQ+ individuals in public spaces. As authors of this piece, we have often experienced the impacts of sexual harassment, discrimination and prejudice in city spaces first-hand.

For example, when we have expressed affection for partners while out in the open  it has been hard not to ignore the significant role that design and planning have played in the enjoyment, comfort, safety, and sense of belonging in our urban landscapes.

In Sex in the digital city: location-based dating apps and queer urban life, Sam Miles argues that cities have historically "constituted vital spaces for sexual difference and queer communities, from the Victorian flaneur and cruiser to the gay villages of the Global North"  but today, these spaces are few and far between, likely due to the evolving nature of sociality.

More people are turning to online dating apps to develop personal connections. Is that because of a widespread embrace of technological change? Or because our public spaces have turned on us, becoming less safe and less able to support spontaneous interaction and gathering? According to Miles, contemporary cities are becoming privatized, and "urban space is losing is centrality as a site of encounter, including queer encounter."

With COVID-19 restrictions, opportunities for spontaneous connection and dating in public space is even further reduced.

Meeting online through a dating app might make it easier and more efficient to establish connections with like-minded or similar individuals, sometimes through a filtering of preferences. For LGBTTQ+ people, it might be easier to locate others online, rather than in a public space  spaces that have been largely designed for heteronormative experiences. In cities where public spaces are not equally accessible, where people do not feel like they belong, going "online" is often the ubiquitous alternative  helping many to find a sense of place, and to develop community connections.

In Miles study, 36 gay men who use location-based dating apps such as Grindr and Tinder, were interviewed on topics of sexuality, community, technology and spaces of encounter. These participants noted how dating apps allowed them to filter potential dates based on their location and proximity. For example, dating app users would rather connect with individuals living near to them. Miles interviews showed a consensus amongst the men: that dating apps allow users to more easily identify other gay individuals in their city, moreso than they would be able to in public spaces  thereby reducing the chance of mistaking heterosexual individuals as gay  an occurrence that was noted as happening quite often, resulting in feelings of embarrassment and a perceived lack of safety. When asked about where they meet, participants noted how "urban public space is increasingly subject to surveillance and access reduction"  leading to many users meeting in private spaces for the first time.

How do these online experiences conflict with a citys growing desire to become more inclusive, more safe, and more accessible for people of all backgrounds, gender identities, sexual orientations, ages and abilities? When dating app users go from "online" to "offline" and have no public spaces to meet and feel comfortable, how does that potentially impact personal safety and well-being? If public spaces are designed to accommodate only heteronormative experiences and identities, what does that say about a citys support for LGBTTQ+ communities?

A woman, who asked to be anonymous, shared with us that she used dating apps such as Tinder and Bumble to explore and learn more about her queerness, and to be able to meet other racialized LGBTTQ+ people in a safe space.

"My experience in a lot of queer spaces in real life are often not in sober spaces, instead, they are in bars and clubs," she said. "It can feel really insular. A lot of queer folks go online because they dont feel safe offline  these spaces can feel really overwhelming for baby queers who are just learning and exploring their own needs, wants, and boundaries for space."

When asked about alternative meet-up spaces, she said that many LGBTTQ+ individuals create space for each other in a do-it-yourself fashion: in each others homes. This migration to privately owned spaces seems to suggest that public spaces currently lack amenities, services and opportunities to nurture a sense of comfort and safety for people in the LGBTTQ+ community. In cities such as Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver, LGBTTQ+ districts are becoming the norm  offering both public and private spaces for a wide variety of expression, whether that be passive recreation or evening hospitality.

We can learn a lot from the behaviours of people who use dating apps. When people meet online, then eventually decide to meet in person, they may consider factors that include location, proximity to their home/neighbourhoods, comfort/convenience. Gender and sexual identity may also play a role in determining where to meet  likely public spaces that feel more safe. What do people consider when making the decision to meet someone offline? Where do they meet? How do they get there? Do they feel safe?

For many women, the location of the first date is limited by both practical and serious considerations. One woman, who we will identify as Emma, met her husband Ryan on Lavalife. When deciding to meet Ryan in person, she noted, "Safety was my No. 1 consideration. Meeting in a public place is a must. Midday for lunch on a weekend was preferable, as it was the safest, especially in winter with the shorter daylight hours."

At a restaurant or cafe, a woman also has a built-in safety net if things go wrong. One woman, who we will call Amanda, told us about meeting up with a man for the first time in person after initially connecting on Tinder. He showed up to the date drunk, and became increasingly belligerent as they sat at a table for a half-hour. Amanda went up to the bartender and explained the situation. He told her to excuse herself and go to the restroom, and to stay there until he came to get her. When the bartender returned, the situation had been resolved: he and another staff member had asked the man to leave.

The design of a public space plays a big role in where users might meet, Emma noted.

"Ensure public spaces are safe, thoughtfully designed and well-lit. Decrease blind spots and provide fun activities for offline dates. I took the bus, and so it was important for the meeting location to be relatively central, a place like The Forks." When these constraints are considered, central locations with good access to transit and taxis come out on top. Main streets downtown also have more potential meeting spots such as cafes, restaurants, bars, and public squares. Activities that include public markets, live music and live theatre are usually located in central areas or on main streets.

When considering Emmas experience, we could not help but think about how young people, who live outside of the downtown, might navigate "online to offline" dating scenarios. Without transportation options, how do young people meet up?

For those living in suburban areas, using a car to access meeting locations is critical because they are more dispersed, but the availability of ride-hailing apps removes this barrier. The availability of potential dates may be more limited in small towns. Dating within small communities is spatially simple  the local bar or cafe may be the only place to meet in person. In Modern Romance, Aziz Ansari and Eric Klinenberg noted that those in smaller communities and rural areas used dating apps, but admitted that the dating pool is much more constrained because everyone knows each other and their dating histories. Young people in these communities are content to date and settle down with someone within this limited dating pool  a marked contrast to those in cities such as New York, where the seemingly unlimited pool of potential dates contributes to a persons inability or unwillingness to focus on one partner.

For those who are in their 40s, 50s, or older, dating apps are one of the few ways to meet people in their age range. Thats because they are less likely to live centrally, where a lot of casual meeting places are located, and they have few single friends within their social circles, where long-term partnerships are often the norm. Dating apps are also ideal for winter cities, where people tend to hibernate for several months. In-person dates allow interaction with people and areas of the city that they may not visit in their daily lives, particularly those with children, who may be completely occupied with work and child care.

With dating apps becoming the norm, are businesses experiencing an uptake in visitation? Have there been positive economic spin-offs? It is easy to observe the impact on local businesses: at a Halifax Brewery Night event in the historic waterfront, our friend Claire noted that she could spot lots of Tinder dates around us. She used to work as a bartender, and had spent years observing people on dates. At a recent dance event held at Haliente, a Halifax dance studio teaching in salsa, bachata and African dance, one participant told us that she was on a first date. In a city rumoured to have more bars per capita than any other in Canada, Halifax has a lot to gain from those who want to meet their online crush in person. In Winnipeg, heavily frequented food halls such as The Forks and Hargrave Street Market, have many businesses seeing green as more and more online connections evolve into public encounters.

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So what is a city planner to do?

In Toronto, a condemned building located at 519 Church St., was converted into The 519, a City of Toronto agency that provides space for communities to meet, to organize, and to work towards their goals. Counselling services, resources and support are designed to respond to the evolving needs of the LGBTTQ+ communities. Perhaps Winnipeg and other cities might benefit from creating similar sober spaces like these  offering many to meet and feel safe.

The Calgary Institute for the Humanities recently launched a map, as part of The Calgary Atlas Project. Developed by Mark Clintberg and Kevin Allen, it highlights early histories of Calgarys LGBTTQ+ communities. Perhaps additional layers, stories and information could be added to a map of this format  sharing with readers and users the safe, comfortable and convenient places for people to meet and gather?

Dating apps might be the domain of the private sector, but planners can facilitate spaces for people to meet and socialize. Public parks or recreation venues like the Halifax Common and waterfront boardwalk in Halifax provide opportunities for people of all ages to meet: theyre free and offer a variety of activities, such as ice-skating, concerts and people-watching. Downtowns redesigned Argyle Street ensures safety with well-lit patios, a high level of pedestrian traffic and pedestrian prioritization over cars in key areas; the numerous bars, restaurants, live music venues and the Neptune Theatre provide a range of meeting places. Planners should expand these high-quality streetscapes and meeting places to key suburban areas as well, such as transit interchanges or regional shopping centres. If Winnipeg and other cities become eager to "swipe right" to improvements to the public domain, it might mean increased opportunities for meet-ups, connections and inclusivity.

Jason Syvixay is an award-winning urban planner and public relations professional currently completing his PhD in Urban and Regional Planning at the University of Alberta. He has worked as the managing director of the Downtown Winnipeg BIZ, a planner with HTFC Planning & Design, and more recently, has joined the City of Edmonton to lead and support the implementation of its Infill Roadmap.

Dr. Ren Thomas is a researcher, writer, and instructor who is passionate about planning, with a focus on housing, transportation, growth management policies, and governance. She is an Assistant Professor at the School of Planning at Dalhousie University, where she teaches a course on social justice and leads research on non-profit housing, rental housing policy and transit-oriented development.
Students at one of Australia's most exclusive all-girls schools could be banned from sitting final exams after plans for vulgar muck-up day 'Scavenger Hunt' were leaked.

Students at Pymble Ladies College, on Sydney's north shore, encouraged each other to 'swallow a goldfish', 'streak down a highway' and to even 'have sex with someone's dad' as part of a graduation challenge.

Many of the challenges in the document believed to be associated with the $33,000-a-year school were sexual or criminal in nature.

Students would be split into teams and would gain points for every task they could prove they had completed.

Graduating students at elite private girls' school Pymble Ladies' College (pictured), on Sydney's north shore, allegedly created a vulgar muck-up day challenge

Some of the alleged challenges by the students at Pymble encouraged girls to 'have sex with someone's dad' and 'eat someone's vomit'

A spokesperson for the school said students would face punishment for carrying out the muck-up day plan, 7NEWS reported.

'We are horrified and disappointed that any student would have their name associated with what was apparently a competitive list between students at a number of schools,' they said.

'Students have been advised of the consequences.'

One of the alleged tasks challenged students to 'do cocaine off someone's body', to 'get arrested' or even apply for a job at a brothel.

The God Tier of challenges asked Year 12 girls to get a tattoo and tell their parents how they lost their virginity

Sending a 'group photo' to specific teachers, inking a 'PYMBLE' tattoo or getting a face piercing was worth 100 points.

The 'God tier' level of challenges also included 'ring parent and explain in depth how you lost your virginity' and 'meet up with someone' from LGBTQ dating app Grindr.

Daily Mail Australia has contacted Pymble Ladies College for comment.

A similar scavenger hunt was also organised as part of a muck-up challenge for the elite Shore School on Sydney's lower north shore.

The 'official rule and challenge book' - created by students in a PDF document - revealed they planned to meet between 5pm and 6pm on Wednesday at Waverton Park for the series of 'treacherous' challenges.

The 'Scavenger Hunt' required girls to divide into teams and perform a variety of sexual and illegal acts in order to score points (Pymble Ladies' College pictured)

The school leavers would then be split into teams of five or six before carrying out a series of tasks to compete for points.

The rule book stated all participants from the $33,000-a-year school were required to chip in $10 and the team who gathers the most points would be awarded the total cash prize.

Before starting the challenges, the groups would be required to finish a case of 30 beers in 15 minutes.

The competitors would then be given seven hours of 'hunting' from 6pm to 1am.

There were more than 150 challenges listed in the scavenger hunt rule book and the tasks range in difficulty.

Students from elite private boys' school Shore, in Sydney's lower north shore, also attempted to complete a controversial challenge named the 'Triwizard Shorenament' (pictured)

The school is among the top ranked in New South Wales and regularly features impressive Year 12 results

One challenge called the 'Pakistan Sacrifice' read: 'Eat two laxatives and a Phaal Curry (spicy curry) from Lavender Bay Curry.

'Warning: Will be s***ing all night and probably will want to die.'

Another challenge was dubbed the 'trifecta spit' which included a 'spit roast', spitting on a homeless man and jumping off the Spit Bridge.

For 10,000 points, students could 'get on a plane to Melbourne'.
WASHINGTON, Sept. 26, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- President Donald Trump today announced Judge Amy Coney Barrett as his nominee to the nation's highest court.

Family Research Council President Tony Perkins, who attended the White House announcement on the Court, released the following statement:

"Once again, President Trump is following through on his promise and has selected a nominee who has a proven, originalist track record. Judge Amy Barrett is a highly qualified nominee who is committed to the Constitution and understands that a judge's role is not to legislate from the bench.

"Senate Democrats have already made clear there will be a fight over the nominee regardless of who it is, so the president is making the fight worth it.

"Thanks to President Trump, we now have the opportunity after many decades to finally return lawmaking back to the legislatures that are elected by the people. The Left, failing to win in the court of public opinion and in legislatures, has increasingly relied on the courts to rewrite laws to suit their purposes. However, the reality is sinking in among Senate Democrats that the era of legislating from the Supreme Court bench may soon be over. That's why the president's judicial nominees face smears and attacks on their faith.

"Senate Democrat Dianne Feinstein once infamously told Judge Barrett that the 'dogma lives loudly within you'  more than insinuating that it is somehow impossible to serve both God and country. Implying Barrett's religious beliefs somehow disqualifies her for the job is a violation of Article VI of the Constitution.

"We are putting Senate Democrats on notice should they return to their religious test playbook. Should you use Judge Barrett's faith as a club to attack her nomination, she will not stand alone. Millions of Americans will stand with her. In fact, 'Remember the dogma' like 'Remember the Alamo' may become an enduring battle cry for religious liberty," concluded Perkins.

SOURCE Family Research Council

Related Links

http://www.frc.org


Dilmah launches tea beer in Australia View(s):

Two of Australias most beloved rituals have been combined in one ground-breaking beer thanks to Port Adelaide Pirate Life Brewing and family tea company Dilmah.

The Australian-first collaboration has produced Tea and Biccies Brown Ale, combining the deliciousness of fresh beer with the refreshing taste and natural goodness of Sri Lankan black tea, Dilmah Tea said in a statement in Colombo.

We are planning to push the boundaries on what tea and beer can be, said Pirate Life Brewing Founder Michael Cameron. Tea and Biccies Brown Ale, exclusively available in Australia from September 24, is made from handcrafted malted barley, New Zealand hops and is infused with the global tea brands signature Single Origin Pure Ceylon Black Tea.

Pirate Life and Dilmah  well known in Australia for its iconic advertising featuring the sign-off Do Try It!  will work closely together to produce a series of alcoholic beverages. Tea and Biccies was first tasted by Dilmah Founder, Merrill J. Fernando at a Tea Party hosted by Australias High Commissioner to Sri Lanka, David Holly this week.

Dilmah CEO, Dilhan C. Fernando said he knew from the first taste of the Pirate Life beer that this was no ordinary beer.

My father, Merrill J. Fernando  Mr Dilmah  was the original disrupter, offering tea picked, perfected and packed right where it is grown with the love that only a tea grower can have for his produce. When he brought Dilmah Tea to Australia, he was the first tea grower in the world to offer his tea direct to consumers. It was only a matter of time, in the land where good tea and good beer are held in high esteem, before Dilmah tea would partner with the very passionate and disruptive team at Pirate Life, Mr. Fernando said.

Dilmah Founder, Merrill J. Fernando added, We have a long association with Australia, the birthplace of Dilmah Tea, and with the Australian Mission in Sri Lanka.

Mr. Cameron said drinkers can expect the new brew to have rich malty aromas, with lifted notes of stone fruit and spice. On the palate, fine tannins, freshly baked biscuit, and a host of herbal undertones. It is 5.6 per cent ABV.
Pubs have to close at 10pm (Picture: Getty)

A scientist advising Boris Johnson has claimed he never heard the 10pm pub curfew plan discussed before it was announced.

The prime minister told people in England this week to work from home where possible and ordered restaurants and bars to close early from Thursday to tackle a fast-spreading second wave of coronavirus.

Some politicians have questioned whether those measures go far enough, however, with the first minister of Scotland, Nicola Sturgeon, telling households they also cannot mix indoors.

Professor Graham Medley, who sits on the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) committee, has now said the group never talked about the impact the policy of closing hospitality services earlier would have on infection rates.

He said: I never discussed it or heard it discussed.

His colleague on Sage, Professor John Edmunds, also previously said the curfew was fairly trivial and would have a very small impact on the epidemic.

Prof Medley, a professor of infectious disease modelling, added: We put forward, what we think works, but it's the government which decides what package of measures to put forward and, in the end, it's a societal decision.

He said he was worried the UK could be moving too slowly to tackle the sharp rise in COVID-19 cases because of a lag between case numbers and deaths which means fatalities have remained relatively low.

He added deaths would rise in three to four weeks to around 100 a day.

Prof Medley said: "And the things that we do now will not stop 100 people dying a day, but they will stop that progressing much higher.

Professor Graham Medley said the 10pm curfew was not discussed with Sage (Picture: Getty)

The UK already has the highest death toll in Europe from COVID-19, at 41,936.

While around 900 people died a day at the April peak of the pandemic, current death rates are around 30.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said on Friday new cases in England had shot up to around 9,600 per day in the week to 19 September, up from around 6,000 the previous week.

It was also reported the number of coronavirus patients who have been put on ventilators has doubled in the past eight days.

Story continues

The most recent government data shows 228 patients were on ventilators on Wednesday, up from 115 on 15 September.

Coronavirus: what happened today

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The (ADB) has approved a 300 million dollar (about Rs 2,200 crore) loan to finance inclusive water supply and sanitation infrastructure and services in secondary towns of

The project is expected to build citywide access for improved water supply services for about 5.7 lakh people and enhanced sanitation services for about 7.2 lakh people in at least 14 secondary towns. These localities have 20,000 to one lakh residents.

"Partnership with ADB helps ensure a longer-term policy dialogue on deepening financial sustainability and institutional strengthening, particularly in local governments, and introduces new good practices," said ADB Senior Urban Development Specialist for South Asia Na Won Kim.

"Specifically, ADB will help ensure that the project incorporates practical lessons and innovations. The use of smart technologies and a cost-effective system are the key innovative features that could be widely replicated in other cities in and beyond," she said in a statement.

Through the project, water supply systems in at least eight project towns are expected to improve by 2027 with about one lakh households including all urban poor households benefiting from five new or rehabilitated water treatment plants and 1,350 km of distribution networks.

Citywide sanitation systems based on the most cost-effective solutions will also be developed. The project will build on three earlier related projects and sector reforms funded by ADB in

Since 2000, the government has implemented two multi-sector urban investment projects supported by ADB, benefiting more than 70 lakh people in 21 cities. The third project, Rajasthan Urban Sector Development Programme, implements water supply and sanitation investments in six major cities.

The project will strengthen institutional capacity of local governments and Rajasthan Urban Drinking Water, Sewerage, and Infrastructure Corporation Ltd, a corporate entity established with ADB's technical support.

The project will provide enhanced support to women and vulnerable groups through skills training, paid internships, and community engagement and awareness activities.

.
Making a strong pitch for India's inclusion as a permanent member of United Nations Security Council, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday said "reform in the responses, in the processes, and in the very character of the United Nations is the need of the hour" and wondered as to how long India with its unique contribution to the UN will be "kept out of the decision-making structures" of the world body.

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BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syria's air defence chief was killed during an offensive by President Bashar al-Assad's forces against rebels east of Damascus, Islamist rebels and a monitoring group said. They said General Hussein Ishaq died on Sunday from wounds suffered on Saturday during the assault by Assad's forces on the town of Mleiha which appears aimed at expanding the president's control around the capital before a June 3 election. The air defence forces which have a large base in Mleiha and are responsible for defending against air attacks, have played little part in the war with rebels who have no air power. However, Ishaq is one of the most senior military officials to be killed in three years of conflict. The last high-ranking casualty was Hilal al-Assad, a cousin of the president and regional head of the National Defence Force militia, who was killed two months ago in the Mediterranean province of Latakia. "We announce good news to the Islamic nation, of the killing of one of the leaders of unbelief, General Hussein Yaqoub Ishaq, head of the Air Defence Administration in Mleiha," the Islamic Front said in a statement. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based monitoring group, also reported Ishaq's death in Mleiha, which is close to the road linking central Damascus to the international airport. Mleiha lies on the edge of the eastern Ghouta region - a mix of farmland and small towns which have formed a base for rebel fighters but which have been surrounded by Assad's forces for more than a year. The army, backed by Shi'ite fighters from Iraq and Lebanon's Hezbollah group, has pushed back the rebels around Damascus and consolidated Assad's grip over central Syria, including the Lebanese border the country's third-largest city, Homs. State media made no mention of Ishaq's death but pro-Assad Internet sites said he was "martyred" in Mleiha. REBELS SEIZE HAMA TOWN North of Damascus, rebels killed 34 pro-Assad fighters when they attacked an army post near the town of Tel Malah in Hama province on Sunday, the Observatory said. Video footage released by the rebels showed the building - a school which they said the army had commandeered as a base - as well a captured armoured personnel carrier and a tank. The area has changed hands several times during Syria's protracted conflict, and the rebels said it was the third time they had taken control there. The town of Tel Malah lies on a road linking two Christian towns in Hama province and is also close to several Alawite villages. Assad's family is from Syria's Alawite minority, who mostly support the president, and many Christians also back him, fearing the increasingly radicalised Sunni Muslim rebels. The rebels who took over Tel Malah included fighters from the Nusra Front - al Qaeda's official branch in Syria - the Islamic Front. More than 150,000 people have been killed in Syria's civil war, which erupted after Assad responded with force to protests against his rule three years ago. After clawing back territory in the centre of the country Assad is now preparing for a presidential election which is widely expected to extend his 14-year rule for another seven-year term. (Reporting by Dominic Evans; Editing by Alison Williams and Sophie Hares)
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-27 04:59:54|Editor: huaxia

Video Player Close

BEIRUT, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- A total of 13 militants were killed in clashes between the Lebanese army and an armed group in Wadi Khaled of northern Lebanon, Elnashra news website reported on Saturday.

The Lebanese army raided on Saturday the armed group in Wadi Khaled leading to severe clashes between the two sides near the Syrian border.

On Friday, the Lebanese army arrested a member of the Islamic State (IS) group in the north of the country for his involvement two weeks ago in al-Beddawi area in a battle that killed four army soldiers and a leader of a IS group. Enditem
Its starting to look a lot like fall.

Yet the vast majority of Oregons classrooms remain empty as the coronavirus pandemic continues. And although some schools have welcomed younger students back into schools, many more are located in counties where case counts are too high to meet state metrics for reopening.

State and local education officials have emphasized the new school year will look much different than any other.

And theyve been right: From the pandemic to continued protests against systemic justice and police brutality to historic wildfires that displaced hundreds across the state, fall 2020 is among the most news-laden, school-hampering seasons in history.

Weve got all of that and more in this jumbo-sized education roundup. Heres the biggest news from across the state this week:

Education stories from the Portland area:

Portland Public Schools is providing only 4 1/2 hours per week of synchronous instruction for its middle school students. Sixth, seventh and eighth graders in the states largest district are allowed six 45-minute periods of face-time with their teachers on Mondays and Tuesdays and none after that.

Meanwhile, middle schoolers in neighboring Beaverton have four periods in which they get direct contact with their teachers on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays. And in McMinnville, teachers touch base with their students daily.

Portland parents say its unfair.

Im not expecting that the teacher put on some amazing lesson on a Wednesday, Thursday or Friday. But there should be a check-in. Something, Kara Colley, whose daughter attends West Sylvan Middle School, told The Oregonian/OregonLive.

Meanwhile, several Portland-area districts continue to grapple with racist intrusions during online school events. The latest instance came during a back-to-school event at Ron Russell Middle School, where someone logged into the digital meeting and went on a racist tirade, The Portland Tribune reports.

Officials in Lake Oswego and Portland had previously reported intruders logging into classroom sessions and leaving racist messages in the chats.

Experts say the best way to avoid interruptions in Zoom is to lock the session or require a password to enter. Hosts can also close person-to-person chats in order to mitigate bullying.

From across the state:

School districts in the coastal cities of Warrenton and Brookings have gone fully online for the foreseeable future after coronavirus cases surfaced in both communities this week.

In Clatsop County, an outbreak of 77 new cases at a local seafood cannery, prompting education officials in Warrenton to close school buildings until at least Oct. 9. Until this week, staff and faculty were allowed inside, The Daily Astorian reports. Officials in nearby Astoria had planned to begin in-person instruction for its youngest students Oct. 1. But the state requires that counties see no more than 30 cases per 100,000 residents for three consecutive weeks before reopening to kindergartners, first-, second- and third-graders. Last week, Clatsop County logged an average of 43 new cases per day, according to state figures.

In the southern coast city of Brookings, officials last weekend announced one case tied to an elementary school. Brookings-Harbor district Superintendent David Marshall in a note to families said people in the building were exposed by individuals but did not specify whether the case was linked to students, staff or faculty.

So far, coronavirus cases have been linked to three school districts across the state, Brad Schmidt of The Oregonian/OregonLive reports.

And nationally:

For this weeks episode of the NPR program Its Been a Minute, host Sam Sanders heard from dozens of educators across the country about teaching in the age of COVID and spoke at length with two  one in Utah and another in Texas.

Their experiences differ wildly on everything from their working conditions to the reasons one of them feels perfectly comfortable speaking on the record while the other cannot. (Fun fact: Sanders briefly worked for Oregon Public Broadcasting.)

On a similar note:

Teachers! We want to hear from you. Tell us what fall has been like. How is your day-to-day? What are some of the biggest challenges youve faced so far this year? What about some of the small victories youve notched? Email Eder or give him a call: 503-221-4344.

More education headlines from The Oregonian/OregonLive:

When school districts canceled meal delivery, Black moms stepped in to make supply runs

Small Oregon school district in county with high COVID-19 rates sues state for barring in-person education (The Argus Observer)

Oregon Department of Education issues ban on hate symbols on public schools

2 SW Washington schools close due to COVID-19 (The Associated Press)

Ruth Bader Ginsburgs 92 grad address with husband Marty remembered at Lewis & Clark Law

Education coverage from other Portland-area media:

Prescott Elementary principal focused on building relationships, equity in distance learning (OPB)

Online learning camp taught by Washington County students (The Beaverton Valley Times)

One Latina educators personal, professional distance learning challenges (The Portland Tribune)

And across the state:

Parents urge Baker school board to bring students back to classrooms (The Baker City Herald)

Rising COVID cases could cancel Bend-La Pines K-3 reopening plans (The Bend Bulletin)

Change in state school reopening rules could put older Crook County students back in classrooms (The Bend Bulletin)

Lake County School District begins in-person instruction (The Lake County Examiner)

COVID-19 spike means some Douglas County schools must delay in-person learning plans (The Roseburg News-Review)

Corvallis school board discusses land transfer with Philomath, emphasis on Indigenous Peoples' Day (The Corvallis Gazette-Times)

Kids under stress as wildfire evacuations join pandemic, recession and no in-person school (The Salem Reporter/Pamplin)

Parents can get time off work to help with distance learning. Heres how (The Salem Statesman Journal)

--Eder Campuzano | 503-221-4344 | @edercampuzano | Eder on Facebook

Eder is The Oregonians education reporter. Do you have a tip about Portland Public Schools? Email ecampuzano@oregonian.com.
Islamabad: Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan has assailed Indias Hindu nationalist government and its moves to cement control of Muslim-majority Kashmir, calling his neighbour a state sponsor of hatred and prejudice against Islam.

Khan told the annual United Nations gathering of world leaders that Islamophobia ruled India and threatened the nearly 200 million Muslims who live there. He also criticised other countries' "targeting of Muslims" in the "name of free speech" but stopped short of faulting economic partner China for its treatment of Uighurs.

They believe that India is exclusive to Hindus and others are not equal citizens, he said in a prerecorded speech to the UN General Assembly being held virtually over several days amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Pakistani PM Imran Khan speaks in a pre-recorded message played during the 75th session of the UN General Assembly on Friday. Credit:UNTV/AP

Khan has frequently criticised the August 2019 decision by the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to strip Jammu and Kashmirs statehood, scrap its separate constitution and remove inherited protections on land and jobs.
Grolsch relaunching in UK with new branding and ad campaign

Premium pilsner Grolsch is returning the UK market this Autumn with a new look to match its new brewing location.

Following feedback from UK consumers, the pilsner is back with a lower ABV of 4% and is now made using two types of Dutch malt and a "double-brew" process at his historic home in Enschede, in the Netherlands.

It brings with it a new bottle design, designed to champion its heritage and Dutch provenance, and its recognisable 'swing-top' bottle profile. The relaunch will be supported by a multimillion-pound advertising campaign, focused around the strapline 'Double brewed for double the flavour'. Following a social media launch next month, the campaign will roll out in 2021 with national advertising, point-of-sale materials, staff training and other promotional activity.

Tim Clay, managing director at Asahi UK, which owns Grolsch, said: "Grolsch Premium Pilsner is back with a fresh identity and a brilliant, revitalised liquid, brewed at its iconic home in the East Netherlands. The new packaging and in-bar experience we've tailored for Grolsch's return is just as exciting - highly distinctive and full of character. We're delighted with the response and take-up so far and already have more than 100 draught installs agreed.

"It comes at an important time with a growing consumer preference for a range of ABV beers that also offer high quality and strong provenance."

Marc Janssen, second-generation master brewer at the Royal Grolsch brewery in the Netherlands, added: "Our double-brew process here at Grolsch might take a little longer and cost more than some do, but we believe it's worth it."

26 September 2020 - Bethany Whymark
Major fire was reported from a shoe factory in Narela industrial area on Friday night. At least 26 fire tenders were rushed to the spot to douse the inferno.

"We received a call at around 10:45 p.m. from the factory about the fire in basement and other floors. Total 26 fire tenders rushed to the site," said Atul Garg, Director Delhi Fire Service.

Though no injuries were reported and the cooling operation continued till Saturday morning.

Earlier, fire was reported in Jagatpuri main market in Shahdara district in a hardware store on Friday evening. No casualty was reported.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 26)  Senator Leila de Lima again filed a measure seeking to define and criminalize extrajudicial killings, with tough penalties against government officials found guilty of abetting the crimes.

This is the third time De Lima introduced a proposed Anti-Extrajudicial Killings Act. The first two failed to hurdle Congress.

Senate Bill No. 1842, filed early this week, defines EJK as the unlawful or arbitrary killing by state agents or other individuals. It includes killings perpetrated under actual or apparent authority, or color of law, or upon the instruction of, or under the direction or control of, or by policy, order or behest of, the State.

It further specifies EJKs done with the complicity, tolerance, connivance, acknowledgment, adoption, ratification or acquiescence of the government.

The bill wants EJKs to cover killings that government agencies fail to conduct effective investigation into, resulting in degradation of human rights. It tasks the Department of Justice, in cooperation with the Commission on Human Rights, to ensure that prosecutors and investigators assigned to look into alleged EJKs have the training and education on human rights.

It also proposes that officials who allowed the act or abetted in the consummation of extrajudicial killing be held liable as principals to the crime, particularly those whose position mandate them to stop or uncover the killings.

Once the bill is passed into law, perpetrators and officials considered as principals will face reclusion perpetua or imprisonment of up to 40 years without the benefit of parole. The same penalty awaits those who directly ordered, solicited, forced, instigated, encouraged or induced others to commit the act of extrajudicial killing." Other conspirators, including the perpetrators superiors who fail to take all necessary measures to prevent the crime or submit the matter for investigation and prosecution shall also serve decades in jail.

In a statement on Saturday, De Lima said one of the most salient provisions of the bill is the prima facie case or presumption of liability on the President, heads of the police and military or other officials when a victim dies while in the custody or protection of the state or in the hands of authorities. When there is a rise in EJKs or summary executions, or when there is lack of transparency in the documentation of the killings, the concerned officials are to be held liable.

This provision would be a powerful deterrent that would make the perpetrators of EJKs think twice before pulling the trigger because they could no longer hide behind the flimsy excuse of impulse, De Lima said in a dispatch from jail. She has been detained on drug charges, but the senator calls it political persecution as a result of her criticisms of President Rodrigo Duterte's bloody war on drugs.

READ: UN rights chief: Revoke PH policies, rhetoric that lead to killings and abuses

De Lima's bill seeks varying degrees of punishment for those found to be accessories to the crime, including those who have information on the case but do not report it, those who attempted to commit EJKs, and investigating authorities who fail to immediately probe the incident.

Government agencies are also required to grant victims relatives, lawyers, and human rights organizations access to all information regarding the EJK.

A Human Rights Violations Victims Reparations Fund shall be created, to be managed by the CHR, to compensate EJK victims and their families. It shall have a budget of 20 million or higher annually.

Latest government data show 5,856 suspects have been killed in anti-drug operations. Local and international human rights groups say there have been thousands more extrajudicial killings since Duterte launched his war on drugs and talked violence against drug users in his public pronouncements.

READ: PH govt drug war worsened amid COVID-19 pandemic

Duterte, in his first appearance at the United Nations General Assembly, assured that his government remains committed to protecting citizens' human rights amid allegations of drug-war killings and human rights violations in the country. The Philippines is also facing possible trade sanctions from the European Union Parliament if it fails to act on alleged abuses.
"Frivolous and trumped up!" This is how Kentucky Representative Attica Scott described the charges that were filed against her.

Scott was among the 24 people arrested on Thursday night, following a stand-off between police and "Breonna Taylor" protesters who were seeking shelter at the First Unitarian Church in downtown Louisville.

Scott, 48, was arrested along with her daughter Ashanti. The Democratic representative is facing a felony charge of first-degree rioting and two misdemeanor charges for failure to disperse and unlawful assembly.

Speaking from the jail grounds on Friday morning after her release, Scott said that charges against her were frivolous and trumped up. She added that she's ready to fight the charges against her when she goes to court next month. Based on the court records, Scott's arraignment is scheduled for October 6.

Scott said the police claim that they were trying to burn a library does not make sense because libraries are in her district, and she has been lobbying for more funding for libraries. She noted that it does not make sense that she would be involved in burning one.

A crowd had started to gather early on Thursday night to continue the protest against a decision handed down against three police officers involved in the fatal shooting of Taylor. None of them were indicted for her death.

Scott said she was trying to join the crowd that had gathered at the grounds of the First Unitarian Church on 4th Street after the 9 p.m. curfew took effect. The church has opened its doors to protesters who would otherwise be arrested for violating the curfew.

Last month, Scott had proposed a bill dubbed as "Breonna's Law" following Taylor's death during a police raid in her home last March. The bill proposes to end no-knock warrants statewide.

Scott has been calling for police accountability and has been vocal in saying that justice is hardly ever served when Black people are being "murdered" by police officers.

The bill, which Attica Scott co-authors, would also require that a judge approve the use of violent entry when issuing the warrant.

Other provisions are having police officers activating their body cameras while serving a warrant and having police officers screened for drug and alcohol after a deadly incident or after having fired their gun while on duty.

According to Scott, their call to action is to make sure that the entire Louisville City understands that they will not go away and will continue to demand the defunding of police and the dismantling of the police department because it is corrupt from top to bottom. She said it cannot continue to function the way it does now.

Attica Scott noted that Breonna's Law for Kentucky must be passed and approved to prevent a tragedy similar to Taylor from happening again.

She added that there should be a policy change because there would be no change in the system unless policies will reflect what the people want.

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When Dylyn Fry told her uncle, Victor Melendez II, she would see him this weekend, she couldn't have known it was the last time she would speak to him.

"The last thing I ever said to him was 'I'll see you later,'" Fry said. "I figured I was going to see him that weekend. Obviously, it's the weekend, and he's not here."

Melendez, 41, was killed Monday night after being struck by an SUV in the Belmont neighborhood. The driver, Hani Hadgi, 29, was booked into jail Tuesday and charged the next day with leaving the scene of an accident causing serious bodily injury or death.

Fry said she met Melendez, known to friends and family as "Oso," when she was about 8 years old after her aunt Teresa Hill became Melendez's partner. Fry said Melendez immediately became a special person in her life, and she looked forward to spending holidays with her aunt and uncle.

"It was our tradition that, every single year, we always spent the Fourth of July together, no matter what," Fry said.

"He would drop by randomly to make sure we were doing OK," she said. "He was that kind of person that was always thinking about you."
THE PRESENCE of seconded officers of the Royal Turks and Caicos Islands Police Force (RTCIPF) has brought "calm to Her Majestys Prison in Grand Turk.





This is according to Governor Nigel Dakin, who made this and other remarks on the situation at the prison, during a press conference on Tuesday, September 15.





"Having recently visited the prison and prisoners and I can report it is far calmer since we have deployed police officers temporarily there.





"Even the prisoners I spoke to recognised that this was a necessary, if regrettable, short term measure, he stated.





The deployment of police officers to bring extra security to the prison is only a temporary assignment, with relief coming from the recruitment of 12 prison officers from the UK.





These officers will be paid by the TCI Government and are expected to arrive in early October to relieve the local police ranks.





"The UK is paying for a trainer to build up our present prison officers who we have under-invested in, the governor said. That person arrived on Thursday, September 17.





Governor Dakin said a second trainer arrives on Sunday (September 27) and that person will be contracted for two years.





Meanwhile, a new prison superintendent - who comes with extensive experience running prisons in Northern Ireland - will soon arrive in the TCI.





The governor said this person has a military background, has chaired the UK prison response to Covid-19, and has a strong reputation around rehabilitation.





Additional works to the prison will soon be completed, the governor announced.





"This week a $2 million project, paid for by the UK, to complete internal fencing and lighting projects at the prison was completed.





"A project to jam mobile phones, while allowing prisoners proper regulated access to telephony, is nearing completion.





On August 25, during a press briefing in Providenciales, Premier Sharlene Cartwright Robinson said a new prison costing $18 million will be built next to the existing failing facility.





Dakin said that despite the latest immediate investments, the premier is correct when she says that a new prison is now long overdue.





"The present prison can neither hold violent offenders securely nor can it offer any hope of serious rehabilitation.





He stated that as the territory works to build the police forces effectiveness, and make the justice sector more efficient, it also has to invest in the prison.





"Those we hold there in the end become our neighbours.





Over the years, the prison has been the scene of inmate uprisings, gang violence and a plethora of issues ranging from a lack of staff to run-down infrastructure.





Earlier this year, an inmate wielding a plank of wood knocked a prison officer unconscious in the prison yard during an altercation.





Following this incident, the Government approved a string of measures to protect staff at the facility including allowing prison guards to use Tasers, pepper spray and mace.





The combined challenges have prompted the Government to further adjust operations at the facility which currently houses 71 inmates.
With the school holidays here, police are urging people not to leave anything jup to chance when it comes to travelling on the road.

If you and your family are leaving town these school holidays to enjoy the New Zealand countryside, Police wish you safe travels, says Acting Superintendent Gini Welch, National Manager for Road Policing.

A safe trip on our roads depends on a number of factors that shouldnt be left to chance."

Gini says planning your journey is a key component.

She says think about the time of day you are travelling, especially if you are unfamiliar with the route.

If the journey is a long one, factor in breaks and sharing the driving.

Remember traffic volumes increase on our roads during school holidays, which increases the risk of serious crashes.

So make sure you play your part in staying safe on the road.

"If youre the driver, put your phone away before you set off, and dont let people in the car distract you from what youre doing.

"Its your job to get everybody to your destination safely.

Watch your speed and your following distances.

"The trip may involve traffic getting out of the main centre - you dont want to start with a fender bender.

"The margin for error is also reduced when road and weather conditions arent favourable.

"When youre travelling at higher speeds on the open road, if anything goes wrong, the speed youre travelling at will have the biggest impact on the outcome of the crash.

"So take care and always drive to the conditions.

Make sure youre well rested before you set off."

Gini says driving fatigued can be just as dangerous as driving drunk or drugged.

Finally, don't be complacent about wearing your seatbelt  everybody in the car should be wearing a seatbelt or a child safety restraint.

"And if the family dog is coming too, its a good idea to have them in a car harness or crate.

Spring weather in New Zealand is temperamental.

"It can still be cold and icy in places, incredibly windy in others, and sun strike is a major problem at certain times of the day.

So just keep these things at the front of your mind when youre on the road and enjoy your journey safely.
WATERLOO  Two teenagers are facing arson and mischief charges after an early-morning couch fire near Wilfrid Laurier University Thursday.

At approximately 2:40 a.m. Waterloo Regional Police, Waterloo Fire and Wilfrid Laurier University Special Constables responded to the area of Bricker Avenue and Clayfield Avenue after receiving reports of a couch fire in the middle of Bricker Avenue.

The fire was extinguished and no injuries were reported.

On Friday, Waterloo Regional Police arrested two teenage men, an 18-year-old and 19 year-old, and both were charged with arson and mischief under $5,000. They are scheduled to appear in court on Nov. 9.
One person was killed on Friday by a police officer trying to disperse crowds, in a bid to protect the governor of Sokoto State, Aminu Tambuwal.

The incident happened when the governor was attending a special prayer session for the commemoration of Nigerias forthcoming 60th anniversary which took place at Sultan Bellos mosque, Sokoto.

The Sokoto police spokesperson, Muhammad Sadiq, in a press statement, confirmed the incident and said the officer has been taken into custody for interrogation following the unprofessional conduct.

The police identified the deceased as Aminu Abdulrahman, aged 25, and said three others sustained injuries during the incident. The deceased and injured victims were evacuated to Specialist Hospital Sokoto for treatment and autopsy respectively.

Eyewitnesses said while at the mosque, Mr Tambuwal gave out some money to a group of people who hailed him as he arrived at the mosque. However, the sharing of the money turned violent when another group of people appeared at the scene.

The trouble started when the warring group suddenly appeared from Iraq, a community in Sokoto metropolis, and claimed ownership of the money given by the governor.

The thugs started fighting over the money and the environment became tense with the governor still in the vicinity. The police officer in a bid to disperse the youth, shot dead one of them.

The Commissioner of Police in Sokoto, Ibrahim Kaoje, had ordered the detention and trial of the erring officer and charged the state criminal investigation department to speed up the investigation.

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The spokesperson said the police command condemned in its entirety the unwarranted, uncivil, and unprofessional conduct of a police sergeant, who is on special duty in the state.

The police identified the erring officer as Sergeant Bello Garba serving at Counter Terrorism Unit Base 18 Gusau, attached to government house Sokoto but on special duty at Sultans palace.

The commissioner unequivocally cautions that officers and men of the command must deploy all professional acumen at their disposal including psychological capacity in order to enhance the safety of the people of the state and not to resort to using the same against the populace, the police in a statement said.
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Shocking footage has emerged of a police officer with the Los Angeles County Sheriff's office caught on camera using his riot shield to slam a Black Lives Matter protester who was already lying on the ground on Friday night.

The footage shows the deputy forcefully using their riot shield to subdue a protester.

The footage was shot in West Hollywood area of the city which saw more than 100 protesters gathered on Friday evening as they marched along Santa Monica Boulevard.

LOS ANGELES: Footage was captured showing an LAPD deputy using his riot shield to slam a Black Lives Matter protester into the ground on Friday night

LOS ANGELES: Around 100 people were seen marching in the Hollywood area of Los Angeles on Friday evening

Meanwhile, across the other side of the country, hundreds of Black Lives Matter staged a 'sit-in' on the Brooklyn Bridge in New York City.

Hundreds of angry demonstrators marched through from the Barclays Center in Brooklyn to the Brooklyn Bridge where they sat and refused to move for more than hour.

And in Oakland, California, police said more than 250 protesters became 'immediately violent' and threw bottles and cans at officers in the downtown area.

NEW YORK: Hundreds of angry demonstrators marched through from the Barclays Center in Brooklyn to the Brooklyn Bridge where they sat and refused to move for more than hour

NEW YORK: A woman holds a portrait of Breonna Taylor during the march for Breonna Taylor

NEW YORK: Hundreds of Black Lives Matter staged a 'sit-in' on the Brooklyn Bridge on Friday night

NEW YORK: Protesters exit the Brooklyn Bridge during the march for Breonna Taylor in New York City

NEW YORK: People participate during the march for Breonna Taylor in New York City on the Brooklyn Bridge

Cops deployed smoke to counter the demonstrators, and a downtown Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) station was closed.

Friday's rally was held in solidarity with protests taking place in Louisville, where large demonstrations are planned for the weekend.

Several other demonstrations took place around the rest of the country including Boston and San Diego to protest a grand jury's decision not to charge the Louisville, Kentucky, police officers in the death of Breonna Taylor.

OAKLAND: Cops deployed smoke to counter the demonstrators, and a downtown Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) station was closed

OAKLAND: Police said more than 250 protesters became 'immediately violent' and threw bottles and cans

NEW YORK: People are pictured protesting on the Brooklyn Bridge during the march for Breonna Taylor on Friday night

NEW YORK: A sign is seen on the Brooklyn Bridge during the march for Breonna Taylor along the Brooklyn Bridge

NEW YORK: Police wait at one end of the bridge as protesters attempt to leave the massive structure after the demonstration

NEW YORK: The march started off at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn and slowly moved towards the famous bridge

'This is extremely traumatizing. I have been out here since June, almost every day on the streets, marching for my Black life to show people that I matter, that it could be me, it could be him, it could be him, it could be any Black face that you see in this crowd,' protester Sophie Michel said to CBS2.

'I think we need to send a message that it's unacceptable that no one was charged with Breonna Taylor's death,' said John Donahue to PIX11.

Demonstrators have gathered across the country to express their anger after it was announced on Wednesday that the officers who shot the black woman in her Louisville, Kentucky apartment during a drug raid last March wouldn't be charged with her death.

Taylor, an emergency medical worker, was shot multiple times by white officers in Louisville who entered her home during a narcotics investigation in March.

'I'm angry because this nation is learning that our Black women are dying at the hands of police officers,' said Bianca Austin, 'and this is not okay.'

'I was reassured Wednesday of why I have no faith in the legal system, in the police, in the law that are not made to protect us Black and brown people,' Austin read.

BOSTON: A woman leaves a flower at an altar to Breonna Taylor at a 'Stand Against Racist Police Murders' demonstration

BOSTON: Demonstrators march past Boston Police headquarters during a 'Stand Against Racist Police Murders' demo

BOSTON: A protester gestures towards Boston Police headquarters as demonstrators march past on Friday night

BOSTON: The group then moved onto City Hall Plaza for a sit-in. The gathering appeared to be among the larger groups the city of Boston has seen in some time

BOSTON: Protesters could be seen gathered downtown with even large protests planned for Saturday

In Kentucky on Friday, a crowd surrounded Breonna Taylor's family. Her aunt, Bianca Austin, wore Taylor's emergency medical technician jacket while reading a message from Taylor's mother, who was too distraught to speak.

In Boston, demonstrators gathered in Nubian Square to at part of the nationwide protests.

The protest remained peaceful as they marched to the Boston Police Headquarters later in the night. The group then moved onto City Hall Plaza for a sit-in.

The gathering appeared to be among the larger groups the city of Boston has seen in some time.

Some carried signs with messages such as 'Justice 4 Breonna,' 'Black Lives Matter,' and 'Let Black women dream.'

The demonstration was largely peaceful with no arrests had been reported as of 10:45pm.

'I feel like that message being sent that cops can do whatever they want and not be held accountable so this is just an attempt to reenergize the city and reenergize anyone that sees this to get back out on the streets to fight and increase the antiracist movement because this is not ok,' organizer Ernest Jacques Jr. said to WHDH.

LOUISVILLE: Protests over the killing of Breonna Taylor continued for the third day in a row Friday

LOUISVILLE: Protesters marched to First Unitarian Church and stayed there past the cities 9pm curfew. Pictured is protest organizer in front of the First Unitarian Church

LOUISVILLE: Protests over the killing of Breonna Taylor continued for the third day in a row Friday. Pictured are protesters marching down Market Street in the city

LOUISVILLE: Protests over the killing of Breonna Taylor continued for the third day in a row. Pictured is a woman holding a BLM flag in front of the First Unitarian Church

The mayor of Boston Marty Walsh urged calm and asked demonstrators to respect the city ahead of the protest.

'I'm asking people planning to demonstrate in Boston tonight and over the weekend to respect the city and respect each other,' he said. 'I'm asking you to keep it peaceful, I'm asking you to keep it powerful. People are deeply upset, but we cannot turn to violence to express our pain.'

'We want to maintain law and order and at the same time protect everyone's ability to peacefully assembler and make their voices heard. So in case, there is a need for us we're a little bit closer than we were perhaps in May,' Lt. Colonel Bryan Pillai said.

'Start charging police officers for murder. You in your house sleeping, you ain't safe. Usually the rebuttal is don't fight the police, cooperate. How the hell do you do that sleeping?' community activist Monica Cannon-Grant said to NBC Boston.

LOUISVILLE: A woman holds a BLM flag in front of the Breonna Taylor memorial at Jackson Square Park

LOUISVILLE: A woman wearing a protective mask holds a portrait of Breonna Taylor during the march

ALBUQUERQUE: A car drove into a group of protesters near UNM Friday night. No one appeared to be hurt. Police have not said whether the driver was arrested. Protesters claim the driver was disparaging them before driving through the crowd

On the west coast, protesters returned to the streets of Hollywood on Friday evening just a day after at least one person was injured as two separate vehicles rammed through crowds demanding racial justice.

At 6pm on Friday evening, a group of about 75 demonstrators walked down Santa Monica Boulevard.

The group swelled to more than 100 people as the march made its way toward The Grove shopping mall.

In San Diego, demonstrators took to the streets of downtown to protest the grand jury's decision not to indict police officers on criminal charges directly related to Breonna Taylor's death.

A group of about 40 to 50 demonstrators were organizing in front of the superior court in downtown at around 7:30pm San Diego Police said.

The group then started marching on downtown streets chanting, 'No Justice, No Peace,' and chanting Breonna Taylor's name.

In Albuquerqu, a car drove into a group of protesters near the University of New Mexico campus.

Nobody appeared to be hurt and police have not said whether the driver was arrested.

Protesters claim the driver was disparaging them before driving through the crowd.

'It's sad that we have to come out here and fear for our safety by the citizens of our state. We're supposed to be better than that. We're supposed to be loving one another, and people are out here basically trying to kill people,' an organizer of the protest said to KOB.

SAN DIEGO: Demonstrators took to the streets of downtown to protest the grand jury's decision not to indict police officers on criminal charges directly related to Breonna Taylor's death

SAN DIEGO: A group of about 40 to 50 demonstrators were organizing in front of the superior court in downtown at around 7:30pm San Diego Police said

SAN DIEGO: The group then started marching on downtown streets chanting, 'No Justice, No Peace,' and chanting Breonna Taylor's name

In Louisville, the city's police chief is urging armed militia to stay away from this weekend's protest.

'Many of them say they are coming to help us. Let me be clear, that is not help we need. That is not help we want,' said Rob Schroeder, interim police chief of the LMPD.

'America at large will not stand by and allow a Black woman to be murdered and have no consequences,' protester Kimberly Bernard said.

When asked if he would release the grand jury's report and transcript, the Kentucky Attorney General said he would revisit the question after the FBI finishes its independent investigation.
Lebanon is facing a dire economic crisis as a result of decades of governmental mismanagement, corruption, and the repeated failure of Lebanese leaders to undertake meaningful, sustained reforms. The devastating August 4 explosion has only magnified calls by the Lebanese people for economic and institutional reforms, better governance, and an end to the endemic corruption that has plagued Lebanon.

The United States stands with the Lebanese people who are saying business as usual is unacceptable. While the Lebanese people suffer through an economic crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic, Iran-backed Hezbollah and its supporters exploit the rampant political corruption that has been pervasive in Lebanon for decades to promote their terrorist and illicit activities.

On September 8, the United States designated Yusuf Finyanus and Ali Hassan Khalil, two former government ministers, for providing material support to Hezbollah, pursuant to Executive Order 13224.

While holding positions in previous Lebanese cabinets, said Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in a written statement, Finyanus and Khalil directed political and economic favors to Hezbollah, including ensuring Hezbollah-owned companies won government contracts worth millions of dollars and moving money from government ministries to Hezbollah-associated institutions.

Yusuf Finyanus is a former minister of transportation while Ali Hassan Khalil is a former minister of finance, health, and agriculture.Both men abused their positions to direct public funds to the terrorist group.

Hezbollah depends on Lebanons corrupt political system for survival, wrote Secretary of State Pompeo. Anyone helping to advance Hezbollahs political or economic interests is further eroding what remains of effective governance and facilitating financing for terrorism.

The Treasury Department noted in a written statement that the multi-layered crisis in Lebanon stems from decades of corruption and economic mismanagement. Since October 2019, popular, cross-sectarian protests across the country demanded political and economic reform in Lebanon. The protesters calls for all of them, means all of them demonstrates the seriousness of their desire for reform and to pull back the curtain on certain groups corruption, including Hezbollah.

Corruption has run rampant in Lebanon, and Hezbollah has exploited the political system to spread its malign influence, said Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin. The United States stands with the people of Lebanon in their calls for reform and will continue to use its authorities to target those who oppress and exploit them.
By ANI

NEW DELHI: Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on Saturday said that India has announced USD 15 million grant assistance to Sri Lanka for the promotion of Buddhist ties between the two countries.

"Testifying the long and civilization links and cultural heritage between the two countries, Prime Minister Modi announced grant assistance of USD 15 million for the promotion of Buddhist ties between the two countries," Amt Narang, the Joint Secretary for Indian Ocean Region Division (IOR) of the MEA said on India-Sri Lanka virtual Bilateral Summit.

"This grant will help deepen people to people linkage between the two countries in the sphere of Buddhism," he added.

The MEA official also said that in the current COVID imposed restrictions, the successful conduct of the virtual summit reflects the high degree of commitment at the leaders' level on taking forward the bilateral relations.

During the summit, the two leaders also reviewed the entire range of bilateral matter and exchanged views on regional and international issues of common consensus.

"India will facilitate the visit of a delegation of Buddhist pilgrims from Sri Lanka in the first inaugural flight to Kushinagar in Uttar Pradesh," the MEA official said.

"Sri Lankan PM Mahinda Rajapaksa made a special mention of the Jaffna Cultural Centre, an iconic project built with Indian assistance. The Centre is almost ready and PM Rajapaksa extended an invitation to PM Modi to inaugurate the project," MEA said.

The Joint Secretary also said that PM Modi has expressed hope that the temporary restrictions imposed by the Sri Lankan side on imports of some products will be relaxed soon.

"PM Modi expressed his hope that the temporary restrictions imposed by the Sri Lankan side on imports of some products will be relaxed soon as this will also benefit the Sri Lankan economy and common people," MEA official said.

MEA official further said that External Affairs Ministers S Jaishankar and National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval and Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla also took part in the meeting. (ANI)
Pandemics are bad for politics.

Fundraising dinners are suspended and ordinary donors are upended. That leaves the major parties desperate for fat-cat developers to make up the difference.

Money politics is the ugly underside of democracy  outstretched hands and greasing of palms. But fundraising is only half the story.

Yes, the COVID-19 crisis is straining campaign financing. But it is also constraining campaign spending.

Quite apart from the sudden shortfalls in fundraising, its the sharp limitations of physical distancing that have redrawn the map for politicians, who can no longer roam far and wide to reach voters, let alone hit up donors. Which is why the pandemic is, paradoxically, a prescription to cleanse our politics of accumulated toxins.

We tried once before. Back in 2016, after a series of columns exposing the wild west of Ontario fundraising, the previous Liberal government clamped down on the worst abuses  so that politicians from all parties could cater to voter interests, not pander to vested interests.

But Doug Fords Tories unilaterally diluted those reforms after they took power two years later, revoking public financing of political parties (modest per-vote subsidies based on most recent election results). Now, COVID-19 has changed the equation.

Fundraising is falling on deaf ears because ordinary Ontarians are out of pocket. Which leaves deep-pocketed developers whispering in the ears of desperate politicians.

With the benefit of hindsight, the premier has every reason to restore the per-vote allocations that he unilaterally phased out (scheduled to end next year). And with a little foresight, Ford could go even further in leading a cleanup of dirty money.

The perfect storm of a pandemic is the ideal time for the premier to curb excessive campaign spending, better reflecting the virtual world of COVID-19. Why allow parties to spend (and therefore raise) as much as $10 million for a provincial election campaign that amounts to overkill?

Amid COVID-19, we are entering a new world of political outreach and campaign marketing that is more digital than ever before. The premier could make the best of a pandemic by forcing all politicians to collectively clean up their act  with sharp new limits on how much they spend to grease their lumbering campaign machines.

The major parties already spend too much money to raise money. All those sumptuous fundraising dinners are obscenely inefficient ways to attract donors  with big sums (and fine wine) poured down the drain to keep the cash flowing, while politicians waste time prostituting themselves.

As for those costly and clunky whistle-stop campaigns, they are whistling past the political graveyard. Just ask Ford, who ditched the traditional leaders tour in the 2018 election, forsaking the customary chartered aircraft and customized bus, while eschewing the companion media bus laid on (for a hefty fee) for travelling reporters. The leaders tour tends to be a loss leader for parties keen to get earned media (coverage), but most cash-starved outlets dropped anyway (the Star was often one of the few organizations to tag along).

Prohibitively expensive television advertising is fading as rival parties opt for more targeted social media channels and other digital vectors. Todays technology allows campaigns to harvest hundreds of thousands of cellphone numbers for a song, identifying potential voters with a simple text message.

Large election rallies are today populated mostly by weary campaign volunteers trying to create the illusion of support (those Donald Trump rallies are an anomaly and anachronism). Spared the expense of renting large halls, chartering transportation, and spending on big media buys, provincial campaigns are overdue for downsizing  while rightsizing per-vote subsidies to shore up the gap.

The 2016 campaign finance reforms belatedly and wisely banned corporate and union donations, but compensated the parties for the funding gap with a per-vote public subsidy of $2.71 per ballot cast. Based on the results of the 2018 election, the victorious Tories were in line to receive $6.3 million annually while the NDP would get $5.2 million, the Liberals about $3 million, and the Greens around $700,000  until Ford overruled his own party by phasing them out.

Oh, and lets stop calling them subsidies  an outdated misnomer  and refer to them more accurately as voter allocations. In fact, we already heavily subsidize contributions from the most affluent Ontarians thanks to generous tax credits (starting at 75 per cent of the donation), so why not level the playing field by letting every taxpayers vote count with a per-vote subsidy rather than a rich voter subsidy?

The premier should restore those public funding allocations (even if it means dialing down the old subsidies that enrich the most affluent donors), while also reducing campaign spending limits. A true populist would ensure that all political parties wasted less money at campaign time  and wasted less time on raising money at other times.

Just as COVID-19 is upturning the economics of business, it is changing the business of politics. Ontario needs to finish what it started in 2016, responding to the recent strain on private fundraising with a new constraint on party spending  and a matching increase in public funding.

The virus of dirty money can distort democracy in the best of times. Now, in the worst of times, the deadly COVID-19 virus can disrupt our democracy for the better.

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The defence ministry of Japan intends to request a budget of 5.4 trillion yen, that is 51.7 billion USD, for the fiscal year 2021, Kyodo news agency reported citing military sources. The ministry is headed by Nobuo Kishi, who was elected as a part of Yoshisde Sugas cabinet and would make the request by end of September. The next fiscal year in Japan would begin in April next year.

According to ANI, the funds, in particular, would be allocated to the formation of a special unit specializing in electronic warfare in addition to the development of fighter jets to replace Mitsubishi F-2 fighters. The country's defence budget shown growth for the eighth consecutive year, reaching 5.3 trillion yen for the current fiscal year.

Read: Japanese PM Yoshihide Suga To Meet Mike Pompeo In Early October: Report

Read: Japan's Ex-PM Abe Visits Controversial Tokyo Shrine

Suga, Trump hold talks

This comes as newly appointed Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga held his first talks with US President Donald Trump since he took office, a diplomatic phone call that was one of his first as the countrys leader and one that highlights the close tie between the two allies. Suga was elected as Japans new prime minister on September 16, replacing Shinzo Abe, who forged close personal ties and regularly held meetings and phone calls with Trump. Sugas cabinet comprises of 20 members and 15 out of those held portfolios during Abes administration. A tweet from the Japanese Prime Ministers office also stated that Suga, in addition to tackling bureaucratic sectionalism, will also wage a war against "vested interests and notorious habit of always following precedent".

As per reports, the two leaders spoke for about 25 minutes over the phone and after the conversation, Suga informed the Japanese media that he had told Trump that US-Japan alliance was the cornerstone of peace in the region. He also added that the US President wished for stronger bi-lateral relations and that he urged Suga to call him anytime. The two leaders also reportedly discussed the situation in North Korea, the COVID-19 pandemic and vaccine projects.

Read: Japan's Suga Holds 1st Phone Talks With Trump As Leader

Read: Japan: Robots Deployed In Convenience Stores To Cope With Labour Shortage

Image credits: AP
Thousands of young people across Europe joined a global day of climate protests on Friday, many wearing masks and keeping their distance against the coronavirus.

The rallies marked the resumption of street protests by the Fridays for Future" movement, which had kept its actions mainly online in recent months because of the pandemic. Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg, who launched the school strikes two years ago, led the protest in Stockholm.

The goal was to build up this pressure on people in power so that something happens", the 17-year-old said outside the Swedish parliament, wearing a white mask emblazoned with the Fridays for Future logo.

With Swedens coronavirus rules limiting crowd sizes to 50 people, Thunberg said the demonstrations would focus on being few people in many places and keeping distance." Posting pictures from protests held around the world Thunberg later tweeted satisfaction with the response.

What a huge success! With masks and socially distant, hundreds of thousands returned to the streets, demanding climate action, in over 3200 places on all continents, including Antarctica! The fight for a future doesnt end here. This is just the beginning," wrote Thunberg.

Previous global Fridays for Future demos have seen millions of young people pour into cities to demand action against global warming. In Germany, police said some 10,000 protesters braved the rain to gather at Berlins Brandenburg Gate. Organisers estimated the figure to be twice as high.

Demonstrators clutched umbrellas and carried signs to highlight the climate crisis, while some scribbled messages on their face masks such as Not a single degree more" and Unite behind the science". A Berlin police spokeswoman said participants were adhering to hygiene regulations imposed to contain the virus spread, with many demonstrators standing or sitting at least 1.5 metres apart.

Who if not us?

Elsewhere in Germany, some 7,000 people turned out in the western city of Cologne while the cities of Freiburg and Hamburg each drew around 6,000 demonstrators. Bad weather across the country however was believed to have dampened the overall turnout somewhat.

A large protest planned in the southern city of Munich had to be cancelled because of a regional spike in coronavirus infections, and was replaced by a smaller event outside the city centre.

Climate strike organisers in Austria said that 6,000 people had attended a demonstration in the capital Vienna despite heavy rain and organisational hurdles posed by the Covid-19 pandemic. Viennas police department estimated turnout at 2,500.

Protest organisers said that a further 2,000 people had rallied in other parts of Austria using the slogan: Masks up, emissions down!" We dont know when the pandemic with be over but we do know that the climate crisis is getting worse every day and is endangering human rights," said Vienna-based activist Klara Butz. Who is going to demand our right to a liveable future, if not us?" she asked.

Greenpeace meanwhile marked the day by releasing a photo recently taken in the Arctic of 18-year-old ornithologist Mya-Rose Craig, known as birdgirl". She is pictured standing on an ice floe holding a poster reading Youth Strike for Climate"  in what the environmental campaign group said was the worlds most northerly climate strike.

Im here because I want to see for myself whats at stake as this crucial protector of the planet, the Arctic Ocean, melts away at a terrifying rate," she said from the Svalbard archipelago in a statement.

afp
President Muhammadu Buhari has commended Governor Godwin Obaseki and his Deputy Philip Shaibu for paying him a courtesy visit at the Presidential Villa after beating the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the just-concluded Edo Election.

Mr. Godwin Obaseki of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) defeated Mr. Osagie Ize-Iyamu, of the APC to win a second term as governor of Edo State.

The President, while speaking to the governor and his delegation on Friday, said, I thank you for bringing your deputy and supporters to come and see me after beating my party. I am supposed to preside over all Nigerian interests whether I like it or not, but my single desire is to make sure that innocent people don't suffer. That message I got across to the Inspector General of Police, that elections must be free and fair.

If contestants have too much money and they decide to spray, so be it. But what I insist is, nobody should go and raise a counterforce to the government, arm heavily-drugged thugs to go and humiliate people.

I want Nigerians to appreciate that I respect them as Nigerians and that I am bound by the oath I have taken, that their security is in the hands of God and in the hands of the government, which I am leading.

President Buhari noted that as the leader of the governing party, and despite the fact that the party has lost some states in the elections, he wishes to leave behind a political culture based on integrity.

We have lost states across the country. Now I do not like to escape the responsibility, seeing as the leader of the country, I am also the leader of my party, that I am not leading the party very well.

I am trying to make sure that the party is built on a civilised basis, rule of law and respect for human rights and human beings, right from polling units to local governments, to states up to Abuja and that's what I have been insisting as my contribution to the National Working Committee and executive of the party. I know we are a developing country, a developing economy, and trying to develop our political culture. I want the development of political culture to be based on integrity and accountability. Let people work very hard and earn what they are looking for through their hard work and through fair competition, the President said.

He added jocularly that he was congratulating the Edo governor reluctantly because he defeated the candidate of his party, the APC.

In his remarks, Governor Obaseki thanked the President for ensuring that fair play reigned during the election which saw him victorious.

You would recall a couple of weeks before the election, I came to see you and you assured me that we were going to have a free, peaceful, and credible election. That is what we had during the election of 19th September and the whole world has acclaimed that the Edo election was perhaps one of the best conducted in recent times in Nigeria. This could not have been possible without your insistence that the right things be done, and for that, we want to say thank you very much.

He also thanked the President for his congratulatory message, assuring him that the message has been internalised, that it is God that made this election possible, therefore I should be humble about the election and also magnanimous in victory.

He pledged his unalloyed loyalty and support and that of the people of Edo State to the President and the federal government. Channels Tv
A six-year-old girl has died after a tree fell on her at school.

The youngster, who has not yet been named, was struck at Gosforth Park First School in Newcastle.

Emergency services, including an air ambulance, rushed to the scene shortly after 1pm on Friday but the girl passed away on Saturday morning.

Northumbria Police say an investigation has now been launched and they are working with the Health and Safety Executive.

A spokesperson for the force said on Saturday: At 1.15pm yesterday, we received a report that a child had been struck by a falling tree at Gosforth Park First School.

Emergency services attended the scene and the six-year-old girl was taken to hospital.

Sadly, earlier today, the young girl passed away.

Our officers are continuing to support her family and our thoughts are with them at this incredibly difficult time.

Leanne Lamb, head teacher, said: Our entire school community has been shocked and devastated by the tragic news that one of our pupils passed away during the night, as a result of injuries suffered from a falling tree in the school grounds.

First and foremost, our thoughts and prayers are with the childs family and friends as they come to terms with this tragic loss.

As a school and community, we will take the time to mourn and are putting in place extra support for the staff and pupils, who are devastated by this incident.
Joseph R. Biden Jr. was trying to demonstrate the lasting power of the federal judiciary. So he did the math.

Addressing a Michigan law school audience in April 1991, then-Senator Biden said that if trends in life expectancy held, a justice freshly confirmed around that time would be making landmark decisions in the year 2020.

Ill be dead and gone, in all probability, Mr. Biden told the crowd.

He was half right: Nearly three decades later, the man whom the Senate confirmed that year, Justice Clarence Thomas, is still rendering decisions  the eldest jurist, if President Trump has his way, of a soon-to-be 6-to-3 conservative majority.

But Mr. Biden is indeed alive, left to consider what the courts emerging tilt would mean for the Democratic agenda if he wins the White House  and for his own attachment to the Capitols bygone harmony and mores.
New York AG Letitia James says the death of a Bronx motorist last October further underscores the need for this change

NEW YORK (AP)  New Yorks attorney general on Friday recommended the New York Police Department get out of the business of routine traffic enforcement, a radical change she said would prevent encounters like one last year in the Bronx that escalated quickly and ended with an officer fatally shooting a motorist.

Attorney General Letitia James, who acts as a special prosecutor appointed to investigate certain police killings, argued that traffic stops for minor infractions often end in violence and that Allan Felizs death last October after he was pulled over for a seat belt violation further underscores the need for this change.

James office concluded that the NYPDs use of deadly force was justified but that the sequence of events leading to Felizs death would never have happened if police hadnt stopped him in the first place. Police further heightened tensions by attempting to arrest Feliz on outstanding warrants for low-level offenses such as spitting, littering and disorderly conduct, James office said.

The NYPD declined to comment.

In this Aug. 6, 2020 file photo, New York State Attorney General Letitia James addresses the media during a news conference in New York. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens, File)

Feliz initially complied when an officer asked him to get out of his car, but then jumped back in and tried to flee, James office said in a report on his death that included the recommendation about police yielding traffic stop duties.

READ MORE: NYPD cop promoted after allegations of inappropriate contact by multiple Black men

Sgt. Jonathan Rivera then fired a stun gun at Feliz and climbed into the car, warning, Yo, boss, I am going to (expletive) shoot you, as Feliz shifted the vehicle into gear and began moving. Rivera shot Feliz once in the chest, killing him.

James office concluded Rivera was justified in shooting Feliz in part because he feared the vehicles movement was endangering another officer standing nearby, the report said.

The officers alleged justification is a fairy tale, said Robert Vilensky, a lawyer for the Feliz family, which is suing the NYPD. The car which they say was moving was at best moving 2 mph. That wouldnt knock over a fly.

Story continues

The justification is a made-up story to rationalize killing an unmarked civilian, he said.

READ MORE: NYPD union backs Trump for the next election

The NYPD has a separate unit of personnel who are not officers but direct traffic and hand out parking tickets  but who also have limited interaction with the public. James recommendation is aimed at officers who stop people for things like speeding, seat belt infractions and other issues.

If police officers are to remain involved in traffic enforcement, James office said, the police department should drop a policy that encourages officers to arrest any motorist who is found to have an open warrant.

Instead, the report said, drivers with open warrants should be arrested only with a supervisors approval if an officer had reasonable cause to believe they were a danger to the community.

It is highly unlikely that the incident involving Mr. Feliz  would have escalated in the manner it did in the absence of this automatic arrest policy, James office wrote.

Have you subscribed to theGrios podcast Dear Culture? Download our newest episodes now!

The post NYPD should stop making traffic stops, attorney general says appeared first on TheGrio.
Internet was suspended in four tribal districts of southern Rajasthan on Saturday and section 144 was imposed, prohibiting assembly of more than five people, following violent protests in Dungarpur district by tribal youth over teacher recruitment examination.

On Thursday, hundreds of tribal youths blocked national highway No. 8 in Dungarpur before setting vehicles on fire and injuring several policemen. The protesters demanded filling of 1,167 unreserved posts of government teachers with ST candidates.

In the last three days, six trucks, five buses, four police vehicles, nine cars, nine tempos and one motorcycle have been torched. More than 1,000 rubber bullets were fired to bring the situation under control.

As tension continued in Dungarpur, three neighbouring districts, Udaipur, Banswara and Pratapgarh, suspended internet in selected areas and imposed prohibitory orders on Saturday.

A stretch of the national highway is still under the control of the tribal youths.

Also read: CBI chargesheet says Tuticorin cops tortured father, son whole night

Udaipur Range Inspector General Binita Thakur said a control room had been set up at the Kherwara police station where seven Indian Police Service (IPS) officers are camping to keep the situation under control. These officers are Thakur, ATS DIG Anshuman Bhomia, Jaipur Rural SP Shankar Dutt Sharma, Jodhpur DCP headquarters Kaluram Rawat, Chittorgarh SP Deepak Bhargav, Udaipur SP Kailash Bishnoi and Dungarpur SP Jai Yadav.

So far around 550 people have been booked and 34 persons have been arrested, said Thakur. Also, 5,000 policemen have been deployed in tribal areas of Udaipur, Pratapgarh, Banswara and Dungarpur districts.

She said between the midnight of Friday and early Saturday morning, eight trucks were torched in Kakra Doongri area on the national highway. Protesters also vandalised some shops.

In Udaipur, district collector Chetan Deora imposed section 144 to prohibit any unlawful assembly. The order is applicable in all revenue borders of the district, he said. Strict action will also be taken against the individuals who spread provocatory messages on social media, the order read. Internet services have been suspended in Rishabhdeo and Kherwara areas of the district.

In Banswara, district collector Ankit Kumar Singh said in an order that this has been done as the tension continued to prevail for the third consecutive day in Dungarpur. Internet services have been also banned in the entire district other than Choti Sarwan and Banswara city.

In Pratapgarh district also section 144 has been imposed and internet service has been suspended in Arnod, Peepalkhoont and Dhariyawad towns.

Following the vandalism on early Saturday morning, some businessmen and traders staged a protest outside Kherwara police station and blamed the government for being a mute spectator to violence.

Bharatiya Tribal Party (BTP) MLA from Chorasi (Dungarpur) Rajkumar Roat said peaceful protest was going on for the last 18 days. The government also scheduled a meeting on September 14 with the protesters but called it off later. The meeting was rescheduled on September 24 but was cancelled again. People became aggressive after the meeting was cancelled the second time, he said.

Around 30 percent of the people came down to the highway but the police charged towards them; then the rest joined as well. He said arson and stone-pelting took place, unfortunately, both police and youth worked similarly.

The police set fire to their bikes and even barged into houses from Bicchiwada to Kherwada and damaged properties, the MLA said.

The BTP submitted the demand for filling the vacant posts and the CM had agreed when we extended our support in Rajya Sabha polls. This agitation is going since December 2019. The government should not have taken it lightly. Whatever happened is unfortunate, he said.

Meanwhile, a meeting was held between the representatives of government, tribal leaders of the regions and representatives of the candidates at Parsad village in Udaipur district which went inconclusive. The meeting started at around 4 pm and concluded around 6 pm.

While the meeting was on, six vehicles were torched by the protestors in Kherwara because of which Udaipur district collector Chetan Deora and Udaipur divisional commissioner Vikas Bhale had to leave the meeting in between, an official said.

During the meeting, SC/ST development minister Arjun Singh Bamaniya, state youth Congress president Ganesh Gogra, member of working committee of CWC Raghuveer Singh Meena, BTP Leader Rajkumar Roat, Sagwara MLA Ramprasad Dindore, Kanti Bhai Roat of BTP, 10 candidates and few Congress activists and BTP party workers were present in the meeting.

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About 11:10 a.m, the teenage boy was in an alley in the 200 block of North Leamington Avenue, when two people walked up, pulled out weapons and fired shots at him. The teenage boy suffered a gunshot wound to the upper torso, and was pronounced dead at the scene, police said.
Godwin Obaseki

When Governor Godwin Obaseki secured his second term in office after crushing his main challenger, Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu in the recently concluded Edo governorship election, he was quick to direct his gratitude towards one powerful man. That person was President Muhammadu Buhari. He said Buhari should be remembered as the father of democracy in Nigeria

Yesterday, he made out time out of his busy schedule to pay a special visit to Buhari alongside his deputy, Philip Shuaibu.

Yes, Obaseki must have exercised too much hyperbolism in his statement, especially in the heat of an exhilarating victory, but there is much sense in what he said. When a video emerged in which the former national chairman of the ruling All Progressives Congress, Adams Oshiomhole, was allegedly plotting with Buharis Chief of Staff, Ibrahim Gambari, to rig the election, the fears of the people were confirmed. The election was expected to be rigged in the favour of the ruling party. No politician is innocent in Nigeria; they easily roll out all the weapons in their arsenal to secure victories. Obaseki could have done that if he was in the shoes of Iyamu.

When elections are organised in Nigeria, the popular talk on the streets is that the best rigger wins. With the drama that accompanied the election and the braggadocio of Oshiomhole and Obaseki alongside other kingmakers in Edo State, nobody was expecting a free and fair contest. Blood was expected to flow. The election wasnt entirely free of skirmishes and oddities, but they were kept to the barest minimum.

The role of Buhari in this election needs to be applauded. It might seem like a norm in saner climes where political leaders refuse to interfere in electoral processes but the situation is different in Africa. Free and fair elections are a rarity in Nigeria. The US and the UK had to issue out warnings to political actors fomenting trouble during elections and undermining the process.

There is a general institutional weakness in Nigeria and this makes government institutions prone to manipulations by political actors and the ruling elites. We have strong men and weak institutions. The President wields enormous powers that could undermine any democratic process. The President appoints the chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, the service chiefs and the Chief Justice of Nigeria. In June 2019, Buhari also controversially influenced the appointment of five new justices of the Supreme Court. These people play significant roles in the democratic process in Nigeria.

INEC organises the election and the security agencies maintain law and order during the event. In the past, security operatives have been accused of helping political parties rig elections. When its all said and done, the aggrieved parties head to the courts to seek redress on the outcome of elections which usually gets to the supreme court in the course of litigation. The judges appointed by the president might also be waiting to do his bidding. Till date, the supreme court judgement that ushered in Governor Hope Uzodinma in Imo State still remains contentious. The popular view is that the Federal Government had a hand in the outcome, although this hasnt been backed with strong evidence.

What the above means, in essence, is that the executive arm of government dominates over the legislature and the judiciary in a way that erodes checks and balances. Nigerian politicians are like armed robbers who operate in broad daylight under the nose of the general public and then damn the consequences.

When the Inspector-General of Police, Mohammed Adamu, deployed 30,000 police officers to maintain law and order during the Edo election, PDP members and supporters of Obaseki felt they were going to be targeted. The general public felt that way too. The term Federal Might is a deciding factor in Nigerian politics and it is exercised through lacunas like this.

At the end of the day, the election was peaceful to a very large extent. Obaseki schooled and battered Iyamu again. As Nigerians took to social media and the streets to celebrate the victory with Obaseki, Buhari also joined. He released a statement like the father of the nation, congratulating Obaseki (a member of the opposition party) and urging Iyamu to accept defeat in good faith. That move watered down the bitter agitations of sponsored protests, propaganda, litigations, violence and others which trail elections in Nigeria.

Another influential figure of the APC  the governor of Kaduna State followed suit by going on national TV to commend the electoral process. The Chairman of the APC National Caretaker Committee, Mala Buni also accepted the defeat and extended his hand of fellowship to a former party member, Obaseki.

Iyamu who had earlier rejected the outcome of the result was almost left alone in any plan to challenge results in court. His godfather, Oshiomhole was silent and there were rumours of the APC plotting to expel him. Iyamu later met with the leadership of the APC in Abuja and conceded defeat. The formerly vocal and agile Oshiomhole would also slowly crawl out of his shell, to accept and respect the stand of the electorate.

The level of sanity enjoyed in the Nigerian political space has been so encouraging, that many have envisaged that Obaseki might return to the APC. But he has denied nursing such plans. But we never say never! Iyamu expressed his desire to work with Obaseki to better the state of affairs in Edo State. Obaseki isnt expected to take the offer, but it is good for the press.

If Buhari had decided to influence the process, he would have successfully done that and probably get away with it. People will protest for a while and be overwhelmed by security operatives. Critical reports will fly around in the media until people lose interest. Obaseki would then head to the election tribunal where the machinery of the ruling party will be waiting for him. After a prolonged and maybe choreographed legal battle, his petition will be respectfully and civilly kicked out. He then releases a long press statement appreciating his supporters and then moves on with his life like nothing ever happened.

Buhari had a loaded gun in his hand but he refused to pull the trigger as Oshiomhole and Iyamu would have expected. He is the real and true hero of the Edo 2020 election.

***

Written by Osayimwen Osahon George

Email: g.osayimwen@gmail.com
In the latest development in the Bollywood drug probe, sources have informed Republic Media Network that NCB conducted multiple raids in Mumbai on Friday while Dharma-associated Kshitij Ravi Prasad and Anubhav Chopra were being grilled by the agency.

NCB teams conducted raids in six different locations in Andheri and Versova while Kshitij Ravi Prasad and Anubhav Chopra were being interrogated. Kshitij Prasad continues to be in the NCB's custody as the agency and, as per top sources, has given names of 5 Bollywood celebrities and 2 producers in connection with the drugs angle.

READ | NCB Probe To Intensify For Anubhav & Kshitij; Karan Johar & Dharma Distance From Them

Dharma Productions-associated Anubhav Chopra has not been given a clean chit by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) and will be summoned once again on Saturday, sources informed Republic TV following his questioning ending past midnight on Saturday.

Anubhav Chopra was summoned by the agency after fellow Dharma employee Kshitij Ravi Prasad was picked up following raids at his Versova residence where drugs were seized.

Kshitij Ravi Prasad has been named by an alleged peddler Ankush Arneja, as well as actor Rakul Preet Singh in her confession to the agency. The latter has named him for supplying drugs to her close associates in Bollywood.

READ | Rakul Preet Singh Names Karan Johar's Aide & 4 Actors In NCB's Interrogation: Sources

Rakul Preet admits Dharma-associated Kshitij supplied drugs

Actor Rakul Preet Singh, in her admission to the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) on Friday in the ongoing Bollywood-drug probe, has named four top actors and Kahitij in her statement, sources informed Republic TV. Rakul Preet has denied consuming drugs but has admitted that Kshitij Ravi Prasad was involved in some activities, sources added.

Rakul has also taken the name of Kshitij as the person who supplied drugs to some of her close associates. Rakul has also given several details to NCB after which NCB's KPS Malhotra questioned Kshitij in the NCB Mumbai Zonal office. Further, Rakul Preet has claimed that Kshitij Prasad had approached her to work as his conduit," sources informed. She also confessed that Rhea Chakraborty would get drugs delivered to her home, and that the contraband seized from her residence was Rhea's, sources said.

READ | Second Karan Johar-Dharma Employee Grilled By NCB Over Drugs; Anubhav Chopra After Kshitij

Drugs seized from Kshitij's residence

Kshitij Ravi Prasad was picked up from his Versova residence on Friday after the agency conducted raids there. Marijuana has been seized from Kshitijs place during searches. Kshitij had only hours earlier landed in Mumbai from Delhi where he was on Thursday when summons were issued to him. His house was raided by the agency officials on Thursday as well. Alleged peddler Ankush Arneja had confessed to the agency, many times, that Kshitij procured drugs from him.

Karan Johar, meanwhile, had distanced himself and Dharma Productions from both Kshitij and Anubhav, claiming that they weren't full time employees, were not personally known to him, and that it is not his concern what they do in their personal time. He also refuted using drugs himself.

READ | Karan Johar To Have 'Koffee With NCB' Soon: Manjinder Sirsa Turns Up Heat On Bollywood
Net overseas migration, which the federal government said was slowing before the pandemic, is now expected to collapse from 154,000 last financial year to just 31,000 in 2020-21. Treasurer Josh Frydenberg this week gave an insight into what this meant for the budget. He said the nation's future population would now be smaller and older than previously assumed with net migration movement out of Australia now likely to be negative both this financial year and next. "While migration will eventually return to the levels we are accustomed to, lost migrants will not be replaced," he said.

"And given our migrant workers tend, on average, to be younger, this will lower labour force participation and average hours worked across the economy into the future." Migration accounts for about 60 per cent of Australia's population growth. The rest is natural increase - births minus deaths. Data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics this week showed in March the country experienced its smallest natural increase in the population in 14 years. It was caused by a combination of the smallest number of newborns since March 2009 and the largest number of deaths for the quarter on record.

Deaths will continue to grow - a factor of the larger number of people in the country and the ageing population. Loading If migration is falling, then the only way to offset the increase in deaths is via more babies. The 2019-20 budget assumed the nation's fertility rate would climb from a 15-year low of 1.78 to 1.9 and remain there for decades to come. Instead, new modelling commissioned by the government forecasts fertility will drop to an all-time low of 1.59 this financial year, recover a little around 2024 but then continue its downward trend to a little over 1.6 by the end of the decade.

The difference between what the budget is built upon and what the government now expects equates to 56,000 fewer births every year out to 2024. That's a city the size of NSW regional centre Wagga Wagga every year in missing bubs. Dr Allen says the drop in fertility is not necessarily something to worry about on its own. Dr Liz Allen says the pandemic is "going to cause a ripple that will be felt for years". Credit:Alex Ellinghausen "But when you look at in the broader context then there are a number of alarm bells that are really ringing," she says. "The COVID outbreak is going to cause a ripple that will be felt for years."

According to Dr Allen, fertility rates were already an issue before the pandemic. Loading Substantial economic barriers confront women who might want a larger family, most clearly around childcare and the long-term impact on their careers when they take time away from work around birth. Drawing a line from Whitney Houston's 1980s anthem Greatest Love Of All, Dr Allen says if "children are our future" then the community and governments have to do far more. "Children are indeed our future. They're our future taxpayers," she says.

"Policies already favour older Australians. Lower fertility [and reduced migration] means as a community we're going to get older and that will just mean more policy support for older people at the expense of younger people. Loading "The young, and women, have borne the brunt of COVID and it could get even worse." Recessions and economic dislocations always shock the creation of families. Births fell during the start of the last century as the federation drought slowed the economy.

Between 1914 and 1918, when hundreds of thousands of men were out of the country because of World War I, birth numbers also fell. And then between 1928 and 1934, during the start and then depths of the Great Depression, the number of babies born crashed by more than 18 per cent. Outside of these events has been a global change towards family size. Between 1950 and 2017, the global fertility rate fell by 49 per cent. Research funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation found from 4.7 live births per woman in 1950 the fertility rate had reached 2.4 live births per woman 67 years later. Every one of the 195 countries examined in the study had experienced a fall in fertility rates, although at 7.1 the rate in the African nation of Niger remains extraordinarily high.

Britain's Office of National Statistics says there is a series of inter-connected reasons for the fall in fertility rates. Improved access to contraception (which in itself is connected to higher levels of education for women), a sharp drop in the mortality rate for children under 5, and women delaying having babies until an older age - especially in richer nations - are all major contributory factors to falling fertility rates. All that before the deepest global economic downturn since the 1930s. Laura Mehew and her husband can afford to look after one child but say economic circumstances mean they're not planning to have a second. Credit:Rhett Wyman The human face of that economic impact is Sydney couple Laura Mehew, and her husband Cheyne, both 30, who had their first child Tessa nine months ago.

Trying to pay off a mortgage, Laura took a contract job while pregnant, but then lost it after maternity leave due to the pandemic. The couple's income halved, forcing them to dip into Laura's superannuation. They've also had financial support from Laura's parents who loaned money saved for a cancelled overseas holiday. "We try not to live week-to-week. We have a budget and put money away for bills - but baby products are expensive," she said. The Australian economy was once said to have ridden on the back of sheep to prosperity, but for 30 years the country has surfed a wave of population growth to economic success. The coronavirus pandemic may have delivered a long-lasting wipe-out.
New Delhi:

External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj tonight offered to help a nonagenarian Indian-origin woman, who was reportedly sent back by her son to India from the US, with visa issues.

Thanks for bringing this to my notice. We will help her, was Swarajs response to a report which said 90-year-old Kantaben Shah has written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to prevent her from being forcibly sent back to the US.

According to reports, Shah was sent back to India from the US by her younger son without checking her valid visa. She has appealed for help as she is in no position to go back to the US and does not have a valid visa to stay in India.

Shah is resisting her deportation to the US as she wants to spend her last years in her motherland.

In a separate tweet, Swaraj, responded to a man seeking medical help for his daughter.

Swaraj, who last week helped a Bhopal family to get an admission for their infant baby in AIIMS, asked the man to approach his constituencys MP for help.

The External Affairs Minister last week had offered to help the two-day-old infant, who was born in Bhopal, with a heart disease.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.
New Delhi, Sep 26 : It's that time of the year in Punjab-Haryana-NCR.

Amid the protests over farm Bills, Punjab farmers are back at burning stubble. Satellite images released by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)show that stubble burning has started for nearly five days in the farm basket of India, which means in the next three days, Delhi's air may turn into 'poor' category amid the Covid-19 pandemic, sparking health concerns.

The System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting And Research (SAFAR) has already started to show the results with Delhi's air quality turning 'moderate'.

To put things into context, the air quality in Mumbai and Ahmedabad is 'satisfactory', while it is 'good' in Pune.

SAFAR has red-flagged that in the next three days alone, PM 2.5, which is in moderate quantity in Delhi air as of now, will turn into 'poor'. As on Saturday, PM 2.5 count in Delhi air was 68. In the next three days, it is likely to reach 96. PM 2.5 count in Mumbai was 33 on Saturday, and is likely to go up to 35 in the next three days.

While farmers are being brazen about the Supreme Court guidelines on stubble burning, the state administrations too seem to have turned away their attention from it.

In August this year, the Supreme Court had asked Delhi, Punjab, Haryana and other state governments about their preparedness to prevent stubble burning.

Like in recent years, when Delhi turned into a gas chamber last year, the Supreme Court had asked, "Why are people being forced to live in gas chambers?" But less than a year on, Punjab farmers are back at what they do while complaining that with no financial support to avail alternative methods, burning stubbles is all they can afford.

Hemant Kaushal, Project Coordinator at the Centre of Excellence for Research on Clean Air, Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Delhi, told IANS, "Unlike other years, we have a pandemic this year which affects the lungs. A gas chamber in Delhi will only aggravate the situation as far as the fight against Covid-19 in Delhi-NCR is concerned." "This needs to be curbed immediately. This stubble burning carries on from October to November and badly affects Delhi-NCR. We can not wait for that," he added.

SAFAR warned on Saturday, "A marginal increase in stubble burning was witnessed in Punjab and its neighbouring border areas on Friday. High surface winds are expected for the next two days. Favoruable ventilation condition is likely to keep Delhi AQI in the moderate category for the next two days. AQI may reach the high end of the moderate category by September 29."
A 20-year-old woman was killed in a hit and run incident after an over-speeding vehicle ran over her when she was crossing the road near Jassiyan cut on Thursday night.

The victim has been identified as Kajal of Kesri Enclave, Jassiyan road.

According to the onlookers, the woman was crossing a road near Jassiyan cut on Thursday night at around 9pm to reach Basti Jodhewal when an unidentified over-speeding vehicle hit her. The passers-by rushed her to the ESIC Hospital, where she succumbed to the injuries a day after the incident took place.

Gurjant Singh, the father of the victim, is a labourer. He stated that due to the familys poor financial condition, Kajal, the eldest of his three daughters, had discontinued her studies after Class 12 and started working to support her family. For the past few months, she had been working at a petrol pump.

ASI Prem Singh, who is investigating the case, said that an FIR, under sections 279 (rash driving or riding on a public way) and 304-A (causing death due to negligence) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) had been lodged against the unidentified driver at Salem Tabri police station. The police have been trying to trace the vehicle, he added.
Onitsha, Eastern Nigeria, Sat, 26th Sept 2020: Intl Society for Civil Liberties & Rule of Law is deeply frowning at steady and unchecked embarrassment and tainting of Nigerias international corporate image by Mallam Shehu Garba and Mr. Femi Adesina and other private media aides attached to the office of Mr. President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. This they have been doing since mid 2015 when their boss hired them under the guise of Presidential Media Aides. Since then they have internationally reduced Nigeria to government of parochialism, clannishness and mockery including a government where indefensible policy blunders and conduct atrocities are fruitlessly defended and repeatedly perpetrated.

The personally biased and inexperienced presidential media aides not only talk loquaciously and emptily on sensitive matters requiring tact handling and expert opinions, but have also elevated their personal biases and opinions as policy and conduct laws of the country; to the extent that they now lecture the same international agencies and governments they and rest of Nigerians have consistently and solely fallen back on, in matters of credible local and international data and statistics including data on governance, defense, security, policing and intelligence.

Henceforth, such embarrassing and loquacious opinions expressed by private media aides of Mr. President on weighty national issues must be regarded by Nigerians and members of the Intl Community and other watchers on Nigeria as personal opinions and biases of such private media aides of the President. This is because Nigeria as a country of over 200m citizens and acclaimed democratic country is not a Government or Presidency of Mallam Garba Shehu and Mr. Femi Adesina.

Sadly and regrettably, such uninformed and unguarded utterances have steadily escalated the butcheries and emboldened the perpetrators to continue unchecked to butcher, maim, plunder, rape, abduct, loot and forcefully convert captive defenseless Nigerian Christians with reckless abandon or impunity. Such utterances are also tactically a confirmation of Nigerian Government aiding and abetting in the butcheries and provision of state cover and protection for their perpetrators.

By the 1999 Constitution, the present Government of Nigeria, though grossly asymmetrical in composition or heavily Muslim controlled; is constituted and led through a Federal Executive Council with Secretary to the Government of the Federation as its chief scribe and intellectual warehouse. Governments responses on such weighty issues of international coloration such as the letter to the Commonwealth by some concerned UK Parliamentarians ought to and should be handled by the Federal Executive Council or Secretary to the Government of the Federation through a media conference or briefing; not by private Presidential media aides.

We have therefore read and analyzed with deepest dismay a statement of indefensible defense, distortion and trivialization, released by Mallam Shehu Garba, claiming to be representing the Government and People of Nigeria and in response to media reports of some concerned UK Parliamentarians that petitioned the Commonwealth Secretary General, praying the body to prevail on Government of Nigeria to adhere strictly to her human rights commitment to the Commonwealth Charter as a notable member of the Organization by addressing the spate of anti Christian butcheries and other forms of insecurity in Nigeria.

Lacking intelligent, tact and expertise, Mallam Shehu Garba undertook again to embarrass the country and taint her international corporate image by telling the international friends of the countrys downtrodden and persecuted citizens that Vice President Osinbajo is a Christian Evangelical Pastor and as such, an indication of formation of a religiously balanced (50-50 Muslim-Christian) Government by the Government of his Boss. Instead of thanking the concerned UK Parliamentarians and others like them, with firm promise to frontally address the butcheries, Mallam Shehu Garba opted to rigmarole in absurdity, frivolity and irrelevance.

As if that was not enough, Mallam Garba Shehu further manifested personal bias, ignorance and psychology of typewriter age, by attempting to reduce the weighty issue of killing of Christians and gathered intelligence and victims testimonies showing overt and covert complicity of the countrys security agencies and their operatives in the butcheries to personal castigation and attacks. We have wondered and still wonder what the years of service and government appointment of Retired Gen Theo Danjuma or Kanu/IPOB as a proscribed terror group got to do with the unchecked killing of Christians and obvious security forces complicity.

This is more so when the killings have been researched and published by over 50 local and international groups including human rights and Christian, victims and non faith groups and locally and internationally respected personalities. Included in the list of agencies that have reported or published the killings are various agencies working for Federal Government of Nigeria which dishonestly and falsely chose to label the killings as farmers-herders clashes. This is more so when the same Federal Government of Nigeria was reported to have hired the like of Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon and others as its chief lobbyists in the same UK Parliament.

Osinbajos Christian Vice Presidency Is A Camouflage

The stark reality on the ground in the present Nigeria is that Prof Yemi Osinbajo as the countrys Vice President and a Christian does not in any way indicate formation under the present Federal Government of Nigeria a religiously balanced or 50-50 Christian-Muslim Federal Cabinet and its defense, security, policing and civil agencies.

As a matter of fact, Prof Osinbajos Vice Presidency is a camouflage-which was the case in Sudan where a makeshift position of a Vice President was allocated to Christians and in Lebanon where a post of largely ceremonial President was also allocated to same. Yet behind the scene, systematic efforts including propagation and institutionalization of radical Islamism were intensified to wipe out the Christian populations in the two countries with intent to convert same posts to Muslim hold once Christians are no more. In Lebanon, but for State of Israel, radical Islamists would have wiped out all members of Christian faith and in Sudan, but for independence of largely Christian dominated South Sudan in 2011 following a 2005 agreement, same would have happened.

Also in Asyut Egypt, Coptic Christians once made up approximately 20% of the entire population of the country. But owing to years of sustained persecutions by State backed Jihadists, the Coptic Christians are presently not up to 2% of the countrys population. Yet, Asyut is the oldest Christian nation-state in African. It also hosts the oldest Christian church-the Hanging Church of Asyut built in AD60. With present radical domination of the Federal Government of Nigeria and its security and civil agencies by Muslims-a deliberate policy of the present central Government, the country is going same way as in Egypt, Sudan and Lebanon.

Therefore, since Mallam Shehu Garba has raised the issue of formation by his Bosss Government of balanced or 50-50 Muslim-Christian Government with gross distortion of facts, the following are the true position: that Sections 14 (3) and 10 of the 1999 Constitution prohibit domination or controlling of Federal Government of Nigeria and its agencies by Muslims or a particular ethno-religious group; but in practice and present case, the Government of Nigeria and its agencies are heavily Muslim controlled. In the area of composition of the Armed Forces of the Federation, Section 218 (1) of same 1999 Constitution clearly forbids and provides that the composition of officer corps and other ranks of the armed forces of the Federation shall reflect the federal character (ethno-religious balancing) of Nigeria; yet in practice, these provisions are observed in gross breach by the same Government.

For instance, the following top political, electoral, defense, security, policing, paramilitary and justice establishment positions, numbering twenty-eight are held by Muslims since mid 2015, out of the countrys 35 of such positions. President of Nigeria (Northern Muslim), Chief of Army Staff (same), Chief of Air Staff (same), Inspector Gen of Police (same), DG, SSS (same), DG, NIA (same), National Security Adviser (same), Minister of Defense (same), Minister of Police Affairs (Southwest Muslim), Comptroller Gen of Customs (same), Comptroller Gen of Immigration (same), Comptroller Gen Prisons (same), Commandant of Nigerian Security & Civil Defense Corps (same), Attorney Gen of the Federation (same), Chief Justice of Nigeria (same), Acting Chairman of EFCC (same), Chairman, Police Service Commission (Southwest Muslim) and CEO/Chairman of NAFDAC (same).

Other positions held by Muslims in the countrys security sector are the Senate and the House of Reps Chairmen on Defense, Interior, Police, Army, Navy, Air Force, National Intelligence, National Security, Customs, Immigration, etc. Few posts held by Christians in the Cabinet of the present Government of Nigeria are: Vice President (Southwest Christian), Chief of Defense Staff (Southwest Christian), Chief of Naval Staff (South-South Christian), Controller Gen, Federal Fire Service (North-Central Christian), Corps Marshall, FRSC (North-central Christian) and lately in acting capacity-Chief Judge of the Federal High Court (Christian) and President of the Court of Appeal (Christian).

Finally, since Mallam Garba Shehu has claimed internationally that his Bosss Government is religiously balanced or a secular Government, we strongly call and challenge him to publicly publish the names and their ethnic and religious identities of all the 21 constitutionally provided serving Justices of the Supreme Court, 49 Justices of the Court of Appeal, 69 Judges of the Federal High Court, all the serving DIGs, AIGs, CPs, State CPs, DCPs, ACPs, CSPs and SPs of the Nigeria Police Force especially those in charge of 18 Police Zonal Commands, 36 State Commands and the FCT; SCIDs, Police Area Commands, Police Marine, Police Border, Police Highway, Police Railway, Police Mobile Force, Police Divisional Commands, and Anti Terror, Anti Cult, Anti Bunkering and Anti Robbery Police in Nigeria.

To be publicly published by Mallam Garba Shehu, too, are names and ethno-religious identities of serving Deputy DGs, Assistant DGs, State Directors and Local Government heads of SSS in the country and those in the Customs, Immigration, Prisons, NSCDC and FRSC as well as GOCs, Brigade, Battalion and Artillery Commanders of the Nigerian Army throughout Nigeria and their equivalents in the Nigerian Air Force and the Nigerian Navy. Not excluded from being publicly published are serving heads of Federal Governments parastatals, agencies and departments (MDAs) including Vice Chancellors, Rectors and Provosts of Federal Universities, Polytechnics and Colleges of Education and special schools including Principals of Federal Colleges as well as current heads of the NNPC, Nigerian Ports Authority and Air Port Authority, etc.

Signed:

For: Intl Society for Civil Liberties & Rule of Law

Emeka Umeagbalasi, Board Chair, Chinwe Umeche, Esq., Head, Democracy & Good Governance, Ndidiamaka Bernard, Esq., Head, Intl Justice & Human Rights and Damaris Amaka Onuoha, Esq., Head, Campaign & Publicity

Contacts:

Mobile/WhatsApp: +2348174090052

Email: [email protected]

Website: intersociety-ng.org


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GMR Infrastructure on September 25 said its unit has agreed to sell its stake in Kakinada SEZ (KSEZ) to Aurobindo Realty.

GMR SEZ and Port Holding (GSPHL) will sell its entire 51 percent stake in Kakinada SEZ to Aurobindo Realty and Infrastructure, according to a BSE statement.

The total consideration for the stake sale as well as the sub-debt in Kakinada SEZ is Rs 2,610 crore. Of this amount, Rs 1,600 crore would be received on the closing date and balance Rs 1,010 crore would be received in next 2 to 3 years which is contingent upon certain agreed milestones.

"As part of the proposed transfer of stake of KSEZ, the 100 percent equity stake of Kakinada Gateway Port Limited ("KGPL") held by KSEZ would also be transferred to Aurobindo Realty," the statement said.

KGPL had in 2018 signed a concession agreement with the Andhra Pradesh government to set up a greenfield commercial port in Kona village.

Shares of GMR Infrastructure rose 3 percent in early trade after the announcement.
New Delhi, Sep 26 : The Indian Army on Saturday observed Animal Transport Remembrance Day to honour the valour, courage and sacrifices of animals in various military campaigns and operations.

Indian Army Service Corps Lieutenant General MKS Yadav, Director General Supplies and Transport and senior colonel commandant paid tributes to the animals and muleteers who laid down their lives for the nation and continue to be a source of immense motivation and inspiration for the force.

Animals and Muleteers of Army Service Corps are an intrinsic part of the Indian Army and have conducted various missions across high mountain ranges and dense jungle terrain and have been instrumental for the success of the armed forces in hostile and harsh conditions.

"The Indian Army has a long history of effectively using animal transport in various military campaigns and operations," Indian Army stated.

Today, animal transport is still the critical backbone of logistics support to Indian Army at forward border posts under extreme weather and terrain conditions.

To honour valour, courage and sacrifices of animal transport warriors, September 26 is celebrated as "Animal Transport Remembrance Day" every year.

On this very day in the year 1914, the 9th and 30th Mule Corps, part of Indian Expeditionary Force 'A', landed at Marseilles, France, thus becoming among the first Supply and Transport Corps troops to be inducted into the First World War.
Shore School mothers have taken to social media to stand up for their sons after the North Sydney school was engulfed in controversy over year 12 muck-up day plans for a scavenger hunt.

Mothers have been posting photos on Instagram and Facebook of their children in Shore uniform, tagging the pictures #ProudShoreMum and adding blue and white hearts to represent the school's colours. The posts are made in private social media groups.

Shore parents have been posting photos of their children in uniform on social media, as the fallout continues over plans for a potentially illegal scavenger hunt. Credit:Jim Rice

One parent who did not want to be identified said the posts were a reaction to the social and mainstream media pressure Shore boys had been subjected to since The Sydney Morning Herald published an inappropriate year 12 scavenger hunt list compiled by a Shore student or students.

The Shore mothers say their sons were approached by journalists last week while waiting for public transport and subjected to radio and television interview requests. Boys have also been abused by members of the public on the way to school according to one primary school mother who wanted to remain anonymous.
BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept. 26

Trend:

President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev expressed condolences to Volodymyr Zelenskyy, President of Ukraine.

"Dear Mr. President,

I was deeply saddened by the news of multiple casualties as a result of the crash of a military aircraft in the Kharkov province.

It is due to this tragedy that on my own behalf and on behalf of the people of Azerbaijan, I offer my profound condolences to you and the families of the victims and wish a speedy recovery to the injured," the message said.
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Two militants were killed on Friday in a gunfight in restive Indian-controlled Kashmir, police said.

The gunfight broke out between the government forces and militants at village Sirhama of Anantnag district, about 68 km south of Srinagar city, the summer capital of Indian-controlled Kashmir.

"Yesterday evening a gunfight broke out at village Sirhama here. No sooner the contingents of police and paramilitary reached the suspected area, the gunfight began," a police official said.

"The operation was suspended late-night in wake of the darkness and resumed this morning. In the heavy exchange of fire between the two sides two militants were killed."

According to police, the government forces have not suffered any damage in the standoff.

A guerilla war has been going on between militants and Indian troops stationed in the region since 1989.
As the Election Commission announced the dates for the Bihar assembly elections, it seems to be a direct fight between the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and the RJD-led Opposition Grand Alliance (Mahagathbandhan). However, in these elections several rookie parties and groupings will also be in the political fray.

One such grouping is the Left which had to be content with very few seats in the previous elections. Many other outfits will also come before the voters after having fought previous elections in alliance with other parties. These include the Vikassheel Insaan Party (VIP), Janata Dal (Rashtrawadi), Jantantrik Vikas Party (JVP) and others.

Former MP Pappu Yadavs Jan Adhikar Party (JAP) has announced it will contest on 150 seats. It is no secret that Yadav, a former RJD leader, has carved his own political space in many regions of Bihar. Speculation is rife that he will benefit from the hard work done in the last five years in some regions.

Pappu Yadav said Bihar is frustrated with the ruling party and the Opposition and was looking for an alternative political narrative offered by him.

JVP Chief Anil Kumar has also announced he will field party candidates on 150 seats. The party is considered strong in Buxar, Bhojpur and Rohtas districts.

Kumar said the development which has been claimed to have been done in Bihar has been exposed during the ongoing corona pandemic and such fake development promises were known to the people.

Former MP Ranjan Yadav, who has worked with RJD President Lalu Prasad Yadav in the past, is also in the electoral fray contesting on a Janata Dal (Rashtrawadi) ticket in these elections. Party workers showed their strength on Friday, taking to the streets in protest against the Farm Bills passed by Parliament.

Janata Dal (Rashtrawadi) Convenor Ashfaq Rahman said his party is contesting as a constituent of the Union Democratic Alliance (UDA) which gives people an alternative political choice.

The performance of the Left-centric parties is also not considered to be better in Bihar. In the last elections, the Left parties had to be content with only three seats. However, in this election the Left is set to enter the political arena aligning with the Opposition Grand Alliance.
Hugely popular places in Taiwan! Tour Jiufen and Shifen in a single day! You can also choose to get off at Taipei Station or at the Shilin Night Market on the way back depending on where you want to explore on this tour. Start from dawn when Jiufen is the most beautiful to dusk at Shifen for the lively night. You can participate in many cultural events such as releasing a latern. At Shifen, you can write a wish on a paper lantern and release it high in the sky. The wish depends on the color of the lantern, but there is also a multi lantern with four colors for those who want it all! Come experience the unique combination of a retro and simple atmosphere that these towns have to offer.
Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - September 25, 2020) - SKRR Exploration Inc. (TSXV: SKRR) (OTC Pink: SKKRF) (FSE: B04Q) ("SKRR" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that the Company has retained Integrous Communications as its investor relations advisor. Integrous will assist SKRR with corporate communications, public relations and investor and shareholder outreach.

"Our decision to engaging Integrous as our investor relations partner came due to the breadth and depth of services they provide in North America and abroad," said Sherman Dahl, Chief Executive Officer of SKRR. "As we continue to develop our highly prospective exploration portfolio, Integrous' expertise in the mining and metals sector is an exceptional fit. With their established global presence and strong relationships with retail and institutional investors, we expect to expand our shareholder base."

"SKRR is an exciting exploration story led be a seasoned management team," stated Rich Matthews, Managing Director of Integrous Communications. "The Company is taking advantage of a strong precious metals market coupled with one of the most respected scientific teams. With a new story for the Street and a proven explorations model in an emerging gold-producing region, we feel there is significant upside to the SKRR investment story. We look forward to enhancing the corporate brand and investment value proposition."

The investor relations agreement with Integrous Communications has a term of twelve months from the date of TSX Venture Exchange ("TSXV") approval and may be terminated at any time without charge by either party by giving 60 days' notice. Integrous Communications will be paid a monthly fee of C$7,500 and will be granted stock options to acquire up to 250,000 common shares of SKRR at a price of $0.32 per share for a period of two years, vesting in stages over a period of 12 months in equal portions every three months, in accordance with the Company's stock option plan and the policies of the TSXV.

The engagement of Integrous Communications remains subject to the approval of the TSXV.

About SKRR Exploration Inc.:

SKRR is a Canadian-based precious metal explorer with properties in Saskatchewan - one of the world's highest ranked mining jurisdictions. The primary exploration focus is on the Trans-Hudson Corridor in Saskatchewan in search of world class precious metal deposits. The Trans-Hudson Orogen - although extremely well known in geological terms has been significantly under-explored in Saskatchewan. SKRR is committed to all stakeholders including shareholders, all its partners, and the environment in which it operates.

About Integrous Communications

Integrous Communications is an independent communications and investor relations consulting firm which provides integrated corporate communications services. Headquartered in North America with representation in the US and Canada, the firm's diverse team of professionals has more than 100 years of combined experience. Integrous serves both domestic and international clients, including companies listed on the U.S., Canadian, Australian and European exchanges.

ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD

Sherman Dahl

President & CEO

For further information contact:

Rich Matthews, Investor Relations

Integrous Communications

rmatthews@integcom.us

+1 6047577179

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this news release.

Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward Looking Information

This news release contains "forward-looking information or statements" within the meaning of applicable securities laws, which may include, without limitation, statements that address the TSXV approval of the Integrous Communications agreement, the advancement of the Company's gold projects, other statements relating to the technical, financial and business prospects of the Company, its projects and other matters. All statements in this news release, other than statements of historical facts, that address events or developments that the Company expects to occur, are forward-looking statements. Although the Company believes the expectations expressed in such forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, such statements are not guarantees of future performance and actual results may differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements. Such statements and information are based on numerous assumptions regarding present and future business strategies and the environment in which the Company will operate in the future, including the price of metals, the ability to achieve its goals, that general business and economic conditions will not change in a material adverse manner, that financing will be available if and when needed and on reasonable terms. Such forward-looking information reflects the Company's views with respect to future events and is subject to risks, uncertainties and assumptions, including those filed under the Company's profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in forward looking statements include, but are not limited to, continued availability of capital and financing and general economic, market or business conditions, adverse weather conditions, equipment failures, failure to maintain all necessary government permits, approvals and authorizations, decrease in the price of gold and other metals, the impact of Covid-19 or other viruses and diseases on the Company's ability to operate, failure to maintain community acceptance (including First Nations), increase in costs, litigation, and failure of counterparties to perform their contractual obligations. The Company does not undertake to update forward-looking statements or forward-looking information, except as required by law.

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Lanka avoids any13A commitment at Rajapaksa-Modi summit View(s):

Sri Lanka avoided any commitment over an Indian call for the implementation of the 13th Amendment during a virtual summit between the leaders of the two countries yesterday.

Indian Premier Narendra Modi called on the Sri Lankan Government to address the aspirations of the Tamil people for equality, justice, peace and respect within a united Sri Lanka, by carrying forward the process of reconciliation with the implementation of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution.

Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa expressed confidence that Sri Lanka would work towards realising the expectations of all ethnic groups, including Tamils, by achieving reconciliation nurtured as per the mandate of the people and implementation of the constitutional provisions.

The positions of Premier Modi and Premier Mahinda Rajapaksa were outlined in a joint statement issued by the two countries last evening.

However, a statement issued in Colombo by Prime Minister Rajapaksas office made no reference to the subject. Instead, like the Indian statement, it listed out a broad range of issues discussed both by Premier Rajapaksa and his Indian counterpart.

Though Premier Rajapaksa assured Northern fishermen on Friday that he would take up the case of Indian fishermens illegal bottom-trawling in the Northern waters, there was no mention in his statement about the position taken.

However, the joint statement said both countries would continue to address the issues related to fishermen through regular consultation and bilateral channels according to the existing frameworks and shared goals, including the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

Indian Premier Modi also announced a grant assistance of USD 15 million for the promotion of Buddhist ties between the two countries while stressing the longstanding civilisational links and cultural heritage.

The Indian premier in his opening remarks said that in addition to the USD 400 million currency swap facility to the Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBSL) in the recent past, another additional request for a currency swap arrangement worth around USD 1 billion by the Sri Lanka side is still under discussion.

The two premiers agreed to deepen cooperation in renewable energy with particular emphasis on solar projects under a USD 100 million line of of credit from India.
The Supreme Court confirmation hearings for U.S. Circuit Judge Amy Coney Barrett will be an exercise in Kabuki theater. (Rachel Malehorn )

In January 2006, I testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee against the Supreme Court confirmation of Samuel A. Alito Jr. At a break in the proceedings, then-Sen. Joe Biden came up to me and said, You know this is all an exercise in Kabuki theater. Everyone in this room knows that Sam Alito is going to be a very conservative justice. The Republicans are pretending that he has no ideology. The Democrats are trying to ask questions to trip him up or pin him down and he is too smart for that.

Biden was correct: Alito was confirmed and has been a staunch conservative on the court.

Soon, the Judiciary Committee will embark on a new bit of theater: the confirmation hearings for Trumps latest Supreme Court pick, Amy Coney Barrett. Once again, the outcome is a preordained conclusion. Senate Republicans already have announced that they are going to confirm her, and there is no doubt that she is going to be an extremely conservative justice.

Since the hearings for Barrett dont have even a semblance of open inquiry, should the Democrats even participate in this charade? Im sure they are tempted to boycott the hearings as a way of protesting the stunning hypocrisy of the Republicans rush to confirm Barrett when just four years ago they blocked the confirmation of Judge Merrick Garland on the pretext that a president should not be able to pick a Supreme Court justice in an election year.

Refusing to participate might convey that message, but it also could make them seem petulant and failing at their duties. Instead, Senate Democrats should view the hearings as an important opportunity to demonstrate how Republicans are packing the court with justices on the far right-wing fringe.

The Democrats need to approach the hearings strategically. It is a mistake to think that anything they say or ask has the slightest chance of blocking Barretts confirmation. It also is a mistake to think that Barrett is going to say anything meaningful. She is sure to repeat the platitudes all nominees fall back on, saying she is open-minded, will respect precedent and cannot discuss any issue that might come before the court.

Story continues

What message then should Democrats seek to convey with their statements and questions? They should constantly remind everyone that this is an unprecedented power play by the Republicans. Just four years ago, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said, The American people should have a voice in the selection of their next Supreme Court justice. Therefore, this vacancy should not be filled until we have a new president. Many other Republicans, including ones on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said the same thing. Their words should be quoted often.

Democrats should also, through their questions, show that Barrett is going to be an extremely conservative justice and explain what that is going to mean for peoples lives in this country, particularly on issues of healthcare.

After the Supreme Court upheld the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in 2012, Barrett was sharply critical of the decision and said, "Chief Justice Roberts pushed the Affordable Care Act beyond its plausible meaning to save the statute." The issue of the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act is back before the court in November, and it is quite possible that Barrett could join with Justices Clarence Thomas, Alito, Neil M. Gorsuch and Brett M. Kavanaugh to strike it down. About 21 million people would be at risk of losing their health insurance in the midst of a pandemic.

Barrett is a self-professed originalist, like the late justice she clerked for, Antonin Scalia. This is the view that a constitutional provision means the same thing today as when it was adopted. Democrats need to point out that originalists long have argued that Roe vs. Wade was wrongly decided and that Barrett almost certainly will be the fifth vote to overrule that landmark decision. Originalists reject any protection of gay and lesbian rights under the Constitution, and Barrett, before becoming a federal appellate judge, expressed opposition to same-sex marriage. Based on her writings, she is sure to vote to allow businesses and employers, based on a claim of religious freedom, to discriminate against gays and lesbians.

Barrett, of course, will refuse to answer questions about these subjects. But that should not matter: Democrats must politely, but firmly, explain to the American people that President Trump has appointed someone who is going to take away their rights.

Amy Coney Barrett is as conservative as any federal judge in the United States. Trump picked her to please his political base. The Democrats, sadly, have no way to stop her confirmation, but they should use the process to leave no doubt in anyones mind what this is going to mean for the Constitution, the country and for peoples lives.

Erwin Chemerinsky is dean of the UC Berkeley School of Law and a contributing writer to Opinion.





This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
File photo shows P Jeyaraj and his son Fennix, who died at police custody on June 23 with relatives alleging that they were severely thrashed at the Sathankulam police station. PTI photo

New Delhi/Madurai: The CBI has chargesheeted nine Tamil Nadu policemen for murder, conspiracy and other offences in the custodial death case of the father-son duo who were arrested on a "fake" charge of violating the lockdown and tortured in Sathankulam police station in June this year, officials said Saturday.

The policemen have also been accused of destruction of evidence in the charge sheet filed before the Chief Judicial Magistrate in Madurai on Friday in the alleged torture and murder of shopkeepers J Benniks and his father RP Jeyaraj, who ran a mobile phone shop in Thoothukudi district.

The ghastly crime had triggered a massive outrage prompting the chief minister to seek a CBI probe in the matter.

In its charge sheet, the CBI has named the then Inspector and SHO S. Sridhar, Sub Inspectors K. Balakrishnan, P. Raghuganesh, Head Constables S. Murugan, A. Samadurai, and Constables M. Muthuraja, S. Chelladurai, X. Thomas Francis and, S. Veilumuthu posted at the police station.

The CBI rushed to file the charge sheet as the three-month custody of the accused is getting over on September 30 making them eligible for bail, sources said.

The agency has alleged that after the torture of the two victims in the police station which led to their death, the police officials destroyed evidence and filed "fake" charges against them of violating the coronavirus lockdown by keeping their shops open beyond the permitted time, they said.

When asked what was the motive behind the incident, the officials said the probe is being kept open.

During the investigation, nine CBI officers contracted COVID-19 while one of the accused sub-inspector died.

All the remaining accused police personnel are under judicial custody, they said.

"A CBI team camped continuously at Madurai and worked untiringly in the cases, even through the odds of COVID 19 pandemic," CBI Spokesperson RK Gaur said.

"The CBI investigation revealed that the father-son duo were arrested in the evening of 19.06.2020 and allegedly tortured at the Sathankulam Police Station by the accused in the evening as well as in the intervening night, consequent to which both of them succumbed to the injuries and died in the intervening night of June 22, 2020 and June 23, 2020," he said.

After investigation, a combined charge sheet in both the cases has been filed, he said.

"Further investigation is continuing to look into the role of other persons in the case," he said.

Meanwhile, the Judicial Magistrate probing the incident had told the Madras High Court that the policemen thrashed the deceased father-son the whole night in the police station. "Lathis were used" for allegedly assaulting them and a table carrying bloodstains bears testimony to the grisly crime.

The findings were based on a statement of a woman police personnel attached to the police station where the alleged crime took place.

After the alleged torture, Jeyaraj and Benniks were sent to sub-jail under remand at around 2.30 AM on June 20 where they were kept as prisoner number 3636 and 3635 respectively.

In the morning at around 7.45 am, Benniks complained of a wheezing problem and was taken to Kovilpatti government hospital in an autorickshaw. The doctors declared at 9 AM that he could not survive, the FIR had alleged.

Two days later at around 10.20 PM on June 22, Jeyaraj complained of fever and was taken to the government hospital.

In the morning at around 5.40 AM the next day, doctors told the authorities that treatment failed and Jeyaraj too had died, it said.
New Delhi:

The government on Monday has convened an all-party meeting ahead of budget session that is starting tomorrow, to seek oppositions support for the smooth functioning of the Assembly sessions in both the houses. However, Trinamool Congress is expected to skip the meet that will start at 11:30 AM on Monday.

Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan has also called for a similar meeting of leaders of all political parties in both the Houses on Monday evening at 7pm.

Budget will be presented on Wednesday by finance Minister Arun Jaitley. On Tuesday, President Pranab Mukherjee will address a joint sitting of the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha before the Budget Session.

The Economic Survey will also be presented on the first day of the session.

It is worth to note here, that winter session of parliament that was held in November-December last year, witnessed ruckus and blockade over demonetisation issue.

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Nearly three years after Hurricane Harvey, when a release of water from Lake Conroe impacted flooding in the Lake Houston Area, the San Jacinto River Authority board made a pivotal vote in February.

The highly contested decision made sure Lake Conroe maintains lower pooling levels during hurricane season to limit the lakes impact on downstream flooding while maintaining an area for boaters to still enjoy.

LOCAL: Trae tha Truth and his Relief Gang are helping victims of Topical Storm Beta

The move has had implications for how the entity has dealt with major rain events this month, SJRA and city of Houston officials said.

Jace Houston, general manager of the SJRA, said the organization did not have to lower the lake this year because the Lake Conroe area did not get significant rain during Hurricane Laura and Tropical Storm Beta.

Lake Conroe ended the month of August about 14 inches below the normal pooling level, exceeding the requirements set during the vote. In September, the target of being 18 inches lower than the normal pooling level by Sept. 15 was met naturally, according to Houston.

Since there were no releases during the storms, there have been very few phone calls or emails from Kingwood residents.

After June the first, after the spring lowering ended, weve had very little rain and so we actually havent released any water this summer at all, Houston said. And evaporation has gradually taken the lake level down to where we met the fall targets without the necessity of letting any water out.

However, the decision to lower Lake Conroe wasnt an easy one.

Before the coronavirus pandemic hit the region, hundreds of people attended a board meeting held at the Lone Star Convention and Expo Center in Conroe representing campaigns called Stop the Drop for Lake Conroe residents or Lives Over Levels for people who stay in the Lake Houston area. The board heard from officials, residents and even children from Kingwood who lived through Harvey in 2017.

Now, the target elevation for water levels is 1 foot below normal pool levels from April to May, then 1 foot below normal pool levels again in August with an additional 6 inches less in September.

Beyond those levels, if a named storm entered the Gulf of Mexico, the city of Houston  who owns two-thirds of the water rights to Lake Conroe  can ask for another half-foot of water to be released, bringing it to 199 feet above mean sea level.

While they could have safely lowered those levels this year, they didnt have to  mother nature did it for them, Houston said.

So mother nature takes care of this every year, Mayor Pro Tem and District E Councilmember Dave Martin said. And thats been our point when we went up to Conroe is folks, we dont touch your water, mother nature lowers your lake because of the heat, humidity (and) evaporation. Historically we showed data, Chuck Gilman showed data that said we never touch the lake level in Conroe unless its absolutely life or death.

NON-PROFIT SUPPORT: Army of volunteers keep Houstonians safe through The Emergency Aid Coalition

Martin, who advocated for the lake lowering strategies to prevent future flooding in Kingwood, said that he thinks it has been working well during this hurricane season.

During Harveys rainfall event, Lake Conroe was about 8 inches below normal pooling level. By comparison, Lake Conroe was about 12 inches below normal pooling level during Hurricane Laura, which didnt provide much rain to the area, and 18 inches low during Tropical Storm Beta which raised the water level about 3 inches from rain according to Houston.

Before choosing to release water from Lake Conroe ahead of a storm, some things need to be considered, Houston said. First, they look at whether the forecast projects the rain will affect Conroe and how long it will take for the water to reach Lake Houston. This helps the entity determine whether it is valuable for flood prevention efforts to release water.

While the technology to determine the forecasts of hurricanes is advanced, its also difficult to have confidence in the forecast models because they can vary widely. The nature of the storms can be unpredictable, Houston said.

You dont want to be putting water into the river from Lake Conroe in the last few days before a storm because it takes the water a day, a little over a day, to get down to Lake Houston and we dont want to be filling up Lake Houston right before a storm, Houston said. So you would need at least three, four, five days to start releasing.

Renew Houston: Get the latest wellness news delivered to your inbox

Meanwhile, the City of Houston has been lowering Lake Houston prior to major storms like Hurricane Laura and Tropical Storm Beta. However, the process will change in a few years.

Lake Houston will be receiving a long-awaited update by 2022 as part of the flood mitigation efforts made by the city. A $50 million flood relief project will update the Lake Houston spillway by creating 10 dam gates. The project will allow water to be released from the spillway when tropical storms or hurricanes threaten the Houston region.

Ive been very pleased with the working relationship with the SJRA board, and Im very pleased with the way the city of Houston and coastal water authority operate the Lake Houston spillway dam, Martin said. But, I still cant wait until 2022 when we open up that new dam structure.

Correction: An earlier version of the article used the wrong measurement for the pooling level of Lake Conroe.

savannah.mehrtens@chron.com
PC Lianne Matthews, 38, (pictured) was killed by a train travelling 50mph near Caerphilly on February 3

A police officer who had been talked out of killing herself died after being hit by a train while her parents were still on the phone to her.

PC Lianne Matthews, 38, had climbed onto train tracks near Caerphilly on February 3 over fears she was about to lose her job.

The mother-of-three had been fined 1,000 and given a 20-month driving ban for drink-driving and being drunk in charge of a child.

However, after speaking with her parents on the phone, Mathews, based in Roath, Cardiff, 'changed her mind' and decided to return home to her children.

Still on the phone to Matthews, her parents heard the sound of an approaching train, an inquest in Newport heard.

In a statement read to the court, sister, Heather Holsgrove said: 'Lianne called my mother and was on loudspeaker as my mother wanted my father to hear.

'She was crying and said 'do you know what it feels like not wanting to be here?'.'

The hearing was told Lianne was declared dead 20 minutes after the impact and investigating officer DC Dilwyn Lewis said Lianne's position on the track was not consistent with someone attempting suicide.

He said: 'If it was a deliberate act and it was intended then they would stand in front on the train facing away and the injuries would be more traumatic.

Matthews (pictured with partner Geraint Higgins) had climbed onto train tracks to kill herself over fears she was about to lose her job but after speaking with her parents on the phone she 'changed her mind'

'I think Lianne at the time deliberately went onto the track but I think the contact with her mother caused her to change her mind and tried to get back up on the platform and then it was either mistiming or she was expecting the train to stop at the station.'

Andrew Lee had been driving the train and he said that he was travelling at 50mph and had been given the green light to pass through.

He said: 'Suddenly I saw an image in front of me. I thought it was a young person with a backpack.

'I tried to apply the emergency brakes but couldn't stop in time and came to a stop a few hundred metres down the track.'

Matthews had joined the police in 2006 but was facing a police misconduct hearing for 'discreditable conduct'.

The hearing in Newport was told Lianne was declared dead 20 minutes after the impact

Her partner Geraint Higgins also serves as a detective in the same force.

Higgins told the inquest that Matthews had not intended on killing herself and a mixture of alcohol and anxiety had taken her down onto the tracks.

Assistant coroner for Gwent Sarah le Fevre said that Matthews had climbed onto the tracks around 7.10pm before being hit by the train and was declared dead at 7.30pm.

At the time of her death South Wales Police said: 'The officer's family are currently being supported by specially-trained officers and our thoughts remain very much with them, her friends and colleagues who are grieving at this time.

'The officer's death is being investigated by British Transport Police.

'She had been due to appear before a misconduct hearing in March to answer an allegation of discreditable conduct, following a conviction at Merthyr Tydfil Magistrates' Court on September 9.'

For confidential support, call the Samaritans on 116123 or visit a local Samaritans branch. See www.samaritans.org for details.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 16:44:31|Editor: huaxia

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DOHA, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- Sweden's world record holder Armand Duplantis continued his winning streak in the men's pole vault at the Diamond League meet in Doha on Friday.

The 20-year-old kept a clean sheet after clearing 5.82 meters. Reigning world champion Sam Kendricks of the United States and France's former world record holder Renaud Lavillenie needed their third attempts to leap off 5.82m.

The leading trio all chose to skip the height of 5.87m and the bar was then lift to 5.92m. After Lavillenie and Kendricks failed in all their three attempts, Duplantis, who also failed twice at 5.92m, had already secured his win and he went on to challenge 6.00m, but only saw his effort go in vain in the humid and hot weather conditions.

The top three finishers all achieved 5.82m but Kendricks and Lavillenie had to settle for the second and third places respectively on countbacks.

It is the 16th straight win for Duplantis, who set the world outdoor record of 6.15m in Rome last week and improved the world record to 6.18m on the World Indoor Tour in February. Enditem
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Bindi Irwin is expecting a baby girl in 2021.

On Tuesday, the 22-year-old reality TV star shared a photo of herself and her husband, Chandler Powell, holding a sonogram photo, hugging a giant tortoise, and surrounded by pink flowers. The caption on Irwins Instagram post read, Baby girl, you are our world. 

Irwin added, Our beautiful daughter is now about the same size as a hatchling Aldabra tortoise and is as healthy as can be. We cant wait for her arrival next year.

Wakeboarder Chandler Powell (L) and conservationist/TV personality Bindi Irwin attend Steve Irwin being honored posthumously with a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on April 26, 2018, in Hollywood, Calif. (David Livingston/Getty Images)

Irwin and Powell had a small, private wedding five months ago, during which Irwin called Powell her soulmate, and he vowed to remain by her side no matter what life throws our way.

Some might say that life has thrown them a curve ball with pregnancy so soon after marriage, but Powell is ecstatic about the news of their babys gender.

He shared an update the same day as Irwin, writing, Our little girl and my beautiful wife are my entire world. Im so excited to meet our daughter when shes born next year and to see the incredible person she will grow up to be 

Fans are equally ecstatic, leaving comments of encouragement, and even baby name ideas. One commenter suggested, Name her Stevie! after Irwins late father.

You both are [already] wonderful parents to your daughter, said another follower. I can tell.

The gender reveal is an ideal followup to the couples heartwarming pregnancy announcement last month.

Bindi Irwin poses for a photo with fiance Chandler Powell at the annual Steve Irwin Gala Dinner at Brisbane Convention & Exhibition Centre on Nov. 9, 2019, in Brisbane, Australia. (Bradley Kanaris/Getty Images)

We really want you to be part of our journey, Bindi wrote on Aug. 11. We couldnt wait to share the news.

At the same time, Powell announced, Were going to be parents!! We have a baby Wildlife Warrior on the way coming in 2021. Becoming a dad is the highlight of my life. I cannot wait to embark on this new adventure and life chapter with my gorgeous wife, @bindisueirwin. Bee, youre going to be the most amazing mother.

Less than a month after discovering she was pregnant, Irwin confided in her followers, saying, Discovering that I was going to become a mother will forever be a moment where time stood still.

It is such a blessing knowing that this tiny person has chosen us as parents, she added. Our baby Wildlife Warrior is going to be so very loved by our families and entire Australia Zoo team. I cant wait to find out what this amazing new soul loves in life, and experience the world all over again through their eyes.

We would love to hear your stories! You can share them with us at emg.inspired@epochtimes.nyc
Islamabad, Sep 26 (IANS) Pakistanis with negative Covid-19 test results can now travel to Saudi Arabia after the Kingdom lifted travel restrictions on people having valid visas subject to their coronavirus reports, the Foreign Office here said.

In a statement on Friday, the Foreign Office spokesperson said there was no Pakistan-specific travel restriction, reports Dawn news.
BAY CITY, MI  John and Autumn Filburns 5-2-oh food truck is bringing Asian fusion street food to Bay City.

Korean tacos filled with shredded, marinated pork and topped with fresh kimchi, shrimp tacos filled with popcorn shrimp tossed in a sweet chili sauce and topped with cilantro lime slaw, Korean-style chicken wings, and specialty burgers are just a few things hungry customers will find on their ever-changing menu.
Fonterra co-creates grass root solutions with their dairy farmers View(s):

Fonterra Brands Lanka has implemented specific solutions together with its dairy farmers to improve milk quality and yield, which includes the provision of fodder and farming equipment.

Smallholder dairy farmers form the backbone of the dairy industry, contributing to 90 per cent of Sri Lankas local milk supply. Organised knowledge-sharing, training, a sustainable business model and the transfer of deep dairy expertise can help upskill these farmers and lift their dairy farm performance and income, Fonterra said in a media release.

With this purpose in mind, Managing Director of Fonterra Brands Lanka and Indian Sub-Continent Ms. Vidya Sivaraja recently initiated the Dairy Discussion Group series with a group of farmers in Bingiriya, Kurunegala together with Fonterras Supplier Relationship Officers (SROs).

Good insights come from the grass root  and through our Dairy Discussion Group series which we initiated in July, we have looked into the various challenges faced by our hard-working dairy farmers. Such consultations have been valuable in co-creating solutions to help improve milk quality and yield. The solutions we are implementing are in line with the imperatives called out by the Presidential Task Force for Economic Revival and Poverty Eradication. Our country is rich in resources, talent and ingenuity. We are committed to championing this potential in line with the nations priorities, she said.
The race to win the space wars is back. After the last Apollo missions that took a man on the moon, its no secret that all international space agencies are eager to send an actual habitat there. In light of this undeclared race, space research, especially lunar research, has been a priority for many organisations.

The Chinese robotic spacecraft, Change 4 has become the first project to document the actual radiation on the lunar surface. While Neil Armstrongs team had carried dosimeters, the official data was unreported.

According to a new study published in the journal Science Advances, the Chinese spacecraft landed on the far side of the moon in January, 2019. The findings revealed that average daily radiation exposure on the moon could be 1,369 microsieverts per day. This value is 2.6 times more than the daily dose on the International space station.

Radiation is simply energy emitted in electromagnetic waves or particles. On earth, it can be from visible light to heat like infrared radiation. In space, the astronauts are subjected to potentially harmful radiations. On earth, we are protected from the outer spaces radiation with our blanket of atmosphere. In space, the astronauts will be exposed as the moon has no atmosphere.

There are some radiations that will be absolutely fatal even at the slightest exposure. Some of the radiation to be experienced there include sporadic solar particle events (from suns energy), galactic cosmic rays, gamma rays (yes, the Hulk one but it more likely to kill than make someone a superhero) and so on.

The radiation levels we measured on the Moon are about 200 times higher than on the surface of the Earth and 5 to 10 times higher than on a flight from New York to Frankfurt, Robert Wimmer-Schweingruber was quoted by CNN.

He is the corresponding author of the study that published Friday and a professor of physics at the University of Kiel in Germany.

He further explained, since the astronauts will be in space for a considerable amount of time, definitely much longer than a transatlantic flight, the exposure risks will be higher.

NASAs Artemis Moon Mission is set for 2024. This time, it will send a woman on the moon. The mission is likely to last a week.
This article was written by Duncan Robins, a member of the Entrepreneur NEXT powered by Assemble content team. Entrepreneur NEXT is our Expert solutions division leading the future of work and skills-based economy. If youre struggling to find, vet, and hire the right Experts for your business, Entrepreneur NEXT is a platform to help you hire the experts you need, exactly when you need them. From business to marketing, sales, design, finance, and technology, we have the top 3 percent of Experts ready to work for you.

When the asteroid that is COVID-19 struck world economies, the market was in the middle of a protracted, painful transition out of the Industrial Era. That asteroid will cost the global economy anywhere from $10 trillion to $15 trillion. It will also speed us on our way to the next era, the digital age.

The times are a-changin.

Physical infrastructure was the backbone of the Industrial Era. Management relied on rigid organizational structures and demanded a repetitive production from a loyal workforce of Baby Boomers.

Times are changing, however.

In the digital age, the businesses that dominate their industries and market niches will almost definitely do so by embracing technology. They wont ask their millennial workforce to be loyal to unfilling jobs requiring redundant laborinstead theyll ask for agility and creativity. To make this radical shift, organizations will need to rethink every aspect of Boomer-era employee-employer relationships. Theyll also need to force politicians to reconstruct funding mechanisms for government programs, while their formerly community-centered businesses and marketplaces dissolve.

Technology-enabled, Distributed Services organizations (TEDS for short) will likely dominate the post-COVID marketplace. These agile and efficient organizations, and their ecosystems, will thrive during the digital age. Their backbone will be the digital platforms that connect their distributed workforces, support their marketplaces, and enable their market-facing applications.

These platforms will also allow for the ubiquitous deployment of automation, robots, and A.I. (in physical and digital forms). You can expect continued advancement and optimization of these tools throughout the digital age.

They came. They saw. They conquered.

TEDS represent a new form of organization that will likely dominate global markets for years after the Industrial Era has given way. The most successful of these entities will share many of the same organizational characteristics. They will:

1) Be technology-enabled

2) Have distributed workforces

3) Mix physical and digital assets in their service offerings

4) Be extremely agile and efficient

We know this because the current incarnation of TEDS includes not only behemoths like Alphabet (Google), Amazon, Facebook, Apple, Uber and Airbnb, but also smaller startups like Assemble Technologies.

These beasts and babes arent just out to disrupt markets and industries, they want to dominate them. Many of these current companies and their ecosystems include a platform, a marketplace, and an application (App) or software-as-a-service (SaaS) offering. The most successful have already discovered how to incorporate distributed workforces and physical assets in novel legal structures. They use this edge to achieve maximum agility and efficiency, while offering their workforce new opportunities and flexibility.

The largest TEDs have evolved into voracious organizations, devouring markets and industries at a fantastic rate. Consider that in 1995 - 12 years after AOL got its start - the top 15 internet companies were worth $17 billion. In 2015 - 12 years after Facebook launched its social media platform - the top platform companies (the precursors to TEDS) were worth a whopping $2.5 trillion. Economists predicted pre-COVID that the digital share of the global economy was expected to grow from 15 percent in 2015 to 25 percent in 2020.

They forecasted the potential dawning of the digital age.

The number one problem shared among entrepreneurs today is finding, vetting, hiring, and retaining expertise.

Millenials will choose their future.

Although TEDS appear to have the upper hand over their workforces today, balance will be quickly restored. Millennials will be a powerful counterforce to TEDS as they become the majority workforce, consumer market, and voting public. They will surprise many musty politicians, officials, and community leaders by what they demand, and how active they will be.

Most freelancing millennials will not fight for employee status. According to polls, most millennials prefer the independence of freelancing. Forty-two percent of millennials participated in the Gig Economy in 2018, and many more are interested in doing contract work in the near future. Successful millennial freelancers do not necessarily want to become employees. However, they are interested in benefits that are currently tied to employment including:

1) Work-related training

2) Access to healthcare

3) Tax incentives to invest in retirement

However, none of these benefits need to be tied to an employer-employee relationship. If millennials get their way, they wont be much longer.

This is because freelancers are very politically active. Eighty percent of freelancers expect to vote in the coming election, almost twice the rate of non-freelancers. Over 80 percent of full-time freelancers would cross party lines to support candidates that solve their needs. They also vote with their wallets and feet, supporting organizations that align with their values, boycotting ones that dont, and moving to communities that support their "work as life" choices.

Darwinian evolutionthriving post-asteroid.

For businesses to survive and thrive in the post-COVID digital age, most will need to align with one or more TEDs by joining their ecosystems. The alignment will give these organizations a fighting chance, but they will still need to evolve. Theyll still need to use new platforms and digital tools to gain agility and efficiency in order to survive.

Unfortunately, when formerly physical connections to customers are digitized, businesses will find themselves increasingly reliant on their TEDS ecosystems.

While there will be many legal and political efforts to slow the rise of TEDS, most attempts will be futile in the long run. Businesses scrambling to adjust should not be distracted or lulled by these efforts. Rather, they should stay focused and resolute on adapting for the future of work.

The new future.

TEDs operate in stark contrast to Boomer-era hierarchical organizations. They redefine the worker-employer paradigm in such a way that courts, legislators and officials worldwide will find it difficult to apply outdated laws, policies and practices. Formerly straight-forward questions will be difficult to answer.

For example, what is the relationship between an organization and the worker? Or, what is the legal relationship between each of these entities and the customer? Are the workers independent contractors, sole proprietors, or employees? Are the guests or passengers the workers customers or the companys or both?

In the future, we expect five workplace trends to prevail:

1) Workforces and technology will morph as physical robots and digital bots become ubiquitous.

2) The definitions for employee and job will become blurred as organizations incorporate more flexible staffing models.

3) Organizations and the nature of work will be defined more by teams and their digital collaboration tools than by centralized, corporate-controlled, physical spaces and organizational structures.

4) Upskilling and reskilling programs will become competitive advantages of organizations, required of, but also sought after by their skills-based workforce.

5) Traditional employee, pre-tax benefits like healthcare and 401Ks will become decoupled from workplaces.

The future of work looks bright for many workers. Millennials will force improvements to their quality of "work as life," winning increased independence and flexibility by leveraging their skills and expertise. More people will have access to a more liquid labor market which will be more merit-based and "color blind."

However, governments will need to work with the TEDS to develop updated training and upskilling programs, as well as roll out additional technology to struggling communities. This will bridge the digital divide (a massive and growing social and economic challenge) to the benefit of everyone.

To hire the Experts you need, exactly when you need them, visit next.entrepreneur.com to schedule a meeting with our Expert solutions team.

Related:

9 Top Trends Shaping the Blockchain Industry

Predicting the Aftermath of the Economic Asteroid Known as COVID-19

Yalitza Aparicio sera la protagonista de la campana de Dior sobre mujeres que cambian el mundo



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Sex predators are targeting young children on popular social media app TikTok and blackmailing them into sending nude images and videos.

There has been a damning increase in online child sex abuse particularly during lockdown as kids remain inside on their phones.

The Australian Federal Police (AFP) have already arrested 161 disgusting predators and saved 134 children from abuse this year alone.

Detective Sergeant Daisie Beckensall said grooming is popular on social media apps like TikTok and Facebook, including gaming sites.

Detective Sergeant Daisie Beckensall said grooming is popular on social media apps like TikTok and Facebook, including gaming sites (stock image)

She explained that before the grooming process, the stranger pretends to be the child's friend before threatening to blackmail them.

'We see a lot of friend requests from online predators looking for children to follow, and the children will usually follow them back,' she told The Herald Sun.

'They start chatting online  they build up a rapport with the child, it starts off as an innocent and friendly chat, then they ask, ''Send me a photo of yourself''.'

As the paedophiles pretend to be of similar age to the children they're grooming, they also first ask for innocent photos.

Soon after, they become more demanding asking for sexualised images and threatening to tell the children's parents if they stop sending photos.

'Once the predators have the photos, they use them to manipulate and put fear into kids.'

She said paedophiles pretend to be the same age as the child they are talking to before grooming them (stock image)

Detective Beckensall also said another worrying trend was children posting naked photos and videos of themselves because they think it is 'normal' after seeing it online.

With some students still studying at home, they might not be privy to the 'scrutiny' as they would if at school.

She said it is important that parents tell their children to come forward if they are being bullied.

A TikTok spokesperson told Daily Mail Australia said they work fast to remove any child exploitation material from their app.

'We prohibit content that depicts or disseminates child abuse, child nudity, or sexual exploitation of children in digital or real world format,' they said.

'If we become aware of any such content, which is in direct violation of our Terms of Service and Community Guidelines, we will take immediate action to remove content, terminate accounts, and report cases to NCMEC and law enforcement as appropriate.

'Unlike other platforms, we don't permit images or videos to be sent in comments or messages. TikTok was built to provide a positive place for creativity and we prioritize the safety of our users.

'From the very beginning we chose not to allow users to upload photos or videos to their messages.'
Among the reasons President Trump has reportedly decided to appoint Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court is that the Democrats already attempted to Bork her, but failed, and disgraced themselves in the process while elevating her public profile.

Think I exaggerate? Check out this Tweet from Center for American Progress far-leftist Ian Millhiser:

You can expect a lot of news reports over the next few days to re-run Sen. Dianne Feinstein attacking Barretts Catholic faith in Barretts confirmation hearings to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals three years ago. It will not be a good look for Democrats if they reprise this attack, but Im betting they wont be able to help themselves. I hope Barrett quotes John F. Kennedy back to them.

There is apparently a lot of rumbling among liberals along Millhisers lines. Politico reported Thursday:

Democrats worry Feinstein cant handle Supreme Court battle As the Senate prepares for yet another brutal Supreme Court nomination fight, one particularly sensitive issue is creating apprehension among Democrats: what to do with 87-year-old Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee. Feinstein, the oldest member of the Senate, is widely respected by senators in both parties, but she has noticeably slowed in recent years. Interviews with more than a dozen Democratic senators and aides show widespread concern over whether the California Democrat is capable of leading the aggressive effort Democrats need against whoever President Donald Trump picks to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Feinstein sometimes gets confused by reporters questions, or will offer different answers to the same question depending on where or when shes asked. Her appearance is frail. And Feinsteins genteel demeanor, which seems like it belongs to a bygone Senate era, can lead to trouble with an increasingly hard-line Democratic base uninterested in collegiality or bipartisan platitudes. Just this week, Feinstein infuriated progressives after declaring her opposition to ending the Senates legislative filibuster  a top goal of party activists if Democrats win full control of the Congress and White House in November. Some on the left called on her to resign over the comments, although other Democratic moderates have expressed similar views. . . A Democratic senator, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said a group of Feinsteins colleagues want Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) or Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) to serve as the top Democrat on the Judiciary panel for the upcoming nomination hearings, which are expected to be extraordinarily contentious. This senator is worried that potential missteps by Feinstein could cost Democrats seats. Shes not sure what shes doing, the Democratic senator said of Feinstein. If you take a look at Kavanaugh, we may be short two senators because of that. And if this gets [messed] up, it may be the same result.

Order up some extra popcorn.

P.S. Remember that Kamala Harris is on the Judiciary Committee. Chances shell grandstand bigly in the Barrett hearings: 100%.

UPDATE: Heres Judge Barrett arriving back home at South Bend this evening. Shes trolling the libs hard herethats a Whole Foods bag she has in her hand! Millions of grumpy woke Whole Foodies will be even grumpier now.
EDWARDSVILLE  A new tuition initiative by Southern Illinois University could have a huge impact on low-income students who want to attend Southern Illinois University Edwardsville.

New undergraduate students from Illinois with family incomes below $63,575 can attend either SIUE or Southern Illinois University Carbondale tuition-free beginning fall 2021.

SIU President Dan Mahony announced the SIU System Commitment initiative during the Sept. 17 meeting of the SIU Board of Trustees. Under the new program, incoming four-year undergraduate students who meet the program requirements at both the Carbondale and Edwardsville campuses will have their tuition and any mandatory fees fully covered.

Its a totally new program for us and its something weve been talking about even before I started, Mahony said. Over the summer, people on both campuses put together a program that would work for everybody.

What it means is that on top of whatever federal aid the students get, we will fill in the gap, so they dont have to pay anything out of pocket. Its a huge step for both institutions and for the system and its a game-changer for a lot of people in lower-income families to provide them with an educational opportunity in a way that is easily affordable.

Students will still be responsible for housing, meals, course fees, books and supplies.

But for many local students, being able to attend college tuition-free opens a whole new window of opportunity.

What this means for our students in East St. Louis is that its life-changing, said Gina Jeffries, director of the SIUE East St. Louis Charter High School. We will have students who never considered higher education becoming first-generation college graduates. Its my belief that once they get there with free tuition, theyre going to stay.

SIUE Chancellor Randy Pembrook knows firsthand about what a life-changing experience a college education can be.

The two things I think about are access and affordability, Pembrook said. We talk about how higher education changes lives, and it did for me. I grew up in a rural environment in Greene County and having access to a college education and a degree and becoming a teacher made a huge difference for me.

The SIUE East St. Louis Charter High School has 115 students, who are all residents of East St. Louis. The student body is 100 percent black and 100 percent of the students are eligible for the national free school lunch program.

When you have students that are considering what to do after high school and what higher education institutions they want to look at, and when they see that its SIUE, they know were already a part of the system, Jeffries said. It makes sense and it makes it an easy transition for them to want to go there.

The initiative will cover eight semesters of continuous enrollment. Participants must maintain satisfactory academic progress in order for the program to be renewed. In addition to the income restriction, students must have assets less than $50,000 based on a submitted Free Application for Student Aid, or FAFSA; be an Illinois resident who attended an Illinois high school; apply for admission by the priority deadline of March 1; and enroll in a baccalaureate degree program.

Eligible students must first apply for all eligible state and federal financial aid for which they qualify, including federal Pell grants, state Monetary Award Program (MAP) grants and other institutional aid.

Mahony said the university will cover the outstanding balance.

Mahony believes that as the word spreads about the SIU System Commitment Initiative, the number of students taking advantage of it will continue to grow.

When we looked at the incoming class, it would affect 200 to 300 students on each campus, Mahony said. We assume that number will be at least the minimum next year, so we think it will be north of 300 students.

Pembrook expects the enrollment at SIUE to increase due to the initiative.

Were thinking about 100 [tuition-free] students coming in as freshmen plus another 100 transfers per year, Pembrook said. For some students, there is still a gap [after financial aid] and were looking to close that gap. It may be $1,000 or $1,500, but this will enable them to come to college and not have to pay tuition or fees.

For high school students in East St. Louis and other communities, Jeffries believes the initiative will serve as a motivating factor.

It will keep them in-state because the opportunity is just too good not to take advantage of, Jeffries said. Theyre very close to home, which is another advantage.

Jeffries feels the initiative will have long-term effects well beyond four years of free tuition.

For black and brown students who have traditionally been underserved, having this opportunity will now diversify both SIU campuses, which will in turn better diversify the workforce, Jeffries said. We will finally see some equity across the line for those black and brown students.

Im elated and proud to be a part of a system that would do this.

Pembrook, likewise, believes the opportunity for a tuition-free education will have far-reaching consequences for students and their families.

Im on a committee at the state level and we were talking the other day about the Aim High and MAP [grant] programs and many of the people that receive those kinds of funds are first-generation college students, Pembrook said. A lot of these students [under the new initiative] will be the first in their family to go to college, and thats incredibly exciting.

The SIU System Commitment Initiative comes on top of a recent announcement that SAT/ACT test scores are not required for admission at SIU through fall 2021.

That was also part of our effort to increase access and equity, so the two measures combined provide a lot more opportunities for people, Mahony said.
EV Motoring: Geely Reveal At 2020 Beijing Auto Show







Lynk & Co pure electric Zero Concept made its public debut at the Beijing Auto Show

Details of the concept model state-of-the-art technology released in detail

New technology underpins Lynk & Cos future leadership in smart pure electric vehicles

2020 September 26, Beijing. Lynk & Co, the global premium brand created by Geely Auto Group, debuted their Zero Concept pure electric model to the public at the 2020 Beijing Auto Show and revealed new details about the state-of-the-art technology underpinning the model.

The smart pure electric Zero Concept is the first of many models developed on Geely Holdings Sustainable Experience Architecture (SEA), a new electric vehicle architecture that Geely Holding aims to share across the Group and also with third party OEMs.

Based on a dedicated pure electric vehicle architecture, the new Zero Concept was able to achieve a perfectly balanced 50:50 chassis weight ratio with a length of over 5 meters and long wheelbase over 3 meters. With short front and rear overhangs, interior space has been maximized enhancing user experience.

The Zero Concept eliminates range anxiety with a long battery range of 700km; the battery has been tested to be able to retain its range without degradation for at least 200,000km and have a design life of 2,000,000km, much higher than competitors.

The model is equipped with a total of 400kW motors powering a four-wheel drive system which can accelerate the vehicle from 0 to 100km/h in under four seconds. With its world class chassis tuning, inherent low center of gravity, wide body, the Zero Concept provides its users with the ultimate dynamic driving experience.

Taking autonomous driving to the next level, the Zero Concept comes with Lynk & Cos CoPilot ADAS system. CoPilot takes advantage of Mobileyes Supervision Technology and latest system-on-chip EyeQ5 to offer users the highest level of safe and reliable autonomous driving features currently available to the public.

The Zero Concept is Lynk & Cos most luxurious product to date coming equipped with a range of highly customizable state-of-the-art technologies. To provide its users with the ultimate level of ride comfort, Zero Concept come with 150mm-220mm height-adjustable air suspension and continuous damping controlled (CDC) electromagnetic shock absorbers. Not only does the technology allow the model to make adjustments to its suspension according to various road conditions right out of the factory, full-life OTA updates allow Lynk & Cos R&D team to continue optimizing the system after receiving user feedback. Inside, the Zero Concept comes with a variety of user experience enhancing features such as high-end Yamaha speakers, customizable ambient lighting, on-board cameras, etc.

The Zero Concept was developed with the idea that vehicles can continue to evolve after leaving the factory. The SEA OS development ecosystem connects global developers and SEA-based models. Together with full-life OTA updates, SEA-based models such as Zero Concept can continue to evolve and improve their users experience.

Full press release and photos available online at http://zgh.com/media-center/ news/20200926-1/?lang=en

=End=

About Zhejiang Geely Holding Group

Zhejiang Geely Holding Group (Geely Holding) is a global automotive group that owns several well-known international automotive brands, with operations spanning the automotive value chain, from research, development and design to production, sales and servicing.

Founded in 1986 by Li Shufu, the companys Chairman, in the city of Taizhou in Chinas Zhejiang province, Geely Holding launched its automotive business in 1997 and is now headquartered in Hangzhou, China. The Group is comprised of five main businesses: Geely Auto Group, Volvo Car Group and Geely New Energy Commercial Vehicle Group, Geely Technology Group, Mitime Group. Its brands include Geely Auto, LYNK & CO, Geometry, Volvo Cars, Polestar, London Electric Vehicle Company (LEVC), Farizon Auto, PROTON, Lotus, and Terrafugia.

Geely Holding sold over 2.178 million vehicles in 2019, with Volvo Cars sales reaching historic highs of 705,452 units globally and Geely Auto Group's Hong Kong listed entity reporting 2019 sales reaching 1,361,560 units.

Geely Holding employs over 120,000 people globally, and has been listed in the Fortune Global 500 for the past nine years.

For more information regarding Zhejiang Geely Holding Group please refer to the official website at www.zgh.com
YEREVAN.  Zhoghovurd newspaper of the Republic of Armenia (RA) writes: It seems the crisis in the RA Constitutional Court [(CC)] is just beginning.

The thing is that after three days of discussions, the Constitutional Court did not elect a new president. CC Judge Yervand Khundkaryan did not garner the necessary number of votes to assume the post of court president. He garnered two votes in favor, three against; three [CC] judges did not partake in the voting.

Let us stress: since Khundkaryan was the only candidate, he needed five votes in favor to be elected, but he actually got two votes in favor, one of which votes in favor he gave to himself, and three votes against.

Zhoghovurd daily learned that Khundkaryan received the one [other] vote in favor from [CC Judge] Edgar Shatiryan, and [CC Judge] Arevik Petrosyan gave one of the votes against, whereas [CC Judges] Hrayr Tovmasyan and Vahe Grigoryan did not even take part in the voting.

Let us note once again that Hrayr Tovmasyan [former president and now ordinary judge of the CC] and Vahe Grigoryan seem to have formed a "coalition" against Khundkaryan, and they do everything so that either [CC Judge] Arman Dilanyan or a third personbut not Khundkaryanis elected CC president.

But, as we had predicted, there will be a 2nd round of the elections for the CC president, and it is not ruled out that only Khundkaryan will be nominated in the second round as well, and will be elected.
Michael and Dorothy Nelson have owned their Edison home since 1985.

Missing mortgage payments arent normally part of the couples life.

But in December 2019, they received a notification from their mortgage company that their $1,627 payment for the prior month was never received. They would have to make two payments to bring the account current.

But that couldnt be right, they thought.

They checked their PNC account and saw the check was indeed cashed and the money was out of their account. To make sure their mortgage was current and so their credit wouldnt be trashed, they sent in the extra payment.

But what happened to the first check?

We are seniors and need every penny we have," Dorothy Nelson said. "Weve been robbed.

Its nine months later, and the couple has been caught between two banks that havent come up with a resolution.

Ive spoken to so many people at PNC Bank, from customer service representatives, managers, executive client relation specialists, she said. Every one of them gave me an amount of time needed to `resolve' this issue.

But nothing has been resolved.

Heres a taste of what happened.

PHONE CALLS AND MORE PHONE CALLS

When the couple first learned the payment was missing, they contacted PNC, which said it would look into the matter.

On Jan. 11, Nelson received a copy of the check.

The check was cashed by Bank of America with no endorsement, Nelson said.

Over the next few weeks Nelson, made several calls to PNC. Each representative said it would take time to review  three to five days, 10 days and so on  and each time Nelson called back, the bank said it needed more time, she said.

On Jan. 27, a representative said the management team would start to research what happened.

Then on Jan. 30, another rep said there were no notes about the incident, and Nelson would need to fax full copies of her bank statements to show the check had been cashed and money was taken from the account, she said.

So she did.

Into February, there were more calls, and each new representative didnt seem to know anything about the case, Nelson said.

Finally, on Feb. 12, Nelson said she reached two representatives who seemed on the ball. One sent a request to Bank of America to investigate.

But by March 2, Bank of America hadnt responded. Nelson was told by PNC to give it another week.

You can imagine what happened next.

Nothing. Nelson said she was told to wait another week.

This went on  wait longer, Nelson was told over and over  until June 5.

Thats when Nelson said she got a call from a PNC investigator who said the bank may reimburse her. She was given a case number, too. That seemed like progress.

More calls. More instructions to wait.

On June 25, a PNC representative said a letter of resolution was sent to Bank of America on May 22, and it will take 90 days from that date for a resolution.

But 90 days later, there was no resolution, still.

Nelson was given a new target date: Sept. 8.

Can you guess what happened then?

Nothing.

On Sept. 9, another representative said the case would be escalated, and possibly, PNC would credit her account.

But the next day, still another representative said something different.

She said PNC cannot help until Bank of America gets back to them and reimburses the money, Nelson said. She said that PNC will not reimburse my money to me.

That was enough for Nelson.

Weve lost $1,637 from this and PNC refuses to give us the money and then go after Bank of America to pay them back as I suggested many times, noting shes been a long-time faithful customer of PNC.

She asked Bamboozled for help.

THAT RESOLUTION, FINALLY

We examined the front and back of the check and the lengthy log of phone calls Nelson kept since the start of this ordeal.

We shared it all with PNC and Bank of America, asking them to review the case. In 24 hours, Nelson got a call.

He informed me that they received a call from a newspaper journalist regarding my check fraud yesterday afternoon, Nelson said. He said PNC is going to make this right for us and the full check amount will be put into our account by the end of the day.

PNC will continue to investigate with Bank of America to try to recover the funds.

I really cant believe that it took me nine months with no resolution and you handled this in one day and were getting our money, Nelson said. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts.

By the end of the day, the money was back in the Nelsons account.

We went back to PNC and Bank of America to see if they could explain why this took so long. Both banks declined to comment.

Despite the nine-month wait, thanks to PNC for helping this customer.

Please subscribe now and support the local journalism YOU rely on and trust.

Karin Price Mueller may be reached at KPriceMueller@NJAdvanceMedia.com.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-27 00:16:57|Editor: huaxia

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Police officers clash with a protester during an anti-coronavirus restrictions protest in Trafalgar Square in London, Britain, on Sept. 26, 2020. Police has shut down an anti-coronavirus restrictions protest in central London on Saturday because crowds have not complied with social distancing rules. At least three protesters and one police officer were reportedly injured and treated by medical staff after they clashed at the anti-lockdown protest in Trafalgar Square. (Photo by Ray Tang/Xinhua)



LONDON, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Police has shut down an anti-coronavirus restrictions protest in central London on Saturday because crowds have not complied with social distancing rules.

At least three protesters and one police officer were reportedly injured and treated by medical staff after they clashed at the anti-lockdown protest in Trafalgar Square.

Thousands had gathered in the "we do not consent" rally to protest against government rules, with very few wearing masks.

BBC reported police officers penned the crowd in Trafalgar Square as water and bottles were thrown at them by demonstrators, while police removed sound equipment and used batons against protesters, leaving some with visible injuries.

A Metropolitan Police statement said that those who stayed could face criminal penalties because they "have not complied with the conditions of their risk assessment and are putting people in danger of transmitting the virus".

"This has voided their risk assessment and we have informed the event organisers they are no longer exempt from the regulations."

The rally came a week after a separate event which saw more than a dozen officers injured and more than 32 arrests were made.

Rules in England limit indoor and outdoor gatherings to six people. Protests are exempt from the rule-of-six restrictions, but demonstrators must maintain social distance and a risk assessment must be submitted by organizers.

On Friday, London was placed on the national COVID-19 "watch list" as an area of high concern. As the coronavirus cases continue to rise in the British capital, the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, warned that London is "at a very worrying tipping point right now."

Meanwhile, countries, such as Britain, China, Russia and the United States, are racing against time to develop coronavirus vaccines.

The British government's Chief Scientific Adviser Patrick Vallance said Monday that it is possible that some vaccine could be available in small amounts later this year, but it is more likely that a vaccine will be available early next year, although that is not guaranteed. Enditem
A mother has spoken of her agony after switching off her 24-year-old daughter's life support the day after she was hit by a lorry and left with incurable brain damage.

Anysha Vincent was struck in the early hours of September 2 on the A40 in London.

She was airlifted to London's St. Mary's hospital and put on life support, by which time her family had all arrived.

'When the police knocked on our door at 2am and said Anysha was in hospital, we thought she'd broken her leg or something,' her mother Louise Hatton, 50, said.

'She's clumsy like me and was always getting into scrapes like that.'

Anysha Vincent, pictured, was hit by a lorry in the early hours of September 2 on the A40 in London, and taken to St Mary's hospital in London

Louise Hatton, Anysha's mother, said that she first through her daughter may have broken her leg as they were both quite clumsy. But when she arrived at hospital, she was told by nurses to prepare for the worst

But upon arriving in Hospital Ms Hatton, from Folkestone in Kent, said realisation set in when staff at the hospital told her and the rest of Anysha's family to 'prepare for the worst'.

'They then took us to see her in A&E. She looked like she was sleeping, if you ignored all the IV lines,' Ms Hatton said. 'Then she had to go to intensive care to go on life support because of the brain damage.

'The doctors did their best for 24 hours but there was nothing they could do.'

Ms Hatton, with ex-husband and Anysha's father Darren Vincent, 52, had a meeting with surgeons at the hospital who told the family that the damage was too severe.

Anysha worked at The Railway, a pub in West Hampsted, and her mother, who has set up a GoFundMe page to raise funds for her daughter's funeral, described her as 'bubbly and sociable.'

'Even if they kept her alive, it wouldn't be a life worth living, not for someone like her.

'They then took us to see her in A&E. She looked like she was sleeping, if you ignored all the IV lines,' Ms Hatton said. 'Then she had to go to intensive care to go on life support because of the brain damage'

The family agreed that the best thing to do was to take Anysha off life support, with her mother Louise (pictured right) saying that 'Even if they kept her alive, it wouldn't be a life worth living, not for someone like her'

'She was so bubbly and sociable, she loved painting so much, we couldn't make her spend the rest of her life barely conscious in a hospital bed. It's not what she would have wanted.'

The family agreed that the best thing to do would be to take her off life support, saying that they were with her until the end. She died on September 3.

'We sat by her bed and I held her hand until it was all over. There were a lot of tears and it was the hardest thing I've ever had to do but it was the best thing for her,' Ms Hatton said.

She has since created a GoFundMe page to raised funds towards Anysha's funeral. So far, it has raised over 3,370 of its 5,000 goal.

On the page, she said she was 'posting this with a heavy heart', and went on to describe the events that ultimately led to the decision to take Anysha off life support.

Pictured: Louise holding Anysha as a toddler. Louise has created a GoFundMe page to raised funds towards Anysha's funeral. So far, it has raised over 3,370 of its 5,000 goal

'We cannot get over the shock as she had just started a new job and on her way to promotion and just decorated her room. She was such a happy young woman and very well loved by all. We are all completely numb,' she wrote.

'I hardly ever ask for help but sadly we have no savings to give my beautiful girl a good send off.

'This has been so hard to write. But if you have a spare few pounds to help with funeral we shall be truly grateful.'

Her mother said that Anysha 'would do anything to help people', adding that she was very popular and that the family have received many messages of support saying how she helped people through their low moments.

She added that her daughter had a special connection with her younger half-brother Brandon, 17, who was diagnosed with autism when he was six.

'We knew she was popular but it's so overwhelming to see how adored she was.

Left: Anysha with half-brother Brandon, who was diagnosed with autism at the age of six. Her mother said that Anysha 'would do anything to help people', adding that she was very popular and that the family have received many messages of support saying how she helped people through their low moments

'She was an amazing big sister as well. Her half-brother was diagnosed with autism when he was six, but they had a special connection from an early age. She absolutely adored him.

'I can remember them huddled up on the sofa drawing together, she would make arts and crafts with him.'

Ms Hatton also paid tribute to the staff from the emergency services who responded to the incident, who worked hard to save her life. 'They were amazing,' she said.

'The people who tried to resuscitate her by the road, the paramedics, the air ambulance staff, the nurses, the brain surgeons  they were all incredible. They couldn't have done more.'
A watchdog group calls the finding highly problematic and warrants congressional scrutiny. DHS officials dismissed it.

Acting Secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Chad Wolf is currently facing Senate confirmation to officially assume his role.

A new report from NBC News has revealed that Berkeley Research Group, where Wolfs wife, Hope Wolf, serves as vice president, has been awarded $6 million in contracts from DHS since September 2018.

The Homeland Security Department, which has been helmed by Acting Secretary Chad Wolf, has awarded more than $6 million in contracts to the firm at which his wife is vice president. (Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

Wolf was named the Transportation Security Administration chief of staff in 2017 before playing the same role for then-Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen a year later. Although Berkeley Research Group has a history of federal contracts, the consulting firm had never received funding from the Department of Homeland Security until Wolf joined the TSA.

In his financial disclosures released as part of his confirmation, Wolfs largest asset listed is his wifes $1.1 million retirement account.

Read More: Trump questions why the hell he passed reform after failing to energize Black voters

According to Kyle Herrig, founder and president of left-leaning watchdog group Accountable.US, After Mr. Wolf joined DHS, it began pumping millions of dollars into his wifes firm, which also happens to be his largest financial asset.

The arrangement, he told NBCs Julia Ainsley, is highly problematic and warrants congressional scrutiny.

Officials at DHS dismissed talk of anything unethical.

Read More: Sasha, Malia Obama no longer thrilled to be with parents, Michelle says

At no time in any of his positions since joining DHS has Acting Secretary Wolf been involved in awarding any contracts, a DHS spokesperson said. Even if he were involved with the procurement process for this particular contract, which he was not, he would have had to recuse himself due to even the appearance of impropriety.

Story continues

During his confirmation process, which began Wednesday, Wolf has faced questioning about the detainment of children at the U.S. southern border, as well as a whistleblower complaint that Wolf and his deputy, Ken Cuccinelli, repeatedly instructed Brian Murphy, who headed the Office of Intelligence and Analysis, to modify those assessments to suit President Donald Trumps agenda.

Wolf denied the claims as patently false.

The acting secretary also addressed white supremacist extremists, saying that while they were the most persistent and lethal threat facing the U.S. among domestic violent extremists, he rejected the idea that it was the overall deadliest threat facing the homeland, pointing to nation-state threats, pandemics and hurricanes.

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The post DHS gave $6 million in contracts to Acting Secretary Wolfs wifes firm appeared first on TheGrio.
A nurse prepares to swab a patient at a coronavirus testing center in Texas on July 7, 2020. Sergio Flores/Getty Images

No pathogen on Earth is being more closely monitored than the coronavirus.

Scientists have been regularly collecting and genetically sequencing samples of the virus to track how it's changing. Over time, that monitoring has revealed, one version became more prevalent than the rest: a strain with the mutation dubbed D614G.

According to a new, preliminary study from researchers at Houston Methodist Hospital, that mutated strain was responsible for nearly every COVID-19 infection there this summer, during in Texas' second peak of infections.

James Musser, the senior author of the new research, thinks that means the mutated strain  which contains the amino acid glycine, or G  is more transmissible than the original.

"There's a preponderance of evidence that there's biologically something different in G variant organisms, Musser told Business Insider. "It more readily infects."

His research is the latest in a string of studies suggesting coronaviruses with the D614G mutation are more contagious than their genetic predecessors.

But many other scientists question that conclusion.

"The study provides more evidence for what we already know about this mutation: That it's the most common variant," Emma Hodcroft, a geneticist at the Nextstrain project, told Business Insider. "That doesn't mean the virus is effectively mutating."

Hodcroft's team has tracked the coronavirus' genetic changes since the start of the pandemic, and she said they have yet to identify a mutation that would meaningfully change how infectious or lethal the virus is.

Story continues

A dominant form of the virus

An illustration of the novel coronavirus. Corona Borealis Studio/Shutterstock

Geneticists classify the original version of the coronavirus as the "D lineage," whereas strains with the D614G mutation are categorized as the "G lineage." The G lineage didn't crop up until January, Hodcroft said. Since then, according to her Nextstrain colleague Richard Neher, it has come to dominate "almost all places in the US, Europe, and Latin America."

The particular mutation that differentiates these strains is a swap at the amino acid labeled 614  the part of the virus' genome that codes for the shape of its spike protein.

That spike is what the coronavirus uses to invade our cells, so it's possible a tweak there could make it easier for the virus to infect our bodies. Indeed, a June study found that the D614G strain is three to six times better at infecting human cells in the lab than its predecessor. Other preliminary research has also suggested that the mutation enhances the virus's ability to invade cells.

That's what Musser believes, too.

His research  the largest genetic study of the virus to date in the US  involved more than 5,000 virus samples from Houston collected between March and July. The team classified the samples collected between March 5 and May 11 as part of the city's "first wave" of infections. In that group, the data showed, 82% contained the D614G mutation. But in the set of samples collected between the end of that first wave and July 7, the figure jumped to 99.9%.

Musser said this shows the G variant "out-competes the D variant."

But there could be other reasons the G variant became most common

Contact tracers with the Houston Health Department monitor the spread of the coronavirus in the city. REUTERS/Adrees Latif

Hodcroft said there's another possible explanation for why the G strain has become so prevalent: luck.

Data shows that the D614G mutation arose just before the coronavirus spread to Europe. So the G lineage might have coincidentally just ended up being the version that spread to countries in Europe and North America. Many of those countries did not enact lockdowns for weeks after their first cases appeared, which allowed that version of the virus to proliferate.

Medical personnel transport a COVID-19 patient to an ICU tent in Cremona, Italy. Emanuele Cremaschi/Getty Images

"One important thing to keep in mind is the G mutation arose in January 2020, so early on in the pandemic. It became the strain that most people got," Hodcroft said, adding, "we've been dealing with this strain the whole time."

In that sense, according to immunologist Kristian Andersen, Musser's study offers "no novel insights." He added, however, that the team did sequence "an impressive number of genomes."

'An advantageous mutant'

Even if G variants of the coronavirus are better at infecting new cells, that still may not necessarily impact how well the virus spreads from person to person.

"This G strain can be stopped in all the same ways the D strain can: masks, hand washing, and socials distancing," Hodcroft said.

Musser's research also describes other amino acid swaps observed at different sequences of the coronavirus' genome. The more a virus replicates, he said, the greater the chance that "an advantageous mutant" may arise. But the slight changes Musser's team observed are still not reason to panic, according to Hodcroft.

All viruses accumulate mutations over time, she said: "That's normal. That's how viruses work."

A technician scans test tubes containing live samples of the coronavirus in the Robert Ballanger hospital near Paris, France, April 30, 2020. Gonzalo Fuentes/Reuters

Most mutations her team is seeing are harmless, Hodcroft added, and the coronavirus is mutating slowly. Hodcroft's project sees a maximum of 20 to 25 differences between sequences that contain about 30,000 genetic building blocks.

"People are getting the same virus now that we saw in the spring," she said.

Houston researchers kept their data to themselves

Nextstrain tracks mutations by collecting as many sequences as possible. Typically, researchers from around the world share those sequences on GISAID, a publicly accessible repository.

"Our sequencing endeavors permit us to have more knowledge about the enemy we're fighting," Musser said.

Healthcare workers push a patient into a less intensive unit from the COVID-19 unit at United Memorial Medical Center in Houston, Texas on July 2, 2020. MARK FELIX/AFP via Getty Images

But his team did not upload their sequences to the server right away. Instead, they waited to do that until after their preliminary study went out.

Musser said the group tried to share the data sooner, "but unfortunately the website could not accommodate the unusually large magnitude of genomes."

Eventually, he added, the information was broken into parcels and uploaded successfully.

"All of this took time to figure out, of course," he said.

But Hodcroft said the existence of Musser's data in the first place came as a surprise to her. All summer, she said, she'd been hunting for more genetic data from Texas in order to glean a better understanding of infections there.

As far as she knew, only 600 or so samples were available from the state. Then suddenly, a paper appeared with an analysis of more than 5,000 sequences.

"It's a bit of a gut punch to every scientist putting their sequences out there," Hodcroft said. "These scientists kept the data for themselves."

Read the original article on Business Insider
Hands off states internal affairs, President tells the United Nations 20A tabled in House: 18 petitions before Supreme Court as SJB asks 20A to be placed before people at referendum View(s): View(s):

As the United Nations began celebrating its 75th anniversary beneath a pall of COVID restrictions, and asked member states to answer the theme question What We Need of the United Nations, Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksas pithy reply was: We expect the United Nation will place due emphasis on non-interference in domestic affairs of other states.

In a pre-recorded statement delivered via video conferencing to the High-Level Meeting to mark the 75th Anniversary Summit of the United Nations on Monday, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa said, At a time when the world is facing a common and an unrivalled threat, the United Nations We Need, I am certain, will place due emphasis on the sovereign equality of States, respect for territorial integrity and non-interference in their domestic affairs.

The President said he firmly believes that partnerships fostered between Member States and the UN continues at their best when no country is held hostage to the interests of a few.

Non-interference in the domestic affairs of other states? Havent heard that one for some time?

It has, indeed, taken a long, long time for that line to escape the lips of a Sri Lankan President or Government. During the Tiger terrorist war years and at its climactic heights when the United Nations started to express untoward concern, the constant refrain of Sri Lanka has been to tell the UN or any other nation, especially, India, that dared to meddle in her affairs where to get off the bus and to keep its hands off Lanka.

It was then, of course, the fashionable age old ideology that what a nation did with her own people was her sole affair and it was none of anyone elses business to poke their noses into it, based on the then sacrosanct concept of the sovereignty of nations, including the right of governments to butcher its own people if it felt so inclined.

But much water has flowed under the bridge since then that it has eroded this once inviolate concept, and today the international community has realised that it can no longer look askance when Governments of member states, even democratically elected ones, take cover behind this once impenetrable shield of sovereignty to supress the internationally recognised fundamental rights of humanity. These rights are not indigenous to a certain area but are transcendent, they are rights without borders. Inviolate rights which, if infringed, give the international community the right to lift the veil of sovereignty and act, if need be by force.

It is the mandate the United Nations Commission of Human Rights has to probe instances where rights have been violated; and, in certain cases, even before they are violated.

For instance, when the Government gazetted the 20 Amendment Draft to the Constitution, there were not only shrieks of protests made locally at the prospect of the executive presidency being strengthened to an unwarranted extent and Parliament reduced to a presidential play thing which could be dissolved in toto at presidential whim the moment it ceased to amuse, the UNHRC issued a statement decrying the draft amendment.

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, said the proposed 20th Amendment may negatively impact the independence of key institutions, including the National Human Rights Commission. She was troubled that the new Government of Sri Lanka is swiftly reneging on its commitments to the Human Rights Council since it withdrew its support for resolution 30/1.

The surveillance and intimidation of victims, their families, human rights defenders, journalists and lawyers should cease immediately. I encourage the Council to give renewed attention to Sri Lanka, in view of the need to prevent threats to peace, reconciliation and sustainable development, she said on Monday 14 September.

These comments were given short shrift by the Lankan Government on September 15. Though it fell short of telling off the UNHRC Chief to mind her own business and state not to interfere in the internal affairs of a sovereign nation, Lankas Acting Permanent Representative to the UN in Geneva, Dayani Mendis, said the comments made by the UN High Commissioner Michelle Bachelet on the proposed 20th Amendment are unwarranted and pre-judgemental, based on presumption. The draft 20A submitted through Parliament will be discussed, debated, following a complete democratic process.

After this brief standoff with the UN Human Rights Council, Sri Lanka formerly put the entire United Nations on notice a week later on Monday the 21st, not to interfere in her internal affairs and planted the signboard firmly on the land stating, Do Not Trespass. This was done at the UNs 75 years Anniversary Summit for the whole world to take note of and avoid stepping on the grass.

The day following the Presidents address to the UN not to mess around with Lankas domestic affairs and encroach on her sovereignty, the Government tabled the 20th Amendment Draft Bill in Parliament as scheduled. It was as it had been gazetted. The Original Monty without a comma or a colon changed. Any changes to the controversial bill will be considered at the committee stage, the Government had declared.

The bill was presented to Parliament amidst uproar. And though the election had decimated the opposition, the din of protest that swelled from its eunuchised ranks was not muted nor diminished. The oppositions disquiet over the vista the 20 Amendment Draft Bill had in store for both Parliament and nation if enacted, found voice vibrant enough to resound throughout the chamber and passionate enough to quell its defenders.

By Friday afternoon, 18 petitions challenging the bill were filed in the Supreme Court. The hearings are expected to begin on Tuesday and are estimated to last 3 weeks. Among the petitioners is the main opposition party, the Samagi Jana Balawegaya.

The SJB petition states that the proposed 20th Amendment is inconsistent with the Constitution and that it requires not only a two-thirds majority in Parliament but approval by the people at a referendum for it to be enacted.

In its petition, the SJB claims that the 20 amendment

violates peoples sovereignty and franchise enshrined in Article (3) and (4) of the Constitution;

is inconsistent with the public trust doctrine and the principle of checks and balances and would prejudicially affect public finance;.

seeks to repeal Article 156A of the Constitution, which provides constitutional recognition to the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption;

seeks to repeal the prohibition on dual citizens being elected to Parliament and to the post of President;

seeks to curtail the power of the Auditor General to audit state institutions

seeks to make an omission by the President no longer challengeable in the Supreme Court through a fundamental rights violation petition;

seeks to further enhance the powers of the President by allowing him to unilaterally remove the Prime Minister and to make the President not accountable to Parliament;

seeks to enable the President to dissolve Parliament after a general election

Thus, as things stand today, it will lie in the hands of a Supreme Court bench of Judges to decide whether a government with a two-thirds majority can steamroll its way through the House to make the proposed amendment law or whether the right to sanction such a radical change will be returned to the people to decide through a referendum what form of government they deserve to receive and live under.

Harin comes a cropper in Cardinal slander blast It may be due, perhaps, to SJB member Harin Fernandos singularly wise decision to give up seeking the peoples mandate to take his seat in Parliament but to slip in to the House through the rear door without sweat, that has made him fling his Catholic caution and catechism to the winds and cast baseless accusations against the Archbishop of Colombo, Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith that has made him come a cropper for the second time within three months. And this new habit of his has made his vexed party leader Sajith Premadasa, poor fellow, go down on his knees to clean the mess left behind and grovel before the altar atoning for Harins sins. He first flung his stone at the Cardinal, as Harin must recall now as he peers through the glass paned windows of his Hotel Shangri-La luxury apartment staring at the rising Port City, in June when he accused him of playing politics. Addressing an election meeting, he said, We all know that 80% of Catholic votes traditionally support the UNP. They carried out a well-thought-out plan to drive them away. Cardinal Ranjith said certain ministers, whose fathers knew of the Easter Sunday attacks, managed to protect themselves. That statement alone was a part of that politically orchestrated plan. Sajith had to follow, soon after, with poop tray in hand to clean the stink, which may have cost other SJB candidates who contesting the elections and not coming through the National List, an inestimable amount of Catholic votes as a result of that remark. Harin confessed his sin of ignorance and, perhaps, after a few Hail Marys, a truce was struck. Now the fireworks have started again. It ignited at the Presidential Commission of Inquiry into the Easter Sunday bombings last April when Harin was questioned of the prior knowledge he had received from his hospitalised father who had warned him not to attend Easter mass, especially at St. Anthonys Church, Kochchikade. Whilst being questioned by the State Counsel, Harin requested to make a statement and proceeded to do so. He said, The Catholic Church could not have been unaware of the impending attack. When cross-examined by Presidents Counsel Shammil Perera, who looks after the Cardinals interests in the proceedings, whether he had evidence to back his claim, Harin said he hadnt. He then insinuated that Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, too, had had prior information of a possible attack and, as a result, had not celebrated Easter Mass in public on that fateful day. This was indeed a damaging slander to level at His Eminence the Cardinal. He was thus accused through innuendo of exposing his flock to death and injury by not warning them of the impending attack on churches whilst he himself had saved his own skin by keeping away from church that morning. Mr. Shammil Perera P.C. calmly asked Harin Fernando whether he was aware that by tradition the Archbishop Cardinal Ranjith presides over the solemn celebration of the Easter Vigil Service at midnight of Saturday which continues throughout the night and ends in the early hours of Sunday morning? Whether he was aware that subsequently, the Archbishop celebrates another Holy Mass at Archbishops House in the morning of Easter Sunday? And that Archbishop Cardinal Ranjith had done all that last year as well? To all these three piercing, pertinent questions, Harin Fernando had to sheepishly answer no. He had not been aware that the Cardinal had attended these public functions and had not been hiding under his bed to save his cassocked hide as Harin claimed through innuendo? One year and five months after the Easter Sunday carnage and Harin Fernando had not bothered to check on the Cardinals public whereabouts on that Easter eve and Sunday morn before making his unfounded claim? Leaving the Commission, Harin remained unrepentant. He told reporters that he found it hard to believe that not a single DIG had not informed the Catholic Church of the impending attack. One day soon the truth will be out, he warned. Better he awaits the advent of that day before opening his gab and casting calumnies against men of the cloth and others without a shred of evidence to support his claims. The freedom of speech is not the freedom of the wild ass and does not cover what is incredulous to this burnt out politico whose slide from public popularity has, sadly, been meteoric in its descent.
Ayushmann Khurrana is going through a massive physical transformation for his next, a progressive love story being directed by Abhishek Kapoor. Now, we have confirmed news that Ayushmann has flown his personal trainer Rakesh Udiyar to Chandigarh to achieve his desired physique.

Ayushmann Khurrana is going through a massive physical transformation for his next, a progressive love story being directed by Abhishek Kapoor. The star is currently in Chandigarh going through intense training sessions to become a cross functional athlete and he has been hiding his change on social media. Now, we have confirmed news that Ayushmann has flown his personal trainer Rakesh Udiyar to Chandigarh to achieve his desired physique.

A trade source says, Ayushmann has been extremely regimented about his training routine and he has now flown his trainer Rakesh to Chandigarh so that he can achieve the physique for the film. Its literally a race to the finish now. Rakesh understands Ayushmann thoroughly, having worked with him for years and he has been extremely clued in about this films look. Ayushmann has to flaunt a certain physique on screen that he has never attempted and Rakesh has been guiding him through the journey.

The source adds, Rakesh was previously training him virtually given the pandemic but now Ayushmann has flown him to Chandigarh. After self-quarantining and going through COVID-19 test which has come negative, Rakesh is pushing Ayushmann to pump iron through face to face sessions. The next few weeks will be excruciating for him but as the saying goes no pain, no gain! Ayushmann is hell bent on getting a certain physique and Rakesh understands his intention. He will push him hard to ensure that Ayushmann gets the body he wants to make audiences believe that he can be a cross functional athlete.

Also read: 7 fun facts to know about supermodel Karan Oberoi on his birthday

Also read: Amazon Prime Video surprises Mirzapur fans by dropping Season 1 for free

When contacted, his trainer Rakesh confirmed the story by saying, Yes, Im in Chandigarh right now. Training is underway. He, however, did not divulge any more details on the same.

In addition to prepping for his film, the young icon recently joined hands with UNICEF and has joined them as a celebrity advocate for ending violence against children in India

Earlier this week, Ayushmann also featured on TIME 100s most influential people list 2020. He was the only Indian actor featured on the list alongside Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Sundar Pichai CEO of Google, London-based Indian-origin doctor Ravindra Gupta and Bilkis  Dadi of Shaheen Bagh

Also read: Do not consume, promote or encourage narcotics: Karan Johar alleges malicious campaign
Somali and Kenyan troops engaged in a minutes-long firefight on Saturday at the two countries' shared border, local officials and witnesses said after the Kenyan side fired shots to deter Somali demonstrators from approaching.

The incident took place at the frontier between the Somali town Bulo Hawo and Kenya's Mandera, close to where the border meets Ethiopia to the north.

Multiple sources told AFP the exchange was triggered when a group of Somali demonstrators angry at the alleged killing of three civilians approached border posts manned by Kenyan soldiers.

"Kenyan troops opened fire on Somali protesters who closed (in) on their positions along the Bulo Hawo boarder and the Somali troops stationed close to the area responded with heavy fire, this continued for several minutes," Bulo Hawo police officer Mohamed Abdirahman told AFP by phone.

None of the sources contacted by AFP reported any casualties from the brief exchange of fire.

The demonstrators believed that three civilians "kidnapped the day before" in the border town of El Wak, south of Bulo Hawo, had been killed by Kenyan anti-terror police, Abdirahman said.

They "were dispersed with heavy gunfire by the Kenyan troops," eyewitness Abdifatah Hassan said. "The Somali forces close to the area intervened in the situation by engaging (in a) gunfight with the Kenyans."

A Kenyan security official confirmed to AFP that "there was gunfire at the border where SNA (Somali National Army) and KDF (Kenya Defence Forces) exchanged gunfire after some incident of protests".

"The locals on the other side are accusing Kenyan forces of killing three civilians who were not Al-Shabaab," he added, referring to the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Islamist militant group active in Somalia.

The Somali government has so far not acknowledged the incident.

Striking from Somali territory, Al-Shabaab regularly defies Kenyan army troops to attack towns along the two countries' long shared border.

Over the past year, relations between Nairobi and Mogadishu have soured, especially over a political crisis in the semi-autonomous Jubaland region of Somalia.

The Somali government has refused to acknowledge the contested reelection in August 2019 of Jubaland president Ahmed Madobe, a political ally of Kenya's.

Somalia accuses its larger neighbour of interference in its internal affairs, in particular through its support for Madobe.

Tensions were stoked in March when fierce fighting broke out between Somali and Jubaland troops, also near Mandera.

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Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 06:35:28|Editor: huaxia

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KIEV, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- The Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine said 25 people were killed in the military plane crash in the country's northeastern Kharkiv region on Friday night, while two in serious condition were sent to hospital and the search for others continues.

According to the office, criminal proceedings were instituted for violation of flight rules, which caused a crash and serious consequence.

Interfax Ukraine news agency reported that head of the Kharkiv Regional Administration Oleksiy Kucher had arrived at the crash site.

According to Kucher, before the plane crash, the pilot reported failure in the left engine.

Kucher noted that such a situation is not critical for an experienced pilot and the tragedy's exact cause needs further investigation.

It was reported that an An-26 aircraft of the Air Force of Ukraine crashed while landing at the airport in the city of Chuguev. A total of 28 people, including cadets of the Kharkov National University of the Air Force and crew members, were on board the plane.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on social media that he would fly to the Kharkiv region on Saturday.

Zelensky said a commission was urgently set up to investigate the circumstances and causes of the tragedy.

Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal has also made relevant instructions. And a search team is working on the spot. Enditem
The 4 million Calf Investment Scheme was announced by the Department of Agriculture for the 2020 calving season to support calf rearing infrastructure such as automatic feeders and calf penning.

The Calf Investment Scheme needs to be rolled over ahead of the 2021 calving season, the ICMSA has claimed.

With more than 1.5 million dairy cows forecast to calf down this spring, the ICMSA said it was essential that on-farm calf-rearing capacity was expanded so that farmers could retain young calves for longer on the holding of birth.

The 4 million Calf Investment Scheme was announced by the Department of Agriculture for the 2020 calving season to support calf rearing infrastructure such as automatic feeders and calf penning.

However, only half of the available funds are likely to be drawn down under the scheme, with just 700 claims for payment submitted to-date from a total of 2,400 applicants.

Denis Drennan of the ICMSA rural affairs committee reminded farmers that the closing date for the submission of payment claims for the scheme is this Wednesday (September 30).

Mr Drennan blamed the low uptake of the current tranche of the Calf Investment Scheme on the impact of Covid-19.

Unfortunately, the impact of Covid-19 in early spring affected farming like all sectors and many interested farmers were forced to delay investments given the uncertainty around the duration of the virus and the reduction in farm incomes, Mr Drennan said.

However, the ICMSA representative pointed out that more calf-rearing capacity will be required at farm level given the ongoing growth in the dairy herd.

ICMSA is therefore calling on the Minister for Agriculture to re-open the Calf Investment Scheme immediately for new applicants so that farmers can get approval for calf equipment in advance of the 2021 calving season, he said.

Grant aid of 40pc is available under the scheme for the purchase of calf-rearing equipment or the installation of facilities such as calf pens.

The maximum grant attainable under the scheme is 3,000.

Meanwhile, Arrabawn is the latest dairy processor to increase its milk price for August. It lifted its price by 0.25c/l to 31.25c/l.

In other milk pricing news, Tipperary held its August price at 31c/l, while North Cork Creameries is up 1c/l to 31.5c/l. Boherbue Co-op is paying 31.2c/l for August supplies, an increase of 0.2c/l.

Strathroys base price for August milk is 30.83c/l.
City of Midland

The city of Midland finished the week with another 31 new coronavirus cases and the 83rd COVID-19- related death of the pandemic.

The city reported that a man in his 80s died Friday. He was being treated at Medical Center Hospital and was described as having underlying health conditions.
Nadia Bolz-Weber is an ELCA ordained pastor and the founding pastor of House for All Sinners and Saints in Denver, Colorado, a community for all, especially maybe those whove been made to feel they arent welcome at the table. She is the author of the New York Times bestseller Accidental Saints: Finding God in All the Wrong People (Convergent, 2015).
Im looking to attend a school for 6 months next winter in Seoul and was curious if anybody knows of anywhere cheap like hostel/dorm style place? Im open to anything else thatll let me stay for that long?

Ive searched a few hostels but their reviews are mixed, not in Seoul or a little out of budget. I tried Airbnb but I believe you have to pay all up front and thats a lot. Staying at the dorms in the school are nearly $3,200 which would cut down how long I can attend the school.

I thought about workaway and volunteer for a free room in a hostel but i assume thats considered work and I cant work until after 6 months of attending school.

Anybody with any recommendations? I appreciate the help!
P olice are probing the background of a man suspected of killing an officer in a south London custody suite before turning the gun on himself while in handcuffs.

Sergeant Matiu Ratana, 54, died in hospital after the handcuffed 23-year-old opened fire at his chest in Croydon custody centre at around 2.15am on Friday.

The suspect, who had been arrested for possession of Class B drugs with intent to supply and possession of ammunition, also shot himself and remains critical but stable in hospital.

No police firearms were fired and the case is not being treated as terror-related, Scotland Yard said.

It is understood the suspect was not regarded as a subject of interest by security services, but he was reportedly on their radar and had been referred to the anti-extremism Prevent programme.

Croydon Custody Centre shooting - In pictures 1 /46 Croydon Custody Centre shooting - In pictures Jeremy Selwyn Forensics at Croydon Custody Centre Jeremy Selwyn General view of the scene at Croydon Custody Centre Sky News Flowers at Croydon Custody Centre Jeremy Selwyn Police tape cordon inside Croydon Custody Centre in south London where a police officer was shot by a man who was being detained in the early hours PA Croydon Custody Centre Jeremy Selwyn A police officer has been shot dead by a suspect being booked into custody at a south London police station today Jeremy Selwyn Croydon Custody Centre Jeremy Selwyn Croydon Custody Centre Nigel Howard A Forensic ServiCes van at Croydon Custody Centre Jeremy Selwyn A police officer stands guard at Croydon Custody Centre Getty Images Croydon Custody Centre Jeremy Selwyn Croydon Custody Centre Nigel Howard Croydon Custody Centre Jeremy Selwyn Forensics at Croydon Custody Centre Jeremy Selwyn Nigel Howard Nigel Howard Nigel Howard Nigel Howard Flowers are laid down outside the custody centre where a British police officer has been shot dead in Croydon, south London REUTERS Croydon Custody Centre in south London where a police officer was shot by a man who was being detained in the early hours of Friday morning PA The scene at Croydon Custody Centre in south London where a police officer was shot by a man who was being detained in the early hours PA Croydon Custody Centre Jeremy Selwyn A police officer beside flowers left outside Croydon Custody Centre in south London where a police officer was shot by a man who was being detained in the early hours PA REUTERS REUTERS AFP via Getty Images PA AFP via Getty Images AFP via Getty Images AFP via Getty Images REUTERS PA AFP via Getty Images Nigel Howard AFP via Getty Images PA Nigel Howard Nigel Howard PA PA AFP via Getty Images PA REUTERS Police Commissioner Dame Cressida Dick paid tribute to the "wonderful" officer known to colleagues and friends as Matt, in a ceremony at the National Police Memorial in central London on Sunday also attended by Home Secretary Priti Patel and London Mayor Sadiq Khan PA Metropolitan Police Commissioner Dame Cressida Dick, Home Secretary Priti Patel and London Mayor Sadiq Khan pay tribute to the "wonderful" officer known to colleagues and friends as Matt, in a ceremony at the National Police Memorial in central London PA

A murder probe has been launched with the Metropolitan Police investigation expected to focus on the motive for the killing.

The Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) is assessing how it was allowed to happen. Investigators attended the scene, obtained CCTV and body-cam footage and are taking initial accounts from the officers present.

The IOPC said the suspect was taken into the building and sat in a holding area in the custody suite, then opened fire while still in handcuffs as officers prepared to search him with a metal detector.

IOPC regional director Sal Naseem said: It is at that point that shots were fired resulting in the fatal injuries to the officer and critical injuries to the man.

A non-police issue firearm, which appears to be a revolver, has been recovered from the scene. Further ballistic work will be required.

Known as Matt to his family and friends, Sgt Ratana, originally from New Zealand, joined the force in 1991.

Matt Ratana was two months away from being eligible for retirement / MPS Hackney

Met Commissioner Dame Cressida Dick, who with the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, led police officers across the capital in a minutes silence on Friday, described Sgt Ratana as a talented police officer.

He was big in stature, big in heart, friendly, capable, a lovely man and highly respected by his colleagues, and leaves behind a partner and adult son, Dame Cressida said.

Forensic officers in white suits were seen entering the police station on Friday morning, while floral tributes were left throughout the day.

Forces across the country flew flags at half-mast as a mark of respect and tributes poured in for Sgt Ratana, who Dame Cressida Dick described as a lovely, lovely, much-respected police officer.

New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern told the officers family we share your sorrow and have all our condolences. UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson offered his deepest condolences.

Sgt Ratana is the eighth police officer in the UK to be shot dead in the last 20 years and the first to be murdered by a firearm in the line of duty since Pcs Fiona Bone, 32, and Nicola Hughes, 23, in September 2012.

They were murdered by Dale Cregan in a gun and grenade attack while responding to a report of a burglary in Greater Manchester.
The Chairman of the University of Lagos , UNILAG chapter of the union, Dr Dele Ashiru, said on Saturday that nothing of such happened.

Contrary to speculations making the rounds in the social media that the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, has called off strike, nothing of such is the case, investigation by the Vanguard has shown.

Commenting on the development, the Chairman of the University of Lagos, UNILAG chapter of the union, Dr Dele Ashiru, told Vanguard on Saturday that nothing of such happened.

Ashiru, who is also a member of the National Executive Committee of the union, said the union was still on strike.



If we are going to call off our going strike, there is process that will be followed and nothing of such has been done,  he said.

Recall that the union embarked on strike early March, this year over some issues.
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Linkedin (Reuters)  Sat, September 26, 2020 14:45 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c476a480 2 Entertainment Netflix,China,Uighur Free

Netflix Inc, in a response to US senators' concerns over the company's plans to adapt a Chinese science-fiction book trilogy, said on Friday it did not agree with the Chinese author's views on the Chinese government's treatment of Uighur Muslims.

Five Republican US senators urged Netflix this week to reconsider plans to adapt the book into a TV series because they said the author has defended the Chinese government's clampdown on ethnic Uighurs and other Muslims in the Xinjiang region.

"The Three-Body Problem" and two sequels were written by Liu Cixin.

Netflix announced this month that it was turning the books into a live-action, English-language TV series led by D.B Weiss and David Benioff, the creators of HBO megahit "Game of Thrones".

Liu serves as a consulting producer on the project.

"Mr. Liu is the author of the book not the creator of this show. We do not agree with his comments, which are entirely unrelated to his book or this Netflix show," said Netflix Global Public Policy Vice President Dean Garfield in a letter to the senators.

"If anything, the government is helping their economy and trying to lift them out of poverty," Liu told the New Yorker magazine in 2019.

"If you were to loosen up the country a bit, the consequences would be terrifying."

The senators also asked Netflix to reconsider the implications of providing a platform to Liu in producing this project.

The Netflix streaming service is available in more than 190 countries but does not operate in China.

The United States and human rights groups have criticized China's treatment of the Uighurs.

China's foreign ministry has repeatedly denied the existence of internment camps in Xinjiang, calling the facilities vocational and educational institutions and accusing what it calls anti-China forces of smearing its Xinjiang policy.

Topics : Netflix China Uighur
BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept. 26

Trend:

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan's statement on Azerbaijan and Turkey at the 75th session of the UN General Assembly is an attempt to deceive the world community, the Turkish government told Trend.

The whole world understands that Armenia is going through a deep internal political crisis. And it used the UN rostrum to deceive the world community, the government noted.

But all of Pashinyan's attempts to deceive the world community with his groundless statements against Azerbaijan and Turkey are doomed to fail. Armenia is the main cause of problems in the South Caucasus. Azerbaijan, as a country subjected to aggression by Armenia, has every right to liberate its territories. As for Pashinyan's statement that there is no military solution to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Azerbaijan makes the decision on this. Turkey, as the main ally of Azerbaijan, no matter what decision Azerbaijan makes, will always support it, the Turkish government emphasized.
One person was killed and at least five injured in Udaipur as violent protests by candidates of a teacher recruitment exam in Rajasthans Dungarpur reached other districts late on Saturday, police said.

Earlier, an official said, the protesters vandalised over 100 houses in a residential colony of the town. State government has sought Rapid Action Force from Centre to rein in the agitators. DG Crime ML Lathar, Jaipur police commissioner Anand Shrivastwa and anti-corruption bureau ADG Dinesh MN have been flown to Udaipur to bring the situation under control.

On Thursday, hundreds of protesting ST candidates of Rajasthan Teacher Eligibility Test 2018 (REET) blocked national highway-8 in Dungarpur before setting vehicles on fire and injuring several policemen. They demand that 1,167 unreserved posts of government teachers be filled with scheduled tribe (ST) candidates.

Bharatiya Tribal Party MLA Rajkumar Roat said peaceful protest was going on for 18 days. The government cancelled the meeting twice.

People became aggressive after the meeting was cancelled the second time.
In 1988, a group of South Fork naturalists formed a membership organization called the South Fork Natural History Society, better known as SOFO. The objective of this organization was to increase public awareness about the past, present, and future of eastern Long Islands natural history and to share their joyful experiences of exploring and learning with others in the community. SOFO used to operate out of a small building referred to as the Nature Clubhouse where children gathered to examine different species, research for school projects, and just hang out. The Clubhouse served as a prototype...




Haiti - News : Zapping...





Billionaire American rapper Kanye West in Haiti

On Friday, the billionaire American rapper Kanye West, who came to explore business opportunities in Haiti and to visit Labadee, Turtle Island and a germoplasm center in the North-West, arrived at the international airport of Cap Haitien where he was welcomed at the Diplomatic Room by President Jovenel Moise who accompanied him on his visits. "Kanye West's visit is an opportunity for me to invite the African-American community to get more involved in various investments in Haiti. Our country is the ideal place to promote universal culture. Haiti is Africa at the heart of America," declared the Head of State at the airport. Note that the personal fortune of Kanye West is estimated at 1.3 billion US dollars, according to Forbes magazine (2020).



Remedial course

Louis Fritz Dorminvil the West Departmental Director of Education and Nadine Henry the Director of Fundamental Education announced the start of remedial classes from next Monday See also : https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-31893-haiti-flashd-16-everything-about-the-next-official-exams-and-remedial-courses.html



Exchanges between fishermen's associations

The Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources, via the Artisanal Fishing Project, launched an exchange program this week between fishermen's associations from the departments of South, South-East and Grand-Anse. The objective is to enable these professionals to make the best use of the potential of the sea and to become real development actors in their respective communities.



Inauguration of the Ste Anne de Bois de Laurence public square

The Office for the Monetization of Development Assistance Programs (BMPAD) inaugurated the Ste Anne de Bois de Laurence public square (Mombin Crochu, Dept North-East).



Contemporary Art Thursdays

The Thursdays of Contemporary Art announce the resumption of their activities since Thursday, September 24, 2020 from 6:00 p.m. at Maison Dufort. The monthly event will host the exhibition "Vein and courage" by Sebastien Jean Ju September 27 to October 4, 2020. For health security reasons, the organizers are announcing a limit on the number of participants and invite all those who wish to participate to wear a mask, under penalty of denial of access to the Dufort house.



6th Edition of the Young Journalist Prize

Friday took place the launching ceremony of the 6th Edition of the Young Journalist Prize in Haiti, around the theme: "school in Haiti". An initiative of the Regional Office of the Organization Internationale de la Francophonie (OIF) Caribbean and Latin America (BRECAL/OIF), supported by the Ministry of Culture, which invites young people from the ten departments to highlight "the school in Haiti" through written, radio and audiovisual reports.



HL/ HaitiLibre


















U.S. Rep. Andy Levin, D-Bloomfield Twp., is looking to keep his congressional seat in the family for a 20th term as he faces Republican challenger Charles Langworthy in the Nov. 3 election.

Levin won the seat in 2018, replacing his father Sandy Levin, who represented the district for 18 terms before retiring.

Langworthy, briefly a U.S. Navy sailor and now a realtor with Liberty Way in Lake Orion, earned 57% of the vote to defeat Gabi Grossbard in the Republican primary on Aug. 4. He received more than 32,000 votes to win the nomination.

Read more: Langworthy wins primary, will challenge Congressman Andy Levin in November

The 9th Congressional District spans portions of northern Oakland and Macomb counties. The Cook Political Report rates the district as trending +4 points Democratic.

Langworthy calls himself a constitutional patriot and a proud American that loves this nation and its people. He has appeared with other Michigan Republican candidates alongside the Trump Unity Bridge.

I am a man of conviction with a good moral compass that wants nothing more than to live in a free and prosperous nation, he says on his campaign website.

Before being elected to Congress, Levin was a business owner, a director of the Michigan Department of Energy, Labor & Economic Growth under former Gov. Jennifer Granholm, and a staff attorney for former President Bill Clintons labor law reform commission.

He has raised $940,536.09 in this election period, according to the most recent campaign finance records.

Langworthys campaign finance information was not filed with the Federal Election Commission.

Mike Saliba is running as a libertarian, while Andrea Kirby is running as the Working Party candidate.

All responses in the voter guide were submitted directly by the candidate and have not been edited by the League of Women Voters, except for a necessary cut if a reply exceeded character limitations. Spelling and grammar were not corrected. Publication of candidate statements and opinions is solely in the interest of public service and should NOT be considered as an endorsement. The League never supports or opposes any candidates or political parties.

MLive Media Group has partnered with the League of Women Voters of Michigan to give readers more information on candidates. Candidates outlined their stances in a questionnaire on a variety of public policy issues.

Information on all state and federal races and many of Michigans county and local races will be available at Vote411.org, an online voter guide created by the League of Women Voters.

The candidates submitted responses to questions posed by the League of Women Voters.

All responses in the voter guide were submitted directly by the candidate and have not been edited by the League of Women Voters, except for a necessary cut if a reply exceeded character limitations. Spelling and grammar were not corrected.

Publication of candidate statements and opinions is solely in the interest of public service and should not be considered an endorsement. The League never supports or opposes any candidates or political parties.

Here is a look at how Langworthy and Levin responded to questions on some key issues:

HEALTH CARE: What do you see as the federal governments role in health care? Given the Covid19 pandemic, what are your concerns and plans regarding U.S. health coverage, policies and programs, including Medicare and Medicaid?

Langworthy: The Federal govt needs to reduce start up regulations to allow more insurance companies to open up and create more competition. More competition equals lower prices. Insurance companies must also provide individually tailored plans. For example a 25 year old male does not need urology coverage so take that out of the plan and it will lower premiums. Big Pharma is way out of control we must wrangle them in and lower drug prices. The whole pharmaceutical industry regulations need a huge overhaul. It is unjust to charge what they charge.

Levin: In the midst of a global pandemic, the federal role in health care has never been clearer. Weve seen in real-time what happens when leadership is abdicated: we were late in preparing, the response was chaotic, and pitting state against state in the race for medical supplies contributed to the deaths of over 180,000 Americans. Many who perished were from poor, minority communities. This disproportionate toll combined with the uncoordinated public health response has underscored my commitment to universal health care as embodied in the Medicare for All bill, ensuring access to quality, affordable health care.

ECONOMY: What federal policies do you support for a healthy economy and to help the broader American public improve their economic positions?

Langworthy: Lower taxes and cut burdensome regulations that kill economic growth. Ending the Federal Reserve and return to a gold backed currency issued by the Treasury. Article 1 section 8 of the constitution says only congress will have the power to coin money and regulate the value thereof.

Levin: The U.S. economy was beset by the worst inequality of income and wealth in a century before the COVID-19 pandemic, and now the crisis is making it worse and laying bare all manner of injustice. In Congress I have worked hard to raise the national minimum wage to $15 with no sub-minimums for tipped workers; protect workers' pensions; restore the freedom to form unions and bargain collectively; provide universal childcare and pre-school and excellent public school education for every child; and make college free or affordable for all.

ELECTIONS: What federal policies do you advocate regarding elections, campaign funding and voting rights? Do you support mailing ballots to all eligible voters?

Langworthy: No on the mail in ballots. We absolutely need election reform. We must take the big money out of elections. Politicians become beholden to the special interests before they even take their oath of office. We should use local high school gymnasiums to host meet and greets, town halls, and debates. The taxpayers already pay for the schools lets use them. We also must make the media due their civic duty and and provide space for written articles and time for radio ads and tv ads. Fair and equal coverage of the candidates. The whole getting elected process is a multi billion dollar industry that breeds corruption.

Levin: The COVID-19 crisis is not just a public health and economic crisis, but a threat to our democracy. Im glad that voters in MI set in place important safeguards like approving Prop 3 in 2018. This amendment makes it easier to vote by mail. In Congress, I have been proud to support election reform in H.R. 1, the For the People Act, which puts a stop to voter roll purging; shines a light on dark money by including my amendment requiring greater transparency for corporate contributions; and raises the bar on financial disclosures to root out potential conflicts and strengthen the enforcement of ethics laws.

SOCIAL INJUSTICE: Do you believe there is systemic racism, economic disparity, and other social injustices which should be addressed by Congress? If so, what policies do you support?

Langworthy: Children in lower class neighborhoods are not getting a fair education. We must have school vouchers that allow parents to send their children to schools of choice, charter or private schools and or homeschooling. Where you live should not determine the type of education you receive.

Levin: Yes, of course! I support many policing and criminal justice reforms, increasing transparency of police records, and ending the militarization of police. I have been a lifelong advocate for working people, and will continue to fight the weakening of our labor unions who protect health and wages most especially for people of color. I cosponsored H.R. 8 to strengthen our firearm background check system, as our Black community who suffers disproportionate effects of gun violence. As Vice Chair of the Ed and Labor committee, I am committed to an equitable system of education across our classrooms and public universities.

ENVIRONMENT & ENERGY: What policies do you support to meet U.S. energy needs while protecting our water, air and land for current and future generations?

Langworthy: We absolutely have to protect our air and water quality. I am fully against polluting, I am an outdoorsman that loves to fish and hunt. I want our water to be clean and chemical free.We also live in a world that uses fossil fuels. We have to drill for oil and use it. We must do so responsibly. I am fully against any green new deal policys not only are they asinine but also destructive to our way of life. I am for transitioning to renewable energy but it must come along at a natural pace based upon technological advances.

Levin: Climate change is our #1 existential threat. Its our duty to ensure the planet that our next generations will inherit not only survives, but thrives. Im a cosponsor of the Green New Deal, and I support efforts to move us in the direction of a 100% renewable energy future. I introduced the Electric Vehicle (EV) Freedom Act to promote EV adoption by creating a real EV charging infrastructure on our highway system. I have sought every opportunity to fight contamination in our communities from forever chemicals like PFAS, force clean-up of toxic waste in Madison Heights, and to hold corporate polluters accountable.

IMMIGRATION: What policies do you support relative to immigration into the U.S.?

Langworthy: i support stopping chain migration, and visa lotteries. We must have a MERIT BASED immigration policy. We must stop the inflow of people coming in here illegally. Illegal immigration drives down wages, takes resources from struggling American citizens and some of them commit crimes. We have to know who we are letting in our country and have the ability to prevent criminals from coming into our country. It would be nice to not need a wall, and we would not need one if there were no sanctuary cities and states that refuse to enforce immigration laws. Sadly that is not the case so we need a wall.

Levin: We see the benefits of immigration in the diversity of our communities, and reflected in the productivity of our labor force. When it comes to consumer demands, especially agricultural and seasonal industries, New Americans contribute to an outsized level. I have personally traveled to our nations border to inspect detention centers, and I am outraged that the way we are treating immigrants does not reflect our values as a nation. We must pass comprehensive immigration reform that creates a legal immigration system to provide a pathway to citizenship, keeps families together, and protects our borders.
Hope Uzodinma, governor of Imo state, says it is the height of ignorance for people to describe him as supreme court governor. S...

Hope Uzodinma, governor of Imo state, says it is the height of ignorance for people to describe him as supreme court governor.

Speaking when he featured during a Channels TV programme, the governor said those describing him by that tag lack understanding of how the court works.

In January, the apex court declared Uzodinma as governor after ruling that Emeka Ihedioha, who was announced winner of the state governorship poll, was not duly elected.

Some, however, faulted the courts decision, and started calling Uzodinma supreme court governor.

During the TV programme on Friday night, the anchor asked him if he was unsettled by the tag, to which he responded that his emergence followed due process.

He said he was not the first person to have been declared winner of an election by the court, wondering why his case should be different.

It is the height of ignorance because I dont know what they mean by that, the governor said when asked.

There is a reason for the supreme court. In the doctrine and principle of democracy, the law expected that there would be grievances and malpractices in the electoral process.

When this happens, the only legitimate right you have is to seek redress at the court. And of course, the court determines.

Remember that this is not the first time, so many elections had held where the candidates went to court and they got justice. So, why will mine be different?

He said the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) failed to count for the votes of some persons during the election.

I went to the supreme court and INEC was unable to explain why they did not enter the result. It was a simple judgment; the supreme court said INEC was wrong, Uzodinma added.

The governor recently petitioned the National Judicial Council (NJC) and Abubakar Malami, attorney-general of the federation, over the tag.
Trump to Establish US-Africa Pandemic Research Institute to Fight Future Outbreaks

The White House has announced plans to establish a joint pandemic research institute between the United States and Africa, aiming to prevent future outbreaks of deadly diseases.

In a statement, the White House Press Secretary said that, following President Donald Trumps remarks at the Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) Board of Advisors Meeting, his administration will establish the United StatesAfrica Institute for Epidemic Preparedness and Innovation, an initiative in which HBCUs will serve as a key liaison.

The U.S.-Africa Institute will build the leadership and capacity of African health professionals, support African technological innovation, and create a data hub to support the rapid detection and mitigation of pandemics, the press secretary said.

The chief aim of the endeavor is to prevent, detect, and respond to disease outbreaks. HBCUs, which the White House called a uniquely American asset, will play a leading role in the Institute, which will also complement longstanding United States investments and relationships, and usher in a new era of two-way partnership with the African continent.

The United States has made more health-related investments in Africa in the past twenty years than any other nation.

We stand in solidarity with the people of Africa, and are proud to do so in the face of COVID-19, dedicating close to $270 million to bolster African efforts to mitigate the virus, said Jessica Lapenn, U.S. Ambassador to the African Union, on the occasion of May 25 celebrations of Africa Day.

According to the U.S. Mission to the African Union, funds will go towards such initiatives as $1 million to bolster surveillance and case management efforts in response to COVID-19 in Rwanda, or a similar amount to Kenya, including for health-communication networks.

This COVID-19 specific assistance comes on top of long-term U.S. investment in Kenya, including $6.7 billion in health assistance alone, and more than $11.7 billion in development and other assistance over the last 20 years, the U.S. Mission stated.

The United States longstanding leadership in public health in Africa has generated extensive networks of labs, thousands of trained personnel, and has saved lives across the African continent, the White House press secretary said.

On the third day of the United Nations annual gathering on Sept. 24, African leaders called for dramatic fiscal measures to help their economies survive the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus outbreak, which one leader called the fifth horseman of the apocalypse.

Africas 54 countries estimate they need $100 billion in support annually for the next three years.

President Roch Marc Christian Kabore of Burkina Faso recalled the UN chiefs speech early this year warning against the four horsemen of the apocalypse, including geopolitical tensions and the dark side of technology, like the lethal potential of artificial intelligence in warfare.

Unfortunately, Kabore said, less than two months later, a fifth horseman of the apocalypsevery destructive, the coronavirushas appeared.

Health experts say Africa has fared much better than the dire predictions early in the pandemic. So far, there have been over 1.4 million confirmed cases on the continent of 1.3 billion people.
In this 2018 photo, Imperial Beach, Calif., Mayor Serge Dedina surveys the Tijuana River Valley. (Howard Lipin)

The mayor of Imperial Beach, Calif., and the governor of Baja California are engaged in an ongoing public feud over cross-border sewage spills, which have been a problem for years and resulted in polluting local communities in the United States and making people ill.

Mexican Gov. Jaime Bonilla has held three separate news conferences this month demanding Mayor Serge Dedina apologize for his public criticisms of Mexicos inability to stop sewage from flowing into the U.S.

Bonilla publicly insisted that his administration has already fixed the problem by repairing broken pumps and clearing trash along the Tijuana River Valley. However, Dedina pointed out that Tijuanas overburdened sewage system continues to discharge contaminated water from a pump station six miles south of the border. Until that is fixed, he said, cross-border sewage flows will continue.

The pumps along the Tijuana River Valley were only one source of the cross-border flow. Even though they are repaired, the other flow still threatens Imperial Beach residents.

To be sure, repairing the pumps has had a positive effect. There have not been any cross-border sewage flows in the last couple of weeks and the Imperial Beach shoreline has remained open for the longest continuous period since the pumps stopped working in November 2019.

When those pumps broke, sewage flowed through the Tijuana River Valley on an almost daily basis. Before, sewage only flowed during heavy rainstorms.

But even though the pumps are fixed, Imperial Beach is still vulnerable to sewage from Punta Banderas, the pump station six miles south of the border, during south swells that cause sewage to drift north to Imperial Beach.

Sewage-filled south swells most recently forced Imperial Beach to close beaches on Labor Day.

Officials from the International Boundary and Water Commission say the incident was caused by trash build-up in one of the intake screens at the station and resulted in a flow of roughly 877,000 gallons of contaminated water.

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Were back to the normal horrific situation that still needs to be fixed, Dedina said. All they did was repair the apocalyptic situation that we had.

Bonilla has dismissed Dedinas critiques as an attempt to raise his political profile.

We will not allow a mayor to attack Mexico because of his political aspirations, because he wants to be senator, Bonilla told Zeta, a Tijuana news outlet.

Dedina added that this public spat has actually been good for Imperial Beach because it has brought attention to the cross-border sewage issue, particularly in Mexico where local media have covered Bonillas press conferences and asked about Punta Banderas.

A recent report by Telemundo noted that a Committee for Clean Beaches has met only once since Bonilla took office in June 2019. In that report, Baja California state officials acknowledged that the Punta Banderas pump station has not been fixed, but they have a plan in place and hope to get federal funding to execute the plan.

Officials say they expect to receive that funding sometime in 2021, according to the Telemundo report.

Imperial Beach is not the only place along the border where cross-border sewage spills are a problem. Earlier this month, CBS' "60 Minutes" reported on continuous raw sewage spills from the Tijuana River into the United States as well as the Pacific Ocean. U.S. officials recently announced new investments in infrastructure in the river valley that will address problems with sewage runoff.

Regarding Bonillas demands, Dedina laughed when asked whether he planned to issue a public apology.

The mayor said he and his son have personally gotten sick from polluted waters; so have Imperial Beach residents, lifeguards, Border Patrol personnel and Navy sailors.

We have a long way to go before we ever apologize, he said.

Earlier this year, the federal government set aside $300 million for infrastructure projects along the U.S.-Mexico border. Additionally, after lobbying from local stakeholders and San Diegos congressional delegation, the Environmental Protection Agency committed millions to short-term solutions to slow down cross-border sewage until a more permanent fix is in place.

Solis writes for the San Diego Union-Tribune.

For the record:

10:11 AM, Oct. 01, 2020: An earlier version of this post referred to Imperial County when it should have referred to Imperial Beach.


India has accused Pakistan of not only persecuting minority Hindus, Sikhs and Christians, but also of killing Muslims  countering neighbouring countrys Prime Minister Imran Khans allegation of Islamophobia after staging a walk-out during his speech at the United Nations General Assembly.

After Khan accused the Government of India of sponsoring Islamophobia, New Delhi deployed a young diplomat to exercise its Right to Reply and respond to the Prime Minister of Pakistan. This (Pakistan) is the country that has systematically cleansed its minorities including Hindus, Christians, Sikhs and others, through the abuse of its blasphemy laws and through forced religious conversions, said Mijito Vinito, the First Secretary at the Permanent Mission of India at the headquarters of the United Nations in New York.

Vinito, earlier staged a walkout as soon as Khan started addressing the UN General Assembly virtually. For someone who professes to be a champion of Islam, this is also a country that has encouraged killing of fellow Muslims merely because they belonged to a different sect, or to a different region in Pakistan, and through sponsoring terrorist attacks against its neighbours, said the Indian Foreign Service (IFS) officer of the 2010 batch.

He took a dig at Khan and reminded the General Assembly that Pakistan Prime Minister had referred to the Al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden as a martyr in the Parliament of his country in July. He also pointed out that Khan had in 2019 admitted in public in the US that Pakistan still had about 30,000-40,000 terrorists who had been trained and fought in Afghanistan and in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) of India.

He also referred to Pakistan Armys genocide in Bangladesh in 1971.

Khan earlier targeted the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS)  the mentor of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party of India. While the Nazis hate was directed at the Jews, the RSS directs it towards the Muslims and to a lesser extent towards the Christians. They believe that India is exclusive for Hindus and others are not equal citizens, said the Prime Minister of Pakistan. The secularism of (Mahatma) Gandhi and (Jawaharlal) Nehru has been replaced by the dream of creating a Hindu Rashtra by subjugating, even cleansing Indias 200 million Muslims and other minorities.

He referred to the process of upgrading the National Register of Citizens in Assam and the violent clash in Delhi in February to allege growing Islamophobia in India. He also said that Muslims had been blamed for the spread of coronavirus in India.

Khan also raised the issue of J&K, just as he did in his speech to the UNGA last year. He said that India must rescind its August 5, 2019 decision to strip J&K of its special status and reorganise the state into two Union Territories. He said that India must end its military siege and human rights violation in J&K and settle the dispute with Pakistan in accordance with the UN Security Council resolutions and the will of the people of Kashmir.

Vinito, in his response said that J&K was an integral and inalienable part of India. The rules and legislation brought in J&K were strictly internal affairs of India, he said, adding, The only dispute left in Kashmir relates to that part of Kashmir that is still under illegal occupation of Pakistan. We call upon Pakistan to vacate all those areas that it is in illegal occupation of it.
Amy Coney Barrett

Amy Coney Barrett University of Notre Dame

President Donald Trump revealed his Supreme Court nominee on Saturday, barely five weeks out from the Nov. 3 election. He has chosen conservative Judge Amy Coney Barrett for the job.

If the 48-year-old law professor is confirmed, her appointment would consolidate a conservative majority in the country's top court.

Democratic opponents, led by presidential candidate Joe Biden, have demanded that Republicans back off on replacing Ruth Bader Ginsburg  a liberal icon  until after the Nov. 3 election.

Leaders of the Republican majority in the Senate, which is tasked with confirming Supreme Court nominees, said they have enough support to hold a vote on the nomination either before the election or at worst during the "lame duck" session between the election and the inauguration of the next president in January.

"We will certainly do that this year," Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said.

If Barrett is confirmed, the Supreme Court would have a 6-3 conservative majority.

Barrett was only appointed to the bench for the first time in 2017. A deeply conservative Catholic, she is considered hostile to abortion rights  a key issue for many Republicans.

The left-leaning government watchdog group Accountable US was unimpressed with the reported choice. "Barrett has proven time and again that protecting businesses  not people  is her top priority," said group president Kyle Herrig.

In 2018, the mother of seven was on the shortlist presented by Trump for a seat vacated by the retirement of Justice Anthony Kennedy, a position ultimately filled by Brett Kavanaugh after a ferocious confirmation battle.

For Trump, nominating a conservative judge to the Supreme Court is a way to fire up his base heading into November's election.

But at Friday's whirlwind campaign outings, the president also looked beyond his core supporters and in Florida  where the Latino vote is all-important  said his Democratic challenger Joe Biden has been "very bad to Hispanics."

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"I'm a wall between the American dream and chaos," he said.

Later in Georgia he insisted that as president he had exceeded his promises for African-Americans.

"I did more for the black community in 47 months . . . than Joe Biden did in 47 years," he said, repeatedly swiping at Biden's legislative record in co-sponsoring 1990s tough-on-crime legislation that many experts say resulted in high incarceration rates for Black Americans.

Biden himself did no in-person campaigning Friday, but traveled from his home in Delaware to Washington for a ceremony in the U.S. Capitol, where Ginsburg lay in state  the first woman and Jewish person to do so.

Ginsburg's last wish, reportedly relayed to her granddaughter, was for her seat to be decided by whoever wins the next election.

Trump cast doubt upon the veracity of that in an interview Monday, suggesting it could have been a ploy made up Democratic leaders.

Republican leaders have said that if the fate of a disputed election rests with the Supreme Court, they will need a full bench of judges to prevent a deadlock.

The Democratic leadership has vowed to do everything in their power to prevent the confirmation of a new justice before the election, but with a 53-47 Republican majority in the Senate, there is little they can do to stop it.

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PARIS  The suspect in the stabbing of two people outside the former Paris office of the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo has confessed and said his attack was directed at the publication because it printed cartoons mocking the Prophet Muhammad, a French judicial official said on Saturday.

Charlie Hebdos former office was the target of a January 2015 terrorist attack that killed 12 people after the weekly first published the cartoons. It republished them in early September on the opening day of the trial of 14 people suspected of having links to the 2015 attack.

The stabbing took place during the long-awaited trial of alleged accomplices in the 2015 attack, which has forced France to relive the trauma of a series of terrorist strikes in the past few years.

French authorities have said that the suspect, who was arrested shortly after the attack on Friday, is an 18-year-old Pakistani man who arrived in France three years ago as an unaccompanied minor. Although he was briefly arrested a month ago for carrying a screwdriver, he had not been previously identified as an Islamist radical, Frances interior minister, Gerald Darmanin, told France 2 television on Friday.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 20:53:50|Editor: huaxia

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BEIJING, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- The China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) has given the green light to the trading of polyester staple fiber futures, an important textile material.

Trading of the polyester staple fiber futures will be launched on the Zhengzhou Commodity Exchange starting Oct. 12, according to Chang Depeng, a spokesperson with the CSRC.

Chang said that trading of the futures will help provide relevant enterprises with open, consistent and transparent price signals and effective risk-management tools, and will boost the steady and sound operation of the sector.

The CSRC will ask the exchange to make full preparations to ensure the steady operation of the trading. Enditem
The Liberal governments Sept. 23 Throne Speech and the address to the nation Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau delivered that evening were aimed, above all, at providing political cover for the capitalist ruling elites reckless back-to-work, back-to-school drive.

Behind cynical promises of social justice and building back better, the Trudeau government made clear no matter how many people are infected or die from COVID-19, its principal concern is ensuring that nothing impedes corporate Canadas profit-making.

In his 15-minute address, Trudeau acknowledged Canada now finds itself in a second wave of the pandemic, with daily new infections averaging well over 1,000 per day for the past week and a half. Were on the brink of a fall that could be much worse than the spring, Trudeau added, indicating that the ruling class expects the current death toll of 9,250 to rise dramatically.

The reality is that big business and the political establishment considers thousands more deaths to be the cost that must be paid to revive the economy and ensure that Canadian capitalism remains competitive.

The Throne Speech stated explicitly that any shutdowns to check the virus spread would be short-term and limited to the local level. In what amounted to an implicit threat to health care authorities not to be overzealous in fighting the pandemic, the government declared that as members of the communities they protect, local health officials know the devastating economic impact a lockdown order can have. Underscoring that the government is determined to restrict lockdowns to individual businesses or institutions where there are documented COVID-19 outbreaks, the speech pledged to target additional financial support directly to businesses which have to temporarily shut down.

That the policy of letting the virus rip is endorsed by all levels of government was illustrated by a CBC report published the same day on the Fall Pandemic Preparedness Plan drafted by Ontarios hard-right Conservative government. The plan, which was leaked to the CBC, discussed three possible scenarios for the pandemics second wave: small, medium or large. But in all three cases it stipulated that any public health response should be limited to targeted action at the local level: The return to an earlier stage of provincial reopening, or even regional approaches to tightening would be avoided in favour of organization-specific or localized change. (Emphasis added)

In other words, even if the pandemic surges province-wide, infecting tens of thousands, no serious measures will be taken to protect working people and their families from the deadly disease, so as to ensure that the process of extracting profit from the labour of working people can continue unimpeded.

Well aware that a frank annunciation of this herd immunity policy would trigger mass opposition, the Trudeau government sought to conceal it behind its customary progressive rhetoric. The government, the Throne Speech declared, would ensure a feminist, intersectional response to this pandemic and recovery, and even consider taxing extreme wealth inequality.

Who do Trudeau and his speech writers think they are kidding? The Liberal government has claimed to be carrying out a feminist foreign policy over the past three years, during which time it has initiated a more than 70 percent increase in military spending, ensured that more women are recruited into the army to fight wars on behalf of Canadian imperialism, and stepped up Canadas involvement in US-led military aggression around the world.

As for wealth inequality, the Liberals, supported by their trade union and New Democratic Party allies, organized an unprecedented transfer of public funds into the hands of big business and the banks at the beginning of the pandemic. In March, the Trudeau government, the Bank of Canada, and various other state agencies funnelled more than $650 billion into bailing out the financial oligarchy, while laid-off workers were placed on rations of just $2,000 per month under the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB). The unions, led by the Canadian Labour Congress, helped the ruling class perpetrate this massive public heist by both trumpeting the governments meagre social assistance as an act of generosity and keeping silent about the vast funds being poured into bailing out the rich and super-rich.

As a result of this financial bonanza, Canadas richest 20 billionaires have seen their combined wealth shoot up by $37 billion since the onset of the pandemic.

The Liberals now plan to transition the estimated 2.8 million workers still receiving the CERB to Employment Insurance and several new makeshift, time-limited assistance programs. This move, which the unions have praised to the skies, will subject workers to stepped-up pressure from the state to actively seek and return to work, even as the pandemic returns with a vengeance.

Several Liberal initiatives, lauded by the unions and a myriad of middle-class NGOs as progressive victories, are, as closer inspection demonstrates, in reality aimed at boosting the competitive position of Canadian capitalism. For example, the Throne Speech recycled a longstanding Liberal pledge to establish a national child care program. But this was presented not as an essential measure to alleviate the social crisis confronting families and offer children improved care in small groups with highly-trained and well-paid pedagogical experts, but as necessary to improve womens participation in the workforce. In other words, working-class women will be encouraged to place their children in poorly-funded, overcrowded, privately-run government-subsidized child care facilities so that they can work for a pittance trying to make ends meet.

Even in the long-term care sector, where decades of austerity and privatization had such devastating consequences in the initial stage of the pandemic, resulting in the deaths of thousands of residents, the government proposed no fundamental changes. No additional funding was announced for the chronically underfunded publicly-run long-term care facilities, or any limits on the operations of private for-profit companies. All the government would commit to is drafting new national standards for long-term care in conjunction with the provinces. The only other measure promised in the speech was legislation providing for the criminal prosecution of those who neglect seniors under their care. Needless to say, this will not be applied retroactively to the politicians and corporate bosses who slashed funding for long-term health care and profiteered off housing seniors in barrack-style residences.

Along with emphasizing the governments commitment to pressing forward with reopening the economy, the Throne Speech included a raft of policy commitments and measures tailored to the demands of big business.

These include promoting internal free trade by pressing for the removal of provincial regulatory barriers to the free movement of goods and services. This has been a longstanding demand of the most powerful sections of Canadian capital, who view such barriers as impediments to creating globally competitive Canadian companies and attracting more foreign investment.

The government also announced the extension of its corporate-designed wage subsidy program, which funds workers wages up to a maximum of $873 per week, until next summer.

The speech stressed that government would preserve Canadas fiscal advantagethat is lower debt levels than its G-7 rivalsand remain committed to fiscal sustainability and prudence. The pursuit of these austerity principles by Liberal, Conservative, New Democrat and Parti Quebecois federal and provincial governments alike has devastated public services. Indeed, among the 37 member-states of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Canada has one of the lowest rates of social spending as a percentage of GDP. The 17.3 percent of GDP allocated by Canadas governments to social spending is lower than that of even the United States, Hungary, Poland and Slovenia

Many of the economic recovery initiatives promised in the Throne Speech were tied to the governments plans, in the name of fighting climate change, to make Canada a leader in Green capitalism. The speech commits the government to creating 1 million jobs over the next year through building public infrastructure, subsidizing the retrofitting of energy efficient homes and businesses and promoting Green enterprises. Global consumers and investors are demanding and awarding climate action, noted the speech, and Canada cannot afford to pass up this global market opportunity. To this end, the government will establish a new fund to attract investment in the production of zero carbon emissions products, slash the corporate tax rate in half for clean technology businesses and ensure Canada is the most competitive jurisdiction in the world for clean technology companies.

A central role in crafting this strategy to promote Green capitalism is being played by the trade unions, which were intimately involved in consultations with the government in the lead-up to the speech. In a series of corporatist meetings with leading representatives of big business and the government since April, union leaders like Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) President Hassan Yussuff and Unifors Jerry Dias have been advocating for national strategies on everything from auto manufacturing to battery production.

At the same time, these meetings were used to orchestrate the back-to-work drive, which has led directly to the current sharp increase in COVID-19 infections. In recent weeks, the unions have systematically suppressed working class opposition to the drive to reopen schools, which the Trudeau government and the ruling elite as a whole view as essential, as it frees the parents of school-age children to return to work.

Predictably, the unions have celebrated the Throne Speech. The government is making it clear that it is listening to the concerns of workers and their families by recognizing that investments are the only way to get us through this pandemic, gushed the CLCs Yussuff. Its time to roll up our sleeves. Were going to have to keep working closely with the government to ensure that they get the details on these programs and initiatives right.

Earlier this month, Yussuff publicly declared that the NDP has an obligation to continue propping up the minority Liberal government in Parliament.

NDP leader Jagmeet Singh, who publicly appealed for the Liberals to accept the NDP as junior partners in a coalition government both before and after last Octobers federal election, signaled Thursday that a backroom deal to secure NDP support for the Throne Speech has all but been secured.

For their part, both the Conservatives and Bloc Quebecois were quick to announce they would vote non-confidence in the government. The former attacked the government for failing to announce a plan to reduce Canadas budget deficit in the coming years and ignoring the crisis facing the Alberta-based oil industry. The BQ accused the Liberals of intruding into provincial affairs and denounced them for rejecting the call of Quebecs pro-austerity CAQ government for increased federal health care transfers.
Germany on Friday pressed Russia and China to allow the release of an interim UN report on violations of the arms embargo on Libya that found violations by Moscow-linked fighters.

"We have not been able to reach an agreement on this point. I hope that the two delegations who have a problems with this will give a green light," Guenter Sautter, Germany's deputy ambassador to the United Nations, told reporters before a closed-door Security Council meeting sought by Berlin.

The interim report by experts, submitted to the Security Council in August and widely leaked, said that the Wagner Group, a Russian military contractor reputed to be close to the Kremlin, have committed numerous violations.

Interim reports are generally not released, unlike final reports.

Germany, which heads the committee on the Libya sanctions, wants to "make sure that we have transparency on this issue," Sautter said.

"We need to name and blame and shame those who blatantly violate the arms embargo," he said.

The document, seen by AFP, found rising international support at the time to both strongman Khalifa Haftar -- who is backed by Russia, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates -- and the UN-recognized government that has support from Turkey.

"The arms embargo remains totally ineffective. In the cases of those member-states directly supporting the parties to the conflict the violations are extensive, blatant and with complete disregard for the sanctions measures," it said.

The report points to violations by the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Egypt, Syria, Russia, Qatar and Turkey.

Asked about the report by AFP in a discussion with several journalists, the foreign minister of the United Arab Emirates, Anwar Gargash, rejected the accusations and said his country would not comment on a report it had not read.

"We categorically deny these. Our position is very clear, especially since the Berlin conference (in January), of the necessity of a ceasefire," he said.

The UN-backed government and Haftar-linked parliament in eastern Libya last month reached a fragile ceasefire, raising hopes of bringing peace to a nation in turmoil since the Western-backed overthrow of Moamer Kadhafi in 2011.
The court also overturned the former minister of cultures decision to categorise Abu Hasira's shrine as being one of the countrys Islamic and Coptic monuments

Egypt's Supreme Administrative Court rejected on Saturday an appeal against a 2014 ruling barring the transfer to Israel of the remains of Rabbi Yaakov Abuhatzeira, known commonly in Egypt as "Abu Hasira."

"Egypt is a country of religious tolerance, and it is not permissible to transfer the remains of a Jewish rabbi to Israel, because the People of the Scriptures  those who believe in the 'Torah' or the 'Gospel'  enjoy all rights in Egypt. Transferring [the remains] would contradict Islams tolerance and its generous view of the People of the Scriptures," the court said, adding that the remains should not be transferred to Jerusalem given the citys Arab identity.

Saturday's ruling, which is a final verdict and cannot be appealed, also overturned the former minister of cultures decision to categorise Abu Hasira's shrine as being one of the countrys Islamic and Coptic monuments.

The administrative court also ordered the government to publish this in the states official journal and to inform UNESCO of the decision.

In December 2014, an Alexandria administrative court banned the controversial annual religious festival (moulid) of Abu Hasira in Beheira governorate. The court also ordered the removal of the shrine for the revered Jewish rabbi from the Egyptian antiquities and monuments list.

The shrine of Abu Hasira and the Jewish cemetery next to it were registered as a monument, in accordance with a decision by the culture minister in January 2001.

The court also rejected a request by Tel Aviv at the time to transfer the remains of the Jewish rabbi to Israel, as this violates Islamic teachings prohibiting the exhumation of graves.

This is not the first time the administrative court has banned the annual festival of Abu Hasira. In 2001, the Alexandria administrative court also cancelled the celebrations, and they were again cancelled in 2012 by Egyptian authorities, who cited political instability.

The pilgrimage of Jews to the annual celebration of the birth of the Moroccan rabbi, who is believed to have died in the Egyptian village of Damatiuh during the 1880s, has often caused civil unrest in the village, spurred by locals who refuse to normalise relations with Israel.

The local community in Damatiuh also maintains that the Jewish rabbi was not buried in Egypt, and was actually buried in Morocco.

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The return of students to universities in Britain has produced an explosive rise in COVID-19 cases. With nearly 2 million students in higher education, cases will continue to grow. Outbreaks have already taken place in around 20 universities.

Scottish universities have been particularly hit, exposing the lying claims of the Scottish National Party government that its policies have protected public health during the pandemic, unlike the Tory government in Westminster.

At Dundee University, all 500 students in the Parker House student accommodation have been quarantined while contract tracing is carried out. By yesterday, 172 students at Glasgow University had tested positive for the disease and 600 are in self-isolation. Edinburgh Napier University has identified 120 cases, and Edinburgh University has admitted to a small number of cases. At Aberdeen University, over 70 students are isolating. At St. Andrews University, 10 students and two members of staff have contracted coronavirus with more than 40 people self-isolating. There have been cases at Stirling University.

One of the accommodation blocks (left) at Manchester Metropolitan Universitys Birley campus where dozens of students are locked down and in self-isolation after being infected with COVID-19

In her Friday press briefing, Scotlands First Minister Nicola Sturgeon warned the countrys quarter of a million students not to go out this weekend or return home. Around 35,000 live in university halls and 10,000 in private halls.

The former regional director for public health in northwest England, Professor John Ashton, said it was almost inevitable that the return of students would lead to a spike in COVID-19 cases. He called for student numbers at university to be limited to a third of their normal population.

English universities, with a later starting date in Scotland, are already witnessing a similar surge in COVID-19 cases. There were 87 positive COVID-19 cases at the University of Liverpool last week, prompting fears of a bigger surge as more students return to the city this week. Liverpool John Moores and Liverpool Hope Universities were forced to move most course online to avoid face-to-face contacts.

Of nearly 60 cases reported in Devon, half are being attributed to Exeter University.

The Tab, a student culture website noted, A Sussex professor estimates 14,000 students currently have COVID at UK universities. It reported yesterday that five apartments across two Leeds University halls are self-isolating with the university confirming six cases of COVID-19. Cases have been reported at the universities of De Montfort, Leicester, Oxford Brookes, Bristol, Bath, Hull, and Warwick, as well as the University of the West of England.

On Friday evening, the Manchester Evening News reported that "case numbers have soared to 127" across the Birley campus in the Hulme district and another site, Cambridge Halls, "with a number of other students also recording symptoms." The newspaper revealed that "Halls at Manchester Metropolitan Universitys Birley campus, as well as Cambridge Hall near All Saint's Park, are to be locked down for a fortnight and 1,700 students living there told to self isolate 'with immediate effect'".

In Wales, 12 students at Swansea University have tested positive.

A relentless propaganda campaign is under way by the government and university authorities to lay the blame on students for socialising, centring their fire at parties held on campuses. An editorial by the British Medical Journal replied, It has been disheartening to watch university leaders blaming students for outbreaks instead of admitting that the universitys reopening plans were dangerous.

Lauren McDougall, a project officer at the University of Glasgow, pointed out in several tweets: Many of the Covid + students will have broken no rulesthe most conscientious students are the ones who will feel the weight of the blame.  Systemic failures need systemic solutions.  Blaming students as individuals for the current outbreaks at Scottish universities is not only unfair but downright dangerous. This wasnt caused by a handful of students going to parties and suggesting so only shifts the blame and seriously risks the mental well-being of students.

BBCs Good Morning Scotland on Friday featured responses from other Glasgow students. Lucy Owens, a student in the Murano student residence at the centre of the outbreak, said, What are we paying for? I could do everything I am doing from my house, so why have they sent us here? ... Putting two thousand students into such a confined area, something like this was bound to happen.

Politics student Tessa Morrison said she had tested positive and described conditions akin to prisons that students were now in. Tessa was living with 10 other students, some of whom had also tested positive. She had to share two bathrooms and one kitchen. They should have waited until at least Christmas to let us come herethey are just trying to make money off us being in halls and they knew this was inevitably going to happen.

Helen Kirkpatricks daughter is at Strathclyde and lives in a private hall. Helen said, After going back there she has found out that all classes will be online for the first semester. Shes signed an agreement and paid a lot of money to stay there and what for? She could have studied at homeI think the Scottish government could have handled this a lot better.

Universities are financially reliant on their annual influx of students. Thousands of redundancies are threatened, and management is utilising this situation to enforce face-to-face teaching. The Guardian reported, One academic at a Russell Group university, who asked not to be named, said her university had dismissed her concerns about infecting her partner, who has type 1 diabetes and is therefore at an increased risk from coronavirus.

A young PhD student at the University of St. Andrews reported that in his department PhD students teach 82% of the first- and second-year seminars that will now be face-to-face. He said, Weve basically been told, if you want one of these tutor groups the teaching will be in person. The student receives a pittance of just 81.75 a week (which includes holiday pay) teaching three undergraduate seminars. He makes below the 120 a week necessary to claim statutory sick pay if he contracts the virus.

The government and the press speak of universities as though they are hermetically sealed rather than existing within densely populated urban areas where tens of thousands of students, university workers and the general public live, work and study. Most university campuses are found in and around town and city centres. These working-class districts are where the highest levels of positive COVID-19 test results are located, and where most students rent accommodation.

While the government has made much of the relatively low death rate among young people, they have ignored the growing numbers of previously healthy young people suffering what is known as long COVID, where the viral symptoms last months and for some have not subsided yet.

The terrible situation in the United States is a sign of things to come. There are at least 3,000 confirmed cases at the University of Georgia, 2,000 at the University of Alabama and another 2,000 at the University of South Carolina. With almost 90,000 confirmed cases on American campuses since the pandemic emerged, new regional surges of COVID-19 have been seeded by the return to higher education.

The herding of several million college and university students onto campuses would have been impossible without the collaboration of the University and College Union (UCU). Its position is that online education only should be the de facto position of higher education, at least until Christmas.

The union was fully aware of the criminal endangering of the safety of its members and students but did nothing to mobilise its 120,000-strong membership in opposition. Instead, it is calling on them to act as individuals and write to their institutions to complain about inadequate safety conditions. UCU members received an e-mail from union leader Jo Grady containing pro-forma letters for them to complete and send to their vice chancellor. Each begins with some variation on an identity politics theme: Writing as a BAME member of staff, Writing as a female member of staff... Nowhere are members encouraged to fight back collectively as workers.

The Socialist Equality Party calls on all educators, teachers, and students to take matters into their own hands and organise independently of the education trade unions in rank and file safety committees. Join the newly founded Educators Rank-and-File Committee and share your experiences since returning to campus with other workers. To participate in our online meeting today from 2 to 4 p.m., click here.
Eight days after the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, President Trump nominated her successor Saturday  Amy Coney Barrett, a federal appeals court judge for three years and a staunch opponent of abortion  and called for a lightning-quick confirmation that could shift the Supreme Court sharply to the right.

Barrett is one of our nations most brilliant and gifted legal minds, a person of towering intellect, sterling credentials and unyielding loyalty to the Constitution, Trump said at the White House Rose Garden, with Barrett standing alongside.

This should be a straightforward and prompt confirmation. ... Its going to be very quick, Trump told an audience that included her family, a number of U.S. senators, and Attorney General William Barr and other administration officials.

It is a selection with potentially profound consequences for issues such as health care, gun ownership and immigration.

Barrett, 48, a former law clerk to the late Justice Antonin Scalia, was appointed by Trump in October 2017 to the Seventh U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago. Her confirmation by the Republican-controlled Senate  the same Senate that refused to consider President Barack Obamas election-year nomination of Merrick Garland in 2016  seems virtually assured and would give the court a 6-3 majority of Republican appointees.

That would effectively end Chief Justice John Roberts role as the courts swing voter who has sided with more liberal justices in some major cases. The 5-4 rulings have rejected Trumps attempts to add a citizenship question to the U.S. census, to repeal the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program for young undocumented immigrants, and to overturn the Affordable Care Act, which provides health insurance for more than 20 million Americans.

The court is scheduled to hear a new challenge to the Affordable Care Act on Nov. 10, one week after election day. Barrett signaled her viewpoint in a 2017 law review article before her judicial appointment, saying Roberts had pushed the Affordable Care Act beyond its plausible meaning to save the statute.

The prospect that Barrett could determine the fate of the health insurance law drew an alarmed reaction Saturday from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco. Every vote to confirm this nominee is a vote to dismantle health care, she said in a statement.

Supporters and opponents of abortion rights also reacted strongly.

Jodi Hicks, president of Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California, said Barretts confirmation wou l d put tens of millions of Americans fundamental human rights at risk, and access to sexual and reproductive health care, like birth control and abortion, under extreme and dire threat.

Jeanne Mancini, president of March for Life, said the antiabortion group believes Barrett will fairly apply the law and Constitution as written, which includes protecting the most vulnerable in our nation: our unborn children.

Historically, the impact of the nomination could be even greater.

With the addition of Barrett, I think itll be the most conservative court since the 1920s and early 30s, said Rory Little, a UC Hastings law professor in San Francisco and former Supreme Court law clerk.

Erwin Chemerinsky, the law school dean at UC Berkeley who has argued cases before the Supreme Court, said it would be the most conservative court since the 1930s, maybe ever.

Barrett, fellow Trump appointees Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, and Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito are collectively as conservative on the political spectrum of their times as any who ever have been on the court, Chemerinsky said.

Chemerinsky is liberal, but a similar assessment came from Josh Blackman, a conservative-leaning law professor at South Texas College of Law Houston, who said political scientists foresee the most conservative court since President Franklin D. Roosevelt took office in 1933.

I think she has the potential for greatness, Blackman said of Barrett. Recalling Scalias judicial writings and public appearances promoting originalism, the conservative-backed doctrine of interpreting the Constitution according to the intentions of its drafters regardless of later developments, Blackman said, Barrett has the charisma and the personality to sell it.

At Saturdays announcement ceremony, Barrett paid tribute to Ginsburg  She not only broke glass ceilings, she smashed them  but said of the conservative Scalia, His judicial philosophy is mine too. A judge must apply the law as written.

Ginsburg, who died of cancer Sept. 18 at age 87, had persuaded the court as a lawyer in the 1970s to discard its originalist reading of the Constitutions 14th Amendment and rule that it prohibited sex discrimination. Three years after her 1993 appointment to the court by President Bill Clinton, she wrote the ruling that required the Virginia Military Institute, a public school, to admit women  over the lone dissent of her close friend, Scalia, who argued that the Constitution was silent on gender bias.

Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., the Democratic vice presidential nominee, said Barretts selection was an insult to Ginsburg.

It would be a travesty to replace her with a justice who is being selected to undo her legacy and erase everything she did for our country, Harris said.

Supreme Court confirmation proceedings generally take two to three months, but Senate Republicans plan a vote on Barrett within three weeks, well before the election. Democrats are searching for procedural maneuvers that might slow the process, while contemplating potential corrective measures  such as expansion of the court  if they retake the White House and the Senate in November.

Barrett has taught at Notre Dame University, her alma mater, since 2002, and was named by students as their Professor of the Year in the law school in 2006 and again in 2016. A devout Catholic, she belongs to the schools Faculty for Life group and to People of Praise, a secretive, self-described charismatic Christian community that has referred to its male members as heads and its females, until recently, as handmaidens. (They have been retitled women leaders.) She and her husband, attorney Jesse Barrett, have seven children, two of them adopted.

In a 2013 speech, she said Roe vs. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court ruling that declared a constitutional right to abortion, essentially permitted abortion on demand, and ... recognizes no state interest in the life of a fetus. Notre Dame Magazine paraphrased other remarks in her speech as saying the court had acted by judicial fiat.

I have no doubt that, assuming shes confirmed, the Supreme Court will overrule Roe vs. Wade, UC Berkeleys Chemerinsky said.

Some commentators arent sure the court will go that far, including Kevin Wallsten, a Cal State Long Beach political science professor and coauthor of the recent book The Politics of the Pill. But he said a more conservative court would embolden right-leaning states to enact new restrictions on access to abortion procedures and clinics.

California, by contrast, has a state law protecting the right to abortion, provides Medi-Cal coverage for poor womens abortions under a 1981 state Supreme Court ruling, and probably would be unaffected by any new U.S. Supreme Court decisions on the issue.

Barrett has taken part in several abortion cases as a judge. Two of them involved Indiana laws that barred abortions motivated by the race, gender or an expected disability of the unborn child, and required burial or cremation of fetal remains. When her appeals court ruled in 2018 that the laws violated womens rights, Barrett signed a dissent arguing that the laws were within the states authority, treated fetal remains with respect and did not violate anyones rights. The Supreme Court later reinstated the states restrictions on disposal of fetal remains.

In October, she joined a dissent from a ruling blocking an Indiana law that required minors to notify their parents before having an abortion. The Supreme Court recently told the appeals court to reconsider the ruling based on a high court decision in June that requires opponents of such laws to show that they create a substantial obstacle to abortion rights.

While she has not ruled on gay rights, Barrett was among a group of Catholic women in various professions who signed a letter to a conference of bishops in 2015, after the Supreme Courts ruling that legalized same-sex marriage, saying that the churchs teachings on marriage and family founded on the indissoluble commitment of a man and a woman provide a sure guide to the Christian life.

In a gun case, Barrett dissented from her courts 2-1 ruling in 2019 that upheld a federal law banning firearms ownership by anyone convicted of a felony, whether violent or not  the defendant in this case was convicted of mail fraud. Disagreeing with two colleagues who had both been appointed by President Ronald Reagan, Barrett said the court treats the Second Amendment as a second-class right.

On immigration, Barrett dissented in June from a 2-1 ruling that struck down the Trump administrations public charge rule, which would deny legal status and work permits to immigrants who accept public benefits, like food stamps and Medicaid.

The majority said the rule was unauthorized by law and that many migrants were forgoing health care and other necessities for fear of deportation, but Barrett said their fears were groundless and that the administration had reasonably interpreted the law. With court permission, the Trump administration reinstated the rule on Tuesday.

Barrett also dissented from a 2018 ruling that overturned the first-degree murder conviction of a man who was questioned by a Wisconsin state judge in a pretrial hearing in which the defense lawyer was not allowed to speak. The judge then refused to reduce the charge to second-degree murder. Barrett said the Supreme Court has never decided whether a defendant has the right to a lawyer at such a hearing.

Whatever the ideological slant of her rulings, faculty colleagues at Notre Dame say Barrett is even-handed and fair-minded.

She is very good at understanding the viewpoint of a person shes disagreeing with, said Jeffrey Pojanowski, a law professor who took classes from Barrett as a student and joined the faculty in 2010. He said Barrett is probably the smartest person Ive ever met.

Paolo Carozza, who directs the schools Kellogg Institute for International Studies and taught Barrett as a student before she joined the faculty, traveled with her to Ecuador in 2013 to teach a weeklong seminar for members of that nations Constitutional Court  judges who were pretty far to the left, said Carozza, who described himself as a political independent.

They were enraptured by her capacity to treat fair-mindedly all the different theories, he said. Sure, she has firm convictions about the way to approach constitutional law. She doesnt hide it. But it reveals to me how much she is capable of dialogue and reason and trying to meet people where they are.

Bob Egelko is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: begelko@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @BobEgelko
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Linkedin (Agence France-Presse) Washington  Sat, September 26, 2020 14:00 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c4767cf1 2 Science & Tech TikTok,Donald-Trump Free

The Trump administration said Friday it would not back down from a plan to ban new US downloads of the popular video-sharing app TikTok, setting up a court showdown ahead of a Sunday deadline.

A Justice Department court filing said it opposes TikTok's petition for an injunction to block the order from President Donald Trump, who has called the Chinese-owned social platform a national security risk.

US District Judge Carl Nichols set a hearing for Sunday at 9 am (1330 GMT) in Washington for TikTok's request to block the president's order before it goes into effect at 11:59 pm Sunday (0359 GMT Monday).

The government lawyers said they wanted to file a brief "under seal," which would not be available as a public record, citing national security and confidential business information.

The court filing said TikTok had tentatively agreed to sealed briefs but would reserve the right to request that some documents be made public.

'Irreparable harm'

TikTok has argued that a ban, even if temporary, could cause irreparable harm to the video-sharing application, which has some 100 million US users.

Nichols, who sits on the bench in Washington, told a telephone hearing on Thursday he disagreed with government lawyers' claims that the ban -- which would not immediately prevent usage of TikTok but prevent downloads by new users and updates -- "merely preserves the status quo."

Analysts also pointed out that any ban could prevent users from downloading updates and security patches for TikTok.

Earlier this month, Trump cited national security concerns and issued orders to ban both TikTok and the popular Chinese app WeChat -- which has been put on hold in a separate court case in California.

But the TikTok order stops short of a full ban until Nov. 12, giving the Chinese parent firm ByteDance time to conclude a deal to transfer ownership of the app.

A tentative deal unveiled last weekend would make Silicon Valley giant Oracle the technology partner for TikTok and a stakeholder in a new entity to be known as TikTok Global.

The status of the deal, which would include investment from US retail giant Walmart, remained unclear as the parties awaited word on whether it would win approval in Beijing.

As part of its earlier court filing, a statement from TikTok interim head Vanessa Pappas said the proposed ban would be devastating for the social platform, which had been surging in much of the world.

A ban "will cause our user base to stagnate and then precipitously decline," Pappas said.

She noted that until July 1, when rumors of a ban first began to circulate, TikTok was adding some 424,000 new US users each day.

The TikTok petition also speculated that Trump was retaliating because of reports the app was used by his critics to snatch up tickets to a campaign rally in Tulsa to which they had no intention of going -- an event which flopped with significantly fewer people in attendance than expected.
Paul Nice retires after more than half century of working for Franconia
President Donald Trump's pick to fill the Supreme Court seat left vacant by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is one that will elate social conservatives. And if she is confirmed as expected by the Republican Senate in the coming weeks, Amy Coney Barrett could cement the court's conservative lean for years.

Barrett is currently a federal judge on the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago. She's had a swift rise in the judiciary, from being a law professor at Notre Dame in 2017, to a seat on one of the highest federal courts, to now being the president's nominee for the Supreme Court.

Here are four political takeaways from her nomination.

- - -

1. This is a pick designed to avoid a Kavanaugh-like controversy

Republicans already have a political fight on their hands to push through her confirmation this close to an election. The last thing they want is a nominee who will run into controversy of a personal nature, like the one over sexual assault allegations against Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

That drove Coney Barrett's pick. She is Trump's first female nomination for the court. She is a mom of seven children, two of whom are adopted from Haiti and one of whom has Down syndrome.

Trump dedicated significant time to her family in his remarks: "If confirmed, Justice Barrett will make history as the first mother of school-aged children ever to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court," he said to applause.

So did Coney Barrett: "While I am a judge, I'm better known back home as a room parent, carpool driver and birthday party planner."

As Trump handed over the mic to Coney Barrett, he ad-libbed to uneasy laughter: "This should be a straightforward and prompt confirmation. Good luck. It's going to be very easy. It should be very quick. I'm sure it will be extremely non-controversial. Well, we said that last time."

- - -

2. It's not immediately clear what her nomination means for abortion rights

Coney Barrett personally opposes abortion and has talked openly about her Catholic religion with language that has irked some Senate Democrats. Judicially, she's in line with the late conservative Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia, for whom she clerked, in interpreting the constitution as she thinks the founders originally intended.

But her social conservative convictions and the fact her nomination would tilt the court 6-3 conservative-to-liberal don't automatically mean abortion rights' days are numbered in America.

She could play a part in overturning Roe v. Wade, should the right court case come before the justices - and abortion opponents are certainly trying to grab the court's interest by passing laws in states that ban abortion before most women know they're pregnant.

But Coney Barrett has previously acknowledged that the legal right to abortion is settled law. "The fundamental element, that the woman has a right to choose abortion, will probably stand," she said as a major abortion case was before the court in 2013.

As The Fix's Aaron Blake wrote in 2018 when Coney Barrett was a contender for that open Supreme Court seat, those comments suggest she abides by a commonly accepted legal doctrine, stare decisis, that suggests long-settled court cases are just that, settled.

More immediately, Coney Barrett will be under political pressure not to say in her confirmation hearing that she's going into this job with an ideological bent, particularly on abortion. She previewed how she might do that on Saturday: "The president has nominated me to serve on the United States Supreme Court, and that institution belongs to all of us. If confirmed, I would not assume that role for the sake of those in my own circle, and certainly not for my own sake. I would assume this role to serve you."

There are two Republican senators in particular she'll have to keep in mind - Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska - who side with protecting abortion rights. (Those two have also suggested they could vote against Trump's nominee because it's coming too close to an election.)

- - -

3. Health-care coverage is going to be a major political issue in her confirmation fight

If Barrett gets confirmed before the election, it's possible she'll be seated in time to help decide if the Affordable Care Act should effectively stand, a monumental case scheduled to be heard about a week after the election.

The challenge brought by Republican attorneys general and supported by the Trump administration argues the law shouldn't stand after Congress zeroed out the tax penalty for people who don't have health insurance when it passed its tax overhaul in 2017.

Coney Barrett doesn't have a long judicial record to scrutinize. But she has written critically of a decision by the Supreme Court to uphold Obamacare.

"Chief Justice Roberts pushed the Affordable Care Act beyond its plausible meaning to save the statute," she wrote of the 2012 case, arguing the decision did not show judicial restraint.

And she's expressed concern about legislatures in language that matches conservative orthodoxy about government overreach. She's argued the courts have a role to play in protecting Americans from that: "They provide the forum in which citizens seek protection of their natural rights from legislative infringement," she wrote in 2017 as a law professor.

Expect Democrats, who see health care as a winning political issue, to use these comments to frame Coney Barrett as a threat to Americans' access to it.

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden's main criticism of Coney Barrett was framed that way: "She has a written track record of disagreeing with the U.S. Supreme Court's decision upholding the Affordable Care Act," he said in a statement.

- - -

4. This doesn't appear to change the politics of confirming a nominee

While confirming any justice this close to an election is politically controversial and against public opinion (57% of Americans said in a Washington Post-ABC News poll they want the winner of the November presidential election to nominate Ginsburg's successor), the opportunity to cement the court's conservative lean is too good for Republicans to pass up.

Plus, Senate Republicans don't need bipartisan support or even all 53 members of their caucus to get Barrett on the court. Just 50 Senate Republicans voting yes, plus Vice President Pence casting the tie-breaking majority vote, will be enough.

During Brett's Senate nomination in 2017 to her current seat, Democrats questioned how she has spoken about her Catholic faith. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., drew huge backlash from conservatives over saying to Barrett, "The dogma lives loudly within you."

Republicans pointed to that as bias, and accused Democrats of applying an unconstitutional religious test to potential judges. Barrett got confirmed with 55 votes. The point is, she has been vetted and through a tough process before.

On Saturday, Barrett received immediate praise from perhaps the one person most important to getting this nomination through, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. "President Trump could not have made a better decision," he said in a statement. And a potential swing vote, Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, described her in a statement as a "highly-respected jurist with distinguished legal and academic credentials."
London, Ont., police said Saturday began quietly and with no known public health infractions in the university town known to host large parties on the same weekend each year.

Western University students usually celebrate a fake homecoming on the last Saturday in September, a tradition thats been discouraged this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Authorities were monitoring to ensure provincial gathering limits were being followed among students at the school where at least 39 people have tested positive for COVID-19 since classes began.

Const. Sandasha Bough said by phone that officers were on the streets near the university.

As of shortly after noon on Saturday, she said only small outdoor gatherings had been observed.

City bylaw officers, who enforce gathering limits of 25 people outdoors and 10 indoors, were also patrolling the streets, Bough said.

Social media posts from the city over the last few days have reminded people of possible fines up to $10,000 for hosting a large gathering and $750 for attending.

The Middlesex-London Health Unit has also been speaking directly to students on social media in the days leading up to the expected festivities.

On Friday, a Twitter post from the public health unit thanked students for their adherence to health guidelines since outbreaks among students were reported earlier this month. It also asked them to spread the word to their peers.

Weve been impressed with the efforts of the (Western) students who have helped limit the spread of COVID-19 recently, the post reads. Youve stayed away from big gatherings & parties, kept physical distance, worn your masks & kept your social circles small.

Another tweet reminded students that law enforcement would be keeping an eye on parties this weekend, noting possible fines, reprimand from the university and the risk of catching COVID-19.

The consequences of large gatherings are real, the post reads.

Western University will host its official homecoming virtually in October.

The university said in a Saturday statement that its working with health officials to discourage nuisance parties this fall, communicating across campus and online on the need to remain vigilant about COVID-19.

We are encouraged by reports this week from the mayor and city bylaw enforcement of increased compliance, fewer gatherings and reduced get-togethers from last weekend, the statement said.

Having said that, the university is prepared to use the full force of the code of student conduct should students risk the health and safety of the community through their actions.

The university suspended non-academic, in-person activities amid news of COVID-19 outbreaks among students this month.

Clubs, athletics and events have been put on hold, and restrictions instituted on libraries and other campus buildings.

University president Alan Shepard wrote to students this week asking them to continue avoiding large gatherings, practising physical distancing, wearing masks and keeping their social bubbles small.

Thank you for what youve done and please keep up the good work, he wrote.
Protests over a grand jury's decision to not charge any police officers for Breonna Taylor's death continued for a third straight night in Louisville Friday, with several demonstrators arrested for violating the city's 9 p.m. curfew.

Demands to release transcripts from the grand jury hearing swelled after Breonna Taylor's family attorney, Ben Crump, accused Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron of swaying the jury, rather than impartially presenting evidence as he was tasked.

"Release the transcript so that we can have transparency," he said at a family press conference after the decision.

Crowds chanted "release the transcript" with Crump on Friday before evening fell and police fired flashbangs to break up the demonstrations.

Protesters spend time in a church lot, Friday, September 25, 2020, in Louisville. / Credit: Darron Cumming/AP

Taylor, an EMT, was killed in a botched drug raid by Louisville Metro Police, in which officers entered her home with a no-knock warrant and fired off more than 30 rounds, hitting her multiple times.

Only one officer was charged in the shooting. Brett Hankison was indicted on a wanton endangerment charge, for firing bullets that entered a neighbor's apartment. The grand jury ruled the officers acted in legal self-defense because Taylor's boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, fired first when he feared the squad of officers was a home invasion.

"They didn't even mention her daughter's name in this damn indictment process, in this grand jury hearing. How dare you," Tamika Mallory, who leads activist group Until Freedom, said at a press conference.

Outrage over Taylor's death was revived by the grand jury's decision, prompting crowds of both young and old Americans to demand accountability and seek justice for the slain EMT this week.

"I've been doing this all my life," protester Mary Williams told CBS News' Adriana Diaz on Friday.

Williams is in her 70s and marched in the demonstration using a walker.

Story continues

"This is for our children," Walker said.

Another demonstrator, Karis Jefferson, took her children to see Taylor's family and supporters speak, acknowledging the intensity of the situation.

"It's a little heavy for children, but I think that they need to see it," Jefferson said. "They need to know what's going on so they can be the best that they can be, so they could be part of the change for the future."

Attorney General Cameron's office responded to the outrage, telling CBS News "everyone is entitled to their opinion, but prosecutors and grand jury members are bound by the facts and by the law." He previously said he would revisit the matter of releasing the transcripts after the FBI concludes its own investigation.

Civil rights attorney Ben Crump is calling for the passage of the George Floyd Justice and Policing Accountability Act to enact meaningful, lasting change.

"It speaks to the systematic reform that we need in policing all across America," Crump said. "To prevent future Breonna Taylors, to prevent future George Floyds, to prevent future Jacob Blake, Jr.'s, to prevent future Pamela Turners."

The police reform bill named for George Floyd would ban no-knock warrants, which was used in Breonna Taylor's case, and raise the standard for what justifies use of force. That bill is held up in Congress, and Crump is calling for Americans to head to the polls in the upcoming election so policies can be changed.

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Las Azaleas focuses on the work of of historic and contemporary female Latin artists and composers, some of whom may not have received the same level of exposure as their male counterparts.
With the Assembly election in Bihar due to be held amid the coronavirus pandemic, virtual rallies will play an important role in connecting with voters.

However, it will be a big challenge for political parties to reach voters through live streaming especially in flood-affected areas.

Experts believe that the cellular towers installed in flood-affected areas may be less effective due to water logging on the surface which may reduce the speed of internet.

Areas surrounded by flood and rain might interrupt subterranean network in many ways. The combination of water seeping into the ground can damage the various electric components in the network, or cause physical damage at locations where the fibres are spliced together," an official of BSNL said, requesting anonymity.

Heavy monsoon rain, wind, and lightning can cause damage to cell towers, resulting in interruptions in the area they cover. This is also due to loss of signal in particular area. In this case, signal may catch from nearby cell towers. It puts additional burden with chances of signal reduction. A cellular tower of service provider generally has a capacity for 600 phones," he said.

Suppose a cell phone tower is installed in the middle of water and the place is completely cut off from land, it would be extremely difficult to reach there and repair them in case of technical errors," he said.

Bihar currently has around 85 lakh people affected in 16 flood-affected districts. The flood situation remains serious.

In this case, the political parties will face more challenges and largely dependent on ground level workers.

Nikhil Anand, the chief spokesperson of BJP Bihar unit said: BJP is a cadre-based party with dedicated members in all constituencies. Our organisational structure is such that it connects with people standing at the last mile of the state through our saptrishis and Panna Pramukhs."

As per recent reports of Election Commission, Bihar has 1,06,526 polling stations in 2020 which is 62.96 per cent higher than during the 2015 polls when there were 65,367 polling stations.

The other bigger political parties like JDU, RJD and Congress have similar strength to connect with voters. The smaller parties would face greater challenges due to lesser ground workers.
Mr. Bidens team continues to cast the race as above all a referendum on Mr. Trump and his stewardship of the pandemic, seeing the issue of the courts chiefly as a chance to mobilize the elements of the Democratic base. For now, the Supreme Court appears unlikely to leapfrog the economy and the pandemic as the central messages in his case for defeating Mr. Trump.

As the president announced his nomination of Judge Barrett, Mr. Biden issued a written statement that focused heavily on the threat to health care and devoted only a few sentences to Judge Barrett directly.

Even now, in the midst of a global health pandemic, the Trump administration is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the entire law, including its protections for people with pre-existing conditions, Mr. Biden said, citing Judge Barretts past opposition to the health care law.

Democrats signaled that their strongest political strategy was to focus on the issues at risk with a 6-3 conservative court.

Shes a woman, but the most important fact is that shes for getting rid of Roe v. Wade and the Affordable Care Act and has positions that will hurt millions of women, said Josh Schwerin, a spokesman for Priorities USA, a leading pro-Biden super PAC. If Republicans think that just by putting up a woman they are checking a box that will help them win back suburban women, theyre wrong.

Whomever Mr. Trump nominated, Democrats had planned to portray her as a threat to the Affordable Care Act. But Judge Barrett provides particular ammunition after she criticized an opinion by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. preserving the law as having gone beyond its plausible meaning to save the statute.

Were getting a nominee who is fundamentally at odds with the public on two very core issues, former Mayor Rahm Emanuel of Chicago said, describing coverage for people with pre-existing conditions and protecting Roe v. Wade as powerful Democratic arguments. Thats where the line of inquiry should be.
Our beloved country is filled with hate and division. Not against the common enemies of democracy which dwell outside our borders, the autocratic and totalitarian regimes headed by dictators around the world sworn to our destruction, but hate against each other, our fellow citizens.

One need look no further than a momentary glance at the social media which dominates our culture today. The voices of disrespect and violence completely cover even the smallest voice for respect and unity among our people. The chasm has grown so wide among us, one must wonder if any bridge of reason or love can span the divide? It is stunning that our country should come to this point of division.

President Lincoln, in his Second Inaugural, stated this concern in the midst of our Civil War: Neither party expected for the war, the magnitude, or the duration, which it has already attained ... Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible, and pray to the same God; and each invokes His aid against the other.

Mr. Lincoln had warned in an earlier speech in 1838 that if destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time or die by suicide.

Are we there? Are we on the path? While we pray America will never endure another Civil War, we can destroy ourselves from within through the hate and violence being espoused by too many.

President Lincoln proposed the only antidote to our situation that I know. He said at the end of that same Inaugural Address. With malice toward none, with charity(love) for all ... let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nations wounds  to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations.

Justices Ginsburg and Scalia showed our country we can be miles apart in our interpretation of the Constitution and remain as friends who share a passion for our democracy and its laws. John Lewis followed in the footsteps of Dr. King in showing that we can be passionate in our march toward justice without resorting to violence.

But what can I do? All my life I have attempted to be of service to my country in one form or another. I cant just do nothing in these perilous times.

Beginning this Monday, Sept. 28, I will be silently marching in front of each courthouse in all 39 counties of the two congressional districts I represented in Congress. I will be carrying signs of nonviolence and respect for our people and our democracy.

I will be joined by my wife and some of our grandchildren and in a few counties by my 99-year-old high school American history teacher. Each march is for 50 minutes beginning at 9 a.m., 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. A 10-minute recitation of the Gettysburg Address to remind us of who we are as Americans will begin at 9:50 a.m., 11:50 a.m. and 2:50 p.m. We will be wearing masks and observing appropriate distances as we walk. Anyone attending the Gettysburg Address recitation must do the same.

The following is a list of the dates, times, and counties:

Sept. 28: 11 a.m. Jackson, 2 p.m. Williamson

Sept. 29: 11 a.m. Alexander, 2 p.m. Pulaski

Oct. 1: 11 a.m. Jefferson, 2 p.m. Franklin

Oct. 2: 11 a.m. Sangamon, 2 p.m. Macon

Oct. 5: 11 a.m. Effingham, 2 p.m. Shelby

Oct. 6: 9 a.m. Clark, 11 a.m. Cumberland, 2 p.m. Coles

Oct. 7: 9 a.m. Union, 11 a.m. Massac, 2 p.m. Johnson

Oct. 8: 11 a.m. Fayette, 2 p.m. Marion

Oct. 9: 11 a.m. Christian, 2 p.m. Moultrie

Oct. 13: 9 a.m. Perry, 11 a.m. Clinton, 2 p.m. Washington

Oct. 14: 9 a.m. Jasper, 2 p.m. Crawford

Oct. 15: 9 a.m. Clay, 11 a.m. Richland, 2 p.m. Lawrence

Oct. 16: 9 a.m. Wayne, 11 a.m. Edwards, 2 p.m. Wabash

Oct. 19: 11 a.m. White, 2 p.m. Hamilton

Oct. 20: 2 p.m. Saline

Oct. 21: 9 a.m. Gallatin, 11 a.m. Hardin, 2 p.m. Pope

Oct. 22: 9 a.m. Randolph, 11 a.m. Monroe, 2 p.m. St. Clair

Glenn Poshard is a former Illinois state senator, U.S. Congressman, gubernatorial candidate, and is a former president of the Southern Illinois University system.

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By PTI

CHANDIGARH: Shiromani Akali Dal chief Sukhbir Singh Badal on Saturday demanded that the Punjab government immediately bring an ordinance to declare the entire state as an agriculture market to thwart the implementation of the Centre's farm legislations.

"Instead of being obsessed with the Akali phobia day and night and indulging in petty mudslinging against his opponent, Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh must act to safeguard farmers," the SAD chief said in a statement.

"The best and in fact the only way to block the implementation of the Centre's new Acts in Punjab is to declare the entire state a principal market area or a mandi for farm produce," he said, adding that any area declared as a "mandi" is exempt from the application of the new legislations.

Badal said with the move, 'big corporate sharks' will not be able to enter the state, thus saving farmers from their 'fangs'.

Badal also asked the chief minister to repeal the amendments made by his government in the Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee Act in 2017.

The Amarinder Singh government had amended the Act to include all provisions like the creation of private yards, direct marketing and e-trading, he said.

"These amendments are exactly the same as the black laws of the Centre against which the farmers are protesting. Amarinder's APMC provisions have actually pre-dated the Centre's black laws," Badal said.

"These APMC amendments need to be repealed by the Punjab Vidhan Sabha. We will fully support the state government initiative to repeal these," he added.

Badal said this initiative needed to be taken by the CM the earliest.

"There is no time to waste, he said, adding that an ordinance should be issued to this effect before the farm Bills become Acts and notified by the Centre."

Earlier, addressing farmers and Akali workers in Patiala and Ludhiana, Badal said his party will "wholeheartedly support" the CM regarding the ordinance.

"We urge him to first immediately issue an ordinance declaring Punjab a mandi and follow it up quickly by convening a special session of the Vidhan Sabha to convert it into a formal Act," he said.

Badal urged all political parties to rise above political considerations to ensure a unanimous passage of such a Bill.

The SAD expresses support to all initiatives, agitations or any other programme announced by farmer representative, regardless of which organisation or party starts them, he said.

ALSO READ | Centre orders immediate procurement of paddy in Punjab, Haryana to 'pacify' agitating farmers

Amarinder on Saturday said the Akalis' "adamant refusal" to quit the NDA coalition over the contentious agricultural Bills showed the "extent of their greed and desperation to cling to the power".

The fact that the Shiromani Akali Dal is holding on to the "last vestige" of power it enjoys at the cost of Punjab and its farmers, despite being publicly humiliated by its alliance partner BJP, has exposed their dual standards and total lack of concern for the farming community, said the chief minister.

He was referring to the BJP's statement that it has left the task of convincing farmers on the agriculture Bills to the Akalis.

"Why else are the Akalis still a part of the anti-farmer and anti-people BJP-led government at the Centre, which had conspired with large corporate houses to deprive farmers of their livelihood and ruin Punjab?" asked Singh.

Singh also accused the SAD of "trying hard to stay politically afloat by hook or by crook".

After the "politically motivated drama" of Harsimrat Kaur's resignation from the Union Cabinet, "clearly undertaken to save face" amid farmers' unrest across Punjab, SAD president Sukhbir Badal was widely expected to pull his party out of the Union government, but it did not happen, said Amarinder Singh, seeking to deride the Akali leader for his "shameful double-speak".

Lambasting Akalis for "actively supporting" the Union government in "selling off" the farmers' rights to the "monopolistic corporate houses through the unconstitutional and undemocratic farm Bills", the chief minister said the SAD has completely lost its political credibility after their antics on the new laws.

The Badals will go down in the Akali history as leaders responsible for the party's destruction, he said in a statement here.

From the farmers' resentment against them to their fallout with the BJP, the Akalis seem to be heading towards total elimination from Punjab's political arena, said Amarinder Singh, adding the people of the state, especially the farmers, will not forgive the Badals for their deception and dishonesty.

"The Prime Minister and his BJP do not care for the Akalis as is evident from the promptness with which Harsimrat's resignation was accepted," said the chief minister.

It seems the BJP wants to go it alone in the Punjab assembly polls, he said, adding the stage seems set for the NDA to throw out SAD if the latter does not quit the ruling coalition on its own.
Denmark's Prime Minister is urging world leaders to use the COVID-19 pandemic as "a wake-up call" to lessen world inequality.

Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen gave a pre-recorded speech to the United Nations General assembly on Friday.

"We must solve the global inequality that the virus has so brutally exposed. The inequality of today leads to the conflicts of tomorrow," she said.

Frederiksen also called on the global community to reform the asylum system to aid countries on paths of migration and "put an end to the cynical business of human smugglers."
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Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, September 26, 2020 15:37 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c476c55b 4 City COVID-19,sexual-harassment,Soekarno-Hatta-International-Airport-Police,COVID-19-rapid-test,rapid-test,Soekarno-Hatta-International-Airport,North-Sumatra,extortion Free

The Soekarno-Hatta International Airport Police have arrested a medical worker accused of sexual misconduct and extortion by a traveler who underwent a rapid COVID-19 test at the airport in Tangerang, Banten.

The suspect, identified as EF, was arrested at a rooming house in Balige, Toba Samosir regency, North Sumatra. He was with his wife and children during the arrest.

A team arrested the suspect today [Saturday]. We have brought him in for interrogation, the polices criminal detective chief, Comr. Alexander Yurikho, said on Friday as quoted by tribunnews.com.

Jakarta Police spokesperson Sr. Comr. Yusri Yunus said EF fled to Balige after the victim had shared her experience on Twitter, saying the incident occurred on Sept. 13 when she was about to fly to Nias, North Sumatra. The post later went viral.

Soekarno-Hatta Airport Police named EF a suspect and went to his rooming house in Tangerang, Banten, but did not find him there.

EF told investigators that he immediately left for North Sumatra by using public transportation after reading the [viral] tweet, said Yusri.

Read also: Soekarno-Hatta Police receive report of sexual harassment during COVID-19 test

According to investigators' findings, EF recently graduated from a medical school at a private university in North Sumatra. However, he does not have a medical license because he has yet to complete an internship program.

We will question representatives of the Indonesian Medical Association [IDI] and the university to confirm whether the suspect had indeed graduated from medical school, Yusri said.

Clinical laboratory firm PT Kimia Farma Diagnostika, a subsidiary of pharmaceutical company PT Kimia Farma, said it would pursue legal action against EF, who is an employee of the company. (dpk)
CHICAGO  Although Amy Coney Barrett is the nominated replacement for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, she is more aptly described as heir to another departed Supreme Court justice: conservative hero Antonin Scalia.

Like Scalia, for whom she once clerked, she is a committed Roman Catholic as well as a firm devotee of his favored interpretation of the Constitution known as originalism. Those qualifications delight many on the right but dismay liberals and others who fear her votes could result in the chipping away of some laws, especially the Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion.

President Donald Trump announced his choice of the 48-year-old Indiana judge at a Saturday afternoon press conference, setting Barrett on the path to help conservatives hold sway over the court for decades to come.

Her selection is as sure to energize the presidents political base as it is to galvanize his foes with only weeks left to Election Day. Republican leaders in the Senate have already said they have the votes to confirm her nomination this year, likely before the election.

But beyond the 2020 election, the Barrett elevation could bring a national reckoning over abortion, an issue that has divided many Americans bitterly for almost half a century. The idea of overturning or gutting Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 decision, has been an animating political issue exploited by both sides.

Her legal writings and speeches show a commitment to originalism, a concept that involves justices endeavoring to decipher original meanings of texts in assessing whether someones rights have been violated. Many liberals say that approach is too rigid and doesnt allow the Constitutions consequences to adjust to vastly changing times.

President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump pay respects as Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg lies in repose at the Supreme Court building on Thursday, Sept. 24, 2020, in Washington. Ginsburg, 87, died of cancer on Sept. 18. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)AP

On abortion, questions have arisen about Barretts involvement in organizations that vigorously oppose it. But she has not said publicly she would, if given the chance, seek to scale back rights affirmed by the high court.

Barrett has been a federal judge since 2017, when Trump nominated her to the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. But as a longtime University of Notre Dame law professor, she had already established herself as a reliable conservative in the mold of Scalia.

She gained a reputation as a Scalia clerk in the late 1990s as bright and adept at picking apart poorly reasoned arguments. Ara Lovitt, who clerked with her at the time, recalls that at her investiture ceremony for the 7th Circuit, Scalia had high praise for her.

'Isnt Amy great,' Lovitt remembers Scalia saying.

Before becoming a judge, she discussed how court precedents provide welcome stability in the law. But she also seemed to leave the door open to the possibility of reversing ones about which there remained sharp disagreement.

Once a precedent is deeply rooted, a 2017 article in the University of Pennsylvania Journal of Constitutional Law, which Barrett co-wrote, said, the Court is no longer required to deal with the question of the precedents correctness. But it added: None of this is to say that a Justice cannot attempt to overturn long-established precedent. While institutional features may hinder that effort, a Justice is free to try.

Barrett and her husband, Jesse Barrett, a former federal prosecutor, both graduated from Notre Dame Law School. They have seven children, including two adopted from Haiti and one with special needs.

She would be the only justice on the current court not to have received her law degree from an Ivy League school. The eight current justices all attended either Harvard or Yale.

How her religious beliefs might guide her legal views became a focus for some Democrats during bruising confirmation hearings after Barretts nomination for the 7th Circuit. That prompted Republicans to accuse Democrats of seeking to impose a religious test on Barretts fitness for the job.

At Notre Dame, where Barrett began teaching at 30, she often invoked God in articles and speeches. In a 2006 address, she encouraged graduating law students to see their careers as a means to building the kingdom of God.

She was considered a finalist in 2018 for the high court before Trump nominated Brett Kavanaugh for the seat that opened when Justice Anthony Kennedy retired. Even some conservatives worried her sparse judicial record made it too hard to predict how she might rule, concerned she could end up like other seemingly conservatives who wound up more moderate.

Three years on, her record now includes around 100 opinions and dissents, in which she often illustrated Scalias influence by delving deep into historical minutiae to glean the meaning of original texts.

A 2019 dissent in a gun-rights case argued a person convicted of a nonviolent felony shouldnt be automatically barred from owning a gun. All but a few pages of her 37-page dissent were devoted to the history of gun rules for convicted criminals in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Barrett has twice joined dissenting opinions asking for abortion-related decisions to be thrown out and reheard by the full appeals court. Last year, after a three-judge panel blocked an Indiana law that would make it harder for a minor to have an abortion without her parents being notified, Barrett voted to have the case reheard by the full court.

She wrote a unanimous three-judge panel decision in 2019 making it easier for men alleged to have committed sexual assaults on campus to challenge the proceedings against them. And she was in dissent in June when her two colleagues on a 7th Circuit panel put on hold, just in Chicago, the Trump administration policy that could jeopardize permanent resident status for immigrants who use food stamps, Medicaid and housing vouchers.

Barrett would assume the court seat with already substantial wealth, and her financial disclosures show close ties to a number of conservative groups. Barrett and her husband have investments worth between $845,000 and $2.8 million, according to her 2019 financial disclosure report. Judges report the value of their investments in ranges. Their money is invested mostly in mutual funds, some of which are for retirement and their childrens education.

Barrett was raised in New Orleans and was the eldest child of a lawyer for Shell Oil Co. She earned her undergraduate degree in English literature in 1994 at Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee.

She also served as a law clerk for Laurence Silberman for a year at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Between clerkships and entering academia, she worked from 1999 to 2001 at a law firm in Washington, Miller, Cassidy, Larroca & Lewin.

By MICHAEL TARM, The Associated Press
KEY HIGHLIGHTS

Welcoming social security benefits for workers, some experts say the new labour laws would create a permanent cadre of "insecure and temporary employees"

Given the short term of employment, companies would prefer not to invest in skill training

Companies say millennials prefer easy and flexible job terms. They want to move from one firm or sector to another and gain varied expertise

The new labour law makes hiring and firing easy for companies. It makes difficult for unions to go on strike without prior 60-day notice

India Inc has hailed the newly-enacted three labour codes, claiming it will spur much-needed investment and create more jobs in the country. But, a section of experts believe the law is tilted in favour of employers and put long-term industrial relations at risk.

They have termed some of the social security benefits provided for workers as "deceptive". The new law would eventually create a permanent cadre of insecure and temporary employees, they believe.

While industry has welcomed the labour law reforms that allow them to hire and fire, eminent academicians argue it will make future uncertain for employees. Some, however, disagree saying millennials prefer easy and flexible employment terms. They want to move from one firm or sector to another and gain varied expertise, they opine.

The Code on Industrial Relations allows companies with up to 300 workers to fire them without the prior government approval. The current threshold is 100 workers, making it a cumbersome process for industrial establishments to retrench or lay off. The other industry-friendly change in the new law is 60 days prior notice for unions to go on strike.

Also read: What stops India from taking care of its crisis-hit workers?

Ravi Srivastava, Director, Centre for Employment Studies, Institute for Human Development, said that steps such as annual health check-up and issuance of appointment letters do not mean much unless a minimum period of employment is brought into force. "One benefit is that they will get equal pay and the second is they will get social security benefits. These two benefits have been open to even contract workers under the old law. The only additional benefit for them is gratuity benefit. Now gratuity is the benefit which will accrue to them only if they complete a minimum period in an establishment," he said.

KR Shyam Sundar, XLRI Jamshedpur professor and a labour economist, says the code gravitates in the favour of employers. "Employers have been extended a tremendous amount of labour flexibility in order to determine terms and conditions of service in a unilateral manner and also to be able to dismiss workers on alleged acts of misconduct without even a domestic enquiry," says Sundar.

Not surprisingly, labour unions, including RSS-backed Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS), have been up in arms against several key changes in the labour law. "The most controversial chapter VB (now Chapter X) on prior permission for lay off, retrenchment and closure is exempted up to three hundred workers. It will promote "ease of closing business" not "ease of doing business," said infuriated BMS General Secretary Virjesh Upadhyay.

The BMS, along with other unions, have launched protest marches and sit-ins against the labour law reforms. Various stakeholders have, however, unanimously welcomed social security benefits provided in the new labour law, saying it had been due for long.

Also read: Industrial Relations Code 2019: Balance tilts in favour of industry; makes trade unions jittery

The Social Security Code, nine related laws condensed into one, has widened the social security net, covering unorganised workers and gig workers. For the first time, a fixed term employee working for a certain period on contract has been given the right of social security like a regular employee.

Provision has been made to formulate various schemes for providing comprehensive social security to workers in the unorganised sector. A "Social Security Fund" will be created on the financial side to implement these schemes.

The new law extends social benefits to even those working with aggregators such as Ola, Uber, Swiggy and Zomato. "Aggregators will be required to contribute between 1-2% of annual turnover towards the social security fund for the welfare of unorganised workers," said Saraswathi Kasturirangan, Partner, Deloitte India. She termed the overall reforms and the consolidation of 29 different labour laws into four Codes as "forward-looking".

Former JNU professor Srivastava thumbed down the new legislations, saying they were neither in the interest of employers nor employees in the long run. However, there could be some short-term gains, he said.

Also read: New labour laws are pro-business, anti-workers

"It is not only against the interest of workers, it is actually against the interest of the employers and the economy," he said. He feared the new law would create an environment where work precariousness would increase. Further, it would deter employers from making investment in workers' skills and training, he said.

"For the past many years, we have seen employers talk big but they do not want to invest in their workers' training and this is a standard economic theory. Globally, economists have shown that employers do not have interest in skill training of non-core employees. That means there is under investment in skills training," Srivastava said.

Also read: The ugly side of automobile industry: Over 500 scarred for life in Gurgaon-Faridabad cluster
Technavio has been monitoring the caviar market and it is poised to grow by USD 534.61 mn during 2020-2024, progressing at a CAGR of almost 8% during the forecast period. The report offers an up-to-date analysis regarding the current market scenario, latest trends and drivers, and the overall market environment.

This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200925005265/en/

Technavio has announced its latest market research report titled Global Caviar Market 2020-2024 (Graphic: Business Wire)

Although the COVID-19 pandemic continues to transform the growth of various industries, the immediate impact of the outbreak is varied. While a few industries will register a drop in demand, numerous others will continue to remain unscathed and show promising growth opportunities. Technavio's in-depth research has all your needs covered as our research reports include all foreseeable market scenarios, including pre- post-COVID-19 analysis. Download a Free Sample Report on COVID-19 Impacts

Frequently Asked Questions:

At what rate is the market projected to grow?

The year-over-year growth for 2020 is estimated at 6.76% and the incremental growth of the market is anticipated to be 534.61 mn.

The year-over-year growth for 2020 is estimated at 6.76% and the incremental growth of the market is anticipated to be 534.61 mn. Who are the top players in the market?

Agroittica Lombarda Spa, California Caviar Co. LLC, Caviar Blanc, Caviar de France, Hangzhou Qiandaohu Xunlong Sci-tech Co. Ltd., LABEYRIE FINE FOODS SAS, Russian Caviar House Pte. Ltd., SEPEHR DAD CAVIAR GmbH, Sterling Caviar LLC, and The Caviar Co., are some of the major market participants.

Agroittica Lombarda Spa, California Caviar Co. LLC, Caviar Blanc, Caviar de France, Hangzhou Qiandaohu Xunlong Sci-tech Co. Ltd., LABEYRIE FINE FOODS SAS, Russian Caviar House Pte. Ltd., SEPEHR DAD CAVIAR GmbH, Sterling Caviar LLC, and The Caviar Co., are some of the major market participants. What is the key market driver?

The increasing demand for luxury foods is one of the major factors driving the market

The increasing demand for luxury foods is one of the major factors driving the market How big is the Europe market?

The Europe region will contribute 33% of the market share

The market is fragmented, and the degree of fragmentation will accelerate during the forecast period. Agroittica Lombarda Spa, California Caviar Co. LLC, Caviar Blanc, Caviar de France, Hangzhou Qiandaohu Xunlong Sci-tech Co. Ltd., LABEYRIE FINE FOODS SAS, Russian Caviar House Pte. Ltd., SEPEHR DAD CAVIAR GmbH, Sterling Caviar LLC, and The Caviar Co. are some of the major market participants. The increasing demand for luxury foods will offer immense growth opportunities. To make most of the opportunities, market vendors should focus more on the growth prospects in the fast-growing segments, while maintaining their positions in the slow-growing segments.

Buy 1 Technavio report and get the second for 50% off. Buy 2 Technavio reports and get the third for free.

View market snapshot before purchasing

Technavio's custom research reports offer detailed insights on the impact of COVID-19 at an industry level, a regional level, and subsequent supply chain operations. This customized report will also help clients keep up with new product launches in direct indirect COVID-19 related markets, upcoming vaccines and pipeline analysis, and significant developments in vendor operations and government regulations.

Caviar Market 2020-2024: Segmentation

Caviar Market is segmented as below:

Product Inorganic Caviar Organic Caviar

Distribution channel Hypermarkets And Supermarkets Independent Retailers Specialty Stores Others

Geography Europe North America APAC South America MEA



To learn more about the global trends impacting the future of market research, download a free sample: https://www.technavio.com/talk-to-us?report=IRTNTR43436

Caviar Market 2020-2024: Scope

Technavio presents a detailed picture of the market by the way of study, synthesis, and summation of data from multiple sources. The caviar market report covers the following areas:

Caviar Market Size

Caviar Market Trends

Caviar Market Industry Analysis

This study identifies health benefits of caviar as one of the prime reasons driving the caviar market growth during the next few years.

Technavio suggests three forecast scenarios (optimistic, probable, and pessimistic) considering the impact of COVID-19. Technavio's in-depth research has direct and indirect COVID-19 impacted market research reports.

Register for a free trial today and gain instant access to 17,000+ market research reports. Technavio's SUBSCRIPTION platform

Caviar Market 2020-2024: Key Highlights

CAGR of the market during the forecast period 2020-2024

Detailed information on factors that will assist caviar market growth during the next five years

Estimation of the caviar market size and its contribution to the parent market

Predictions on upcoming trends and changes in consumer behavior

The growth of the caviar market

Analysis of the market's competitive landscape and detailed information on vendors

Comprehensive details of factors that will challenge the growth of caviar market vendors

Table of Contents:

Executive Summary

Market Landscape

Market ecosystem

Market characteristics

Value chain analysis

Market Sizing

Market definition

Market segment analysis

Market size 2019

Market outlook: Forecast for 2019 2024

Five Forces Analysis

Five forces summary

Bargaining power of buyers

Bargaining power of suppliers

Threat of new entrants

Threat of substitutes

Threat of rivalry

Market condition

Market Segmentation by Product

Market segments

Comparison by Product

Inorganic caviar Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Organic caviar Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Market opportunity by Product

Market Segmentation by Distribution channel

Market segments

Comparison by Distribution channel

Hypermarkets and supermarkets Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Independent retailers Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Specialty stores Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Others Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Market opportunity by Distribution channel

Customer landscape

Overview

Geographic Landscape

Geographic segmentation

Geographic comparison

Europe Market size and forecast 2019-2024

North America Market size and forecast 2019-2024

APAC Market size and forecast 2019-2024

South America Market size and forecast 2019-2024

MEA Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Key leading countries

Market opportunity by geography

Market drivers

Market challenges

Market trends

Vendor Landscape

Vendor landscape

Landscape disruption

Competitive scenario

Vendor Analysis

Vendors covered

Market positioning of vendors

Agroittica Lombarda Spa

California Caviar Co. LLC

Caviar Blanc

Caviar de France

Hangzhou Qiandaohu Xunlong Sci-tech Co. Ltd.

LABEYRIE FINE FOODS SAS

Russian Caviar House Pte. Ltd.

SEPEHR DAD CAVIAR GmbH

Sterling Caviar LLC

The Caviar Co.

Appendix

Scope of the report

Currency conversion rates for US$

Research methodology

List of abbreviations

About Us

Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. Their research and analysis focuses on emerging market trends and provides actionable insights to help businesses identify market opportunities and develop effective strategies to optimize their market positions. With over 500 specialized analysts, Technavio's report library consists of more than 17,000 reports and counting, covering 800 technologies, spanning across 50 countries. Their client base consists of enterprises of all sizes, including more than 100 Fortune 500 companies. This growing client base relies on Technavio's comprehensive coverage, extensive research, and actionable market insights to identify opportunities in existing and potential markets and assess their competitive positions within changing market scenarios.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200925005265/en/

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By Trend

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan's statement on Azerbaijan and Turkey at the 75th session of the UN General Assembly is an attempt to deceive the world community, the Turkish government told Trend.

The whole world understands that Armenia is going through a deep internal political crisis. And it used the UN rostrum to deceive the world community, the government noted.

But all of Pashinyan's attempts to deceive the world community with his groundless statements against Azerbaijan and Turkey are doomed to fail. Armenia is the main cause of problems in the South Caucasus. Azerbaijan, as a country subjected to aggression by Armenia, has every right to liberate its territories. As for Pashinyan's statement that there is no military solution to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Azerbaijan makes the decision on this. Turkey, as the main ally of Azerbaijan, no matter what decision Azerbaijan makes, will always support it, the Turkish government emphasized.

--

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
RIO DE JANEIRO - A cloud of uncertainty that has hung over Rio de Janeiro throughout the coronavirus pandemic has been lifted, but gloom remains  the annual Carnival parade of flamboyant samba schools wont be held in February.

And while the decision is being characterized as a postponement of the event, no new date has been set.

Rios League of Samba Schools, LIESA, announced Thursday night that the spread of the coronavirus has made it impossible to safely hold the traditional parades that are a cultural mainstay and, for many, a source of livelihood.

Carnival is a party upon which many humble workers depend. The samba schools are community institutions, and the parades are just one detail of all that, Luiz Antonio Simas, a historian who specializes in Rios Carnival, said in an interview. An entire cultural and productive chain was disrupted by COVID.

Rios City Hall has yet to announce a decision about the Carnival street parties that also take place across the city. But its tourism promotion agency said in a statement to The Associated Press on Sept. 17 that without a coronavirus vaccine, it is uncertain when large public events can resume.

Brazils first confirmed coronavirus case was Feb. 26, one day after this years Carnival ended. As the number of infections grew, the samba schools that participate in the glitzy annual parade halted preparations for the 2021 event.

Nearly all of Rios samba schools are closely linked to working class communities. Their processions include elaborate floats accompanied by tireless drummers and costumed dancers who sing at the top of their lungs to impress a panel of judges. Tens of thousands of spectators pack the bleachers of the arena, known as the Sambadrome, while tens of millions watch on television.

Before the schools began competing in the 1930s, Carnival was celebrated in dance halls and haphazardly on the streets, Simas said. The parades entered the Sambadrome in the 1980s, and have become Rios quintessential Carnival display.

The immense labour required for each show was already stymied by restrictions on gatherings that Rios governor imposed in March. Even with those measures, Rios metropolitan region, home to 13 million people, so far has recorded more than 15,000 deaths from COVID-19.

Beneath the Sambadromes bleachers, the city created a homeless shelter for the vulnerable population during the pandemic.

Samba schools suspended float construction, costume sewing, dance rehearsals, and also social projects. The Mangueira schools program in the favela near downtown Rio that teaches music to children  keeping them away from crime, and cultivating the schools future drummers  hasnt held classes since March.

The pulse of entire suburban Rio cities like Nilopolis, whose population of 160,000 cheers the Beija-Flor samba school, has faded, Simas said.

Some performers resorted to odd jobs and gigs. Diogo Jesus, the lead dancer referred to as master of ceremonies in the Mocidade school, couldnt make rent without his income from private events. He started driving for Uber and sewing facemasks to sell at a fair.

It was a blow. We live Carnival all year round, and many people when they realized everything would stop wound up getting sick or depressed, Jesus said in an interview inside his house in Madureira, a neighbourhood in northern Rio. Carnival is our life.

The last year Rios Carnival was suspended was 1912, following the death of the foreign relations minister. The mayor of Rio, at the time Brazils capital, postponed by two months all licenses for the popular dance associations Carnival parties, according to Luis Claudio Villafane, a diplomat and author of the book The Day They Delayed Carnival. The mayor also voiced opposition to unregulated celebrations, but many Rio residents partied in the streets anyway.

Revelers were undeterred during World War II. And they poured into the street every year during more than two decades of military dictatorship, until 1985, with government censors reviewing costumes, floats and song lyrics.

Then came coronavirus.

We must await the coming months for definition about if there will be a vaccine or not, and when there will be immunization, LIESAs president, Jorge Castanheira, told reporters in Rio on Thursday. We dont have the safety conditions to set a date.

The 2020 coronavirus already forced Rios City Hall to scrap traditional plans for its second-biggest party, New Years Eve, which draws millions of people to Copacabana beach for dazzling fireworks. Earlier this month, the citys tourism promotion agency Riotur announced that main tourist spots will instead display light and music shows to be broadcast over the internet.

Delay of the Carnival parade will deprive Rio state of much needed tourism revenue. In 2020, Carnival drew 2.1 million visitors and generated 4 billion reais ($725 million) in economic activity, according to Riotur. A statement from the agency Thursday provided no further clarity on the fate of the Carnival street parties.

Some parties are small  for example one including a few dozen dog owners exhibiting their pets wearing wigs or funny hats. But most feature amps blasting music to throngs of thousands who dance, kiss and swill booze in a crush of celebration. The biggest one boasts more than two million partygoers.

Rita Fernandes, president of Os Blocos da Sebastiana, said her association already cancelled its 11 street parties that together draw 1.5 million revelers. Most others groups will follow, she said.

We cannot be irresponsible and bring the multitudes to the street, she said, pointing to Europes second wave of contagion.

After several weeks of declining daily infections, Rio authorities have begun expressing concern about an uptick. Public spaces such as beaches have been crowded in violation of pandemic restrictions.

A drummer in Mangueiras samba school, Laudo Braz Neto, said the children he instructed before the pandemic are listless, and he knows there is no way to put on Carnival without being able to safely gather.

Carnival will only really happen when the whole world can travel. Its a spectacle the world watches, brings income and movement here, he said. I have no hope for 2021.

____

Associated Press videojournalist Diarlei Rodrigues contributed to this report.

Read more about:
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Students in elementary, middle and high schools will join their preschool and special education peers when those in the blended learning model begin their return to campus for in-person learning next week under New York Citys phased-in school reopening -- and there are important dates families need to know as this school year gets underway amid the coronavirus (COVID-19).

All New York City public school students began the 2020-2021 school year on Monday -- but not all returned for in-person learning. Instead, students will return to their classroom for in-person instruction in phases by grade level through Oct. 1.

Pre-K, pre-K3 and students with disabilities in District 75 began the return to school buildings on Monday.

In-person classes will start for students in K-5 schools and K-8 schools beginning Tuesday, Sept. 29, with middle schools, high schools and adult education students beginning their return on Thursday, Oct. 1.

Blended learners will learn remotely until they return to school buildings under the phased approach.

Students have the option between full-time remote learning or blended learning, in which students attend school for in-person learning one to three days of the week and learn remotely the other days.

If they are in blended learning, students need to fill out a health screening questionnaire upon arrival to school. The city Department of Education (DOE) is encouraging families to use an online health screening tool each day a child is scheduled to attend in-person learning.

Under the current reopening plan, classes will be held in cafeterias, auditoriums, gymnasiums and in enclosed outdoor spaces -- and students and teachers will be required to wear a face covering while following strict social distancing rules.

The city DOE will supply schools with cleaning supplies and personal protective equipment, like face coverings, and schools will be deep-cleaned every evening using an electrostatic disinfectant.

*** CLICK HERE FOR COMPLETE COVERAGE OF CORONAVIRUS IN NEW YORK ***

Heres a look at key dates now in effect through the end of 2020.

SEPTEMBER

Monday, Sept. 28: Schools closed for Yom Kippur.

Tuesday, Sept. 29: K-5 and K-8 schools begin in-person learning.

OCTOBER

Thursday, Oct. 1: Middle schools, high school, and adult education schools begin in-person learning.

This also marks the first day that the mandatory random coronavirus testing program begins for students and staff. All tests are free of charge, and results will be available within 48 hours.

Each month, schools will select and test a blind sample of anywhere from 10% to 20% of the school community. The size of the sample will depend on the population of the school, said Dr. Jay Varma, the mayors senior adviser for public health.

Monday, Oct. 12 -- Schools closed for Columbus Day.

NOVEMBER

Tuesday, Nov. 3 -- School buildings closed for Election Day. This is not a day off for students, as they will still learn under a fully remote instructional day.

Wednesday, Nov. 11 -- Schools closed in observance of Veterans Day.

Thursday, Nov. 26 to Friday, Nov. 27 -- Schools closed for Thanksgiving.

DECEMBER

Thursday, Dec. 24 -- Winter recess begins

Heres a look at other key dates in the 2020-2021 public school calendar.

Related stories:

First day of school in NYC: So glad to have our students back

NYC schools reopening amid coronavirus: How to care for your childs mask

NYC schools reopening: Heres what you need to know

Safety protocols in NYC schools: What you need to know

NYC to bring in 2,000 more educators for the start of school as de Blasio pushes forward with Sept. 21 reopening

Coronavirus: How to find ventilation inspection results for your childs school

NYC school year delayed; in-person learning to start Sept. 21

Reopening of NYC schools delayed: What you need to know

Heres how coronavirus testing will work in NYC schools

Coronavirus: How NYC plans to safely reopen schools in fall

FOLLOW ANNALISE KNUDSON ON FACEBOOK AND TWITTER.
Certain areas of Donegal have an incidence rate of coronavirus four times the national average (stock photo)

A hotel in Downings in Donegal is renting rooms for just 2 per person sharing to allow for indoor dining despite Level 3 restrictions currently imposed on the county.

Beach Hotel in Downings issued a Facebook post on Friday night offering rooms for the minimal fee of 2 for the weekend so that customers could dine inside.

The offer said: Spoil yourself, dine indoors and avail of our food and beverage services - our rooms are currently available to rent for an allotted time - 2 per person sharing all weekend.

This comes as Donegal overtook Dublin with the highest incidence rate of coronavirus in the country and as the government imposed tighter restrictions on the county to stem the spread of the virus.

Read More

Certain areas of Donegal have an incidence rate of coronavirus four times the national average, as of recent figures published by the Health Protection Surveillance Centre.

Under current restrictions in Donegal and Dublin, all indoor dining, except for guests of hotels, is banned and confined to a maximum of 15 people outdoors.

This morning, the hotel defended its offer in another Facebook post stating: Under the government guidelines hotels are not closed, this offer was aimed at local people in the area.

No one will be using the rooms; it is merely a method to allow people to become a resident for a maximum period of one hour 45 minutes so they can avail of our dining and beverage services.

The government allows residents to be served inside and 15 non-residents outside, the statement read.

The hotel admitted the move was a way to recoup costs from stock ordered for the full house of residents that cancelled on Friday evening.

The hotel confirmed they would be closed after the weekend until further notice.

Beach Hotel were not immediately available for comment when contacted by Independent.ie.
Former Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis and Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut met on Saturday, prompting speculation in political circles, while the Bharatiya Janata Party denied their discussion had any political aspect.

Raut, whose strident anti-BJP posture over power sharing formula after last year's state assembly polls was daily fodder for TV channels, met Fadnavis at a luxury hotel in the western suburbs.

Maharashtra BJP chief spokesperson Keshav Upadhye said there was no political angle to the meeting.

"Raut wanted to interview Fadnavis for (the Sena mouthpiece) Saamana and this meeting was to discuss how to go about it," he tweeted.

"Fadnavis informed Raut that he would grant him the interview after returning from the Bihar poll campaign," Upadhye said.

He said there are no "political connotations" to the meeting between Fadnavis, now the Opposition leader in the Assembly, and Raut, who is the editorial mainstay of Saamana.

Raut said, "Is it a crime to meet Fadnavis, who is a former chief minister and now the Opposition leader in the state assembly?

"When I interviewed Sharad Pawar, I had announced that I have planned interviews with Fadnavis, Rahul Gandhi and Amit Shah," Raut said, adding meeting leaders from other parties is not a crime in politics.

Shiv Sena and BJP, which contested the 2019 state assembly elections as allies, fell out over power sharing formula, with the Uddhav Thackeray-led party said it was not ready to accept "less than what was agreed" with the BJP.

The Sena formed the government in November last year with the Nationalist Congress Party and Congress as the new alliance partners.

The two-hour-long meeting between Fadnavis and Raut was the first one between leaders of both the parties after the acrimonious post-poll break-up after last year.

Leader of Opposition in the Legislative Council Pravin Darekar said Fadnavis and Raut met to discuss the interview.

"Raut had sought Fadnavis' appointment for an interview for Saamana. Fadnavis wanted the interview to be published unedited and both met to discuss the framework," he said.

Raut has interviewed NCP chief Sharad Pawar for Saamana, besides Bal Thackeray and Uddhav Thackeray.

Darekar also told a TV channel that "anything can happen in politics", while Union minister Raosaheb Danve said such meetings were expected in future too.

Former state BJP minister Sudhir Mungantiwar said BJP and Sena have drifted apart and no politics should be seen in Saturday's meeting.

Danve said, "BJP is currently playing a strong role as opposition in the state. We are not trying to break any party in the state to form government in Maharashtra."

Mungantiwar said, "Any such decision of government formation has not been discussed in the state core committee, hence the possibility of joining hands with Shiv Sena to form a government in Maharashtra is out of question."

He referred to Fadnavis forming a government by joining hands with NCP leader Ajit Pawar in November last year, where the BJP leader had to resign in three days as Ajit Pawar could not garner necessary number of MLAs.

"BJP workers strongly objected to that attempt and have maintained that party leaders should be taken into confidence henceforth ahead of any such political moves," Mungantiwar said.
Twice on Thursday, Senator Lindsey Graham pleaded with Fox News viewers to help save his campaign for reelection. First on Fox & Friends then later on Hannity, the sitting Republican senator from South Carolina complained that he had been massively out-fundraised by his Democratic rival.

In tones that The Washington Post called weepy, Graham plead with Hannitys viewers: Im getting overwhelmed. Help me. Theyare killing me money-wise. Help me. You did last week. Help me again.

Hannity quickly threw to commercial.

Hahaha @LindseyGrahamSC is on hannity BEGGING for help! gY pic.twitter.com/oIjQ2DpRlZ  Angela Melini (@angelamelini) September 25, 2020

Grahams Democratic opponent, Jaime Harrison, soon tweeted the clip from Fox & Friends.

Anybody else get the sense that @LindseyGrahamSC just realized he's going to lose on November 3rd? pic.twitter.com/tdLlkdkhI2  Jaime Harrison (@harrisonjaime) September 24, 2020

Then on Friday The Lincoln Project, a PAC run by a group of former and current Republicans working to defeat Donald Trump, unleashed an eviscerating ad mocking Graham and using his own words to fundraise for its cause.

Every single hour in South Carolina, Lindsey Graham is violently out-fundraised, the ad states, playing Sarah McLachlans song Angel over very extreme close-ups of Graham. The ad then continues, But you can help stop the suffering.

Story continues

McLachlans song may be familiar to viewers of CNN, where it is often featured in longform television commercials for the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

The ad ends with a phone number and promises: Pay now and youll get a picture of Lindsey Graham eating a hotdog.

After dialing the phone number callers hear an audio version of the ad and then a pitch to donate  not to Graham, but to The Lincoln Project.

Every single hour in South Carolina, Lindsey Graham is being violently out-fundraised.



But you can help stop the suffering. pic.twitter.com/9rDS5naJ4V  The Lincoln Project (@ProjectLincoln) September 25, 2020

After releasing the ad, The Lincoln Project then began posting gleeful voice messages from callers.

Thank you for your support. Every little bit helps. #SaveLindsey pic.twitter.com/9mAy0MdqBD  The Lincoln Project (@ProjectLincoln) September 25, 2020

It even retweeted a retweet from MSNBCs Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough.

Pay now and youll get a picture of Lindsey Graham eating a hotdog. https://t.co/9f9339kxpH  Joe Scarborough (@JoeNBC) September 26, 2020

Related: Jamie Harrison is taking on Lindsey Graham
Syracuse, N.Y. -- Thursday was the worst day so far in the Central New Yorks pandemic schooling experiment. Three school districts in Onondaga County reported positive Covid-19 cases.

Skaneateles shut down all of its school buildings, Fayetteville-Manlius closed two and Jamesville-DeWitt quarantined a class.

County Health Commissioner Dr. Indu Gupta is not alarmed. In an interview with Syracuse.com, she explains what it all means, including:

How many students have gotten the virus at school.

Are any students really sick?

Why schools are taking different approaches to any positive tests among teachers or students.

How many students and school employees have tested positive?

As of Thursday, there were 24 cases attributed to schools, Gupta says. Of those, 12 were remote learners who have not been in school buildings. The remaining 12 cases were students and staffers.

Of those 12 cases of students or teachers, none picked up the virus at school, Gupta says. The data so far shows that what schools are doing  social distancing and requiring masks  is working.

Are any of those 24 people seriously ill?

No. Some have mild symptoms and some cases are asymptomatic. That doesnt mean some child or adult could not become seriously ill, though, Gupta warned.

Why have the responses varied so widely in districts? Skaneateles shut down all of its school buildings, but Jamesville-DeWitt only quarantined one class?

A school district can decide to be more restrictive than what Gupta recommends, but not less. She has not told any district to shut down a physical school, or the entire district. She has only ordered quarantines of groups or classes.

How is the countys Covid-19 testing site at NBT Stadium for symptomatic students and teachers working?

Students and teachers with symptoms can call to make an appointment to be tested. If someone has a suspected Covid-19 case, they do not have to get tested there, though. Of the 350 people tested there so far, there have been no positives.

But Gupta said a negative test does not mean you can get out of an ordered quarantine. The virus can take between four and seven days after exposure to show up in a test.

What about those districts that are only requiring students to wear masks when they are not six feet apart? (Skaneateles and LaFayette are among those that are not requiring masks when kids are socially distant.)

Dont do this, Gupta says. Everyone should wear a mask at school, whether they are six feet apart or not.

It is fine to allow kids to take mask breaks for lunch and for a few minutes here and there. But other than that, masks should stay on.

A kid who often has a runny nose or allergies would technically have a Covid symptom, but should they be kept home or sent home?

The thing to be on the lookout for here is something that is a new symptom, Gupta said.

Is there a new, unexplained headache or cough? Congestion and a runny nose that is not ordinary? If the school nurse feels there are new symptoms that are consistent with Covid-19, then a child should be isolated and sent home, Gupta says. They need to have a negative Covid-19 test before they will be allowed to return to school.

Is there enough testing capacity?

Yes, Gupta says. The NBT testing site can take 90 people a day. That requires an appointment. There is also drop-in testing at Syracuse Community Health Center. Many primary care doctors and urgent care facilities also offer tests.

Should we expect more cases?

Yes. We are still in a pandemic. The virus is where ever we are, Gupta says. The only way to keep the number of cases down is to be vigilant about wearing masks, washing hands, social distancing and staying home if you feel sick.

MORE STORIES ON EDUCATING CNY

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Complete education coverage on syracuse.com

Marnie Eisenstadt writes about education, public affairs and the Syracuse City School District. Contact her anytime email | Twitter| Facebook | 315-470-2246
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Scientists advising the Government on coronavirus considered a plan to ask everyone over the age of 45 to shield.

It was suggested those over 45 were at greater risk from the virus, and more likely to die from it, so could be segmented from the rest of the population. The suggestion, revealed in papers from the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE), was eventually advised against, as it was considered unlikely to be successful.

However, it is being kept under review, and news of it follows a similar option drawn up by officials to potentially target over-50s with another lockdown.

The minutes of the 48th meeting of the Sage scientists, held on July 23, state: Although under-45s are at less risk from Covid-19, including lower risk of death, they are nonetheless at some risk and long-term sequelae (consequences) are not well understood.

The document adds: Around two-thirds of people in the UK live in a household which includes one or more individuals aged 45 and above. Any segmentation based on this age threshold would therefore affect most households.

The segmentation looked at would have involved those over 45 shielding, which early in the pandemic meant staying at home, and avoiding unnecessary contact with others.

Yesterday saw another 6,874 Covid-19 cases recorded, meaning the seven-day rolling average is 54 per cent higher than it was a week ago. MailOnline analysis shows this is the sixth consecutive day the average compared to the week before has risen

Britain's coronavirus R rate could now be as high as 1.5, government scientific advisers warned on Friday after rises in all regions of the country

Minutes from July 16 note there is likely to be 'merit' in segmenting society by age, particularly 'to vulnerable people and those likely to have more contact with vulnerable people'.

It continues: 'Data shows that people tend to have more contacts with others around their own age, but also have a significant number of contacts with those 20-30 years older and younger than themselves (likely to mainly be contacts between parents and children).

'There are also significant levels of contact between grandparents and children.'

Figures reveal that children and those aged below 45 are at far lower risk of dying from coronavirus than those aged over 75.

Office for National Statistics data reveals only four Covid-19 deaths were recorded in children aged one to 14 years old in England and Wales, or less than 0.01 per cent of the total. And 574 have been recorded in those aged 15 to 44, or 0.96 per cent of the total.

In comparison, 39,058 people aged 75 and over have died from the virus, or 65 per cent of the total.

WHAT ARE THE SYMPTOMS OF LONG COVID AND HOW BAD IS THE PROBLEM? Covid-19 is described as a short-term illness caused by infection with the novel SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. Public health officials tend to say people will recover within two weeks or so. However it's become increasingly clear that this is not the case for everyone, and that the two-week period is only the 'acute illness' phase. The North Bristol NHS Trust's Discover project, which is studying the longer-term effects of coronavirus, is just one of a handful of studies to have shown the long impact of Covid-19. However it only studied hospital patients. A total of 163 patients with coronavirus were recruited to the study. Nineteen of those died. The remainder were invited for a three-month check-up and 110 attended. Most (74 per cent) had at least one persistent symptom after twelve weeks. The most common were: Excessive fatigue: 39%

Breathlessness: 39%

Insomnia: 24%

Muscle pain: 23%

Chest pain: 13%

Cough: 12%

Loss of smell: 12%

Headache, fever, joint pain and diarrhoea: Each less than 10% Patients who had suffered more severe Covid-19 reported more symptoms on their follow-up. Other long term symptoms that have been reported by Covid-19 survivors, both suspected and confirmed, anecdotally, include: Hearing problems

'Brain fog'

Memory loss

A lack of concentration

Mental health problems

Hair loss The impact of long Covid on people who had mild illness have not been studied in depth yet. Data from the King's College London symptom tracking app shows that up to 500,000 people in the UK are currently suffering from the long-term effects of Covid-19. That's according to the founder of the Long Covid Support Group, Claire Hastie, who said the lasting effects of Covid-19 had left her wheelchair-bound after being diagnosed in March. A survey recently found a third of British doctors have treated patients with long term Covid-19 symptoms, including chronic fatigue and anosmia. Advertisement

The difference led a scientific paper published in Nature in July to conclude that those aged 80 and over are more than a hundred times more likely to die from the virus than patients aged 40 and below.

Despite the gap in risk of death, however, there have been warnings over long Covid, or where symptoms persist after the disease subsides, which could already affect more than 60,000 people in the UK.

On Wednesday MPs called on the Government to address this problem, and admit that it exists, stating they had heard moving statements from those who had recovered but still suffered from fatigue, heart palpitations and breathing difficulties.

Layla Moran, chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on coronavirus said Westminster must commit further resources to investigating and tackling the problem.

Writing in the British Medical Journal, she said as the number of people suffering long Covid increases the situation will become 'more and more urgent'.

'In August, we heard from people living with long Covid and hundreds more sufferers admitted written evidence to our inquiry.

'Their testimonials were incredibly moving and concerning. What was clear was that we needed to make some urgent recommendations to the Prime Minister; the health, wellbeing and employment arrangements for those living with long Covid remain unaddressed.

'And as the number of people with long Covid grows, the situation gets more and more urgent.'

One of the victims was Claire Hastie, who is the founder of the Long Covid Support Group on Facebook.

She described how she used to cycle 13 miles to work but since her Covid-19 diagnosis in March, can no longer walk 13 metres and is now largely confined to a wheelchair with her children providing much of her care.

Dr Jake Suett, a staff grade doctor in anaesthetics and intensive care medicine who also suffers from long Covid, said that since catching the disease he has no longer being able to do 12-hour shifts in intensive care.

'And now a flight of stairs or the food shop is about what I can manage before I have to stop... if I'm on my feet then shortness of breath comes back, chest pain comes back.'

SAGE minutes have also revealed that the group considered a 'segmentation and protection strategy', where vulnerable parts of society are placed into lockdown to avoid a surge in deaths from the disease.

The strategy, presented to the group by Professor Mark Whoolhouse, from the University of Edinburgh, would use an algorithm to identify those most at risk by accounting for age, ethnicity and health conditions.

They would be placed into lockdown, where they are trusted to avoid high risk locations and interactions, alongside a designated carer. This would allow parts of society, such as those who are healthy and of working age, to continue to contribute to the economy.

But SAGE did not advise that the Government follows this strategy, citing ethical concerns. Professor Woolhouse wrote: 'Segmentation and protection raises ethical questions as some measures are targeted at subsets of the population.

'However, lockdown also raises ethical questions as the benefits are felt mainly by those same subsets of the population. It needs to be understood that there are no easy options available.'

The UK recorded a further 6,874 cases of coronavirus yesterday, as the outbreak continues to gather speed.

As cases mount, new lockdown measures have been announced for Leeds, Wigan, Stockport and Blackpool in England, and Llanelli, Cardiff and Swansea in Wales.

When the rules come in to force as many as 17million people in the UK will be living under tightened coronavirus restrictions.

Friday saw another 6,874 Covid-19 cases recorded, meaning the seven-day rolling average is 54 per cent higher than it was a week ago. MailOnline analysis shows this is the sixth consecutive day the average compared to the week before has risen

SAGE said up to two-thirds of the UK lives in mixed-age households, making the plan unworkable. Above are students enjoying a night out in Birmingham yesterday
The global death toll from COVID-19 could double to 20 lakh before a successful vaccine is widely used and could be even higher without concerted action to curb the pandemic, an official at the World Health Organization (WHO) said on September 25. "Unless we do it all, (2 million deaths) ... is not only imaginable, but sadly very likely," Mike Ryan, head of the U.N. agency's emergencies program, told a briefing on Friday.

The number of deaths about nine months since the novel coronavirus was discovered in China is nearing 10 lakh. "We are not out of the woods anywhere, we are not out of the woods in Africa," Ryan said. He said young people should not be blamed for a recent increase in infections despite growing concerns that they are driving its spread after restrictions and lockdowns were eased around the world.

"I really hope we don't get into finger wagging: it's all because of the youth," said Ryan. "The last thing a young person needs is an old person pontificating and wagging the finger." Rather, indoor gatherings of people of all ages were driving the epidemic, he said.

The WHO is continuing talks with China about its possible involvement in the COVAX financing scheme designed to guarantee fast and equitable access globally to COVID-19 vaccines, a week after the deadline for committing passed. "We're in discussions with China about the role they may play as we go forward," said Bruce Aylward, WHO senior adviser and head of the ACT-Accelerator program to back vaccines, treatments and diagnostics against COVID-19.

He confirmed that Taiwan has signed up to the scheme, even though it is not a WHO member, bringing the total to 159 participants. Some 34 are still deciding. Talks with China also include discussion of the world's second-largest economy potentially supplying vaccines to the scheme, he said.

The U.N. agency published on Friday draft criteria for the assessment of emergency use of COVID-19 vaccines to help guide drugmakers as vaccine trials reach advanced stages, said WHO assistant director-general, Mariangela Simao. The document will be available for public comment until Oct. 8, she said.

Earlier on Friday, a Chinese health official said the WHO had given its support for the country to start administering experimental coronavirus vaccines to people even while clinical trials were still underway.

Also read: COVID-19 vaccine: China claims WHO gave support, understanding for emergency use programme

Also read: France won't buy COVID-19 vaccines through WHO's COVAX initiative
Boeing's grounded 737 MAX could receive regulatory approval to resume flying in November and enter service by the end of the year, Europe's chief aviation safety regulator said on Friday. "For the first time in a year and a half I can say there's an end in sight to work on the MAX," said Patrick Ky, executive director of the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA).

EASA expects to lift its technical ban "not long" after the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), probably in November, but national operational clearances needed for individual airlines to resume flying in Europe could take longer, he said. "We are looking at November," he said when asked when the technical ban would be lifted. China is expected to take longer to give its own approval, he said, without elaborating.

Boeing shares were up 3.8% in afternoon trading, against a fractionally higher market. Cologne-based EASA, which regulates air safety in 32 mainly European Union countries, has locked horns with the FAA and Boeing over the scope of an international review into 737 MAX systems following two fatal crashes in 2018 and 2019.

All but one of the differences has been resolved, Ky said, with EASA, supported by regulator Transport Canada and some unions, calling for pilots to be able to manually cut power to a "stick shaker" alarm system suspected of distracting Lion Air and Ethiopian Airlines crew.

A spokeswoman for Canada's transport minister said Ottawa would "not hesitate to apply additional training measures and practices as a condition" for its validation. The main focus of the review has surrounded black-box evidence that bad data from a single faulty flight-angle sensor triggered a cockpit software system that repeatedly pointed the aircraft's nose down and overwhelmed the crew on both flights.

Boeing has said inputs from both "angle of attack" sensors on the MAX will be used in the modified aircraft, instead of just one in the past, but EASA has called for a third "synthetic" sensor to provide independently computed data. Ky said Boeing had agreed to install the computerised third-sensor system on the next version of the plane, the 230-seat 737 MAX 10, followed by retrofits on the rest of the fleet later.

Boeing declined detailed comment on the additional sensor. "We are committed to addressing all of the regulators' questions and meeting all certification and regulatory requirements," a spokesman said

Turning to Boeing's next development, Ky warned EASA would examine the 400-seat 777X development "much more closely" than it would have done if the MAX grounding had not happened and pay particularly close attention to flight control systems. The MAX crisis has shaken a system of co-operation between regulators and thrown into question the practice of routinely accepting decisions by the lead regulator, in this case the FAA.

EASA and the FAA - the world's largest aviation regulators - will continue to recognise each other as the leader when certifying aircraft built in their respective countries, but are expected to get more involved in checking each other's homework.
In yet another massive embarrassment to CPM state secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan, and also the ruling LDF, the Enforcement Directorate in Kochi has slapped a case against Kodeyeri's son Bineesh Kodiyeri. The case has been registered under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act.

The Assistant Director of ED has written a letter to the registration department on September 11 seeking information regarding the properties and assets owned by Bineesh. The letter also directed the Registration Department that no properties of Bineesh be transacted without informing the ED authorities. It is also reported that Bineesh is suspected to have committed the offence as per section16,17,18 of the UAPA Act.

READ | Sandalwood drugs case: Ex-cricketer NC Aiyappa questioned by CCB division, denies links

Earlier, on September 9, the Enforcement Directorate had interrogated Bineesh for 11 hours. The probe team suspected that he has companies under his Benamis and that the Thiruvananthapuram-headquartered UAFX Solutions Private Limited is one among them. A report also alleges that he is the director of a visa stamping company which is related to the gold smuggling case and that Bineesh has received profits through it.

Muslim Youth League state general secretary P K Firoz had, in a press meet alleged that Bineesh also has close connections with the drugs smuggling gang. Mohammed Anoop, who was caught by the central crime branch in the Bengaluru drug case had also been in the public domain.

READ | Sandalwood Drug Racket Live Updates: Hunt for Aditya Alva on; CCB nabs another peddler

"I started a restaurant in 2015. Bineesh was the one who provided the financial assistance for the restaurant. I sold the restaurant to another group in 2018 due to a crisis," Anoop had stated.

Responding to it, Bineesh said that he knew Anoop for 7 years and has financially helped him but he is unaware of his drugs link.

"I have had financial dealings with him. I gave him Rs 6 lakh for a hotel business. He had called me two days before his arrest saying he did not have money to come home. So, I gave him Rs 15,000. I did not know he was a drug dealer," Bineesh had said.

READ | Sandalwood drug case: Bengaluru police arrests drug peddler; seizes Ecstacy, hash & MDMA

Bineesh and his past

Bineesh has been in the centre of controversy earlier as well. In 2019, a Dubai Court had sentenced Bineesh to two months imprisonment in connection with the non-repayment of a loan of Rs 2 lakhs Dirhams the Dubai branch of a Saudi-based finance company.

In 2018, BJP senior leader AN Radhakrishnan had disclosed some documents that exposed unscrupulous financial dealing of him. He had alleged that 28 companies, in which the Bineesh and his elder brother Binoy, have a partnership, are operating in a building at Sasthamangalam in Thiruvananthapuram. "Most of the companies started operations in 2008 when their father Kodiyeri was the Minister for Tourism," he had alleged.

READ | Sandalwood drug racket: Arrested drug peddler names CPM state secy's son Bineesh Kodiyeri
Woman beheaded in India for refusing to convert to Islam after marriage

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A Muslim man in northern India beheaded his Hindu wife one-and-a-half months after their marriage because she refused to convert to Islam, a local newspaper reported.

Police this week found the beheaded body of the 23-year-old victim, identified as Priya Soni, in a forest area near Preet Nagar area of Sonbhadra district in the state of Uttar Pradesh, according to The Tribune.

The suspect, Sonis husband who was identified as Ejaz Ahmed, and his friend, identified only as Shoaib, have been arrested. Police said they recovered the mobile phone of the victim, a knife and an iron rod from the suspects.

The districts police chief, Ashish Srivastava, was quoted as saying that officers used social media to identify the womans body. Her father, Laxminarayan, identified her from her shoes and clothes.

Priya married Ahmed against the wishes of the family and was being pressured to convert to Islam, police said, adding that they were considering charging the accused under the stringent National Security Act.

While religion is a sensitive issue in India, such incidents are rare in the country, where Hindus constitute about 80% of the population of more than 1.3 billion people. India also has the worlds third-largest Muslim population  after Indonesia and Pakistan.

The Uttar Pradesh state and the federal government are both governed by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, which, critics say, persecutes the minority communities of Muslims and Christians.

In a seemingly targeted spate of violence in February, at least 53 people, mostly from the Muslim minority, were killed in northeast Delhi. The violence came after months of protests in several Indian cities against a recent controversial citizenship law that excluded Muslims.

In July, a 25-year-old woman, Suman Munda, who had recently converted to Christianity, was brutally murdered in the eastern state of Jharkhand by four youths associated with a Hindu nationalist group, marking the fifth religiously motivated killing of a Christian in the country in less than two months.

A local pastor told the U.S.-based Christian persecution watchdog International Christian Concern that Munda converted to Christianity six years earlier. After learning of her conversion, Hindu nationalists started harassing her. When relatives visited Mundas house they could not find her, they later discovered her body at a deserted place near her home.

I suspect that it is the handiwork of a Hindu fanatic group. Christians here have been facing a serious threat from it. The fanatic group is asking us to go back to Hinduism. We are scared and our people are shattered, Bishop Binay Kandulna of Khunti told UCA News at the time.

According to the bipartisan U.S. government advisory body, U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, the religious intolerance and violence in India rose with the growth of Hindu nationalism under the Bharatiya Janata Party government.

Muslims and Christians have had cordial relations in India.
New Delhi: Well-known economist and Padma Bhushan awardee Isher Judge Ahluwalia died on Saturday after battling brain cancer for nearly a year.

She was married to Montek Singh Ahluwalia, a former Deputy Chairperson of the Planning Commission. She would have turned 75 on October 1. The couple had two sons -- Pavan and Aman.

Isher Ahluwalia was Chairperson of the think-tank Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER) for 15 years and had stepped down last month due to ill health.

She had wide experience in the fields of economic growth, productivity, industrial and trade policy reforms, and urban planning and development.

At ICRIER, Isher Ahluwalia led a major research and capacity building programme on the challenges of urbanisation in India. In 2009, she was awarded Padma Bhushan by the President for her services in the field of education and literature.

Punjab Chief Minister Amrinder Singh said Isher Ahluwalia was one of India's most distinguished economists "We had the privilege of having her as Vice-Chairman of State Planning Board in my last term."

Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, Chairperson and Managing Director of Biocon, tweeted: "Isher Ahluwalia, my dear dear friend and a brilliant remarkable intellectual economist, passed away after a brave battle with cancer. My deepest condolences to Montek Singh Ahluwalia and his sons Pavan and Aman in the family."

This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text. Only the headline has been changed.

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Wicklow County Council has voted to restore the Local Property Tax in the county to its base level. (stock image)

Wicklow County Council voted to restore the Local Property Tax (LPT) in the county to its base level after increasing it by ten per cent last year.

Council officials recommended continuing with last year's ten per cent increase mainly due to events caused by Covid-19. The council has experienced a considerable drop in income due to a loss of parking fees, planning fees and commercial rates during the height of the pandemic.

However, some Councillors argued that they had provided a commitment to constituents that last year's rise in the property tax would only last a year.

Brian Gleeson, Head of Finance, advised the elected members that if maintained as is, the LPT would provide for 13.7 million in next year's budget. However, 1.7 million in revenue would be lost and would have to be found elsewhere if last year's rate wasn't maintained.

Members were also critical of the Government's failure to include any new builds since 2013 within the LPT parameters, as was promised last year.

Cllr Gerry Walsh said: 'Every year we express dissatisfaction with the whole process. Councillors are being asked to prop up a flawed system. Our base is the 23rd lowest in the country and is outdated and needs changing. Structural changes are needed to address the unevenness of the LPT. New developments built since 2013 still haven't been brought into the net, which is causing this council to lose out on 1.5 million, yet we are being asked to subsidise other counties.'

Cllr John Mullen felt new builds since 2013 should have been included. He said: 'This tax hasn't been paid on any property built since 2013. It is now 2020. There has been successive failures by the Department and the Government to address this inequality.'

Cllr Tom Fortune favoured a 15 per cent decrease.

'I am disgusted on behalf of the residents of this county and I want a 15 per cent decrease due to the difficulties they find themselves in. You have pensioners who have raised their families and are having to pay for their home when they can't afford heat or basic maintenance. Measures for Covid should not be coming out of the council budget. This LPT was imposed on us by national Government and was brought in on the premise of a lie.'

Cllr Derek Mitchell said he wouldn't be supportive of maintaining the 10 per cent increase introduced last year.

'The simplest principal of property tax is too support local services for the areas the houses are in. The people of Greystones pay the most property tax in the county, yet every other area has three times the amount of staff.'

Cllr Aoife Flynn Kennedy said she wouldn't be supporting any potential LPT increase.

'The people in the places I represent are really struggling. They are out of work and are experiencing additional expenses. Mental health is also a huge problem. I won't support any increase.'

Cllr Dermot O'Brien felt it was clear from the submissions received from the public that there wasn't much support for an LPT increase, with 67 per cent of submissions asking for a reduction, 31 per cent asking for no change, and only two per cent favouring an increase.

He said: 'This is a case of flogging a dead horse. Some of the people have to pay up, and some don't. There are 5,000 who don't pay anything and are happy enough to stay under the radar. To increase the LPT would be doubling down on the people already impacted by Covid. This really is a case of trying to squeeze the last bit of blood from a dead horse.'

Cllr Shay Cullen described the whole LPT system as 'flawed' and accused the Government and Department of lacking leadership regarding the tax.

'You have over 4,000 people who don't pay the property tax, but unfortunately the rest of us are expected to pay for those not yet in the net. There is almost 3.5 million going to other counties to cover their shortfall. It's unfair in any walk of life. On the other side, the onus is on us not to cut services and to provide facilities for the people of Wicklow. I would be reluctant to see an increase but we have to maintain services as much as possible.'

Cllr Mary Kavanagh said: 'We give away 20 per cent of what is collected. No account is taken over the ability of people to pay. You can ask for a deferral but to get it you have to be earning 15,000 as a single person or 25,000 as a couple. People can barely keep their heads above water, but they still have to play property tax. How is that fair?'

Cllr Paul O'Brien pointed out that after Dublin City Council voted to reduce their LPT by 10 per cent, they had to make two attempts to pass the budget and were forced to raise parking charges and other fees.

Cllr Vincent Blake had concerns that certain projects may end up sacrificed due to lack of funding if the LPT was reduced.

'What will the implications be? I see money being spent well in terms of distributing a spread across the county, and grants achieved by the council have had good results in rural areas. We have a responsibility to provide the services to the people we represent.

Cllr Joe Behan said he admired members of the Government parties who had shown they could 'think for themselves' having indicated that they would not be following the Chief Executive's recommendation to maintain last year's ten per cent increase .

'The Government comprises of three parties - Fine Gael, Fianna Fail and the Greens. Members of Fianna Fail and Fine Gael in this chamber have expressed concerns over the LPT. Yet this Government is insisting on just letting this go on for another year, without addressing the inequalities. The more money we take from the people, the more money we have to send to other parts of the country.'

Cllr Gerry O'Neill suggested scrapping Special Policy Committee (SPC) meetings as a way for freeing up extra revenue.

'We need to send out a signal today that we aren't going with the powers that be. The Government are asking people to dig further into their pockets when you have 160 over-paid TDs sitting in the Dail, as well as all the money spent on their various assistants. SPCS could also be abolished for the next five years to save money. They aren't that effective at the moment anyway.'

Cllr Patsy Glennon said rural Wicklow, and especially west Wicklow, was often left behind when it came to funding. He was also critical of Cllr Behan's remarks regarding Councillors from the Government parties and their disapproval of the LPT.

Cllr Glennon said: 'I found the comments very patronising. I can certainly think for myself and don't need a former party member speaking to me in such a condescending manner.'

Cllr Peir Leonard said: 'I can see the perspective of the county council and the people I represent on the ground. Arklow needs investment and people are struggling. I am shocked at the lack of best value that is being spent. I'd like to see more focus placed on more creative ways of making revenue. Arklow and other parts of the county need investment, but lets not increase the LPT.'

Cllr Avril Cronin said she already gave a commitment to her constituents that last year's increase would be for one year only.

'I can't turn around and say to people "sorry. I'm voting to put it up again." Families paying LPT are already the ones impacted by Covid.'

Cllr Mags Crean said: 'We are responding to a second economic crisis. In the previous recession, austerity measures were placed on ordinary households. My fear is that if we increase the LPT, we will be adding to that struggle, and like the last recession, the ordinary people are being asked to bear the burden.'

Cllr Anne Ferris felt 'let down' by Central Government.

She said: 'Successive Governments have taken the cowardly route. A lot of people are living in quite large houses, but have raised their families and are just trying to keep their heads above water. People have lost their jobs or don't know if their work premises will reopen. There are also huge mental health issues. In my view, we can't break our word to the people.'

Cllr Lourda Scott was in agreement that the LPT wasn't fit for purpose.

'Lots of new homes have been built since 2013, with some selling for up to 1 million. Yet those properties are exempt. It's not fair to go back and ask the same people to bear the burden again.'

Cllr Sylvester Bourke was concerned that Wicklow could be penalised regarding additional Government funding should a decision be made to reduce the LPT.

Cllr Irene Winters said: 'We gave an undertaking last year and did so in the understanding that it would be for one year only. It's wrong that over 4,000 people don't pay. We are being asked to subsidise for people outside of the net due to a lack of responsibility on behalf of the Government.'

Cllr Pat Fitzgerald proposed reducing the basic rate by ten per cent to bring it back to the level it had been at before last year's vote.

Twenty-four Councillors voted in favour, seven against and one abstained. Since the vote was passed, separate proposals from Councillors Dermot O'Brien and Fortune to reduce the LPT by a greater amount weren't put to the vote.
In Ukraine, as of Saturday morning, the largest number of new cases of coronavirus disease COVID-19 was recorded per day - 3,833 cases, with 1,740 people reported as recovered, 76 deaths, according to data published on the website of the coronavirus monitoring system of the Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council (NSDC).

A day earlier, on September 25, some 3,565 coronavirus infections were reported, there were 3,372 new cases of infection on September 24, there were 3,497 new cases on September 23, and on September 22, some 2,884 new cases were recorded.

The number of infected people since the beginning of the pandemic was 195,504 on Saturday morning, 3,903 people have died since the beginning of the pandemic from COVID-19, and 86,873 people have recovered.

Now, 104,728 people are currently sick with COVID-19, which is 2,017 people more than the day before.

The largest number of detected cases of COVID-19 over the past day was recorded in Kyiv (447), Kharkiv (380), Ternopil (284), Odesa (264), Dnipropetrovsk (201) regions.

In addition, 4,131 suspicions of COVID-19 disease have been recorded in Ukraine as a whole over the past day.
HOW delighted was I to get a call from Blathnaid Treacy, one of the stars of RTE, to be part of a new series!

Wardrobe Raiders will appear as part of the RTE Today Show. It will see Blathnaid going around the country to peoples homes offering us a sneak peek inside their wardrobes. And we get to hear them talking about their favourite items of clothing.

Of course I love nothing better than chatting about clothes so I certainly had plenty to talk to Blathnaid about in relation to my own wardrobe.

I recalled the outfit I wore when I was grand marshall in the St Patricks Day parade as well as revealing some of my favourite evening wear, including pieces designed by my great friend John McNamara.

The Today Show returned to our screens on September 21 and you may have heard that they have a new presenter, the gorgeous Sinead Kennedy.

It is one of the most popular daytimes shows in the country and I was delighted again to be in Dublin at Clontarf Castle to film one of the fashion segments for Oxendales new A/W fashion collection. I hadnt been to Clontarf Castle in years. I think the last time I was there was for a shoot with the late Richard Lewis.

Again, I bumped into Blathnaid there as she is now also presenting the fashion segments for The Today Show. So there will be fashion, cookery, news and much much more, so make sure you tune in and enjoy.

Celia xx
Children wearing protective face masks as they attend preschool classes in Singapore on 2 June, 2020. (PHOTO: Reuters)

SINGAPORE  Kelly Tan is aware that her two daughters aged two and four will soon be exempted from wearing masks in public, but the self-employed mother wants to ensure that the girls continue to be masked up before they step out of their house.

On Wednesday (23 September), the Singapore authorities said they will raise the legal age for children to wear masks in public  part of COVID-19 preventive measures here  from two to six years old and above.

It is safer for everybody, be it them catching any viruses from others or them spreading it. It may not be a 100 per cent foolproof method but at least some precautionary measures are taken which reduce the risk, Tan said.

The 38-year-old mothers views were echoed by other parents that Yahoo New Singapore spoke to.

The change in policy by the Ministry of Health (MOH) comes after the World Health Organisation (WHO) and United Nations International Childrens Emergency Fund (Unicef) recently issued their guidance that children below the age of six may not have the coordination necessary for the proper use of masks.

Therefore, consistent adult supervision is recommended to ensure the appropriate and safe use of masks by these young children, the global organisations advised.

Previously, only children below two years old need not wear face masks in public. However, the authorities said they will continue to strongly encourage young children to wear a mask or a face shield, especially if they are in a group setting, such as in a preschool, or when they are in social activities interacting with other kids.

Parents said they will continue to take extra precautions and closely supervise their young children when they are wearing masks or face shields.

To ensure the fit is correct, Tan said she and her husband constantly check on the masks worn by their daughters and make adjustments if necessary. When their masks become damp from prolonged usage, they would be replaced with new ones immediately, she added.

Story continues

Ng Pei Ru, a mother of a girl and a boy, said wearing masks is not just about protecting children from COVID-19.

The good habit practised by her daughter, who is turning four next month, can also help prevent other viruses, such as those causing the cold and hand, foot, and mouth disease, from spreading in a preschool.

A mask is particularly useful when it is tough to ensure that young children keep to a safe distance from one another, the 33-year-old public relations account director said.

I will ensure that she also doesn't wear it for too long a period and an adult  either parents or teachers  is always around her when she is wearing it, she added.

As for her son, who is turning two in November, he is not as receptive to wearing masks due to his young age, Ng said. Instead, she would continue to encourage him to put on a face shield as it is more comfortable for him.

He still pulls (the mask) off as he doesn't quite understand. However, I will want to at least get him to put on a face shield.

Despite the revised guidelines, Tan and Ng said they would only allow their children to take their masks off outdoors when they are in less crowded locations.

Their children have gotten used to wearing masks after using them for a number of months and seeing adults, as well as their peers, masked up.

We also made it (wearing of masks) a rule in order for them to be able to step out of the house, said Tan.

Ng noted that her daughter reminds her and her husband to put their masks back on after a meal outdoors and before the family leaves their car.

Adeline Ang, 44, who has two daughters aged four and nine, said mask-wearing is a personal hygiene guideline for her children and she wants them to observe it consistently.

Otherwise, it might also (cause) conflict when the older one sees the younger one not wearing and decides not to wear, she said.

Stay in the know on-the-go: Join Yahoo Singapore's Telegram channel at http://t.me/YahooSingapore

More Singapore stories:

COVID-19: Singapore confirms 20 new cases, 1 in the community

FAQ: what you need to know about going back to workplace from 28 Sept

COVID-19: Migrant workers may now be quarantined by levels instead of entire blocks
TDT | Manama

The mobile monitoring system launched to detect municipal violations here has identified 2,386 violations during the period from January to September, a top works ministry official said. The number translates to as a staggering 80 per cent increase in violations from a year ago.

In the same period of 2019, the online system detected 1,322 violations, said Sheikh Muhammad bin Ahmed Al Khalifa, the Undersecretary for Municipal Affairs at the Ministry of Works, Municipalities Affairs and Urban Planning. The system which works using a single electronic portal provides an integrated database about violations allows inspectors to access them through an electronic portal and smart devices.

The digital system monitors and keeps track of violations of municipal laws regarding building regulation acts, laws allowing reconstruction, public road works, advertising, public-hygiene and housing laws. Road works related violations emerged at the top spot in the eight-month evaluation period, said the official.

Ramshackle real-estates, illegal constructions, buildings without a permit, advertisements past their expiry dates were the others. When it comes to Cleaning services Department, the Undersecretary said the majority of the violations were for leaving or placing discarded vehicles on streets, sidewalks, public squares and beaches.

Inspectors also booked people for dumping wastes in places other than designated for them and washing vehicles or similar actions turning public-places into swamps. Authorities, Sheikh Muhammad, said, also dealt with violations related to illegal street encroachments, illegal parking of vehicles with for sale or rent stickers in public places, cleanliness of public-places during the periodic followup.

Since the launch of the mobile monitoring system under the patronage of Sheikh Khalid bin Abdullah Al Khalifa, the Deputy Prime Minister and Chairman of the Ministerial Committee for Development Projects and Infrastructure, on January 19, 2020, the ministry has distributed 49 devices and provided the necessary training to employees on their usage.

The ministry has also created a specialised team to evaluate the system and solve technical issues that may arise. All of the municipalities in the Kingdom are currently using the mobile monitoring system to detected municipal violations. The new violation registration system constitutes a qualitative leap in rectifying violations by helping inspectors to retrieve all required information with ease at any time, said Sheikh Muhammad.
Left-wing television host Bill Maher has wasted no time in going the low road, branding President Trump's expected Supreme Court nominee, distinguished law professor and Seventh Circuit Appeals Court Justice, Amy Coney Barrett, as a 'f***ing nut.'

Well be saying this name a lot, Im sure, because shes a fing nut, he said. Religion. I was right about that one too, he continued. Amy Coney Barrett, Catholic. Really Catholic, I mean really, really Catholic. Like speaking in tongues. Like she doesnt believe in condoms which she has in common with Trump because he doesnt either. I remember that from Stormy Daniels. So shes gonna be on the court. RBGs laying in state. Trump visited RBGs casket. When he walked in, everybody went boooo. And of course all the ass kissers around Trump, they told him, No sir, theyre saying coup, coup,' Maher said. Its so funny but were losing our country.

Class was never his strong suit. And 'unhinged' is just a Tuesday for him.

But what he's doing is getting the ball rolling for the ongoing leftist narrative, that Amy Coney Barrett is a nut. With his sizable audience, he has a very big voice for for narrative-setting.

Pretty much all of the left is marching in lockstep to this narrative, bunching up to make Coney Barrett's faithful adherence to Roman Catholicism, the largest professed religius in the U.S., encompassing 21% of the population, into something that's purely for nuts. Be a Catholic, head for the margins of human society is the message. Polite people don't do Catholic. Don't let Amy get all those Catholic cooties on you. Funny how no one says that of an atheist or am Episcopalian...

It's disgusting.

It seems that for the left, they've got no boyfriends to throw sex harassment charges at her with, as they tried with Kavanaugh, and in any case, they've been to that well twice before. Therefore all they have to grasp at in the life of this spotless judge is making her Catholicism the issue.

Funny, they didn't seem to have this problem at the confirmation hearings of Sonia Sotomayor, Antonin Scalia, Sam Alito, Anthony Kennedy or even Brett Kavanaugh. It's just Barrett whose Catholicism is all of a sudden a problem.

"The dogma lives loudly within you," sneered Sen. Dianne Feinstein to Barrett a couple years earlier. Maher is far from the only one pushing this outrageous line of thinking. Here are a few headlines from around the press: Amy Coney Barrett: spotlight falls on secretive Catholic group People of Praise -The Guardian Notable & Quotable: Durbin to Amy Comey Barrett: Do You Consider Yourself an Orthodox Catholic? -WSJ Opinion pages ABC News suggests link between Christian group and 'The Handmaid's Tale' during Amy Coney Barrett report - Fox News, dated Sept. 25 As U.S. Supreme Court nomination looms, a religious community draws fresh interest -Reuters The bombshell consequences of Amy Coney Barrett --Ruth Marcus/Washington Post

Even the leftwing National Catholic Reporter thinks Catholicism is controversial:

Amy Coney Barrett, controversial Catholic, re-emerges as potential Supreme Court pick -Religion News Service/National Catholic Reporter

Which shows you how far things have gone downhill.

They've got nothing but good references, a sterling record, and fine character reports, That is why they've suddenly decided that Catholicism, and its 51 million adherents in the U.S., is reason enough to keep someone off the Supreme Court.

Image credit: Rachel Malehorn, via Wikimedia Commons // CC BY-SA 3.0
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Feminist icon: Artemisia in her 1623 portrait

Long before Vermeer painted his Girl With A Pearl Earring (portrayed by Scarlett Johansson in the Hollywood film of the same name) there was another woman famous for her shiny pearl earrings.

She was Artemisia Gentileschi, one of the worlds most celebrated female painters. When, at the height of her fame in the 1620s, she sat for her own portrait, she wore pearl drops that would become her signature bling.

Her talent will be evident when Artemisia, the first ever show of her work, opens at the National Gallery in London next Saturday with more than 30 of her paintings, many on view for the first time in Britain.

In a world dominated by the male genius of Michelangelo, Da Vinci and Raphael, Artemisia was a rarity. Born in Rome in 1593, she trained in the studio of her artist father, Orazio, before launching out on her own.

Rediscovered in recent years, she has become the poster girl of women painters. Brilliant and bold, her depictions of biblical heroines such as Judith and Susanna hang in all the worlds great collections.

She was never in doubt about her abilities, boasting in a letter of having the spirit of Caesar in the soul of a woman.

As the curator of the show, Letizia Treves, reminds us, Artemisia had to be fearless and feisty to survive in a mans world. She needed to be doubly fearless when, having been raped by an associate of her fathers, she endured a trial during which she was tortured with thumbscrews to test her veracity. The judge believed her. No wonder she has become a modern feminist icon.

And no one was more skilled at self-promotion than Artemisia as she touted her talents around Rome, Naples and Florence.

The Daily Mail's Deidre Fernand travelled to Tuscany to trace the roots of Artemisia. Pictured is Pisa Cathedral and the Tower

Artemisia is known for her depictions of biblical heroines. Pictured is Susanna and the Elders, 1610

So pinning her down to one city is tricky. I sought to do this in Tuscany, arriving shortly before lockdown.

After all, it was in Florence that she made her name. My trail began in Buonarroti House, once the home of one of her patrons, Michelangelo the Younger, and now a museum.

The great-nephew of the sculptor, he commissioned her to decorate part of his palazzo. Portraying herself as a heavenly muse, she adorns the ceiling of the grand salon.

She appears nude, save for wisps of gauze to protect her modesty. A perfect example of 17th-century product placement.

There is no such feminine delicacy in Judith And Holofernes, on view in the citys Uffizi gallery.

In this startling painting, the heroine wields a sword to hack off the tyrants head, an Old Testament example of girl power. Blood seems to seep from the canvas.

Stupendo, said an Italian woman beside me, lost in admiration.

So few of Artemisias paintings have survived that there is no danger of succumbing to get-me-outta-here museum madness. So once you have seen the handful of her works, plus a few Giottos and Botticellis, you can reward yourself with coffee and cake in the Uffizis cafe, the Bartolini.

Its terrace, in the shadow of Brunelleschis cathedral dome, offers one of the greatest views in the city. When Artemisia was working here, the cupola was already 200 years old, a true marvel.

She would also become a marvel acclaimed throughout Europe, feted by the Medicis and a friend of the astronomer Galileo, before dying of the plague in Naples around 1654.

My Artemisia adventure took me next to Pisa, from where her family could trace its roots. It is hard to understand why this small city on the Arno, just an hour from Florence by train, is so neglected.

Day-trippers who bus in to Instagram themselves against the Leaning Tower, then bus out again, dont know what they are missing.

After all, this is where the British love affair with Italy began, with travellers disembarking at the nearby port of Livorno to begin the Grand Tour. My hotel, the Royal Victoria, had hosted the Duke of Wellington, Charles Dickens and a slew of royalty besides.

Pisas wonky tower is only part of a medieval campus. Buy a combined ticket for 9 and you can visit the Romanesque cathedral next door and the Campo Santo cemetery. Then cross the square to the cathedral museum and climb to the cafe for another superb view. And as darkness falls, the city, home to more than 60,000 undergraduates, comes alive. Students have been carousing here since 1330 and in the bars around Piazza delle Vettovaglie, I stopped to sample some Tuscan reds and almost forgot the real reason I had come.

Next morning she was waiting for us across the river in a small gallery, Palazzo Blu.

She did not disappoint. Gazing out of her portrait painted by Simon Vouet in 1623, Artemisia holds her paintbrush aloft.

The spirit of Caesar in the soul of a woman, her confident beauty and the lustre of her pearl earrings staring out from the canvas. It was magnificent. Stupendo.
As she inched ahead in her rusty Chevy pickup, Brianna Lordz bemoaned that engine problems had prevented her from making it to the last few drive-up produce giveaways organized by a food pantry.

But Lordz managed to coax her old truck to a parking lot, where she waited behind dozens of other vehicles spread across four lanes and lined up at a semi-trailer stocked with 20-pound boxes of cabbage, onions, peppers, carrots and other veggies provided by the federal government. The giveaways are a godsend, she said, at a time when the coronavirus pandemic has caused jobs to dry up and grocery prices to soar.

This is amazing. This is something the government did, and lets talk about taking care of the people, she said. Everything about the COVID-19, its just a bad thing but you cant blame nobody for it.

Across the country, people like Lordz have picked up roughly 75 million food boxes this summer through the program overseen by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The effort began in the spring when efforts to slow the spread of the coronavirus caused food demand at restaurants and schools to plunge. That left farmers with little choice but to dispose of produce, meat and dairy products even as millions of people desperately turned to help from overwhelmed food banks.

The Farmers to Families Food Box Program was intended to help farmers, distributors and people who had lost their jobs. After a few hiccups, it has largely succeeded. The USDA recently added another $1 billion to the program this fall after already spending roughly $2.5 billion.

Anti-hunger advocates say that while they appreciate the delivery of fresh, high-quality food, many more people could be helped if the federal government would increase spending on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. Democrats in Congress have been seeking a 15% increase in funding for SNAP, the federal governments main anti-hunger program, which lets people buy food at grocery stores and provides an estimated nine meals for each one offered by the nations food banks.

So far, proposals to increase SNAP have failed, leaving food bank leaders cautioning that there is a limit to how many people they can help. They warn of problems ahead now that a $600 weekly federal jobless payment has expired and many states havent approved even $300 in extra payments. Across the country, more than 14.5 million people are collecting unemployment benefits, compared to 1.7 million a year ago.

Everyone sees were meeting the need and thinks maybe we dont have to come up with these other solutions, the nonprofit sector will take care of it, said Mutt Unger, CEO of a group that operates 14 pantries and mobile operations. But thats not what were meant to be. Were not supposed to be here in place of solving problems. Were a stopgap measure.

Feeding America, a Chicago-based network of more than 200 food banks, expects a 10 billion pound gap between demand and supply of food this year, made worse by the decline in unemployment benefits. Thats about double the gap the organization saw last year.

Increasing SNAP benefits is just the most efficient way we can make sure people have the food they need and reduce demand at food banks, said Kate Leone, Feeding Americas chief government relations officer. That kind of intervention is the only way to bend the demand curve down in a meaningful way.

Despite those concerns, officials at food banks said the federal food box program has undoubtedly helped.

Brian Barks, CEO of the Food Bank of the Heartland, said at times this summer, his food bank was giving away nearly twice as much food as normal, and the food box program accounted for roughly 20% of its supply.

Its been awesome, Barks said. The amount we have been receiving has been very, very helpful.

At the FIND Food Bank in California, the 2 million pounds of food being distributed monthly is roughly double the demand before the coronavirus pandemic struck. Since March, the food bank has distributed a total of 11.8 million pounds of food, and the food box program provided 2.7 million pounds of that, said Debbie Espinosa, president and CEO of the food bank.

Were very thankful the boxes came when they did because we needed the extra food support, Espinosa said.

The federal food box program initially faced questions because some of the companies that won contracts werent food distributors and the contracts didnt always cover the final delivery costs that food banks incurred.

Despite coming together quickly, Greg Ibach, the USDA undersecretary overseeing the effort, said its contractors delivered all or above 90% of the boxes that they had proposed to deliver.

Although food banks had to absorb the cost of delivering the prepackaged food boxes the program provided, they were able to use money they would have spent buying the produce and other products.

It was a bit of a scramble to get it going and get it out. But we were definitely very happy to have it, and we made it all work in the end, said Rachelle Mesheau with the Redwood Empire Food Bank.

The USDA is tweaking the program in the third round of bidding to try to address some of the concerns that have been raised.

The USDA definitely learned a lot from phase one and phase two, so in phase three they are really tightening up some aspects of it, said Robin Safley with Feeding Florida food banks.
Despite the administrations claims to upgrade the citys fire-fighting infrastructure, nothing concrete has been done in years.

Due to this apathy, firefighters continue to endanger their lives. In the past, many have sustained injuries while nine had died while dousing the flames in 2017.

Earlier in February, a city-level technical committee, a component of the smart city mission, had approved a project worth 25 crore to upgrade the fire brigade. Yet seven months later, the plan remains to be on paper only. Due to this, the ill-equipped firefighters are forced to brave the blazes without proper safety.

When quizzed, the authorities said the project was still at the tendering stage and the new equipment would take some time to reach.

As part of the infrastructure enhancement, the fire department is working to purchase hydraulic platform, water bowser, fire safety suits, life/heat detectors, advanced rescue tender, mini fire tender, multiple gas detectors, hydraulic combi tool, victim location camera with breaching system, quick response vehicle, inflatable lighting tower, portable fire pump and communication system at fire stations.

Even as high-rise structures have mushroomed in the city over the years and factory fires take place frequently, the department has functioned without hydraulic ladders, an essential part of the fire-fighting equipment. On top of this, the firefighters have to cover their faces with wet cloth to avoid asphyxiation as they dont have fire safety suits.

Every time we ask the authorities about the equipment, we are told that the department is working on the same and it would be provided soon. We do not even have fire safety suits to save ourselves. Apart from the equipment, the department also needs to conduct recruitment as the fire brigade is facing acute staff shortage, said a firefighter.

In October last year, a fireman had sustained injuries after the roof of a five-decade-old house collapsed due to a fire outbreak in the building near Neem Chowk in the old city area.

Four firefighters had suffered burn injuries while dousing a fire in Vijay Nagar here in 2017, while nine had lost their lives on the job at a plastic factory that collapsed in November 2017. Total 16 people had died in the plastic unit blaze.

Previously, chief minister Capt Amarinder Singh and former local bodies minister Navjot Singh Sidhu had made tall claims about upgrading the fire services, but to no avail.

Municipal commissioner, Pardeep Sabharwal said, The project to upgrade the fire brigade was part of the agenda tabled in the meeting of the city-level technical committee held last week. While tenders have been floated for procurement of new equipment, there are a few items for which we need approval from the state level committee. The fire brigade would be upgraded soon.

As many as 333 fire incidents were reported in 2019, 394 in 2018, 324 in 2017, 860 in 2016, 281 in 2015 and 580 in 2014. The maximum number of fires (1,098) was reported in the year 2010, as per the data available since 2004. This year, over 135 fire incidents have been reported in the city so far.
By Alexandra Tempus, FairWarning.org

As genetic testing companies increasingly pivot to medical and pharmaceutical ventures, a regulatory gap in consumer privacy protections is drawing calls for change and even legislative proposals.

At-home DNA test kits from companies like 23andMe and Ancestry have enabled customers to trace their heritage and piece together family trees. A lack of strict data privacy protections has allowed these companies to rack up hundreds of millions in revenue through the collection of DNA samples and sales of genetic data, all with the consent of customers who may not have read the fine print.

As it stands, there is no comprehensive federal privacy law in the U.S. Other laws, including HIPPA and the Genetic Information Discrimination Act, only keep genetic information off-limits to certain types of insurers and employers. Further, the agency that is supposed to enforce privacy rules by DNA testing companies, the Federal Trade Commission, has limited authority.

Exposed genetic information poses risks from the mundane to the extreme, experts say. Long-term care, disability and life insurers, for example, can still legally inflate their rates based on a customers predisposition to adverse health conditions. And if a person takes a DNA test, the information could be used to profile unsuspecting relatives as well.

Some have warned of more dire consequences. One DNA data security startup, Geneinfosecwhich counts former U.S. assistant secretary of defense Andrew C. Weber among its advisorsclaims that someones DNA profile could be used as blackmail, or even to create bioweapons that target specific people. In 2019, Pentagon officials advised military troops to avoid taking consumer DNA tests because they could, create unintended security consequences and increased risk to the joint force and mission.

In 2018, the nonprofit Future of Privacy Forum issued a set of voluntary privacy best practices, with several large DNA test companies signing on, including Ancestry and 23andMe. The guidelines aimed to increase transparency, provide consumer choices and ensure protection. But the genetic testing landscape has transformed since then, said Rachele Hendricks-Sturrup, the forums health policy counsel.

The best practices that are in front of us here today, theyre great, but as these companies begin to engage more in health care, should there be additional consideration? Hendricks-Sturrup asked, adding that some may feel more protective of personal health information than details about their heritage.

Earlier this year, private equity giant Blackstone acquired Ancestry.com for $4.7 billion, raising speculation about what Blackstone was up to. In a statement to FairWarning, Ancestry was unequivocal: Blackstone will not have access to Ancestry customer data, nor will any of their portfolio companies. But in the acquisition announcement, Ancestry president and CEO Margo Georgiadis said the company expected to collaborate with Blackstone on bringing to life our long-term vision of personalized preventive health. Blackstone has also invested heavily in medical devices for diabetes patients and treatments for high cholesterol and kidney disease.

The best practices prohibit sharing with third parties genetic data that isnt aggregated or de-identifiedthat is, data that has been stripped of names and contact information, and pooled together in group health statistics. But the same rules would not apply in the case of the corporate acquisition of a company that held the data, as with Blackstone and Ancestry, said Hendricks-Sturrup.

Interestingly our best practices dont really speak to business acquisition instances, she explained. But we do state that consumers should be offered choices, they should be given the opportunity or option to express consent.

Blackstone reiterated to FairWarning that it would have no access to Ancestrys genetic data, but declined to answer specific questions for this story.

Exposure of genetic information does not carry the obvious risks of bad actors getting hold of credit card or social security numbers, said Lisa Parker, the director of the Center for Bioethics and Health Law at the University of Pittsburgh.

However, in the case of the Blackstone acquisition, she added, there are concerns about the sale of a company and its assets. How the purchaser is going to make use of these assets is not clear.

In 2018, 23andMe entered into an exclusive four-year deal with drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline The companies said in a joint announcement that 23andMe would comply with the best practices and only share anonymous, pooled health statistics. But the arrangement also allows those with specific conditions or mutations who have opted in to be identified and invited to participate in clinical trials.

23andMe sells a health package with its DNA tests featuring 150+ personalized reports with insights on everything from the breast cancer mutation and sickle cell anemia to muscle composition and something it calls genetic weight.

Given such offerings, consumers may not understand what partnerships like that of 23andMe and GlaxoSmithKline mean for their personal data, said Peter Pitts, president and co-founder of the New York-based nonprofit Center for Medicine in the Public Interest.

This is not about medical treatments tailored to a persons DNA profile, he said. What were talking about is the ability of pharmaceutical research and development people to find it easier for people to be in clinical trials by DNA identifier, which saves time and money and expedites medicine to market.

According to the voluntary best practices, which were unveiled just days after the 23andMe-GlaxoSmithKline deal, sharing anonymous group statistics may provide strong assurance of privacy to individuals. But experts point out that data could be hacked and participants identified.

Even if Ancestry has the best security system, the people with whom it does business may not, said Pitts of the Center for Medicine in the Public Interest. There are many opportunities for people who want to do bad things to get a hold of this data.

Currently, privacy rights relating to DNA testing are enforced by the Federal Trade Commission. The agency can challenge deceptive trade practicesincluding if a company failed to live up to its own privacy policy.

Protecting consumers' sensitive personal informationsuch as health or DNA datais a Commission priority, an FTC spokesperson told FairWarning. When asked for examples of FTC consumer protection enforcement cases involving DNA testing companies, the agency provided just one, and cited four other cases involving data privacy unrelated to genetic information.

The genetics-related case, from 2014, targeted Genelink Biosciences, which claimed to customize nutritional supplements and skin-care products to customers' DNA disadvantages obtained by a cheek-swab test kit. In its complaint, the FTC disputed the scientific validity of such products. It also said the more than 30,000 genetic samples the company had collected since 2008 had been vulnerable to identify theft and other privacy violations by third party contractors hired by the company.

But a search of the FTC case database using the words genetic, DNA, and biosciences turned up only one other DNA testing case related to consumer protection.

The FTC doesnt have enough authority to adequately regulate these companies, said Maureen Mahoney, a policy analyst for magazine and advocacy group Consumer Reports. We need a privacy law that requires privacy by default that limits what companies can collect in the first place and requires disclosure.

State-level privacy laws are cropping up to fill the gap. In August, California lawmakers passed a bill that enshrines some of the voluntary best practices into lawspecifically, that genetic data cannot be shared with third parties without the individuals prior written consent.

We wanted to ensure that these companies dont decide to change their collection and disclosure practices and that there be repercussions if they do, said Mahoney, who advised lawmakers on the bill.

23andMe and Ancestry formed the two-member Coalition for Genetic Data Protection, which consulted with the sponsor of Californias privacy bill.

I think they have indeed advocated for privacy protections and for strong security measures, said Parker of the Center for Bioethics and Health Law. Its certainly in their interest to do so.

But other experts say that major consumer DNA test companies can improve how they communicate what they will do with DNA samplesespecially as they expand into health services.

People need to be made aware that their data may be shared or sold with third parties, Pitts said. This needs to be more than just clicking I Agree at the bottom of a lengthy text. It needs to be written in plain English, on a number of different screens.

Lawrence Brody, a senior investigator in medical genomics at the National Institutes of Health, said that while many of the major DNA testing companies are well-intentioned, the industry should do a better job of informing consumers.

I dont know that anyone can bear to read those 15 pages of fine print, he said. "You want to know under what circumstances they might share your information. Its the business model, sharing your information is part of what they do to earn their own returns "

A federal data privacy bill sponsored by U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, would challenge this business model in a fundamental way: barring companies across different industries from sharing data with anyone other than their customers.

For critics like Peter Pitts, such a proposal makes perfect sense.

I dont understand why a consumer would pay for the privilege of having a third party sell their personal genetic information for profit, he said.

FairWarning is a nonprofit (501(c)(3)) investigative news organization that focuses on public health, consumer, workplace and environmental issues, and related topics of government and business accountability.
Have you ever carefully kept the last slice of pizza or your favourite chocolate inside a fridge only to later realise that it has gone missing? Stuff being stolen from the refrigerator is something most of us have experienced. At times, it has also prompted many to don a detectives hat and launch an investigation to apprehend the culprit. The case is same with these pet parents who decided to investigate why who steals cheese from their fridge. The investigation yielded a hilarious  and adorable  result. Theres a probability after seeing the perpetrator in action, you may end up rooting for the thief herself. Turns out, the culprit is a super cute German Shepherd named Anya.

Who else loves cheese? with this caption a video of the act was shared on the Instagram of the dog.

The clip opens to a text written on the screen reading, Cheese kept disappearing from our refrigerator, we set up a camera to see who was stealing it. The scene then transitions to show the video from a camera set inside the fridge. It shows Anya opening the door and grabbing a whole bag of cheese before simply walking away.

Take a look at the video:

Posted on September 14, the clip has garnered over 4.4 lakh views along with more than 41,000 likes. Netizens couldnt stop praising the dogs smartness. The comments section also saw several supportive comments from Anyas pooch friends as they all agreed that cheese is delishus.

Heres how everyone reacted:

Only disadvantage for having the smartest dog on earth, joked an Instagram user. Just take the whole bag will last me a couples days until groceries time, wrote another, trying to figure out Anyas thoughts.

Caught in the act, commented one of her friends to which Anya replied with, Send halp fren. Just guarding it Anya, not guilty, declared another individual.

What are your thoughts on this clip?

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The late Philomena Lynott (centre) at her 80th birthday with Mary and Colm Weadick

An Arklow man is involved in new documentary about the life of legendary Irish musician Phil Lynott.

'Phil Lynott; Songs for While I'm Away' is a documentary directed by Irish film-maker Emer Reynolds, who directed the critically acclaimed documentary 'The Furthest'.

The film about the Thin Lizzy frontman is due to be released nationwide on Friday, October 23.

Arklow's Colm Weadick is a fan of the band and campaigned for a plaque to be installed at the Coral Leisure Centre in 2011. The plaque, which remembers the band's performance in Arklow, was unveiled by the late Philomena Lynott.

Colm Weadick said his involvement in the film came about by chance.

'It all started sometime in late 2018. The production designer Joe Fallover had to replicate Phil's bass guitar for the film.

'It was near completion and now all he needed were strings. His brother happens to live not too far from Arklow. He suggested to Joe that he visits the music shop 'Powersound' on the Main Street.

'Joe told Gerry Power why he needed the strings. Before Joe could finish his sentence, Gerry said, "you know the biggest Thin Lizzy fan lives right here in Arklow." That is how I got involved.'

Joe got in touch with Colm and the pair decided to meet at Coral Leisure Centre.

'At that time, I had a shrine to Philip at my home and a mesmerised Joe spent a couple of hours photographing before deciding on a few pieces of memorabilia that would look great in the project.

'Not long after then I was contacted by a lady named Maggie from Ardmore Studios who was coordinating items for close-up photography for the film.

'I drove up to Ardmore Studios in Bray for the first time ever. It was such a thrill to see where some great movies had been made.'

During his time at the studio, Colm got a glimpse at the project and a first-hand view of other Thin Lizzy memorabilia that had been loaned for use in the documentary.

After fiming was finished, Colm travelled to Glasnevin to collect his items. His name will also appear in the film's credits.

'Phil Lynott; Songs for While I'm Away' release date has added significance as October 23 would have been the late Philomena Lynott's 90th birthday. The documentary will tell the story of Phil Lynott's life and how he became Ireland's greatest rock star.
Police Shooting Wisconsin Rittenhouse (ASSOCIATED PRESS)

The mother of Kyle Rittenhouse, an Illinois teenager charged with fatally shooting two people and injuring a third in August during Black Lives Matter protests in Kenosha, Wisconsin, received a standing ovation at a Wisconsin GOP event on Thursday.

Rittenhouse, 17, is being charged as an adult for six counts, including two of first degree murder, for allegedly shooting Anthony Huber and Joseph Rosenbaum with a semi-automatic, military-style rifle. He has become a cause celebre among conservatives, and has attracted millions to his legal defence as he fights extradition to Wisconsin.

Michelle Malkin, an alt-right figure and political commentator who invited Rittenhouses mother and lawyer to the event Republican Women of Waukesha County event, is associated with a variety of white supremacist figures and ideas, according to the Anti-Defamation League. She has defended Japanese internment and post-9/11 racial profiling of Muslims, the ADL says, and has called Black Lives Matter a terrorist organization and mocked when its supporters got hit by cars.

Days of demonstrations occurred in Kenosha in late August after video showed police shooting Jacob Blake, who is Black, seven times in the back on August 23 while his children were reportedly in the car. He is now paralysed.

Blake was facing a July arrest warrant for sexual assault, trespassing, and disorderly conduct at the time of the incident, when the woman whose complaint prompted the charges called 911 to alert police to Blakes presence at her home. The Department of Justice is investigating the incident.

On August 25, Rittenhouse travelled to Kenosha from his home in Antioch, Illinois, with the rifle, which he was too young to legally carry, and joined the scores of armed conservative vigilantes converging around businesses at the protests.

Videos from the night of the shootings shows Rittenhouse at various points. In one instance, 15 minutes before the shooting, police drive by and offer Rittenhouse and others water out of appreciation. Patchy footage of the shooting incident shows Rittenhouse being pursued by a group attempting to seize his rifle, beginning to shoot, and then police initially ignoring him as he walks toward them with his hands up.

Story continues

Counter-demonstrators armed with military weapons and body armour are becoming an increasingly common sight across the country at Black Lives Matter protests.

Read more

I stood in Kenosha and watched Trump's circus come tumbling down
The Taoiseach has said Cork City is now a danger area for Covid-19, given the rapid rise in cases during the last fortnight, raising fears that a lockdown may be imminent.

Infection rates have been rising in urban areas, and Micheal Martin has said public health officials are very concerned about the cities of Cork, Limerick, Galway, and Waterford.

However, he said there is still the opportunity to avoid tighter restrictions if everyone rigidly adheres to public health guidelines.

Of the 326 new Covid-19 cases announced last night, 32 were in Cork. That was the second-highest total after Dublin, which has 152 cases.

In places like Cork City, cases have been going up in a straight line in the past two weeks," said Mr Martin. "That is a worry  between 20 and 30 cases a day. Likewise in other city areas. Those are danger areas right now."

But Cork "is coming from a low base", he said, and there is still "an opportunity" to reverse the trend.

The National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET) may advise the Government to bring in localised lockdowns in cities like Cork, leaving the wider county to operate more freely if infection rates remain lower there.

"They [NPHET] are concerned about urban centres, said Mr Martin.

Cork, Limerick, Galway, and Waterford  particularly as universities and institutes of technology reopen in the coming weeks. That is a concern  where you have high-density populations, the virus can thrive."

Mr Martin said that there is no magic number of Covid cases an area has to reach before it moves to level three.

However, on the upward trend in Cork City and other urban centres, he added: The trend is wrong at the moment, and reversing it is key. That can prevent us from getting to phase three."

Meanwhile, the HSE, Gardai, and local authorities have appealed to the people of Cork to re-double their efforts to stop the spread of the virus.

The regional inter-agency emergency management group said that the number of confirmed cases of Covid-19 has increased over the last seven days, and the city and county are now at a "critical juncture".

Michael Fitzgerald, chair of the area HSE crisis management team, expressed concern about the increasing numbers, particularly cases which have spread in social settings.

"We are once again at a critical point, he said. "The actions we all take right now will dictate the spread of the virus over the coming weeks."

Acting director of public health for the region, Dr Anne Sheahan, said that while there is evidence of some community transmission of the virus, many recent confirmed cases can be traced back to transmission within family groups and groups of friends.

It is crucial that we all act right now to reduce the number of people we come into contact with," she said.

"I appreciate that this is a big ask of people, but the alternative is that we see a continued rise in the number of cases.
Describing the agriculture-related bills passed by the Centre recently as black laws", the Haryana unit of the Congress on Saturday announced an over month-long protest programme against the legislations. The protest schedule from September 28 to October 31 was announced at a joint media interaction by in-charge of the partys Haryana affairs Vivek Bansal, Haryana Pradesh Congress president Kumari Selja, former chief minister and Leader of Opposition Bhupinder Singh Hooda, general secretary of All India Congress Committee Randeep Singh Surjewala and secretary AICC Ashish Dua here.

The party announced the statewide agitation against the central governments three black laws", saying the legislations will ruin" the lives of farmers, commission agents and labourers. On September 28, a foot march" under the leadership of Kumari Selja will be held from the party office to Haryana Raj Bhavan seeking the repeal of these laws by giving a memorandum to the governor with a request to forward it to the President of India, as per the programme.

It stated that the party activists will observe save farmers and labourers" events at every assembly and district headquarters on October 2. A state-level farmers conference will be held on October10. From October 2 to October 31, the party will launch a signature campaign" against the bills.

Partys Haryana affairs in-charge Bansal said the Congress party, under the leadership of its president Sonia Gandhi and former chief Rahul Gandhi, stands fully united with the farmers to protect their interests. Selja said the BJP government has launched a brutal attack" on the farmers, labourers and commission agents (arthiyas) through these black laws".

She alleged thethree agri bills were passed in Parliament by murdering democracy. Selja said the BJP government has completely failed to double the income of the farmers and to give the prices of agricultural produce as per the recommendations of the Swaminathan Committee, and now it is determined to completely ruin the farmers, labourers and commission agents through these legislations.

She claimed that with the implementation of contract farming, small farmers will become labourers in their own fields and their lives will be ruined. Due to not getting the least assured price of farm produce, the agricultural economy will be completely destroyed," she claimed.

Selja said with the farmers not getting the minimum support price of cotton, maize and paddy, they will be forced to sell their produce at throwaway prices. Speaking on the occasion, Hooda said the demand of the Congress party is that the BJP government should enact another law to ensure that the farmers will get the minimum support price for their produce under all circumstances.

Surjewala said Prime Minister Narendra Modi, while being the chief minister of Gujarat, had advocated to make the agriculture market system more comprehensive and strong, but now he himself is making a law to abolish the mandis. He said the Modi government after destroying shopkeepers and labourers through its wrong policies is now hell-bent on completely eliminating the farmers.

When mandis are finished, who will get the minimum support price and how will the small farmers send their produce to far-flung areas, Surjewala asked. He said there are over 15 crore farmers in the country and when the BJP government is unable to buy agricultural produce from 42,000 farmers at the minimum support price, then how will it be able to give the minimum support price to all the farmers of the country.

Surjewala said the grain business is of 25 lakh crore and the governments intention is handing it over to the mafia. More than 86 per cent farmers own two acres of land or less. They do not have the ability to sell produce outside the mandis," he said.

Meanwhile, Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar said the farmers interests are supreme for the state government. Now, no politics can be done in the name of farmers as Prime Minister Narendra Modi has set a target of doubling the income of farmers by the year 2022 and implemented several schemes and programmes in this direction," he told the mediain Gurgaon.

He said bills on agriculture reforms passed by Parliament during the Monsoon Session would prove to be very effective towards doubling the income of farmers. Taking a dig at the opposition, Khattar said the opposition parties are spreading confusion among the farmers on the Agriculture Act under a political agenda, which is not appropriate.

He said the Congress is misguiding the farmers to fulfill its political interests.
If somebody hits you, youve got to hit em back five times harder than they ever thought possible, Donald Trump said in a speech outlining his philosophy on business in 2012. Youve got to get even. Get even.

Which raises the question: Whatd New York ever do to you, Mr. President?

Has any other president ever shown such animosity toward the place he came from, or used the authority of his high office to exact revenge on the city that built his career?

Kathryn Wylde, president and chief executive of the Partnership for New York City, a business group, said Mr. Trumps approach to New York feels personal. Its a vendetta, she said.
In a tweet, India's Permanent Representative to the UN, T.S. Tirumurti decried Khan's attacks as "warmongering and obfuscation".

First Secretary Mijito Vinito, who was sitting on the second seat in the first row of the Assembly chamber, stood up and left as soon as Khan turned on India by focusing on the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).

Khan's pre-recorded speech was screened at the General Assembly chamber during the annual meeting stymied this year by the Covid-19 precautions.

A new element tucked into Khan's 34-minute speech, more than a third of which was devoted to India, was a call for the Security Council to send its peacekeeping force to Kashmir by drawing a parallel to East Timor, now known as Timor-Leste.

"The Security Council must prevent a disaster conflict (in Kashmir) and secure the implementation of its own resolutions, as it did in the case of East Timor," Khan said.

The Security Council authorised international intervention and sent peacekeepers in the aftermath of the Indonesian invasion of the former Portuguese colony, but a parallel would require such a force to clear Pakistanis in Kashmir in defiance of its resolution demanding their withdrawal.

Khan also declared a thinly veiled support for the attacks on India by the militants.

"The government and the people of Pakistan are committed to standing by and supporting the Kashmiri brothers and sisters in their legitimate struggle for self-determination," he said.

To preemptively deny the involvement in any Pakistan-sponsored attacks on India, Khan said, "We have consistently sensitised the world community about a false flag operation."

Khan alleged, "India is playing a dangerous game of upping the ante against Pakistan in a nuclearised environment."

In his tweet, Tirumurti said, "PM of Pakistan's statement a new diplomatic low at 75th UN General Assembly. Another litany of vicious falsehood, personal attacks, warmongering and obfuscation of Pakistan's persecution of its own minorities and of its cross-border terrorism. Befitting Right of Reply awaits."

At the start of his speech with religious platitudes, Khan declared his commitment to an even more stringent theocratic state before accusing India of moving away from secularism.

"We envisage Naya Pakistan to be modelled on the principles of the state of Medina, established by the Holy Prophet Mohammed," he declared.

Later, the premier of the Islamic republic, which constitutionally denies full citizenship rights to non-Muslims as well as Muslims of the Ahmadiyya sect, asserted that India is giving up on the secularism of Mahatma Gandhi and is moving towards a "Hindutva" state.

"The secularism of Gandhi and Nehru has been replaced by the dream of creating a Hindu Rashtra," he asserted.

Khan's attacks on the RSS is to try to build up support for his cause, which has so far seen only Turkish support, by linking it to Nazism as his attacks on India have not found any backing.

Khan was silent on the persecution of the Uighur minority in China, Pakistan's patron, and Beijing's verified creation of camps for internment of the Muslim minority and campaign to eradicate their cultural and religious identity.

But he claimed that according to "reports", there were camps in India filled with Muslims.

He also accused India of changing the demography of Kashmir and suppressing its cultural identity.

He invoked the Security Council resolutions on Kashmir and said the Council should enforce them.

However, the main resolution on Kashmir -- No. 47 -- demands that Pakistan should withdraw its troops and personnel from Kashmir.

(Arul Louis can be reached at arul.l@ians.in and followed on Twitter at @arulouis)

--IANS

al/arm
The Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC) has imposed a fine of 1 lakh on two more private hospitals for flouting the ICMR guidelines and treating Covid-19 patients without authorisation.

On September 23, the civic body issued an order of suspension of license to a hospital at Sector 28 in Vashi for treating Covid patients without authorisation.

Sanjay Kakade, assistant municipal commissioner of NMMC, said, In case of the Vashi Hospital, it was a second complaint and hence we suspended the licence. Meanwhile, in the case of the other two hospitals, it was the first complaint and hence we have penalised them and not suspended the licence.

The two hospitals penalised are from Sector 9 in Vashi and Sector 16 in Airoli. Complaints against a total of four private hospitals were made to us. Of the four, only three were found to be having no authority to treat Covid-19 patients. The fourth one had permission from us to treat Covid patients. We are now verifying the bills issued by the fourth hospital if they were as per the guidelines, Kakade said.

NMMC had issued a show-cause notice to the three hospitals on September 19. Failing to provide timely response to the civic body, NMMC issued orders to the hospitals. The civic body has appealed to the public to approach them in case any hospital was found flouting any guidelines.
In 2013, she did not seek reelection, but was rehired by the district. In a 2015 memo, then-Superintendent Barbara Mason wrote that it had become apparent that Brown was unable to take direction from Mason and accused Brown of presenting items to the school board in an effort to undermine Masons authority. In a written response to Masons 11-point plan for corrective action, Brown called the measures ambiguous and requested further refinement, records show.
Letters to the Editor View(s):

Such a pleasant surprise to see smooth operation at Passport Office

I had a very uplifting experience at the Passport Office Battaramulla on September 22 which I thought I should share. Even though in present times a passport does not serve a great purpose, I was nervous about hanging onto one about to expire and decided to follow the renewal process. A travel agent friend insisted that the process was simple but I had my reservations based on experiences of old.

I was surely in for a surprise. I entered the Passport Office building at 8 a.m. and was back in my vehicle by 8.30 a.m. with a new passport collection receipt in hand. Of course due to the present day clamp on overseas travel, the demand for new passports has obviously declined. However, the overall efficiency and level of customer service demonstrated by the Passport Office team right through the process was commendable.

A fully automated tracking system takes the customer through a seamless process even though you have to present yourself at about three counters. I am a strong believer that the technology and the processes linked to good working conditions stimulate and facilitate higher productivity and enhance customer service as well. The Passport issue operation is absolute proof of this theory. The only point at which I experienced any kind of negativity was at the token issue counter, when I overheard the staffer talking down to a customer. If not for this incident you were directed and helped all the way. Maybe management should improve on attitudes of the custodian of the tokens, especially when helping simple folk who are not so conversant with such procedures.

Perhaps the present lesser work load helps overall, but to see this level of efficiency at a government department gives us Sri Lankans a breath of fresh air. The icing on the cake was when I returned to my home in Kotte and was pleasantly surprised to receive a call from the Passport Office at 10 a.m. to say that my new passport was ready for collection. As a person with wide training and experience in the art of delivering high global customer service standards in my working life, I was truly impressed. The Controller, his senior staffers and the front line staff at the Passport Office ought to be very proud of what they do, and must keep striving for improvement. I can only say well done! to the team.

I hope people who matter in the Government machinery including our Executive President Gotabaya Rajapaksa are privy to this letter, and that all government departments are encouraged to emulate the high standards maintained by the Passport Office. The other hidden benefit is that when the organisation machinery runs this smoothly there is hardly any room or need for malpractices such as petty bribes etc. We Sri Lankans are normally inclined more to complain and find fault than encourage good practice and I hope my good experience becomes the norm and not the exception. Hope all other government departments take a cue from the Passport Office team.

The only negative aspect of the entire exercise was the traffic snarl in the Battaramulla area. It took me about the time taken to get a new passport application processed, to travel back about two kilometres to Kotte!

Lasantha R. Siriwardene Kotte

Ensuring the safety and security of our senior citizens

Five years ago my mother faced a tragic event that partially burnt her house and somewhat injured her. Four days later, she died in hospital of a cardiac arrest. It devastated us. Everything we did to keep her safe came to nothing.

My mother, a retired teacher, had an independent spirit. In her five childrens absence she carried on her day-to-day life with the greatest spirit. For her company and protection, we hired the services of carers from a known company which provided male carers to both my late father and father-in-law. At that time, I was in Sri Lanka for a longer stay and my younger brother too was in the country, and together we monitored the process.

But our situation changed, and I came back to Australia. Having her five children in Australia (although she was able to visit us and our wish was to take her here permanently), she was all by herself, so we hired the carers. The company always sent someone when the need occurred. However, many of them did not meet the requirement. A few actually cared, but they had constant issues with their families which made them visit homes frequently. The rest were returnees from West Asian countries and some according to the Sinhala expression were, Loke Kala Wathura Beela.

My observation was that most carers were not trained to manage the duties of the old people in their care, and on how to be vigilant or how to act in an emergency.

We have many unanswered questions, but I have heard of worse stories of how our senior citizens, who have sacrificed their lives for their families and the country, are taken advantage of.

Many aged and vulnerable citizens undergo hardships. Some are abandoned, some are placed in homes, and some suffer abuse in their own houses. No doubt there are reputable places. But it is high time that all the places and the people who are entrusted with caring for our senior citizens come under scrutiny.

The government must look into this matter and start aged care services as an accredited occupation, so that people with knowledge, character and proper training could be employed. Without going to West Asia, many could be locally occupied with dignity.

Having a National Council/Secretariat for Elders or having savings schemes, insurance policies, mobile packages for retirees is not enough. They need tender, loving care in their last years.

Savithri Jayasinghe Cooray Via email

Is this how a senior citizen should be treated at a leading state institute?

My EPF monies were due to me from a court case I had filed around two or three years ago  the Labour Tribunal awarded that I should be paid all my dues.

I checked subsequently with the Central Bank and my monies were duly credited to my account.

Unfortunately I lost my wallet whilst travelling in the bus on the Dehiwela/Maharagama route last week, along with it my National Identity card and drivers licence.

Since I did not have a Grama Sevaka attestation on my K Form for the claim, I obtained an affidavit from a JP and visited the 3rd floor to meet the Commissioner General. It was a Monday (Public Day) at 8.30 a.m. No one else was there.

A gentleman in tie came out and very politely asked how he could help me. I told him the story. I was in slippers with a wound on my toe. He said he would call the Commissioner EPF who was on the 8th floor.

But when I went to meet him, the first question was Who told you to go to the 3rd floor? He did not even want to listen to my story. He told me to go and bring my ID. I said I had only a Police report as I had lost it. He said he was not interested. I said I have a copy of the ID. He then said Bring your Passport. When I replied that it had expired last month, he said Then you renew it and come. I was dumbfounded. He said Next time you come to me with your new ID.

He also commented, How come you were not paid EPF since you were GM.That was not his business.

He did not respect my age leave alone treat me with any courtesy. With disappointment I walked out and went back to the 3rd floor and asked the clerk who the gentleman who had spoken to me very kindly was. He said he was the Additional Commissioner General. He was not in.

I called him subsequently and related the story. He said Dont worry, fax me your ID copy  I will get it approved by the Commissioner General.

Subsequently I handed the copy to him and he called me two days later and asked me to bring a copy of my birth certificate.

I was very disturbed as to how I as a senior citizen was treated.

Senior citizen Via email

Public way too lax about COVID-health precautions

Looking around, one gets the impression that there is no threat from the Corona virus in Sri Lanka. We see a vast number of people these days moving around without face masks and not adhering to the prescribed precautionary measures.

There are many mass gatherings, organised functions and meetings where people are in close proximity to each other without face masks.

I feel the guidelines set by the health authorities should still be followed until such time as we know Sri Lanka is safe.

Wearing the face mask should be mandatory in public for instance when using public transport. Other measures should also be strictly followed.

People seem to be taking things way too easy and the gradual relaxation of all the health measures against the virus is a dangerous trend.

B. Joseph Wattala

Sequel to Dadayama movie: How the true story ended

In response to the article in the Sunday Times of 7/6/2020 regarding the sequel to Dadayama, the movie based on a true story, I congratulate the producers on winning awards, and mostly Swarna Mallawarachchi for her astounding performance. You will be interested in the true ending to this story.

The Police should be commended on their superlative work considering their limited resources at that time, and finding the car abandoned which had a hair of Adelines on the tyre.

My father Attorney and Judge Corbet Jayewardene was a friend of Lord Devlin, a superior Judge of the British High Court. This was around the end of the 1950s.

Lord Devlin came on a holiday to Sri Lanka and my father took him on a trip to Anuradhapura and Wilpattu. Whilst passing the very lonely spot where Adeline was murdered, my father explained the case to Lord Devlin and told him how it was appealed in UK.

Lord Devlin said I know the case  I was one of the judges on the Privy Council, who heard the appeal, which was taken to the UK. It was an unanimous judgment and the fiance was given a death sentence.

Amitha Jayewardene Via email
Steve Thomson, B.C. Minister of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations, speaks during an announcement regarding protecting British Columbia's Great Bear Rainforest, at the Museum of Anthropology in Vancouver, B.C., on Monday February 1, 2016. A former Liberal cabinet minister is British Columbia's new Speaker of the legislature in what is likely to be a short-term appointment. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck
Judge orders church services outside Planned Parenthood clinic to move across the street

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A church operating outside an abortion clinic in Washington state will continue to hold services directly adjacent to the facility after a court order was issued this week and forced it to make changes.

A Washington Superior Court judge issued a preliminary injunction Monday ordering the Church at Planned Parenthood, a monthly service held outside a Planned Parenthood facility in Spokane organized by Covenant Church, to move its services across the street from the facility and coordinate service times to avoid coinciding with the clinics hours of operation.

The ruling comes three months after Planned Parenthood of Greater Washington and North Idaho filed a lawsuit against the church and five of its pastors and leaders accused of recklessly disrupting the normal functioning of a health care facility by making noise that unreasonably disrupts the piece within the facility.

The courts decision today recognizes the importance of meaningful access to healthcare for all Washingtonians, the Planned Parenthood affiliate tweeted in response to the ruling.

The chief executive of the regional Planned Parenthood organization had previously referred to TCAPP worshippers as bullies who are trying to take away care from young women, men, the LGBTQ community and black, indigenous people of color in Spokane.

The Church at Planned Parenthood, founded in 2018, describes itself as a worship service at the gates of Hell and a gathering of Christians for the worship of God and the corporate prayer for repentance for this nation, repentance for the apathetic church and repentance of our blood guiltiness in this abortion holocaust.

TCAPP attorney Tracy Tribbett responded to the court decision by implying that officials at the local Planned Parenthood want to take away their First Amendment rights.

Plaintiffs (Planned Parenthood) do not like the speech that is occurring outside of their walls, they want it completely eradicated, Tribett said in a statement. People do not picket away from the place where they have an issue.

Planned Parenthood officials are scared of our prayers and our worship, Ken Peters, the pastor of Covenant Church, contended in a previous interview with The Christian Post.

We arent there to bother them, we are there to touch Heaven and be a light to the world, Peters explained. We are there to be a prophetic statement that we, the church dont approve of killing life inside the womb.

On Tuesday, just one day after the ruling, Peters announced on Twitter that a TCAPP service was taking place that evening but with modifications to accommodate the court order.

ATTENTION: Due to Judges Leftist Order  New Service Time for TCAPP Tonight! You are welcome to come pray at 6 pm BUT the ACTUAL WORSHIP Service starts at 7!

Based on a picture posted on social media by Peters of the Tuesday night service, the court ruling did not hamper turnout.

In a statement, Spokane Police Department Sgt. Terry Preuninger said that the court did not grant law enforcement authority to criminally enforce violations of the injunction. Preuninger said the department will report any suspected violations of the civil injunction to the court for review.

He vowed the police will continue to work to protect people and property, ensure the health center is able to operate without disruption and to enforce local and state laws.

According to Peters, the battle is not over. He is willing to take the legal battle to the Supreme Court if necessary. The pastor commented on the court order in a video posted Monday.

Planned Parenthoods lawsuit not only seeks a permanent injunction against the church services but also seeks damages of $5,000 per day for each day that defendants interfered with Plaintiffs operation.

Peters is hardly the only pro-life activist that has tried to send a message to Planned Parenthood, Americas largest abortion provider.

Independent journalist Tayler Hansen has started the Baby Lives Matter movement. Hansen hoping to raise awareness for the hundreds of thousands of unborn babies aborted at Planned Parenthood facilities every year by painting murals in front of Planned Parenthood clinics nationwide that read Baby Lives Matter.

Earlier this month, pro-life activists in Baltimore, Maryland who are not affiliated with the Baby Lives Matter movement, painted a mural with the words Black Preborn Lives Matter in front of their local Planned Parenthood clinic.
Taran also spoke about the plane's pre-accident condition.

One of the sensors in the engine of the An26 transport military aircraft failed, as a result of which the plane caught on the ground as it was approaching the airfield near Chuhuiv before plunging and setting ablaze, Ukraine's Defense Minister Andriy Taran says citing aviation experts.

On the morning of Saturday, September 26, Taran arrived at the crash scene and spoke with journalists, Suspilne reports.

Taran elaborated that the training routine involving Air Force University crew and cadets had been going as planned before things went wrong abruptly.

"Preliminary assessment of flight safety experts: some sensor in the left engine failed. We can't provide more details at the moment. According to preliminary information, the engine didn't fail. Some sensor did. According to the incoming reports, the engine had over 5,000 flight hours left before the next scheduled repair. So now we can't name any reasons that something happened to the engine," the minister said.

Read alsoMilitary plane carrying cadets crashes in Kharkiv region (Photo, video)At the same time, Taran added that the cause of the tragedy could only be confirmed once flight recorders are decrypted.

Plane's pre-accident condition

The An-26 was 43 years old, while the minister says it was intended to fly for another three years.

"That is, the plane had enough resource, and the engine, too, had enough resource... What exactly happened was some technical issue," he replied.

The head of the Ministry of Defense also noted that on September 25, the plane had made six safe takeoffs and five safe landings.

An-26 accident in Chuhuiv: Background

The plane crashed on approach to the Chuhuiv military airfield by the highway, on the night of September 25. Kharkiv's Air Force University's crew and cadets were on board  a total of 27 people.

According to updated information from the Office of the Prosecutor General, as a result of the accident, 25 people were killed on scene and two survived. The survivors were hospitalized in grave condition. One of them later died of his burns, according to a morning update.

Volodymyr Zelensky came to the region on Saturday, declaring Day of Mourning across country.

What's An-26

The Antonov An-26 (NATO reporting name: Curl) is a twin-engined turboprop civilian and military transport aircraft, designed and produced in the Soviet Union from 1969 to 1986.
The claim: Joe Biden said the Second Amendment is 'obsolete'

A post offering Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden's views on the Second Amendment started off as satire, but has now contributed to the spread of misinformation ahead of the 2020 election.

Biden Says the Second Amendment is Obsolete,'  reads the headline of the article from the site America's Last Line of Defense that has been shared by users on Facebook. USA TODAY reached out to those users for comment.

Just recently, Biden confirmed one of those very fears during a campaign speech at the Joe Barron Jewish community center in Pohtaytoe, Virginia, referring to the sacred and God-blessed Second Amendment right of all Americans to own and use firearms at any time anywhere for any reason whatsoever as obsolete, the article reads.

False quotes have been frequently attributed to Biden and Sen. Kamala Harris, the Democratic vice presidential nominee. Several originate as satire and are then shared by users who perceive them to be fact.

Fact check: Biden, like Trump, received multiple draft deferments from Vietnam

A well-known satirical site

The claim that Biden called the Second Amendment "obsolete" stems from the site called America's Last Line of Defense and the top of its page reads, "SATIRE FOR YOUR CONFIRMATION BIAS."

The article is listed under "BIDEN SATIRE FOR DELUSIONAL TRUMPSTERS TO HATE" and according to the site's about us page, America's Last Line of Defense defines itself as a "network of parody, satire, and tomfoolery."

"Everything on this website is fiction. It is not a lie and it is not fake news because it is not real. If you believe that it is real, you should have your head examined," the site reads.

Creator of America's Last Line of Defense Christopher Blair, who also goes by "Busta Troll," launched the satirical site with other liberal bloggers during the 2016 presidential campaign as a joke among friends, the Washington Post reported in 2018.

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"The more extreme we become, the more people believe it," Blair told the Post.

Biden's stance on gun control

Biden's gun control plan includes universal background checks, additional resources to enforce existing gun laws, pushing "smart guns"  firearms that require an electronic ownership confirmation  and banning assault weapons.

The plan also calls for other measures, such as restricting purchases and possession of guns by fugitives and people convicted of hate crime, and banning online sales of weapons and ammunition.

While Biden has advocated for stricter gun laws, he has never pledged to "take away" the Second Amendment.

NBC reported that Biden has said on numerous occasions that he is "not opposed to the Second Amendment."

USA TODAY has also previously debunked claims that Harris would take away guns or use law enforcement to confiscate weapons.

Our ruling: Satire

Claims that Biden called the Second Amendment "obsolete" are SATIRE, based on our research. The post originates from a satirical site that explicitly states all of their content is fiction.

Our fact-check sources:

Thank you for supporting our journalism. You can subscribe to our print edition, ad-free app or electronic newspaper replica here.

Our fact check work is supported in part by a grant from Facebook.

This fact check is available at IFCNs 2020 US Elections FactChat #Chatbot on WhatsApp. Click here, for more.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Fact check: Satire site says Biden called Second Amendment 'obsolete'
The smell of gasoline filled the air on Friday afternoon as the first cars drove across the newly-opened 12th Avenue Viaduct. Old-timey cars led the charge and electric cars rounded out the end of the parade.

The 12th Avenue Viaduct ribbon-cutting ceremony was an event in which officials thanked everyone who made the construction possible while also looking toward the future.

We actually had a discussion on maybe there should have been a horse in the lead, Columbus Mayor Jim Bulkley said, standing at a podium next to two rows of white chairs. Because weve kind of been talking about (Viaducts) that longthats not a slam at anybody, thats just the reality of sometimes how long it takes to get something good done.

Instead, the ceremony had a car from every decade and excitement all around. This project is open to traffic now and there are more projects coming.

Nebraska Department of Transportation Director Kyle Schneweis said officials are working on the 29th Street viaduct and there are other efforts coming, including highway repairs, some preservation work east and north of town, and the 23rd Street project.

I love Columbus  you guys care about infrastructure and you care about transportation. You know how important it is and as a DOT guy, (Ive got to) tell you, I love coming to communities like this, Schneweis said. Its a beautiful bridge.

He might be excited about the bridge, but he also said it means something more.

Its about the community, its about safety, its about being able to have mobility through this part of town in a safe way so we can have the kind of quality of life that we need to have as Nebraskans, he said. We want to build projects in communities in ways that serve you.

A few years ago, NDOT had 125 projects that were local, that were behind schedule and long overdue.

Weve got less than 25 left, said Schneweis, who said his agency focused on those projects. 100 projects have moved through the gates and heres one of them today.

State Sen. and former Columbus Mayor Mike Moser, who was thanked throughout the ceremony, also gave credit to others.

Like all good government things, it only took us 15 years, Moser said. Some of the people who helped make this possible are no longer council members. Some of them have even passed onbut we owe a debt of gratitude to all the people who worked on this.

The opening of the viaduct will mean the permanent closing of a few at-grade roadway crossings. The crossings are located at 12th Avenue, 21st Avenue and 25th Avenue, wrote Raquel Espinoza, senior director of Corporate Communications and Media Relations for Union Pacific in an email. The crossings will close a few days after the overpass opens, she wrote.

Kim Kwapnioski, speaking as a Columbus resident, said it will help make the area a good place to live.

I was born and raised here, moved away for a while and moved back, said KwapnioskI, who is a member of the Platte County Board of Supervisors but was not representing the County at the ceremony. Seeing a project like this being done is amazing. The economic impact that it will have for, I mean, just for the community as a whole is a great piece.

Bulkley also said it will return some normalcy to the neighborhood.

Are we done? asked Bulkley. For right now, were done. But I would tell you weve got to continue to keep looking and thinking: 'What more could we do here in Columbus?'"

Carolyn Komatsoulis is a reporter for the Columbus Telegram. Reach her via email at carolyn.komatsoulis@lee.net.

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Singapore-based cryptocurrency exchange KuCoin has been hacked.

In a blog post released on Friday night, the exchange disclosed that it had "detected some large withdrawals since September 26, 2020" from its hot wallet. While the exchange has not disclosed the amount lost in the hack, one of the Ethereum addresses associated with the hack shows roughly $150M in funds stolen.

On Friday night, users across various social media platform platforms began to complain that they were having issues withdrawing assets from KuCoin. While the KuCoin team assured users that "funds will be safe," that no longer is the case.

In a livestream, KuCoin CEO Johnny Lyu reassured his users that funds in this hack will be "covered completely by KuCoin and our insurance fund." Lyu also noted that hacked funds were only "a small part of our total assets holdings" and that KuCoin is currently working with other exchanges like Binance and Huobi and law enforcement to track down the assets.





 2020 The Block Crypto, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.
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Linkedin Colin Packham (Reuters) Sydney, Australia  Sat, September 26, 2020 14:02 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c47689be 2 World whales,Australia Free

Australian wildlife officials began disposing of hundreds of dead pilot whales on Saturday after concluding there was no longer any hope of rescuing any more.

In Australia's biggest whale beaching, 470 whales were first spotted on a wide sandbank during an aerial reconnaissance of rugged Macquarie Harbour in Tasmania state on Monday.

After days of difficult and dangerous rescue attempts, Australia said they rescued 108 whales, with the rest now believed to have died.

Rob Buck, Incident Controller and Parks and Wildlife Service manager, said 15 whales have already been disposed of at sea, but the operations to dispose of the remaining near 350 mammals was expected to take several days at least. "Collection and disposal is being undertaken with the assistance of aquaculture companies whose equipment and expertise on the harbor is essential for a timely and effective outcome," Buck said in an emailed statement.

The bodies of the dead whales were being separated into groups and enclosed with water booms to try keep them in one place and isolated from sharks and other predators.

Most of the released whales, a gregarious species that lives in deep waters, were expected to "regroup" and recover from the traumatic event, officials said.

Topics : whales Australia
An enormous wildfire that churned through mountains north-east of Los Angeles and into the Mojave Desert was still threatening homes on Monday and was one of more than two dozen major fires burning across California.

Five of the largest wildfires in state history are currently burning and more than 5,600 square miles have been charred, an area larger than the state of Connecticut, state governor Gavin Newsom said.

At 165 square miles, the so-called Bobcat Fire is one of the largest ever in Los Angeles County after burning for more than two weeks. It was only about 17% contained.

Evacuation orders and warnings are in place for thousands of residents in foothill and desert areas, where semi-rural homes and a popular nature sanctuary have burned. Statewide, at least 23,000 people remain evacuated, Mr Newsom said.

No injuries have been reported from the fire about 50 miles northeast of downtown Los Angeles.

However, 18 homes and other buildings have been destroyed and 11 damaged, some in the Juniper Hills area, with the toll rising to perhaps 85 when damage assessment teams can complete their work this week, fire officials said Monday evening.

Nearly 19,000 firefighters in California are currently battling 27 major blazes, Mr Newsom said. At least 7,900 wildfires have erupted in the state this year, many during a mid-August barrage of dry lightning ignited parched vegetation.

Twenty-six people have been killed. Officials were investigating the death of a firefighter at another Southern California wildfire that erupted earlier this month from a smoke-generating pyrotechnic device used by a couple to reveal their babys gender.

Erratic winds that drove flames into the states community of Juniper Hills over the weekend had died down, said US Forest Service spokesman Larry Smith.

Its slightly cooler too, so hopefully that will be a help to firefighters, Mr Smith said.

However, evacuation warnings  meaning residents should be prepared to flee if ordered  remained in effect for Pasadena, home of the Rose Bowl and the annual Rose Parade, and Wrightwood, a mountain community near several ski resorts.

Numerous studies in recent years have linked larger US wildfires to global warming from the burning of coal, oil and gas, especially because climate change has made California much drier, meaning vegetation is more flammable.

Officials said it could be days before teams determined the scope of the destruction in the area burned by the Bobcat Fire.

Early estimates are that 6,400 buildings have been destroyed across the state, but Mr Newsom said by no stretch of the imagination do we think this tells the entire story.

The Bobcat Fire started on September 6 and has doubled in size over the past week while ripping through forested areas that had not burned in decades. The cause is under investigation.

Firefighters battled back against another flare-up near Mount Wilson, which overlooks greater Los Angeles in the San Gabriel Mountains and has a historic observatory founded more than a century ago and numerous broadcast antennas serving Southern California.

Flames destroyed the nature centre at Devils Punchbowl Natural Area, a geological attraction that draws some 130,000 visitors per year. A wildlife sanctuary on the property was undamaged, and staff and animals had been evacuated days earlier.
Animal-rights activists seen earlier this year offering water to pigs headed to slaughter at a Farmer John processing plant in Vernon. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

Seven animal-rights activists were cited for allegedly trespassing while trying to rescue a pig from the Farmer John slaughterhouse in Vernon, police said Saturday.

Police received a call about 4 a.m. Friday from officials at Smithfield Foods  owner of Farmer John  to report that some trespassers were on the premises at 3049 E. Vernon Ave., according to Vernon Police Sgt. Daniel Onopa.

"Two subjects were determined to be inside the livestock yard and five subjects fled on foot," Onopa said. "They [the five subjects] were then detained by officers nearby. Due to the pandemic, they were cited at the scene and released."

The animal rights group DXE Los Angeles  which is hosting a 48-hour vigil in front of the slaughterhouse beginning Sunday  posted a video on its Facebook page showing activists wearing hardhats inside the facility.

The group places a pig on a gurney and attempts to leave, according to the video, but police are shown outside and a voice is heard saying, "They're locking the doors, guys."

It was unclear what became of the pig, or how the activists gained entry to the plant.

"I don't know the exact details about that," Onopa said. "There's still pending, further investigation that I can't comment on."

Thousands of pigs are trucked into the facility each day, where they are slaughtered and their meat is used for Dodger Dogs, as well as the ham, bacon, sausage and hot dogs sold under the Farmer John label.

DXE said on Facebook that its vigil will attempt to educate workers and the public about the inhumane treatment of animals at such plants, and the effect of the factory farming industry on climate change and public health issues, including the coronavirus outbreak.

Attempts to reach Smithfield Foods and DXE Los Angeles for comment on Friday's incident and Sunday's planned vigil were not immediately successful.

Earlier this year, the Farmer John slaughterhouse experienced a large coronavirus outbreak, in which 153 workers have tested positive for the disease.

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In May, the union that represents some 1,300 Farmer John employees called for an immediate closure of the plant.

"Workers are still too close together on the line, in the breakroom, the bathrooms and other such hubs," said John Grant, president of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 770. "Smithfield has not provided full information about what is really going on inside the Vernon plant. Without information we cannot make an informed decision about workers' health and safety."

Virginia-based Smithfield Foods has said it has implemented stringent new health protocols to protect against the virus.

"Our Smithfield family members are crucial to our nation's response to COVID-19. We thank them for keeping food on America's tables, and have implemented aggressive measures to protect their health and safety during this pandemic," the company said in a statement.
Seoul, Sep 26 : A US surveillance aircraft flew over South Korea on Saturday, an aviation tracker said, days after North Korea killed a Seoul official drifting at sea.

"USAF E-8C 96-0042 RONIN31 conducted a mission over South Korea earlier today," tweeted Aircraft Spots which monitors military air movements.

According to Aircraft Spots, the US Navy's EP-3E surveillance plane also conducted missions in areas near Seoul on Friday, reports Yonhap News Agency.

According to the South Korean military, North Korean authorities shot the fisheries official who was adrift in its waters to death and incinerated his body on September 22.

He went missing the previous day while on duty near the Yellow Sea border island of Yeonpyeong.

Pyongyang admitted to the shooting and leader Kim Jong-un issued an apology on Friday.

North Korea however, claimed that it set an object the official used to stay afloat on fire, not his body.
Defense Minister of Ukraine Andriy Taran has made a decision to pay financial assistance to the families of those killed in a military plane crash in Kharkiv region.

"Minister of Defense has made a decision to pay one-time financial assistance to family members of the killed servicemen of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in connection with the deaths of servicemen. The amount of payments is 750 living wages, which is UAH 1.5 million for each. The amount of payments will be done at the expense of the funds of the Ministry of Defense," said Deputy Defense Minister Ihor Starobynsky at an extraordinary meeting of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine on Saturday.
FILE PHOTO: Offices in the Central Bank of Ireland are seen in the financial district in Dublin

DUBLIN (Reuters) - Ireland's central bank on Thursday fined KBC Bank Ireland 18.3 million euros ($21.3 million) for overcharging mortgage customers who should have been given the option of a cheaper "tracker" mortgage, the second bank to be fined over the issue.

Ireland's main banks, including permanent tsb <IL0A.I> which was handed a record 21 million euro fine last year, have paid out almost 700 million euros to compensate 40,000 borrowers denied mortgages that follow the low European Central Bank rate.

Ireland's central bank launched a probe in 2015 into the product that was widely offered by Irish banks during the country's housing boom in the mid 2000s. The country's other lenders remain under investigation.

The central bank said KBC's failing had a "devastating" impact on 3,741 account holders, including the loss of 66 properties, and described KBC's engagement on the issue as "deeply unsatisfactory."

The lender, the Irish unit of Belgian bank and insurance group KBC <KBC.BR>, apologised "profoundly" to customers impacted by its management of their mortgages.

"The tracker mortgage issue is a hugely regrettable chapter in Irish banking and one from which we in KBC have learned significant lessons," KBC Bank Ireland chief executive Peter Roebben said in a statement.

"We deeply regret these events, and recognise that they have led to a breach of trust."

($1 = 0.8586 euros)

(Reporting by Padraic Halpin and Conor Humphries; Editing by Toby Chopra and Mark Potter)
Photo credit: Donaldson Collection - Getty Images

From Veranda

Its namewhich comes from ancient Greek and Latin languagesmeans to "perceive a change in color." The opal, one of October's birthstones, was first discovered in a cave in Kenya around 4000 B.C. Opals were commonly used for amulets and jewelry in ancient times, and many cultures (like ancient Rome) associated the mysterious stone with love and hope.

Photo credit: Universal History Archive - Getty Images

Opals, which have been mined in Hungary and, more recently, Australia, once had a reputation for bringing the wearer bad luck. Empress Eugenie of France refused to wear the stone, but most admirers of the stone (like the ancient Greeks) believed the stone to be lucky and magical because it supposedly bestowed the gifts of prophecy and protection against disease. Arabic legends even went so far as to give the stone supernatural originsthey believed it fell from the heavens among flashes of lighteningand powers. This may be why the opal, with its multitude of colors, was given romantic nicknames like Pandora, Light of the World, and Empress.



Photo credit: Santi Visalli - Getty Images

Iconic figures throughout history have sported the stone, including Marc Antony, Cleopatra, and Queen Victoria. Emperor Napoleon gifted a large red opal called the Burning of Troy to Empress Josephine, and it is rumored that one Roman emperor traded one-third of his kingdom for a single magnificent opal.

Andy Warhol, the New York City artist, film director, and leader of the Pop Art movement in the United States, had his own love affair with this effervescent gemstone. He was known for his collection of opals, and in 1977, he included photographs of the gemstone in his exhibition "Opal the Rainbow Gem" at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London.

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"To the extent that ComEd or Exelon believed that they could influence my conduct as a legislator by deciding to hire someone I may have recommended, someone who worked for me, or someone who did political work for me, they were incredibly mistaken, he said.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 17:39:48|Editor: huaxia

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HERAT, Afghanistan, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Taliban militants attacked a village in Afghanistan's western Herat province on Friday night, killing five pro-government militiamen, provincial government spokesman Jilani Farhad said on Saturday.

The armed insurgents, according to the spokesman, stormed Hajji Salam village in the restive Adraskan district late Friday night and after killing five pro-government militiamen retreated to their hideouts.

Farhad also claimed that the Taliban militants had suffered casualties in the firefight, but he did not give an exact figure.

The Taliban outfit has yet to make comment on the attack. Enditem
4 Things You Need to Know to Enjoy a Secure Retirement

Singapore is going through a rough patch right now.

The pandemic has caused the countrys second-quarter GDP to plunge by a record 13.2%.

Sadly, along with the decline, retrenchments have spiked up in the quarter ended 30 June, more than doubling to 8,130 compared to the previous quarter.

And there could be more challenges to come as relief measures are slowly winding up, exposing businesses to the full brunt of the crisis.

With all thats been going on, retirement may sound like a pipe dream to many.

However, the truth is that retirement is not out of reach if you are disciplined and patient with your investment portfolio.

Having a healthy savings habit is a good start, and so is maintaining a buffer of cash in preparation for bad times such as these.

Here are four things you need to know to enjoy the comfortable retirement you deserve.

Resilience is the word

The word resilience is used much more often these days as the world is suffering from an unprecedented health crisis caused by the coronavirus.

For businesses, being resilient means being able to withstand sudden economic shocks and plummeting demand without going bankrupt.

And the first place you turn to for resilient companies is blue-chip companies.

These companies have a long track record of weathering crises, are well-capitalised and also have dominant competitive positions.

By including such companies within your portfolio, you can sleep better at night knowing that they have a higher chance of weathering the storm.

With much better resources available, these businesses may also be on the lookout for acquisitions on the cheap to further solidify their competitive position.

When the crisis is over, these companies will emerge even stronger and can go on growing.

Of course, the key is also to buy the right blue-chip companies (i.e those that are performing well), and not those that are falling on hard times.

Turning on the cash tap

Having a source of passive income is important in your retirement years, as you would already have ceased active employment by then.

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And what better way to enjoy this type of income than to own a bunch of dividend-paying stocks?

Choosing companies that pay consistent dividends is one of the keys to a successful retirement.

As such businesses generate copious amounts of cash, this also makes them less susceptible to getting in trouble when a downturn hits.

It will be a bonus if the company can increase its dividend payments over the years, as this will boost your passive income flow without the need to inject more cash.

Whats more, as companies pay out more dividends, it also signals that their business is booming, which in turn will result in a rise in the share price.

The power of compounding

Receiving dividends always feels satisfying.

But thats only part of the equation.

The other is for you to take that dividend and reinvest it in even more dividend-paying companies to receive ever-higher dividend payments.

You could recycle the money back into the same company that paid you the dividend or use the cash to buy another dependable dividend payer.

Such a process is called compounding, and it can work wonders for your investment portfolio and dividend flow.

If this process is repeated over years, even decades, it will result in a substantial increase in the dividends paid out annually.

By the time you are ready to retire, the compounding would have left you with a veritable pile of quality companies that churn out ever-increasing dividends.

Long-term growth catalysts

Finally, you should look for businesses with a long runway for growth and have clear catalysts supporting it.

Choose industries that will continue to boom for many years to come, as well as nascent industries that have the potential to become much larger in time.

These catalysts will ensure that your investments can enjoy multi-year growth, and will also make them more resistant to poor economic conditions.

As companies find their niche and develop their competitive moat, your investment will become more secure as well.

Get Smart: Patience and fortitude

It wont be an easy journey, though.

The road to riches will not be a smooth ride as you may encounter obstacles along the way.

Patience and fortitude will go a long way in helping you to achieve your retirement objectives.

Allow yourself room to stumble, but learn from your mistakes.

If you fall, pick yourself up again and soldier on.

With perseverance, you will eventually reach your goal and be able to enjoy your well-deserved retirement.

Want to know what stocks we like for our portfolio? See for yourself now. Simply CLICK HERE to scoop up a FREE copy of our special report. As a bonus, we also highlight 6 blue chips stocks trading at a 10-year low. But you will want to hurry  this free report is available for a brief time only.

Click here to like and follow us on Facebook, here for our Instagram group and here for our Telegram group.

Disclaimer: Royston Yang does not own shares in any of the companies mentioned.

The post 4 Things You Need to Know to Enjoy a Secure Retirement appeared first on The Smart Investor.
LOS ANGELESCandy Glitter is leading the first-ever AVN Cover Model Contest for the fourth consecutive week as the competition enters the final weekend of the monthbut its not over yet.

Even though Candy still holds the No. 1 spot, several models remain in contention for the top prize.

The No. 1-ranked earner on the platform in September will receive $1500 cash and also be featured on the cover of the December 2020 issue of AVN magazine along with a feature story and photo layout inside.

The creator who gets the cover will be based only on her cumulative earnings for the month of September in a first since the magazine began publishing monthly in February 1983. Available in both print and digital form, AVN magazine has hundreds of thousands of readers from around the world.

Mel Fire was ranked second, Violet Doll third and Leena Fox fourth at press time Friday.

The second-place finisher through the 10th will also receive cash prizes for their September earnings total.

Countess Diamond (5th), Goddess Naomi (6th), Princess Emma (7th), Lili Dallas (8th), Goddess Nikki Kit (9th) and Princess Miki Aoki (10th) rounded out the Top 10 earners at press time.

The breakdown is as follows:

1st place: $1500 + AVN magazine cover & feature layout in December 2020

2nd place: $1200

3rd place: $1000

4th place: $800

5th place: $700

6th place: $600

7th place: $500

8th place: $400

9th place: $300

10th place: $200

To join AVN Stars for free, visit stars.avn.com.

Built for adult entertainers, AVN Stars is a subscription-based community where creators can monetize their content without the worry of censorship, discrimination, shadow-banning or suspensions. Creators may charge a subscription fee or make their posts available for free.
The Nigerian Army on Saturday buried three soldiers reportedly killed in a recent ambush by suspected members of Boko Haram.

The unnamed soldiers were buried at the military cemetery located in the Maimalari Barracks of the 7 Division, Nigerian Army in Maiduguri.

The Chief of Army Staff, Tukur Buratai, was reportedly at the funeral that quietly took place on Saturday morning.

Journalists were not invited to cover the funeral.

The three soldiers were buried four days after a Brigade Commander, Dahiru Bako, who died after an ambush along Biu-Damboa road, was laid to rest at the same cemetery.

Sources said the three soldiers also died in an ambush along Biu- Damboa road.

It is not clear if the three deaths were related to the ambush on the late Bako. The army has not spoken on what happened to the soldiers with the slain colonel when his vehicle was attacked.

A statement issued on Monday by the spokesman of Operation Lafiya Dole Theater Command, Maiduguri, Ado Isa, only mentioned Mr Bakos death.

Mr Isa, a colonel in the Nigeria Army, could not be reached at the time of filing this report.

A WhatsApp message sent to him at about 10:56 a.m, seeking information about the said funeral was not replied.

ALSO READ: Borno Governor mourns army colonel killed by Boko Haram

The burial took place barely 24 hours after Boko Haram attacked a convoy of some Borno government officials along Monguno-Baga road.

Three soldiers, eight policemen and four operatives of the Civilian-JTF were killed during the Friday attack.

The corpses are yet to be buried at the time of filing this report.
The visiting Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein met with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani on Saturday, in what marked his first visit to the Iranian capital.

Hussein arrived in Tehran for his two-day visit earlier on Saturday and met Mohammad Javad Zarif, his Iranian counterpart upon arrival.

Zarif visited Baghdad in mid-July, when he met with Hussein and Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi.

It was Zarif's first visit to Iraq since a US airstrike in January killed a top Iranian general, Qassim Soleimani, outside Baghdad's international airport.

The strike catapulted Iraq to the brink of a US-Iran proxy war that could have destabilied the Middle East.

After Zarif's trip, the Iraqi premier visited Iran in July.

The report did not elaborate on the main reasons behind the top Iraqi diplomat's two-day trip to Tehran.

Iran sees neighboring Iraq as a possible route to bypass US sanctions that President Donald Trump re-imposed in 2018 after pulling the US out of the 2015 nuclear deal between Tehran and world powers.

Last year, Iran's exports to Iraq amounted to nearly $9 billion, the official IRNA news agency reported on Tuesday.

It said the two nations will discuss increasing the amount to $20 billion.

Before the current global pandemic, some 5 million Iranian pilgrims annually brought in nearly $5 billion visiting Iraq's Shiite holy sites.

Iran has seen the worst outbreak in the region, with more than 443,000 thousand confirmed cases and at least 25,300 deaths.
Erin Marquino, a junior at the University of Missouri, sits in a hammock, working on her laptop in a photo she posted on Instagram in early September.

Having completely virtual classes has its perks sometimes, but @Mizzou has made it easy to be on campus, too!! the caption reads. Its also been great partnering with them on this campaign to bring awareness to their Renewal Plan! Be sure to keep practicing Covid-19 safety procedures like wearing a mask, sanitizing, & socially distancing, especially on campus!

In a Sept. 17 post, Caleb Poorman, a freshman, looks straight into the camera, shirtless, wearing a Mizzou-branded mask. Hey guys, I hope your school year is going well! In these troubling and uncertain times, its important to stay focused and still have fun, he wrote in the caption. For those who may be struggling with everything going on, the University of Missouri counseling center offers remote individual therapy, he said, adding a phone number students could call to schedule counseling.

Around the country, colleges have enlisted students to help share coronavirus safety messaging on official school channels. The University of Missouri has gone a step further. Over the summer, through a program overseen by the marketing department, it hired six of its own students including Ms. Marquino and Mr. Poorman to serve as social media influencers, sharing content written by the university about coronavirus on their personal accounts.
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Police say a right-wing Proud Boys rally and counter-protests in Portland, Oregon, have largely dispersed without serious violence, though they are investigating an assault after one person who was documenting the event was pushed to the ground and kicked in the face.

About 1,000 people gathered at the Proud Boys rally in Delta Park on Saturday, while a group of 500 left-wing counter-protesters massed at nearby Peninsula Park, leading to fears of clashes.

Ahead of the right-wing rally, which organizers said was to support President Donald Trump and 'to end domestic terrorism', Oregon Governor Kate Brown declared a state of emergency and Mayor Ted Wheeler said it poses the 'greatest threat we've faced so far' amid fears of clashes with left-wing protesters.

At the site of the left-wing Black Lives Matter counter-protest, cops said they seized buckets full of large rocks as well as condoms 'full of unknown liquid'. Condoms filled with urine have previously been used as weapons by Antifa supporters in Portland.

Three blocks from the left-wing protest, an Oregon State Trooper sustained minor injuries after a large rock was throw at his patrol car window, police said.

Separately, police said a criminal citation was issued after officials confiscated firearms, paintball guns, baseball bats and shields from a pick-up truck that was initially stopped for having obscured license plates as it left the Proud Boys rally.

Man pushes live-streamer to the ground and kicks him in the face at Proud Boys is rally in Portland pic.twitter.com/SAdHShqir3  Zane Sparling (@PDXzane) September 26, 2020

The Proud Boys hold a rally in Portland, Oregon. Governor Kate Brown declared a state of emergency prior to Saturdays rally as fears of political violence between Proud Boys and Black Lives Matter protesters grew

Armed left-wing Black Lives Matter protesters (above) gathered in another Portland park about three miles away to counter protest the Proud Boys. It raised fears of violent clashes, but the two rallies dispersed without major incident

At the site of the left-wing Black Lives Matter counter-protest, cops seized buckets full of large rocks as well as condoms 'full of unknown liquid'

After the rally, Proud Boys were spotted loading into trucks with shields and paintball guns in a caravan headed to Vancouver

Police confirmed that officers conducted a traffic stop of a vehicle leaving Delta Park. The officers took possession of firearms, paintball guns, baseball bats, and shields. At least one criminal citation was issued

Photos show the Proud Boys, some heavily kitted out in military-style attire and toting bats and paintball guns, distributing makeshift riot shields from the back of a truck. Police say banned shields were spotted at both rallies and vowed to seize them.

'Our primary focus is life-safety and protection of free speech rights, without regard to the content of that speech,' said a Multnomah County Sheriff's Office spokesman.

At the Proud Boys rally, a man who was livestreaming the event was pushed to the ground and kicked in the face by an unknown assailant. Police are actively investigating, and seeking information in the case.

The events began at noon and were largely dispersed by 3pm. The Oregon Department of Transportation shut down the interstate highway for a brief time to help control the crowd and flow of traffic.

'The purpose of this closure was to clear some people out of the area who wanted to leave and to keep competing groups separate,' said Chris Liedle, a spokesman with the Multnomah County Sheriffs Office, in updates posted on Twitter, as the city had braced for the threat of violence with multiple rallies in the area.

Police also said they arrested three people, including a man suspected of driving under the influence and a woman for an outstanding arrest warrant, Liedle said.

Portland Police Chief Chuck Lovell said in a statement: 'I'm pleased to say that through the unified efforts of Oregon State Police, Multnomah County Sheriff's Office, and the Portland Police, events earlier today were free from serious violence. Thanks to those who demonstrated peacefully. May that continue throughout the evening.'

About 1,000 people gathered at the right-wing Proud Boys rally in Delta Park on Saturday in Portland, Oregon

Proud Boy organizers take the stage at a right-wing rally on Saturday, amid fears of violent clashes with counter-protesters

Members of the Proud Boys and other right-wing demonstrators attend a rally on Saturday in Portland, Oregon

Photos show the Proud Boys, some heavily kitted in military-style attire and toting bats and paintball guns, distributing makeshift riot shields from the back of a truck

Police say banned shields were spotted at both rallies, and vowed to seize them 'as can be done safely and as resources allow'

A Proud Boy supporter is seen carrying a bat and an American flag at Saturday's rally. A large counter-protest nearby led to fears of violent clashes between left-wing and right-wing groups

A supporter of the far right group Proud Boys carries a paintball gun at a rally in Portland, Oregon on Saturday

A Trump supporter poses for a photo on Saturday at Delta Park in Portland, Oregon at a rally to 'end domestic terrorism'

An elderly woman reacts during a the Proud Boys rally, which drew Trump supporters from around the region

Women wearing 'women for Trump' and 'Asians for Trump' shirts show their support at the Proud Boys rally

A police officer speaks to supporters of the far right group Proud Boys at a rally in Portland, Oregon on Saturday

The right-wing event was organized by the Proud Boys, which the Southern Poverty Law Center has called a hate group, saying members regularly use anti-Muslim and white nationalist rhetoric. The group vehemently denies it holds racist ideology, insisting it is a fraternal group spreading an 'anti-political correctness' and 'anti-white guilt' agenda.

At Saturday's rally, a black member of the Proud Boys took the stage and proclaimed: 'I am not an African American, I am an American.'

Just two miles away from the pro-Trump rally, left-wing counter protesters gathered in another park. Police have canceled all officer leave in order to ramp up efforts to keep the two groups apart.

At the counter protest, organizers led the crowd in chants of 'Nazis out' and 'cops and Klan, hand in hand'.

In Portland and across the country, Black Lives Matter protesters have been taking to the streets of America since May, demanding an end to police brutality and racism following the Memorial Day in-custody death of black man George Floyd in Minneapolis.

Demonstrations erupted once again this week when a Kentucky grand jury decided to not bring murder charges against officers involved in the death of Breonna Taylor - a black EMT who was shot six times and killed in a botched raid in March.

Portland has been the scene of some of the most violent demonstrations. On Wednesday, protesters lobbed a massive firebomb at police, and such attacks have increased in frequency.

The Proud Boys vowed that their rally will restore law and order. They condemn what they have branded anti-fascists, 'domestic terrorism' and 'violent gangs of rioting felons' in the city's streets.

Proud Boys and far-right groups kneel in prayer while clutching cans at the rally in an Oregon park Saturday

Some attendees waved the Confederate Flag which has been banned from Portland schools as a symbol of racism and white supremacy

Members of the Proud Boys and other right-wing demonstrators attend the rally at a park near downtown Portland

Proud Boys wearing military body armor have started gathering for a pro-Trump rally to 'end domestic terrorism' in Portland, after Oregon Governor Kate Brown declared a state of emergency

A member of the Proud Boys, which the Southern Poverty Law Center has called a hate group for its anti-Muslim, white supremacist stance, has the group's name tattooed on his arm

Two Proud Boys members sport Fred Perry shirts. The Proud Boys adopted the company's black polo shirt with yellow laurel as their uniform - something that the company has tried to distance itself from, pulling sales of the shirt out of the US because of the association

By midday when the rally started, just 200 people had descended on the park - far fewer than the thousands expected

Almost everyone was wearing some sort of militarized body armor, including helmets and protective vests

Dozens of people waving MAGA flags and decked in Proud Boys merchandise arrived early for the right-wing rally Saturday

The rally is expected to attract thousands who support the president and his 'law and order' reelection campaign

Some attendees carried signs reading 'Free Kyle Now' - a reference to Kyle Rittenhouse, the 17-year-old Illinois teen charged with shooting dead two protesters and injuring another in Kenosha, Wisconsin

Members of the Proud Boys and other right-wing demonstrators kneel in prayer at the rally

Shields are seen as people gather for the rally in Portland, Oregon, where Governor Brown has declared a state of emergency

Two hours before the event was to start, dozens of people began showing up, some packed into the beds of pickup trucks.

By midday when the rally started, just 200 people had descended on the park - far fewer than the thousands expected.

The rally kicked off with the National Anthem and the Pledge of Allegiance.

Almost everyone was wearing some sort of militarized body armor, including helmets and protective vests, but very few wore face masks to slow the spread of coronavirus.

Several were heavily-armed with rifles slung over their shoulders.

Many flew American flags or black flags bearing the logo of the Three Percenters, another far-right group and some wore Make America Great Again hats in a show of support for Trump.

The rally kicked off with the National Anthem and the Pledge of Allegiance before several speeches were held

The air filled with chants against Antifa and confrontations broke out when a large group of far-right attendees surrounded two men they suspected were from Antifa and pushed them out of the park

Some attendees waved the Confederate Flag which has been branded a symbol of racism and white supremacy

Several speeches were held, with many condemning Black Lives Matter protesters who have demonstrated every night for almost four months to call for an end to racism

A group of women wore 'Oregon women for Trump' and 'Asians for Trump' clothing.

Trump 2020 and MAGA merchandise stands were set up for supporters to stock up on more pro-Trump supplies, while men were seen offloading shields from a van in a sign of possible clashes to come.

Some attendees waved the Confederate Flag which has been branded a symbol of racism and white supremacy and banned from Portland schools as a result.

The Proud Boys flag with the laurel emblem also hung on a makeshift stage next to the American flag.

Some attendees carried signs reading 'Free Kyle Now' - a reference to Kyle Rittenhouse, the 17-year-old Illinois teen charged with shooting dead two protesters and injuring another in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

Members of the Proud Boys and other far-right groups knelt in prayer at one point in the rally, some of them clutching cans of Coors Light beer while praying.

Several speeches were held, with many condemning Black Lives Matter protesters who have demonstrated every night for almost four months to call for an end to racism.

The air filled with chants against Antifa and confrontations broke out when a large group of far-right attendees surrounded two men they suspected were from Antifa and pushed them out of the park.

In their permit application for the event filed with the city this week, the Proud Boys referenced Rittenhouse and raised the specter of a vigilante response to the actions of a 'mob'.

'Portland leadership is unwilling to stop the violence,' the Proud Boys wrote in the application.

Members of the Proud Boys and other right-wing demonstrators started arriving two hours before the rally was due t start

A woman holds 'Kyle's Life Matters' signs, a parody on 'Black Lives Matter' and in reference to Rittenhouse

One protester holds up a banner saying 'Who killed Aaron 'Jay' Danielson?' Danielson was a Trump supporter and Patriot Prayer follower who was shot and killed at a protest in downtown Portland

Trump 2020 and MAGA merchandise was on sale at the event expected to draw around 20,000 attendees

Mayor Ted Wheeler said it poses the 'greatest threat we've faced so far' amid fears of clashes with left-wing protesters

Right-wing groups hold up signs with 'who killed...?' on and banners reading 'Kyle's Life Matters' about Rittenhouse

The event is expected to attract thousands who support the president and his 'law and order' reelection campaign

A woman clad in Trump 2020 merchandise and American flags smiles at the rally where some were armed with bats

Crowds began to gather for the event organized by the 'hate group' and extreme right-wing group Proud Boys

'They have been blinded by their hatred of our President and will not allow outside help stopping the violence.'

Prosecutors say Rittenhouse murdered two protesters and wounded a third in Kenosha on August 25.

His attorneys are portraying him as a courageous American patriot who was exercising his right to bear arms during unrest over the police shooting of black man Jacob Blake.

The permit application also mentioned Aaron 'Jay' Danielson, a Trump supporter and Patriot Prayer follower, who was shot and killed after some vehicles in a pro-Trump car caravan diverted into downtown Portland and crossed paths with left-wing activists.

The suspect in the shooting, a self-described anti-fascist, was killed the following week by law enforcement as they tried to arrest him in Washington state.

Proud Boys members drink Coors light while shouting and gesturing at the rally Saturday

Many right-wing members carried flags and Trump 2020 merchandise as they shouted and chanted at the rally

Proud Boys Chairman Enrique Tarrio talks with a law enforcement officer in the park in Portland

He was then seen smoking a cigarette and holding a can of hard seltzer White Claw in front of an American flag

Very few people attending the rally were seen wearing face masks to slow the spread of coronavirus

Proud Boys raised the specter of a vigilante response to the actions of a 'mob' in the application for the rally sent to the city this week

TJ Detweiler, who works in construction and plumbing, said at Saturday's rally that he wanted to end domestic terrorism in the US.

'I would like to see people stop the looting and rioting and enjoy the country for what rights we have,' Detweiler said.

Proud Boys Chairman Enrique Tarrio was seen at the event talking with a law enforcement officer.

The Proud Boys have held multiple events in Portland since Trump's election alongside other right-wing groups such as Patriot Prayer that often end in violent clashes with left-wing counter-demonstrators.

The group has described Saturday's rally as a free speech event but local and state elected officials condemned it and rushed to shore up law enforcement ranks.

People wave flags at the rally that Mayor Ted Wheeler warned poses the 'greatest threat we have seen so far'

Clothing brand Fred Perry released a statement ahead of Saturday's rally saying it has 'absolutely nothing to do with us' as the Proud Boys have adopted the company's iconic black polo shirt with a yellow laurel as their uniform

A woman reacts to another person at the rally while men are seen sporting Proud Boys shirts

The event is taking place in a park about six miles north of downtown Portland. Just two miles away, left-wing counter protesters are gathering in another park

A right-wing demonstrator wears body armor reading 'I hate the left n racism' at Saturday's event

Police have canceled all officer leave in order to ramp up efforts to keep the right-wing groups and left-wing groups apart

Portland has been the scene of much of the demonstrations and the Proud Boys vowed that their rally will restore law and order

Some far-right rally attendees were heavily armed with rifles and wore military vests at Saturday's event

The Proud Boys flag with the laurel emblem hangs next to the American flag at the event

The Proud Boys bow their heads and kneel in prayer at the start of the rally which then erupted into chants

People carried Confederate flags which has been branded racist and a hate symbol by many across America

People embrace as they gather for the rally that has led Governor Kate Brown to declare a state of emergency

The Proud Boys have held multiple events in Portland since Trump's election alongside other right-wing groups

The group has described Saturday's rally as a free speech event but local and state elected officials condemned it and rushed to shore up law enforcement ranks

Proud Boys chairman Enrique Tarrio said 'they will be peaceful unless provoked'

Proud Boys chairman Enrique Tarrio said his group did not intend to cause violence.

'We will be peaceful unless provoked. I encourage people to protest us,' Tarrio wrote on Twitter on Thursday. 'What we won't condone or tolerate is violence towards attendees.'

The men-only Proud Boys group describes itself as a fraternal organization that is 'anti-racism' and 'anti-political correctness.'

Oregon Governor Kate Brown on Friday declared a state of emergency over the weekend due to risks of violence because of the rally involving thousands of members of what she called 'white supremacist groups'.

'I am incredibly concerned about the increased risk of violence in Portland this weekend,' Brown told reporters.

'These types of demonstrations in the past have often ended in fistfights, and sometimes escalated to bloodshed.'

Brown also noted, 'The Proud Boys and Patriot Prayer groups have come to Portland time and time again from out of state looking for a fight and the results are always tragic.

She then added a warning to the group.

'Let me be perfectly clear: We will not tolerate any kind of violence this weekend. Those stoking the flames of violence, those coming to Portland looking for a fight will be held accountable,' Brown said.

Under her emergency declaration, state troopers and the Multnomah County Sheriff's Office will lead a law enforcement taskforce authorized to use 'proportional force' including tear gas to keep the peace, said Oregon State Police Superintendent Travis Hampton.

Oregon Governor Kate Brown (in 2019) declared a state of emergency in Portland over fears of violence between BLM protesters and Proud Boys during a right-wing rally Saturday

Portland's Mayor Ted Wheeler said Saturday's arrival of the Proud Boys and other extreme right-wing groups poses the 'greatest threat we've faced so far'.

'The alt-right and white supremacist groups organizing to come to Portland on Saturday present the greatest threat we've faced so far,' he said in a statement.

'These groups embody and empower racism, intolerance and hate. Those are not Portland values, and they are not welcome here.

'Hate has no home in Portland. They have actively threatened violence against elected officials and others in our community.'

Civil rights group The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) classifies the Proud Boys as a hate group, citing its members' anti-Muslim and misogynist rhetoric.

'Saturday's rally is the latest in a long series of sustained provocations that the Proud Boys have held in Portland,' SPLC research analyst Cassie Miller said in a statement on Friday.

Police are seen rushing towards BLM protesters after a petrol bomb was thrown at the Portland Police Bureau on September 23, following the Breonna Taylor grand jury decision

Local and federal police are seen heading towards protesters on September 23 in Portland

Portland protesters are seen taking cover from smoke during the September 23 demonstration

The FBI has also warned of the dangers the group brings to national security, with FBI director Christopher Wray in February comparing 'racially motivated violent extremism', particularly from white nationalists, to the threat of Isis and other foreign terror groups.

Clothing brand Fred Perry released a statement ahead of Saturday's rally saying it has 'absolutely nothing to do with us, and we are working with our lawyers to pursue any unlawful use of our brand.'

The Proud Boys adopted the company's iconic black polo shirt with a yellow laurel as their uniform leading Fred Perry to pull sales of the style out of America.

President Donald Trump, who has made law and order a principal theme of his bid for re-election on November 3, has singled out Portland as one of several Democratic-led cities he calls 'anarchist jurisdictions.'

His Democratic challenger, former Vice President Joe Biden, says Trump's rhetoric is stoking the violence.
By Steve Peoples and Zeke Miller

WASHINGTON  Ahead of the first debate-stage matchup between President Donald Trump and his Democratic challenger Joe Biden, each campaign is promising a stark contrast in policy, personality and preparation.

Trump has decided to skip any formal preparation. And while Bidens team believes the significance of the debate may be exaggerated, the Democratic nominee has been aggressively preparing to take on the president.

Bidens campaign has been holding mock debate sessions featuring Bob Bauer, a senior Biden adviser and former White House general counsel, playing the role of Trump, according to a person with direct knowledge of the preparations granted anonymity to discuss internal strategy. Bauer has not actually donned a Trump costume in line with Trump stand-ins from previous years, but he is representing his style and expected strategy.

Im sure the president will throw everything he can at (Biden). My guess is that theyre preparing for that  bombarding him with insults and weird digressions, said Jay Carney, a former aide to Biden and President Barack Obama.

I think its an important moment  I think its really important for President Trump, because the direction of this election has been pretty stable for a long time now, and he needs to shake it up as any candidate would whos behind, Carney added. The question is, can that work?

Trump and Biden are scheduled to meet on the debate stage for the first time Tuesday night at Case Western Reserve University and the Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio. The 90-minute event moderated by Fox News host Chris Wallace is the first of three scheduled presidential debates. Vice President Mike Pence and California Sen. Kamala Harris, Bidens running mate, will also debate in October.

Related: What to know and how to watch the Sept. 29 presidential debate

For some, the debates represent the most important moments in the 2020 campaigns closing days, a rare opportunity for millions of voters to compare the candidates' policies and personalities side-by-side on prime-time television. Trump has been trailing Biden in the polls for the entire year, a reality that gives the president an urgent incentive to change the direction of the contest on national television if he can.

Others, including those close to Bidens campaign, do not expect the debates to fundamentally change the race no matter what happens, given voters' daily struggles with the pandemic and the economy. They also point to high-profile debates in past elections thought to be game-changing moments at the time but that ultimately had little lasting effect.

Those with knowledge of Bidens preparations suggest he will not take the fight to Trump if he can avoid it. But on Saturday, at least, he was on the attack when he discussed his strategy on MSNBC.

Im prepared to go out and make my case as to why I think hes failed and why I think the answers I have to proceed will help the American people, the American economy and make us safer internationally, Biden said, arguing that Trump wont persuade voters with broadsides because the people know the president is a liar.

He said he doesnt expect Trump to articulate a detailed vision for a second term.

He doesnt know how to debate the facts, because hes not that smart, Biden continued. He doesnt know that many facts. He doesnt know much about foreign policy. He doesnt know much about domestic policy. He doesnt know much about the detail.

While Biden has said he will try to be a fact checker of sorts on stage, the Democrat is being advised to avoid direct confrontations and instead redirect the conversation to more familiar campaign themes of unity and issues that matter most to voters: the economy, health care and the pandemic.

Arguing over facts, litigating whether what hes saying is accurate, that is not winning to Biden, said Jen Psaki, a former Obama aide who is close to Bidens team. This is an opportunity to speak directly to the American people. His objective should be to speak directly to them, but not be pulled in by Trump. That is hard.

Trump has not been doing any formal preparation, according to aides and allies who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations.

No set has been constructed and aides refused to say whether anyone is playing Biden. Trump, instead, has maintained that the best preparation is doing his day job  particularly his frequent and often contentious interactions with reporters. White House aides also scheduled an ABC town hall earlier this month to expose Trump to real voter questions for the first time in months in preparation for the second debate.

Privately some aides and allies are worried that Trumps lack of formal preparation will lead him to fall into the same hubris trap as other incumbents in their first general election debate. Obama, for example, famously struggled in his first matchup against Mitt Romney in 2012.

But other Trump backers are confident that the president is ready to handle any tough questions or pushback from Biden.

The debates matter, said Lara Trump, a senior adviser to the campaign and the presidents daughter-in-law. Donald Trump certainly did a great job on the debates (in 2016) and I think this will be no different.

Lara Trump also seemed to simultaneously raise and lower expectations for Biden.

Joe Biden spent a lot of time in his basement to study up. Hes been in this game for 47 years. I assume hell do OK, she said. Quite frankly, the bar has been lowered so much for Joe Biden that if he stays awake for the whole thing its like maybe he won.

The mixed messages were in line with those of Trumps allies who spent much of the year raising questions about Bidens physical and mental strength, while in recent days trying to cast him as a strong and experienced debater facing a relative neophyte in Trump.

A former reality show star, the president is keenly aware of the power and pitfalls of live television. Aides say he is acutely mindful of the power of moments to define how a debate is perceived and that he intends to make his share of them happen.

It remains to be seen how aggressively Trump attacks Biden. He has warned apocalyptically about the consequences of a Biden victory and is never one to shy away from a fight. He is also an avowed counterpuncher and will surely respond to any attacks by Biden in kind.

Terry McAuliffe, the former Virginia governor and onetime national Democratic chairman, said Biden must fashion a succinct, debate-stage version of his message since the spring: draw a straight line from Trumps personal deficiencies to his handling of the pandemic, its economic fallout, the national reckoning on race and then explain why a Biden presidency would be different.

Trumps just looking for a Hail Mary here, McAuliffe said. He knows hes in trouble.

___

Peoples reported from New York. AP writer Bill Barrow in Atlanta contributed.
Washington:

In a significant blow to President Donald Trump, a US judge issued an emergency order staying deportations for people who have arrived in America with valid visas from seven Muslim-majority nations but were detained on entry due to the controversial immigration ban.

US District Judge Ann Donnelly in New York issued the emergency order after the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed a petition on behalf of two Iraqi men detained at the John F Kennedy International Airport as thousands of people joined demonstrations at airports across America to protest over Trumps immigration ban on Muslims.

Judge Donnelly, who was appointed by former president Barack Obama, ordered that the government could not remove individuals with refugee applications approved by US Citizenship and Immigration Services as part of the US Refugee Admissions Programme, holders of valid immigrant and non-immigrant visas, and other individuals from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen legally authorised to enter the United States.

She ordered the government to provide lists of all those detained at US airports since the measure went into effect.

The judge said that sending those travellers back to their home countries following Trumps order exposes them to substantial and irreparable injury.

The order barred US border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the US with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application.

Trump ordered extreme vetting of people entering the US from seven Muslim-majority countries and banned the entry of Syrian refugees until further notice yesterday, as part of new measures to keep radical Islamic terrorists out of America.

The controversial move, signed a week after he was sworn-in as the President, fulfills the vow Trump made on the campaign trail to limit Muslim immigration to the US.

This ruling preserves the status quo and ensures that people who have been granted permission to be in this country are not illegally removed off US soil, ACLUs Immigrants Rights Project Deputy Director Lee Gelernt said, welcoming the ruling.

Judge issued stay on Muslim ban, said no one could be removed/sent back. But unclear what will happen to those detained, said ACLU executive director Anthony D Romero.

Clearly the judge understood the possibility for irreparable harm to hundreds of immigrants and lawful visitors to this country, he said.

Our courts today worked as they should as bulwarks against government abuse or unconstitutional policies and orders. On week one, Donald Trump suffered his first loss in court, he added.

Trumps war on equality is already taking a terrible human toll. This ban cannot be allowed to continue, said Omar Jadwat, director of the ACLUs Immigrants? Rights Project.

The executive order signed by Trump bars citizens of seven countries from entering the US for the next 90 days and suspends the admission of all refugees for 120 days. There is exception for Christian refugees.

For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.
New Delhi, Sep 26 : A 35-year-old man was allegedly kidnapped, bludgeoned to death and his body thrown into a canal just because he was unable to repay Rs 4000 that he owed to a local meat seller.

The Delhi Police crime branch has arrested three persons in this case and recovered the Santro car used for disposing of the body.

According to the police, a missing complaint was lodged at Narela Industrial area by a woman who said her husband Irshad has been missing since September 2.

He was last seen with one Bhanu, a resident of Sonipat in Haryana. After the initial investigation, the Crime Branch of Delhi police arrested Bhanu, Pintu Kumar and Anil.

Bhanu tried to mislead the investigators by pretending to help the victim's wife.

Later Bhanu, a supplier of raw meat, confessed that he had been constantly reminding Irshad to pay an outstanding amount of Rs 4,000 on account of supply of raw meat that Irshad had bought from him.

"On September 2, in order to teach him a lesson, Bhanu went to his house and took Irshad along with him in his car. He said that if Irshad wasn't in a position to repay the outstanding amount, he should pay him back by working for him," said DCP Crime Monika Bhardwaj.

Bhanu took him to a poultry farm in Sector B-4, Narela where the two co-accused were already present.

Thereafter Bhanu started beating Irshad with a stick and hit him with his fists.

When Irshad became unconscious, he was left there even as Bhanu and his associates went away.

Irshad succumbed to his injuries and died. Bhanu returned late in the night to the spot and with the help of Pintu Kumar and Anil, shifted the body to his car and later dumped it in a canal near Halalpur Village, in Haryana's Sonipat district.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
PARIS - French women enjoy a reputation for their instinctive knack for spot-on chic attire. But now they may well be confused.

Ministers, already working overtime to tamp down the coronavirus spread and ramp up the economy, have gotten side-tracked in a debate about whether crop tops or other skimpy clothing on adolescent girls in classrooms is a grave affront to the French Republic.

Education Minister Jean-Michel Blanquer has said that girls should go to school dressed in a republican manner. That apparently means prim and modest, but no one is quite sure.

Meanwhile, fueling the feeling that women in France just cant win, some have come under fire recently for covering up too much  by wearing a Muslim headscarf.

Blanquer was responding to an initiative started on social media, dubbed the Monday, Sept. 14 Movement, encouraging students to come to school in their best provocative or indecent clothes. The idea was to claim freedom from what is seen as an implicit dress code in public schools, which have no written rules about attire.

In a land where portraits and statues of the bare-breasted symbol of France, Marianne, are omnipresent, Blanquers remark drew mockery on social media. Some posts portrayed women of the French Revolution in their traditional Phrygian bonnets, and dresses with deep decolletes exposing cleavage.

The word republicain, referring to the French Republic, has in recent years been increasingly thrown about by government officials to describe the values of the democratic system on which France has been built for more than 200 years. But many, even among his government colleagues, think Blanquer went too far.

In France, everyone is free to dress as they like, the minister in charge of equality between women and men, Elisabeth Moreno, said Tuesday in the daily Parisien. Women took centuries to be able to free themselves of dress codes. This freedom (that has been won) has no price.

For some, the education ministers remark in response to the Sept. 14 movement is a minor dispute, but for others the serious issue of womens rights is at stake. Both Moreno and the industry minister, Agnes Pannier-Runacher, regretted that girls alone were the focus of the debate.

A teacher at a high school in Alfortville, southeast of Paris, Francoise Cahen, tweeted: The parents of young Marianne are asked to quickly pick up their child, sent away from school for her non-republican dress. Attached was a picture of the bust of Marianne, Frances national symbol, her breasts bared.

In another tweet, Cahen noted that what is really indecent at school is needy students who cant afford school supplies or gym shoes.

Amid the derision and disagreements, the education minister might take comfort in a poll on skin-revealing clothes in school released Friday by the Ifop polling firm.

The poll of 2,027 adult men and women of all ages showed a broad opposition to such dress, with 73% of women opposed and 58% of men. The poll had a margin of error of around 3%.

Two French out of three (66%) opposed students going to school braless, including 41% of younger people. Plunging necklines also were seen as inappropriate classroom dress, while the popular crop tops baring midriffs got a 55% no from older people, while 59% of under-25s approved.

Pollsters linked the results not to republican dress but to an overall sense that its still up to girls to handle masculine desire despite their generations rejection of such notions.

The debate over school dress was also framed by the resurgence of the long-standing polemic over Muslim headscarves, seen as an affront to Frances secular foundations. The head coverings have been banned in French schools since 2004.

A Muslim university student who wears a headscarf was hounded off Twitter after demonstrating on French TV how fellow students can cook low-budget meals. And separately, the vice-president of the student union UNEF, Maryam Pougetoux, triggered an incident when she appeared before a parliamentary commission on youth and the coronavirus in her headscarf.

Several scandalized lawmakers walked out, starting with Anne-Christine Lang, of President Emmanuel Macrons centrist party. She tweeted that as a feminist attached to republican values ... and womens rights, she saw the veil as a mark of submission and had no choice but to leave.

UNEF replied that to be feminist is as much to back the Monday, Sept. 14, movement as to back women who choose to wear headscarves.

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(Natural News) Tech giant Amazon is limiting the ability of competitors to promote their rival smart speakers, video doorbells and other devices on its e-commerce platform. This is according to both Amazon employees and executives at rival companies.

The strategy is seen to give Amazons own devices an edge, which the company sees as central to building customer loyalty. The strategy, however, puts other gadget makers who rely on Amazons site for a significant share of their sales at a disadvantage.

Amazon blocks ads and even products from competitors

Amazon routinely lets other companies buy ads that appear inside search results, including searches for competing products. These represent a lucrative part of the companys business.

Some of the companies, however, who have products that directly compete with Amazons own are being prevented by from buying sponsor-product ads tied to searches for Amazons own devices, such as Fire TV, Echo Show and Ring Doorbell, according to some Amazon employees and others familiar with the policy.

Examples include products from Roku Inc., maker of devices that stream content to TVs, similar to Amazons own Fire TV, which cannot even buy Amazon ads tied to its own products.

Even other tech giants have experienced issues with Amazon. Facebook has encountered issues when trying to advertise its own voice-activated smart displays. Google, on the other hand, had been blocked by Amazon from selling its Chromecast streaming devices, which compete with Amazons Fire TV.

Amazons barring of these companies from advertising shows the conflict between the e-commerce platform that Amazon initially built its business upon and its growing role as a product manufacturer in its own right.

Traditional retailers buy inventory from manufacturers and resell it to consumers, limiting the number of vendors they can work with. Amazon, on the other hand, has more than a million businesses and entrepreneurs selling directly to Amazon shoppers. The company currently accounts for 38 percent of all online shopping in the U.S., with roughly half of all online shopping searching in the country starting on Amazon.com.

Amazons device business is stated to be a priority of CEO Jeff Bezos, who sees it as a way of building customer loyalty. (Related: Pandemic profiteering: Watchdog accuses Amazon of price gouging as Bezos wealth soars to $200 billion.)

When somebody buys an Amazon device, they become a better Amazon customer, said Dave Limp, who heads the companys devices business, in an interview last year. Limp explained that the company can build services attached to those devices, enabling it to sell the gadgets at a low price.

We dont have to make money when we sell you the device, he said.

Amazon claims that its industry practice, but that may not stop legislators from investigating

In response to a request for comment by the Wall Street Journal, Amazon stated that the practice was actually common among retailers, and not just itself.

News flash: retailers promote their own products and often dont sell products of competitors, said Amazon spokesman Drew Herdener in a written statement. Herdner then pointed out how Walmart refuses to sell Amazon brands such as Kindle, Fire TV and Echo.

The restrictions Amazon has put in place, however, do mean that products that they do allow from rival companies often dont appear atop search results for those products.

According to tests done by the Wall Street Journal, searches for Roku products frequently displayed sponsored product advertisements from Roku competitors  not just Amazons  or Roku products offered by resellers.

Amazons actions could attract the attention of legislators who are already looking into the companys business practices and its treatment of competing sellers on its site. In July, Bezos was made to testify to Congress about the tactics of Amazons private-label brands and the companys business practices in general.

Meanwhile, the Federal Trade Commission, Department of Justice as well as European Union and Canadian regulators are also looking into the companys business practices.

Follow TechGiants.news for more on Amazons shady, anti-competitive practices.

Sources include:

WSJ.com

FR24News.com
China, UN to hold high-level conference on poverty reduction, South-South cooperation

BEIJING, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi will on Saturday attend and chair a high-level virtual conference on poverty alleviation and South-South cooperation, a Foreign Ministry spokesperson announced Friday.

China will co-organize the conference with the United Nations (UN) Department of Economic and Social Affairs and the United Nations Development Programme, spokesperson Wang Wenbin told a daily press briefing.

This year marks the 75th anniversary of UN's founding.
In 2002 Mr. Hufnagel opened the first Huf, a streetwear boutique that carried rare sneakers and apparel by brands like Supreme, in San Francisco. Huf had a minimalist interior design that highlighted its products, and the stores also displayed and sold works of art by skateboarders and artists like Aaron Rose and Haroshi.

In time Huf expanded to new locations and became catnip for sneakerheads, who waited in line for hours to spend hundreds of dollars on limited-release Nikes or Adidas.

Mr. Hufnagel designed some of those prized sneakers himself, including customized Nike Dunks, tie-dyed in the colors of the San Francisco Giants, and the Nike Air Max 90 HUFquakes, with a colorway that looked like a crackling fault line.

The store eventually developed into a label of its own, featuring apparel sometimes branded with a straightforward H logo and sometimes with more profane slogans. Huf apparel became known for irreverent T-shirts, capacious and durable pants and hoodies, and limited runs of products pegged to musical acts like Smashing Pumpkins, cartoon characters like Felix the Cat and products like Budweiser.

The company also made skate shoes for years, and supports a team of professional skateboarders. Mr. Hufnagel, of course, rode for his brand.

Our clothing retails a bit higher than your average core skate brand, but our apparel winds up appealing to a broader spectrum of people, Mr. Hufnagel told WWD in 2009. We definitely take function into consideration, so you can skate in nearly anything we make, but you can wear what we make in a variety of elements outside of skating.
Stan Margulies was a little apprehensive about coming to Rapid City for the preview of a film produced by him and David Wolper called The Mystic Warrior. Margulies and Wolper had joined forces to produce the great TV miniseries on slavery called Roots. They had also produced the Thorn Birds.

But when they turned a book by Ruth Beebe Hill called Hanta Yo into a TV miniseries they faced some criticism from several Lakota people about its authenticity. They first made the mistake of having their publicist call the miniseries the Roots of Indian Country. With more than 500 Indian tribes in America, each with different traditions, language and culture, that was not very likely.

Margulies asked me, Joe American Horse, and Mike Her Many Horses to review the script while the shooting was in progress and make any cultural changes we thought to be necessary. After the show was complete Margulies decided to preview it at the Elks Theater in Rapid City in early 1982. Joe, Mike and I flew out to LA to meet with Wolper and Margulies and discuss some of the changes we had made to the script. It was a good meeting and they agreed to adjust the script.

Ruth Ziolkowski, the wife of Korczak, the sculptor of the Crazy Horse Monument, called me and invited Margulies and me to dinner at the Memorial. Margulies had produced the 1971 movie Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory and the Ziolkowski children had fallen in love with the movie and wanted very badly to meet the producer.

Before we drove up to the Mountain I got a call from Stans secretary. She asked me to get a bottle of orange juice and keep it in the car because Stan had diabetes and at times his blood sugar fell very low and it was dangerous. I did as she asked. We had a wonderful dinner at the Crazy Horse Memorial. All 11 children were there and Margulies regaled them with tales of behind the scenes while shooting Willie Wonka.

It was late in the evening when we drove back to Rapid City. As we approached Hill City we saw the flashing lights of a police car behind us. Stan and I had both had a couple of glasses of the homemade wine served at our dinner. We were a little apprehensive when the Hill City police officer walked up to the car, asked for my drivers license and shined his flashlight in the window. He immediately recognized Margulies. He asked for an autograph handed me back my drivers license and waved us on our way.

The Elks Theater was packed that night. Oglala Sioux tribal members were invited to the movie without charges. Joe American Horse was honored and then the lights dimmed and the movie was on. It was going to be a two-part series on ABC so the first part of the show went on and we were given a 30 minute break before Part II aired. All in all Margulies need not have been apprehensive because everybody loved the show.

Jump Big Crow and Robert Fast Horse came up to Stan and me after the show to tell Stan how much they enjoyed the movie and I could see Stan visibly relax.

I think that the bad public relations preceding the show caused confusion and concern and so what could have, and should have, been a great movie about American Indians never got off of the ground. It aired for two consecutive nights on ABC and it never had the impact we hoped it would.

I still have the tapes of the Mystic Warrior and I take them out and look at them occasionally if only to see my old friends Will Sampson and Sonny Skyhawk playing their assigned roles. Sampson made his film debut in One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest and Skyhawk has been in several movies, but his major role in Hollywood had been as an advocate to get fair treatment for Native American actors.

Thanks to Skyhawk many of the roles that would have gone to non-Natives posing as Natives are now going to real Native Americans. Sampson came to Rapid City in the early 1970s to appear on my television show that aired on KEVN-TV back then called The First Americans. The interview is available on Utube.

Margulies passed away not long after he produced The Mystic Warrior, but he always recalled the wonderful trip he made to Rapid City, the Crazy Horse Memorial and the Black Hills.

(Tim Giago can be contacted at najournalist1@gmail.com)

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The small number of mishandled military ballots at a Pennsylvania elections board that sparked a federal inquiry and allegations from the Trump campaign that Democrats were "trying to steal the election" were actually "incorrectly" tossed by a temp, a county official said Friday.

In a press release, Luzerne County County Manager David Pedri said a "temporary seasonal independent contractor" who started work sorting mail at the Elections Bureau on Sept. 14th had "incorrectly" thrown out a small number of military and overseas ballots.

The county elections director found out what had happened two days later, and had all the trash from the three-day period "placed in a dumpster and secured," the release said.

Each bag of garbage from the entire building in the dumpster was searched by the Federal Bureau of Investigations, the Luzerne County District Attorneys Office, Pennsylvania State Police as well as Luzerne County staff. All items of concern were taken into custody by the Federal Bureau of Investigations, according to the release, which noted the temp was asked not to return.

In a highly unusual move Thursday, David Freed, the U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, issued a statement saying his office had begun "an inquiry into reports of potential issues with a small number of mail-in ballots at the Luzerne County Board of Elections." The release also noted that at least seven of the nine ballots were "cast for presidential candidate Donald Trump."

Freed's release was tweeted out by the White House and the Trump campaign, with the campaign's deputy communications director Matt Wolking summarizing the release as "FBI finds military mail-in ballots discarded in Pennsylvania. 100% of them were cast for President Trump. Democrats are trying to steal the election."

In a letter to Luzerne County officials later in the day, Freed said their initial findings showed the ballots may have been opened by a staffer who confused the envelopes with absentee ballot applications.

Story continues

Wolking later deleted his tweet accusing Democrats of having been involved, but Trump again suggested on Friday it was part of a Democratic plot against him.

"Democrats are playing games, you see that. You see that they found ballots in a wastepaper basket," he said at an event in Florida.

The county's release said election officials found out the discarded ballots were Trump votes from Freed's press release.

Matthew Miller, a spokesman for the Justice Department during the Obama administration, told MSNBC's "MTP Daily" that DOJ's actions in the case are "highly unusual, highly political and highly inappropriate."

"There's just an overall rule that DOJ doesn't comment on ongoing investigations" and "even stronger rules for investigations involving elections," Miller said, adding "there is no reason they should have mentioned the candidate for whom these ballots were cast. ... It's irrelevant to the investigation. The only reason you'd make that claim publicly is because you're trying to help the president."

While general mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania don't get sent out until October, ballots for overseas and military voters in the county were sent out beginning on Aug. 25th, the county said.


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Kaley Cuoco has been hard at work shooting the upcoming HBO Max miniseries The Flight Attendant.

And on Friday The Big Bang Theory actress was spotted enjoying some downtime, in between scenes, on the set in Brooklyn, New York.

Flashing a big beaming smile, Cuoco stepped out the front door of a restaurant showing her homage to the Big Apple by wearing an 'I Love New York' hoodie.

In-between takes: Kaley Cuoco, 34, was spotted on the set of her upcoming HBO Max miniseries The Flight Attendant in Brooklyn, New York on Friday

The California native, 34, wore a grey-patterned overcoat over the hoodie with a pair of faded black denim jeans that were cuffed above her ankles.

Adding an edgy touch, she also donned a pair of burgundy platform boots and had her blonde tresses styled long to the middle of her back with a part in the middle.

It appears Cuoco's outfit was part of the costume stylists had her wearing for her upcoming scene for the miniseries.

When in Rome: The Big Bang Theory actress showed homage to New York by wearing a 'I love NY' hoodie, which was likely part of her outfit for an upcoming scene for the miniseries

Break time: After mulling about outside the restaurant with crew members, the actress decided to take a walk with her beloved dog Dumpy, who she pushed in a baby stroller

After mulling about outside the restaurant with crew members, Cuoco decided to take a walk with her beloved dog Dumpy, who she pushed in a baby stroller.

For the stroll the 34-year-old put on a black protective mask amid the still ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

At point she stopped to say hello to a large dog that one of the crew members had on a leash.

Filming for season one of The Flight Attendant was more than halfway finished when the shoot was suspended in March due to the coronavirus crisis.

Four-legged friends: The dog lover also took some time to say hello to a large pooch on the set

The cast and crew reassembled in New York in late August but had to go into quarantine for 14 days before they could start filming.

In the miniseries, Cuoco plays Cassandra 'Cassie' Bowden, a flight attendant who Cassandra Bowden wakes up in her hotel room hungover from the night before in Dubai with a dead body lying next to her.

Afraid to call the police, she continues her morning as if nothing happened and catches up with the other flight attendants and pilots traveling to the airport.

By the time the flight reaches New York, she is met by FBI agents who question her about the layover in Dubai, which leaves her wondering whether should could be the killer.
Production will take place in Queensland on three US television productions, including a Joe Exotic dramatisation of the Tiger King star.

Brisbanes Screen Queensland Studios will be home to 18 months of production from Universal Studio Group, a division of NBCUniversal.

Matchbox Pictures will lead and oversee all three projects for Universal Studio Group, which comprises Universal Television, Universal Content Productions (UCP) and NBCUniversal International Studios:

From Nahnatchka Khan (Fresh Off the Boat) and Dwayne Johnson, NBCs Young Rock is a comedy inspired by Johnson himself. The show will be produced by Universal Television, Seven Bucks Productions and Fierce Baby Productions.

Joe Exotic is a limited series from UCP based on the hit Wondery podcast depicting the true events of Carole Baskin (Saturday Night Lives Kate McKinnon), a big cat enthusiast, who learns that fellow exotic animal lover Joe Exotic Schreibvogel is breeding and using his big cats for profit, and sets out to shut down his venture, inciting a quickly escalating rivalry. The eight-episode adaptation will launch on flagship network NBC, USA Network and streaming service Peacock.

Hailing from NBCUniversal International Studios Matchbox Pictures is new ten-part drama series Irreverent, which is being developed and produced for the global market. It follows a criminal on the run from his life of crime back in New York, who is forced to hide out in a reef town in Far North Queensland, posing as the new church Reverend.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said, These productions are expected to contribute around $143 million to the Queensland economy.

More than 3,500 local cast, crew and extras will also be employed to work across the three shows and many more jobs supported in numerous industries like hospitality, tourism, transport and logistics.

Due to the measures we have in place and the amazing efforts of Queenslanders in dealing with this pandemic, Queensland is one of the safest places to film not just in Australia, but in the world.

Queensland locations, together with talented crew and first-rate facilities like Brisbanes Screen Queensland Studios, are able to deliver what these big budget productions need.

Were able to support the industry and get people back into work in a COVID safe environment.

Screen Queensland CEO Kylie Munnich said, This is a massive boost for the Queensland screen industry and a vote of confidence in how safe Queensland is as a major destination for film and TV production.

We cant wait to welcome the Universal Studio Group and Matchbox teams to Screen Queensland Studios and watch as these series take shape, and also see our facilities and locations showcased around the world.

Screen Queensland was able to help attract these productions to Queensland through the Queensland Governments Production Attraction Strategy.
The PT sessions relieved his ankle pain, but only temporarily. By May, the pain had migrated to his right knee and lower back. A month later his metatarsals  long bones in the feet that maintain balance and distribute body weight  began to hurt. The pain then moved to his shoulders. Perhaps, Gajavelli thought, the problem was caused by the way he was climbing stairs at home. To take the weight off his sore ankle Gajavelli extended his arm to grab the railing and hoist himself up.
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Linkedin (Agence France-Presse) Los Angeles, United States  Sat, September 26, 2020 21:05 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c47719fb 2 Food supermarket,junk-food,california Free

Berkeley in northern California will ban the sale of junk food from supermarket checkout displays -- becoming the first US city to do so, according to local media.

The city council unanimously passed a bill this week to promote healthier eating, by prohibiting products with over 5 grams of added sugar or 250mg of sodium from checkout aisles.

Drinks high in sugar and artificial sweeteners will also be restricted.

"The healthy checkout ordinance is essential for community health, especially in the time of COVID-19," said councilmember Kate Harrison.

"What is good for Berkeley customers is also good for our businesses."

The ordinance noted that cheap, unhealthy food dominates checkout displays, where "shoppers are more likely to make impulse purchases and where parents struggle with their children over demands to buy treats."

Read also: Seeing what your friends are eating on social media may influence your eating habits

The ban will affect 25 large supermarkets in the university city of around 120,000 people from next March.

Progressive Berkeley, just across the Bay from San Francisco, has a track record of pioneering health initiatives.

In 2014 it imposed a tax on soft drinks that was adopted by several other major US cities.

According to a study last year, Berkeley residents reduced their consumption of soft drinks by half by 2017.
As if working mothers did not have enough to worry about, experts are now sounding the alarm that progress toward gender equality may be the latest in a long list of casualties of the coronavirus pandemic.

Substantial research has shown that most professional gender gaps are in fact motherhood gaps: women without children are much closer to parity with men when it comes to salaries and promotions, but mothers pay a large career penalty.

Women tend to take on more of the burdens of caring for children and the family. To go to work, they need someone to help with that care. But fathers have been slow to change their behavior. And without subsidies, private child care can be prohibitively expensive.

Workplaces already tend to penalize women who choose to work fewer hours or need more flexibility, and that, too, is proving to be exacerbated in the pandemic.
Area animal shelters showered with funds in memory of Betty White

The online fundraiser challenged fans of actress Betty White to donate to a local animal rescue or shelter in honor of her Jan. 17 birthday.
In a momentous week, President Donald Trump painted a fantastical portrait of a coronavirus that affects virtually nobody among the young as he faced a grim U.S. milestone of 200,000 deaths and he asserted a constitutional basis that doesn't exist for rushing a replacement for the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg over her dying wishes.

As Americans absorbed news of a grand jury decision not to prosecute Kentucky police officers for killing Breonna Taylor, Trump's campaign pointed to purported economic progress for Blacks under his administration that didn't tell the full story.

And with their first debate days away, Democratic presidential rival Joe Biden botched details about the pivotal Supreme Court vacancy and exaggerated his early statements on COVID-19, saying he declared it a pandemic in January when he didnt.

A sampling of the misstatements on these topics and more:

200,000 DEATHS

TRUMP, speaking hours before the U.S. hit a milestone of 200,000 virus deaths: It affects elderly people, elderly people with heart problems, and other problems. If they have other problems, thats what it really affects. ... In some states thousands of people  nobody young  below the age of 18, like nobody  they have a strong immune system  who knows? ... It affects virtually nobody.  rally Monday in Ohio.

THE FACTS: No, it's affected quite a few.

In all, the U.S. death toll from the coronavirus topped 200,000 Tuesday, by far the highest in the world, hitting the once-unimaginable threshold six weeks before an election that is certain to be a referendum on his handling of the crisis. The number of dead is equivalent to a 9/11 attack every day for 67 days. It is roughly equal to the population of Salt Lake City or Huntsville, Alabama.

Kids certainly aren't immune and Trump ignores racial disparities among those who get infected. He is also brazenly contradicting what he privately told journalist Bob Woodward.

Now it's turning out it's not just old people, Bob, he told Woodward in March. It's plenty of young people.

Although its true that children are less likely than adults to develop COVID-19, the CDC has nevertheless counted more than 419,000 infections in Americans younger than 18, or about 8.5% of all cases. Racial disparities in the U.S. outbreak also extend to children, with Hispanic and Black children with COVID-19 more likely to be hospitalized than white kids.

It isnt just the elderly, Dr. Anthony Fauci the governments top infectious diseases expert, told CNN on Tuesday. He noted that a person of any age with underlying health conditions is at significantly higher risk of serious effects if they get COVID-19.

The total number of kids who have been infected but not confirmed is almost certainly far higher than the CDC figures, experts say, because those with mild or no symptoms are less likely to get tested. Kids also can spread disease without showing symptoms themselves.

The CDC in May also warned doctors to be on the lookout for a rare but life-threatening inflammatory reaction in some children whove had the coronavirus. The condition had been reported in more than 100 children in New York, and in some kids in several other states and in Europe, with some deaths.

___

TRUMP: Were rounding the corner  with or without a vaccine.  interview Monday on Fox & Friends."

TRUMP, asked if the virus will go away if there isn't a vaccine immediately available: Sure, with time it goes away. And youll develop  youll develop herd-like, a herd mentality. Its going to be  its going to be herd-developed, and thats going to happen.  ABC News town hall on Sept. 15.

THE FACTS: Trump appeared to promote a herd immunity approach to the virus if a vaccine isn't immediately available that would require millions more people to get infected and significantly higher deaths.

Public health officials say that to reach herd immunity, which is when the virus can no longer spread easily, at least 70% of the population, or 200 million people, would need to develop antibodies. The U.S. currently has 7 million COVID-19 cases.

Developing herd immunity doesnt just take time, it works by infecting over a hundred million and killing hundreds of thousands," University of Michigan professor Justin Wolfers tweeted. "Hes describing a massacre.

Fauci last month called a herd immunity approach totally unacceptable because a lot of people are going to die.

He also disagrees the virus is rounding the corner," saying Americans should not underestimate the pandemic and they will need to hunker down and get through this fall and winter because its not going to be easy. Fauci and other health experts such as Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, have warned of a potentially bad fall because of dual threats of the coronavirus and the flu season.

___

GINSBURG

TRUMP, on Ginsburgs request that her replacement be chosen by the next president: I dont know that she said that, or if that was written out by Adam Schiff, and Schumer and Pelosi. That came out of the wind. It sounds so beautiful, but that sounds like a Schumer deal, or maybe Pelosi or Shifty Schiff.  interview Monday with Fox & Friends.

THE FACTS: Hes making a baseless assertion that congressional Democrats invented Ginsburgs request, which Trump is ignoring by announcing a new nominee Saturday.

In the days before her death on Sept. 18, Ginsburg told her granddaughter Clara Spera that my most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed, according to NPRs Nina Totenberg, a longtime veteran Supreme Court reporter.

Totenberg, who is close to the Ginsburg family, reaffirmed her reporting this week. She told MSNBC on Monday that others in the room at the time also heard Ginsburg make the statement, including her doctor. I checked because Im a reporter, Totenberg said.

There is certainly no evidence that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Rep. Adam Schiff or Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer manufactured Ginsburgs request, as Trump asserts. Mr. President, this is low. Even for you, Schiff tweeted Monday.

___

COURT NOMINATION

TRUMP, on why hes moving forward with a nomination so close to the Nov. 3 election: I have a constitutional obligation to put in nine judges  justices.  remarks Tuesday to reporters.

THE FACTS: To be clear, there is no constitutional requirement to have nine justices on the Supreme Court.

The Constitution, in fact, specifies no size for the Supreme Court, and Congress has the power to change its size.

Over its history, the high court has varied in size from five to 10 justices, depending on the number of judicial circuits in the U.S., according to Russell Wheeler, a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution and former deputy director of the Federal Judicial Center. He explained that a major duty of the justices until the late 19th century was to try cases in the old circuit courts. Congress decided on nine circuits in the late 1860s.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt pushed to expand the high court in the 1930s in a bid to gain broader judicial support for his New Deal policies, but that effort failed.

___

BIDEN, arguing that a Supreme Court nomination should be decided by the next president so voters can have their voice heard in who serves on the court: Theres no court session between now and the end of this election.  remarks Sept. 20 in Philadelphia.

THE FACTS: Hes wrong on the scheduling. A new Supreme Court session begins Oct. 5, nearly one month before the election on Nov. 3. The justices are set to hear oral arguments in several cases during that time.

___

TRUMP: We need nine justices. You need that. With the unsolicited millions of ballots that theyre sending, its a scam; its a hoax. Everybody knows that. And the Democrats know it better than anybody else. ... So doing it before the election would be a very good thing because youre going to probably see it.  remarks Tuesday to reporters.

THE FACTS: Theres nothing fraudulent about mail-in ballots, and Trumps repeated false assertions certainly dont provide a valid justification to speed up a judicial nomination.

First of all, there is no such thing as an unsolicited ballot. Five states routinely send ballots to all registered voters so they can choose to vote through the mail or in person. Four other states and the District of Columbia will be adopting that system in November, as will almost every county in Montana. Election officials note that, by registering to vote, people are effectively requesting a ballot, so it makes no sense to call the materials sent to them unsolicited.

More broadly speaking, voter fraud has proved exceedingly rare. The Brennan Center for Justice in 2017 ranked the risk of ballot fraud at 0.00004% to 0.0009%, based on studies of past elections.

In the five states that regularly send ballots to all voters who have registered, there have been no major cases of fraud or difficulty counting the votes.

Of the four states adopting the system of universal mail balloting this year, only Nevada is a battleground, worth six electoral votes and likely to be pivotal only in a national presidential deadlock.

Its true that many states are expecting a surge in mail-in voting because of the coronavirus pandemic, which may lead to longer times in vote counting. But there is no evidence to indicate that massive fraud from unsolicited balloting is afoot.

___

BIDEN: We cant keep rewriting history, scrambling norms, ignoring our cherished system of checks and balances. That includes this whole business of releasing a list of potential nominees that I would put forward. Theyre now saying, after Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed away, they said, Biden should release his list. Its no wonder the Trump campaign asked that I release the list only after she passed away.  remarks Sept. 20 in Philadelphia.

THE FACTS: Its not true that the Trump campaign waited until Ginsburgs death last week to call for Bidens list of potential Supreme Court nominees. Trump was calling for it last month.

On Sept. 9, Trump released a list of 20 additional people he would consider nominating to the high court if there were vacancies. He released a similar list in 2016.

In a press release that same day, Trumps 2020 campaign manager, Bill Stepien, said Voters deserve transparency and a clear view of what direction candidates for president would take our federal courts. We now forcefully demand that Joe Biden do the same.

Trump called for a list from Biden even earlier, during the Republican National Convention on Aug. 24.

Remember this, Im saying that  Im demanding actually, a list. Let Biden put up a list of the judges hes going to appoint, Trump said.

Biden has pledged to appoint the first Black woman to the Supreme Court but hasnt offered additional details.

___

HEALTH CARE

TRUMP: The historic action I'm taking today includes the first-ever executive order to affirm it is the official policy of the United States government to protect patients with preexisting conditions. So we're making that official.  remarks Thursday in North Carolina.

THE FACTS: It's already been the official federal policy to protect people with preexisting medical conditions because Obamacare already does that, and its the law of the land. Trump is currently trying to dismantle that law. If he persuades the Supreme Court to overturn the Affordable Care Act as unconstitutional, its unclear what degree of actual protection the executive order would offer in place of the law.

President Barack Obama's health law states that a group health plan and a health insurance issuer offering group or individual health insurance coverage may not impose any preexisting condition exclusion with respect to such plan or coverage.

Other sections of the law act to bar insurers from charging more to people because of past medical problems and from canceling coverage, except in cases of fraud. In the past, there were horror stories of insurers canceling coverage because a patient had a recurrence of cancer.

Its dubious that any president could enact such protections through an executive order, or Obama would never have needed to go to Congress to get his health law passed. Likewise, President Bill Clinton could have simply used a presidential decree to enact his health plan, or major parts of it, after it failed to get through Congress.

___

TRUMP, on Republicans: "Democrats like to constantly talk about it, and yet preexisting conditions are much safer with us than they are with them.  North Carolina remarks.

THE FACTS: That's highly questionable.

Republicans were unable to muscle their replacement for Obamacare through Congress when they controlled the House and Senate in 2017 during Trumps first year. Various GOP bills would have offered a degree of protection for people with preexisting conditions, but the proposed safeguards were seen as less than what the law already provided. The general approach in the Republican legislation would have required people to maintain continuous coverage to avoid being turned down because of a preexisting condition.

Trump has frequently claimed he will always protect preexisting conditions despite evidence to the contrary and has even asserted falsely that he was the one who saved such protections.

One of Trumps alternatives to Obamas law  short-term health insurance, already in place  doesnt have to cover preexisting conditions. Another alternative: association health plans, which are oriented to small businesses and sole proprietors and do cover preexisting conditions. Neither of the two alternatives appears to have made much difference in the market.

Democratic attacks on Republican efforts to repeal the health law and weaken preexisting condition protections proved successful in the 2018 midterms, when Democrats won back control of the House.

___

RACIAL PROGRESS

TRUMP CAMPAIGN: Black Americans dont have to imagine what the economy would be like under Joe Biden because theyve already lived through it. He oversaw the slowest recovery since the Great Depression, with stagnant wage growth and anemic job creation.  statement Wednesday from Katrina Pierson, the campaigns senior adviser.

THE FACTS: Thats not fully accurate. The economy was healthy when Trump arrived at the White House.

Even if the recovery from the 2008 financial crisis was agonizingly slow, Trump took office with unemployment at a low 4.7%, steady job growth and a falling federal budget deficit. The longest expansion in U.S. history began in the middle of 2009 and continued until the start of the year, spanning both the Obama and Trump presidencies.

The U.S. economy did benefit from Trumps 2017 tax cuts with a jump in growth in 2018, but the budget deficit began to climb as a result of the tax breaks that favored companies and the wealthy in hopes of permanently expanding the economy. Annual growth during Obamas second term averaged about 2.3%. Trump notched a slightly better 2.5% during his first three years, but the country swung into recession this year because of the coronavirus and will probably leave Trump with an inferior track record to his predecessor over four years.

___

TRUMP CAMPAIGN: President Trump, on the other hand, has a real record of accomplishments for the Black community, including achieving record-low unemployment prior to the global pandemic. ...President Trump is a far better choice for Black Americans and it isnt even a close call.  Piersons statement.

THE FACTS: The campaign is skirting key facts.

Republicans can talk successfully about the decline in unemployment rates for Black and Hispanic workers. But thats just one gauge  and plenty of troubles and inequalities abound for minorities. Minority groups still lagged behind white people with regard to incomes, wealth and home ownership before the pandemic. And when the coronavirus struck, it became clear that the economy did not work well for everybody as the job losses and infections disproportionately hit minorities.

Black unemployment now stands at 13%. Hispanic unemployment is 10.5%. The white unemployment rate is 7.3%. For every dollar of total wealth held by white households, Blacks have just 5 cents, according to the Federal Reserve. Its 4 cents for Hispanics.

___

BIDEN, criticizing Trump for posing for pictures while holding a Bible in front of a church near the White House after protesters in a park were forcibly removed: The protesters were removed so Trump could walk across to a Protestant church and hold a Bible upside down  I dont know if he ever opened it  upside down, and then go back to a bunker in the White House.  CNN town hall on Sept. 17.

THE FACTS: To be clear, Trump was not holding a Bible upside down.

His administration did fire off chemical irritants and smoke bombs in June to clear demonstrators who had gathered in Lafayette Park to speak out against the killing of George Floyd, a Black man who died after a Minneapolis police officer pressed his knee onto his neck. Trump then walked across the park to hold up a Bible at St. Johns Church for the cameras. Associated Press photos and other videos show the Bible was right side up.

Trump also took shelter in a White House bunker in the days before his visit to St. Johns, not after, as Biden asserts.

___

MORE ON THE VIRUS

BIDEN, contrasting his approach to the coronavirus vs. Trump's: Imagine had he at the State of the Union stood up and said, when back in January, I wrote an article for USA Today saying, Weve got a pandemic. Weve got a real problem.' Imagine if he had said something. How many more people would be alive?  CNN town hall on Sept. 17.

THE FACTS: Biden is incorrect that Trump didn't mention the coronavirus in his State of the Union address. The former vice president also exaggerates what he himself said about it in a Jan. 27 op-ed in USA Today.

Trump made brief mention of COVID-19 in his Feb. 4 address, which came five weeks before it was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization. He said:

Protecting Americans health also means fighting infectious diseases. We are coordinating with the Chinese government and working closely together on the coronavirus outbreak in China. My administration will take all necessary steps to safeguard our citizens from this threat.

A few days later on Feb. 7, Trump privately described the coronavirus to Woodward as more deadly than even your strenuous flus. It's unclear if Trump knew or believed that at the time of his State of the Union address, although he later acknowledged in Woodward's book Rage" that he often played down the virus threat in public, so as to avoid panic.

Biden's op-ed makes clear his own view that the coronavirus in the U.S. will get worse before it gets better, but Biden does not declare it a pandemic. He wrote: The possibility of a pandemic is a challenge Donald Trump is unqualified to handle as president.

___

TRUMP, calling Biden's handling of the swine flu during the Obama administration a disaster: Joe Bidens incompetent ... They had no clue.  interview Tuesday with Detroit's WJBK Fox 2 TV station.

THE FACTS: Trump frequently distorts what happened in the pandemic of 2009, which killed far fewer people in the United States than the coronavirus is killing now. For starters, Biden as vice president wasnt running the federal response. And that response was faster out of the gate than when COVID-19 came to the U.S.

Then, the Centers for Disease Control and Preventions flu surveillance network sounded the alarm after two children in California became the first people diagnosed with the new flu strain in this country.

About two weeks later, the Obama administration declared a public health emergency against H1NI, also known as the swine flu, and the CDC began releasing anti-flu drugs from the national stockpile to help hospitals get ready. In contrast, Trump declared a state of emergency in early March, seven weeks after the first U.S. case of COVID-19 was announced, and the countrys health system struggled for months with shortages of critical supplies and testing.

More than 200,000 people have died from COVID-19 in the U.S. The CDC puts the U.S. death toll from the 2009-2010 H1N1 pandemic at about 12,500.

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Associated Press writers Carla K. Johnson in Seattle, Jessica Gresko, Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar, Jill Colvin, Kevin Freking and Darlene Superville in Washington, Nicholas Riccardi in Denver and Bill Barrow in Atlanta contributed to this report.

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EDITOR'S NOTE  A look at the veracity of claims by political figures.

___

Find AP Fact Checks at http://apnews.com/APFactCheck

Follow @APFactCheck on Twitter: https://twitter.com/APFactCheck
Archbishop of Dublin and Primate of Ireland Diarmuid Martin with Maeve Sikora, Keeper of Antiquities at the National Museum

Minister for Media, Tourism, Arts, Culture, Sport and the Gaeltacht Catherine Martin TD and Catherine Heaney, Chair of the National Museum of Ireland looking at some of the exhibits

A new exhibition taking place in the National Museum of Ireland explores the Glendalough monastic site down through the centuries.

The launch of the 'Glendalough: Power, Prayer and Pilgrimage' on Wednesday was live-streamed and featured contributions from Minister for Media, Tourism, Arts, Culture, Sport and the Gaeltacht Catherine Martin T.D., Chair of the National Museum of Ireland Catherine Heaney and Archbishop of Dublin and Primate of Ireland Diarmuid Martin, amongst others.

Since it was founded by St Kevin in the late 6th century, Glendalough has been a place where people have retreated to seek isolation and healing, making the timing of this as the first new exhibition to open at the National Museum of Ireland since Covid-19 arrived - causing widespread acts of self-isolation on a global level - particularly pertinent.

Despite reasonably rich historical evidence, archaeology, and in particular portable objects, provide important physical evidence for life in this important early monastery. Partnership between archaeologists, park administrators and local authorities and the local community at Glendalough has allowed a rich approach to making places through heritage.

Twenty six objects which have never been exhibited before celebrate this special place. Researching these objects brings rich insights into the lives of both the humble and powerful who travelled as pilgrims or who lived at Glendalough.

Director of the National Museum of Ireland, Lynn Scarff said; 'This exhibition demonstrates so clearly the connections between our material, natural and cultural heritage and how all these elements are intertwined. One of the few positives of the COVID 19 lockdown period was that people got to explore their immediate environment within 2k of their home and the heritage - be it built or natural on their doorstep. We hope this exhibition shines a light on a very special place in Ireland.'

Among the items on display is a bronze coated iron hand-bell, dated to the 8th or 9th century AD, found at a site near Glendalough and recently donated to the National Museum of Ireland by Archbishop Martin on behalf of the diocese. Ironworking evidence from Glendalough suggests that this bell may well have been made at the monastery.

Archbishop Martin said: Glendalough holds a special place in Irish history and in the history of Christianity. I am delighted that the iron bell we have donated to the National Museum is on display for the first time in this important exhibition, helping to tell the story of Glendalough as a centre of spirituality for centuries.'

Also featured is a tiny cross made of jet originating in north-eastern England discovered in 2017 and thought to have been worn by a pilgrim as a mark of private devotion, which is considered a rare find in an Irish medieval context.

Another exhibit is a fragment of a porphyry tile, a stone quarried in the eastern Mediterranean, which was recovered during the excavation of one of the most remote sites in the Glendalough valley in 1958 and is thought to have been taken from a building in Rome or from a Roman building in Europe and carried back to Glendalough by a cleric and used as a mark of authority.

A late 10th / early 11th century bell, the earliest in Ireland, which was suspended for rope-ringing in a belfry at St Kevin's Church, is thought to have been imported from England or north-western Europe.

The exhibition also features items such as a shoe from the 10th century which belonged to a pilgrim and which was lost in a bog until it was found by a passer-by and reported to the National Museum of Ireland over a thousand years later, as well as a collection silver coins found as part of a hoard in the 1980s.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 16:52:54|Editor: huaxia

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BEIRUT, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Newly appointed Lebanese Prime Minister Mustapha Adib declared on Saturday his failure to form a new cabinet given his inability to overcome obstacles hindering his mission, al-Jadeed local TV channel reported.

"It has become clear for me that the consensus no longer exists noting that the efforts have reached their final stages," Adib said from Baabda Palace following his meeting with President Michel Aoun.

Adib apologized to the Lebanese people, stressing that "the initiative of French President Emmanuel Macron must continue because it expresses the sincere intention of France."

Adib was appointed on Aug. 31 to form a new cabinet following the resignation of Caretaker Prime Minister Hassan Diab's cabinet after the blasts that rocked Beirut on Aug. 4.

However, Adib's efforts faced several obstacles including the insistence of the two Shiite political parties to hold the Finance Ministry and name the Shiite ministers in the new cabinet. Enditem
Kip McGrath Education Centres Limited (ASX:KME) shares have continued their recent momentum with a 27% gain in the last month alone. Looking back a bit further, it's encouraging to see the stock is up 37% in the last year.

Following the firm bounce in price, Kip McGrath Education Centres' price-to-earnings (or "P/E") ratio of 38.5x might make it look like a strong sell right now compared to the market in Australia, where around half of the companies have P/E ratios below 20x and even P/E's below 11x are quite common. Although, it's not wise to just take the P/E at face value as there may be an explanation why it's so lofty.

For instance, Kip McGrath Education Centres' receding earnings in recent times would have to be some food for thought. One possibility is that the P/E is high because investors think the company will still do enough to outperform the broader market in the near future. You'd really hope so, otherwise you're paying a pretty hefty price for no particular reason.

View our latest analysis for Kip McGrath Education Centres

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We don't have analyst forecasts, but you can see how recent trends are setting up the company for the future by checking out our free report on Kip McGrath Education Centres' earnings, revenue and cash flow.

How Is Kip McGrath Education Centres' Growth Trending?

Kip McGrath Education Centres' P/E ratio would be typical for a company that's expected to deliver very strong growth, and importantly, perform much better than the market.

Retrospectively, the last year delivered a frustrating 41% decrease to the company's bottom line. That put a dampener on the good run it was having over the longer-term as its three-year EPS growth is still a noteworthy 8.0% in total. Accordingly, while they would have preferred to keep the run going, shareholders would be roughly satisfied with the medium-term rates of earnings growth.

Comparing that to the market, which is predicted to deliver 22% growth in the next 12 months, the company's momentum is weaker based on recent medium-term annualised earnings results.

Story continues

With this information, we find it concerning that Kip McGrath Education Centres is trading at a P/E higher than the market. It seems most investors are ignoring the fairly limited recent growth rates and are hoping for a turnaround in the company's business prospects. There's a good chance existing shareholders are setting themselves up for future disappointment if the P/E falls to levels more in line with recent growth rates.

The Bottom Line On Kip McGrath Education Centres' P/E

Kip McGrath Education Centres' P/E is flying high just like its stock has during the last month. Generally, our preference is to limit the use of the price-to-earnings ratio to establishing what the market thinks about the overall health of a company.

Our examination of Kip McGrath Education Centres revealed its three-year earnings trends aren't impacting its high P/E anywhere near as much as we would have predicted, given they look worse than current market expectations. When we see weak earnings with slower than market growth, we suspect the share price is at risk of declining, sending the high P/E lower. If recent medium-term earnings trends continue, it will place shareholders' investments at significant risk and potential investors in danger of paying an excessive premium.

Before you take the next step, you should know about the 6 warning signs for Kip McGrath Education Centres (1 is significant!) that we have uncovered.

If you're unsure about the strength of Kip McGrath Education Centres' business, why not explore our interactive list of stocks with solid business fundamentals for some other companies you may have missed.

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.



Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com.
President Donald Trump has signed an executive order that will protect babies born premature, including those that survive abortions.

On Friday, Trump signed the order directing the Health and Human Services Department to ensure that federally-funded facilities will give life-saving medical care for infants who survived an abortion.

Trump first mentioned the measure during a pre-recorded virtual address to the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast early this week, but details were unclear, as per Fox News.

The President noted that protecting premature babies was a "sacrosanct moral duty."

In the released order, the White House specified that it would enforce the medical care requirements and prioritize funding for programs that research improvements to life-saving care or train medical personnel to provide that type of treatment.

"Every infant born alive, no matter the circumstances of his or her birth, has the same dignity and the same rights as every other individual and is entitled to the same protections under federal law," the order said.

The measure was celebrated by anti-abortion activists who have linked up with Trump in the lead-up to November.

In 2018, the issue featured prominently in Trump's political message after Virginia Governor Ralph Northam indicated that doctors should refuse life-saving care to infants who survive abortions.

Trump's focus on abortion will likely boost his standing among social conservatives as he prepares to nominate another Supreme Court justice.

Meanwhile, a recent testimony from David Daleiden's civil trial has revealed that Planned Parenthood saw at least one baby born after an abortion, and may have seen more.

The order was intended to protect individuals like Gianna Jessen, who claims to have survived a botched saline abortion. In a video posted this week, Jessen thanked the President for his efforts.

NARAL Pro-choice America responded to the previous announcement by accusing Trump of misinformation and using the term "born alive" that's not grounded in medical science, as per a press release.

NARAL President Ilyse Hogue said it is downright cruel and a slap in the face to the American public that Trump uses executive powers to impose his extreme ideology and deploys dangerous disinformation in a power grab for the Supreme Court.

House Democrats rejected the measure called the "Born Alive Abortion Survivors Act" early this year. The said law would have applied penalties to doctors who refuse to provide life-saving care. The measure has been touted as a way to make sure infants will receive care and protection.

Vice president at Planned Parenthood Action Fund Jacqueline Ayers noted that Trump was trying to solve a "nonexistent" problem. "Health care providers already have an obligation to provide appropriate medical care," Ayers said.

Former president George W. Bush has passed the Born Alive Infant Protection Act in his first term. He said that infants born at any stage deserve the same protection as anyone else.

Trump's order applies that law and Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA) that mandates emergency medical care, as benchmarks whether federally-funded programs are in compliance.

The executive order noted that some hospitals refuse the mandatory medical screening examination and stabilizing treatment or do not provide potentially life-saving medical treatment to premature or disabled infants despite these laws and even when parents plead for such treatment.

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Mumbai, Sep 26 : The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) on Saturday confirmed that the agency is not probing the alleged 'drug party' video posted by Bollywood filmmaker Karan Johar, adding that their focus is on the drug-related investigation surrounding the death of Sushant Singh Rajput.

The video was posted on July 28, 2019, by Johar that shows several Bollywood celebrities including Deepika Padukone, Arjun Kapoor, Malaika Arora, Shahid Kapoor, Ranbir Kapoor, Vickey Kaushal present at the party that took place at his residence.

Later Shiromani Akali Dal MLA Manjinder Singh Sirsa demanded an investigation on the matter of celebrities' involvement in the consumption of drugs.

On Saturday during a press address, asked if NCB plans to summon Johar over the alleged 'drug party' video that has surfaced, Mutha Ashok Jain, NCB South-Western Region Deputy Director-General told the media: "No, there is no connection of that said video with this case." There were speculations in the media that Johar might be summoned by the NCB on the matter.

However, Jain confirmed that no fresh summons have been sent to any other film personality in the case.

On Saturday Bollywood actresses Deepika Padukone, Shraddha Kapoor, and Sara Ali Khan were grilled by the NCB.

Kshitij Ravi Prasad, a former executive of Johar's production house Dharma Productions has been arrested by the NCB on Saturday.

Till date, Jain said, 18 to 19 persons have been arrested in connection as part of the probe into the death of Sushant, who was found dead at his Bandra home on June 14.

Latest updates on Sushant Singh Rajput Death Mystery
The final moments of a car dealer who was believed to have been offered millions of dollars to become a Chinese spy have been revealed.

CCTV footage obtained shows Bo 'Nick' Zhao checking in to a hotel in Melbourne on February 28, 2019 - three days before he was found dead.

Mr Zhao's death was ruled to be non-suspicious by a coroner earlier this week.

He was due to face court over allegations he created $1.45million of fake invoices - media reports suggesting that authorities are investigating claims a Chinese espionage ring offered him money to run for parliament also arose, The Herald Sun reports.

The final moments show car dealer Bo 'Nick' Zhao checking into a hotel room before he died

The footage showed Mr Zhao go up to his room on the third floor after getting into a lift.

Inside the room, Mr Zhao made a series of phone calls before going to the lobby to collect two business associates who were owed $8million.

Mr Zhao is seen walking downstairs to collect the men, before bringing them to his room.

In a phone call his lawyer Mr Zhao claimed that the men threatened to hurt his wife and child unless he killed himself - but police later found this to be untrue.

The men left after an 80-minute meeting and Mr Zhao was never seen again, and his mobile phone was shut off.

Hotel staff found him dead inside of his room on March 3.

CCTV footage obtained by the Herald Sun showed Mr Zhao check in to a hotel in Melbourne on February 28, 2019 - three days before he was found dead

Mr Zhao's death was ruled to be non-suspicious by a coroner earlier this week

Detective Senior Constable Nicholas Jung told the court Mr Zhao died from a mix of drugs - including an antidepressant - and had been having suicidal thoughts in the lead up to his death.

'As a result of the investigation I've got absolutely no concerns that a third party was involved in the death of Mr Zhao,' Detective Sen-Constable Jung told the court.

'Suicide and mental health was something that had been an issue for Mr Zhao months prior to him passing away.'

The meeting with the other two men is thought to have been a last-ditch effort to minimise possibility penalties for the accusations against him.

The coroner's written report will be released in the coming weeks.

If you or anyone you know is in need of mental health support, you can contact Lifeline 13 11 14, Beyondblue 1300 22 4636 or Kids Helpline 1800 55 1800.
New Zealand's looming referendum on legalising cannabis could have a significant impact on drug law reform in Australia, according to Harm Reduction Australia, and could even trigger marijuana tourism when borders between the two countries reopen.

New Zealanders will be asked to vote in two referendums on October 17, in addition to choosing whether to return Jacinda Ardern's Labour government to power or vote for the National Party, led by Judith Collins. The second referendum will ask if assisted dying should be legalised for the terminally ill.

Marijuana plants growing at a facility in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Credit:AP Photo

Medical marijuana is legal in Australia and New Zealand and pot was decriminalised in the ACT under strict conditions on January 31. But legalising the growing, sale and consumption of the drug for recreational use in NZ would represent a significant expansion of the drug's availability.

Gino Vumbaca, the president of Harm Reduction Australia  which advocates for drug law reforms  said his organisation was watching the events closely and was in regular contact with their counterparts at the NZ Drug Foundation.
Voters are now more worried about the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the economy than they are over the collective health of the nation, a Mail on Sunday poll has found.

The Deltapoll survey suggests that a majority of people  51 per cent  think the impact on the economy is the greatest problem facing the UK over the next year, compared to 42 per cent who worry about the effects on health.

When asked about the impact over the next five years, the gap widens, with 66 per cent citing the economy and just 28 per cent mentioning health.

The Deltapoll survey suggests that a majority of people  51 per cent  think the impact on the economy is the greatest problem facing the UK over the next year

And an overwhelming 89 per cent are concerned about the impact of Covid restrictions, such as the 10pm curfew on business, with just 8 per cent saying they are unconcerned.

The results suggest there is growing support for the position of Chancellor Rishi Sunak, who has argued in Cabinet against doves such as Health Secretary Matt Hancock and Cabinet Office Minister Michael Gove who want more stringent restrictions. Mr Sunaks ratings continue to soar, with an approval rating of plus 37. Boris Johnson, by contrast, receives a rating of minus 17. Tory strategists will also be alarmed by the scores for Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer, who is given a score of plus 19 when people are asked how well or badly he is performing.

In total, 48 per cent of people think the Government is doing the wrong thing over Covid while 38 per cent think it is doing the right thing.

The results suggest there is growing support for the position of Chancellor Rishi Sunak

Worrying, nearly one in five people  19 per cent  say they will not take a Covid vaccine if it becomes available.

The poll puts the Conservatives on 42 per cent, four points ahead of Labour.

Deltapoll co-founder Joe Twyman said: Six months after the coronavirus lockdown first began, public support for Boris Johnson and his Governments approach has diminished.

It is clear from Deltapolls results the impact the Covid-19 restrictions will have on the British economy both nationally and locally are key concerns. The Prime Minister must hope that the Jobs Support Scheme and similar initiatives go some way to address peoples fears or the decline in support for the Governments position is likely to continue.

Deltapoll interviewed 1,583 British adults online on September 24 and 25. The data have been weighted to be representative of the British adult population as a whole.
If you really want to honour him, implement his inclusive ideology: SC Bose's grandnephew

As biggest vaccine maker, India will help world overcome Covid: PM Modi at UNGA

India

oi-Deepika S

United Nations, Sep 26: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday raised questions on the response of the United Nations in combating the COVID-19 pandemic, and assured the global community that India will use its production and delivery capacity to help all humanity in fighting the deadly disease.

'Over the last 8 to 9 months, the whole world has been battling the pandemic of the coronavirus. Where is the United Nations in this joint fight against the pandemic? Where is its effective response?' Modi said as he asserted that reform in the responses, in the processes, and in the very character of the United Nations is the need of the hour.

In his pre-recorded video statement to the landmark General Debate of the 75th session of the UN General Assembly, Prime Minister Modi said that even during these very difficult times of the raging pandemic, India's pharmaceutical industry has sent essential medicines to over 150 countries.

Lost brave soldiers in the course of maintaining peace: PM Modi at UNGA

'As the largest vaccine producing country of the world, I want to give one more assurance to the global community today. India's vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis,' Modi said in a strong assurance to the international community that is battling the devastating coronavirus pandemic.

The COVID-19 pandemic has so far infected over 32 million people and more than 993,500 people have died across the world. In India, the deadly virus has infected nearly 6 million people and killed more than 93,000.

The prime minister's remarks questioning the UN's effectiveness in combating the pandemic came amidst the strident criticism of the role played by the World Health Organisation (WHO) by US President Donald Trump, who this week alleged that the top world health body was virtually controlled by China.

Trump has repeatedly blamed China for the coronavirus pandemic which originated in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in December last year and accused Beijing of suppressing the details of the deadly contagion.

Modi told the 193-member UN General Assembly that in India and the neighbourhood, "we are moving ahead with phase 3 clinical trials in India.' He further assured that India will also help all the countries in enhancing their cold chain and storage capacities for the delivery of the vaccines.

This year's high-level UN General Assembly is being held in a largely virtual format as world leaders did not travel to New York for the annual gathering due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Heads of State and Government and Ministers sent in pre-recorded video statements for the high-level week, including the special commemoration of the UN's 75 years and the General Debate.

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Story first published: Saturday, September 26, 2020, 19:23 [IST]
GAZA, Palestinian Territory - The bodies of two Palestinian fishermen whom Egyptian naval forces killed in Mediterranean waters were returned Saturday to the Gaza Strip, the territorys Interior Ministry said.

Hamas, the Palestinian militant group ruling Gaza, has called on Egypt to investigate the incident, condemning it as violence targeting those hunting for a living for their children.

The shooting occurred Friday as three fishermen were fishing near the Gaza-Egypt maritime frontier, said the Palestinian fishermen union, noting the three were brothers. The third brother was receiving treatment in Egypt.

There was no immediate comment from Egyptian officials, but the union said fishermen usually work near the border and the Egyptian navy is aware of their presence.

Even if they happen to exceed the limit, shooting and killing them is unjustifiable, said Nezar Ayyash, head of the fishermen union. They could have stopped them because their boats engine is weak and cant run faster than the naval boat.

Egypt sent the bodies via the Rafah crossing point, Gazas main gate to the outside world, on its 13-kilometre-long border with the Gaza Strip Saturday evening.

Israel and Egypt imposed a blockade on Gaza in 2007 to isolate Hamas after it seized control of the territory from the internationally backed Palestinian Authority. Hamas relations with Egypt have experienced different phases of warmness and tension, but Cairo has been a longtime mediator between Hamas and Israel, securing numerous ceasefire deals and unofficial truces between the two sides to calm down cross-border fighting.

Ayyash of the fishermen union said the Egyptian military has killed six Gaza fishermen in separate incidents in the past 14 years. He said the fishermen will go on a general strike for three days to protest the loss of their colleagues.
New Delhi: Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Sri Lankan Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa met on Saturday (September 26, 2020) for a virtual summit. While this is the third virtual summit amidst COVID crisis by PM Modi, this is a first with a leader of the neighbouring country.

PM Modi's first meeting was with Australian PM and second meet with the European Union leadership.

PM Modi congratulated Sri Lankan PM Mahinda Rajapakse for his recent electoral success which the former said shows "confidence in your leadership and the victory will give the opportunity to start a new chapter in Indo-Sri Lanka ties".

"Under neighbourhood first policy and SAGAR Doctrine, we will give priority to Sri Lanka," he said.

Live TV

The Sri Lankan PM recalled the close ties and while talking about the COVID-19 crisis, thanked New Delhi for extending support, especially financial support to deal with the economic impact. "Indian government supported us... and India is with us and helping us," Rajapksa said.

Earlier this year, India and Sri Lanka agreed for a $400 million currency swap agreement which will be a relief to Colombo. Both countries also engaged in debt repayment rescheduling talks.

Mahinda Rajapakse appreciated India's rapid help during the MT Diamond ship fire crisis. Earlier this month, the ship which was on the eastern coast of Sri Lanka caught fire risking a major environmental disaster. The Indian Navy played a key role as one of the key responders to the crisis.
Delta, like all airlines, faces a very real, very big challenge. Right now, the vast majority of people aren't that interested in climbing onto an airplane with 100 people they don't know for a few hours.

It turns out that traveling isn't as bad as you think it would be. But that doesn't mean it isn't very different. For example, when I flew to New York City last month, I had no idea what to expect. Even as a fairly regular traveler during "normal" times, I had more anxiety about getting on a plane than I ever had before.

That's entirely natural considering that most people don't like the "unknown." We tend to avoid uncertainty as much as possible. Flying simply involves too many variables out of our control for most of us to take what seems like an unnecessary risk during a pandemic.

But if you're Delta, that's bad news. In fact, it's very expensive bad news. As a result, the company has made an extraordinary effort to keep passengers and crew members safe.

In an interview with MSNBC's Stephanie Ruhle at The Atlantic Festival, Delta's CEO made clear the cost of COVID-19 to the airline's business:

We're flying today at a 60 percent load factor cap. So that means 40 percent of the seats we fly, we are deliberately not filling and not selling. That is not cheap. But the more important decision we make is we gotta put people over profits. And we know that instilling confidence in our customers, as well as our own employees, is job number one. That's our priority right now. I'd much rather people remember Delta as the company that took care of them through the pandemic... Customers are making a decisions about who Delta is by the values that we put out on display.

All of that is great, but the key here is "instilling confidence." None of the rest of it matters if people are too anxious or afraid to do business with your company. To that end, Delta has a brilliant strategy for providing information for customers: Instagram. This morning, I was swiping through my feed, when I came across the following post.

inlineimage

If you tap on it, it reveals individual profiles for each of the different steps the company is taking to make the boarding process safer. If you select one of those profiles, they provide additional information. For example, if you tap on the Customer.Face.Masks profile, it explains:

For everyone's safety, customers must wear a mask or face covering, and extra masks and Care Kits will be available if you need one. Those with underlying conditions who can't wear a mask or face covering are required to complete a "Clearance-To-Fly" process before being permitted to travel.

Think about that for a moment. Delta took the time to create a dozen Instagram profiles so that it could better communicate with its followers. Sure, you can argue that Delta has plenty of resources and staff to do this. That's definitely true. But the thought behind this makes it effective for two reasons.

The first is that it helps create expectations. In that example about face masks, it provides a potential traveler with all of the information they need to know about what is required of them. It even details the process if a passenger has an issue with wearing a mask. (As a side-note, Delta's CEO says the company has already put 350 people on a no-fly list for refusing to wear masks.)

The second reason I think this is so effective is that it's not just about creating expectations for someone who has already decided to travel. In my article describing my flight last month, I explained the steps the company is taking to do just that. In a statement, Delta told me, "Our community management team has been highly engaged and very responsive with customers to help increase confidence and reduce anxiety."

This, on the other hand, is meant to reach people who haven't decided to travel. It wasn't on their website or in an email. It was on Instagram. Remember Instagram, that place where we all used to share images of the cool places we visited when we traveled? Delta clearly wants us to get back to that, which is why the fact that it ran this content there is so effective.

Delta is meeting travelers who have a sense of wanderlust where they are, and is helping them better understand the effort the company is taking to keep everyone safe. That, in turn, helps to reduce the anxiety and uncertainty around travel.
The Inspector-General of Police, Mohammed Adamu has ordered the immediate arrest of a former Minister of Education in Late President Umaru Yarduas administration, Kenneth Gbagi over an alleged nude video and pictures that has gone viral on social media networks.

The alleged video clip and photos which have been roundly condemned by Nigerians across board made the IGP to order the immediate arrest of the former minister who is also a 2023 guber aspirant in Delta State.

The viral video clip depicts photos of naked ladies and a young man, whom Olorogun Kenneth Gbagi allegedly stripped naked in his hotel in Warri.

The Inspector General of Police as a matter of urgency dispatched a team of detectives from the Police Force Headquarters in Abuja to storm Delta State for the immediate arrest of Olorogun Kenneth Gbagi, due to the alleged drastic actions he took by subjecting his female staff members and a guy to open shame, forcing them to go naked by removing their clothes; remaining their underwears.

The most annoying part, according to various sources, is that one of the ladies stripped naked is a legally married woman.

How can a normal human being, a governorship aspirant for that matter, a former Minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria ask a married woman to go naked, with her breasts, tommy, pants and other vital parts open for the world to see on social media?? This is the height of wickedness and warrant sanction by the Nigerian police and the law courts, another source close to Chief Gbagi satated.

What is N5,000 stolen, according to Olorogun Kenneth Gbagi, that warrants the shame and humiliation of stripping women naked in public? To add salt to injury, after stripping the ladies naked, he called his 15yrs old son to bring his mobile phone to video and snap the naked women. Jesus Christ of Nazareth! This is wickedness of the highest order. Even Lucifer the Devil can NOT do this to any lady. The prostitutes on the street, who are agents of the devil even have self respect and dignity let alone a legally married woman, one of the human rights advocates who have taken up the case against chief Gbagi fumed when reached for her comments.

Olorogun Kenneth Gbagi deserves to be sentenced to jail to serve as example to other so-called influential Nigerians who think they can use their influence and ill-gotten wealth to intimidate the poor masses.

Thank you Inspector General of Police for rising up to the occasion and taking the bull by the horn, she further remarked.
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Close to 3,000 students across seven British universities have been confined to their flats 'without warning' after coronavirus outbreaks thrust entire halls of residence into lockdown - with 17 other institutions reporting infections on campus.

Some 1,700 Manchester Metropolitan University students are among those who have been instructed to self-isolate for 14 days following a spike in Covid-19 cases. The immediate measures were introduced at campus housing at Birley and All Saint's Park on Friday after 127 students tested positive.

Elsewhere, 600 students at Glasgow University were confined to their accommodation following outbreaks at the Murano Street and Cairncross residences due to social activity at the start of Freshers Week, which took place between September 12 and 14.

Around 172 people have tested positive for the virus across the two halls, though the university warned the number of those infected is 'likely to be higher'.

In Manchester students at the Birley campus described confusion as security staff arrived to enforce the lockdown on Friday, before many of them had received any official communication from the university to tell them what was happening.

Dominic Waddell, a first-year filmmaking student,said: 'A few people got an email to announce they were locking down my accommodation, but not everyone got that so there was a big freak-out with everyone.

'There was a security guard that then just arrived at the gate of our accommodation and he wasn't letting anybody leave, not really explaining what was going on.'

Additional support was today announced by the institution for those in university accommodation, with all students set to receive a one-month rent refund, 50 for food and supplies and further 'proactive drop-ins' organised by support staff.

Scotland has reported more than 1,200 students in self-isolation due to the virus, with 500 locked down at Abertay and Dundee University due to a 'small number' of Covid-19 cases linked to Parker House, which provides private housing for students at both.

A further 72 people are in lockdown at Aberdeen University following an outbreak of the virus, with 40 also forced to stay home at St Andrews following a Freshers' Week party in a hall of residence.

And in Kent, at least 11 students are now self isolating after two students tested positive for the virus at the University of Kent's Canterbury campus.

Outbreaks have hit 23 universities in total, with cases detected at Edinburgh's Napier University and Oxford Brookes, alongside campuses in Leeds, Nottingham, Swansea, Liverpool, Salford, Bristol and Exeter.

It comes as a lecturers' union today insisted face-to-face classes should be halted at campuses until the Government slows the spread of Covid-19.

Jo Grady, general secretary of the University and College Union (UCU), has urged bosses to consider allowing students to return home amid the growing number of outbreaks in campus housing.

A father drops water off for his daughter at a university halls in Manchester today after driving to the campus from West Bromwich

Students in Manchester wave through a flat window after their accommodation was plunged into lockdown last night

Some 1,700 Manchester Metropolitan University students are among those who have been instructed to self-isolate for 14 days following a spike in Covid-19 cases. Pictured: Students in Manchester

Students on Friday night at Manchester Metropolitan University's Birley campus who have been placed in lockdown for 14 days after positive Covid-19 tests on site

She told the Guardian: 'If [vice-chancellors] don't do something now, all their efforts will be undone in a few weeks because the number of infections will be so high, or there won't be enough staff to teach.

'There is an urgency about this that didn't exist a month ago, because we are seeing infection rates rising and there is the danger that students are just becoming incubators.

'But until there is an effective UK-wide test-and-trace programme, there are going to be cases everywhere.

'Even if you've got a self-contained university campus with a relatively small number of students, you are still bringing people all together from all over the UK, and staff who teach at multiple institutions moving between them.'

Students trapped in a spate of campus Covid outbreaks have slammed universities for opening halls of residents when coronavirus means they are studying from their rooms. Meanwhile, students at the University of Manchester were filmed throwing an illegal party outside their student halls.

Some have also asked for assurances from institutions they will not be shut up in their accommodation when they move in. They fear universities in England may follow ones in Scotland in banning students from going to pubs and restaurants when they arrive.

Megan Tingey, a 19-year-old criminology student in Manchester, said police also turned up outside her Birley Vine accommodation.

'It was quite scary and confusing,' she said. 'A police van turned up and there were police outside the gate, quite a lot of them just walking around looking at everyone, especially because we didn't know what was going on.

'No one's really told us much and then the police turn up as well with security outside - it's a really, really difficult situation.'

Ms Tingey said that by Saturday afternoon she still had not received an email from the university, though most of her friends had.

For those in her flat, she said, it was particularly tough as they were only just emerging from isolation having themselves tested positive for the virus around 10 days ago.

Manchester Metropolitan University (pictured, Cambridge Halls) students at two accommodation sites in the city have been instructed to self-isolate for 14 days following a spike in coronavirus cases

The immediate measures have been introduced at the Birley campus (pictured) and Cambridge Halls after 127 students tested positive

'I think petty much everyone in our accommodation finished their self isolation around yesterday, so I think doing a lockdown of the building now is quite bad considering we've all just come out of it,' Ms Tingey said.

Ms Tingey said she briefly had a mild cough but that none of her flatmates were now showing any symptoms.

Many students were left wondering how they would stock their shelves as they were not allowed to go out to buy food.

Mr Waddell, 21, said: 'They're saying 'the safety and wellbeing of our students and staff and the local community is our top priority' but it doesn't really seem like that if they haven't allowed us time to prepare for this.

'Even if they'd just given us 12 hours notice that would have been something.'

Mr Waddell now faces spending the next two weeks with the 11 other people in his house, who he only met for the first time two weeks ago.

He said the situation had been 'pretty poorly handled' and that his fellow residents in Birley Naylor were not happy.

'There's a lot of confusion still,' he said. 'Lots of people are very angry.

Students at the University of Manchester have been filmed throwing an illegal party

'People are jokingly saying we'll rush the gates and stuff.

'There's a lot of confusion, frustration, worry that you're not going to be able to get food - I think that's the main worry.'

Ms Tingey said she believes there 'should be some form of refund for students' while Mr Waddell said he hoped the university will step in to help out those who are struggling.

He said: 'Given the amount of money we're giving them...they can use that money to put in some provisions for food care packages and things like that, I think that's something that would help a lot of students.'

Vice-chancellor of Bolton University George Holmes told the Telegraph pupils had asked him if they will be prisoners in their flats. He said: We have had students contacting us saying if we have to stay at Christmas, we don't want to come. Students are citizens of this country and can behave in the way that anyone else can.'

University of Glasgow student Lucy Owens tested positive for coronavirus just a couple of weeks after arriving at her halls in the now-locked down Murano complex. She asked on the BBC's Good Morning Scotland programme: 'What are we paying for? I could do everything I am doing from my house, so why have they sent us here?

'I know we're making the most of this accommodation because we're stuck in it all day but we're not really making the most of being at university. Putting two thousand students into such a confined area, something like this was bound to happen.'

Meanwhile footage recorded at 1am this morning showed a large gathering outside of Owens Park halls in Fallowfield, south Manchester, with one clip captioned: 'Covid wah?'.

Another clip shows a sea of people dancing to music which appears to be coming from a sound system.

There has been a surge in cases across the UK including 558 more in Scotland as students in Scotland were being faced with the prospect of receiving red and yellow cards which will be awarded for breaking Covid rules.

The cards are meant to act as a warning at first but universities say they will not hesitate to scale up to disciplinary action if necessary.

The move has been welcomed by Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon who said that discipline is necessary for those students who are 'flagrantly breaching rules'.

But with at least 362 confirmed coronavirus cases at universities across the UK, Sage's Sir Mark Walport has warned that infected students could be prevented from returning home at Christmas.

He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: 'If students are infected when it comes near to the end of term they may have to remain where they are.'

Some students have said that catching coronavirus upon their return to university was 'inevitable'.

A student walks past a sign at Murano Street Student Village in Glasgow, where university students are being tested at a pop up test centre

A University of Manchester statement said: 'Details of offending students are being recorded and a number of these will now go through our disciplinary process.' Pictured: Owens Park halls in Fallowfield, south Manchester

A sign saying 'help us, send beer' at Murano Street Student Village in Glasgow, where Glasgow University students are being tested at a pop up test centre today

One student, 18, who has now been isolating for nearly a monthsays that catching coronavirus after returning to university was 'inevitable'. The teenager is staying in an eight-person flat in Glasgow University's Murano Street Student Village, which houses 1,175 students

One student who stays at Glasgow University's Murano Street Student Village, which can house 1,175 students, said that 'it was bound to happen' with so many people concentrated in such a small area.

Close to 3,000 students self-isolating after Covid-19 outbreaks Around 2,900 students have been asked to self-isolate after coronavirus outbreaks at six campuses across the UK. Manchester Metropolitan University - 1,700 in isolation Glasgow University - 600 in isolation Abertay and Dundee University - 500 in isolation Aberdeen University - 72 in isolation St Andrews University - 40 in isolation University of Kent in Canterbury - 11 in isolation Advertisement

Universities in Glasgow and Edinburgh have seen the greatest number of university cases: 124 and 120 respectively. Despite warnings, a group of students at the University of Manchester held an illegal party outside of their student accommodation during the early hours of this morning.

Video footage showed a crowd of students dancing to music, with one clip captioned: 'Covid wah?'. Responding to the incident, a University of Manchester statement said: 'We are aware of this party and our security services worked with Greater Manchester Police to shut it down.

'This behaviour is totally unacceptable and the University strongly condemns it.

'We have been clear and consistent with our messaging around student conduct and behaviour in halls and we will be working hard to identify those involved.

'Our students must respect social distancing rules and all other restrictions to keep themselves and others safe.

'If students do not comply, they will face disciplinary action from the University, which could lead to fines or expulsion, and we will not hesitate to involve the police if necessary.

'Some students have already been issued with fixed penalty notices by the police.

'Additional security officers have been deployed in Fallowfield and further reminders sent.

'Details of offending students are being recorded and a number of these will now go through our disciplinary process.'

Greater Manchester Police said that officers were called out around 1.20am this morning and that they seized music equipment before dispersing attendees.

Students at the University of Manchester have been filmed throwing an illegal party at 1am this morning outside of Owens Park halls in Fallowfield, south Manchester

Around 600 students are self-isolating at Glasgow University, which has set up its own mobile testing unit, while students are warned not to attend parties and pubs this weekend

At least a dozen other universities in England and Wales have brought in their own testing facilities to monitor for potential outbreaks

Student Safe Lead, Inspector Shoheb Chowdhury of GMP's City of Manchester Division, said: 'We appreciate that the student experience is very different to usual this year, particularly for those beginning new courses and who would usually be enjoying freshers' week.

'We have taken a very measured approach to breaches we've encountered, taking care to engage and explain the importance of following social distancing and current local lockdown guidance.

Unions call for universities to drop face-to-face teaching Face-to-face classes should be halted at universities until the Government slows the spread of Covid-19, a lecturers' union has said. Jo Grady, general secretary of the University and College Union (UCU), has urged bosses to consider allowing students to return home amid a growing number of outbreaks at campuses. She told the Guardian: 'If [vice-chancellors] don't do something now, all their efforts will be undone in a few weeks because the number of infections will be so high, or there won't be enough staff to teach. 'There is an urgency about this that didn't exist a month ago, because we are seeing infection rates rising and there is the danger that students are just becoming incubators. 'But until there is an effective UK-wide test-and-trace programme, there are going to be cases everywhere. 'Even if you've got a self-contained university campus with a relatively small number of students, you are still bringing people all together from all over the UK, and staff who teach at multiple institutions moving between them.' Many universities across Britain have moved to online-only teaching amid the pandemic, with others spending millions on their own test-and-trace systems. Almost 3,000 students are currently believed to be in self-isolation in six campuses across the UK after outbreaks in halls of residences. Elsewhere, at least 23 institutions have reported infections. Advertisement

'However, where necessary we are prepared to issue Fixed Penalty Notices, and in the seven days preceding 23 September, 29 FPNs were issued to students across the City of Manchester Division.

'We continue to work positively with our partners across the higher education sector to drive home the importance of following restrictions.

'We'd encourage all students to consider the potentially negative impact on their education - not to mention their health and that of their loved ones - before attending gatherings that break the law.'

The University of Manchester has also warned that students could be made subject to a curfew following a 'significant' number of coronavirus breaches.

Bosses said 'active consideration' is now being given to the introduction of a curfew across halls, or other restrictive measures.

Earlier this week, four students in Fallowfield were fined by the police after organising an 'after the pub party'.

Each student was handed a 100 fixed penalty notice from officers for not adhering to social distancing guidelines.

And at Birley Halls, accommodation for Manchester Metropolitan University students, residents claim around 100 people were partying till the early hours of the morning last Monday and Tuesday night.

A GMP sergeant tweeted last week: 'Shocked at the arrogance, ignorance & selfishness of some of the freshers in Manchester.

'When you're asked to follow the Covid rules, do as you're told. If you refuse, resulting in being told to leave, don't kick off! Your actions are risking bars / pubs being closed!'.

Some students however have said they felt 'on edge' and like they had been unfairly targeted throughout the coronavirus crisis so far.

One fresher said: 'It's a bit weird. The first few weeks are about meeting people and obviously it's so hard to do that.

'Everyone is a bit on edge. '

The video comes as Scottish students are being threatened with a strict 'red and yellow card' system for breaking Covid-19 rules as they're banned from parties and pubs.

It follows the news that at least a dozen universities in England and Wales have set up their own testing facilities, as outbreaks are reported on 17 UK campuses.

Institutions have said they will make it 'absolutely clear' for those studying that parties will not be tolerated - as a SAGE scientist warned students could be kept on campus over Christmas where outbreaks occur.

Sir Mark Walport told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: 'The one thing that we don't want is for an outbreak of coronavirus in a university to then result in students going home and spreading that infection to other parts of the country and other communities, to their parents, to their grandparents.

'If students are infected when it comes near to the end of term they may have to remain where they are.'

At least 362 cases of coronavirus have been diagnosed among the UK's student population, but none of them are thought to have been hospitalised by the virus.

UK universities to report Covid-19 cases Aberdeen - Number unconfirmed at Aberdeen University, two at Robert Gordon University Nottingham - One student Liverpool - 80 students, seven staff Edinburgh - 120 students at Edinburgh Napier, five at the University of Edinburgh and Queen Margaret University Dundee - Four students at Abertay University Fife - Four cases at St Andrews University Glasgow - 172 cases Exeter - Number unconfirmed Stirling - One student Canterbury - Two cases at University of Kent Manchester - 127 cases at Manchester Metropolitan University Leeds - Six cases De Montfort - Two confirmed cases Warwick - One confirmed case Swansea - 12 confirmed cases Bristol - One confirmed case at the University of the West of England Oxford - 30 confirmed cases at Oxford Brookes Durham - Number unconfirmed Salford - 20 confirmed cases Bath - Number unconfirmed Advertisement

Universities Scotland yesterday outlined new rules for students in the North of the UK, instructing them not to attend hospitality businesses and not to mix outside their household.

The new rules say institutions will 'make absolutely clear to students that there must be no parties, and no socialising outside their households'.

They add: 'This weekend, the first of the new tighter Scottish government guidance, we will require students to avoid all socialising outside of their households and outside of their accommodation.

'We will ask them not to go to bars or other hospitality venues.'

It warned of taking a two-strike approaches to anyone breaking the rules, saying: 'We will take a strict 'Yellow Card/Red Card' approach to breaches of student discipline that put students and others at risk.

'While we first want to advise students about breaches of discipline, we will not hesitate to escalate this to disciplinary action including potential discontinuation of study.'

Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has backed the new measures and said that discipline is necessary for those students who are 'flagrantly breaching rules'.

Asked if she supports such a tough stance, Ms Sturgeon said: 'Yes I do support universities taking disciplinary action as a last resort, and as a back stop.

'I would not expect universities - and I spoke to principals this morning and I know this is not their intention - to use discipline as a first resort.

'But as with the police, if you have people who are just flagrantly breaching rules then of course discipline and enforcement has to be part of the answer.'

The National Union of Students has claimed students are being 'unfairly' blamed for spreading the disease, and it condemned the 'unjustified step of applying different rules to students over and above the rest of the adult population'.

But hundreds of students are currently self-isolating after outbreaks of the virus at Glasgow, Edinburgh Napier and other universities.

The latest daily coronavirus figures also show a rise in positivity rates - with almost one in 10 (9.5%) of those tested confirmed as having Covid-19.

In response to this, Sturgeon also expressed her sympathies for students, many of whom will be staying away from home for the first time and insisted that the decision to allow students to return wasn't linked to the loss of income potentially seen by universities if students had stayed away.

She said she did not want to 'underplay the significance' of asking students not to visit pubs this weekend, but said it is not the only difficult request she has made during the pandemic.

Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon (pictured) has backed the new measures and said that discipline is necessary for those students who are 'flagrantly breaching rules'

Nicola Sturgeon backs disciplinary action as a 'last resort' against students Nicola Sturgeon has backed disciplinary action being taken as a 'last resort' against students who breach new rules aimed at curbing the spread of Covid-19 on university campuses. Speaking as the daily increase in cases reached a record high, with 558 Scots testing positive in the past 24 hours, the First Minister said that for those who are 'flagrantly breaching rules, then of course discipline and enforcement has to be part of the answer'. University principals - backed by the Scottish Government - have made it 'absolutely clear' to students that they must not take part in house parties. As part of efforts to prevent outbreaks in university campuses from spreading into the wider population, all students are being asked to avoid pubs this weekend. Nicola Sturgeon (pictured) has backed disciplinary action being taken as a 'last resort' against students who breach new rules aimed at curbing the spread of Covid-19 on university campuses In addition, universities will adopt a 'yellow card/red card' approach to breaches of discipline, with students warned the consequences could include 'potential discontinuation of study'. Bruce Adamson, the Children and Young People's Commissioner for Scotland, has raised concerns about the human rights implications of such measures, saying he is seeking an 'urgent conversation' with ministers and universities 'to establish the nature and legal basis for these restrictions'. Asked if she supports such a tough stance, Ms Sturgeon said: 'Yes I do support universities taking disciplinary action as a last resort, and as a back stop. 'I would not expect universities - and I spoke to principals this morning and I know this is not their intention - to use discipline as a first resort. 'But as with the police, if you have people who are just flagrantly breaching rules then of course discipline and enforcement has to be part of the answer.' The National Union of Students has claimed students are being 'unfairly' blamed for spreading the disease, and it condemned the 'unjustified step of applying different rules to students over and above the rest of the adult population'. Ms Sturgeon also expressed sympathy for students, many of whom will be living away from home for the first time and could being having to self-isolate in halls of residence. Pictured: Glasgow University's cloisters But hundreds of students are currently self-isolating after outbreaks of the virus at Glasgow, Edinburgh Napier and other universities. The latest daily coronavirus figures also show a rise in positivity rates - with almost one in 10 (9.5%) of those tested confirmed as having Covid-19. At her coronavirus briefing on Friday, Ms Sturgeon also expressed sympathy for students, many of whom will be living away from home for the first time and could being having to self-isolate in halls of residence. She insisted the decision to allow students to return to campus was not linked to the drop in income universities would have suffered had they been told to stay away. Describing herself as the 'devoted auntie' of someone who has just left home to go to university, she told students directly: 'I am so sorry, so heart sorry, that this time of your lives is being made as tough as it is just now. She said the Scottish Government is considering whether self-isolating students could be allowed to return to their family homes. Pictured: A bar in Bristo Square, Edinburgh, which is part of the University of Edinburgh's Student Village 'I really feel for you, but I feel especially for those of you starting university for the first time and, of course, living alone for the first time.' She said the Scottish Government is considering whether self-isolating students could be allowed to return to their family homes, adding guidance on this may be issued over the weekend. But she cautioned: 'I'm going to be frank, that's a difficult balancing act, because if you go home after you've been asked to self-isolate that may have implications for your family, who then also may be asked to self-isolate if you test positive.' She said she did not want to 'underplay the significance' of asking students not to visit pubs this weekend, but said it is not the only difficult request she has made during the pandemic. Ms Sturgeon said: 'I have asked people for six months now not to visit their vulnerable relatives in care homes. 'I'm having to ask people to do really difficult things all of the time. 'So I am asking all students for a weekend to not go to pubs, and hopefully that will help us stem these outbreaks.' Advertisement

Ms Sturgeon said: 'I have asked people for six months now not to visit their vulnerable relatives in care homes.

'I'm having to ask people to do really difficult things all of the time.

'So I am asking all students for a weekend to not go to pubs, and hopefully that will help us stem these outbreaks.'

The new measures come as the likes of Nottingham University set up its own testing facilities to monitor for an outbreak, while Exeter has brought in its own private tests.

Professor Jonathan Ball from Nottingham University said its scheme had potentially prevented an outbreak.

He told BBC Radio 4: 'We've had a pilot running with vet students they started towards the end of July, we've been weekly testing them and they've been taking their own swabs.

'We've had a single case that was an asymptomatic person, because of our advice they isolated, their household isolated. We've continued testing three weeks on and we've had no more cases.

Students may have to spend Christmas on campus to avoid infecting parents with Covid, warns SAGE expert A scientist advising the Government has said university students may have to be told to stay on campus over Christmas in the events of coronavirus outbreaks. Sir Mark Walport, who is on the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: 'There's absolutely no doubt about that and we've seen that from universities across the world. 'There was a paper published, endorsed by Sage, at the beginning of September that noted there was a significant risk that higher education could amplify local and national transmission. 'Universities are very large communities, they bring together people from across the country and they're far from monastic communities these days. 'The one thing that we don't want is for an outbreak of coronavirus in a university to then result in students going home and spreading that infection to other parts of the country and other communities, to their parents, to their grandparents. 'If students are infected when it comes near to the end of term they may have to remain where they are.' Advertisement

'We were able to identify it quickly and potentially stop an outbreak before it started.'

If a positive test is returned at the university, it has to apply for a pillar two test from the Government, in order for it to be officially registered as part of the track and trace system.

Professor Powell explained why the scheme was so important: 'It's been known for sometime that universities are particularly high risk settings. When you have lots of very young people very often somebody who's infected at that age will show very mild symptoms and often no symptoms at all so they won't even know they're infected.

'We're asking them to live together in fairly large numbers so there is the potential for rapid spread of the virus and therefore we need to be aware of that and do all we can to control that.'

So far the majority of outbreaks have been recorded in Scotland, but there have been student Covid-19 cases at universities in Leeds, Exeter, Liverpool and Manchester.

Students in Scotland put up post-it notes in their windows, with one writing 'Send drink' and another lamenting the fact they could not smoke while in isolation.

At least 600 have had to confine themselves to their student accommodation after 172 students caught the virus at the Glasgow university.

This has led to some students suggesting that catching coronavirus after returning to university was 'inevitable'.

One student, 18, said she has now been isolating for nearly a month, having been placed in an initial 14-day quarantine on arrival from California.

The teenager and three other people in her eight-person flat in Glasgow University's Murano Street Student Village have now tested positive for Covid-19.

The complex is the university's largest halls of residence and can house 1,175 students.

She said: 'With this many kids in this small an area, it was bound to happen.

'We have it, so the negative people are cooking. They will drop off food outside our doors.

'It's really hard not to mix, our kitchen is small and we have to share a bathroom. We've been wearing masks.'

Meanwhile Mr Hancock said he does not want students to have to stay at their institutions over the Christmas break.

He said: 'I don't want to have a situation like that, and I very much hope we can avoid it,' he said.

Asked if it was under consideration, he said: 'I've learned not to rule things out. And one of the challenges we have is making sure that people are as safe as possible and that includes not spreading between the generations, but this is not our goal.'

Earlier this week it was revealed 500 students were self-isolating at Abertay University in Dundee after one confirmed case, while 80 students and seven staff were confirmed to have coronavirus at the University of Liverpool.

There have also been 'a number' of confirmed cases at Aberdeen University.

The outbreaks across Scotland have prompted a strong warning against house parties.

Students living in IQ Parker House Students accommodation in Dundee were asked to self isolate due to an outbreak. They entertained themselves by posting messages on the windows

At least 80 students at Liverpool University have contracted coronavirus, along with seven staff

During yesterday's coronavirus briefing national clinical director, Jason Leitch, said: 'We need you not to have house parties, I could not be more clear.'

Nicola Sturgeon said the 'significant outbreak at the University of Glasgow' had impacted on the daily Covid-19 infection figure for the NHS Greater Glasgow area.

A total of 224 cases were recorded across the health board area in the past day, she said.

Prof Leitch said he had spoken to student leaders about the latest restrictions on Tuesday through the National Union of Students.
- Uhuru challenged the leaders to continue rebuking and condemning corruption which he noted was a fight that required every effort

- The head of state said it was only through participation that Kenya may move forward for the good

- The leaders agreed to host national prayer in order to seek divine intervention in the country's efforts to combat coronavirus

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President Uhuru Kenyatta has appreciated the religious leaders for speaking up against some of the vices slowing down Kenya's economic growth.

Uhuru challenged the leaders to continue rebuking and condemning corruption which he noted was a fight that required efforts of every member of the society to win.

READ ALSO: Waiyaki Way: Sections of highway to be closed until 2021

Uhuru Kenyatta when he hosted the religious leaders at the State House on Friday, September 25. Photo: State House Kenya.

Source: Facebook

READ ALSO: Nairobi: Woman dies after spending night at lodging with husband's brother

Speak boldly against corruption

"Speak boldly against all the vices that are holding our nation back. Our job for building this nation is a shared responsibility; we are serving the same people. We deliver on the physical wellness of all the citizens, as you nourish their souls and spirit," he stated.

Speaking at the State House on Friday, September 25, when he hosted a section of men and women of God, the president said it was only through participation that Kenya may move forward.

"The leadership of the church in the anti-corruption fight is highly appreciated. But, there is still room for more action from the church, it is an all of society fight, not one for the government alone," he added.

READ ALSO: You are the DP: Netizens ask Ruto what he's done for Kenya after poetic Kajiado speech

Uhuru Kenyatta leading the country in the March 21 national prayers. Photo: State House Kenya.

Source: Facebook

READ ALSO: Nelson Havi curses Babu Owino days after being made Maragoli elder: "You'll not be re-elected

National prayer day

The leaders who led by Nyeri Catholic Bishop Anthony Muheria who is chairing COVID-19 inter-faith council, agreed to hold another national prayers on Saturday, October 10.

According to State House, the prayer is meant to seek divine intervention in the country's efforts to combat the deadly coronavirus pandemic.

The first national prayer in the wake of coronvirus was held on March 21, it offered Kenyans a chance to turn to God.

"But we also turn to God to share our fears, our apprehensions, but also to seek his guidance and ever-present protection," Uhuru said.

The head of state added Kenya is nothing without God and that it is only by seeking Him that the country would get hope and strength to overcome the challenges.

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My mother abandoned me with two holes in my heart - Baby Petra's story | Tuko TV.

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New Delhi:

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has rejected the request of the Election Commission to enhance the weekly cash-withdrawal limit, imposed after demonetisation, for those contesting Assembly elections in five states, prompting an angry reaction from the poll panel.



The Commission had on Wednesday requested RBI to enhance the withdrawal limit of candidates to Rs 2 lakh from Rs 24,000 per week imposed post demonetisation as the nominees would find it difficult to meet their campaign expenditure.



But RBI said that it was not possible for it to hike the limit at this stage.



An apparently peeved Commission has now written back to RBI Governor Urjit Patel expressing serious concern about the cursory manner in which the issue has been dealt with.



...(It) appears that the RBI has not realised the gravity of the situation...It is reiterated that it is the constitutional mandate of the Commission to conduct free and fair elections and to provide level-playing field to all candidates...in order to facilitate proper conduct of elections, it is imperative that directions issued by the Commission are complied with, the poll panel said.



It urged the central bank to reconsider the proposal.On Wednesday, the Commission had told RBI that it has been apprised of the problems candidates were facing due to withdrawal limits imposed after the note ban.



It said the returning officer of the constituency would issue certificate that the person was a candidate in the fray and the contestant be allowed to withdraw Rs 2 lakh cash per week from the bank account opened especially to meet poll expenses.



The EC said the facility be extended till March 11, the day of counting. Candidates are bound to open an election account for meeting poll-related expenditure which is monitored by the EC.



The Commission said that with a weekly withdrawal limit of Rs 24,000, a candidate would be able to withdraw Rs 96,000 in cash during the election process which lasts three to four weeks.



It reminded the central bank that as per law, candidates contesting Assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Punjab can spend Rs 28 lakh each for electioneering.



The limit in Goa and Manipur is Rs 20 lakh each. The poll panel said despite paying amounts through cheques, candidates still need hard cash for petty expenses. Also the issue is further adversely effected in rural areas where banking facilities are negligible.

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Israel will hold rare talks with Lebanon next month in an effort to resolve a longstanding maritime border dispute, an Israeli official said Saturday.

The official said Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz will lead the Israeli delegation in talks mediated by the United States. Representatives from the three countries are likely to speak by video conference because of the coronavirus pandemic, the official said.

The official requested anonymity in line with regulations. There was no immediate comment from Lebanon.

Israel and Lebanon have no diplomatic relations and are technically in a state of war. They each claim about 860 square kilometers (330 square miles) of the Mediterranean Sea as within their own exclusive economic zones.

Both are hoping to explore and develop new gas fields in the Mediterranean following a number of big finds in recent years. US diplomats have been shuttling between the two countries and pushing for direct talks in recent years.

Lebanon, which is mired in a severe economic crisis, is especially keen to develop offshore energy resources.

The Trump administration is likely to celebrate any direct talks as another diplomatic breakthrough in the Middle East, following recent agreements in which the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain _ Gulf countries that have never gone to war with Israel _ agreed to recognize it and establish diplomatic relations.

Israel invaded Lebanon during the country's 1975-1990 civil war to battle Palestinian militants who had launched cross-border attacks, and it occupied a strip of territory in southern Lebanon until 2000.

In 2006, Israel fought a month-long war with Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group. Hezbollah has vastly expanded its arsenal of rockets and missiles since then, and today Israel views it as its most immediate military threat.

Neither side is believed to be seeking war, but they have traded fire on a number of occasions in recent years, and both have warned that a future conflict would be far more devastating for the other side.

Hezbollah, which is considered a terrorist group by Israel, the U.S. and other countries, is part of a political alliance that dominates Lebanon's parliament and government.

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On Friday, the German Robert Koch Institute announced that it would reclassify Luxembourg as an "at-risk" country.

In a press release, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirmed the decision taken by the German authorities. The Robert Koch Institut (RKI) mainly relies on a country's infection rate to assess the current situation. Once the threshold of 50 infections per 100,000 inhabitants is crossed, a country is considered "at-risk".

In Luxembourg, the number of confirmed cases increased from 282 to 672 residents during the week of 14 to 20 September. After one month, Luxembourg has thus crossed the RKI's threshold of 50 infections per 100,000 residents again, with 107.33 cases as of last Wednesday. This represents a significant increase from last week's 45.04 cases.

The RKI previously classified Luxembourg as at-risk in mid-July. As a consequence, travellers coming from Luxembourg could only cross the border into Germany if they carried a negative Covid-19 test that was not older than 48 hours. Efforts were made from both sides to get Luxembourg off the RKI's list, which finally happened on 20 August.

Other areas considered at-risk by the RKI are for instance a number of French departments, the Belgian Brussels region, and some Dutch provinces. People returning from any of these areas to Germany have to comply with different quarantine and mandatory testing regulations, which vary from state to state.

 RTL-Grafik

In an interview on RTL Radio on Saturday morning, Minister of Foreign Affairs Jean Asselborn stated that for the time being, people should avoid any unnecessary travel to Germany.

Asselborn stated that since last Monday, he has had a number of discussions with his German counterpart, Heiko Maas, about the topic. However, he explained, the German government apparently only wants to consider the number 50 as a decisive factor.

The same rules apply as before: Luxembourg residents have to carry a negative Covid-19 test which is not older than 48 hours, if they wish to cross the German border.

However, due to Germany's federal system, different quarantine rules may apply in the different federal states.

Asselborn stated that his ministry is currently in talks with the neighbouring federal states of Rhineland-Palatinate and Saarland to negotiate special agreements.

The minister also stressed that discussions with the German government in Berlin were ongoing, as the infection rate alone should not determine whether a country is considered at-risk or not.

Instead, Asselborn thinks that the so-called "corona scale" should be used. This scale does not only take into account new infections, but also the number of deaths as well as the capacity of local hospitals, or how many people are in intensive care. When all of these different criteria are considered together, Luxembourg's current situation is quite good, according to Asselborn.

However, the minister expressed disappointment over the fact that Germany is still sticking to the infection rate.

Luxembourg and Belgium have come to an acceptable agreement, but negotiations with Germany proved more difficult. Asselborn stated that he hopes the German government will reconsider its current position.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 17:46:38|Editor: huaxia

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ABUJA, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- At least 15 Nigerian security personnel were killed when Boko Haram group ambushed a convoy of vehicles in which government officials were driven in the northeastern state of Borno, local media reported on Saturday.

The attack near Monguno town in the restive northern state occurred on Friday while the officials were on their way to Baga, another town, where hundreds of returning Internally Displaced Persons were to be received.

Eight policemen, three soldiers, and four Civilian Joint Task Force personnel died in the attack, local online newspaper Premium Times reported, citing security sources.

The security team was deployed to provide escort to the local officials.

Channels Television, a local broadcaster, also reported that an armored personnel carrier belonging to the police, as well as state government vehicles, were hijacked in the attack.

The attack on Friday was the second of its kind in that northern state, stirring great concern. The Monguno area in Borno is believed to be dangerous and has witnessed many abductions by the terrorist group in the past.

Nigerian authorities are yet to react to the latest Boko Haram attack.

Boko Haram has been trying to establish an Islamist state in northeastern Nigeria since 2009, extending its attacks to countries in the Lake Chad Basin. Enditem
The International Monetary Fund said in a statement on September 25 that it has approved Colombia's request to raise its credit line by $6.2 billion. The step was taken after Colombia's continued qualification with strong institutional policy frameworks, track record of economic performance and policy implementation. The IMF also took steps to curb the impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

Read: Colombia Dubs Venezuelan Elex A "pre-fabrication"

IMF provides funds to Colombia

The statement said, The Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) approved today a request by the Colombian authorities to increase access under its current Flexible Credit Line (FCL) arrangement to SDR 12.267 billion (about USD 17.2 billion), equivalent to 600 percent of quota. This represents an SDR 4.4174 billion increase (about USD 6.2 billion) in relation to the two-year arrangement that was approved on May 1, 2020.

Read: Thousands Protest Police Violence In Colombia

Talking about coronavirus, Antoinette Sayeh, a Liberian economist and Deputy Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund, said that Colombia has taken some very strong measures which will help the country to come to a very timely response to the COVID-19 pandemic. According to a tally by John Hopkins University, Colombia has recorded a total number of 798,317 cases with 25,103 fatalities. She said, The authorities' early response and continuing actions - including the temporary suspension of the fiscal rule to raise health spending, as well as to assist vulnerable households and businesses - are welcome and supporting the economy through the recession. She added that financial support from the IMF will help Colombia in dealing with the external crisis and also increase the migrants from Venezuela.

In the last national election in Venezuela, the results were contested which led to both Nicolas Maduro and opposition leader Juan Guaido declaring themselves as President of Venezuela. The move was followed by political turmoil in the country forcing thousands of people to flee from Venezuela. Currently, more than 1.7 million Venezuelans reside in Colombia. Venezuela also contains one of the largest reserves of oil in the world making the country extremely strategically important.

Read: Colombia's Defence Minister Apologises For Police Brutality During Protests

Also Read: Uproar In Colombia Over Police Custody Death

(Image Credits: AP)
Bengaluru, Sep 27 : Rejecting the Opposition party's allegations, Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister J. C. Madhuswamy on Saturday affirmed that Bengaluru riots were pre-planned and the police had not arrested any innocents till date in this case.

Replying to a no-confidence motion here, Madhuswamy asserted that though, Congress MLA Akhanda Srinivasamurthy's nephew B. Naveen Kumar posted derogatory message at 5.30 p.m. on his Facebook and deleted it at 7.30 p.m. but prime accused Yakub Bashir sent out WhatsApp messages to gather in front of D. J. Halli police station after which violence erupted.

Madhuswamy added that it was Bashir's message which led to violence and arson of Congress MLAs residence. "Congress party should not take side of such people," he maintained.

He also added that the police had taken every possible evidence into account be it CCTV footage or various other evidences before arresting as many as 400 persons in this connection. "This is misleading campaign against the government. I appeal the opposition not to fall prey to such machinations," he said.

Earlier in the day, Karnataka Leader of the Opposition Siddaramaiah had appealed to the state government to take immediate steps to release "innocents" who were arrested in connections with the Bengaluru riots.

Speaking after the Speaker allowed the discussion on the no-confidence motion here, Siddaramaiah asserted that the Bengaluru police have arrested more than 400 persons in this connection and all of us know that the police have picked up some innocents too.

"The Congress party is not arguing on behalf of accused persons, we are for the innocents. Let the police examine every possible evidence in this case and act impartially," he affirmed.

Training his guns on the police department, he charged that the entire Bengaluru riot case is a clear case in point where the failure of police and intelligence department.

"The police should have taken immediate steps to contain riots. When accused Naveen posted, derogatory post in afternoon and when some Muslim leaders went to complain, the police should have taken immediate steps. Delayed action by the police itself is main reason to riot going out of control," he argued.

Chiding the ruling party leaders, Siddaramaiah quipped that the state government which doesn't get tired of thumping its chest about the police's achievement, why did it hand over the cases to National Investigation Agency? "Is this the way to this state government telling that the Karnataka police department is incapable of even investigating a riot in Bengaluru?," he questioned angrily.
Ivory Coast should allow former president Laurent Gbagbo, who has been barred from key presidential elections next month, to stand, the African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights said Friday.

It was the second time in 10 days that the court, established by African Union members in 2004, called on the Ivorian state to allow a barred candidate to take part in the tense October 31 election in the world's top cocoa grower.

The court, based in Arusha in Tanzania, asked Ivory Coast to "take all necessary steps to immediately remove all obstacles" preventing Gbagbo from participating.

Ivory Coast withdrew its recognition of the court's jurisdiction in April this year.

Gbagbo, who was president from 2000 to 2010, is not on the electoral roll which was updated this year, and thus cannot vote or be a candidate.

The Constitutional Council, Ivory Coast's top court, has rejected 40 of 44 applications to contest the election, which is taking place against a backdrop of extreme tension.

Those barred include Gbagbo, 75, and former rebel leader Guillaume Soro, 47, both of whom played key roles in the crisis that engulfed the country after disputed elections in 2010.

The Ivorian court, however, accepted an application by President Alassane Ouattara, 78, who is seeking a third term despite criticism that this sidesteps constitutional limits.

Gbagbo was freed conditionally by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague after he was cleared in January 2019 of crimes against humanity. He is living in Brussels pending the outcome of an appeal against the ICC ruling.

'Provocation'

His candidacy was rejected by the Constitutional Council on the grounds that he was handed a 20-year jail term by an Ivorian court last November over the looting of the local branch of the Central Bank of West African States during the post-election crisis.

The African Court, whose ruling is provisional, also said Gbagbo's conviction should not be included on his judicial record until it had time to deliver a full judgement.

On September 15, the African Court handed down a verdict in Soro's favour, saying Ivory Coast should also "immediately remove all obstacles" preventing him from competing in the ballot.

Soro provided military help that enabled Ouattara to come to power after a civil war that erupted when Gbagbo refused to accept defeat in the 2010 election.

More than 3,000 people died in the fighting.

Soro, who lives today in France, was barred from contesting the election on the grounds of a 20-year sentence, also in absentia, for alleged embezzlement of public funds, handed down in April.

Ouattara, has blasted attempts by Gbagbo and Soro to contest the presidential election as "provocation" and said one of them belongs behind bars.

"Soro, like Gbagbo, was excluded because he has a criminal record," Ouattara told the French magazine Paris Match.

"Each of them are perfectly aware that their candidacies are based on provocation... Guillaume Soro doesn't deserve to be on the campaign trail but in prison," he said.

"This young man, drunk on money and power, has simply lost his head."
Painting Workshop with Erin Kendrick 02:00pm | Crisp-Ellert Art Museum

Please join us for a painting workshop with Jacksonville artist Erin Kendrick, co-hosted with Flaglers BSA. This workshop is open to all Flagler College students, provided as both a limited in-person and virtual event, and materials will be provided!

Erin Kendrick is an international artist and arts educator from Jacksonville, Florida. Her color rich, acrylic ink-stained works of art and transformative installations seek to inspire a dialogue about contemporary spectatorship and the power of language as it relates to perceptions of and about black women. She has exhibited work in museums, galleries and alternative spaces throughout the United States and abroad. After receiving her formal art training at Florida State University (BFA, Studio Art, 1999) and Georgia State University (MFA, Drawing & Painting, 2003), she worked for many years as a Studio Artist and Arts Educator in Atlanta, Georgia.

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At CEAM: 10 students

Virtual: 20 students

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The Bombay high court on Saturday refused to interfere with the schedule of the online final year examinations of BA, BCom, BSc, and Bachelor of Mass Media courses at the University of Mumbai (MU) from October 1.

A bench of chief justice Dipankar Datta and justice Girish Kulkarni, however, allowed two petitioners to make a representation to MU vice chancellor for their prayer of postponing the examinations to give enough time to students to prepare for them.

The petitioners, Sachin Manwadkar, 43, who is pursuing BA, and Dilip Randive, 53, enrolled for a three-year LLB course, had moved the court seeking a direction to MU to grant at least a month to students to prepare.

In support of their demand, the two cited a June 2019 circular issued by MU that mandated colleges to declare examination timetables at least one month in advance.

Also Read: Mumbai University final year online exam begins; some colleges face technical glitches, others postpone exams

Advocate Rui Rodrigues, who represented MU, pointed out the circular was applicable to examinations held in physical mode of the first and second years of degree courses. The circular lays down the entire examination schedule for colleges, Rodrigues said.

Rodrigues submitted the circular was not applicable to final year examinations. Besides, this year because of the Covid-19 pandemic, the examinations are being held online and will have only multiple-choice questions.

He pointed out regular examinations for the last-year students are scheduled from October 1. The examinations for backlog subjects have started from Friday.

The petitioners lawyer, advocate Sharon Patole, insisted the university should give proper time to the students to prepare. She said this year, not just the mode, but also the format of the examination has changed and even professors have not been given adequate time to prepare question papers.

Future of the students is at stake; they need time to prepare.

The court refused any relief pointing out that in academic matters, the scope of judicial interference is narrow. Withdraw the petition and make a representation to the vice-chancellor, the court said. If you insist decision on merit that will damage your cause.

Patole agreed to make the representation. The vice-chancellor has been asked to decide on the matter before the examinations begin.
 Flash

UN Undersecretary-General for Peace Operations Jean-Pierre Lacroix on Friday expressed the hope that a new peace agreement between the government and armed groups would usher in a new era in Sudan's Darfur region.

But he warned that much work remains to be done.

The initialing of a peace agreement on Aug. 31 in Juba, South Sudan, between the transitional government of Sudan and the Sudan Revolutionary Front, as wells as the Sudan Liberation Army-Minni Minnawi is an important milestone in the often-troubled history of Darfur, signifying hope for a more peaceful and prosperous future, Lacroix told the Security Council.

He commended the parties for their commitment to peace, as well as South Sudan for its critical role in mediating the agreement.

"As we meet here today, we are only just over a week away from the scheduled signing ceremony, and the start of a new era for Darfur," he said in his briefing.

However, much work remains to ensure that the goodwill shown in the negotiating process is translated into lasting and sustainable change on the ground, he said.

Key players, including the Sudan Liberation Army of Abdul Wahid (SLA/AW), are yet to join the process. The agreements, still a patchwork of documents negotiated on different tracks, are yet to be woven together into a single, unfractured vision of the future of Sudan. With continued armed clashes and protests in Darfur that signals the anxiety of Darfuri constituencies on the decisions being made in Khartoum and Juba, the international community must work together to bring all stakeholders on board and work toward preventing a relapse into conflict, said Lacroix.

Furthermore, the implementation phase will be just as crucial as the drafting of the agreement itself. This includes, as one of the key provisions of the security arrangements for Darfur, the creation of a 12,000-person joint security force within 90 days of the agreement's signing, made up of 6,000 members from Sudanese security forces and 6,000 from the signatory armed groups, he said.

As forces are deployed and resources are mobilized in support of the implementation, it is essential to ensure that local Darfuri communities feel ownership of the agreement and fully participate in the implementation, he said.

Financing, too, will be a key challenge. Therefore, managing expectations of what the international community can deliver at the current international context will be critical, he said.

The Darfur armed movements have suggested that implementation will require 13 billion U.S. dollars over a 10-year period, and the Sudanese government indicated that it will commit 7.5 billion dollars, he noted. "As the parties work to make the vision of the agreement into a reality, we in the international community have a responsibility to support them."

Clashes between government forces and armed groups as well as inter-communal violence make the protection of civilians a tough job, said Lacroix.

Continued intermittent clashes between government forces and the SLA/AW, concentrated in parts of the Jebel Marra, remain a challenge. Equally concerning, as talks in Juba have proceeded, has been the continued infighting between SLA/AW factions reportedly over disagreement on whether the group should join the negotiations, causing civilian deaths and significant displacement mainly in parts of Central and South Darfur, he said.

The final steps toward the peace agreement have also been accompanied by a notable increase in inter-communal violence in Darfur in 2020, with major incidents in West, North, and South Darfur. This violence has coincided with a rise in protests demanding increased security by Darfuri communities, particularly internally displaced persons (IDPs) and others who fear that they may fail to benefit from the final agreement and its implementation, he said.

The government has responded to inter-communal clashes by deploying troops to quell the violence, and by sending mediators to support the peaceful resolution of conflicts. However, while the government has vowed to meet the legitimate security demands of the Darfuri people, it continues to face significant challenges, including limited capacity and a trust deficit, particularly in conflict-affected areas and IDP camps, where protection is most needed, said Lacroix.

"As we stand on the cusp of the historic peace agreement in Juba, we are heartened by the progress that has been made, but also reminded of the significant challenges that remain," he said. "With the start of the implementation phase, it is essential that our support helps achieve improvements that can be felt by the people on the ground in Darfur, most especially in strengthening the safety and security of Darfuris."
September 18, Friday

A minor traffic accident resulting in vehicle damage was reported on the corner of 16th & Yonkers around 7 p.m. on Sept. 18.

Violation of a court order was reported on the 1100 block of W. 10th around 6:30 p.m. on Sept. 18.

Assault was reported on the 1200 block of Kokomo around 6 p.m. on Sept. 18.

Theft was reported on the 1500 block of Yonkers around 4:30 p.m. on Sept. 18.

Sexual assault was reported on the 3200 block of Lexington around 2 p.m. on Sept. 18. According to the police report, the reported crime occurred between March 1-2.

Drunkenness was reported on the 3600 block of Olton Rd. around 1:30 p.m. on Sept. 18.

A 19-year-old was arrested on a warrant for a local misdemeanor on the 1400 block of Quincy around 2:45 a.m. on Sept. 18.

Possession of marijuana was reported on the 1400 block of Portland around 2 a.m. on Sept. 18.

September 19, Saturday

Two people -- a 55-year-old and a 38-year-old  were arrested for public intoxication on the 1400 block of Kokomo around 11 p.m. on Saturday.

Theft was reported on the 900 block of W. 28th around 4 p.m. on Saturday.

Damaged property was reported on the 100 block of W. Givens around 2:30 p.m. on Saturday.

Aggravated assault, family violence was reported on the 1000 block of W. 10th around 12:30 p.m. on Saturday.

September 20, Sunday

A 57-year-old was arrested for assault on the 800 block of Lexington around 11:55 p.m. on Sunday.

Damaged property was reported on the 4500 block of Horseshoe Bend around 6:30 p.m. on Sunday.

Assault was reported on the 900 block of Joliet around 6 p.m. on Sunday.

Terroristic threats were reported on the 2500 block of Howard around 4 p.m. on Sunday.

Assault was reported on the 700 block of N. Broadway around 3 p.m. on Sunday.

Burglary by unforced entry into a residence was reported on the 400 block of Bryan around 9:30 a.m. on Sunday.

Shoplifting was reported on the 600 block of S. Broadway around 12:45 a.m. on Sunday.

September 21, Monday

Possession of a weapon was reported on the 1500 block of N. Columbia around 10 p.m. on Monday.

Theft was reported on the 400 block of W. 5th around 9 p.m. on Monday.

Trespassing on private property was reported on the 1300 block of Milwaukee around 8 p.m. on Monday.

September 22, Tuesday

Jaime Ray Castillo, 40, was arrested on an out of county felony warrant on the 800 block of N. Columbia round 11:30 p.m. on Tuesday.

Theft was reported on the 700 block of Fresno around 11:30 p.m. on Tuesday.

Damaged property was reported on the 1200 block of S. I-27 around 10:30 p.m. on Tuesday.

A minor traffic accident resulting in vehicle damage was reported on the 2600 block of Olton Rd. around 8 p.m. on Tuesday.

Assault was reported on the 900 block of 5 p.m. on Tuesday.

A minor traffic accident resulting in vehicle damage was reported on the 3300 block of Olton Rd. around 4:45 p.m. on Tuesday.

Theft was reported on the 1500 block of Utica around 8:45 a.m. on Tuesday.

Assault was reported on the 1800 block of Floydada around 8 a.m. on Tuesday.

September 23, Wednesday

Assault was reported on the 900 block of W. 28th around 12:30 a.m. on Wednesday.

Burglary by unforced entry into a residence was reported on the 3500 block of W. 25th around 8 p.m. on Wednesday.

Fraud through use or possession of identifying information was reported on the 700 block of W. 22nd around 6 p.m. on Wednesday.

Fraud through illegal use of credit cards was reported on the 2800 block of Olton Rd. around 4:45 p.m. on Wednesday.

Burglary through unforced entry into a non-residence was reported on the 2600 block of Joliet around 12:30 p.m. on Wednesday.

September 24, Thursday

Damaged property was reported on the 1400 block of Yonkers around 10:45 p.m. on Thursday.

A 17-year-old was arrested for assault on the 3000 block around W. 20th around 10:30 p.m. on Thursday.

A hit & run traffic accident was reported on the 1700 block of Houston around 7 p.m. on Thursday.

Cruelty toward a child was reported on the 1400 block of W. 34th around 10 a.m. on Thursday.

Theft was reported on the 300 block of Elm around 10 a.m. on Thursday.

Trespassing on private property was reported on the 2900 block of Lometa around 8:30 a.m. on Thursday.

Suspicious/harassing phone calls was reported on the 3600 block of Grandview around 7 a.m. on Thursday.
DOHC

As of 2019, three motorcycle enthusiasts and close friends founded Plus 3 Motors in the gorgeous little town of Almoradi, Spain. Before lockdown and the rest of that delightful ordeal, these gifted fellows debuted with a couple of ravishing one-off machines, which managed to capture the attention of the custom two-wheeler scene, thanks to their outstanding designs and sheer level of top-grade features.The very first piece of machinery to roll out of their workshop was a truly drool-worthy Honda CB600 Hornet-based creature thatll have just about any rider awestruck. It goes without saying this is a solid testament to these folks admirable skills and utter dedication.However, before most of us even had a chance to come to our senses, Plus 3 dropped yet another spectacular work of mechanical art. This time around, the project in question began with a 1984 model in Hondas revered CBX750 family. Let me tell you, this bad boy does a pretty neat job at looking the business!To give you a clear idea as to what this Spanish firm is capable of achieving, well be taking a minute to examine their magnificent CBX750 entity. After more than three decades of faithful service, the donor was certainly starting to show its age, but Plus 3s surgical interventions helped it regain its youth and former glory.Back in the 80s, Hondas two-wheeled behemoth was a force to be reckoned with. It was brought to life by a feral four-strokeinline-four colossus, with four valves per cylinder and a fierce displacement of 747cc. At around 9,500 rpm, this nasty animal can generate up to 93 hp, accompanied by 52 pound-feet (71 Nm) of fiendish twisting force at 8,500 revs. A six-speed gearbox is tasked with carrying the engines power to a chain final drive.Up front, suspension duties are taken care of by 39 mm (1.54 inches) air-assisted forks, coupled with a Pro-Link setup at the rear. Stopping power is supplied by twin 280 mm (11 inches) discs and two-piston calipers at the front, joined by a single 280 mm brake rotor and a two-piston caliper on the opposite end.Now, in terms of Plus 3 Motors unique creation, the trio kicked things off by fabricating a new subframe and installing a set of rear-mounted foot pegs. A 2005 Suzuki GSX-R600's forks and front brakes were transplanted onto the CBX750, while the rear suspension was honored with a modern CBRs modules. The stock Comstar wheels were removed to make room for a pair of 18-inch multi-spoked counterparts.Next, the crew went about crafting an array of custom bodywork components, including stealthy side panels and a fresh tail section that hosts an LED lighting kit. You will find more LED goodness at the front end, consisting of a halo-style headlight and subtle turn signals.Furthermore, a four-into-two exhaust system and a one-off fiberglass airbox allow CBX750s inline-four leviathan to breathe a little more freely. We also notice clip-on handlebars, Domino grips and a gauge unit from Kossos catalogue. To top it all off, the bike was enveloped in a splendid metallic silver paintwork, complemented by a healthy dose of gloss black accents.And that concludes it, ladies and gents. Whats your take on Plus 3s majestic undertaking?
Pakistani troops on Saturday violated the ceasefire agreement by resorting to firing and heavy shelling on forward areas along the Line of Control (LoC) in Rajouri district of Jammu and Kashmir, a defence spokesman said.

The shelling and firing from across the border in Nowshera sector was unprovoked and drew a befitting retaliation by the Indian Army, the spokesman said.

At about 11.15 am, Pakistan initiated unprovoked ceasefire violation by firing small arms and shelling with mortars along LoC in Nowshera, the spokesman said.

Also read: CBI chargesheet says Tuticorin cops tortured father, son whole night

The cross-border shelling between the two sides was going on when last reports were received. However, there was no immediate report of any casualty on the Indian side, he added.

Pakistan, of late, has also started to push arms, ammunition, narcotics and hawala money into Jammu and Kashmir with the help of drones. Since January 26, at least six such attempts have been made by Pakistan in Jammu region.
By PTI

KOLKATA: Cinema halls are set to reopen in West Bengal from October 1 after remaining closed for over six months in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said on Saturday.

She also said musical, dance and magic shows would be permitted in the state from next month.

"To return to normalcy, Jatras, Plays, OATs, Cinemas & all musical, dance, recital & magic shows shall be allowed to function with 50 participants or less from 1 Oct, subject to adherence to physical distancing norms, wearing of masks & compliance to precautionary protocols," the chief minister said on Twitter.

The decision comes amid repeated requests by actors of the Bengali film industry, including Trinamool Congress MPs Dev, Nusrat Jahan and Mimi Chakraborty, and industry bodies to reopen movie theatres, underscoring that cinema hall owners and employees are under severe financial stress.

The Eastern India Motion Pictures Association (EIMPA) and the Multiplex Association of India (MAI) had in June separately urged the Centre to grant permission for restarting shows in cinema halls.

The West Bengal government had allowed shooting for films, TV serials and web series from June 1 with not more than 35 persons on set and adhering to all health and safety protocols.

Cinema halls have been shut since the nationwide coronavirus lockdown began in late March.
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Over three months ago, a majority of the Minneapolis City Council pledged to defund the citys Police Department, making a powerful statement that reverberated across the country. It shook up Capitol Hill and the presidential race, shocked residents, delighted activists and changed the trajectory of efforts to overhaul the police during a crucial window of tumult and political opportunity.

Now some council members would like a do-over.

Councilor Andrew Johnson, one of the nine members who supported the pledge in June, said in an interview that he meant the words in spirit, not by the letter. Another councilor, Phillipe Cunningham, said that the language in the pledge was up for interpretation and that even among council members soon after the promise was made, it was very clear that most of us had interpreted that language differently. Lisa Bender, the council president, paused for 16 seconds when asked if the councils statement had led to uncertainty at a pivotal moment for the city.

I think our pledge created confusion in the community and in our wards, she said.

The regrets formalize a retreat that has quietly played out in Minneapolis in the months since George Floyd was killed in police custody and the ensuing national uproar over the treatment of Black Americans by law enforcement and by the country at large. After a summer that challenged societys commitment to racial equality and raised the prospect of sweeping political change, a cool autumn reality is settling in.

National polls show decreasing support for Black Lives Matter since a sea change of good will in June. In Minneapolis, the most far-reaching policy efforts meant to address police violence have all but collapsed.
People in the Far Eastern Russian city of Khabarovsk have taken to the streets for the 78th consecutive day to protest the arrest in July of the regions popular former governor.

Crowd estimates for the September 26 rally ranged from some 500 to over 2,000.

Former Khabarovsk Krai Governor Sergei Furgal was arrested on July 9 and taken to Moscow. He faces charges in connection with several killings that happened in the mid-2000s.

In a closed-door hearing, a court in Moscow on September 18 extended Furgals pretrial detention to December 9.

Some protesters in Khabarovsk on September 26 chanted "Long live Belarus" in Belarusian.

Belarus has been rocked by mass protests since Alyaksandr Lukashenka claimed he won the country's August 9 presidential election despite reports of widespread fraud. Western countries have refused to recognize Lukashenka as the country's rightful leader.

Furgal, of the nationalist Liberal Democratic Party of Russia, was elected in 2018 in a runoff that he won handily against the regions longtime United Russia incumbent. Supporters believe the charges against him were fabricated in a bid to reestablish United Russias control over the region.

The protests highlight growing discontent in the Far East over what demonstrators see as Moscow-dominated policies that often neglect their views and interests.

President Vladimir Putin's popularity has been declining as the Kremlin tries to deal with an economy suffering from the coronavirus pandemic and years of ongoing international sanctions.
New Delhi, Sep 26 (UNI) Continuing his attack on the BJP led NDA government at the Centre against the farm sector bills, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Saturday said that the government should withdraw the farm sector bills without much delay and give farmers a guarantee of MSP.

In a video message to people of the country and farmers, as part of the Congress social media campaign against the farm sector bills, Rahul said that the Congress is standing with the farmers of the country to oppose these laws passed in Parliament earlier this week.

'The government has been striking on the livelihood of the farmers through its policies - first through demonetisation, them through the GST and then during Corona pandemic when you were not given any financial help by the government. An attempt is being made to destroy you and make you a slave of the corporates. And now these three farm bills are designed to completely annihilate you,' Rahul said.

Assuring the complete support of the Congress to the farmers against the implementation of these laws, Rahul Gandhi said ,'we are standing together with you. We will stop these laws together.

I would like to tell the government that you have made a huge mistake. If the farmer comes out on the street, it will lead to a tremendous damage. You should withdraw these laws without any delay and provide to the farmers a guarantee of MSP. '

In a post on the social media, Rahul said, 'the demands of the farmers are genuine, Modi ji, listen to the voice of the country. Long live farmer, long live India.'

In an earlier tweet, Rahul called on people to speak up against 'the exploitation and oppression of the farmers by the Narendra Modi government. 'Come, let's unitedly raise our voice against the oppression and exploitation of farmers by the Narendra Modi government,' he said.

He called on people to associate themselves with the 'SpeakUpForFarmers' campaign by posting videos on the Social media.'

The Congress has been protesting against the three farm sector bills, passed by the Parliament, earlier this week, describing them as 'anti-farmer' and a move designed to benefit corporates.

UNI AR SHK1831
Scammers are always thinking of new ways to siphon off your money. Here are some of the most common PayPal scams and how you can avoid them.

PayPal is one of the easiest payment methods online and millions of people use it everyday. While it is relatively safe to use and precautions you take for pretty much any online payment, scammers and hackers are always coming up with new tricks to gain access to users accounts and siphon off money digitally.

Kaspersky has pointed out some of the most popular ways scammers try to cheat people on PayPal and being aware of these dubious methods will help you avoid them. Well also tell you how to avoid them.

Advance payment fraud

Its not unusual for online scammers to take the advance payment fraud route to trap PayPal users. Victims receive notifications that they are owed a certain amount of money - it could be an inheritance, winning the lottery, or some other compensation. And to get this money, the victim is asked to make a small advance payment (in this case, using PayPal). Additionally, you may also be asked to fill out a form with personal data, to receive the money. The message sender disappears once payment has been made and any personal data you have shared ends up in a database or is sold on the dark web.

How to avoid this scam:

Its kinda simple. Do not transfer money or disclose any information about yourself to strangers. Most of these messages come with plenty of red flags - like absurdly generous winnings or compensation, grammatical errors, the senders address would seem very strange etc - you can keep an eye out for these.

Also Read: Delhi Police issues warning: These are the calls, messages you need to be careful about

PayPal account problems

This scam begins with an e-mail that claims to come from PayPal. The email warns you that something is wrong with your PayPal account. You are also told that this can be fixed by clicking on the link below and logging in.

In almost every case, the link will take you to a page that looks like the real PayPal site, but the domain will be slightly different. If you log in there both your username and password will go straight to the scammers. In some severe cases, trying to fix the so-called issue with the PayPal account might require you to install a program to restore access - in all likelihood, this is a Trojan.

How to avoid the scam:

Look for errors in the message and web addresses. Also you must always remember that PayPal will never report a problem to you using that kind of email.

Overpayment refund scams

Scammers also entice people to give them money almost entirely of their own free will. Among the most common scams of this type are overpayment scams, in which a buyer sends a seller money and it is usually more than the sale price. Then the buyer claims that it was a mistake, and asks for a refund of the balance amount. And once that has been transferred, the buyer cancels the original transaction.

How to avoid the scam:

If you think you have overpaid or someone has overpaid you, its best to cancel the transaction and do it all over again. Dont take chances here.

Fraud involving delivery and payment cancellation

Sometimes fraudsters pretend to be buyers and ask a seller to send goods using the buyers favorite delivery service, which supposedly offers them a discount. The scammers then change the delivery address and file a complaint, saying the goods were never delivered.

Alternatively, the delivery company turns out to be a front that allows dishonest buyers to get their money back using chances like goods sent in good faith.

There is also address substitution where the buyer provides a fake address, and after several unsuccessful delivery attempts the company asks them where their purchase should be delivered. That way, they receive the package but file a complaint nonetheless against the seller claiming that they didnt receive anything. Given the numerous reports of unsuccessful delivery, PayPal may believe the fraudster.

How to avoid the scam:

Use only delivery services verified by you personally or by people you trust. Never send anything before receiving payment, and be sure to keep all receipts.

Also Read: SBI warns customers about scam emails, asks users to think before they click

Creative payment schemes

PayPal has a money transfer option with reduced rates for family and friends and sometimes scammers can request a money transfer that way so as to save on commissions, and they promise a discount in return. As per PayPal rules, this method is not supposed to be used to pay for goods, and no customer protection program applies to such transfers. Anyone who sends a friends and family payment to a scammer can kiss the money  and the goods  goodbye.

Scams of this type also include offers to transfer money using alternative means that are supposedly more convenient, or cheaper, or for any other reason considered better by the seller.

How to avoid the scam:

Ignore requests to use alternative payment methods. PayPal has very good protection programs for both sellers and buyers, but they work only for standard transfers made over the platform.

Charitable-contribution and investment scams

There are people who send out fake solicitations for charitable donations as well and it is not uncommon for such people to accept donations or contributions through PayPal.

Canceling the payment does not help if the fraudsters claim the received funds promptly (which they will probably do), so you need to check in advance. Be especially attentive to requests for charitable donations during natural disasters and other force majeure events.

How to avoid the scam:

Research and verify these offers. Check the reputation of every charitable foundation (or investment company) you consider sending money to. It is best if you have acquaintances or friends who have worked with the concern and can vouch for its legitimacy, but regardless, you can verify charities on the Internet using services such as Charity Navigator, the Better Business Bureau, and Charity Watch.

Just remember - if it is too good to be true, it probably is.
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Ohio Republicans on Saturday expressed pleasure at President Donald Trumps decision to nominate judge Amy Coney Barrett to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court, while Democrats from the state cautioned her confirmation could change the courts direction for decades and urged that the vacancy created by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg be filled by the winner of the upcoming election.

U.S. Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio, who urged waiting until after the 2016 presidential election to fill the vacancy created by Justice Antonin Scalias death, issued a statement that said he looks forward to considering Barretts nomination. Portman, a Republican, noted the U.S. Senate confirmed her as a U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit judge on Oct. 31, 2017.

The job of a Supreme Court justice is to fairly and impartially apply the law and to protect our rights guaranteed by the Constitution, not to advance public policy goals by legislating from the bench," Portmans statement said. "Judge Barrett has an impressive background and is highly regarded for her work as a judge and as a constitutional law professor at Notre Dame. I look forward to meeting with her in the coming weeks as she goes through a fair and thorough evaluation process.

Democratic U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio issued a statement that said he has serious concerns about Barretts rulings against womens rights and civil rights and her record of siding with corporations over workers.

Brown added that "the American people deserve to have a say in whether or not she is their nominee to replace Justice Ginsburg. He described the nomination as a power grab by Trump and Republicans who control the Senate when they should be focused on COVID relief for the millions struggling amid this public health and economic crisis.

The Supreme Court has enormous influence over the lives of Ohioans, and any nominee must be willing to defend their rights to make their own health care decisions, collectively bargain for safe workplaces and fair pay, and to be protected from discrimination and Wall Street greed," Browns statement said. Americans are already voting, and deserve to have a say on the court that will decide the fate of their health care, workplace safety, criminal justice reform, and civil rights. The Senate should not be voting on a nominee to fill Justice Ginsburgs seat on the Court until after inauguration.

The top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, Champaign County Republican Rep. Jim Jordan, was more sanguine than Portman, describing Barrett as a great pick.

Amy Coney Barrett is a beyond excellent choice for the United States Supreme Court, Jordan said on Twitter. Shell fight for life, liberty, and the rule of law. The way the Founders originally intended. I look forward to her swift confirmation in the Senate.

Holmes County GOP Rep. Bob Gibbs described Coney Barrett as a fantastic nominee for the Supreme Court.

Her originalist judicial philosophy will allow for interpretation of our laws within the framework of the Constitution, including its checks and balances, said Gibbs' statement. "Barrett will be a fair arbiter of the law, rather than a legislator in a judicial robe. President Trumps selection of Judge Barrett will no doubt be met with unfounded and unfair attacks on her. I hope my colleagues in the Senate can rise above the vicious personal attacks they conducted during the confirmation of Justice (Brett) Kavanaugh. Her confirmation must proceed deliberately, quickly, and without political theater.

Toledo Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur released a statement that said Barrett has a history of legal opinions that are inconsistent with the progress working people have fought so hard to achieve in this nation."

She said this Supreme Court nomination puts the future of a womans right to make her own healthcare decisions in jeopardy, along with the future of the Affordable Care Act, the right of workers to collectively bargain and join unions, civil rights, voting rights, public safety reform and campaign finance reform. Kaptur also criticized Republicans who control the U.S. Senate for blocking President Barack Obamas Supreme Court pick to replace Scalia for over a year, while now rushing to fill the vacancy created by Ginsburgs death in less than 40 days.

Americans want Ruth Bader Ginsbergs replacement for the Supreme Court to be selected by the winner of Novembers presidential election, said Kaptur. There should be no confirmation until inauguration.

President Trump makes another great pick!



Amy Coney Barrett is a beyond excellent choice for the United States Supreme Court.



Shell fight for life, liberty, and the rule of law. The way the Founders originally intended.



I look forward to her swift confirmation in the Senate.  Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) September 26, 2020

Niles-area Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan released a statement that said that instead of passing new legislation to help the nation recover from the coronavirus pandemic, Trump and Senate Republicans are instead dropping everything to confirm an extremist justice to the court before the November 3rd election.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg spent a lifetime helping our country live up to its founding ideals, said Ryan. Her dying wish was that (Senate Republican Leader Mitch) McConnell follow the rule he himself made, and a nominee not be confirmed until the next presidential term. I hope my Republican colleagues will heed her wish and focus on the critical issue of getting the American people the relief they need.

Ohio Republican Gov. Mike DeWine also applauded the pick, saying shes both highly qualified and highly respected." He also noted shes a mother of seven, a constitutional scholar, and an esteemed law professor.

Judge Coney Barretts prior writings and judicial opinions show that she will interpret the law fairly and impartially, and I urge the U.S. Senate to act quickly to confirm her nomination," said a statement from DeWine.

A statement that Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost posted on Twitter called Barrett Trumps best judicial nomination yet.

Brilliant, clear-eyed and capable, she will apply the law is it is written, not as she wishes it to be, said Yost.

Ohio Democratic Party chair David Pepper described Trumps announcement as his latest attack on Ohioans' health care.

Just one week after Election Day, the Supreme Court will take up Republicans' lawsuit to spike health care costs, strip away coverage from 741,000 Ohioans and threaten protections for more than 5 million Ohioans with pre-existing conditions like cancer, asthma and COVID-19," said a statement from Pepper. "Make no mistake: this is just another reminder that working families' health care is on the ballot.

Ohio Republican Party chair Jane Timken said she looks forward to Barretts Senate confirmation, and having another pioneering woman sitting our countrys highest court.

As a wife and mother of seven children, Barrett is proof that women can accomplish anything they choose," said a statement from Timken. Ohio Senator Rob Portman has expressed his readiness to take President Trumps choice into consideration. It is imperative that other Senate Republicans follow suit. The Democrats hoping to block Barretts nomination are the very same ones who ardently supported President Obamas nominee in 2016. The Constitution is clear, and U.S. Senators are duty bound to follow it.

The president of Ohio Right to Life, Michael Gonidakis, said in a statement that having Coney Barrett on the court would provide a once in a lifetime opportunity for the pro-life movement.

He added that Ohio Senate President Larry Obhof is about to introduce legislation called the Human Life Protection Act that would prohibit all abortions except those necessary to save the mothers life. He said the law would take effect when the United States Supreme Court overturns its Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion, and will serve as the trigger to end abortion in Ohio.

Roe is on the ropes and it is only a matter of time before it falls," Gonidakis said in his statement. "Ohio Right to Life is ready to lead the way to ensure that our great state is prepared for a post-Roe America.

NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio Executive Director Kellie Copeland issued a statement that called for stopping Trumps illegitimate power grab and standing up to the tyranny of the anti-choice minority.

Being able to have an abortion or continue a pregnancy is a fundamental human right, Copeland said in the statement. You, and only you, should be able to make that decision about your body and your future. But thats not what Amy Coney Barrett, Trumps nominee to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, believes. Barrett is so extreme; she doesnt even think that health insurance coverage should include contraception. Her outright hostility to the basic human right to bodily autonomy disqualifies her from a life-time appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Court of Appeals Judge Amy Cony Barrett is President Trumps best judicial nomination yet.



Brilliant, clear-eyed and capable, she will apply the law is it is written, not as she wishes it to be. #textualism pic.twitter.com/u3WYKWZwJ0  Dave Yost (@Yost4Ohio) September 26, 2020

Read more:

Sen. Sherrod Brown expects Democrats will fight like hell against Trump Supreme Court nominee

Sen. Rob Portman continues to defend his switch on Supreme Court Justice votes in an election year

John Boehner memoir to hit bookstores in April

U.S. House passes bill backed by Rep. Marcia Fudge to ban hairstyle discrimination

Too many Hagans? Rep. Tim Ryan claims confusion between his opponent Christina Hagan and State Rep. Michele Lepore-Hagan

Ohio GOP Rep. Jim Jordan urges swift Senate vote on successor for Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Sen. Rob Portman says the Senate should consider President Donald Trumps Supreme Court nominee

Ohio members of Congress react to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburgs death

House of Representatives condemns coronavirus-related discrimination against Asians over objections from Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio

Senate Committee approves three Ohio federal judge candidates after members voice concerns about Cuyahoga Countys J. Philip Calabrese

FirstEnergy now under SEC scrutiny: What does that mean?

House adopts bill by Rep. Marcia Fudge to fight school segregation

Bipartisan Congress members including Rep. Anthony Gonzalez propose coronavirus relief plan with $450 weekly unemployment payment

House agrees to rename Grand River Post Office for police officer Andy Nowacki, who died in Iraq war

President Trump honors September 11 rescuer from Ohio at commemorative event

CMHA gets $8.2 million federal grant to help homeless during coronavirus pandemic

Greater Cleveland RTA gets $15 million federal grant to buy new railcars
(Natural News) Four years after the Obama-led deep state launched a denial operation to keep then-GOP nominee Donald Trump out of the White House  which suggests early on they had internal polling showing he had a really good chance of beating Hillary Clinton  we are still learning the sordid, disgusting details behind what is unquestionably the worst non-prosecuted political scandal in our countrys history.

This week, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham provided an unclassified summary report to Attorney General William Barr noting that the primary sub-source for retired British spy Christopher Steeles bogus dossier was a Russian agent  Igor Danchenko  who had long been known to the FBI.

Only, when it came time to obtain a surveillance warrant to spy on the Trump campaign from the secretive FISA court, the FBI conveniently left out that little detail.

To me, failure of the FBI to inform the court that the Primary Sub-source was suspected of being a Russian agent is a breach of every duty owed by law enforcement to the judicial system, Graham said in a statement.

A press release posted to the Senate committees website noted additionally:

The FBI summary provided to the committee reveals that the Crossfire Hurricane team was aware of this information in December 2016, yet failed to inform the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.

Further, they continued to seek three FISA warrant applications using the Steele dossier as a basis.

You got that? The agents involved in this sham knew they were violating procedures and the law just to entrap a president they didnt like.

How do we know? Because some of the agents and officials involved in Spygate, which included setting up Trumps first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, actually bought liability insurance to protect them from lawsuits if anyone found out about their treachery.

[W]e all went and purchased professional liability insurance, one agent texted on Jan. 10, 2017, the same day CNN published a story claiming that President-elect Trump had been briefed by then-FBI Director James Comey about the discredited dossier by Christopher Steele.

Holy crap, another agent responded in an email, as first reported by The Federalist. All the analysts too?

Yep, the first agent noted. All the folks at the Agency as well.

[C]an I ask who are the most likely litigators? an agent asked. [A]s far as potentially suing yall[?]

[H]aha, who knows.I think [t]he concern when we got it was that there was a big leak at DOJ and the NYT among others was going to do a piece, the first agent replied.

As for the FBI and the FISA court, Graham has a little surprise in store.

In light of this newly declassified information, I will be sending the FISA Court the information provided to inform them how wide and deep the effort to conceal exculpatory information regarding the Carter Page warrant application was in 2016 and 2017, he said.

A small group of individuals in the Department of Justice and FBI should be held accountable for this fraud against the court. I do not believe they represent the overwhelming majority of patriotic men and women who work at the Department of Justice and FBI, he added. (Related: Horowitzs report on Obama-era FISA court abuse uncovers MASSIVE corruption: 51 violations and nine false statements by FBI.)

Graham went on to say that Congress must reform the system so it never happens again.

Hows that going to work?

The FISA court meets in secret; it has to be that way because the intelligence agencies and FBI seeking surveillance warrants often present top secret information. The courts location is not known; the judges on the court are known but they hear evidence without a defendants lawyer president.

In other words, the entire surveillance warrant process operates on highly secretive honor system; the FBI agents involved in Spygate were not honorable, but how are the FISA court judges supposed to know? And how will they know when theyre being duped in the future?

The best reforms, then, are lengthy trials and long prison sentences for convictions. Otherwise, Spygate will happen again.

Sources include:

TheEpochTimes.com

Judiciary.Senate.gov

NaturalNews.com
A Metropolitan Police officer shot dead inside a south London custody suite by a handcuffed suspect armed with a revolver has been described as a lovely and highly-respected colleague.

Sergeant Matiu Ratana (54), known as Matt, was originally from New Zealand. He joined the force in 1991 and was nearing retirement.

He died in hospital after the 23-year-old gunman opened fire at Croydon Custody Centre in south London in the early hours of yesterday.

The suspect, who had been arrested for possession of class B drugs with intent to supply and possession of ammunition, also shot himself during the incident at about 2.15am and is in a critical but stable condition in hospital.

No police firearms were fired and the case is not being treated as terror-related. A murder probe has been launched and investigators from the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) watchdog are at the scene.

PSNI Chief Constable Simon Byrne spoke of his sadness, tweeting: "Our thoughts are with the family of the officer and our colleagues and friends at the Metropolitan Police."

Former Chief Constable Sir Hugh Orde, who served here from 2002-2009 and now works with the Police Arboretum Memorial Trust, said he was "appalled and deeply saddened".

Sir Hugh, whose term covered the murder of Pc Stephen Carroll in Craigavon in 2009, added: "This is a dreadful incident and my heart goes out to the officer's family, friends and policing colleagues. Every day our police officers put their lives on the line and this officer has tragically paid that ultimate price.

As the former Chief Constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland, I know personally the devastation of losing one of your own and the awful impact it has on families, friends and colleagues."

The Croyden suspect was arrested by regular officers following a stop and search, then handcuffed behind his back before being taken to the station in a police vehicle.

The IOPC said he was taken into the building and sat in a holding area in the custody suite, then opened fire while still in handcuffs as officers prepared to search him with a metal detector.

IOPC regional director Sal Naseem said: "It is at that point that shots were fired resulting in the fatal injuries to the officer and critical injuries to the man.

"A non-police issue firearm, which appears to be a revolver, has been recovered from the scene. Further ballistic work will be required."

Met Commissioner Dame Cressida Dick, who with Mayor of London Sadiq Khan led police officers across the capital in a minute's silence, described the victim as a "talented police officer".

He was "big in stature, big in heart, friendly, capable, a lovely man and highly respected by his colleagues", she said.
James Murray and Melyssa Davies are married, PEOPLE can exclusively announce.

The Impractical Jokers star, 44, wed his fiancee on Friday at the Lake House Inn in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, in front of family and friends. In attendance, of course, were the rest of the Jokers: Sal Vulcano, Brian Quinn and Joe Gatto, who served as best man and also officiated the wedding.

The six months leading up to the big day were full of twists and turns, as the couple juggled their plans with ever-evolving COVID-19 restrictions.

"We had four different weddings being planned simultaneously, depending on how everything worked," Murray tells PEOPLE. "We had four different wedding lists and four different plans, and one version of it was just our bridal party in our backyard, at the most extreme."

"We ended up going with a compromised list, which was about a quarter of the original list that we had," he continues. "Honestly, it was a lot less stress having one quarter of the guest list. It's a lot less moving parts in that way. And thankfully we're both healthy, and our families are healthy, so it was kind a blessing in that way, having this time to live together and plan our lives together."

Adds Davies, "We moved in not too long before everything happened, and having both of us home, I think, really helped decide what we wanted and what we needed more of and less of. We got to spend a lot more time in the house  which I don't think would have been possible before all of this  and with our puppy. She got spoiled during all of this!"

RELATED: All of the Celeb Couples Who've Tied the Knot in 2020

The venue, a largely outdoor space located on Lake Nockamixon, felt like the perfect choice. It allowed the couple to hold their ceremony outside, overlooking the lake, and their cocktail hour on a sweeping balcony. The reception hall went without its removable doors and windows to allow for more airflow.

Both the bridal party and the bride and groom's immediate families stayed on the property, which offers separate houses for guests.

Story continues

Related: The 'Impractical Jokers' and Jameela Jamil had Instant Chemistry

"It's a beautiful place. They did a great job with it," Murray says. "It's very cool that we get to be with our closest friends and family, without having the need for them to be staying in hotels nearby."

Masks were required, and mask and sanitizing stations were set up throughout the space. The couple also strategized smaller tables for guests, spreading people further apart and ensuring a certain amount of distance from the band.

"It's been interesting," Murray says. "But all that matters is that our closest friends and family were there, and all that matters to me, truly, is that this one person was there besides me, and that she said yes."

RELATED: Impractical Jokers Star James Murray Is Engaged! Inside His Sweet Proposal to Melyssa Davies

Murray and Davies made sure to leave their special touch on the fun, light-hearted celebration  they even rented a bouncy house. For the centerpieces, they selected pieces of old-time luggage, which each came with a wooden photo album for guests.

"There's a picture of Melyssa and I on the cover and it says, 'Melyssa and James' upcoming honeymoon,'" Murray explains. "And when you flip open the album, it's 20 or 25 photos of us where we might go on our honeymoon for the next two weeks  but they're all photoshopped photos. There is one real photo of where we're actually going, but the rest of them are hysterical and funny, like us on the top of Mount Everest, us at a volcano, us kayaking down the Amazon. There's a whole storyline to the photo album."

"And inside each piece of luggage, there's a different antique wooden board game," Davies adds. "We're really big game people."

So where is the happy couple jetting off to for their honeymoon? They're taking a two-week trip to Soneva Jani, a five-star resort in the heart of the Maldives.

"You know, I never thought I would get married, I never thought I wanted to get married," Murray admits. "And I met Melyssa and it was instantly different. I knew I was going to marry her. And my whole life I've wanted to go to one place, and I had kind of resigned myself to knowing that I wouldn't go, because you wouldn't go to this place unless you were getting married."

"It's spectacularly beautiful, and I've wanted to go my whole life," he says. "I never thought I would, and when I met Melyssa, I was like, holy cow, I get to go to the place of my dreams."

Catch People (the TV show!) Monday through Friday. Check your local listings for exact times or stream the show every day at 7 p.m. ET/ 4 p.m. PT at People.com and PeopleTV.com.
In this file photo, bottles of prescription drugs: Lipitor, TriCor, Plavix, Singulair, Lexapro and Avapro are displayed at Medco Health Solutions Inc., in Willingboro, N.J., June 14, 2011. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke, File)

FDA and HHS Implement Safe Importation Action Plan to Lower Drug Prices

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced that they have taken steps toward making safe and affordable drugs accessible to American patients.

As outlined in the Safe Importation Action Plan (pdf), there are two ways to provide Americans with safe and affordable drugsone way relying on the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act to allow drug importation from Canadathe imported drugs from Canada will have to abide by certain conditions to make sure that they dont pose any risk to both the health and safety of the American public, as well as making sure that the imported drugs will be able to cut costs for the American consumers.

The other way, which is highlighted in the action plan, is to import the same FDA-approved drug sold in a foreign country. This drug needed to be verified by the FDA again to make sure that it is the same as the U.S. version. If that condition is met, then the FDA would allow for the foreign version to be imported and sold.

Todays action is an important part of FDAs priorities to promote choice and competition. The Safe Importation Action Plan aims to clearly describe procedures to import drugs that would lower prices and improve access while also maintaining the high quality and safety Americans expect and deserve, said Stephen M. Hahn, the FDA commissioner.

The FDA will continue to assess and act on opportunities to increase competition in the prescription drug market and help reduce the cost of medicines, he said.

This is one of the parts of President Donald Trumps American First healthcare plan, as outlined by the press release issued by the HHS on Thursday.

In addition to the lowered price of drugs through importation, the healthcare plan also takes into account healthcare plans and insurance by lowering health care insurance premiums.

The Presidents Plan delivers better care, more choice, and lower costs for all Americans, said Alex Azar, the HHS Secretary. Because of the Presidents leadership, Americans will enjoy lower drug costs, lower insurance premiums, real access to prices of healthcare services and to their medical records, new protections from surprise bills, and the ability to work with their doctor to determine what treatments make sense for them.

This also comes as Trump announced his signing of an executive order on drug pricing.

Just signed a new Executive Order to LOWER DRUG PRICES! My Most Favored Nation order will ensure that our Country gets the same low price Big Pharma gives to other countries, Trump wrote on Twitter. The days of global freeriding at Americas expense are over, and prices are coming down FAST! Also just ended all rebates to middlemen, further reducing prices.

The Epoch Times reporter Jack Phillips contributed to this article.
Fabien Engelmann was arrested for drunkenness in Luxembourg City in January. A police officer accused the mayor of Hayange of having behaved inappropriately. In the face of the outcry, the elected representative defended himself in the press this Friday.

Fabien Engelmann, mayor of Hayange (Moselle) since 2014 and regional councillor of the Grand Est since 2016, appeared before the court in Luxembourg to face charges of driving under the influence of alcohol and for refusing to submit to a blood alcohol test.

The councillor was arrested by the police in Luxembourg City in January, more precisely between the Gluck roundabout and the Albert Bousser tunnel.

A police officer who was on duty that night, reported that they had noticed a car zigzagging. In the tunnel, the driver suddenly accelerated, causing the police to turn on their flashing lights. The car then stopped after exiting the tunnel. The driver had a strong smell of alcohol and seemed to have great difficulty standing.

He reportedly acted rudely and demanded that they should look for the real criminals, instead of focusing on him. He had to try eight times to blow into the breathalyser before he got a result: 1.2 grams. When Engelmann was told they had to go to the police station to carry out a second alcohol test, he was less enthusiastic, although the police had explained that a refusal would result in a driving ban.

Engelmann then attempted to get out of the blood alcohol test, claiming that as mayor of Hayange, he often had contact with Prime Minister Xavier Bettel, and that the police would have to deal the consequences. The incident lasted over 30 minutes and the accused acted as if he were someone superior, the officer concluded.

"Not a big deal, just one too many"



However, the elected representative, his lawyer, and the passenger who accompanied him on the night of the incident arguedthe Luxembourg police behaved badly, claiming Englemann was subjected to shocking behaviour by the police, such as threats and inappropriate remarks. These accusations were refuted by the police officer, who spoke of lies and described the accusation of intimidation as foolishness.

Contacted on Friday by the Republicain Lorrain, Fabien Engelmann confirmed that he had indeed refused the breathalyser, as the law enabled this, and that the breathalyser read 0.58g - "just one glass too many", said Engelmann.

The elected representative offered another version of his exchanges with the Luxembourg police. On his way home from a birthday party on the night in question, Engelmann said he had encountered a policeman behaving like a "cowboy".

He also claimed he never boasted that he was the mayor of Hayange, or mentioned his alleged contacts in the government. Reportedly, he had opened the car boot to get his papers, and that is when the officers saw his campaign posters. He had calmly said that the Prime Minister would not be too happy to know how the police officers behaved, according to the Republicain Lorrain.

The representative of the public prosecutor's office requested a fine and a three-year driving ban, which will possibly be suspended.

The verdict is expected on 23 October.
Sara Arrived At NCB's The Zonal Office In Mumbai

On Friday, the agency questioned several other names which emerged in the case like actor Rakul Preet Singh, Padukone's manager Karishma Prakash, and Dharma Productions' executive producer Kshitij Ravi. Padukone's manager Karishma Prakash, who was interrogated for about seven hours, was summoned for another round of questioning on September 26. Meanwhile, according to reports, Rakul was questioned for about four hours.

Deepika Padukone And Shraddha Kapoor Were Also Summoned By NCB

The drug angle in Sushant Singh Rajput's death case emerged after ED officials found evidence of drug usage and procurement in Rhea's WhatsApp chats. The case was then handed over to the NCB, who arrested actor Rhea Chakraborty on drug-related charges. Rhea reportedly had mentioned the names of Simone Khambatta, Sara Ali Khan and Rakul Preet Singh during her interrogation between September 6 and 9.

NCB Might Summon More People In The Investigation

The agency soon revealed they will be summoning more actors in the case. On the other hand, some reports have claimed the agency could also summon four male actors in upcoming weeks.
Yukoners took their last soak in the Takhini Hot Pools on Friday.

After 49 years of operation, the aging premises, including the pool, will be demolished.

"The facility was literally crumbling, we have had lines freezing up, we have had floors starting to sag and cave in," said Gary Umbrich, president of Takhini Hot Springs Ltd.

He says his team kept the old facility running as long as they could, but the building and concrete pool were too far gone to operate for another season.

Mike Rudyk/CBC

But all is not lost: Umbrich and his family purchased the land to build a new facility nearby. There are three new pools coming with a brand new, $6-million dollar facility.

Umbrich says there was a lot of nostalgia for the old pool, but he is optimistic the new spa will win Yukoners over.

The hot springs have been used for centuries. One of the first pools was built in the 1940s by the US military when it was building the Alaska highway.

Back then the pool was made from wood and canvas.

The facility was literally crumbling, we have had lines freezing up, we have had floors starting to sag and cave in. - Gary Umbrich, president of Takhini Hot Springs Ltd.

Located about a half hour drive out of Whitehorse, the Takhini Hot Pools is one of the most visited destinations in Yukon.

There is no sulfur smell, and the main minerals in the natural springs are calcium, magnesium and iron.

Mike Rudyk/CBC

Laura Melvin regularly goes to the pool with her children. She says she is going to miss the hot pool this winter, but looks forward to the new facility opening up.

"This sort of history of the 40-plus years of it being the way it has been, [it's] definitely something that will have changed with the new facilities going in," said Melvin.

New facility aims for spa-like experience

Umbrich says the new, modern facility under construction will have more natural looking pools for a spa-like experience. It will have steam rooms, saunas and heated ceramic lounge chairs.

Story continues

The facility will also have stonework waterfalls and landscaping surrounding the pools and buildings.

Umbrich says some of the pools will be hotter, because of the short distance to the source of the underground springs.

He says when completed, the project will be a world class facility. The name of the new facility hasn't been released.

While the old Takhini Hot Pools will soon be just a memory, Umbrich says the new hot springs will be ready to warm Yukoners winter blues in the new year.

He says construction should be finished in early 2021.
MANZINI - The late former Senator and businessman, Robert Zwane started business as a vendor, but he died a millionaire.

This is according to information that is contained in his obituary and further confirmed by former Deputy Senate President Ngomuyayona Gamedze, who was speaking on behalf of Zwanes friends. This was during his memorial service, which was held at Metropolitan Evangelical Church in Manzini yesterday. Khabonina, who is one of the late former Senators daughters, read her fathers obituary and she revealed that he used to work as a chef at Swazi National High School and he started a fruits and vegetable selling business at the main gate of the school. On the other hand, the former deputy Senate president said Zwane died a millionaire. According to his obituary, Robert Lobi Zwane was born in 1950 and he was the second born of the late Samuel Kufa Zwane and the late Hendrianah Salwane Mabuza. He was born in Mankayane under the Manzini Region and went to Musi Primary School in 1959 before continuing with his education at Cana Mission School.

Zwane worked as a chef at Swazi National High School, which was Matsapha High School then.

Passion

He began a fruit and vegetable selling business at the main gate of the school, where his wife Sibongile Dlamini worked. His strong passion for business made him start another one; buying and selling cattle. In the early 1970s, he started a butchery business in Malkerns. Later on, this business gave birth to another butchery at Sicelweni (kaKhoza) and this marked the beginning of his success in business. He developed himself until he had yet another butchery in Manzini, which was passionately known as Ekhaya Town Butchery. The business moved to Manzini Bus Rank where he expanded and spread his wings to bottle stores and other businesses.

The obituary also revealed that Zwane had a strong passion for livestock, cattle in particular. He invested so much into cattle farming. After the devastating drought which hit the country in 1992, he made a huge loss. That sad experience inspired him to venture into the property business. As a result, he owned properties both in Eswatini and South Africa.

He was also the core founder of Eswatini Community Police, an organisation which fights crime in communities. He served in Parliament as a Senator from 2008 to 2013. He died in a hospital in South Africa after a short illness.

Brave

He is survived by his four wives and many children. He also had a few grandchildren, his elder brother and two sisters. He will be remembered as someone who was brave, a dreamer, a fighter and outspoken. Rest in eternal peace Mangweni. Your legacy shall live on, Khabonina said.

She then quoted a verse from the Bible, Revelation 14:13 which reads; Blessed are those who die in the Lord, for they will rest from their labour and their deeds shall follow them. Meanwhile, the former Deputy Senate President, Ngomuyayona Gamedze said he was proud that his former colleague (Zwane) died a millionaire because he was a hard worker. Yes, he died a millionaire as he owned farms and businesses in both Eswatini and South Africa, he emphasised.

He said it was a pleasure that he was associated with the late Zwane. He said in Parliament, he was Zwanes boss as he occupied the seat of being Deputy Senate President. He added that as they worked with the deceased Zwane for five years (2008-2013), almost every day there would be a motion that community police should be paid. On another note, he said he failed Zwane together with his former colleagues of the 2008-2013 term as he asked them to take him to the King so that he could be a lecturer at the University of Eswatini (UNESWA). He said at the institution, Zwane said he wanted to teach the students business. He said this was because Zwane was worried that after graduation, the graduates could not even start a business because they did not have knowledge about it.

On another note, Ndzingeni Member of Parliament (MP) Lutfo Dlamini, who was representing Parliament, said Zwane did not go to the House of Assembly for money, but to serve the country. He said this was because there was a time when Senators complained about their salaries and at that time, Zwane was not even aware how much they were paid. He said that was proof that he was there to serve the nation.






District Crime Intelligence Bureau (DCIB) of the District Police arrested a person accused to be an interstate marijuana peddler from Miraj town in Sangli district in Maharashtra and seized contraband worth Rs 24 lakh from his possession. Manhunt has been launched to nab two persons from Warangal and Hyderabad in Telangana who had been supplying the stocks to the accused.

Superintendent of Police Laxman Nimbargi informed on Saturday that Chikkodi police on September 22, had arrested accused identified as Washim Shaikh resident of Miraj and had seized marijuana weighing 2 kg from his possession, while his accomplice and main accused Ashpak Mainuddin Mulla resident of Miraj had escaped.

DCIB team led by Police Inspector Ningangouda Patil investigating the case succeeded in nabbing Mulla from Miraj on September 23. During interrogation, Mulla informed that two persons from Warangal and Hyderabad had been supplying him marijuana and he had been selling in Miraj and Sangli in Maharashtra and in Chikkodi, Belagavi and Dharwad in the state, he said.

Police seized marijuana weighing 40 kg which he had stocked in packets in rear portion of a car parked at Mahishal village in Miraj taluk and 78 kg packets in farmhouse in agricultural lands in the same village. A total of 60 packets of marijuana each containing 2 kg worth Rs 24 lakh were recovered. Car and scooter were worth Rs 4.80 lakh were also seized. Two more accused who supplied the contraband were being searched, he informed.

Nimbargi complimented the team led by Patil in investigating the case.
Featured image to accompany story by Sarah Gantz about how to create a quarantine bubble for safe social interaction. Read more

Due to the rise in COVID-19 cases, Philadelphias pandemic guidelines have changed since this article first published. As of November 13, all public and private indoor gatherings are banned, and food and drink are prohibited at outdoor gatherings. The Pennsylvania Health Secretary Rachel Levine has since also advised that residents not hold holiday gatherings with anyone outside their household.

Pennsylvanias first case of coronavirus was announced in early March, also when the World Health Organization declared the rapidly spreading virus a pandemic. By Thanksgiving, well have lived with this for more than eight months. Were tired. We want normalcy to return. We want to be together. And yet, COVID-19 is still here.

So what does that mean for planning a holiday gathering, especially as cooler weather steers us indoors?

Obviously the safest thing to do is to set up a virtual dinner, says Eric Sachinwalla, a doctor and medical director of Infection Prevention and Control at Einstein Medical Center Philadelphia. Its an option, but Im sure there are families who dont find that very fun.

As with any in-person gathering right now, the decision to host or attend one is personal. With loved ones involved, especially older relatives, making that decision can feel unbearably hard. We asked experts to share advice on how to approach the upcoming holiday season, along with strategies you can take to decrease risk.

Two-week self-quarantines: Are they really necessary to stay safe?

Self-quarantining is ideal. But its rarely realistic.

In theory, thatd be great, but does everyone in the family have the ability to quarantine for two weeks? And how confident are you that someone wont break the quarantine contract? says Sachinwalla. All it takes is one person to mess it up.

If everyone is able to stay home for 14 days, and you can trust them to do so, experts agree its the safest approach. How you define the quarantine is up to everyone involved, who will need to agree on ground rules. For example, you may decide masked visits to the grocery store are OK but socially distanced picnics are not.

 READ MORE: How to do everything better right now: A collection of our most useful stories

But for most, weeks-long quarantining isnt practical, which means considering other strategies. Start by doing an honest risk assessment with everyone who plans to gather. What do their social circles look like? Are their kids going to school? Is anyone high-risk? Is travel involved? How large is the group? Youll need to weigh everyones tolerance for risk, too.

Once you shape a situation that feels comfortable for everyone, think about how to make it safer. Even if youre going to an in-person job or cant quarantine, you can minimize unnecessary exposure for two weeks.

Avoid gyms or going out to eat or really anywhere where youre inside a building for an extended period of time, says Thersa Sweet, an associate professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at Drexel University.

What if everyone gets tested? Can we ditch the masks?

The coronavirus incubation period makes testing tricky.

If you were exposed the day before you get tested, and you test negative, you could still develop symptoms a few days later, says Patricia Henwood, associate professor of emergency medicine at Thomas Jefferson Universitys Sidney Kimmel Medical College and leader of the Emergency Medicine COVID-19 Task Force at Jefferson Health.

 READ MORE: How to create a pandemic pod for safe social interaction

The incubation period ranges from two to 14 days, with a median time of 4 to 5 days from exposure to the onset of symptoms. Henwood advises quarantining for a week prior to testing. It wont make your test results foolproof, but its a reasonable option if one week at home is possible, while two weeks just arent

If you do get a test, you need to be very careful leading up to the gathering, otherwise the results are useless. Tests obviously dont prevent you from getting exposed to COVID-19 in the days that follow.

November is cold. Can we gather indoors?

If you choose to plan an indoor event, make it small, and make sure masks and social distancing remain part of the plan.

It doesnt completely eliminate risk, but if youre stuck inside and its only five people instead of 30, it makes it easier to space yourselves out, and the more time you have a mask on, the lower the risk of transmission occurring, says Sachinwalla.

Keep the windows open to improve ventilation. And skip the annual family karaoke session. Anything with singing or shouting increases risk of transmission. Be mindful of alcohol consumption, too, which often elevates the volume in the room and lowers your safety radar.

Should I invite family from out of town?

Any kind of travel increases your chance of getting and spreading COVID-19, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Inviting family members from out of town requires weighing the risk versus benefit, for everyone involved.

If people are flying, theres obviously risk. If its a long enough trip where that person can quarantine for a certain amount of time before seeing family, I think thats a reasonable approach, says Henwood.

Experts recommend looking at case numbers both where people are coming from and also where the event is happening. The lower the percentage of positive cases in the area, the better.

If its 1%, Im less concerned. But Im still concerned at 3%, says Henwood.

Some experts advise against gathering altogether.

If you ever wanted an excuse to avoid your uncle whose political beliefs you dont agree with, now is the time," says Henry Raymond, associate professor and epidemiologist at Rutgers University.

What about inviting grandma and grandpa who are high-risk?

The thought of giving a close loved one the coronavirus is terrifying. Meanwhile, the holidays arent easy for everyone, and some may find it important to be with family, even if it means taking on some risk.

Particularly for elderly who live alone, holidays can feel even more lonely, says Sweet. You have to balance the risk of COVID and the risk to mental health.

Have honest conversations up front. Everyone should understand everyone elses risk factors, what safety precautions people are taking, and how comfortable everyone feels with risk.

And each person should still remain prepared to cancel.

You can think about doing all of this, but you also cant get caught up in the holiday momentum, says Henwood. If someones child wakes up with a runny nose, it makes sense for them to cancel.

Err on the side of caution, says Henwood, or you could potentially expose the whole family.

Should I actually consider a virtual dinner?

Eating turkey in front of a screen isnt glamorous. But if you want to join the whole extended family together or friends from across the country, a virtual dinner may actually be easiest for everyone. It not only eliminates travel, but allows you to bypass the uncomfortable conversations that in-person gatherings require.

You can also think outside the box, especially if your family is local.

Is it the year for a turkey barbecue outside and you all bundle up? says Henwood. Or do a family football game during the day where people can be together, but it doesnt require removing your mask or talking around a dinner table.
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Sara Ali Khan reached NCB Office for drug nexus case interrogation



Actor Sara Ali Khan has arrived at the NCB office to join the probe into a drugs case lodged following the death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput in June this year. Bollywood actresses Deepika Padukone and Shraddha Kapoor also reached NCB office to join the ongoing probe into the drugs case, which is being investigated by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB). The celebs' alleged chats discussing drugs on WhatsApp group have led to their summoning. They are expected to be questioned about how and from whom they procured drugs and whether they were meant for personal consumption or for someone else.



Actress Rakul Preet Singh appeared before the central anti-drug agency to depose and left after nearly four hours of questioning on Friday. Deepika's manager Karishma Prakash also showed up to join the investigation. Dharma Productions executive producer Kshitij Ravi Prasad was also quizzed by the NCB in connection with its probe into the drugs case related to the death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput. Meanwhile, Rhea Chakraborty, brother Showik along with over a dozen people remain in NCB's custody.

Read More...


Tunis, Tunisia (PANA) - Faced with the blockage they face at land borders, Tunisian fruit exporters have resorted to shipping lines to transport their cargoes to the Libyan market
Broadcaster Anna Daly, pictured with son Rhys (4) to launch this years Temple Street Foundations 'Trick or Treat for Temple Street' campaign. Picture Andres Poveda

IRELAND AM presenter Anna Daly has said she is no longer shocked to read mean comments online about her outfits  and often gets a kick out of them.

The broadcaster said she has learned to see the funny side of the negative remarks fashion fanatics and online trolls send to her.

What Ive learned is that while I might like an outfit or a dress or top or whatever it might be, not everyone will, she said.

Its not a shock to me any more to see some absolute style guru tell me that it would have been nicer if you didnt have a stripe or a print or that its too big or small or whatever on me.

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Quite often if you look at the people who slag you off, you get a kick out of it.

You cant please all the people all the time, so I think you just have to go with what you feel works.

Anna (43), a brand ambassador for Mi Wadi, has teamed up with Temple Street to launch its annual Trick or Treat for Temple Street fundraising drive.

The mother-of-three said she was disappointed that she could not go in to visit the children at the hospital this year.

Expand Close Broadcaster Anna Daly, pictured alongside her three boys Euan (7), Rhys (4) and James (9). Picture Andres Poveda / Facebook

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Whatsapp Broadcaster Anna Daly, pictured alongside her three boys Euan (7), Rhys (4) and James (9). Picture Andres Poveda

The children in Temple Street are immunocompromised on a good day, never mind in the middle of a pandemic, so it wasnt the right thing to go in, she said.

The Dubliner said Halloween for her own children, James (9), Euan (7) and Rhys (3), is going to look very different this year as they will be ditching trick or treating and celebrating at home.

Video of the Day

When we were kids, it was like cutting holes in a black plastic bag and making up your own outfit off the cuff, on the day, she said.

Now its planned for weeks ahead. Everything is bought and everything is perfect and its just such a big deal.

Its a huge event, and its not going to happen this year. Well, I certainly wont have my children going out trick or treating this year, and Im guessing I wont be alone.

Can you imagine all the hands going in and out of the bags? None of that is ideal.

For me, it will just be about the family and the activities and the party that we create for ourselves and the kids here.
The health minister in Australia's Victoria state has resigned in the fallout from an inquiry into why security guards were used instead of police or the military at quarantine hotels. Lapses in security at the hotels were given as the major reason for a second wave of COVID-19 cases.

Victoria reported just one more coronavirus death as Melbournes new case average continued to fall. The death took the state toll to 782 and the national figure to 870. There were 12 new cases, while Melbournes 14-day average fell again on Saturday to 23.6.

Melburnians, who have been in lockdown for more than a month, are waiting for the easing of restrictions on Monday. It's expected to include a staged return to school for some students and outdoor gatherings of five people from two households.

Health Minister Jenny Mikakos on Saturday issued a statement confirming her resignation, just a day after Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews gave evidence to the inquiry and pointed partial blame at Mikakos for her role in the bungled quarantine program.

I am disappointed that my integrity has sought to be undermined, she wrote in a one-page statement. I have never shirked my responsibility." She said she also plans to resign from Victoria Parliament.

Mikakos appears to be taking the blame when no one else would. After six weeks of hearings into the hotel inquiry, it was still not known who made the decision to use security guards instead of police or soldiers, which were used in other Australian states.

Andrews, Jobs Minister Martin Pakula and Police Minister Lisa Neville all denied being involved in the decision. Victoria Police Chief Commissioner Shane Patton, his predecessor Graham Ashton, Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton and multiple senior public servants also said it wasnt their decision.

In other developments around the Asia-Pacific region:

 South Korea has reported 61 new cases of the coronavirus, the first time in four days its daily increase came below 100, as officials call for citizen vigilance ahead of a major holiday. The numbers released by the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency on Saturday brought the national caseload to 23,516 cases, including 399 deaths. Forty-one of the new cases were reported in the densely populated Seoul metropolitan area, where infections have been linked to churches, restaurants, nursing home and schools. Twelve cases were linked to passengers arriving from abroad, mostly from the Philippines, Indonesia, Uzbekistan, India and Bangladesh. Health officials say the annual Chuseok harvest festival that begins Wednesday and continues through the weekend will be a critical period in the countrys anti-virus campaign. While millions of South Koreans travel across the country during Chuseok every year to visit relatives, officials have pleaded for people to stay home. Nightclubs, bars, buffet restaurants and other establishments deemed as high-risk will be shut down in Seoul during the holiday to reduce gatherings.

___

Follow APs pandemic coverage at http://apnews.com/VirusOutbreak and https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak
We've lost count of how many times insiders have accumulated shares in a company that goes on to improve markedly. On the other hand, we'd be remiss not to mention that insider sales have been known to precede tough periods for a business. So before you buy or sell Continental Resources, Inc. (NYSE:CLR), you may well want to know whether insiders have been buying or selling.

What Is Insider Buying?

It's quite normal to see company insiders, such as board members, trading in company stock, from time to time. However, such insiders must disclose their trading activities, and not trade on inside information.

We don't think shareholders should simply follow insider transactions. But equally, we would consider it foolish to ignore insider transactions altogether. As Peter Lynch said, 'insiders might sell their shares for any number of reasons, but they buy them for only one: they think the price will rise'.

See our latest analysis for Continental Resources

Continental Resources Insider Transactions Over The Last Year

In the last twelve months, the biggest single sale by an insider was when the Founder & Executive Chairman, Harold Hamm, sold US$60m worth of shares at a price of US$34.17 per share. While we don't usually like to see insider selling, it's more concerning if the sales take place at a lower price. It's of some comfort that this sale was conducted at a price well above the current share price, which is US$12.73. So it may not tell us anything about how insiders feel about the current share price. Notably Harold Hamm was also the biggest buyer, having purchased US$130m worth of shares.

Happily, we note that in the last year insiders paid US$130m for 7.78m shares. On the other hand they divested 1.81m shares, for US$61m. In total, Continental Resources insiders bought more than they sold over the last year. The chart below shows insider transactions (by companies and individuals) over the last year. By clicking on the graph below, you can see the precise details of each insider transaction!

Story continues

There are plenty of other companies that have insiders buying up shares. You probably do not want to miss this free list of growing companies that insiders are buying.

Insiders at Continental Resources Have Bought Stock Recently

Over the last quarter, Continental Resources insiders have spent a meaningful amount on shares. We can see that Founder & Executive Chairman Harold Hamm paid US$48m for shares in the company. No-one sold. This makes one think the business has some good points.

Insider Ownership

For a common shareholder, it is worth checking how many shares are held by company insiders. Usually, the higher the insider ownership, the more likely it is that insiders will be incentivised to build the company for the long term. Continental Resources insiders own 84% of the company, currently worth about US$3.8b based on the recent share price. Most shareholders would be happy to see this sort of insider ownership, since it suggests that management incentives are well aligned with other shareholders.

What Might The Insider Transactions At Continental Resources Tell Us?

The recent insider purchase is heartening. And the longer term insider transactions also give us confidence. But we don't feel the same about the fact the company is making losses. Once you factor in the high insider ownership, it certainly seems like insiders are positive about Continental Resources. Nice! In addition to knowing about insider transactions going on, it's beneficial to identify the risks facing Continental Resources. Every company has risks, and we've spotted 2 warning signs for Continental Resources (of which 1 is concerning!) you should know about.

If you would prefer to check out another company -- one with potentially superior financials -- then do not miss this free list of interesting companies, that have HIGH return on equity and low debt.

For the purposes of this article, insiders are those individuals who report their transactions to the relevant regulatory body. We currently account for open market transactions and private dispositions, but not derivative transactions.

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.



Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com.
Anne Heche has been serving some impressive moves on this season of Dancing with the Stars.

And the Daytime Emmy winner is showing off her skills in and out of the studio, while rehearsing for the next show.

She had a Marilyn moment Friday in a chic floral wrap dress, as she put on a cheeky display, while arriving at the CBS studios to work on her routine with partner Keo Motsepe.

Marilyn moment: Anne Heche had a Marilyn moment Friday in a chic floral wrap dress, as she put on a cheeky display, while arriving at the CBS studios to work on her routine for DWTS with partner Keo Motsepe

The 51-year-old left little to the imagination, as she twirled the skirt of her pink dress, showing off some white lace underwear and a heart tattoo on her upper thigh.

She finished the ensemble with a pair of chunky nude cat-eye sunglasses, an iridescent face mask, gold necklaces and tan leather laced-up high heeled booties.

Heche carried a can of Red Bull into the studio, with a black and burgundy leather handbag, featuring a beige handle, draped over her arm.

She later took to her Instagram Story to show off the pink floral Kolbo dress, as she posed on the patio of her Los Angeles home.

Peekaboo: The 51-year-old left little to the imagination, as she twirled the skirt of her pink dress, showing off some white lace underwear and a heart tattoo on her upper thigh

Accessorizing: She finished the ensemble with a pair of chunky nude cat-eye sunglasses, an iridescent face mask, gold necklaces and tan leather laced-up high heeled booties. Heche carried a can of Red Bull into the studio, with a black and burgundy leather handbag, featuring a beige handle, draped over her arm

Outfit of the day: She later took to her Instagram Story to show off the pink floral Kolbo dress, as she posed on the patio of her Los Angeles home

Disney princess: The Psycho actress is preparing for week three, when she and Motsepe, 30, will perform a routine of Zero to Hero from Hercules for Disney Night

The Psycho actress is preparing for week three, when she and Motsepe, 30, will perform a routine of Zero to Hero from Hercules for Disney Night.

She previously admitted that she felt in over her head, coming into season 29 of the popular competition series.

Heche told Hollywood Outbreak earlier this week: 'I love to dance on the dance floor. I love to move, and I love to dance. I've never had a professional lesson before,

'But before I got here and really learned what dancing is, I probably would have said, "Yea man, I look great on a dance floor. What are you talking about? I can move."

'Then, cut to, "I can't move. What are you talking about? What is ballroom? I don't know or care to think about how complicated the cha-cha or rumba, la-di-da is." So, time's changed very quickly from "yea, I'm awesome" to "no, I'm not awesome."'
Some members of the University of Ibadan academic community have expressed displeasure about the election of members of the community to join the Joint Council Senate Committee of the institution in the selection of its new vice-chancellor.

There are 18 contestants for the position of vice-chancellor of the premier university.

The Joint Senate Council Committee of the university had elected two members of the council committee to join other top authorities of the insititution in selecting a new vice-chancellor.

But some members of the community have faulted the the method used in the election of the two members.

A petition signed by Ademola Dasylva of the Department of English of the institution, stated that the whole exercise and outcome of the activities of the committee was a far cry from credible.

He noted that the platform for e-voting by the committee to select a new vice-chancellor for the institution was allegedly compromised and manipulated.

There were two windows associated with the platform, one was meant to display the cumulative votes for each candidate. The other was to display the actual votes that accrued to each of the contestants.

At the beginning of the exercise, a request was made for the open display of the voting process for close public viewing to ensure transparency; unfortunately, this was not done.

Instead, the tellers were given a link through which they could check vote counts.

What was accessible through the link was the first window, which displayed the cumulative votes, denying the tellers access to the second window which should display the actual votes accruing to each of the contestants, he said in the petition.

Other petitions

Other petitions, directed to the council chairman of the institution, cited various alleged irregularities in the process of appointing a new vice-chancellor for the university.

The petitioners stated that the result of the September 21 election of the two members by the committee was not free and fair.

They equested the council committee to set up an investigation to look into the electoral process.

I am also constrained to request that the entire election and the results released be nullified.

Let there be a repeat election to be organised by an external body and monitored by the Joint Council Senate Committee, one of the petitioners said, pleading anonymity.

Also, pleading anonymity, another petitioner said: The list (and details) of eligible members of the Senate member who had been accredited to vote in the election was not displayed (hard copy or electronically) before the election to enable confirmation of details and validation of those eligible to participate in the election.

The petitioner said that the distribution of the votes in the final result released did not follow the distribution expected of free and fair elections.

ALSO READ:

There are confirmed reports of conference voting in some offices on campus.

This violates the most important principle of e-voting which is the enablement of individual voting from individual personal computers.

The question begging for an answer is if the voters who undertook conference voting normally go to the said offices to read their emails on a daily basis, the petitioner said.

He noted that the platform for e-voting was allegedly compromised and manipulated.

Others who spoke with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on condition of anonymity, said that the whole process for appointing a new vice-cancellor for the institution was compromised.

But Tunji Oladejo, the Public Relations Officer of the institution, in an interview, denied receiving any petitions written to discredit the process of appointing a new vice-cancellor for the university.

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I am not aware of any petition written to the Council Chairman Nde Waklek who is also the Pro- Chancellor, University of Ibadan, Mr Oladejo said.(NAN)
ZIMBABWE Anti-Corruption Commission (Zacc) commissioner Frank Muchengwa, who was suspended last week following corruption allegations, has approached the High Court seeking to nullify the decision.

Muchengwa cited Zacc and its chairperson Justice Loice Matanda-Moyo as respondents. He wants an order interdicting Zacc from withdrawing his security service and taking away his service pistol until President Emmerson Mnangagwa  who has the sole prerogative of determining the suspension of commissioners through a tribunal, has decided on his case.

Muchengwa was appointed as a commissioner in September 2019 and allocated a police detail and service pistol for security.

The court heard on September 8, Muchengwa received a letter from the Judicial Services Commission indicating that they had resolved in a meeting of September 3 that Mnangagwa should determine if he should be removed from office.

The following day, Matanda-Moyo then removed Muchengwa from a WhatsApp group of fellow commissioners before ordering that he should be barred from Zacc offices.

Matanda-Moyo then orally suspended Muchengwa from his duties on September 11 before facilitating change of locks to his office. On September 18, Muchengwa received a call from the police directing him to surrender his pistol.

In all material respects I still occupy the office of a commissioner and the locking of my office hinders my work. I have some pending matters of national interest that are under investigation. I have a serious apprehension that if I continue to be barred from entering the office someone may tamper with the files, Muchengwa said in his affidavit.

I am still exposed to serious security risks as there were break-ins at my house once, two in my car and once at my office.

Muchengwa argued that only Mnangagwa had authority to order his suspension, not Matanda-Moyo.

He argued that his suspension can only be done after a tribunal has been constituted to determine his fate.

I am advised that my purported suspension is a legal nullity and in all respects, I am still called upon to execute my duties as a commissioner by the appointing authority until the appointing authority decides to appoint a tribunal and refer the matter, added Muchengwa.

If my personal security is revoked, I am exposed to serious risks because of the matters I am working on. I only have one life; it would be a tragedy if I lose it. Daily News
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Angel Broking, one of the largest retail broking houses, is expected to make its market debut on October 5 after its Rs 600-crore initial public offering public saw the lowest subscription among IPOs launched, so far, in 2020.

The offer was subscribed 3.94 times during September 22-24, backed largely by retail investors and qualified institutional buyers, while other IPOs witnessed subscription in the range of 13-151 times.

The IPO comprised a fresh issue of Rs 300 crore and an offer for sale of Rs 300 crore by promoters and investors. The fresh issue proceeds will be used towards working capital requirements and general corporate purposes.

Angel Broking was providing broking and allied services through online and digital platforms and network to more than 11,000 authorised persons as of June 2020. It was managing Rs 13,254 crore in client assets and over 21.5 lakh operational broking accounts as of June 2020.

Also read: Angel Broking falls from grace in grey market; here's why

Its brokerage business accounts for 69.54 percent of the revenue, while the remaining 30.46 percent is contributed by lending activities, income from depository operations, portfolio management services, income from distribution and other activities.

The company, in consultation with merchant bankers, is expected to finalise the basis of allotment on September 29 and the refunds or unblocking of funds from ASBA account can take place on September 30. Equity shares could get credited to the accounts of eligible investors by October 1, the schedule provided by the company says.

Investors can check the allotment status on the BSE website and the registrar's website following these simple steps:

Option 1)

>> Check box "Equity">> Select your "Issue Name" in the dropdown menu - Angel Broking (Note: Company name will appear only after the allotment process is done)>> Type your "Application Number" in the box>> Type your "Permanent Account Number (PAN No.)" in the box

>> Finally click on the "Search" button

Option 2)

>> Select "Company Name" in the dropdown menu Angel Broking (the company name will appear only after the allotment process is done)>> Check box either "Permanent Account Number (PAN)" or "Application Number" or Depository/Client ID>> Type your "Permanent Account Number (PAN )" or "Application Number" or Depository/Client ID in the box

>> Finally click on "Submit" button

If the information provided by you is correct, then you will see the application status. The number of shares you subscribed to and the numbers of shares alloted to you will also get reflected.
New Delhi, Sep 26 : Prominent economist and Padma Bhushan recipient Isher Judge Ahluwalia died on Saturday after a battle with brain cancer.

On the loss of the distinguished economist, tributes poured in from institutions and several noted personalities from across walks of life.

Aged 74, Ahluwalia was till recently serving as the chairperson of the Delhi based think-tank Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER).

Last month, she stepped down as chairperson of ICRIER due to her declining health after a 15-year stint.

Ahluwalia is survived by her husband, former deputy chairperson of the Planning Commission Montek Singh Ahluwalia and two sons.

In a statement, ICRIER said: "The ICRIER family is profoundly saddened at the passing away of Chairperson Emeritus Isher Judge Ahluwalia this morning.

ICRIER director and chief executive Rajat Kathuria said, "I can say without an iota of doubt that ICRIER was in her DNA." Awarded the third highest civilian award in India, Padma Bhushan, in 2009 for her services in the field of education and literature, two of her books are often acclaimed as major contributions to literature, 'Industrial Growth in India: Stagnation Since the Mid-Sixties '(1989, Oxford University Press) and 'Productivity and Growth in Indian Manufacturing' (1991, Oxford University Press).

Other books written by her include 'Transforming Our Cities: Facing Up To India's Growing Challenge' and 'Policy reform in India'.

About a decade ago, her interest in issues of urban economics and governance was ignited when she became Chairperson of the High Powered Expert Committee on Urban Infrastructure and Services during 2008-11.

Subsequently, Isher made the urbanisation field her own and went on to publish two books on the subject.

Tributes also poured in from political, bureaucratic and business personalities for the acclaimed economist.

In a tweet, Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh described her as one of India's most distinguished economists.

"Saddened to learn of passing away of Isher Judge Ahluwalia. She was one of India's most distinguished economists & we had privilege of having her as Vice-Chairman of State Planning Board in my last term. Heartfelt condolences to Montek ji & their family in this hour of grief," he said.

Calling Ahluwalia a "dear friend", Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, the Executive Chairperson of biopharmaceutical major Biocon Limited noted that she was a "brilliant remarkable intellectual economist".

"Isher Ahluwalia, my dear dear friend and a brilliant remarkable intellectual economist passed away after a brave battle with cancer. My deepest condolences to Montek Singh Ahluwalia n his sons Pavan & Aman n the family. She will be hugely missed RIP," she said in a tweet.

Describing Ahluwalia's life as an inspiration, former Foreign Secretary of India Nirupama Menon Rao tweeted: "Deeply grieved by the passing of a dear friend of many years, the brilliant #IsherAhluwalia after a brave battle with cancer. Isher, I shall miss your presence so much. Your life story is an inspiration to all women who dare to dream of a better world. RIP, dear friend."
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) speaks during a news conference at the Capitol in Washington on Aug. 27, 2020. (J. Scott Applewhite/AP Photo)

House Democrats CCP Virus Relief Bill to Contain Aid for Airlines

House Democrats are working up a new $2.4 trillion CCP virus relief bill, which reportedly contains relief for airline workers, according to an industry group representative.

Nicholas Calio, head of the industry group Airlines for America, told The Hill that the bill is to contain aid for airlines, which have been hit hard by the outbreak of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus.

We have been told that airline worker relief is in the package and are grateful for the strong, bipartisan support. We are hopeful that this is the start of a negotiation that will help our industry and others in distress, Calio said, according to the report.

Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.), chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, confirmed that airline aid would be included in the package, according to The Hill.

Prior to the virus crisis, U.S. airlines were transporting a record 2.5 million passengers and 58,000 tons of cargo each day, Airlines for America said in an August analysis of the impact of the pandemic on air carriers.

As travel restrictions and stay-at-home orders were implemented, demand for air travel declined sharply. The lowest point was reported in April when passenger volumes were down 96 percent to a level not seen since before the dawn of the jet age (in the 1950s), it said in a statement.

Airlines have warned that without additional aid, there could be layoffs. Relief granted to air carriers under the CARES Act was conditioned on a commitment not to cut staff or pay, but those restrictions run out at the end of September. U.S. airline chief executives and labor leaders on Wednesday redoubled their calls for lawmakers to urgently pass another $25 billion in payroll aid.

Airlines, weathering their toughest crisis ever, said they want to avoid layoffs until the outbreak subsides, arguing that airline service is essential for an economic recovery.

Everyone agrees that makes sense, American Airlines Chief Executive Doug Parker said on MSNBCs Morning Joe.

Also on Morning Joe, International President of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA Sara Nelson said: Everyone is for this program, including the White House. No one wants to see these mass layoffs on Oct. 1, so we just need to get this done now.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) told news outlets on Thursday that leaders of his caucus are considering an aid package that would be worth around $2.4 trillion.

They said an ideal solution would be a deal with the White House, coming weeks after the two parties hit an impasse over certain provisions.

Republicans have taken issue with around $1 trillion that would be provided to cities and states, while some described other provisions as a socialist manifesto.

Reuters contributed to this report.
Ms Mikakos, who sent her resignation to the governor before notifying the Premier, took a parting shot at Mr Andrews in a scathing statement which said she "strongly disagreed" with elements of his evidence at the inquiry into hotel quarantine. "I am disappointed that my integrity has sought to be undermined," Ms Mikakos said. "I am deeply sorry for the situation that Victorians find themselves in. In good conscience, I do not believe that my actions led to them." Loading

After telling reporters on Thursday that Ms Mikakos had his full-confidence, Mr Andrews said on Saturday that the Health Minister's resignation was the "appropriate decision". "She made that choice... She sent me a text, she's resigned," he said. Ms Mikakos tried to call the Premier before sending the bombshell text. Veteran MP Martin Foley will become the Minister for Health, Ambulance Services and Minister for Coordination of Health and Human Services COVID-19. The development came as Victorians braced for a relaxation of COVID-19 restrictions, with the state recording 12 new coronavirus cases over the past 24 hours and one death.

On Sunday, the Premier will announce the next stage of easing restrictions, with childcare centres set to reopen to all families, classrooms set to accommodate more students and public gatherings of up to five people from two different households to be permitted. Government MPs insist the Premier has the support of the Labor caucus and there are no moves afoot to spill the leadership, but Mr Andrews has been warned to change his "authoritarian" leadership style. "This is a government at war with itself and it all stems back from the fact that Daniel tells everyone to do everything, and anyone who says no gets humiliated," one MP said. Another added: "We're going too far to the left, we need to get back to the suburbs and get back to the centre. [The Premier] has still got my support  but more clean up [and ministerial scalps] are required." Ms Mikakos' resignation came as new witness statements tendered to the board of inquiry revealed the hotel quarantine program was hampered because government departments were "competing" with each other and externally to recruit staff.

And in a separate witness statement, a learning consultant recounted how she saw about 70 security guards standing shoulder to shoulder in a room not observing the social distancing guidelines. Pressure had been mounting on Ms Mikakos over her handling of the pandemic, with serious concerns raised about contact tracing and the hotel quarantine program, which led to Victoria's second wave of coronavirus that has claimed the lives of more than 750 people, decimated the economy and forced Melburnians into one of the world's strictest lockdowns. Ms Mikakos and the Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kym Peake have consistently maintained the hotel quarantine program was a "multi-agency operation with shared accountability". But in an extraordinary testimony to the state's inquiry into the ill-fated program on Friday, Mr Andrews squarely held his Health Minister accountable. The Victorian Liberal opposition has long been calling for Ms Mikakos' resignation, but on Saturday Michael O'Brien said the Premier had used her as a sacrificial lamb.

Opposition Leader Michael O'Brien. had been calling for Jenny Mikakos to resign. Credit:Darrian Traynor Mr O'Brien said Ms Mikakos had "a lot of flaws" but no involvement in crucial decisions to reject defence force support and employ private security at quarantine hotels. "It's about time Daniel Andrews took responsibility  and followed Jenny Mikakos out the door and gave Victoria a fresh start." Prime Minister Scott Morrison said he would not add fuel to the fire by commenting on Ms Mikakos' resignation or Mr Andrew's testimony at Victoria's hotel quarantine inquiry. Neither the Premier nor any of his ministers or senior public servants were able to explain who made the decision to hire private security and knock back an offer of Australian Defence Force support to help with guarding returned travellers.
The Department of Correction will resume visitation for inmates at three TDOC facilities beginning next weekend. A modified visitation schedule is planned for the Turney Center Industrial Complex, the Morgan County Correctional Complex and the Mark Luttrell Transition Center beginning Saturday, Oct. 3.

The Department of Correction suspended visitation at all TDOC facilities in March as COVID-19 began to spread in the community. The decision to resume limited visitation at three facilities was based on community data from the Department of Health, as well as the absence of active COVID-19 cases at each facility.

In order to maintain social distancing guidelines, all visitors will be required to schedule an appointment for visitation. Visitors will be required to wear masks, have their temperatures checked and respond to a series of COVID-19 screening questions prior to entry. All inmates will be required to wear masks during the visits and have their temperatures checked prior to entering the visitation gallery. Hand sanitizing stations will be available throughout the area.

The Tennessee Department of Correction is committed to protecting the safety and well-being of our staff, inmates, visitors and volunteers, Commissioner Tony Parker said. We understand the importance of maintaining contact with family members and we have worked to ensure the lines of communication between inmates and their loved ones remained opened during this time. We are also actively monitoring COVID-19 developments to determine a date for visitation and volunteer services to resume at all TDOC facilities.

To schedule a visit, contact the facility directly:

Turney Center Industrial Complex

Call: (931) 729-7172 (Monday through Friday from 8 a.m.-4 p.m.)



Morgan County Correctional Complex

Call: 346-1390 (Monday through Thursday from 7 a.m.-3 p.m.)



Mark Luttrell Transition Center

Call (901) 581-8173 (Monday through Wednesday 8 a.m.-7 p.m.)

View additional visitation guidelines on the website prior to visiting.








Rashtriya Janata Dal leader Tejashwi Prasad Yadav, his elder brother Tej Pratap Yadav, Jan Adhikar Party leader Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav have been booked in poll-bound Bihar for taking out rallies to protest against the contentious farm bills without permission and violating the COVID-19 protocol.

IMAGE: RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav rode a tractor along with party supporters during the Bharat Bandh, a protest against the farm bills in Patna on Friday. Photograph: PTI Photo

The three were booked on Friday along with 150 others and an FIR was lodged at the Kotwali police station on the basis of a complaint by the magistrate deputed to oversee the situation, the police said.

Several farmers organisations and opposition parties including RJD had held protests against the farm bills on Friday.

RJD heir apparent Tejashwi Prasad Yadav rode a tractor to lead the protest against the passage of the three farm bills on Friday. His elder brother Tej Pratap Yadav sat atop its hood.

A named FIR has been lodged against five persons including RJD leader Tejashwi Prasad Yadav, Tej Pratap Yadav, Jan Adhikar Party leader Pappu Yadav while 150 others have been made as unnamed accused. They have been booked for taking out protest march without having permission to do so, said Kotwali police station SHO Sunil Kumar.

These leaders and unnamed persons have also been booked for taking out a protest march on Baily road where any kind of protest is prohibited, the SHO said.

The FIR has been lodged under various sections of IPC and Disaster Management Act 2005.

Tejashwi Yadav, who is also the leader of opposition in the Bihar assembly, had on Friday termed the farm bills as anti farmer and aimed to privatise the agriculture sector".

The rally began at the 10 Circular Road residence of RJD leader Rabri Devi, who is Tejashwi Yadav's mother, and culminated at the party's office at Veer Chand Patel Path. It did not follow the social distancing norms.

The Information and Public Relations Department Minister and Janata Dal-United leader Neeraj Kumar meanwhile said that the people of the state want to know whether Tejashwi Yadav possesses a valid licence for driving a medium goods vehicle.

He also took a swipe at Tej Pratap for violating the Motor Vehicle Act by sitting atop the hood of the tractor.

The tractor that you (Tejashwi) drove is owned by one Krishna Rai jee. People of the state want to know whether you have a valid licence for driving medium goods vehicle. Your brother (Tej Pratap) sat atop the hood of the tractor and committed a crime by violating section 179 of the Motor Vehicle Act... Committing crimes is your political kusanskar (bad upbringing), Kumar said.

The Congress, Left parties, JAP and others had held bandh and protests across Bihar on Friday as part of the oppositions nationwide protest against the passage of farm bills.
Lankan origin man kills London police officer: Reports View(s):

The suspect who shot and killed a British Police Officer at a custody centre in South London on Friday (25) is a British citizen of Sri Lankan origin, British media reported last evening.

The 23-year-old suspect, is alleged to have pulled a gun and shot the officer while being checked into the Croydon Detention Centre on Friday (25). The suspect had then turned the gun on himself and is in critical condition in hospital.

The suspect is reported to be autistic and British media reported that he had been known to counter-terrorism police, though the shooting is being treated as a murder investigation and not a terror-related incident.

British media identified the victim as Sgt Matiu Ratana, 54, who was born in New Zealand. He died in hospital on Friday. The suspect is yet to be named.
THE ACTING chief medical officer, Dr Ronan Glynn has again praised Limerick for its swift response to Covid-19 in recent weeks, saying that it shows "how people, working together, can take control and turn the tide on this virus".

In a weekend message to the public, Dr Glynn urged people to continue following the guidelines, particularly for those in Donegal and Dublin, who are now subject to 'Level 3' restrictions.

This follows the Government's instructions to all third level institutions to move all classes to online, where possible.

Dr Ronan Glynn on how each of us can live safely with this virus over the coming months. Do not underestimate the value of your individual actions. Please stick with this and together we will get through #COVID19 #StaySafe [for subtitles/closed captions, select "cc"]. pic.twitter.com/HdO92ycHBa September 25, 2020

The University of Limerick has contacted its some-17,000 students to not travel to Limerick if their full programme is being taught online over the next two weeks.

Just hours before Dr Glynn's praise, Taoiseach Micheal Martin appeared to cause some confusion and consternation after he said that Limerick may require local restrictions in order to slow down the virus.

Speaking at a jobs announcement in Cork this Friday, he said Nphet is "very concerned" about the spread of the virus in cities including Limerick.

He made the comments days after Dr Glynn praised Limerick, Tipperary and Leitrim for its response to the a recent surge in cases.

For weeks between August and September, Limerick had the second highest incidence rate per 100,000, behind Dublin. Limerick City North had a higher incidence rate in Dublin at one stage.

Latest @hpscireland & #COVID19 geohive.hub data shows #Limerick City Urban Areas with Decreasing(Not increasing) #COVID__19 incidence rate/new cases.I have compiled data charts to show this real rate & cases reduction.Needs to be acknowledged Limerick is making real progress pic.twitter.com/03QQtZ6vFS  Kieran ODonnell TD for Limerick City Constituency (@kodonnellLK) September 26, 2020

But this, as pointed out by politicians, has massively decreased, rendering Limerick one of the best performing counties for tackling the pandemic at present.

Limerick City North had an incidence rate of 126.8 per 100,000 but this has dropped to 37.4a 71% decrease. Elsewhere in the metropolitan district, City West has seen a decrease from 17.2 to less than five, and City East is down to 31.1 from 36.8.

Fine Gael TD, Kieran O'Donnell said on Twitter said it "needs to be acknowledged Limerick is making real progress".

Hey @MichealMartinTD - will you please stop unnerving people in #Limerick - our rate has dropped by from 56.4 to 34.9 in a Week - also According to @ronan_glynn Limerick people have done a great job in combatting #COVID19 pic.twitter.com/r5zaGTeIwX  Maurice Quinlivan TD (@QuinlivanTD) September 25, 2020

Sinn Fein TD Maurice Quinlivan said that the Taoiseach "has to be more careful with his utterances and in citing certain cities and Countiesthis is causing unnecessary stress to many people, communities and businesses".

Sinn Feins health spokesperson, David Cullinane TD said on social media that talk of well-performing counties, such as Waterford, Limerick and Tipperary, facing restrictions "is unfair and not inevitable".

So far, there have been more than 916 confirmed Covid-19 cases since it was first detected in Ireland in February.

According to the latest CSO statistics, there have been two new deaths associated with Covid-19 in recent weeksthe first since the week of July 24.
Ajay Kanth By

Express News Service

KOCHI: In the wake of the National Investigation Agency (NIA) arresting three suspected Al-Qaeda activists who were masquerading as migrant labourers in Ernakulam, the Kerala Police are considering making use of the vast biometric database of migrant labourers prepared by the Labour Department for policing. The department started collecting biometric data of the migrant workers in the state as part of the Awaaz health insurance scheme. The state police have decided to go in for a heightened surveillance to track migrants with criminal history and verify authenticity of identity cards being presented by them for address proof.

As of January 2020, over five lakh migrant labourers had enrolled for the state governments Awaaz scheme. While the highest enrolment of 1,08,645 was in Ernakulam, the lowest of 11,545 was in Wayanad. Though there were attempts by the police to collect fingerprints and identification details of migrant labourers earlier, human rights activists had raised protests against the same. The activists had alleged that the move was an infringement on the privacy of a citizen who has the right to work in any state of the country.

Even a directive making a police clearance certificate from their home state mandatory for migrant workers coming to Kerala was scuttled by a few labour contractors, who bring in migrants from West Bengal, said a senior police officer. Additional Labour Commissioner Sreelal K said the state police had asked for the biometric data of the migrant labourers which the department had collected for the insurance scheme.

Inspector General of Police S Sreejith said the department was also working to develop an app for collecting the details of the migrant labourers. The Labour Department had said that they could share the database with the police, he added.Jananeethi executive director George Pulikuthiyil said biometric data collection of migrants from other states was a breach of their privacy. Being citizens of India, they have the freedom and right to work anywhere in the country, he said.

As per rough estimates, there are nearly 25 lakh migrant labourers in the state. A majority of them are coming here to eke out a living. But many criminals are using the labourer tag as a cover to hide in the state. We are planning to enforce verification of the identification documents of the migrant labourers once the app is ready, said a senior police officer.
Oregons count of coronavirus cases has grown by 277 new confirmed and presumptive cases, the Oregon Health Authority announced Saturday, one day after the highest recorded single-day total of new cases since the pandemic began. The state has now eclipsed 32,500 total cases.

Lane County, Oregons fourth most populous county, had the most new cases of any county, with 44. Multnomah County, the states largest county, was second with 33.

Public health officials cautioned Friday that cases in the area of Eugene, Lane Countys largest city, were surging, in part because of college student get-togethers. The University of Oregon reported at least 37 students who live off-campus tested positive this week.

Where the new cases are by county: Baker (2), Benton (1), Clackamas (24), Columbia (3), Coos (4), Crook (1), Deschutes (16), Douglas (4), Hood River (3), Jackson (16), Jefferson (5), Josephine (1), Lane (44), Lincoln (3), Linn (12), Malheur (8), Marion (31), Multnomah (33), Polk (7), Umatilla (14), Union (3), Wallowa (2), Wasco (7), Washington (31), and Yamhill (2).

New fatalities: Oregons 543rd COVID-19 death is a 77-year-old woman in Marion County with unspecified underlying health conditions. She tested positive Aug. 15 and died Sept. 23 at Portland Adventist Medical Center.

Oregons 544th COVID-19 death is a 44-year-old woman in Malheur County. She tested positive Sept. 21 and died Sept. 25. Officials are still confirming her place of death and if she had underlying health conditions.

Oregons 545th COVID-19 death is an 84-year-old woman in Washington County with unspecified underlying health conditions. She tested positive Sept. 22 and died Sept. 24 in her residence.

Oregons 546th COVID-19 death is a 75-year-old man in Marion County with unspecified underlying health conditions. He tested positive Aug. 16 and died Sept. 24 at Salem Hospital.

Whos in the hospital: The state reported 139 Oregonians with confirmed coronavirus infections were in the hospital Friday, the same number as the previous day. Updated data was not released Saturday. Oregon remains well below its capacity, with hundreds of hospital beds and ventilators available.

Since it began: Oregon has reported 32,581 confirmed or presumed infections and 546 deaths, among the lowest totals in the nation. To date, 636,090 Oregonians have been tested.

Kale Williams of The Oregonian/OregonLive contributed to this report.

-- K. Rambo

krambo@oregonian.com

@k_rambo_
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BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept. 26

Trend:

Delegation of Azerbaijan to UN has made a statement to reply to the statement by the Prime Minister of Armenia at the General Debate of the 75th session of the UN General Assembly, Trend reports with reference to the statement.

"As is well known, in early 1990s, Armenia used military force against Azerbaijan to fulfill its long-nurtured plan of seizing the territory of Azerbaijan. This was well prepared. As a result, a significant part of Azerbaijan's territory, including Nagorno Karabakh, the seven adjacent districts and some exclaves, was seized by Armenia and remain under its occupation. The war claimed the lives of tens of thousands of people and caused considerable destruction of civilian infrastructure and property in Azerbaijan. The occupied territories were ethnically cleansed of all Azerbaijanis; more than 1 million people were forced to leave their homes in these territories," the statement said.

"Attempts by the Armenia to disguise its unlawful claims and actions by speculations with self-determination are fundamentally flawed and have nothing in common with that principle, as it is set forth in the Charter of the United Nations, the 1975 CSCE Helsinki Final Act and other related international documents," the statement said.

"In their statements regarding the conflict settlement process, the international mediators specifically refer to the Helsinki Final Act, which, inter alia, obliges the participating states, including Armenia, to "respect the equal rights of peoples and their right to self-determination, acting at all times in conformity with the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations and with the relevant norms of international law, including those relating to territorial integrity of States"," the statement said.

"Moreover, self-determination claims are unsustainable when they are accompanied by violation of international law, in particular its peremptory norms (jus cogens), such as those prohibiting the threat or use of force against the sovereignty and territorial integrity of states," the statement said.

"Armenia's allegation that the so-called "authorities" of Nagorny Karabakh should take part in the negotiations does not stand up to criticism. Having succeeded in expelling all Azerbaijanis from the Nagorno-Karabakh region, Armenia established the puppet regime on the occupied lands. However, in its relevant documents and decisions, the OSCE recognizes that the population of this region of Azerbaijan consists of two equal communities, namely, the Azerbaijani and Armenian communities. None of these or any other documents and decisions designates the Armenian community as "elected authorities"," the statement said.

"Over the past two years, we have witnessed consistent attempts by the leadership of Armenia to derail the peace process, including by attempting to undermine the format of negotiations. It prompted the Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group to issue a statement on 9 March 2019, in which they urged to refrain from demanding unilateral changes to the format," the statement said.

"Moreover, the illegality of the puppet regime set up by Armenia in the occupied territories of Azerbaijan has been repeatedly stated at the international level; it is under Armenia's direction and control and is ultimately nothing other than the product of aggression, ethnic cleansing and other atrocity crimes committed against Azerbaijanis on racial, ethnic and religious grounds," the statement said.

"In its unanimously adopted resolutions 822 (1993), 853 (1993), 874 (1993) and 884 (1993), the United Nations Security Council not only did not mention the existence of the so-called "people of Nagorno-Karabakh" and its "right to self-determination", but condemned the use of force against Azerbaijan and the occupation of its territories; reaffirmed respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Azerbaijan and the inviolability of international borders; confirmed that the Nagorno-Karabakh region is part of Azerbaijan; and demanded the immediate, complete and unconditional withdrawal of the occupying forces from all the occupied territories of Azerbaijan. The numerous documents of other international organizations, expressing the unified position of the world community, are framed along the same lines," the statement said.

"It is no surprise that the Armenian authorities refrain from mentioning the resolutions of the Security Council and other relevant international documents, which constitute the legal and political frameworks for the conflict settlement," the statement said.

"Evidently, the public pronouncements by the Armenian authorities expressing commitment to the exclusively peaceful settlement are nothing other than a hollow rhetoric and smokescreen to camouflage the clear-cut annexationist objectives. Actually, having used military force to occupy the territories of Azerbaijan, Armenia has demonstrated its firm conviction in the existence of an alternative to peace," the statement said.

"In July 2020, the armed forces of Armenia, in blatant violation of international law, launched cross-border attacks against Azerbaijan, with the use of artillery and mortars, directly targeting the densely populated areas. As a result, a 76-year-old civilian and 12 officers and soldiers of the armed forces of Azerbaijan were killed, and many were wounded. Serious damage was inflicted upon the civilian facilities in the area," the statement said.

"Even the devastating impact of the COVID-19 pandemic has not prevented Armenia from its armed provocation. It is apparent that Armenia's statement on its support for and adherence to the appeal of the United Nations Secretary-General for a global ceasefire is nothing other than utter falsehood. No doubt, Armenia's objective is not to save lives and alleviate the sufferings of people in need, but to expand and secure its aggression and annexation," the statement said.

"Armenia's insinuations about the alleged threat of "nuclear terrorism" are particularly astonishing given its own solid track record of attacks on civilians and bombardment of inhabited areas in Azerbaijan and its persistent threats to use force against civilian infrastructure. Azerbaijan has clearly stated, at the appropriate level, that our armed forces have never had plans to attack civilian objects and strictly comply with international humanitarian law. Unlike Armenia, Azerbaijan acts exclusively within the purview of its right of self-defense, in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations and customary international law," the statement said.

"With regard to human rights and democracy, the Armenian authorities should first look closely at themselves, rather than blame other countries. Indeed, all successive governments in Armenia, including the current one, have come to power through force, and have resorted to the cruelest possible methods of dealing with political opponents. The crackdown on the opposition, politically motivated killings, limited freedom of media, interference in the judiciary and the undisguised promotion of the odious ideas of ethnic incompatibility and hatred towards Azerbaijan and other neighboring nations are bitter realities in today's Armenia," the statement said.

"Armenia continues to pose a serious threat to regional and international peace, security and stability, thus necessitating the urgent action by the international community. The foundation and objective of durable peace is to ensure the immediate, complete and unconditional withdrawal of the Armenian occupying forces from the Nagorno Karabakh region and other occupied territories of Azerbaijan, the restoration of the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan within its internationally recognized borders and the return of the forcibly displaced persons to their homes. The achievement of that objective is a must, not a compromise," the statement said.
FILE PHOTO: The sun sets behind a crude oil pump jack on a drill pad in the Permian Basin in Loving County

By Stephanie Kelly

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Oil prices edged higher on Wednesday, supported by U.S. government data that showed crude and fuel inventories dropped last week, though concerns about the ongoing coronavirus pandemic capped gains.

Brent crude <LCOc1> rose 5 cents to settle at $41.77 a barrel. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude <CLc1> gained 13 cents to settle at $39.93 a barrel.

U.S. crude, gasoline and distillate inventories all fell last week, Energy Information Administration data showed. Crude inventories <USOILC=ECI> fell by 1.6 million barrels, less than forecast; gasoline stocks <USOILG=ECI> dropped more than expected, sliding by 4 million barrels; while distillate stockpiles <USOILD=ECI> posted a surprise drawdown of 3.4 million barrels.

"The big surprise was the distillates were well below average," said Phil Flynn, senior analyst at Price Futures Group in Chicago.

But rising COVID-19 infections in countries including India, France and Spain and new restrictions on businesses in Britain have renewed worries about demand, just as more supply may come from Libya. In the United States, the death toll has passed 200,000.

U.S. business activity nudged down in September, suggesting a loss of momentum in the economy as the third quarter draws to a close and the pandemic lingers.

Meanwhile, China's diesel exports in August doubled the levels of July to 1.09 million tonnes, customs data showed on Wednesday, as refiners shipped fuel overseas despite poor export margins to reduce brimming domestic oil product inventories.

Oil had collapsed as the pandemic decimated demand, with Brent falling below $16 a barrel, a 21-year low, in April. A record output cut by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and allies, known as OPEC+, has helped revive prices.

OPEC faces a new challenge as Libya, an OPEC member that is exempt from the supply cut, is aiming to boost supply after an easing of the country's conflict. An oil tanker is expected to load crude at Libya's Marsa el-Hariga terminal this week, the first since January.

(Reporting by Stephanie Kelly in New York; additional reporting by Alex Lawler and Aaron Sheldrick; Editing by Marguerita Choy and Leslie Adler)
KOLKATA: Ahead of assembly elections in West Bengal scheduled to be held in 2021, three leaders from the state made it to the list of Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) national office bearers.

While senior leader Mukul Roy was appointed as the national vice-president, Anupam Hazra was appointed as the national secretary. On the other hand, senior leader and Darjeeling MP Raju Bista was appointed as the national spokesperson.

Hours after the names of new office bearers was announced, Mukul Roy said, "I have just got to know that I am part of the BJPs central team and have been appointed as the national vice president. I want to thank JP Nadda and our Prime Minister Narendra Modi. I will fulfil my duties and responsibilities bestowed upon me. In the upcoming assembly elections next year, BJP state president Dilip Ghosh and I will try our best and win elections in the state and form government here."

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Mukul Roy quit Trinamool Congress and resigned from the party and the post of Rajya Sabha MP in October 2017. A month later, he joined BJP in November 2017.

Months ago, rumours were rife about Mukul Roy returning to the Trinamool Congress camp. However, he took to Twitter and clarified that he will remain in BJP, putting all rumours to rest.
Former Married At First Sight couple Michael Goonan and Stacey Hampton recently rekindled their friendship.

And the businessman and his 'ex-wife' looked to be getting on very well while spending time together on the Gold Coast on Saturday.

In a clip shared to Michael's Instagram Stories, the 28-year-old businessman, who split from co-star KC Osborne earlier this year, accompanied Stacey to the salon.

Chance of a reconciliation? As seen on Michael Goonan's Instagram Stories on Saturday, the Married At First Sight star spent time with 'ex-wife' Stacey Hampton on the Gold Coast. Michael accompanied her to a hair salon

'How boring it is waiting on a girl to get her hair done,' Michael jokingly said in an Instagram Stories clip, while Stacey, 26, got her locks freshly blow-dried.

The pair later enjoyed a leisurely lunch in the Sunshine State with Michael's pals.

'Don't embarrass me before all my friends,' he playfully directed at Stacey in another Instagram Stories clip.

'I want you on your best behaviour, not like last night. Swinging off the trees like Tarzan. Nightmare,' he continued to joke.

Group affair: The pair later enjoyed a leisurely lunch in the Sunshine State with Michael's pals

Playful: 'Don't embarrass me before all my friends,' Michael playfully directed at Stacey in another Instagram Stories clip, before heading to lunch

Friendly: Michael also socialised with two blondes the previous night, as seen on his Instagram Stories

Michael appeared to have enjoyed the previous night, socialising with two blondes.

The sighting comes after a source told Daily Mail Australia that Michael is secretly hoping he will reconcile romantically with Stacey.

'They're good friends now, but Michael wants her back,' the source said this month.

Michael previously made a public appeal on Instagram for her to give him another chance - as mates.

Rumours: Michael and Stacey recently rekindled their friendship - but an insider told Daily Mail Australia this month that he hopes they will reconcile romantically

Claims: 'They're good friends now, but Michael wants her back,' a source said

Earlier this month, Michael shared a throwback photo of the former couple in happier times and wrote: 'So publicly Stacey. Wanna be my friend again?'

The millionaire's plea to Stacey came after his break-up with fellow Married At First Sight star KC Osborne in July.

KC blamed their break-up on Michael's unwillingness to change his 'playboy' ways.

Reminiscing: Earlier this month, Michael shared a throwback photo of the exes in happier times and wrote: 'So publicly Stacey. Wanna be my friend again?' They later met up for lunch
Amy Coney Barret, a famous social conservative, is likely to be picked by US President as the new Supreme Court justice.

Barret will replace liberal Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died last Friday. The decision is likely to be announced at the White House on Saturday, the media reported.

The nomination will touch off a bitter Senate fight to get her confirmed as November's White House election looms.

CBS - citing multiple sources involved in or familiar with the selection process - reported that the president had settled on Judge Barrett.

If she is confirmed, conservative-leaning justices will hold a 6-3 majority on America's highest court for the foreseeable future.

Amy Coney Barrett, 48, would be the third justice appointed by this Republican president to the bench, after Neil Gorsuch in 2017 and Brett Kavanaugh in 2018.

Its nine justices serve lifetime appointments, and their rulings can shape public policy on everything from gun and voting rights to abortion and campaign finance long after the presidents who appoint them leave office.

In recent years, the court has expanded gay marriage to all 50 states, allowed for Trump's travel ban to be put in place, and delayed a US plan to cut carbon emissions while appeals went forward.

--IANS

rt/

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
When visiting South Korea, you should make sure to see the variety of attractions that the nation has to offer. This includes trying different foods, seeing the beautiful nature, historical sites and much more. Since your trip is two weeks, I surely recommend getting a little bit of everything.

If youre interested in nature and hiking, here are a few notable spots to check out:

- Bugaksan Mountain

- Gwanaksan Mountain

- Seoul City Wall

- Haneul Park

While visiting youll have to try a variety of foods, depending on the season you visit you may enjoy cold soup in the heat of the summer or warm dumplings in the winter. At the top of my recommendations is visiting street food vendors at local markets such as Gwangjang Market or Bamdokkaebi Night Market. When traveling in a group places with lots of variety are the best so everyone can try a little bit of everything at an affordable price!

Lastly, if youre looking for group activities, Korea has lots to offer! If youre interested in shopping during your trip, popular places to visit are COEX Mall as it is the largest underground shopping mall in Asia. It even has a Kimchi Museum and Aquarium! Another popular attraction is Lotte World which houses an amusement park, aquarium, mall, and hotel all on right next to each other. Other activities include ice skating rinks open year-round, karaoke bars, and museums.

I recommend visit the Visit Seoul site for recommendations as they list by category and neighborhoods in Seoul, so youll surely be able to plan amazing trip!
(Newser)  A Louisiana police officer who said he was ambushed and shot while on duty last weekend has been arrested, with local authorities now saying he staged the whole thing. Per KALB and Heavy.com, John Goulart Jr. of the Pineville Police Department first told fellow officers he'd been getting out of his car in a shopping center close to midnight on Sunday when gunfire rang out. Deputy Chief Darrell Basco originally reported that two shots had been fired: one that struck Goulart int the leg, another that hit his car, WHIO reports. After the shooting, Basco stressed that Goulartwho was taken to a local hospital, treated, and releasedhadn't fired back. "We had no reason originally to question what he was telling us was accurate," Don Weatherford, the town's chief of police, tells KALB. The New York Times notes locals rallied around him, calling him a hero and wishing him a fast recovery.

story continues below

But as police reviewed the evidence more carefully, Weatherford notes, it became clear Goulart had been less than truthful. The 25-year-old was arrested Tuesday, CNN reports. "The investigation led to a determination that the officer shot himself, concealed and altered the facts," Basco said in a statement. Heavy.com notes that Goulart's father, who's also in law enforcementhis LinkedIn shows he's a deputy with the Rapides Parish Sheriff's Officemade apparent vague reference to his son's troubles online. "It's been a nightmare this week," he wrote in a Wednesday Facebook post, thanking his wife for being his family's rock. Goulart, who's been put on administrative leave, was charged with criminal mischief and malfeasance in office and booked into the Rapides Parish Detention Center. He has since been released on a $10,500 bond, per the Town Talk. (Read more police officer stories.)
  ..................................................Select your country................................................ Australia Canada Chile Czech Republic Denmark Estonia Finland France (FR) Germany Ireland Mexico Netherlands New Zealand Norway Portugal Spain Sweden Turkey United Kingdom

  Estonias educational context Students: Students in Estonia perform above the OECD average in mathematics, reading and science in PISA 2012 and their socio-economic background had less impact on performance than in other OECD countries. Performance in reading increased across PISA cycles, while performance in mathematics remained unchanged. Estonia has a comprehensive schooling system from age 7 to 17 which covers all compulsory education and is integrated within a single structure. Grade repetition is low, tracking starts at age 15, and school choice is possible. Estonias enrolment rates in upper secondary vocational education and training (VET) programmes are below the OECD average. Attainment rates are high in upper secondary education and around the OECD average in tertiary education, VET included. In the Survey of Adult Skills, Estonia showed high proficiency levels in

literacy and numeracy among 16-65 year-olds compared to their peers in other countries participating in this survey, and even higher results among 16-24 year-olds. However, unemployment rates are above the OECD average.

Institutions: Schools in Estonia have autonomy above the OECD average, including the capacity to make decisions on curriculum and to hire and dismiss teaching staff. Lower secondary teachers are required to have five years of initial teacher training, including a mandatory teaching practicum, and follow continuous professional development. Primary and secondary education teachers have below-average class size and teaching time. Their

salaries are lower than the OECD average, despite a significant increase since 2000. A lower proportion of teachers in Estonia than the TALIS average consider that the teaching profession is valued in society and would choose to work as teachers if they could decide again. Teacher appraisal is used for career advancement and is moderately used to determine the need for professional development, but there is no appraisal system for school leaders. The assessment of the education system on a system level is carried out yearly by the Ministry of Education and Research.

System: In Estonia, governance of the education system is shared between central and local authorities, with schools having a high level of autonomy on resource allocation. The state sets national standards and establishes principles of education funding, state supervision and quality assessment. Early childhood education and care (ECEC) is managed by local authorities, and most of the decisions in lower secondary education are taken at the school level. Estonias expenditure on educational institutions as a percentage of GDP (for all education levels combined) is below the OECD average, with a higher share of public funding than the OECD average. Estonia had one of the greatest increases in expenditure per student among OECD countries during 2005-11 at the tertiary level.  Selected indicators compared with the average  Click here to access the underlying data Note: For each indicator, the absolute performance is standardised (normalised) using a normative score ranging from 0 to 180, where 100 was set at the average, taking into account all OECD countries with available data in each case. See www.oecd.org/edu/policyoutlook.htm for maximum and minimum value countries. Source: The Estonia Snapshot was produced combining information from Education Policy Outlook: Australia, (OECD, 2013) with OECD data and the countrys response to the Education Policy Outlook Snapshot Survey (2013). More information on the spider chart and sources is available at www.oecd.org/edu/policyoutlook.htm.  Key issues and goals Students: A priority reported by Estonia is ensuring that all students have access to a basic school close to home and an upper secondary school in the closest regional centre offering high-quality study choices that meet the students needs. Estonia aims to further develop the skills required by todays labour market in bothVET and higher education. This includes strengthening apprenticeships and practice in the work place, in collaboration with employers. Institutions: Estonia reports a lack of attractiveness of the teaching profession, with teachers salaries still considered uncompetitive and insufficient practical training in teacher training programmes. Moreover, no systematic appraisal mechanisms are used to reward the performance of school leaders. System: Other important issues in Estonia include guaranteeing funding of salaries for non-teaching staff in general education institutions and efining the responsibility of the national and local governments in securing the salaries.  Selected policy responses The recent amendment to the Pre-school Act of 2000 (2010) (covering children from 1.5 to 7 years of age) introduces an obligation for local governments to provide childcare services where there is a shortage of places in municipal care centres. The cost for parents will be capped at 20% of the minimum wage (the same rule applies to pre-school institutions). The new act also aims to ensure that children from the same family can access the same institution. Presently, around one-third of local governments have shortages, mainly for the group up to 3 years of age, and the same principle applies to major urban areas. Estonia aims to continue modernising VET programmes by focusing on key competencies and workplace practice. Estonia is reforming its VET system with the implementation of the Vocational Educational Institution Act (2013), which sets the legal framework to improve the quality of teaching and practical training in VET, implement distributive leadership in VET institutions and modernise the funding structure and infrastructures. The Vocational Education Standards (2013) aim to create an output-based curriculum, introduce new courses in upper secondary VET, create conditions to intensify and shorten studies, and create a new unit of calculation of course credits. A multi-actor working group is developing a new continuous professional development system for teachers that will be driven by teachers needs for professional development. The new system will be based on the Lifelong Learning Strategy 2014-20, and expected to start in 2015.

The Lifelong Learning Strategy for 2014-20 addresses obstacles to lifelong learning and proposes strategic measures in five areas: 1) changing the approach to learning and teaching; 2) raising the status of teaching profession and developing school leadership; 3) improving the match between lifelong learning opportunities with the needs of the labour market; 4) applying modern digital technology in learning processes; and 5) creating equal opportunities for lifelong learning for everyone. A higher education reform that introduces means-tested financial support for students and ensures the right of free education for all full-time students was implemented (2013). As part of this reform, legislative changes were made in the University Act (Ulikooliseadus) and Professional Higher Education Act (Rakenduskorgkooli seadus) to introduce free education for full-time students starting with the academic year 2013/14. A new performance-based funding system for Higher Education Institutions has also been introduced (2013), that puts more emphasis on the quality and internationalisation of the system. Starting with the academic year 2013, efforts have been made to increase teachers salaries, changing the calculation base from contractual hours to full-time employment pay. Spotlight: Reorganising the school networks Reorganising the school networks (koolivorgu korrastamine) has been high on the policy agenda since 2004/05. During the analytical phase, school-related commutes of all students have been mapped to answer questions such as: 1) how close to their home is the upper secondary school they attend; 2) whether or not they prefer studying in larger cities; and 3) how the institutional set-up of a school influences what students it recruits. In 2012, basic principles that emphasise the separation of basic and upper secondary schools were prepared for legislation. Amendments to the Basic School and Upper Secondary School Act were passed in 2013. Based on the legislation, the central government intends to establish stateowned upper secondary schools in each county. The reform aims to improve students learning environments and optimise the use of educational resources. The reform is still in

the implementation phase, as it involves extensive negotiations with local authorities that have responsibility for managing schools.
Parents put pressure on to hold communions this year despite the pandemic, according to a parish priest.

Father Roy Donovan told the Irish Independent that some parents wanted communions "sooner rather than later" over concerns their children's outfits would no longer fit if left until next year.

"There was pressure coming from parents," he said.

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The parish priest of Caherconlish and Caherline, Co Limerick, added: "They wanted to try and have the sacrament while the children could still fit into the dresses and suits.

"That came up here locally. That is why we were determined to have the communions over early and went for them in early September."

Fr Donovan said Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin had been correct last weekend when he said communions did not have to be rushed and done this year: "He got it completely right. If he hadn't said that, maybe there would be a lot more pressure on priests to do the communions now.

"A lot of parents, when they are having communions, they want a family occasion and to bring together more of the family. I think there is going to be a big danger if the parties continue."

He also highlighted the recent concern expressed by the Association of Catholic Priest's over the increase in the number of priests being sent for Covid tests.

"There have been increasing concerns because more priests are obviously becoming exposed to the virus because of the opening up of the country and visiting the sick and having masses at the weekend. We need to mind ourselves: priests are at risk."

Bishop of Raphoe Alan McGuckian said: "There will be no communions or confirmations in Donegal. There will be no public Masses or services in our churches - the only exception being 25 people allowed to attend a funeral or a wedding."
London: Taxpayers will shield the British royal family from a multimillion pound financial hit caused by the coronavirus pandemic which also threatens to derail a major renovation of Buckingham Palace.

The Queen usually receives an annual payment of about 85 million ($154 million) to help cover the cost of travel, hospitality, staff and building maintenance under an agreement struck with the government in 2012.

The coronavirus pandemic threatens to erode the profits of a vast property empire which helps pay for the Queen and the royal family. Credit:Getty Images

However a deep recession is forecast to hit the Crown Estate, a vast commercial property empire owned by the monarchy and managed independently as the primary source of income for the royal family's yearly cheque.

It is run by Australian businessman Dan Labbad, who took over in December last year after a stint running the Europe arm of construction giant Lendlease.
Mukesh Ranjan By

Express News Service

RANCHI: Seven tribal Christians were allegedly tonsured, thrashed brutally, and forced to chant Jai Sri Ram on suspicion of slaughtering a cow at Ambera Toli of Bherikudar village in Simdega.

According to the villagers, a group of more than 60 people, armed with bamboo sticks and iron rods, entered the village early in the morning on September 16 and attacked on the tribal Christians.

The incident took place on September 16 and the complaint was lodged the next day. The matter came into light only after the issue was raised by a local activist on September 25. Meanwhile, Police lodged an FIR and arrested four persons.

We have arrested four of the nine accused. The hunt is still on for the rest, said Simdega SP Shams Tabrez.

The SP further added that a case under the SC/ST Act and several other sections of the Indian Penal Code has been registered against them. A special investigation team (SIT) led by the sub-divisional police officer has also been roped in to nab the other accused, he added.

ALSO READ | UP police evoke NSA against one more man accused of cow slaughter

The persons who came under attack have been identified as Raj Singh, Deepak, Emmanuel Tete, Sugad Dang, Sulin Barla, Soshan Dang, and Sem Kido.

Raj Singh, who is also a pastor, said that more than 60 people dragged them away from their houses. They thrashed us badly with sticks and alleged that we are slaughtering cows and selling them in the market. We were also forced to chant Jai Sri Ram. When we objected, they garlanded with shoes and took us to nearby Kumhar Toli and partially tonsured us," he added.

They had brought blades. They tonsured us while teasing us, said Singh.

Another victim, Deepak Kullu, said that the mob dragged them to the neighbouring Mahato-Tola, about half a kilometer away, and made them sit under a tree where they were tonsured.

Jharkhand has witnessed several incidents of lynching on charges of cow slaughter during the previous BJP government, but this is the first such incident reported after Hemant Soren came into power in December 2019.


Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has responded to the shock resignation of Health Minister Jenny Mikakos, which came after he suggested she was partly to blame for the bungled coronavirus hotel quarantine scheme.

Addressing media during his daily coronavirus update on Saturday, Mr Andrews said he did not speak to Ms Mikakos before or after she resigned, but received a text from her informing him of her decision.

When asked about the content of the message, the premier refused to provide any details.

I did not speak with the minister before she resigned and Ive not spoken to her since. She sent me a text, shes resigned. Shes no longer a minister, he said.

Asked what the text said, he responded: I think you would understand Im not necessarily going to be going into those details, it was simply to inform you of the fact that a letter had been sent.

He said he believed Ms Mikakoss resignation was an appropriate course of action.

Premier Daniel Andrews has addressed the resignation of Health Minister Jenny Mikakos. Source: AAP

I want to take this opportunity to that her for her dedicated service, for her hard work, shes a very hard working person and Im grateful to her for her efforts and Im grateful to her for her contribution to the parliament and to the people of Victoria and to our party, and I wish her well for the future, he said.

Mr Andrews was tight lipped on revealing exactly why he believed she had made the right choice to step down, and told media he had no conversations with her prior, nor did he ask her to resign.

Mr Andrews announced Mental Health Minister Martin Foley would be stepping in to replace Ms Mikakos and her additional roles would be filled in the coming days.

He later clarified he was aware of Ms Mikakoss resignation hours prior to receiving her text, but he had not spoken to her on Friday night.

I had the letter [to the governor]... I was informed of the actions she had taken, Mr Andrews said.

Story continues

For the purposes of completeness, she had sent a text to me some hours after that.

The premier said he did not believe he had received a missed call from Ms Mikakos on Friday night, but said his line was engaged due to being on the phone for many hours discussing other matters.

In a statement posted to her Twitter account on Saturday, Ms Mikakos said she had written to the Governor of Victoria to resign from her position effective immediately.

Mr Andrews spoke after a further 12 cases and one death, a woman in her 80s linked to an aged-care facility, were confirmed on Saturday.

Premier addresses ADF support offer

He was also questioned over a March National Cabinet meeting where ADF support was discussed, explaining his impression leaving the meeting was that NSW was the targeted recipient.

This was due to more planes entering the state and the Ruby Princess saga, the premier said.

He added Prime Minister Scott Morrison then made a more general offer regarding the opportunity for other states to access ADF support.

Saturdays death takes the state toll to 782 and the national figure to 870.

Former Health Minister Jenny Mikakos resigned from her position on Saturday morning. Source: AAP

Ms Mikakos also intends to resign from parliament after Mr Andrews on Friday gave evidence to the hotel inquiry, where he pointed partial blame at the minister for her role in the quarantine scheme, which led to the state's deadly second wave of infections.

In her one-page statement, she said the premier's comments led her to believe she couldn't continue serving in his cabinet.

"I am disappointed that my integrity has sought to be undermined," she said.

Ms Mikakos said when the case numbers in Melbourne started to rise again in June, she sought an explanation and on June 30 received a briefing on a genomic sequencing report.

The report confirmed 99 per cent of Victoria's second-wave infections could be linked to outbreaks among staff and security guards at the Rydges on Swanston and Stamford Plaza hotel.

"To say that I was shocked would be a massive understatement," Ms Mikakos said on Saturday.

Do you have a story tip? Email: newsroomau@yahoonews.com.

You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter and download the Yahoo News app from the App Store or Google Play.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 25)  The Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency will run after barangay captains who have yet to establish Barangay Anti-Drug Abuse Council, saying they will be subjected to 'tokhang' operations after the COVID-19 pandemic.

But PDEA Director General Wilkins Villanueva clarified that the 'tokhang' operations will follow the knock and plead technique and not the bloody drug operations that were carried out in Metro Manila.

"Dapat magkaroon ng Barangay Anti-Drug Abuse Council," Villanueva said. "If they don't have in their barangay, then si kapitan, totokhangin na natin."

[Translation: They have to have a Barangay Anti-Drug Abuse Council. If they dont have it in their barangay, we will do clear out operations against the captains.]

"The problem is pagdating dito sa Maynila, ginawa niyong anti-drug operations ang tokhang e wala, nasira ang imahe ng barangay clearing program," Villanueva said.

[Translations: The problem is when it comes here in Manila, tokhang became an anti-drug operation. The image of the barangay clearing program was destroyed.]

PNP Chief General Camilo Cascolan said they are now reviewing their policies on anti-illegal drugs operations.

Cascolan said aside from focusing on high value targets, the PNP will come up with more rigid training for their drug enforcement units. This is to ensure that anti-drug operations uphold human rights and the rule of law.

"We are following the rule of law. But we will teach our people how to do it during operations, the rule of law, the PNP Chief said.

E siyempre sabi nga natin survival, survival once binunutan ka ng baril, siyempre babarilin ko na. Wala kang magagawa. But of course, we will always follow, and we will never tolerate the violation of human rights," he added.

[Translation: When we say survival, if a gun is pointed towards you, of course you will shoot. You cant do anything. But of course, will always follow, and we will never tolerate the violation of human rights]

Based on the latest government data, 176,777 anti-drug operations were conducted from July 1, 2016 to August 31, 2020 where 256,788 drug suspects were arrested and 5,856 were killed.

Of the arrested, 10,308 are considered high value targets. Among them are:

-282 foreign nationals;

-352 elected officials;

-102 uniformed personnel;

-431 government employees;

-2,957 from the drug watchlist;

-746 drug group leaders and members; and

-16 celebrities

Pandemic slowed down drug clearing ops

Of the 42,045 barangays in the country, PDEA says 20,165 are already drug-free. 14,171 barangays have yet to be cleared, mostly in Luzon.

Villanueva admitted that the slowdown in their anti-illegal drugs operations was due to the pandemic.

"Para sa natitirang 33% ng drug affected barangays, doon na tayo pupunta sa intervention program. Medyo nagkakaproblema ang local government units dahil it's the local government units that are doing the intervention program. Nagkakaproblema nga sila dahil sa COVID pandemic," the PDEA chief said.

[Translation: The intervention program will go to the remaining 33% of drug affected barangays. The local government units will have a little difficulty because they are the ones doing the intervention program. They are also having a hard time because of the COVID pandemic.]

This is the reason both the PNP and PDEA agreed to bring back their operations in barangays by encouraging officials to have a proactive response in battling illegal drugs in their areas.

Ending illegal drugs is among President Duterte's flagship programs, promising during the election campaign to end the problem within three to six months of his term.

But he eventually took it back saying that it's not doable with the extent of drug infestation in the country.

"We only have 643 days to finish the campaign of War on Drugs of our President particularly on barangay clearing program. And we are committed, your PDEA is committed to do that, Villanueva said.

Kahit anong mangyari, ang importante ay ma-clear natin ang barangay at ang droga ay hindi na lalanding sa ating barangay," he added.

[Translation: Whatever happens, whats important is that we clear out barangays from drugs.]

Narco politicians

PDEA said there are still a lot of politicians involved in drugs in the country but Villanueva did not disclose how many are in their watchlist.

The PDEA chief said based on their monitoring, the so-called narco politicians have suddenly stopped their operations but they are still being monitored.

In fact, Villanueva said they will work with their regional adjudication system which is composed of all intelligence agencies in the country to validate all the supposed narco politicians in their lists.

"Ngayon pa lang mag-adjudicate na sila ng lahat ng persons na nakalagay sa listahan para even before the elections, ma-validate na natin sila lahat at hindi na yan magiging issue next elections," Villanueva said.

[Translation: Starting now, they will adjuciate all the people in the list even before the elections to validate and for it not to become an issue next elections.]
Sens. Tom Udall and Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., announced they have put a hold on the approval of two judicial nominations to fill vacant federal judgeships until after the Nov. 3 election.

The senators withheld their blue slips asserting their home-state authority to keep the Senate Judiciary Committee from completing the final vetting of 1st Assistant U.S. Attorney Fred Federici and Albuquerque attorney Brenda Saiz, who were nominated to fill two long-vacant seats on the New Mexico federal bench, one of the busiest federal court districts in the country.

In a joint statement issued Friday, Udall and Heinrich said they are pausing the judicial nomination process because President Donald Trump insisted on politicizing the judicial appointment process in his remarks at a thinly veiled campaign event at the White House.

We will be pausing the process given the close proximity to the election and will continue to work expeditiously to fill these vacancies once the American people have spoken.

Chief U.S. District Judge William P. Johnson said in response to the news, While I am disappointed that these two exceptionally well-qualified nominees will not receive Senate confirmation hearings before the Senate goes into recess, I am hopeful that the district court vacancy in Las Cruces and the vacancy in Albuquerque will get filled in the not too distant future.

Johnson said the judgeship in Las Cruces has been vacant for almost 27 months and the Albuquerque judicial seat has been open for 15 months.

Federici and Saiz were nominated by Trump in May from a list of candidates provided by Udall and Heinrich.

They were never scheduled for a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, the final step before nominees receive a vote of the full Senate.

Senators from the nominees state must approve the calendar setting by submitting what is called a blue slip.

By withholding the blue slip, a senator can put the nomination process on hold.

The American Bar Association rated both Federici and Saiz as well qualified  the associations highest ranking  for the vacant judgeships.

Udalls office said their statement was in reaction to Trumps remarks to the news media on Sept. 9 at the White House when Trump announced a long list of people he would consider for the Supreme Court that included several Republican senators including Ted Cruz of Texas and Tom Cotton of Arkansas.

Trump also criticized radical judges who would be appointed by Democrats at that White House news conference, which took place nine days before the death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Last week the Journal inquired about the status of the Federici and Saiz nominations and on Monday Udalls office responded with a joint statement from both New Mexico senators that made no reference to Trumps Sept. 9 remarks.

Throughout both Democratic and Republican administrations we have proceeded in good faith to get New Mexico judicial vacancies filled, the earlier statement read. We will continue to work expeditiously to fill these vacancies.

The U.S. District Court in New Mexico is considered one of the busiest in the country and Johnson said he was concerned that federal initiatives like Operation Legend will fill the docket with gun and drug cases that are typically more complicated than immigration cases.

Federal judges from outside of New Mexico take on civil cases on a regular basis to help keep cases from getting too backlogged.

Other federal judges visit the state on a regular basis to handle immigration hearings and sentencings.

Last year federal judges complained that they were being crushed by caseloads because they were down to four judges.

The federal court in New Mexico was short three full-time judges until U.S. District Judge Kea W. Riggs was confirmed by the U.S. Senate last year and sworn in on Dec. 31, 2019.

Confirmation of Federici and Saiz would have brought the New Mexico court up to full strength of seven full-time judges for the first time in several years.

Saiz was a director at Rodey, Dickason, Sloan, Akin and Robb P.A, at the time of her nomination.

Federici has worked in the U.S. Attorneys Office for 25 years as a prosecutor, head of the criminal division and chief of the offices national security section.

Saizs civil law practice concentrated on medical malpractice, trucking law and product liability issues. She also taught at the University of New Mexico Law School.
MISSION, Kan. - It began with devastation in the New York City area, followed by a summertime crisis in the Sun Belt. Now the coronavirus outbreak is heating up fast in smaller cities in the heartland, often in conservative corners of America where anti-mask sentiment runs high.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 25/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

MISSION, Kan. - It began with devastation in the New York City area, followed by a summertime crisis in the Sun Belt. Now the coronavirus outbreak is heating up fast in smaller cities in the heartland, often in conservative corners of America where anti-mask sentiment runs high.

Elsewhere around the country, Florida's Republican governor lifted all restrictions on restaurants and other businesses Friday and all but set aside local mask ordinances in the political battleground state, in a move attacked by Democrats as hasty.

FILE - In this Aug. 26, 2020, file photo, first-grade teacher Jessica Johnson asks students if they've been sick or near anyone who's been sick before the start of the first day of school at Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic School, in De Pere, Wis. Gov. Tony Evers has extended Wisconsin's mask mandate until Nov. 21, citing a surge in coronavirus cases across the state. (Sarah Kloepping/The Post-Crescent via AP, File)

Meanwhile, confirmed cases of the virus in the U.S. hit another milestone  7 million  according to the count kept by Johns Hopkins University, though the real number of infections is believed to be much higher.

The spike across the Midwest as well as parts of the West has set off alarms at hospitals, schools and colleges.

Wisconsin is averaging more than 2,000 new cases a day over the last week, compared with 675 three weeks earlier. Hospitalizations in the state are at their highest level since the outbreak took hold in the U.S. in March.

Utah has seen its average daily case count more than double from three weeks earlier. Oklahoma and Missouri are regularly recording 1,000 new cases a day, and Missouri Gov. Mike Parson, a staunch opponent of mask rules, tested positive this week. Kansas and Iowa are also witnessing a spike in cases. And South Dakota and Idaho are seeing sky-high rates of tests coming back positive.

What were seeing is the newer hot spots rise over the course of the last several weeks, predominantly in the Upper Midwest," said Thomas Tsai, a professor at Harvard's Chan School of Public Health.

The U.S. is averaging more than 40,000 new confirmed cases a day. While that number is dramatically lower than the peak of nearly 70,000 over the summer, the numbers are worrisome nonetheless. The nation's death toll eclipsed 200,000 this week, the highest in the world.

In the Midwest, the virus is now landing squarely in places where there is strong resistance to masks and governors have been reluctant to require face coverings.

In Springfield, Missouri, hospitals are starting to fill up with COVID-19 patients and the city has seen a big spike in deaths over the past month.

Amelia Montgomery, a nurse working in the COVID unit at Cox South Hospital in Springfield, describes a maddening routine where family members of sick patients call up medical staff on the phone on a daily basis and question whether their loved ones truly have the virus and and the veracity of positive test results.

We know what COVID looks like now after six months of dealing with it," Montgomery said. It is like beating your head against a brick wall when you are constantly having patients, family members of these patients and the community argue so intensely that it is not real or we are treating it in the wrong way.

The skepticism about the virus coincides with deep frustration over mask requirements in the Midwestern cities that actually have them.

Mike Cooper, a 59-year-old and sign shop owner from the Branson, Missouri, area, is among those who have grown weary of virus restrictions that he sees as out-of-control government overreach. He has no doubts about the seriousness of the virus, but says the financial toll of business and school shutdowns creates its own set of health problems, such as alcoholism, suicide and depression. Financial ruin kills people too, he said.

To me, flatten the curve means extend the plague. Flatten the curve means you are just going to kill the same number of people over a longer period of time, so they are going to extend the plague," Cooper said.

In Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis, a major ally of President Donald Trump, gave businesses the OK to reopen, declaring, Were not closing anything going forward.

The governor, who has resisted making mask-wearing mandatory statewide, also said he will stop cities and counties from collecting fines from people who dont cover their faces, virtually nullifying local mask ordinances.

Florida was a major hot spot over the summer, and the death toll there stands at nearly 14,000. Deaths are running at over 100 a day, and newly confirmed infections at about 2,700 a day.

Like Trump, DeSantis has questioned the effectiveness of closing down businesses, arguing that states that more aggressively shut down, including California, have fared no better.

The state of Florida is probably the most open big state in the country, he boasted Friday.

Florida Democrats have bemoaned the governor's push to reopen.

No one is advocating for a full-scale lockdown in Florida. But we have been and continue to ask for common-sense prevention measures such as face masks, which are essential to preventing further spread, state Sen. Audrey Gibson said Thursday.

In other developments:

 Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam announced he and his wife have tested positive, though he said he has no symptoms. Northam, a Democrat who is also a doctor and usually wears a mask in public, has been criticized by Republicans who say his restrictions aimed at slowing the spread of the virus are too stringent.

 Two former administrators of a Massachusetts veterans home where nearly 80 people died were charged with neglect over their handling of the outbreak. They could go to prison if convicted. It is believed to be the nation's first criminal case brought against nursing home officials for actions during the crisis.

 In New York City, which beat back the virus after a disastrous spring, four Orthodox Jewish schools were closed for violating social-distancing rules. Health officials said if virus cases in these neighbourhoods continue to build, the city might roll back the reopening in some places and require businesses to close back down.

Mask and social distancing rules are starting to cause fatigue in some areas of the Midwest and West.

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In Joplin, Missouri, a mask ordinance was allowed to expire in mid-August as virus fatigue grew. Since then, the number of positive cases there and in surrounding Jasper County  a deeply conservative county that Trump won by more than 50 percentage points over Hillary Clinton in 2016  has risen about 80%.

I am getting sick and tired of telling people to wear their masks, and I know they are sick and tired of me saying it, said Tony Moehr, chief of the Jasper County Health Department. And it just seems like people have heard it so many times, Im not sure if they really even hear it anymore when we say it.

At the home of the University of Oklahoma, the Norman City Council voted 5-3 this week to require that masks be worn indoors at house parties if more than 25 people are present. The ordinance passed over objections from members of the public.

You can make any law that you want to. You come into my house telling me that I got to wear this stupid thing and youre going to have a firefight on your hands, said Josh Danforth, holding a mask, who identified himself as an Iraq war veteran.

___

Forster and Noveck contributed from New York.
I voted against confirming Amy Coney Barrett to sit on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit because she failed to demonstrate the capability or willingness to serve as an impartial, fair and independent jurist. Judge Barrett was not fit to be a circuit judge in 2017 and she is the wrong choice for a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court today. Once again, she will not have my support, Duckworth said.
New Delhi/New York, Sep 26 : Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday, at the United Nations General Assembly's 75th session, advocated institutional reforms of the international organisation and inclusion of India in its Security Council.

In a 20-minute pre-recorded speech which was delivered virtually in view of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Prime Minister recalled the historical context in which the UN was set up in 1945. Though he acknowledged that the UN had several accomplishments to its credit but he pointed to the failure of the world body to prevent dozens of wars, civil wars and terror attacks in the last seven decades.

The UN, he said, needs to seriously introspect. "Thousands of people like you and me, were humans too. Lakhs of children vanished, lakhs became homeless. Were the efforts of the UN at that time and even now, adequate?" Modi asked in an evocative address.

For the last eight months, the world is combating the coronavirus pandemic, he pointed out while asking emphatically, "Where is the United Nations in that battle? Where is the collective and effective response to this crisis?" The Prime Minister argued that institutional and structural reforms of the UN are a necessity of our times. The UN commands huge respect in India, he said adding that it is equally true that Indians have been waiting for the completion of the reforms for long. "Indians are worried and wondering if these reforms would ever reach a logical end. They have been asking till how long will India be kept out of the UN's decision making structure?" he said.

In a strong pitch for granting India a seat at the UN Security Council (UNSC), the Prime Minister highlighted the nation's role in the world and global peace. "For how long will a country which is the world's largest democracy, a country with more than 18 per cent of the world's population, a country with hundreds of languages, hundreds of dialects, many creeds, many ideologies, have to wait?" he asked.

"When we were strong, we did not trouble the world; when we were oppressed, we did not burden the world either," Prime Minister Modi said adding that India's philosophical values were in alignment with the founding principles of the UN.

"India will always use its experience as a pluralistic culture and democracy for the benefit of the world, humanity, security, progress and prosperity. We will always raise our voice against the enemies of humanity, human race and human valuesa- terrorism, arms smuggling, drugs, money laundering," he said.

The Prime Minister assured the world community that India will continue to help the world as it has even during the current coronavirus pandemic. He informed the Assembly that India is headed towards phase three of clinical trials for a Covid-19 vaccine. "India will provide help to everyone," he said.

While recounting how India has been dealing with its challenges, the Prime Minister explained his vision for self-reliant India and how it would be a force multiplier for the global economy.

Interestingly, Modi completely ignored Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan's diatribe against his government at the UN on Friday.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 18:37:19|Editor: huaxia

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FAIZABAD, Afghanistan, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- The Afghan security forces have repulsed Taliban militants' attack on Duaba Yaftal Bala, a suburban of Faizabad, capital of northeastern Badakhshan province, provincial police spokesman Sanaullah Rohani said on Saturday.

"Taliban rebels launched massive offensive on security checkpoints of pro-government militiamen on Duaba Yaftal Bala at 2:00 a.m. local time, triggering heavy fighting but run away after leaving four bodies and five injured behind," Rohani told Xinhua.

The official also confirmed that one pro-government militia was killed and another one wounded in the firefight.

Taliban militants who have stepped up activities are yet to make comment on the attack. Enditem
TWO outboard fishing boats from the Dominican Republic were detained after they were spotted steering near Seal Cay without permission last week.





Officers of the police Marine Branch Unit and of the Department of Environment and Coastal Resources (DECR) responded to the sighting on Thursday, September 17.





They intercepted the boats at about 11am and discovered eight Dominican nationals on board but no marine products.





The men were immediately arrested and taken into custody. DECR officers carried out processing and further investigations.





Both the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Immigration were informed of the arrests.




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Linkedin (Kyodo News) Tokyo  Sat, September 26, 2020 17:31 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c476f1a8 2 News Japan,travel Free

Japan will make available an online version of a health questionnaire that travelers are required to fill out before entering the country to streamline the immigration control process, sources familiar with the matter said Saturday.

The online questionnaires meant to flag travelers who are possibly at higher risk of arriving when infected with the coronavirus will be available soon on a trial basis for some international flights arriving at Narita airport near Tokyo, they said.

The questionnaires are currently handed out to travelers aboard inbound flights.

With the new system to be introduced more widely later this year, arriving passengers can complete the questionnaires by accessing a dedicated website of the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry before their departure and are given a QR code that confirms they have completed the process to use upon arrival, according to the sources.

Japanese authorities said Friday the country will reopen its borders to foreigners with permits to stay for three months or longer for purposes including engaging in medical, cultural and sports-related activities. Business trips for less than three months will also be allowed.

Travelers must be accepted by entities or organizations capable of ensuring they have tested negative for the virus before entering Japan. After arrival, they have to stay in self-isolation for 14 days and avoid using public transportation during the period.

The government is considering limiting the number of entries to about 1,000 each day. At the same time, it will increase virus testing capacity at airports, government sources said earlier.

Japan currently imposes an entry ban on 159 countries and regions. Foreigners who have been to any of the places within 14 days of their arrival are being turned away, with some exceptions.

The government has started gradually rolling back its travel restrictions. Foreigners with resident status in Japan who had traveled outside the country have been allowed re-entry from September.

Expatriates and other long-term residents have been allowed to come from some Asian countries, including Vietnam and Thailand. Foreign students on government grants can also enter the country.

Topics : Japan travel
By PTI

CHANDIGARH: Describing the agriculture-related bills passed by the Centre recently as "black laws", the Haryana unit of the Congress on Saturday announced an over month-long protest programme against the legislations.

The protest schedule from September 28 to October 31 was announced at a joint media interaction by in-charge of the party's Haryana affairs Vivek Bansal, Haryana Pradesh Congress president Kumari Selja, former chief minister and Leader of Opposition Bhupinder Singh Hooda, general secretary of All India Congress Committee Randeep Singh Surjewala and secretary AICC Ashish Dua here.

The party announced the statewide agitation against the central government's "three black laws", saying the legislations will "ruin" the lives of farmers, commission agents and labourers.

On September 28, a "foot march" under the leadership of Kumari Selja will be held from the party office to Haryana Raj Bhavan seeking the repeal of these laws by giving a memorandum to the governor with a request to forward it to the President of India, as per the programme.

It stated that the party activists will observe "save farmers and labourers" events at every assembly and district headquarters on October 2.

A state-level farmers' conference will be held on October 10.

From October 2 to October 31, the party will launch a "signature campaign" against the bills.

Party's Haryana affairs in-charge Bansal said the Congress party, under the leadership of its president Sonia Gandhi and former chief Rahul Gandhi, stands fully united with the farmers to protect their interests.

Selja said the BJP government has launched a "brutal attack" on the farmers, labourers and commission agents (arthiyas) through these "black laws''.

She alleged the three agri bills were passed in Parliament by "murdering democracy".

Selja said the BJP government has completely failed to double the income of the farmers and to give the prices of agricultural produce as per the recommendations of the Swaminathan Committee, and now it is determined to completely ruin the farmers, labourers and commission agents through these legislations.

She claimed that with the implementation of contract farming, small farmers will become labourers in their own fields and their lives will be ruined.

ALSO WATCH:

"Due to not getting the least assured price of farm produce, the agricultural economy will be completely destroyed," she claimed.

Selja said with the farmers not getting the minimum support price of cotton, maize and paddy, they will be forced to sell their produce at throwaway prices.

Speaking on the occasion, Hooda said the demand of the Congress party is that the BJP government should enact another law to ensure that the farmers will get the minimum support price for their produce under all circumstances.

Surjewala said Prime Minister Narendra Modi, while being the chief minister of Gujarat, had advocated to make the agriculture market system more comprehensive and strong, but now he himself is making a law to abolish the mandis.

He said the Modi government after "destroying" shopkeepers and labourers through its "wrong policies" is now hell-bent on "completely eliminating" the farmers.

When mandis are finished, who will get the minimum support price and how will the small farmers send their produce to far-flung areas, Surjewala asked.

He said there are over 15 crore farmers in the country and when the BJP government is unable to buy agricultural produce from 42,000 farmers at the minimum support price, then how will it be able to give the minimum support price to all the farmers of the country.

Surjewala said the grain business is of 25 lakh crore and the government's intention is "handing it over to the mafia".

"More than 86 per cent farmers own two acres of land or less. They do not have the ability to sell produce outside the mandis," he said.

Meanwhile, Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar said the farmers' interests are supreme for the state government.

"Now, no politics can be done in the name of farmers as Prime Minister Narendra Modi has set a target of doubling the income of farmers by the year 2022 and implemented several schemes and programmes in this direction," he told the media in Gurgaon.

He said bills on agriculture reforms passed by Parliament during the Monsoon Session would prove to be "very effective" towards doubling the income of farmers.

Taking a dig at the opposition, Khattar said the opposition parties are spreading confusion among the farmers on the Agriculture Act under a "political agenda", which is not appropriate.

He said the Congress is "misguiding" the farmers to fulfill its "political interests".

ALSO WATCH:
Pumpkin spice.

Did you read that with disdain? Because I wrote it to be dripping with contempt. Go ahead and re-read it with your best disdainful inner voice.

I may lose a lot of you on this. I may even anger my colleagues. But I do not like pumpkin flavoring. Why would so many people be upset about this? Well, Illinois just so happens to be the top grower and producer of pumpkins, pumpkin fillings, and all the other pumpkiny products that fill the shelves this time of year. Most of this production happens in Tazewell County near Morton.

You may have heard the news that in 2020 we are now in a pumpkin filling shortage. The grocery store shelves are devoid of pumpkin filling for making all types of pumpkin-ish treats. If you can call them treats. Now dont get me wrong, if someone puts a slice of pumpkin pie or pumpkin muffin in front of me, I will eat it. No need to let food go to waste.

If you are in a panic about the pumpkin shortage, not to worry. According to our commercial agriculture specialist Elizabeth Wahle, pumpkin harvest in Illinois has begun. So far it seems harvest is running about average for this year. Very soon, we should have plenty of pumpkin filling and flavoring to satisfy all your autumn and holiday desires. So, no need to hoard pumpkin filling.

At a time when everyone is divided and arguing about everything, let me add to that. And this may be the last straw for some. I am far from anti-autumn. I love the fall, but my flavor of choice is not pumpkin, it is apple. Yes, we are setting up camps for apple versus pumpkin.

So why apples? Well, first they are delicious. (Except Red Delicious. I love apples, but Im not blind that some types taste like cardboard.) Have you ever eaten a freshly picked apple right off the tree? The sweet crisp crunch as juice runs down your arm. Walking down the orchard as the chill air keeps a perk in your step. Try eating a pumpkin right off the vine. You cant!

Is it legal to not like apple pie? Sorry pumpkin pie, your texture is like eating silky mud.

And of course, apple cider. Need I say more?

One very common argument people will give in support of apples is this fruit is an American tradition, but here is where I must preside fairly over both fall flavors. The apples typically grown for consumption, are not native to North America. Yet, pumpkins have been cultivated by Native Americans for generations before any European settlers set foot on this continent. So, you may have me there. In terms of which camp hails from this part of the world, pumpkins are more American than any apple. Plus, pumpkin production supports a lot of jobs and a major industry for Illinois. Also, everyone else in my house loves pumpkin pie and apple pie. In fact, as a show of gluttony, my children will request both for their plates. OK, perhaps pumpkins arent all that bad.

Maybe we dont have to choose. Maybe both apple and pumpkin have their place in our society. Even if you wont find pumpkin-flavored items on my plate, you certainly will see it readily enjoyed by those around me. And you know, if there are any leftover pumpkin pie on my kids plate, I just cant throw it away. Someone has to eat it. No food goes to waste in my house. Pass the whipped cream.

Good Growing Tip of the Week: If growing your own pumpkins, vine health is critical to storage of pie pumpkins or jack-o-lanterns. Often a pumpkin pulled from a sickly or dead vine has a shorter storage life than one cut from a healthy vine.
HyFlex Learning in China: Tools, Tips and Training Strategies

China's Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University was one of the first to shift to remote learning when the COVID-19 pandemic hit earlier this year. Now, it's stepping things up for the fall by outfitting classrooms for the HyFlex model. In this episode of the Campus Technology Insider podcast, Executive Editor Rhea Kelly talks with Roland Sherwood, manager of the university's educational technologies team, to find out more.

Resource links:

Music: Mixkit

Duration: 27 minutes
No, I'm not suffering from a terminal disease (as far as I know). Nor have I been infected with the novel coronavirus that causes covid-19. But thanks mainly to the pandemic I have been motivated to complete about 90 percent of the necessary steps for end-of-life planning. I have taken note of the nearly 202,000 Americans who have died unexpectedly from covid-19 or its complications in the past seven months.

Most of these people, it's fair to say, were not planning on a sudden death. Many died alone in hospitals, and too often they didn't have the opportunity to bid loved ones farewell. Caring.com reported that before the pandemic hit, fewer than half those 55 and older had completed estate-planning documents (such as a will, a living will, and designating a medical power of attorney). Among those 18 to 34, it was a paltry 16 percent.

The No. 1 reason for everyone: I haven't gotten around to it.

Covid-19 has claimed the lives of several people I know in recent months; sadly, they weren't the only deaths in my personal and aging circle. Barry Owen, 67, a friend and former partner, died of pancreatic cancer in May, a year after being diagnosed. Shortly after being told he had Stage 4 of the disease, he posted on his Caring Bridge site, "To borrow a line from 'Grass,' a favorite childhood poem by Carl Sandburg: 'What place is this? Where are we now?' "

That question - "Where are we now?" - resonated for me as the pandemic spread unabated. Who knows when the bell will toll for thee?

Actually, I'm not alone in having jump-started my death planning.

Recently, the New York Times reported on just such a "boom" due to the pandemic. So many questions. Who do I want to act as my medical power of attorney? Why do I need a living will? Do I want to be cremated or not? What songs do I want played at my funeral?

Not surprisingly, there are now new Web services - with checklists - specifically for this kind of planning. One of them, Lantern, whose mission is to be "the single source of guidance for navigating life before and after a death," reported a more than 120 percent increase in users since the beginning of the pandemic.

With the obituary pages growing ever thicker these days, I'm reminded of the nadir of the HIV epidemic when gay men dropped out of sight only to turn up in a death notice soon after. In 1986, at age 29, I'd been given an AIDS diagnosis, then synonymous with a death sentence. Fortunately, it turned out the doctors had erred in making my diagnosis. But during those weeks when I feared dying, I began to make an end-of-life plan.

I didn't get far. I got only as far as engaging a lawyer to draw up a will when I learned that my lesion was not Kaposi's sarcoma, one of the cancers associated with AIDS. No longer facing an untimely death, I put my head back in the sand - which is to say I stopped responding to his emails - and the lawyer actually fired me as an unresponsive client. When I pleaded for one more chance, he gave it to me and I completed my first "Last Will and Testament," and a living will, too, that detailed what medical treatments I wanted - and would forgo - if I could no longer give consent myself.

In 2006, I added a codicil to that first will when I bought a house with my partner, Jim. Oh, and I designated him as my medical power of attorney, bumping my sister down to the "backup" position.

Still, as I crossed the threshold to 50 and then again to 60, I made no other plans. In 2018, a year after Jim and I legally separated (we'd married in 2013), a new lawyer castigated me for taking no action. By leaving things as they were, my soon-to-be-ex would still inherit my part of our house equity (rather than my siblings) and he'd be making life and death decisions for me in the event I was incapacitated. (Yikes!)

Again, I found myself stuck in denial - over the failed marriage, and that like everyone else I'd die one day, too.

By nature I am a procrastinator, but this pandemic - all those deaths - has forced a new reality on me. In recent months, I've taken various steps to make sure I'm ready - or at least "readier" - for what my friend and literary agent Richard Pine likes to call, "The End."

My will and living will are now updated. (I got rid of all mention of my ex in estate finances or end-of-life decisions.) In our family cemetery plot, I've chosen my place, and there are new notes in a manila folder for a memorial service and an obituary, although I've not actually written a draft like other really well-prepared friends I know. With a nod to Leona Helmsley and her much-spoiled Maltese, my new puppy will go to previously agreed-on guardians, along with a crate, some kibble and some money to cover future costs.

If anything, like others these days, I've come to understand the importance of getting one's affairs in order. Greg Brock, 67 and a retired journalist, frets about having unfinished business, especially after his sister "dropped dead" a year ago.

"It was a shock, and her children were left with so many headaches with her estate, including no funeral plans," he said.

Since then Brock has vowed to get his "act together, starting with the end." He has bought a gravesite and is now ordering the headstone, which he admits "will be weird." He hopes that looking at his headstone will spur him on "to organize other aspects of my life." Good luck, friend.

I'm impressed by those I know who have such lofty but wise intentions: To set things in order sooner than later. But "why do today what I can do tomorrow?" has long been one of my favorite mantras.

Well, I've now ditched that aphorism, thanks to Marie Kondo, author of the best-selling "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing." I've gone though much of my stuff - applying her "delight test" - jettisoning and donating shirts and sheets, pots and pans, and bed linens and bandannas. (Although, had I known the pandemic would be still with us, I would have saved all those old bandannas to be used as masks/face coverings.)

The pandemic has also prompted me to say things I might not otherwise have. I've been making it a point to acknowledge those whom I love in a forthright manner, which has brought about reciprocal responses.

At the outset of the pandemic, I emailed Barry Owen a short note; at the time he appeared to be holding steady. I reminded him of our mutual friend, Denise Kessler, and explained that about the time she turned 90, we both "began ending all of our conversations with "I love you." She and I continued that ritual until two weeks before she died at age 98, I wrote Barry, ending with the same message to him, "I love you."

In his reply, he updated me on his condition. "No news is good news, which is to say, I'm still here." He explained that he and Dan, his husband, "speak frankly with each other about death and what is it called? Oh yeah, end-of-life planning. But we don't dwell on my condition or the future. We live our shared lives as normally as possible."

And then he signed the email, "Love, Barry."

In his final weeks, Barry completed the necessary to-dos in preparation of his death, his husband told me. And then he died, a year after his diagnosis, and a week after his first wedding anniversary.

By the time of his death, three months into the pandemic, I had finished my own death planning. I am prepared - but not ready to go.

- - -

Petrow is the author of "Steven Petrow's Complete Gay & Lesbian Manners."
When Premier Brian Pallisters government decided over the summer that in-person public education would resume this fall, did he, his cabinet ministers or his public-health advisors contemplate a major expansion of COVID-19 testing capacity?

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 25/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

When Premier Brian Pallisters government decided over the summer that in-person public education would resume this fall, did he, his cabinet ministers or his public-health advisors contemplate a major expansion of COVID-19 testing capacity?

Were only two weeks into the school year, but the evidence seems rather compelling that they did not connect back-to-school with testing capacity. If thats the case, it is an oversight that borders on negligence.

This is not to say that effective policy on COVID-19 testing isnt a challenge. Best practices governing who should be tested and when are still evolving as we learn more about the novel coronavirus. There is still a vigorous debate, and no consensus, about the value of testing asymptomatic people, even those who have come into contact with a confirmed case of COVID-19.

Testing sites have been busy since school started. (Mike Deal / Winnipeg Free Press)

But if there is one narrative that has held up through the evolution of the pandemic, it is that one of the best tools to allow us to move toward resuming a nearly normal life is the sufficient and expedited provision of testing.

Rapid-result saliva tests could be a game-changer. The United States has already authorized the use of these so-called "saliva tests," which can produce results in less than an hour. Canada does not yet trust the technology to provide accurate results. Obviously, a rapid-result test that could theoretically be performed at home would be a major win in the fight against COVID-19.

However, until we have a universally accepted rapid test, we need to rely on government to provide the resources to ensure that everyone who needs to be tested using conventional methods  including, one presumes, some asymptomatic people  has access to a test, and that results are provided as quickly as possible.

Simply put, there is no excuse for not having expanded testing capacity immediately upon making the decision to resume in-person classes. One neednt have been an epidemiologist to be able to predict that, notwithstanding the rigorous preventative measures that were in place, there were going to be new outbreaks of COVID-19 in schools.

Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister and his government get an F when it comes to testing. (Ruth Bonneville / Winnipeg Free Press)

Gathering large numbers of people in any indoor space creates an environment ripe for new infections. Given that reality, Manitobans needed to know that the children attending a school that experiences a COVID-19 outbreak  and their families  could get a test and results as quickly as possible.

The provincial government should have anticipated this problem and built extra testing capacity to rapidly screen students and staff in schools with outbreaks in order to maintain confidence in its back-to-school policy. It did not.

The disconnect between the back-to-school policy and testing capacity is even more disconcerting given that, two weeks into a school year in which we have already seen those anticipated outbreaks in at least two schools, we are still waiting to see an expansion of testing capacity.

Cost should not be an issue; Manitoba has been gifted $100 million from the federal government expressly for the purpose of performing more tests.

At this stage of the resumption of the public school year, on this critical public-health challenge, the Pallister government has so far earned a failing grade.

All Manitobans should hope that before the end of the school year, it manages to pull up its marks and in so doing, rebuilds public confidence in public education during the pandemic.
Pakistan's former Defence Minister Engineer Khurram Dastgir Khan wrote a letter to Pakistan's Parliamentary Kashmir Committee on Thursday warning them of severe potential implications that could befall the country if it attempted to alter the constitutional status of Gilgit Baltistan. "Legitimate alarming concerns have been expressed that subsuming of G-B by Pakistan will destroy the case for self-determination of the Kashmiri people-- enshrined in the UN Security Council resolutions," said Engineer Khurram Dastgir Khan.

The Former Defence Minster added that the Kashmir Committee must be briefed on the probable consequences of subsuming G-B as a full province in Pakistan adding that the geopolitical consequences against the backdrop of the India-China standoff also needed to be discussed.

The Imran Khan-led government has decided to conduct polls in GB on November 15 and designate it as Pakistan's 5th province. This move orchestrated by Pakistan's military establishment has come under serious criticism from key opposition leaders such as Maryam Nawaz Sharif who has questioned the military's right to take such decisions when a 'democratically' elected parliament is in place.

Former defence minister demands immediate meeting of the Kashmir Committee to discuss grave implications of declaring GB a full-fledged province of Pakistan including severe risks to Paks Kashmir case. pic.twitter.com/SkT3hYBEml  Syed Talat Hussain (@TalatHussain12) September 25, 2020

Read: 'COVID Vaccine May Be Ready By The First Quarter Of Next Year': Health Min Harsh Vardhan

Read: MEA Lambasts Pakistan's Attempt To Alter Illegally Occupied Gilgit-Baltistan's Status

MEA slams Pakistan's move

Meanwhile, the Ministry of External Affairs has come down heavily on Pakistan's attempt to alter the legal status of Gilgit-Baltistan. Addressing the media, MEA official spokesperson Anurag Srivastava clarified that any such action by Pakistan had no legal basis. Maintaining that GB will continue to remain a part of India, he advised Pakistan not to interfere in the country's internal matters.

MEA spokesperson Anurag Srivastava remarked, "We have seen the statements from Pakistani leadership and media reports in this regard. Any action by Pakistan to alter the status of militarily occupied Gilgit-Baltistan has no legal basis whatsoever and is totally void ab initio. Our position has always been clear and consistent. The entire territories of the Union Territories of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh have been, are and would remain an integral part of India. Pakistan has no locus standi to comment on Indias internal matters."

Read: Pakistanis Also Hit By China's Uighur Atrocities; Imran Govt's Silence Criminal & Cowardly

Read: Baloch & Sindhis Protest Outside UN Against Pakistan's Human Rights Violations
Carrie Symonds was pictured enjoying a holiday in Italy without Boris Johnson

Tory MPs are in revolt over economic devastation caused by coronavirus laws

People are talking about the state of his mental, physical and financial health

They were the pictures which ratcheted up an already febrile atmosphere on the Tory backbenches  Boris Johnsons girlfriend Carrie Symonds enjoying a holiday in Italy without the Prime Minister.

We thought  uh-oh, trouble at tmill, said one Tory MP. Hes got enough to worry about without a break-up as well.

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Rumours of a split are dismissed by the couples friends, who blame Boriss growing legion of political enemies for spreading the claims to destabilise him. It comes at a time when Tory MPs  and even his own Chancellor  are in revolt over the economic devastation caused by Covid laws, as mutterings grow louder about the state of the Prime Ministers mental, physical and financial health.

For Gods sake, she is surely allowed to go on holiday? says one. And he is quite busy, you know. Imagine what they would have said if he had taken the time off to be with her.

The pictures of 32-year-old Ms Symonds relaxing at the 600-a-night Grand Hotel Tremezzo on Lake Como carried uncomfortable echoes for some MPs of Princess Diana posing in front of the Taj Mahal in 1992, sending a signal to the world about her doomed marriage to Prince Charles.

Boris Johnsons girlfriend Carrie Symonds was pictured enjoying a holiday in Italy without the Prime Minister

But while Diana engineered the situation to her own advantage, insiders say that Ms Symonds  who was pictured with their four-month-old son, Wilfred, strapped to her front  was just enjoying a private break with friends after a gruelling few months.

Even Boriss closest allies do not, however, dispute that the Prime Minister is caught in a vortex of professional and personal problems which are without precedent in recent political history.

So far this year, he has endured a ruinously expensive divorce, a brush with death and then fatherhood at the age of 56  all while battling the lingering after effects of coronavirus, trying to limit the damage inflicted by the pandemic and preparing for a possible No Deal Brexit at the end of December.

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No 10 was furious over a briefing last weekend which described Mr Johnson as having misery etched on his face because he was weighed down by the financial burden of supporting six children and missing his ex-wife, Marina Wheeler.

A former adviser to Mr Johnson, who has remained close to Ms Wheeler, is being blamed for the brutal and personal attack, with one source claiming they had already confessed and apologised.

While the claim that the Prime Minister was struggling to get by on his 150,000 salary was greeted with scepticism, there is no doubt that he has paid an emotional price for his divorce, with his four children with Ms Wheeler struggling to varying degrees to accept his relationship with Ms Symonds.

Tory MPs are in revolt over the economic devastation caused by Covid laws, as mutterings grow louder about the state of the Prime Ministers mental, physical and financial health

One source said: It must be painful for Boris to have finally made it to No 10 without his children being around. The contrast with Tony Blair, who was always posing with his kids on the steps of No 10, is stark. It is deeply unfair, because he has worked so hard to provide for them.

Shortly after Mr Johnson became Conservative leader last year, he caused mystification in the Commons after he was seen sprinting from the Despatch Box at 12.45pm and running straight out of Parliament. It later emerged that he was frantic because he was late for lunch with his daughter.

The private angst comes as he faces the extraordinarily complex challenges of the Covid pandemic, with tribes of rebellious Tory MPs managing to make the Governments 80-strong majority look uncomfortably slim.

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Sir Graham Brady, chairman of the backbench 1922 Committee, has led the opposition to Ministers ruling by decree over Covid regulations, while Chancellor Rishi Sunak is making increasingly muscular objections from within the Cabinet to the restrictions.

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In the run-up to his decision last week to impose a 10pm curfew on pubs and restaurants, Mr Johnson was forced to mediate between Mr Sunak, who fears the restrictions are causing irreparable damage to the economy, and the pro-lockdown lobby led by Health Secretary Matt Hancock and Cabinet Office Minister Michael Gove.

At a Covid quad meeting on Friday, September 18  Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab is the other member  Mr Sunak effectively blocked Mr Johnson when he proposed a two-week circuit-breaking lockdown.

While No 10 and No 11 both deny the Chancellor implied that the issue was a resignation matter, his opposition was sufficient to force, at a subsequent meeting last Sunday, the idea of a 10pm curfew as a compromise measure. When the issue was put to the full Cabinet on Tuesday, resistance flared again when Business Secretary Alok Sharma and Environment Secretary George Eustice suggested that it would be safer to taper the curfew with last orders at 10pm, rather than force everyone on to the streets at the same time.

Aline Nassif, a former colleague from Ms Symonds time working as a media adviser to John Whittingdale when he was Culture Secretary, joined Ms Symonds in Italy

But Mr Gove insisted that there should be a strict 10pm guillotine.

Complicating Mr Johnsons decisions are the different tribes of increasingly fearless Tory backbenchers, who  despite being unable to bitch and plot in now-shuttered Commons bars  are using private messaging sites to share their frustrations.

One tribe, which calls itself the Common Sense group, has held meetings with Chief Whip Mark Spencer to express anger at the control freakery exerted over the Prime Minister by scientific advisers such as Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty.

The 50-strong membership, which includes former Transport Minister Sir John Hayes and former Chancellor Lord Lamont, told No 10 that it was being too passive and reactive in the crisis.

As one former chief whip says: My advice to Boris and No 10 is to treat the views of the chairman of the 1922 Committee with at least the same level of respect as they accord to those of any scientist, medic or special adviser on this matter. They need to reverse-ferret as soon as possible.

The Common Sense group have also complained about the lack of legislation to tackle the problem of Channel migrants, and urged Ministers to be more anti-woke on issues such as the ban on Rule, Britannia! at the Last Night of the Proms and unconscious bias training. Some Tory MPs fear that the combination of political and personal problems could even lead to Mr Johnson quitting before the next election.

As one MP, who was alarmed by the pictures of Ms Symonds holidaying alone, says: Would even Churchill have been able to cope without Clementine?

Some MPs also make unsubstantiated claims that Ms Symonds, an environmental campaigner, interferes in the running of the country by marching into ministerial meetings to thrust Wilfred into his arms and being more interested in badgers than Brexit.

But her friends paint a picture of a young woman adapting to life in an intense public gaze, who needs to escape the pressures of No 10 by relaxing with trusted friends.

She was joined on her Italian holiday by feminist campaigner Nimco Ali, who has been at her side throughout her time in Downing Street, and Aline Nassif, a former colleague from Ms Symonds time working as a media adviser to John Whittingdale when he was Culture Secretary.

Ms Nassif is now the global head of communications for Bechtel, the American construction giant responsible for UK infrastructure projects such as Crossrail. One friend said: All of these whispering campaigns are just plain nasty. Carrie is a young woman and a relatively new mum. It seems to all be being done to upset Carrie, which in turn upsets Boris. Its baffling that anyone would do this to her.

They argue that becoming First Lady has been a shock to her. The friend added: She might have been involved in politics for some time but finding yourself in the limelight isnt easy for anyone.

This time two years ago nobody knew who she was. Being caught taking her holiday is something Carrie took on the chin but there is a certain mystery surrounding how she and her friends were found.

She clearly had no idea that there were any members of the paparazzi around. Women tend to do their hair if they know they will be seen.

After arriving home from Lake Como last Thursday, the couple spent Friday together in their No 10 flat, and were planning to spend this weekend together with Wilfred and dog Dilyn.

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The friend concluded: She and Boris are very happy together. The only time theyre not really together is when he is off working as the Prime Minister.
Joseph R. Biden Jr. escalated his attacks on President Trump on Saturday, accusing him of dividing the country into blue cities and red cities. And in a newly televised interview, Mr. Biden compared the president to Joseph Goebbels, Nazi Germanys minister of propaganda.

Mr. Biden, the Democratic presidential nominee, made the Goebbels comparison when asked in an interview that aired Saturday on MSNBC about Mr. Trumps claims that he is pushing a socialist agenda.

Im not sure anybody that hadnt already made up their mind theyre for Trump will believe it, Mr. Biden said. But who knows. Hes sort of like Goebbels. You say the lie long enough  keep repeating it, repeating it, repeating it  it becomes common knowledge.

Mr. Biden has made the analogy before when arguing that Mr. Trump often repeats a lie in the hope that it will stick.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 23:41:24|Editor: huaxia

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by Marwa Yahya

CAIRO, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- The alternative international maritime trade routes will not pose a threat to the maritime navigation in the Suez Canal, the shortest passage between Asia and Europe, George Safwat, spokesperson of the Suez Canal Authority (SCA) said.

"The world's other crossings haven't impacted the market share of the Suez Canal so far," Safwat told Xinhua in a recent interview.

The other crossings refer to an Iranian sea corridor that commercially connects Russia with India, and the Russian North Pole crossing through which Russia seeks to create a main trade path for transferring goods between Asia and Europe.

On July 5, Iran's Chabahar Free Trade Zone announced that the trade path which connects the Indian port of Mumbai, Hamburg and St. Petersburg will replace the Suez Canal.

The move raised concerns about its impact on the Suez Canal's revenues, a key source for Egypt's hard currency and a major pillar in the country's economy.

"The SCA takes the concept of competitiveness seriously as a motive for promoting the performance of its navigation path," Safwat said, adding that when any new or even future maritime channel appears, the SCA's economic unit immediately carries out studies to reduce their impacts on the Suez Canal's revenues.

He added that the Russian North Pole crossing operates only for four months per year from July till October, noting that the weak frozen path limits the capacity of its passage.

"Since 2000 we have been following the progress of the Iranian sea corridor which seems at beginning to be a possible competitor to the Suez Canal in the future," Safwat said.

The shipping time of the corridor, however, is costly long, said the spokesperson, adding that in 2019 nearly 8 million tons of goods passed through the Iranian passage, while more than 1 billion tons went through the Suez Canal in the same year.

He added that 90 percent of the goods passed through the Iranian sea corridor is intra-Asian trade, which is different from the trade through the Suez Canal.

The number of ships crossing the Suez Canal increased to 19,300 over the year 2019-2020, compared to 18,500 ships over the year 2018/2019, according to official statistics.

Safwat said that despite a decrease in world trade movements because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Suez Canal managed to attract ships from far geographical locations via marketing policies that include a package of incentives.

Revenues for the canal rose 2 percent during the first four months of 2020, recording 1.907 billion U.S. dollars, up from 1.869 billion dollars during the same period of 2019, he added. Enditem
Boris Johnson is set to do whatever he can to ensure that families will be able to gather together for Christmas this year.

The Prime Minister is believed to be considering mass-testing, a vaccine roll-out or a temporary break from the rule of six.

Sources say that plans for up to three million daily coronavirus tests are underway and work on vaccines being administered from the beginning of December has also begun.

And if these measures don't work, the Government may urge families to isolate for two weeks before Christmas so that they are able to safely meet in groups bigger than six.

Boris Johnson is set to do whatever he can to ensure that families will be able to gather together for Christmas this year

However, the Department of Health has said that nothing can be guaranteed yet.

The Government has revealed that Parliament will be given a vote on the rule of six on October 6 - which could see it being abolished.

Tory rebels have said they will carry on insisting that all new coronavirus lockdown restrictions are debated and voted on in Parliament.

Sir Graham Brady, chairman of the 1922 Committee of backbench Tory MPs, wrote in The Telegraph: The British people have shown remarkable willingness to make sacrifices where it can be shown to be beneficial. But this can't be done on the whim of a Government minister.

'People who are giving up their freedom, losing out on precious family holidays, seeing their livelihoods ruined, really have a right to expect that someone will be there to ask the difficult questions on their behalf: why is this being done? How long will this go on? When exactly will this end?

Sources say that plans for up to three million daily coronavirus tests are underway and work on vaccines being administered from the beginning of December has also begun

'If people are banned from seeing their grandchildren or saying goodbye to a dying friend, they deserve some answers.'

Mr Johnson has been under fire from members of his own party desperately urging him to find a way to rid the country of the lockdown measures which were first put in place in March.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock and Mr Johnson allegedly realised in August that the civil service had lost control of the virus so they both got personally involved, according to an insider speaking to The Telegraph

It was revealed on Friday that the country is in more than 2trillion of debt, partly due to harsh lockdown measures.

The Government's 'Moonshot' programme, which aims to test 10million people a day, is more advanced than previously thought, according to The Telegraph.

And the Prime Minister is aiming for easy access to at-home testing kits that can give a result in 20 minutes which will allow the person taking it a 'freedom pass' to continue with their life as normal if the result is negative.

While one source told the newspaper that officials have set a target of at least 3.2million daily tests by December - 13 times the 245,363 people that were tested for the virus in the UK on Thursday.

However another said that it would be more likely to happen early next year and didn't confirm the three million tests figure.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock and Mr Johnson allegedly realised in August that the civil service had lost control of the virus so they both got personally involved, according to an insider speaking to The Telegraph.

Ministers are still hoping a vaccine will be approved before Christmas so that as many people over 65 can be treated as possible.

Ministers are still hoping a vaccine will be approved before Christmas so that as many people over 65 can be treated as possible

An early school closure is also being considered so that families would be able to self-isolate in the run up to Christmas so they would be able to safely gather on the big day.

And officials are even considering allowing a two-week quarantine after Christmas - which would lead to a month-long holiday from December 11 to January 10.

Mr Johnson has made it clear that stricter rules could follow his 'rule of six', which wouldn't allow larger groups to spend Christmas Day together.

And some advisers have even suggested that a complete ban on any mixing of households should be enforced.

But on Friday night a spokesman for the Department of Health and Social Care played down the claims, saying: 'These figures and timeline are wholly inaccurate and do not represent expectations or planning. We are investing significant resources into piloting new tests and vaccine development.'

Some 6,874 people tested positive for coronavirus on Friday. The death toll rose by 34.
President Donald Trump returns to the Harrisburg area Saturday at a historic moment.

On Saturday, Trump has said he plans to name a nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court to fill a vacancy created by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. He plans to make the announcement from the White House. Late Saturday afternoon, Trump announced he is nominating Amy Coney Barrett, a federal judge highly respected by conservatives.

Later Saturday night, Trump is slated to hold a rally at Harrisburg International Airport, another sign of Pennsylvanias enormous importance in the presidential election.

Both Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden have made several appearances in recent weeks. Biden, the former vice president, spoke with union leaders in Harrisburg and Lancaster on Labor Day.

On Saturday morning, Biden issued a statement criticizing Trumps leadership during the coronavirus pandemic.

This crisis didnt have to be this bad, Biden said in the statement. Were it not for President Trumps failed leadership, thousands of Pennsylvania families would not have suffered such horrific loss and countless others would not be faced with economic hardship, including the nearly 20,000 people out of work in Dauphin County today.

Biden has led Trump in polls in Pennsylvania, but some recent surveys have put the race within the margin of error. This state in many respects is up for grabs, G. Terry Madonna, a political analyst at Franklin & Marshall College, said earlier this week.

With 20 electoral votes, Pennsylvania could be the state that determines who wins the presidential election, several analysts have said. Trump won Pennsylvania by less than a percentage point in 2016, but his victory here helped propel him to the White House.

Hours ahead of the rally, Trump supporters were already lining up to get into the rally. Polls have shown Trump maintains strong support in central Pennsylvania.

Supporters of President Donald Trump line up hours ahead of his rally at Harrisburg International Airport, Saturday, Sept. 26, 2020. Trump is slated to arrive at 7 p.m.

Biden, a Scranton native, has devoted a great deal of time and attention to Pennsylvania, including plenty of ads on TV. For Biden, Pennsylvania is virtually a must-win state: the last Democrat to win the White House while losing Pennsylvania was Harry Truman in 1948. On Friday, Biden picked up the endorsement of the Pennsylvania State Building and Construction Trades and Council.

In making his case to voters, Biden argues Trump has consistently failed to lead as America battles the coronavirus, the nations worst pandemic in a century.

Biden said Trumps failure to act more aggressively to curb the spread of the virus has cost lives and contributed to the economic fallout of the pandemic. More than 200,000 Americans have died due to the coronavirus, including more than 8,000 in Pennsylvania. Millions have lost jobs and many businesses have closed their doors permanently.

Trump has defended his response to the virus. He points to the countrys strong economic performance before the pandemic and said hes the one best suited to help America bounce back economically. Trump has pointed to the job market and unemployment rates that had reached the lowest point in decades before the coronavirus emerged.

It appears Trump has enough votes in the Republican-controlled Senate to confirm his nominee to the Supreme Court.

Democrats, including U.S. Sen. Bob Casey Jr., have implored Trump and the Senate to hold off until after the election. U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., has said hell vote on Trumps nominee if qualified, and Republicans are urging Trump and the Senate to seize the chance to add another conservative justice to the high court.

If successful in getting Barrett confirmed, Trump will have placed three justices on the nine-member court. He previously succeeded in getting Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court.

On Tuesday, Trump and Biden will engage in their first debate of the election. Vice President Mike Pence is slated to appear at a debate watch party in Lancaster County.

While polls show Trump trailing Biden statewide, surveys show Trump with very strong support in central Pennsylvania and his visit offers another opportunity to fire up his base. In December, Trump spoke before a capacity crowd of supporters at the Giant Center in Hershey.

Trump also drew a large crowd for an event at Pittsburgh International Airport earlier this week.

Citing that event, Gov. Tom Wolf issued a statement Friday criticizing Trump for holding large rallies during the pandemic. Wolf asked Pennsylvanians to avoid the rally.

To hold this event is not just misguided, it is dangerous, it is manipulative and it is wrong," Wolf said in a statement Friday. "I would ask Pennsylvanians to think of the health and safety of their families and their communities before attending this event or any rally put on by the Trump campaign. And I would ask the president, for once, to put the health of his constituents ahead of his own political fortunes.

The doors open for Trumps HIA rally at 4 p.m. and the president is slated to arrive at 7 p.m.

PennLive will be covering the event throughout the day.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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With little information to go on, experts in the arcane workings of Medicare regulations struggled Friday to assess the legal and practical details of Trumps plan. Edwin Park, a research professor at the Georgetown University Center for Children and Families, said the administration is stretching to claim authority for the gambit under a waiver authorized in amendments to the Social Security Act. That waiver has long been used to test new ideas that might save entitlement programs money.
Juan Crespi---The Forgotten School

by Lorri Ungaretti

Were you an elementary student at Juan Crespi Home School or a student at Lincoln High with classes at Crespi? If so, I'd love to hear from you. It is very difficult to get any historical information on this school.

Juan Crespi Home School was built at 2105 - 24th Avenue, on the southwest corner of Quintara Street. Plans for the school were controversial. According to the San Francisco Call-Bulletin in May 1948, four homes were condemned so that a new elementary school (originally called "the Sunset Reservoir home school unit") could be built. This was a compromise; the school district originally wanted to condemn twenty-six homes on 24th Avenue.

The school opened on September 5, 1951, as one of several "home schools" in the Sunset. (Noriega Home School was one of this group.) The construction of home schools---most offering classes in kindergarten through grade four---was probably a response to the birth explosion we now call the Baby Boom years. Many Sunset children in the 1950s could just walk a few blocks to school. I, for example, lived on 22nd Avenue, between Quintara and Rivera. The 2-1/2 block walk to Crespi was easy for me, and I did it alone starting in kindergarten.

The early years at Crespi were uneven. Frances Blum Field, who graduated from Lincoln High in 1963, remembers that in 1951, Crespi did not have a kindergarten, so she had to travel from her home, on 20th Avenue between Pacheco and Quintara, down to Jefferson Elementary School at 19th and Irving. She started first grade at Crespi, which she attended through third grade, then returned to Jefferson for the remaining elementary grades.

"I have two great memories of Crespi," says Frances. "It had pressed cork flooring with radiant heating on the floor." She also recalls the janitor. "His name was Scotty Drummond and he always wore a dark-colored uniform. The kids adored him. He had whitish hair, dancing eyes, and a Scottish brogue."

I began kindergarten at Crespi later, in fall 1957. A friendly policeman walked us across 24th Avenue from the east to the west side. Each grade level had one classroom, except first grade, which had two. Some former students might remember Miss (Mrs.?) Fitzgerald or Miss Gough for first grade, Mrs. Behrens for second grade, Mrs. Kelleher for third grade, and Miss Joan Brehm for fourth grade.

In the small playground, which seemed large to us, we played kickball, dodgeball, jacks (on the concrete riser surrounding the flagpole), and hopscotch. We also played on the swings, turning bar, and metal jungle gym. The playground equipment is long gone. The yard is now cluttered with temporary buildings.

Crespi was connected to Parkside School on 25th Avenue between Ulloa and Vicente. We had the same principals---Miss Wisecarver, Miss Grosso, Mr. Rodman---and most of us went on to Parkside for fifth and sixth grades. Other students, depending on where they lived, went to Jefferson for the final grades of elementary school.

In June 1962 or 1963, Crespi closed, due to low enrollment. Actually, the school didn't close completely; it was taken over by Lincoln High School, which needed classroom space. David Whitehead (a 1964 Lincoln High grad) remembers heading across the street from Lincoln for a class at Crespi when he learned that President Kennedy had been shot.

I started at Lincoln in fall 1967 and was amazed when my tenth grade geometry class was in my third grade classroom! We all laughed at how low the chalkboards were. We almost kneeled on the floor to get water from a drinking fountain. Lincoln girls couldn't fix their hair in front of the bathroom mirrors, which stood about waist high. And the toilets! They were so tiny and so close to the floor that they looked like toys.

It is difficult to gather any history about the school. The San Francisco Public Library has no record of Crespi, although the photo archives do have one picture of it. The school district turned over its files to the San Francisco History Center at the main library, but the files do not mention Crespi. An employee of the San Francisco Bureau of Architecture believes that an outside architect designed the building in the late 1940s. (I'd love to know who!) The Bureau's only record of the school is exterior painting and door replacement completed in 1962, but the actual records for this job were turned over to the school district years ago. After this article was published in the Lincoln Log (the high school's alumni newsletter), I heard from someone who attended Lincoln as late as 1980 and had classes in Crespi, so the building was part of the high school longer than it had been an elementary school!

The Juan Crespi Home School building still stands and is used for state and district programs. The address has been changed to accommodate two entrances on Quintara: One can enter the San Francisco School Health Programs Department at 1515 Quintara or enter the California Children's Services Medical Therapy Unit and the San Francisco Unified School District Therapy Unit at 1595 Quintara.

For a short time, this building served as an intimate gathering place during an era when the Sunset was full of young children. And for just as long (maybe longer), it was an extension to Lincoln High School. While Juan Crespi Home School is lost to San Francisco city records, it remains in the memories of those who went there.

Please let me know if you have historical information or stories to tell about Crespi. You can reach me at lorri@outsidelands.org.

Contribute your own stories about your neighborhood!


The seventh encoffin ceremony for Chinese soldiers killed during the 1950-1953 Korean War was held in South Korea's Incheon on Saturday morning. Officials from both China and South Korea attended the ceremony.

The remains of 117 Chinese volunteer soldiers will be transferred to China this year in the seventh transfer of this kind since 2014, the most since 2015. South Korea has transferred the remains of 599 Chinese volunteer soldiers over the past six years.

The 117 remains will arrive back in China on Sunday via Chinese air force's charter plane.

This year's transfer was earlier scheduled to take place around March and April, but was delayed due to the COVID-19 outbreak.
Save Log in , register or subscribe to save articles for later. Normal text size Larger text size Very large text size Rescuers say the noise is the hardest part. When whales are stranded on a beach, they keep calling to one another. Sometimes others will come in from safe water to join their dying pod. Like humans, whales and orcas move through life alongside family and friends. But instead of GPS, they navigate with sound through echolocation, even in the empty darkness of the deep. Whales have been recorded calling to each other between Britain and the Carribean. The voices of humpbacks are so powerful that one note could travel the globe, says expert Wally Franklin, who has been studying whales for 30 years up north at Hervey Bay. Our first sense is our eyes, he says. For whales, they start at their ears. But sometimes, something throws off this well-honed sonar and leads the whales astray, to where they were never made to go: land. A rescue team at Macquarie Harbour in Tasmania on September 24. Credit:Getty Images Why whales beach themselves is still largely a mystery, even after centuries of recorded strandings. Now, as humans deplete fish stocks and make noise of our own in the oceans, as water temperatures rise and ocean currents change, these events seem to be happening more and more. In September 2020, more than 500 pilot whales washed up in Tasmanias remote and treacherous Macquarie Harbour  the largest stranding in Australias history. Five long days of gruelling rescue efforts sent more than 100 back out to sea. Some survived; others returned to strand again alongside their beached pod. For the whales themselves, marine biologist Olaf Meynecke describes a mass stranding like this: imagine trying to find a door in a pitch black room while hearing your loved ones screaming for help on the other side. When one whale gets into trouble, it calls, he says. Like we would, some whales will choose their relatives over their own survival; theyll try to reach them. The calls they make are very disturbing. Theyre not normal calls. You can hear it in their voice, the distress.

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So how do strandings happen? What goes on during a rescue? And are we getting any better at saving whales? (And a warning: this content may be distressing) What are the likely causes of strandings? Whales can strand alone, often sick and unable to keep swimming. A sperm whale might wash up with a belly full of plastic. Or animals can strand in groups, as commonly happens with pilot whales and other orcas such as killer whales. The biggest stranding on record involved more than 1000 pilot whales in New Zealand in 1918. Marine scientist Vanessa Pirotta says there are plenty of theories, from misadventure to navigation errors. Food shortages could be to blame, forcing whales to travel into less familiar waters to chase prey closer to shore, as could a flight from predators, poor weather or changes to the nutrient-rich sea currents that whales follow around the world. Earthquakes, solar flares and noise pollution from military sonar have also been linked to strandings. Since navies began using sonar to guide their submarines in the 1960s, researchers have found 12 mass strandings of beaked whales coincided with naval exercises, while 27 others involving the species happened near a naval base or ship. Another study suggested exposure to this sonar could even explain why some stranded beaked whales had shown signs of decompression sickness, known as the bends, commonly experienced by scuba divers and astronauts. When it comes to big events, experts theorise it could simply be a case of follow the leader taking a wrong turn. Perhaps a sick or confused matriarch wanders into dangerous waters.

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But Meynecke notes that a pod of hundreds is not typically led by one leader. Pilot whales do form bigger groups than a lot of other whales, but  usually they have a core group, about 20 or 30, and they come together as a big pod to mate, sometimes to hunt. Its like high school, he says: there are cliques. And that means mass strandings of this scale happen in more of a chain reaction than one mad rush. They never all beach together. Some come in, and then later, hours, even days on, more come. Whales, such as this humpback calf, can communicate with each other over vast distances. But noise pollution is making it harder for them to hear one other. Credit:Shutterstock In such a case, he says, many subgroups may have come together and the leader of one, perhaps confused or starving, may have led her own companions astray. Those whales might be close to some in another subgroup, so those ones come and then others wont leave them, so they come, one after the other, until theres chaos. Pilot whales, he says, are the masters of strandings. You might have one or two humpbacks, but with pilots its often whole groups. Sometimes a sick animal will move to shallow water to try to survive. Whales are marine mammals after all  they breathe air. And that makes them as afraid of drowning as we are, Franklin says. Workers cover a beached pilot whale (but not its blowhole) to keep the sun off as they attempt to rescue it after a mass stranding at Marion Bay, Tasmania, in 2005. Credit:Getty Images

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How does a huge whale even get onto a beach? Whales do not normally venture into shallow water. Theres no food there, apart from the odd errant squid. But some stretches of coast can trap them in the geography, with waters shifting suddenly from deep water to sand banks and mud. In another very rare event in September 2020, three humpback whales took a wrong turn inland and ended up in a Northern Territory river filled with crocodiles. Two quickly turned back out to sea, but one whale travelled upstream more than 30 kilometres before returning safely to the open ocean more than a week later, at high tide, under the anxious gaze of rangers. Loading Their echolocation works best when theyre in the open ocean or where theres hard rocks to bounce off, Meynecke says. Sand banks absorb their sonar too fast, so they have to get very close to know it's there. By the time the whales realise they have strayed too far, they are trapped. They dont know where to go, or how to get out; they run out of water. They panic. In Hervey Bay, Franklin and his wife, Trish, have studied humpback whale mothers teaching their young to navigate the shallows without beaching. Tasmania and neighbouring New Zealand are hotspots for mass strandings  the site of the September pilot whale stranding, Macquarie Harbour, is notoriously treacherous for boats, let alone whales. Nic Deka, who led the rescue there for Tasmanias Parks and Wildlife Service, said the remoteness of the inlet made it difficult to get equipment and crews into the water  so he thought it unlikely that extra resources could have saved more of the animals.

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The whales stranded on a sandbank at Macquarie Harbour off Strahan in September. Credit:Getty Images Why is it so hard to save them? Imagine youre on an alien planet without a spacesuit. You can breathe but gravity is crushing your lungs against your chest.Not only that but the radiation of the sun is so strong that your skin is dry and youre boiling hot. You dont know where you are or how to get home. You cant even move. Thats how whales might feel on shore. And from the moment they wash up, they are running out of time. In the case of larger whales, Meynecke says their bones can break as their own weight crushes them. The sun is always a big problem. Whales cant sweat, they cant cool themselves down, and especially these pilot whales, theyre black, they will overheat very fast. The whales can also drown on the beach if they are leaning with their blowhole underwater. They dont have hands, they cant roll themselves over, Meynecke says. When the tide comes up, sometimes people have to move them so they can breathe, and youll just see this desperate run from one animal to the next, trying to tip them over.

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The EU-Ukraine Summit will take place in Brussels on October 6.

President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky wrote about this in his post on Twitter following a phone call with President of the European Council Charles Michel on Saturday, September 26.

In our call with Charles Michel we agreed to meet in Brussels on 6 October for the 22nd EU-Ukraine Summit. Looking forward to meeting you and Ursula von der Leyen [President of the European Commission] to discuss the way of Ukraine-EU important partnership, Zelensky wrote.

Previously, the summit was scheduled for October 1.

The previous EU-Ukraine Summit took place in July last year. Following the summit, agreements were signed on financial support for civil society, decentralization, anti-corruption measures and reforms.

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A preliminary injunction extending the deadline for responding to the U.S. Census could give local cities and towns more time to increase their response rates.

A ruling by U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh in California late Thursday allows the once-a-decade head count of every U.S. resident to continue through the end of October.

Koh said the shortened schedule ordered by President Donald Trump's administration likely would produce inaccurate results that would last a decade.

The judge sided with civil rights groups and local governments that sued the U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Department of Commerce, which oversees the statistical agency, arguing that minorities and others in hard-to-count communities would be missed if the counting ends this month.

The ruling, which is being appealed by the Trump administration, gives cities like Meriden more time to address their undercount while other local towns were pleased with their response rates so far.

With the state of Connecticuts rate at 70.2%, Cheshire Assistant Town Manager Arnett Talbot is happy with the towns response rate being at 82.9%.

There were a significant number of responses submitted electronically, which meant less legwork for the Census representatives on the ground, Talbot said. This isnt surprising, given that Cheshire as a community is generally responsive and responsible.

The town and other organizations worked with the Cheshire Complete Count Committee to educate Cheshire residents on the importance of participating in the count. The committee was assisted by regional Census representatives who provided information, materials and other ideas.

Talbot said that while they would love for the total to increase, Cheshires current response rate is great.

We are pleased with the number of residents who have self-reported given this strange and challenging time, Talbot said.

Both Wallingford and Southington have surpassed Connecticuts average self-response rate with Wallingford being at 76.8% and Southington with a rate of 81.5%.

Rob Phillips, the planning director and Census count committee lead for Southington, said 66.2% of Southingtons response rate comes from the internet.

With the self-response rate in Southington being 78.9% in 2010, Phillips is happy that the town has increased that number a bit.

It means more people are self-responding than they did back in 2010 and I dont know what the final numbers are going to be right now, but its probably safe to say its going to be up close to the state-wide average, Phillips said. ... The local count committee has done a great job just communicating the facts and the necessity to partake in the Census because it has everything to do with our representation in Washington and our federal funding ability.

The final push in Southington, according to Phillips, is just to get the people on the ground to go door to door to enumerate.

In Meriden, the self-response rate is below the statewide average at 66.2%. Mayor Kevin Scarpati said hes disappointed because hed like to see the citys numbers higher.

Every person that doesnt get counted equates to nearly $3,000 of federal funding that Meriden will not receive for schools, for road improvements, infrastructure projects, for hospitals, for programs that go directly back to our residents and we should be at as close to 100% as possible, Scarpati said.

With COVID-19 present this year, Scarpati believes that it played a huge role in the current self-response rate.

COVID-19 hit and we couldnt have meetings in person anymore, the subcommittees werent getting together as much as they were and the enumerators at the Census got a late start going door to door, Scarpati said. I think people were obviously concerned about COVID-19 and their health and wellbeing than filling out the Census. Its been a very tough year.

Scarpati said that the Complete Count Committee has worked hard to come up with creative ways to engage with the community. With there now being more time before the Census ends, the committee is working hard to increase the average rate. This includes having the Census present at events, updating the City of Meridens website and reminding the community of the deadline.

Were working with the Census bureau to ensure that they are aware of any events or gatherings that are happening in our community, Scarpati said. For example, weve got the farmers market and making sure the Census has a presence there  We have a billboard along I-91  All of the public meetings we send out friendly reminders.

Information from the Associated Press was included in this report.

jsimms@record-journal.com203-317-2208Twitter: @jessica_simms99
Lankan arts to commemorate Russian War View(s):

The annual exhibition of paintings by students of the Art School of the Russian Cultural Centre in Colombo, this year held under the motto Victory and Peace and dedicated to the main anniversary date of the year  the 75th anniversary of Victory in the Great Patriotic War.

The exhibition was solemnly opened by Chief Guest, Lieutenant General Shavendra Silva, Commander of the Sri Lanka Army and Prof. Kapila Gunawardena, Secretary to the Ministry of Buddha Sasana, Religious and Cultural Affairs.

The opening of the exhibition, which became the first significant event organised at the Russian Centre in Colombo after a long period of restrictions on public events imposed by local authorities to prevent the spread of coronavirus infection, was also attended by the Russian Ambassador to Sri Lanka Yuri Materiy and the military attache of the Russian Embassy Colonel Denis Shkoda.The current epidemiological situation in Sri Lanka can be called stabilized. The total number of cases since the beginning of the pandemic to date is 3299, of which 13 have died, 3100 have recovered and another 186 are being treated. The operating mode of public places and institutions, ministries and departments, public transport, universities and schools has been restored. At the same time, the airport remains closed, and the local authorities have not yet announced the dates of the expected resumption of international flights.

Addressing the audience, Anastasia Khokhlova, head of the Rossotrudnichestvo office in Sri Lanka, emphasised the relevance of the exhibition theme. The 75th anniversary of the Victory in the Great Patriotic War and World War II is the main anniversary date of the year for many millions of people around the world. It is undoubtedly a common task to prevent falsification of historical facts, to ensure the continuity of truthful information on key events in world history, to pass on to future generations the basic values that have become possible in a multipolar world, she said.

The exposition includes more than 120 works by students of the Art School of the Russian Centre in Colombo aged 5 to 15 years, created during the year and united by the theme of Victory and Peace under the professional guidance of its permanent leader, talented artist and experienced teacher Arjuna Jayasinha and his assistants Maheshi Fernando and Natalie Hettiarachchi.

The opening ceremony was followed by the distribution of certificates of participation to the young artists.

The exhibition will be on display at the Russian Centre in Colombo until the end of September.
A meeting between BJP leader and former Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis and Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut on Saturday sparked speculations in the political circles amid the slugfest between the two parties in the last few months.

Both the leaders met at a five-star hotel in suburban Mumbai. The BJP dismissed any political motive to this meeting.

The meeting assumes significance as the Sena-led Maharashtra government is facing a lot of heat over Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput death case and frosty relationship between the ruling party allies as right-wing trolls have targeted chief minister Uddhav Thackerays son Aaditya Thackeray.

Also read: SAD quits NDA over farm bills, says party chief Sukhbir Singh Badal

Sanjay Raut wanted to meet Devendra Fadnavis to take his interview for party editorial Saamana, hence it was decided to meet once before the interview. Since Fadnavis wanted the whole interview to be published unedited, it was decided to meet before to decide on the modalities. The interview will take place after Fadnavis returns from Bihar campaigning, said BJP leader Pravin Darekar.

Raut, a strong critic of the BJP, did not react to the media reports on the meeting.

Political analysts point that the meeting meets more than an eye. No one will just meet to discuss an interview. This seems more of a message by the Shiv Sena to its allies, the Congress and the NCP, that it still has good relations with the BJP, said political commentator Hemant Desai.
Big Bad Wolf goes online: Get your favourite books from the comfort of your home By Yomal Senerath-Yapa View(s): View(s):

The Big Bad Wolf Book Sale this year will happen online. Hosted through a platform called The Readers Portal, the sale will be live 24/7 from October 1-4, it was revealed at the launch of the website, attended by Nishan Wasalathanthri, Director of ProRead Lanka and through live web conferencing by co-founders of Big Bad Wolf Books, Andrew Yap and Jacqueline Ng from Malaysia.

Apart from the popular 50%-90% discounts, this year there will be three times more books than before with 70% of them being titles that have never been in Sri Lanka previously. The website promises a seamless and efficient method of purchasing books right from the comfort of home which is mobile friendly. There will be a recommendation section to help readers choose books, while searching can be done via keywords, ISBN, titles and authors.

Explaining the decision to have an online sale Andrew Yap said The safety of our fans is our priority.

Nishan revealed that only local courier charges apply for delivery and these will be at a minimum- while any purchase above Rs.8000 will be free of all courier charges.

Jacqueline assured that the Big Bad Wolf sales team will monitor the whole process meticulously ensuring all safety precautions are followed thoroughly.

Promotions this year include the Horrible Histories book series where customers can choose to buy three books at Rs. 640, Magical Books with a buy-two-get-one- free and a buy-three-get-two offer, and a buy-one-get-one-free offer for the Classic Fairytale by White Star Kids series. Customers are advised to stay updated on social media pages for other contest and promotion arrangements.

The sale, open 24 hours from October 1 to 4, will happen through www.bigbadwolfbooks.lk. Latest updates will be released through Facebook at www.facebook.com/bbwbookssrilanka and Instagram www.instagram.com/bigbadwolfbooks.lk.

The worlds biggest book sale, Big Bad Wolf was launched in 2009 in Malaysia and extends across cities in Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines, UAE, Pakistan, Myanmar, Taiwan, Cambodia and Korea.
By PTI

JAMMU: A senior police officer on Saturday reviewed the border security grid and national highway security while urging his men to further strengthen relations with people of border areas to foil the nefarious designs of anti-national elements to disturb peace in Jammu and Kashmir.

The direction by Inspector General of Police, Jammu Zone, Mukesh Singh comes in the backdrop of Pakistan using drones to drop weapons across the Line of Control (LoC) and apprehension of any subversive activity by terrorists.

Singh was speaking at a meeting of senior officers during his visit to Samba district.

Deputy Inspector General, Jammu-Kathua-Samba Range, Vivek Gupta, DIG Udhampur-Reasi range Sujit Kumar, DIG Doda-Kishtwar-Ramban Abdul Jabbar, Senior Superintendent of police, Kathua, Shainder Mishra, SSP Samba Rajesh Sharma, SSP Jammu Shridhar Patil, SSP Udhampur Shargun Shukla, SP (operations) Jammu Naresh Kumar and other officers attended the meeting, a police spokesperson said.

He said SSP Samba gave a detailed power point presentation on the security set up in the district viz-a-viz deployment of Border Security Force, Army and Samba Police in three tiers of the counter-terrorism grid and it was followed by presentations by SP operations, SSP Kathua and DIG Udhampur on the emerging challenges along the international border.

The spokesperson said the meeting discussed the suggestions and measures to further improve the security grid following recent detection of a tunnel along the International Border in Kathua district and dropping of arms by drones in Kathua, Samba and Jammu districts.

"The IGP exhorted the officers to work in unison and sensitised them about the emerging challenges and the recent trends in the region. Suggestions of officers were compiled and instructions provided to improve and strengthen the security grid," the spokesperson said.

He said the dropping of weapons using drones was specially dwelled upon and suggestions to counter the same were discussed.

"We have to remain on the constant vigil and alert so that any evil attempt to disrupt peace in J&K is effectively foiled," the IGP said.

He also impressed for further strengthening relations with the people of border areas and emphasised on continuing the good teamwork with full coordination and synergy at various levels with the Army and other security forces.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 04:06:57|Editor: huaxia

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UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- Nepali Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli on Friday told the ongoing United Nations virtual summit that only a collaborative and science-based global partnership can help the world face the difficult months and years ahead.

"Only a collaborative, democratic, science-based and coordinated global partnership will help us face the difficult months and years ahead," Oli told the General Debate of the 75th session of the UN General Assembly via a pre-recorded speech.

"We support the efforts of the United Nations, World Health Organization and the World Bank Group in leading the global response to the pandemic. In particular, we commend the UN secretary-general for launching the Comprehensive Response to COVID-19," said the prime minister of the Himalayan country, which borders China in the north and India in the south.

"What matters most in the ongoing health crisis is an easy, smooth and affordable access by all to anti-COVID vaccines after they are developed; sharing of knowledge and experiences; and provision of timely supply of medical equipment and medicines," he said.

Noting that multilateral cooperation has been an obvious casualty in the face of unilateral tendencies and protectionist policies, Oli underscored that "the theme of 'the future we want, and the UN we need' resonates very well with the present situation."

"It is unthinkable to talk about degrading the value of multilateralism at a time when its relevancy becomes more pronounced than ever. Larger global good, not the parochial national interest, should underpin multilateralism and the rules-based order," he said.

"This historic 75th anniversary of the United Nations is a time to muster stronger political will for an enhanced international cooperation and solidarity and envision a future that is safer, more equitable and just," said the prime minister. Enditem
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A new mathematical model developed by researchers from France and Italy suggests that the second wave of Covid-19 infections in Europe is likely to last until the January of next year.

Giacomo Cacciapaglia, who along with Corentin Cot and Francesco Sannino, told RFI that the predicted time-evolution of the second wave of the European COVID-19 pandemic could help authorities prepare and implement effective measures.

The researchers used data from the first wave of infections starting in March to predict the nature of the second wave across Europe and integrated it with the number of reciprocal travellers between different countries in Europe.

The start of a second wave in each country is identified with the time when the daily count of new infected cases increases, after a period of staying constant.

Their model is based on the assumption that the measures undertaken by different governments during the second wave will produce similar effects as during the first wave of infection.

Comparing the real-time growth curve of infections to the one predicted in the model shows the effectiveness of the measures.

For example, while the second wave in Germany and Finland started at the same time as predicted by the model, the speed of growth in these two countries is lesser than in the model, suggesting the measures have been more effective than during the first wave.

In France, the growth of infections during the second wave follows the growth curve predicted in the model suggesting the measures have produced similar effects as earlier.

The researchers applied a modelling technique from high energy physics to characterise the evolution of the Covid-19 epidemic in different European countries.

What struck us about the nature of the spread of infection was that it starts from a stable state (starting with zero number of cases before the pandemic) and reaches another stable state (after the end of a wave) via a fast growing period.

"We realised that there are some similarities in the way the number of infected behaves over time and some solutions in particle physics models," Cacciapaglia added

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The solutions were obtained by a process called renormalisation group modelling approach. It is an important tool for theoretical physicists to predict the nature of a particle or a phenomenon.

Some models were based on this approach to describe the origins of the Higgs Boson as well as certain phenomena in condensed matter physics and two dimensional solids, Cacciapaglia added.

By using the data of a previous wave, researchers can use this modelling technique to predict the timing of the next waves.
That's what happened with the Rozeks.

They accepted the offer, and the house passed inspection a few days later. But when the appraisal came back $11,000 short, the worry set in.

The buyers asked the Pozeks to split the difference so they wouldn't have to pay private mortgage insurance to finance the gap. The Pozeks, comfortable in their situation, refused  but agreed to pay the $1,024 private mortgage insurance premium instead and leave their 75-inch flat-screen television, to keep the deal alive.

"I kind of felt in my heart that it wasnt going to appraise that high, but I also know there were so many houses around us going for the same high price," Hannah said. "I didn't want to lower the price, and here we are today. They got a beautiful home for their family, and we were able to benefit in the process as well."

The Pozeks experienced one of the risks of the booming housing market in Western New York: What happens when an appraiser doesn't think a home is worth what someone offers to pay?
PRISTINA, Kosovo (AP)  European Union security police arrested the leader of a Kosovar war veterans association for obstruction of justice when officers stormed its offices Friday, apparently to get hold of international prosecutors files from a war crimes investigation that the association said it received anonymously.

Hysni Gucati was arrested following an arrest warrant and transfer order by a pre-trial judge, according to a statement from the Specialist Prosecutors Office at the Hague-based Kosovo Specialist Chambers. The prosecutors were assisted by police officers from the European Union Rule of Law Mission, or EULEX, and local police.

A statement said Gucati's arrest warrant was issued for the suspect for offences against the administration of justice, namely intimidation of witnesses, retaliation and violation of secrecy of proceedings.

The pre-trial judge's decision said Gucati made available to the media confidential and non-public information and documents relating to the work of the Specialist Prosecutors Office, and made no interventions when Nasim Haradinaj mentioned by name certain (potential) witnesses and gave information regarding their place of residence and other personal details ... thus exposing these individuals to potential threats to their safety.

Such disclosures have been made with explicit indifference to security risks posed to (potential) witnesses and with the aim of delegitimizing the Specialist Prosecutors Office and the Specialist Chambers, which he does not recognize, it said.

EULEX police stayed at the associations offices for about eight hours after which court officials were seen leaving and taking files and computers with them.

Members of the veterans association, which represents the former ethnic Albanian separatists who fought Serbian troops in a 1998-1999 war for independence, were prevented from going into the association's offices.

Attorney Tome Gashi also said that Gucatis deputy, Nasim Haradinaj, refused to be taken into custody by EULEX police and was detained by Kosovar police.

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Gucati has been transferred to The Hague, where a special court is investigating alleged crimes by members of the Kosovo Liberation Army, or KLA, during and after the Balkan nations war.

We are against such a court. Full stop, Haradinaj told journalists before the arrest, calling on Kosovo's government and parliament to react.

Neither Gucati nor Haradinaj had been summoned earlier from the court for questioning.

Faton Klinaku, the association's secretary, told reporters that police officers speaking different languages, including Kosovar police forces, had entered the offices in Pristina. An Associated Press video journalist observed police officers telling reporters to move away from the entrance.

Earlier this week, the war veterans group said that for the third time in two months an unknown person had provided war crime files from The Hague investigation. The veterans said they would make the files public.

Specialist Prosecutors Office spokesman Christopher Bennett said that releasing the documents would be undermining the proper administration of justice and making them public was a criminal act.

Former Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj, an ex-commander in the Kosovo Liberation Army, wrote on Facebook that there is no reason for operations or storming because everyone will respond voluntarily to justice.

Haradinaj himself was twice prosecuted and acquitted in another international war crimes court in The Hague. He resigned as prime minister last year when the Kosovo Specialist Chambers called him in for questioning.

On Thursday, The Hague-based court arrested a former KLA commander on charges including torture of detainees and the murder of one prisoner held at a compound in Kosovo. He was taken to the courts detention center in Netherlands.

Kosovar President Hashim Thaci, former parliamentary speaker Kadri Veseli and others have been charged with crimes against humanity and war crimes, including murder, enforced disappearances, persecution and torture. Both men have denied committing any crimes.

A pretrial judge hasnt made a decision on whether to proceed with their case.

Thaci said there was no need for spectacular actions because no potential suspect would escape justice. Leaking of the war crime files has damaged the image of the Kosovo state and the rights of the potential defendant, he said.

The whole world knows that Kosovo is a victim. The KLA and the entire Kosovar people faced genocide and ethnic cleansing, he said in a statement.

The 1998-1999 war for Kosovos independence from Serbia left more than 10,000 people dead  most of them ethnic Albanians from Kosovo, and more than 1,600 people remain unaccounted for. The fighting ended after a 78-day NATO air campaign against Serbian troops.

Kosovo, which is dominated by ethnic Albanians, declared independence from Serbia in 2008, a move recognized by many Western nations but not Serbia or its allies Russia and China.

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Llazar Semini reported from Tirana, Albania.
" " Nelson Mandela, on his 89th birthday, celebratingthe launch of a humanitarian campaign. Photo courtesy Associated Press

On August 5, 1962, Nelson Mandela was arrested. This arrest set in motion a chain of events that made Nelson Mandela a household name around the world. It also eventually brought about the end of the South African political system, known as apartheid. Eventually Nelson Mandela became the president of South Africa, and he received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993 -- one of the highest honors that human beings bestow upon each other.

What was it that made his arrest so powerful? To understand the significance, you need to understand what happened both before and after that day.

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Nelson Mandela was born on July 18, 1918, near the South African town of Qunu. He lived a fairly prosperous life as a child, attending private schools and then college. He finished college while working as a law clerk in Johannesburg.

After the elections in 1948, the apartheid political system became the law of the land in South Africa. Under this system, the country was divided along racial lines, with one area known as White South Africa, another as Black South Africa, and so on. Everything having to do with government, including voting, education and so forth, was divided along racial lines. As a result, whites controlled every aspect of the South African government. Over the course of the next several years, a number of laws were enacted to enforce the separation between races. For example, interracial marriage became illegal, different areas of South Africa were set aside for people of different races to live, and by 1953, it was illegal for different races to share facilities like drinking fountains and restrooms.

Mandela started working peacefully against apartheid, but he was arrested for the first time in 1956, accused of treason along with 150 others. All were eventually set free, but the arrest had an effect. By the 1960s, influenced by his time in prison and other events like the Sharpeville Massacre, Mandela's peaceful ideas changed. He led an armed resistance that used techniques such as the destruction of government property to fight against apartheid. It was for these acts that he was arrested and imprisoned in 1962.

The apartheid system in South Africa was growing around the same time the United States was working to undo decades of racial discrimination against blacks. As you might imagine, the sentiment in the United States and the rest of the world was very much against apartheid, and the imprisonment of Nelson Mandela caused a great deal of angst.

Why did Mandela get so much attention? Part of it has to do with Mandela's leadership position in the armed struggle. But another part of it has to do with his wife, Winnie Mandela. While Nelson was in prison, Winnie campaigned very publicly for his release, and her pleas resonated around the world.

The breakthrough came in 1989, when then-president P.W. Botha lost his office due to a stroke he suffered. Botha's replacement, F.W. De Klerk, released Nelson Mandela from prison in 1990. De Klerk then oversaw the dismantling of the apartheid system. De Klerk and Mandela shared the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993 for their combined efforts to end apartheid.

Because Mandela had so much public recognition in 1994, and blacks held a majority in the new democratic South Africa, he was elected president in the first free election.
Rewards to exporters for COVID-19 performance View(s):

The commendable performance of Sri Lankan exporters and the resilience shown during an unprecedented COVID 19 pandemic is to be rewarded by the Sri Lanka Export Development Board (EDB) of the Ministry of Trade, through a proposed export stimulus rewards scheme.

Exporters who managed the risk and the vulnerabilities despite the current global economic crisis would be encouraged by rewarding their achievements, the EDB said in a media release.

The EDB proposal was presented by the Minister of Trade, to the Export Development Council of Ministers (EDCM) on an Export Development Reward Scheme (EDRS) at its meeting held on September 23 under the leadership of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa.

The proposed scheme will be operative under two categories; covering SMEs and large exporters for consecutive two quarters starting from October 1, 2020 based on the export performance of the exporters. The main objective of the scheme is to encourage exporters to increase their volume of exports in future to be eligible to apply for the rewards.

The quantum of reward will be calculated based on the incremental export turnover of the particular quarter compared to the value earned year ago. Large scale exporters with an annual export turnover of over Rs. 750 million will be paid 2 per cent of the additional export earnings earned during the relevant period with respect to the corresponding period of the previous year while SME exporters get 3.5 per cent of the additional export earnings earned during the relevant period with respect to the corresponding period of the previous year.

The implementation of this scheme is expected to generate an additional export income of US$600 million during the period of October 1, 2020 to March 31, 2021.

Although the government is doing its utmost to alleviate the hardships faced by exporters, they have been adversely hit by the cancellation of orders and declining product demands. However, the exporters are diversifying their production lines grabbing new emerging opportunities due to COVID-19 while some other companies are diversifying markets to avoid the uncertainties. Such positive changes can make a progressive difference in the countrys export earnings, the EDB said.

The EDB said it was of the view, that in spite of the difficulties due to the global economic downturn, the positive contribution made by the exporters to the Sri Lankan economy should be appreciated. This proposed rewards scheme will encourage export industries to secure existing markets, penetrate new markets, establish and promote backward linkages, and diversify into new products according to the existing demand created through COVID-19.
WASHINGTON - Ahead of the first debate between President Donald Trump and his Democratic challenger Joe Biden, each campaign is promising a stark contrast in policy, personality and preparation.

Trump has decided to skip formal preparation, though he said Sunday that former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and his former 2016 primary rival, Chris Christie, are helping him.

We had a little debate prep before we came here, Trump told reporters as Giuliani and Christie looked on in the press briefing room at the White House.

And while Bidens team believes the significance of the debate may be exaggerated, the Democratic nominee has been aggressively preparing to take on the president.

Bidens campaign has been holding mock debate sessions featuring Bob Bauer, a senior Biden adviser and former White House general counsel, playing the role of Trump, according to a person with direct knowledge of the preparations who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal strategy. Bauer has not actually donned a Trump costume in line with Trump stand-ins from previous years, but he is representing his style and expected strategy.

Im sure the president will throw everything he can at (Biden). My guess is that theyre preparing for that  bombarding him with insults and weird digressions, said Jay Carney, a former aide to Biden and President Barack Obama.

Trump and Biden are scheduled to meet on the debate stage for the first time Tuesday night at Case Western Reserve University and the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio. The 90-minute event, moderated by Fox News host Chris Wallace, is the first of three scheduled presidential debates. Vice-President Mike Pence and California Sen. Kamala Harris, Bidens running mate, will debate in October.

For some, the debates represent the most important moments in the 2020 campaigns closing days, a rare opportunity for millions of voters to compare the candidates policies and personalities side-by-side on prime-time television. Trump has been trailing Biden in the polls for the entire year, a reality that gives the president an urgent incentive to change the direction of the contest on national television if he can.

Others, including those close to Bidens campaign, do not expect the debates to fundamentally change the race no matter what happens, given the pandemic and the economy. They also point to high-profile debates in past elections that were thought to be game-changing moments at the time but that ultimately had little lasting effect.

Those with knowledge of Bidens preparations suggest he will not take the fight to Trump if he can avoid it. But on Saturday, at least, he was on the attack when he discussed his strategy on MSNBC.

Im prepared to go out and make my case as to why I think hes failed and why I think the answers I have to proceed will help the American people, the American economy and make us safer internationally, Biden said, arguing that Trump wont convince voters with broadsides because the people know the president is a liar.

He also compared Trump to Adolf Hitlers propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels, saying, Hes sort of like Goebbels. You say the lie long enough, keep repeating, repeating, repeating, it becomes common knowledge.

While Biden has said he will try to be a fact checker of sorts on stage, the Democrat is being advised to avoid direct confrontations and instead redirect the conversation to more familiar campaign themes of unity and issues that matter most to voters: the economy, health care and the pandemic.

Arguing over facts, litigating whether what hes saying is accurate, that is not winning to Biden, said Jen Psaki, a former Obama aide who is close to Bidens team. This is an opportunity to speak directly to the American people. His objective should be to speak directly to them, but not be pulled in by Trump. That is hard.

Trump aides and allies, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal strategy, said heading into the weekend that Trump had not been in formal preparations. The president offered mixed messages Sunday with his confirmation that Giuliani and Christie were prepping him, essentially combining to play the role of Biden. Yet Trump downplayed the sessions.

Sometimes you can go too much in that stuff, Trump said, noting that he defeated Hillary Clinton four years ago despite her extensive debate preparation.

The president added that he takes far more questions from the White House press corps than Biden takes from the reporters covering his campaign, arguing those sessions with reporters are a form of debate prep.

Trump offered a preview of his approach when mused that Bidens previous debate performances were influenced by medication. Hes offered no evidence. First in a tweet and later at the White House, Trump said he would demand that Biden take a drug test and that he would take one as well.

Trumps message seemed to be an attempt at both tripping up Biden and preemptively offering an explanation to his supporters if the Democratic nominee has a strong performance.

Biden, in Delaware on Sunday, laughed and declined to comment when asked about Trumps baseless assertions.

Privately some aides and allies are worried that Trumps lack of formal preparation will lead him to fall into the same hubris trap as other incumbents in their first general election debate. Obama, for example, famously struggled in his first matchup against Republican Mitt Romney in 2012.

But other Trump backers are confident that the president is ready to handle any tough questions or pushback from Biden.

The debates matter, said Lara Trump, a senior adviser to the campaign and the presidents daughter-in-law. Donald Trump certainly did a great job on the debates (in 2016) and I think this will be no different.

Lara Trump also seemed to simultaneously raise and lower expectations for Biden.

Joe Biden spent a lot of time in his basement to study up. Hes been in this game for 47 years. I assume hell do OK, she said. Quite frankly, the bar has been lowered so much for Joe Biden that if he stays awake for the whole thing its like maybe he won.

The mixed messages were in line with those of Trumps allies who spent much of the year raising questions about Bidens physical and mental strength, while in recent days trying to cast him as a strong and experienced debater facing a relative neophyte in Trump.

A former reality show star, the president is keenly aware of the power and pitfalls of live television. Aides say that he is acutely mindful of the power of moments to define how a debate is perceived and that he intends to make his share of them happen.

Terry McAuliffe, the former Virginia governor and onetime national Democratic chair, said Biden must fashion a succinct, debate-stage version of his message since the spring: Draw a straight line from Trumps personal deficiencies to his handling of the pandemic, its economic fallout and the national reckoning on race and then explain why a Biden presidency would be different.

Trumps just looking for a Hail Mary here, McAuliffe said. He knows hes in trouble.

___

Peoples reported from New York. Barrow reported from Atlanta.
From the Beirut port blast to premier-designate Mustapha Adib stepping down on Saturday after less than a month of trying to form a new cabinet, here are developments in crisis-hit Lebanon:

Devastation

On August 4, one of the world's biggest ever non-nuclear explosions destroys much of Beirut's port and devastates swathes of the capital.

The detonation was caused by a fire in a warehouse which Lebanese authorities acknowledge held a vast stockpile of ammonium nitrate for the past six years.

The huge explosion leaves more than 190 dead, over 6,500 injured and ravages large parts of Beirut.

The tragedy strikes as Lebanon has for months been mired in its worst economic crisis in decades, marked by an unprecedented depreciation of its currency, massive layoffs and drastic banking restrictions.

'Apocalyptic situation'

Beirut is in a state of shock, with residents looking for the missing, tending to the wounded and searching gutted buildings for pets and belongings.

It is an "apocalyptic situation", says Beirut governor Marwan Aboud, a day after the blast. A state of emergency is declared. International aid starts to fly in.

Macron weighs in

On August 6, Macron visits Beirut and walks through the devastated Beirut neighbourhood of Gemmayzeh.

His visit is praised by many Lebanese angry at their own leaders, whom they accuse of corruption and incompetence.

Macron calls for an international probe and for the "deep changes" that the Lebanese population has been demanding for months.

President Michel Aoun the next day rejects any international probe into the disaster.

Protests

On August 8, following a handful of lawmakers resigning, thousands of Lebanese call for vengeance against their leaders over the explosion.

Clashes erupt between security forces, using tear gas and rubber bullets, and protesters.

Demonstrators storm a series of ministries and the banking association, occupying the foreign ministry for several hours.

International aid

On August 9, the international community pledges around $300 million in emergency aid at a video conference jointly organised by France and the United Nations.

The international community promises to stand by Lebanon but demands that its aid be directly distributed to the population, and a transparent probe be carried out.

Government resigns

On August 10, prime minister Hassan Diab announces the resignation of his government.

Demonstrators again take to the streets of Beirut and clash with security forces.

System criticised

On August 28, Macron points to the "constraints of a confessional system" in a country where political posts are allocated by sect.

"If we let Lebanon go... it will be civil war," he warns.

Two days later, Hassan Nasrallah, chief of the powerful Shiite Muslim movement Hezbollah, says his group is "open" to a French proposal for a new political pact for Lebanon.

Aoun calls for the proclamation of a "secular state" during a televised address to mark the centenary of the Lebanese state.

New premier

On August 31, diplomat Mustapha Adib is named as Lebanon's new premier.

He vows to carry out reforms demanded by the international community and to conclude an accord with the International Monetary Fund.

Macron lands in Beirut hours later, extracting a promise from all political sides to help Adib form a crisis government of independents in less than a fortnight.

PM-designate resigns

On September 26, less than a month later, Adib bows out, apologising to the Lebanese people over his "inability to realise its aspirations for a reformist team".

His resignation follows weeks of deadlock, including over the insistence of the two main Shiite parties Hezbollah and Amal on keeping the finance ministry under their control.

President Michel Aoun accepts Adib's resignation and is set to "take the appropriate measures according to the requirements of the constitution".

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What was supposed to be a time-limited project meant to encourage children to read is still making a big difference in the lives of Manitobans more than 35 years after it began.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 26/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

What was supposed to be a time-limited project meant to encourage children to read is still making a big difference in the lives of Manitobans more than 35 years after it began.

Bookmates Inc. is a non-profit organization that provides family literacy programs and training. Its vision is to see all families and their communities experience the joy and benefits of literacy.

When it was started in 1983, Bookmates was intended to be a short-term initiative.

The project matched volunteers  mainly university students  with children living in the inner city for trips to the library to encourage and support the love of reading and help familiarize families with available community resources.

In 1984, Bookmates was incorporated as a registered charitable organization.

Over the years, the organization has evolved. Today, it develops and delivers early years programs and training to providers who work with families and young children to build and support the foundations of literacy and learning.

"Its important to give children a good start because they start learning the day they are born," says Monica Dinney, executive director. "We support parents in their role as their childrens first teachers and give them resources so they can be effective in that role."

Bookmates offers a variety of programs and training to families and community agencies.

These include strategies to help manage screen time, develop creative thinking and kinesthetic learning through the arts, and practical strategies for implementing science, technology, engineering and math concepts into early childhood settings.

Other Bookmates programs present tools and resources for engaging male role models in early childhood literacy and learning activities, and promote the benefits of play and exploring the outdoors.

"Our mission resonates with my own love of reading and life-long learning," says Dinney, who has worked at Bookmates for more than 10 years. "So, developing and providing literacy resources for families is really fulfilling."

For Nancy Tovell, working as a program co-ordinator at Bookmates is enjoyable because every day she feels as though she is making a difference  and working together with partner agencies that also want to make a difference.

"The more I reach out and understand what these partners are doing, the more it restores my faith in humanity and the hope that these young people now are going to go forward in life and have the chance to do all kinds of great things," Tovell says.

Prior to joining Bookmates, Tovell  who has a background in marketing  worked in the private sector for 17 years.

Parenting her two daughters made Tovell realize there was more she wanted to do to promote literacy and learning for others. Still, she has encountered difficulties.

"Having these little people look at you and depend on you and believe everything youre doing is designed to make them safe and make them smarter and help them grow is a pretty daunting job to take on," Tovell says. "A lot of the families that are our target group for Bookmates are playing off an empty book. Theyre having to really figure out this stuff from scratch."

Melinda Pascual, family literacy co-ordinator at Mosaic Newcomer Family Resource Network, has witnessed this as well.

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Pascual and her colleagues regularly do professional development through Bookmates (bookmates.ca or 204-582-1804) in the delivery of Mosaics literacy programs.

"We have been in partnership with them for quite a number of years. They have provided us with many workshops that have made a big difference in the lives of the newcomers we work with," Pascual says. "All of the staff are lovely, from the executive director to the program assistants."

The COVID-19 pandemic has been a challenge for Bookmates, just as it has for many other non-profits, but its also given the organization the opportunity to adapt and customize its training and workshops for online delivery.

"Our participants really enjoy time learning together at our in-person sessions, but online sessions allow us to share information more widely, such as in rural Manitoba and even other provinces," Dinney says.

"Im really grateful to work with our talented staff team, who contribute so much to our work every day. We have a small staff, but theyre very creative and dedicated to our work."
Leigh Sales questioned why NSW's health minister didn't resign over cruise ship

Jenny Mikakos quit as Victoria's health minister after hotel quarantine outbreak

ABC presenter Sales compared situation to NSW counterpart, Brad Hazzard

Ruby Princess debacle led to 28 deaths after passengers disembarked in March

ABC presenter Leigh Sales has called for NSW's health minister to follow in the footsteps of his Victorian counterpart and resign over the Ruby Princess cruise ship debacle.

Jenny Mikakos quit her portfolio a day after Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said she was partly responsible for the state's bungled COVID-19 hotel quarantine scheme.

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Victoria's deadly second wave, which resulted in more than 18,000 new infections and 750 deaths, can be traced back to outbreaks at two Melbourne hotels used in the quarantine program.

The outbreak came after NSW's Ruby Princess fiasco, which saw 663 passengers contract COVID-19 at the beginning of the pandemic. There were 28 deaths, including 20 in Australia and eight in the United States.

ABC presenter Leigh Sales (pictured) has questioned why NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard did not resign over the Ruby Princess debacle

Brad Hazzard is seen during a press conference in Sydney on July 14, 2020

Sales compared the two deadly outbreaks following the resignation of Ms Mikakos on Saturday and posed a question to NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard.

'The minister whose department allowed passengers off the Ruby Princess, the end result of which was 28 deaths,' she wrote on Twitter.

'Q Brad Hazzard - Jenny Mikakos is accountable for the mistakes for her department and has resigned - why did you not do the same?'

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The ship - which was low on medical supplies and swabs for COVID-19 tests due to shortages - left Sydney on March 8 for New Zealand and returned 11 days later.

Passengers were allowed to disembark before the results of 13 expedited tests, which showed at least three people had the virus.

The 7.30 presenter made her bold suggestion by replying to a tweet from the minister.

Sales compared Victoria's disastrous hotel quarantine program to the Ruby Princess debacle

Jenny Mikakos quit her portfolio a day after Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said she was partly responsible for the state's bungled COVID-19 hotel quarantine scheme

He wrote: 'Sorry to see Jenny Mikakos resign. She has worked tirelessly in this pandemic.'

'Premier Andrews assertion that the Health Minister was responsible for the Quarantine system lacks logic.

'How could a health minister direct police to be involved?'

Mr Andrews told reporters on Saturday Ms Mikakos texted him to advise of her decision and he had not asked her to resign.

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He believed her resignation 'was the appropriate course of action to take' but would not explain why he thought it was the right decision.

Mr Andrews said he would leave analysis about Ms Mikakos' resignation to the final report to come out of the inquiry into hotel quarantine.

Victoria's second wave came after NSW's Ruby Princess fiasco, which saw 663 passengers contract COVID-19 at the beginning of the pandemic. Pictured: The Ruby Princess departs Port Kembla, south of Sydney, on April 23

'She's a very, very hard working person and I'm grateful to her for her efforts ... I wish her well for the future,' he said.

He would not be drawn on interpreting Ms Mikakos' resignation statement, which she released hours earlier on Saturday morning.

Ms Mikakos also intends to resign from parliament after Mr Andrews on Friday gave evidence to the hotel inquiry, where he pointed partial blame at the minister for her role in the quarantine scheme, which led to the state's deadly second wave of infections.

In her one-page statement, she said the premier's comments led her to believe she couldn't continue serving in his cabinet.

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'I am disappointed that my integrity has sought to be undermined,' she said.
Late last year, a strange scene unfolded several times a week on the roof of the private federal jail at the corner of Front and C streets in downtown San Diego.

There, sometime between midnight and 3 a.m., a stocky, 5-foot 10-inch man under heavy guard walked about the roof, breathing the night air and gazing at the stars above while most of the city slept.

For security reasons, the times he took his hourlong exercise were never the same two nights in a row.

FILE - In this March 9, 2002 file photo released by Mexicos Attorney Generals Office, Benjamin Arellano Felix stands in his home the day of his arrest in Puebla, Mexico. Arellano Felix will plead guilty to unspecified charges, the U.S. attorneys office in San Diego said Wednesday, Jan. 4, 2012. Spokeswoman Debra Hartman said she could not elaborate in advance of the filing. Arellano Felix is expected in federal court Wednesday afternoon. Arellano Felix headed a once-mighty cartel that came to power in Tijuana, Mexico, in the late 1980s. (AP Photo) ( / AP)

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The inmate was Benjamin Arellano Felix, once the feared leader of a Tijuana drug cartel that bore his familys name.

Today, the 58-year-old Arellano will again be under heavy guard, this time inside a downtown federal courtroom for his formal sentencing. He will likely be sent to a super maximum security prison for 25 years  the term his defense lawyers and the U.S. Attorneys Office in San Diego have agreed to under a plea bargain.

The hearing will be historic, marking the end of one era in the drug war, said David Shirk, director of the Trans-Border Institute at the University of San Diego.

At one time, the Arellano Felix Organization was the most feared and by some accounts most powerful criminal organization in Mexico, Shirk said.

And Benjamin was the face of that organization. In some ways this is the closure of a chapter in the drug war in Mexico, he said. Thats a book that is still being written, however.

For years, U.S. authorities pursued Arellano and others in his cartel. In January, he finally pleaded guilty to racketeering and money laundering conspiracy charges.

He admitted being the leader of the organization that smuggled untold tons of drugs into the U.S., bribed and corrupted scores of public officials in Mexico, and controlled the cartels turf through kidnappings and murders.

It was a lucrative trade over the years. Part of the plea agreement calls for Arellano to forfeit $100 million in profits, probably a symbolic figure for a man who has been jailed for a decade in Mexico and the U.S.

The AFO came to power in the 1980s and distinguished itself with a ruthless brand of enforcement on a scale that had not been seen before among drug gangs in Mexico, said Peter Nunez, a former U.S. attorney in San Diego.

They racheted it up, no question about it, said Nunez. They were game-changers.

The cartel had caches of sophisticated automatic weapons it purchased from the U.S. and other countries, recruited street gang members for violent missions, and carried out targeted assassinations of rivals who threatened the AFOs turf.

One mission in 1993 that used San Diego street gang members was meant to kill a rival cartel leader at the Guadalajara airport but ended in a violent shootout that killed Roman Catholic Cardinal Posadas Ocampo.

That kind of brazen violence was something largely introduced by the AFO, said Nunez, and continues today.

Other cartels tried to adopt the same strategy, he said. You had this escalation.

The power of the AFO has faded under a sustained decade-long effort by U.S. law enforcement to investigate, indict, extradite and imprison its leaders. As the cartels power waned, its leaders were replaced by more violent drug traffickers who have plunged Mexico into a bloody war that has killed at least 50,000 people since 2006.

By the standards of the 1990s, the AFO was a very violent and frightening organization, Shirk said. But by the standards of today, where we have seen an exponential increase in the violence in Mexico, the AFO looks almost quaint.

With that kind of legacy, Shirk said the plea agreement Arellano got, with its 25-year sentence, has stirred some controversy.

Others in the cartel have had more severe sentences, including his brother Francisco Javier Arellano Felix, who is serving a life sentence. Several top AFO lieutenants are serving terms of 30 years or more.

The U.S. Attorneys Office has declined to discuss the reasons behind the plea and did not want to comment before the sentencing.

Anthony Colombo Jr., Arellanos former defense lawyer who negotiated the plea, has said prosecutors considered the time and expense it would take to try the case, as well as Arellanos age.

The witnesses against him would be former cartel members whose testimony could be undercut because they agreed to cooperate in exchange for potentially reduced sentences.

Arellano was arrested in Mexico in 2002 and extradited to the U.S. in 2011. Most of his time here was spent at the Metropolitan Corrections Center in downtown San Diego, living in administrative segregation. That meant he was in a cell 23 hours a day, Colombo said.

One hour a day, he was allowed into an adjacent cell, where he could exercise by doing pushups, running in place, or walking up and down a three-step stair in a corner of the cell.

He was not allowed to exercise out on the high-rise jails roof, as other inmates were, Colombo said.

When Colombo challenged those conditions, Arellano was moved for a time to the Western Region Detention Facility on C Street, operated by a private company for the government. Thats when he was allowed his midnight walks on the jail roof.

But after awhile, Arellano returned to MCC at his request, Colombo said. The cells there have a small window that looks out on the city, which the cells at the C Street jail do not.

Arellano wanted a window.

In his few court appearances, he has said little, listening calmly as an interpreter translated the proceedings for him.

Shirk said that silence will likely continue, since over the years Arellano has said little to the outside world.

In a lot of ways, Benjamin will be going behind bars with lots of secrets, he said. I would not expect him to say anything more at this hearing than a simple yes or no. A few waves maybe to his family.

And thats it.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is currently delivering a virtual address at the United Nations General Assembly for general debate in General Assemblys 75th session. Prime Minister Modi was listed as the first speaker in todays forenoon and his speech commenced at 6.30 p.m.

Prime Minister Modi began by saying that India is proud of the fact that it is one of the Founding Members of the United Nations. He says that on this historic occasion, he had come to this global platform to share the sentiments of 1.3 billion Indians.

PM Modi said that we were to make an objective assessment of the performance of UN over the last 75 years, we see several stellar achievements, but at the same time, there were also several instances that point to the need for a serious introspection of the work of the United Nations.

Addressing UNGA, PM said that over the last 8 to 9 months, the whole world had been battling the pandemic of the Coronavirus. he asked that where was the United Nations in this joint fight against the pandemic.

Prime Minister Modi said that the people of India have been waiting for a long time for the completion of the UN reforms process. Calling reforms in the responses, processes, and in very character of the UN as the need of the hour, PM Modi said that the faith & respect that the UN enjoys among the 1.3 billion Indians was unparalleled.

Prime Minister went on to say that Indians were concerned if this reform-process would ever be logically concluded. Questioning uncertainty, the Prime Minister asked that for how long will India have to wait to be a part of the UN decision-making structures.

Prime Minister Modi said that India was never a threat to the world when it was strong and it was never a burden to the world while it was weak. He reiterated and raised the question asking how long will India actually have to wait when the transformational developments happening here influence a large part of the world.

Sources suggest that the Prime Ministers speech will address cross border terrorism and the need to strengthen global action to counter-terrorism. As per sources, PM Modis speech would also push for the process to list and delist terror entities and individuals by the UN sanction committees to be more transparent. India is one of the largest nations that contribute troops to the UN, therefore, India is also going to seek engagement in deciding mandates for UN peacekeeping mission, as per sources.

In the backdrop of ongoing coronavirus crisis, the UNGA is being held virtually this year. Prime Ministers pre-recorded speech will be played out in New York, almost all other world leaders also submitted their pre-recorded video speeches.

Also read: Lies, misinformation, warmongering, and malice: India to Pak at UNGA over Kashmir

Also read: Sushant Singh Rajput death case LIVE news updates: NCB begins questioning Deepika and Shraddha, Sara to arrive shortly

In the beginning of this month, Indias UN Ambassador, TS Tirumurti had maintained that Prime Ministers address to the UN and the vision he outlines would be truly significant, especially on the eve of Indias entering the UN Security Council.

75th United Nations General Assemblys theme is- The future we want, the United Nations we need, reaffirming our collective commitment to multilateralism  confronting the COVID-19 through effective multilateral action.

Also read: India asked to pay Rs 40 crores, not Rs 20,000 crores to Vodafone: Report
Calaveras County Public Health COVID-19 numbers 9-25-20 View Photo

San Andreas, CA  Calaveras Public Health confirmed three new cases of COVID-19 in the county.

All the cases involve females between 18 to 49 years of age. Two of the cases reside in District 4 while one was in District 5. Health officials also report a decline in cases and deaths at Avalon Health Care San Andreas where an outbreak occurred. They also remind the public that whenever there is community spread, residents and staff are vulnerable.

As we head into the cold and flu season it is critical to do what we know works to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Its likely that flu viruses and COVID-19 will both spread this fall and winter. Getting a flu vaccine this year is more important than ever as we wait for a COVID-19 vaccine. While getting a flu vaccine will not protect against COVID-19, it is shown to reduce the risk of flu illness, hospitalization, and death. It can save healthcare resources to help take care of patients with COVID-19, stated Dr. Kelaita.

To help the public in getting flu shots, Calaveras Public Health is offering a no-cost drive-thru flu clinic for those 10 years and older on October 15th from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Calaveras High School. For those under 10 years of age, public health recommends contacting local medical providers or pharmacists for flu vaccinations.

The county remains in the red substantial risk category on the states 4 Tier color-coded system, which allows some businesses to reopen with specific modifications.

Currently, there are a total of 317 confirmed cases of COVID-19 with 139 of those males and 178 females. The 18-49 age group has the highest number of cases at 131. A total of 295 cases have since recovered while 8 cases remain active and 14 have died of coronavirus related causes.
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- As schools reopen in New York City amid the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, Tottenville High School has announced it is moving to virtual instruction with some on-campus supports as needed -- despite the fact that the city Department of Education (DOE) is insisting that students are expected to begin returning to campus for in-person instruction on Thursday.

As we all know, the difficulties facing everyone since March have been a monumental challenge to navigate. So it is with the utmost regret, I must inform all of you of the decision to begin the 2020-21 school year with virtual instruction while having in-person supervision and supports as needed, Principal Gina Battista wrote in a letter obtained by the Advance/SILive.com.

The DOE said the school will welcome students in person on October 1st like high schools across the City.

Battista stated that the school will continue to work to establish a re-entry plan with the DOE, the Department of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to provide us with a safe an healthy return to the building as soon as reasonably possible.

Councilman Joseph Borelli expressed his outrage on Saturday, tweeting that Staten Islands largest school would be 100% remote, no in-person.

Staten Islands largest school gave up. 100% remote, no in-person. The @DOEChancellor & @NYCMayor left the students and faculty high and dry with no options. pic.twitter.com/i2nb1svvUT  Joe Borelli (@JoeBorelliNYC) September 26, 2020

The administrators of Tottenville and every other school I have spoken to have been screaming about the problems for months now, Borelli told the Advance/SILive.com.

In her communication, Battista said she understands that the students want to return, and as a community we are all heartbroken.

As the principal of Tottenville High School, it is my primary responsibility to keep the Tottenville community safe and secure in becoming the best versions of themselves, which I emphasize to my students and staff, she added.

*** CLICK HERE FOR COMPLETE COVERAGE OF CORONAVIRUS IN NEW YORK ***

Tottenville High School had previously reported a confirmed coronavirus case, earlier this month, according to DOE data. Teachers and staff began reporting to schools on Sept. 8.

The first day of public school in New York City was Monday -- but not all students returned to campus. Mayor Bill de Blasio announced earlier this month that the city would phase-in the start of the school year for blended learners.

The phases for students enrolled in the citys blended learning model are as follows: 3-K, pre-K and District 75 students reported in-person beginning Monday; students in K-8 and K-5 schools will begin reporting on Tuesday, Sept. 29; and middle and high school students will begin returning on Thursday, Oct. 1.

Battista said additional information will be provided regarding in-person supervision and supports before Thursday.

For everything you need to know about schools reopening in New York City -- from health screenings to the protocols when there is a confirmed coronavirus case on campus -- click here.

CORONAVIRUS CASES AT SI SCHOOLS

Overall, 17 schools have reported at least one coronavirus case.

PS 21 in Port Richmond;

PS 52 in Dongan Hills;

Markham Intermediate School (I.S. 51) in Port Richmond Center;

PS 78 in Stapleton;

New Dorp High School;

Tottenville High School;

PS 62 in Rossville;

PS 13 in Rosebank;

PS 58 in New Springville;

Zion Lutheran Preschool in Willowbrook;

Lavelle Preparatory School;

St. Joseph by-the-Sea High School

Police Officer Rocco Laurie Intermediate School (I.S. 72) in New Springville

PS 13, Rosebank

Two schools -- PS 59 in New Brighton and PS 32 in Great Kills -- both reported a positive coronavirus case, but since the infected person did not report to campus, no further action was necessary, according to the DOE.

Use the table below to see a comprehensive list of all coronavirus cases reported at Staten Island schools.


International students accepted to the Parsons School of Design in New York City usually move to the city and learn about American culture outside of the classroom. They experience the sights, sounds and eateries of New York, and have a chance to meet other people who live and work there.

Now, these international students are back at home with their families. Their classes are offered online and sometimes taught in the middle of the night while everyone around them is sleeping.

Nicole Becerra is a 17-year-old from Peru. She moved to New York to study English a year ago so that she could attend the Parsons School of Design. Parsons is one of the five colleges at The New School.

Becerra says that like many first-year students, she gained weight during her first few months in New York. One reason may be that she was eating the wonderful mix of foods that the city offers. She returned home at the end of 2019 and was there when the coronavirus pandemic struck. Since then, she has only taken online classes.

I spoke recently with Nicole Becerra.

Actually it's a dream for me to be in my country and study in New York because when I had to go the first time to New York  at the airport, it was like, No, I don't want to go to New York -- I want to be with my family. But now that I have the opportunity to be in a virtual way in New York but in my country  for me, it's perfect, but I know I have to return to the face to face classes. Im enjoying nowadays.

Becerra added that she feels like she is in high school again: living at home and sleeping in her own room. She is not only studying English, but has time to study subjects she simply has an interest in, like French.

She adds that her family is thankful she is with them during the pandemic.

They're really happy because  they didn't see me for more than three months and  it's crazy that she's here and studying.

Speaking up and being understood

Gloria Chen is another Parsons student who is now in Taiwan. She was forced to change her sleep cycle. So, she is now awake all night, taking classes at 2 in the morning on some days.

Chen told VOA her family asks her to keep her voice low in the middle of the night, but she wants to speak louder.

It does bother them They will say, Can you keep your volume a little bit lower? And I will say, Yeah. Ill try it but in the online classes, you're not sure if people can hear you exactly. So, I just want to keep that my volume up and people don't think that Asian people are all shy.

Aretha Wang is a mathematics major at Ohio State University. She was living in Ohio when the school closed in March. Now she is back home in China and taking online classes. She feels that it is harder to do the group work on the internet. Wang says students find it difficult to carry on a discussion in online breakout rooms.

They cant understand me as [they do] in person that much .. and I cannot understand them that much. It feels like it makes us hard to understand each other and it also makes us hard to cooperate with each other.

Good things about online classes

Gloria Chen says one good thing about online education is that all the classes are recorded. She says this helps her when she is studying for an exam.

In fact, I think the best thing about online classes is that the whole class will be recorded, and which gives me a lot of time to review and understand some points I don't understand at the time.

Several of the students I spoke with said they do not miss New York Citys traffic. Becerra says she enjoys not spending time on getting to and from school.

I don't waste time in public transportation. I don't have to be in the snow waiting for my train...

And special clothing for the changing seasons is no longer a concern, said Chen.

The one thing that I really enjoy about online classes is that I don't have to tolerate the traffic anymore in New York because the morning schedule in New York is really crazy. And I don't have to think, What clothes should I wear for school? which is a really comfortable situation for me.

Danger of sitting for too long

For many teachers, the long hours spent at a computer are more tiring than in-person classes. Elizabeth Marner-Brooks teaches English to Parsons international students. She told VOA she had several health problems that were caused by sitting for most of the day. I caution people now. I'm sitting and I don't even realize that they have a break. So, I make sure I do that. I had 20 hours on the computer for Zoom in two days. So, I'm careful, you know -- they go on a break -- I stand up, I walk, I move. There are dangers.

Shorter classes

Marner-Brooks says the length of her classes has gone down with the move to teaching online. Students have asked for her help in forming discussion groups so they can get more experience speaking English. One student formed a WhatsApp group and noted every member of the group is in a different country.

Im Jill Robbins.

Jill Robbins wrote this story for Learning English. George Grow was the editor.

Quiz - Almost a Dream: Going to College from Home Start the Quiz to find out Start Quiz

_______________________________________________________________

Words in This Story

pandemic  n. a disease that spreads across countries and usually affects large numbers of people

opportunity  n. a chance; a series of events that makes it possible to do something

virtual  adj. existing or done on computers or on the Internet

crazy  adj. wild and uncontrolled

cycle  n. a series of events that are repeated in the same order

volume  n. a level or power of sound

review  v. to study or examine

tolerate  v. to let or permit something to exist, happen, or be done

Have you been studying at home? How has it been for you? We want to hear from you. Write to us in the Comments Section.
OTTAWANo federal election. At least for now.

Thats the result of a deal late Friday afternoon.

Justin Trudeaus Liberal government is set to survive a non-confidence vote on the throne speech after securing NDP support in exchange for an expansion of paid sick leave and jobless benefits.

New Democrat Party Leader Jagmeet Singh confirmed hed struck a deal with the Liberals, who agreed to broaden COVID-19 paid sick leave benefits to include millions more workers, although there was no confirmation from the government of the details.

Today is a historic moment, Singh told reporters at a hastily called news conference.

Liberal House leader Pablo Rodriguez announced the deal on Twitter, saying We are entering the second wave and millions of Canadians are still struggling to make ends meet. We now have an agreement with the NDP on a bill that will deliver the help that Canadians need. Its by working together that we will get through this pandemic.

Singh touted the Liberals agreement a day earlier to meet a key NDP demand that Ottawa maintain monthly jobless benefits for workers coming off CERB and transitioning to a new Employment Insurance scheme at $2,000 a month, instead of $1,600. Singh called it a major victory for Canadians.

The agreement to expand access to pandemic sick leave benefits is the first step in achieving the first ever federal paid sick leave program for Canadian workers, he said.

Singh declined to provide specific details of what the Liberals have agreed to, saying the legislation to enact the changes he negotiated is not yet before Parliament. Thats expected Monday.

The agreement seems to ensure the Liberal governments immediate survival.

If what weve agreed upon is reflected in the bill thats presented on Monday, then we will be able to support that bill, and yes we will be able to support the throne speech, the NDP leader said.

However Singh sounded a note of caution, saying hes heard empty words from the Liberals before, only to see them not back it up with actions.

Legislation tabled this week proposed to give the federal government emergency spending powers until the end of the year, and so it is unclear if this falls economic update will lead to any other spending measures requiring parliamentary approval before next years budget.

Asked if he was relieved that Fridays deal will avoid an immediate election, Singh said he had only wanted to fight for people, to find a way and deliver help for people and Im really happy we were able to do that.

Singh said that while he did not know how much the changes would cost, it should not be working-class families, it should not be small businesses that felt the brunt of COVID-19, that pay the costs for the recovery or for these programs.

It should be those companies and the ultra rich and the wealthiest who profited during this pandemic, they should be the ones that pay the price, he said. We need a wealth tax  and were going to continue to fight for that.

Singh said that under the Liberals initial proposal, only thousands of workers might have qualified for federal sick leave benefits if they had to stay home because of COVID-19 or to care for a sick loved one. And he said the program should not end with the pandemic.

We want to see this program become permanent, said Singh. Establishing this paid sick leave  is the first step towards creating the permanent program that should be part of our social safety net.

He said hes not worried that the Liberals will take credit for the changes, saying the response to COVID-19 has been a better response because of New Democrats.

Because we were here, weve been able to help Canadians, Singh said. I want you to know you can count on us.

Earlier Friday, Trudeau gave credit to the provincial NDP in B.C. for its work on sick leave.
After rebuffs by three federal judges, U.S. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos on Friday dropped her effort to give private schools a greater share of billions of dollars in Congress COVID-19 relief funds at the expense of public schools in low-income areas.

The money came from the CARES Act, a $2.2 trillion law passed in March that included $13.2 billion in funding for schools with substantial numbers of low-income students, $1.65 billion of it for California. Congress told states to provide the funds to schools hardest-hit by the virus and to distribute some funds to private schools under the terms of an existing law funding schools in areas of poverty.

That 1965 law provides federal funding for private schools in the same geographic areas as public schools receiving aid, based on how many low-income students the private schools enrolled.

But DeVos, arguing that the pandemic had affected all students, ordered private school aid from the CARES Act distributed on the basis of a schools overall enrollment and not just on its total of low-income students. The effect would be a reduction in aid to public schools in poor and minority areas.

U.S. District Judge James Donato of San Francisco blocked DeVos order Aug. 26 in a suit by California, other states and four school districts, including San Francisco. He said the education secretary had misinterpreted the law and violated Congress edict to distribute CARES Act funds to private schools based on their low-income enrollment, not their overall enrollment.

Donato said the Oakland Unified School District had projected a loss of $2.2 million from Devos order and has had to rely on private donations of food and education technology for low-income students while awaiting the federal funding Congress had promised. DeVos has no authority to rewrite Congresss plain and unambiguous commands under the guise of interpretation, Donato said.

Two other federal judges have issued similar rulings, including U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich of Washington, D.C., an appointee of President Trump. On Friday, DeVos said she disagreed with Friedrichs ruling but would not appeal it.

We respect the rule of law and will enforce the law as the courts have opined, DeVos said in a letter to chief state school officials nationwide.

California Attorney General Xavier Becerra said the decision was a win for children in our state and all across the country. With the CARES Act, Congress intended to protect our students most in need, and thats what the courts affirmed.

Bob Egelko is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: begelko@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @BobEgelko
Iraq's foreign minister arrived on Saturday in Tehran for bilateral talks with senior Iranian officials, according to the state-run news agency.

Upon his arrival, Fuad Hussein met his Iranian counterpart Mohammad Javad Zarif and was scheduled to meet President Hassan Rouhani, in what marked his first visit to the Iranian capital.

The report did not elaborate on the main reasons behind the top Iraqi diplomat's two-day trip to Tehran.

Iran sees neighboring Iraq as a possible route to bypass US sanctions that President Donald Trump re-imposed in 2018 after pulling the US out of the 2015 nuclear deal between Tehran and world powers.

Last year, Irans exports to Iraq amounted to nearly $9 billion, the official IRNA news agency reported on Tuesday. It said the two nations will discuss increasing the amount to $20 billion.

Before the current global pandemic, some 5 million Iranian pilgrims annually brought in nearly $5 billion visiting Iraq's Shiite holy sites.
Dehradun:

A total of 722 candidates have filed their nomination papers for the elections on 70 seats of the Uttarakhand Assembly on February 15.



Major political parties like Congress and BJP have fielded candidates from all 70 seats of the state Assembly, whereas Chief Minister Harish Rawat is the only candidate who will be contesting from two seats.



The last date for filing of nominations was January 27.



According to state Election Commission, 722 candidates were found to have filed nomination after the last date of the process.



Twenty four candidates are contesting from the Dharampur Assembly constituency in Dehradun district, which is the highest number of candidates fielded from a single seat.



State Forest Minister Dinesh Aggarwal who is also contesting from Dharampur seat will be competing with BJPs candidate and Dehradun Mayor Vinod Chamoli.



In Dehradun district, 20 candidates are testing their electoral fortune from the Raipur and 18 from the Sahaspur Assembly constituencies.



The chief minister is contesting the elections from Haridwar (rural) and Udhamsingh Nagar districts Kichcha Assembly seats. Both these seats have eight candidates each competing with Rawat.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.
Amid protests by farmers across the country over the three agriculture-related Bills passed by Parliament, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Saturday slammed the proposed legislations as "big blunders" and demanded their immediate withdrawal.

In a video message under the party's campaign titled 'Speak up for Farmers' against the Bills, Rahul Gandhi said: "Attacks on you have started -- first it was demonetisation, then GST and then during the Covid-19 pandemic not a single rupee was shared with you all. The government is trying to make you slaves, slaves of corporates. And now these three controversial Bills are an attempt to finish you."

"We are standing with you and we will stop these Bills altogether," he said.

The Congress leader added: "I want to tell the government that it is one of the biggest blunders. If the farmers came out on the streets, then a huge loss is going to happen. Withdraw these Bills immediately without taking much time and give guarantee of the MSPs to farmers," he added.

The Congress is protesting against the farm Bills along with other opposition parties. These are The Farmer's Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020, The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020, and The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020.
Australians applying to leave the country are increasingly planning to stay overseas for more than three months to improve their chances of getting permission from the federal government.

The Australian Border Force commissioner's guidelines and operations directives, recently published for the first time, confirm that a person who "has a compelling reason and will remain overseas for at least three months" is likely to be approved for outbound travel.

Melanie Krauss is heading back to Germany, where she grew up, for a few months to take care of her father after an operation. Credit:Steven Siewert

Adam Byrnes, the principal lawyer at Visa & Citizenship Lawyers in Sydney, said he had long been advising clients that "the longer the duration of travel, the higher the chance of success". He found that within the past few weeks, Border Force had started demanding more evidence this was true.

Home Affairs data obtained by The Sun-Herald under freedom of information laws shows the proportion of exemptions given for personal business, including trips of three months and longer, gradually rose between March/April, when they accounted for 23 per cent of approvals, and August, when they accounted for the majority, 62 per cent.
The exams will be held at 82 centres across the state. In total, 15,839 Class 10 students and 17,505 Class 12 students will be appearing for the exams

The Uttar Pradesh Madhyamik Shiksha Parishad (UPMSP) released the admit card for the state board Class 10 and Class 12 improvement examinations 2020 on its website  upmsp.edu.in.

According to a reports, the examination will be conducted on 3 October. The Class 10 exam will be conducted in morning shift between 8 am and 11.15 am. Class 12 students who have applied for the exam will have to write the test from 2 pm to 5.15 pm.

Class 10 students who have not qualified in one subject are appearing for improvement exam, while those who did not qualify in two subjects will be writing the compartment exam. They will have to appear for one of the two compartment papers to pass the Class 10 board exam.

For the first time this year, the students of Class 12 Uttar Pradesh board who have failed in one subject will be allowed to take the compartment exam.

A report by Careers 360 said that the exam will be held at 82 centres across the state. A total of 33,344 students will be writing the exam of which 15,839 will be giving Class 10 exam, while 17,505 will take Class 12 exam.

Students appearing for the exam will have to abide by the COVID-19 guidelines of the government and maintain social distancing as well as wear face mask.

Steps to download admit card:

Step 1: Go to UPMSP official website - upmsp.edu.in

Step 2: Tap on the link that mentions download UP board Class 10 and 12 admit card for improvement and compartment exam

Step 3: Select exam type, district, enter your 7 digit roll number and type the security code as shown on the screen

Step 4: Press the download admit card button

Step 5: Verify all the details before taking printout of the admit card

Here is the direct link to download the admit card.

The Uttar Pradesh Board Class 10 and Class 12 results 2020 were declared on 27 June. A total of 83.31 percent students cleared the Class 10 exam. The overall pass percentage in the UP board Class 12 exam 2020 was 74.63 percent.
Epic Games has been in open litigious conflict with Apple over the latter's 30% levy on developer revenue in exchange for the use of its App Store. Now, the studio has escalated this situation with the implementation of the Coalition for App Fairness (CAF), a new non-profit for "developer rights". Spotify, another company openly disgruntled with Apple's "unfair" practices, has also helped form the group.

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A group of software companies are now also the CAF: not the suite of Android kernel optimizations, but a new non-profit dedicated to combat what it calls the "app tax" levied by Apple and Google for apps hosted on the App Store or Play Store. The Coalition asserts that it "cuts deeply into consumer purchasing power" as well as into the takings of those who design mobile apps.

Two of its most prominent founding members have taken issue with the two mobile OS giants publicly in the past. Spotify has lodged complaints with European Union authorities over what it views as anti-trust violations on the part of Apple, whereas Epic Games is currently embroiled in a legal case over the consequences of not paying the 30% fee, which involves the removal of the game Fortnite from the Play and App Stores.

These two firms have been joined by others, including Match Group (responsible for apps such as Tinder), the remote-collaboration platform Basecamp and Tile. The latter has attested that Apple changed its device-finding hardware app's permissions in a manner coinciding with the development of the Cupertino giant's similar AirTag product. The CAF has stated that it will proceed to protect developer interests and rights in accordance with a new list of tenets now available on its website.
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Linkedin (Reuters) Vatican City, Holy See  Sat, September 26, 2020 14:32 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c4768ecd 2 People Pope-Francis,vaccine Free

The poor and weakest members of society should get preferential treatment when a vaccine for the coronavirus is ready, Pope Francis told the United Nations on Friday.

Speaking from the Vatican in a video address to the UN General Assembly, Francis said the worldwide pandemic had highlighted the urgent need to promote public health and ensure access to vaccines.

"If anyone should be given preference, let it be the poorest, the most vulnerable, those who so often experience discrimination because they have neither power nor economic resources," he said.

Francis has said rich countries should not hoard a coronavirus vaccine and the World Health Organization has warned against "vaccine nationalism", urging countries to join a global pact to share vaccine hopefuls with developing countries.

Read also: Why the COVID-19 vaccine should be mandatory

More than 150 vaccines are in development, about two dozen are in human studies and a handful are in late-stage trials.

In other parts of his address, he repeated calls for rich countries to reduce or forgive debts that are burdening poor countries.

He called for changes in economic and financial institutions so they can better "respond to the rapidly growing inequality between the super-rich and the permanently poor."
SARATOGA SPRINGS  Within his first two weeks of heading Shelters of Saratoga, its new executive director fulfilled one of the nonprofits long-sought after goals  a daytime drop-in center for the homeless.

There, men and women who find themselves without a roof can meet with career counselors, social service and mental health professionals, veteran and domestic violence advocates, as well as others who will help the citys homeless find a path out of their personal crisis, said executive director Duane Vaughn.

People have had a rough go of it, said Vaughn, who was hired last month. Addiction, loss of a job, domestic violence, mental health issues. They are people, but some of them have trust issues and may resist help. We want to build those relationships and provide services where they can access them.

Vaughns army of counselors will move into 31 Woodlawn Ave. on Oct. 1, thanks to the Saratoga Countys Board of Supervisors who unanimously agreed to allow Shelters to use the first floor of its building. They can stay there for six months, rent-free, in the vacant building which used to house the county's Public Health Department.

Saratoga Springs Supervisor Matthew Veitch, who brokered the deal, said the location is ideal. It's in the heart of the city in an area where many of the homeless already hang out. He said the 17,000 sq.-ft. brick building will also serve as the overflow for the Code Blue program, which serves up to 70 people on cold nights, but can only accommodate 40 in its current Adelphi Street location.

As chair of the county's building and grounds committee, he floated the idea and won the needed consensus through to the full Board of Supervisors.

No one was opposed," Veitch said. "Im glad that my colleagues were open to the idea.

The three-story building, erected during the 1920s by the Delaware Hudson Railroad, has housed the countys probation office, the Department of Public Works and Department of Motor Vehicles. Most recently, it was the home of the Department of Public Health, which has since moved to the countys new public safety building in Ballston Spa. Once the short-term lease with Shelters is up, the county plans to sell the building.

This is not the first time Shelters tried to open a drop-in center. In 2018, plans were approved to build a center that would also house all of Code Blue residents. It was supposed to be built next to Shelters' sober living home on Walworth Street, but neighbors successfully blocked its construction. Soon after, then Executive Director Michael Finocchi left. Plans languished under his successor, Karen Gregory.

Some residents, knowing how important a drop-in center is to the homeless, lobbied the county for the Woodlawn building. Attorney Eric Lawson, one of the advocates of the effort, said it's a perfect location and that it could also be designated as the main winter shelter, similar to the original Walworth Street plan.

"It's in the center part of the city, it's got the size and capacity," Lawson said last March when he was pushing the idea. "What has happened in this community is they think by providing temporary housing in the winter that's all they need to do. It doesn't work. They need other support and services ... and the first thing they need is a location where they can focus their efforts in taking the first step to provide homeless people with the resources to get their lives back on track."

While city commissioners and Lawson applauded the county's decision for the Woodlawn building, Mayor Meg Kelly said at a recent city meeting no one discussed it with the city....I feel there is big a disconnect here."

She said she foresees difficulty with staffing, which she was insufficient last winter. However, many of Shelters staff and volunteers resigned during Gregorys stint with Shelters, citing that she created a hostile, confrontational and unprofessional work environment. Shelters' board fired her in June.

Vaughn said he understands the importance of adequate staffing, as he has been establishing and managing homeless shelters since 2003. With that in mind, he said Shelters is seeking to hire between 20 to 50 people. He realizes that overnights can be the toughest to staff and is willing to hire people who will take one or two nights a week.

It needs to be safe for everybody," he said.

Veitch said he doesn't know why Kelly appears unhappy about the plans for the Woodlawn site. But he does know that Kelly's offer to buy the building for the city at $1 is nonstarter. The county, he said, will look to sell at closer to the appraised figure of $2 million.

If the city is interested or Shelters is interested, thats fine, Veitch said. The county isnt going to turn anyone away if they offer what the county is looking for. There are no favorites. It will be whoever will come and agree to terms.

Meanwhile, Vaughn said he doesnt want to get into a political fight between the county and the city. His hope is that the community can unite to solve the problem of homelessness.

Its not a homeless issue, its a human issue, Vaughn said. It's not a political issue to me. Lets try to work together to de-politicize it and see the humanity. I believe the mayor and county want best for everyone."
FILE PHOTO: The company logo for Johnson & Johnson is displayed to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the company's listing at the NYSE in New York

By Vishwadha Chander

(Reuters) - A single dose of Johnson & Johnson's <JNJ.N> experimental COVID-19 vaccine produced a strong immune response against the novel coronavirus in an early-to-mid stage clinical trial, according to interim results published on Friday.

The vaccine, called Ad26.COV2.S, was equally well-tolerated at two different doses, the results showed. A single shot, versus a rival two-dose approach being tested by Moderna Inc <MRNA.O> and Pfizer Inc <PFE.N>, could simplify distribution of the vaccine.

However, it is unclear whether elderly people, one of the populations most at risk from the virus, will be protected to the same degree as younger people with the J&J vaccine.

The trial in close to 1,000 healthy adults, which is backed by the U.S. government, began after the J&J vaccine was found in July to offer strong protection in a single dose to monkeys.

Based on the current results, J&J on Wednesday kicked off a final 60,000-person trial, which could pave the way for an application for regulatory approval. The company said it expects results of that so-called Phase 3 trial by the end of the year or early next year.

The results, released on the medical website medRxiv, have not been peer-reviewed. (https://bit.ly/2G3Ni1X)

Researchers, including those from J&J's unit Janssen Pharmaceuticals, said 98% of participants with data available for the interim analysis had neutralizing antibodies, which defend cells from pathogens, 29 days after vaccination.

However, immune response results were available from only a small number of people - 15 participants - over 65 years old, limiting the interpretation.

In participants older than 65, the rate of adverse reactions such as fatigue and muscle aches was 36%, much lower than the 64% seen in younger participants, the results showed, suggesting the immune response in older people may not be as strong.

The researchers said more details on safety and effectiveness will follow when the study is completed.

Story continues

For now, the results justify why more studies are needed in larger numbers to look for serious adverse effects, Dr. Barry Bloom, a professor at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health who was not involved in the J&J trial, told Reuters.

"Overall, the vaccine is doing what you would expect it to do if you were to move it to Phase 3 trials," Bloom said.

(Reporting by Vishwadha Chander and Manas Mishra in Bengaluru; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila, Nancy Lapid and Will Dunham)
After months of delay brought on by COVID-19, a mental health conference is coming to Montgomery County in November.

The Community Help Expo: Navigating Behavioral Health and Suicide will start at 1 p.m. Nov. 12 at the Lone Star Convention and Expo Center, 9055 Airport Road in Conroe.

Presented by the Behavioral Health and Suicide Prevention Task Force of Montgomery County in collaboration with the Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service, the free event is open to the public in person and remotely. Registration for remote participation can be made at communityhelp.org.

Good community health includes good mental health, said Pct. 1 Justice of the Peace Judge Wayne Mack in a statement. This expo will give residents of Montgomery County the opportunity to see the information and resources we have to help address the mental health challenges they or someone they know may be facing.

The event is a Montgomery County first in its level of comprehensiveness regarding mental health, Mack said Friday.

There will be breakout sessions starting at 1:30 p.m., followed by a 5:30 p.m. panel discussion on behavioral health and suicide prevention. There will also be a brief recap on the accomplishments to date of a little more than 200 BHSP volunteers.

The evening will conclude with a 6:30 p.m. presentation by keynote speaker Kevin Hines, who survived a suicide attempt after jumping from San Franciscos Golden Gate Bridge.

The conventions foyer will feature an art exhibit and a resource fair consisting of 14 BHSP work groups and other agencies partnering with the task force.

The Community Help Expo is designed to bring awareness to mental health issues while also connecting the citizens of Montgomery County to their local mental health resources, said AgriLife Extension program specialist Meredith Carter in a statement.

Breakout sessions 1:30 p.m.-4:30 p.m. Mental Health in the World of COVID-19. Trauma Informed Care/Trust-Based Relational Intevention for Parents. How to Have Tough Conversations with Your Teen About Depression and Suicide. Talk Saves Lives See More Collapse

A grant from the nonprofit Rebuild Texas Fund is providing financial support for the event, according to a presss release.

On the issue of suicide, Mack has been at the forefront of bringing awareness and action to Montgomery County. The BHSP task force was initiated by Mack early last year.

The purpose of this task force is to find and identify solution and resources, build collaboration so that we can shore up and reinforce the safety net that our community has, to identify where its strong and where we need to improve, Mack said when debuting the group in May 2019.

The Community Help Expo was originally slated for May but was postponed to the fall in light of the ongoing pandemic.

jose.gonzalez@chron.com

twitter.com/jrgzztx
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 07:41:01|Editor: huaxia

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Kuwaiti Prime Minister Sheikh Sabah Khaled Al-Hamad Al-Sabah (on the screens) addresses the General Debate of the 75th session of the UN General Assembly at the UN headquarters in New York, on Sept. 25, 2020. The General Debate of the 75th session of the UN General Assembly entered the fourth day on Friday. (Rick Bajornas/UN Photo/Handout via Xinhua)
With Canada aiming to expedite 18,000 spousal sponsorship applications by the end of 2020, here is a step-by-step guide on how to submit an application to reunite with your loved one.

How to sponsor your partner for Canadian immigration

How to sponsor your partner for Canadian immigration With Canada aiming to expedite 18,000 spousal sponsorship applications by the end of 2020, here is a step-by-step guide on how to submit an application to reunite with your loved one.

How to sponsor your partner for Canadian immigration With Canada aiming to expedite 18,000 spousal sponsorship applications by the end of 2020, here is a step-by-step guide on how to submit an application to reunite with your loved one.

How to sponsor your partner for Canadian immigration With Canada aiming to expedite 18,000 spousal sponsorship applications by the end of 2020, here is a step-by-step guide on how to submit an application to reunite with your loved one. Kara Crudo Kareem El-Assal Aa Accessibility Font Style Serif

Sans Font Size A

A

Canada is aiming to expedite the processing of 18,000 spousal sponsorship applications by the end of this year.

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) made this significant announcement on Thursday, outlining the innovative steps it is taking to try and reunite loved ones as quickly as possible.

Looking to sponsor your spouse? Complete this form so a Campbell Cohen lawyer can help you!

In recent years, Canada has been targeting some 70,000 new immigrants to obtain permanent residence each year under its spousal, partner, and children family class sponsorship category. This is due to the Canadian government viewing family reunification as a top priority.

Spousal sponsorship application processing has been delayed due to the coronavirus pandemic, however the new measures announced by IRCC should help to alleviate backlogs.

If you are looking to submit a new spousal sponsorship application, here is key information that you need to know.

About the process

Canadian citizens and permanent residents can sponsor a spouse, common-law partner, or conjugal partner to obtain permanent residence.

The Canadian citizen or permanent resident (the sponsor) and the foreign national (the sponsored person) must be approved by IRCC for the sponsored person to obtain permanent residence.

Complete a free spousal sponsorship assessment form to receive assistance from a Campbell Cohen lawyer.

The sponsor and sponsored person must prove to IRCC that their relationship falls under one of these three categories:

Spouse

Common-law partner

Conjugal partner

Canada recognizes same-sex marriages. Same-sex partners can apply under one of these three categories so long as they meet all of IRCCs eligibility criteria.

IRCCs eligibility criteria

You can sponsor your partner if:

You are at least 18 years old.

You are a Canadian citizen, permanent resident, or a person registered in Canada as an Indian under the Canadian Indian Act. If you are a Canadian citizen living abroad, you must prove that you plan to live in Canada with the sponsored person once they become a permanent resident. A permanent resident is eligible to sponsor their partner if the permanent resident resides in Canada.

You can prove that you are not receiving social assistance for reasons other than having a disability.

You can financially provide for the basic needs of the sponsored person.

Looking to sponsor your spouse? Please complete an eligibility assessment form now for a lawyer to assist you.

Who you can sponsor

Spouse: Your spouse must be legally married to you and at least 18 years old.

Your spouse must be legally married to you and at least 18 years old. Common-law partner: Is not legally married to you, is at least 18 years old, and has been living with you for at least 12 consecutive months.

Is not legally married to you, is at least 18 years old, and has been living with you for at least 12 consecutive months. Conjugal partner: Is not legally married to you, is it at least 18 years old, has been in a relationship with you for at least 1 year, lives outside of Canada, and can not live with you in their country of residence or marry you due to significant legal and immigration reasons. Such reasons can include their marital status (e.g., they are still married to someone else in a country where divorce is not possible), their sexual orientation (e.g., same-sex relationships are not accepted in their country), persecution (e.g., your relationship is between religious groups in a country where this not accepted). You must prove you could not live together or get married in your conjugal partners country.

How to apply

There are two applications to sponsor your partner, which IRCC asks you to submit together at the same time. They are the sponsorship application and the permanent residence application.

Step 1: Get the application package from IRCC.

Step 2: Pay your application fees. Most times, these fees include processing fees, the right of permanent residence fee, and biometrics fee, all of which you need to pay online on IRCCs website.

Step 3: Submit your application via mail to IRCC.

Once your application is successful

After their application has been successful, each couple is required to continue to fulfil certain obligations:

The sponsor is financially responsible for the sponsored person for three years.

Sponsored persons are forbidden from sponsoring someone else for five years after they have been sponsored for permanent residence.

Do you want to sponsor your loved one?

Complete a free spousal sponsorship assessment form to receive assistance from a Campbell Cohen lawyer.

 2020 CIC News All Rights Reserved
Are you hurting or suffering due to loss from the area-wide flooding? Are you experiencing grief over the loss of a loved one? Is your hurt due to family conflict, fear of the pandemic or just general concern about the world we live in?

If these words have spoken to you in any way, Our Lady of Grace Catholic Church in Sanford invites you to a Healing Prayer Service at 4 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 4 at the church. The service will be a time for prayer and stilling troubled hearts as we seek comfort and calm, healing and hope.
Large foreign groups are being accused of muscling out smaller ones

The Ministry of Industry and Trade (MoIT) has held numerous working sessions with the Ministry of Agricultural and Rural Development (MARD), some husbandry associations, and big husbandry companies over the past few years to collect information in order to prepare potential trade remedies to protect domestic companies, especially poultry producers.

However, when the MoIT contacted them for input for a document proposing an anti-dumping investigation, foreign-invested husbandry companies, some of which hold large market shares and looked ready to help before, gave us the cold shoulder, said Pham Chau Giang, deputy director of the MoITs Trade Remedies Authority of Vietnam (TRAV).

Based on current regulations, trade remedies can be raised following the proposal of an individual or a group of agricultural producers holding 25 per cent of the market share.

Explaining their possible reluctance to cooperate, a major husbandry company told VIR that the information requested by the local authorities constitutes trade secrets, and while they are obliged to report some of this information to the tax authorities and the MARD, they are not obligated to share them with other ministries.

A representative of the local authorities told VIR that foreign-invested husbandry companies are tight-lipped about their performance because trade remedies would be against the best interests of their parent companies as they would impact business relations with partner countries.

In fact, due to cheap chicken imports flooding the market, domestic farmers have been complaining that they lose around VND10,000 (43 US cents) after each chicken they sell.

In the opinion of Nguyen Van Ngoc from the Animal Husbandry Association in the south-eastern region, foreign-invested giants deliberately ignore taking action to fight against imported chicken, with the intent of leaving local companies to die. Foreign-invested companies have been earning a lot from feed or pigs recently which they can use to offset the losses from chicken, while local companies do not have the reserves to suffer for long, he said.

Over the past five years, chicken imports have grown to massive volumes at very low pricing.

The average price of imported chicken is low enough to confirm dumping, and a number of local husbandry companies are calling for an anti-dumping investigation, but foreign-invested ones ignore it, Giang from TRAV said.

She added that the MoIT will strengthen monitoring domestic enterprises compliance with international regulations and provisions in bilateral and multilateral trade agreements. The areas of special attention will include the livestock sector that have been and are at risk of foreign countries launching investigation and applying trade remedies against Vietnamese exporters. More, the ministry will study, review, and perfect domestic and international policies and laws related to trade remedies, said Giang.

Trade remedies include anti-dumping action, countervailing duties, and safeguard action. These are trade policy tools that allow the government to take remedial action against imports which are causing material injury to a domestic industry.

This should be highlighted in the context that Vietnam is integrating ever deeper into the global economy. Trade remedies are last-resort measures to protect domestic production from imports, the TRAV representative added.
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Linkedin (Agence France-Presse) Washington, United States  Sat, September 26, 2020 09:08 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c47598b7 2 Environment sparrow,bird,animals,wildlife,Science,coronavirus,pandemic Free

As the streets of San Francisco emptied out in the first months of the pandemic, the city's male birds began singing more softly and improving their vocal range, making them "sexier" to females, according to a new study published Thursday.

The paper adds to a growing body of research describing how animals -- from whales to coyotes to the white-crowned sparrow studied here -- have adapted their behaviors to COVID-19 shutdowns that forced humans to retreat to their homes, a phenomenon dubbed the "anthropause".

"When the city was loud, they were singing really loudly," Elizabeth Derryberry, a behavioral ecologist at the University of Tennessee, who led the study published in Science, told AFP.

But as traffic ground to a halt following a statewide shelter-in-place order in spring, noise levels fell by 50 percent, she said.

The number of vehicles on the Golden Gate Bridge collapsed to 1954 levels, the researchers found.

They compared birdsong data they had collected from previous years to recordings made at the same sites from April to May 2020, finding the sparrows were now singing far more quietly, and were able to hit much lower notes, which in turn expanded their range and enhanced their overall performance.

Imagine going to a party at a friend's house: at the start of the night you speak at a normal volume, but as the place fills up you have to raise your voice to be heard.

Read also: 10 new bird species and subspecies found on remote Indonesian islands

"When you're shouting at a cocktail party, your voice is not at its best," said Derryberry, adding that it was similar for birds.

As noise pollution decreased, "their songs also sounded better, they sounded sexier," she said.

"They were better competitors, and they sounded like better mates to females."

The scientists were surprised by just how far the volume of their songs had dropped -- almost a third.

But despite this, the sparrows' trills could still be heard from twice as far away compared to before the shutdown, tying in with anecdotal reports of birdsongs becoming more conspicuous to humans.

The authors said their research showed just how quickly birds can adapt to changing environments, and suggest that finding long-term solutions to curbing noise pollution might lead to other positive outcomes like higher species diversity.

Topics : sparrow bird animals wildlife Science coronavirus pandemic
After sweeping the trotting features one week ago at Woodbine Mohawk Park, Andy McCarthy is loaded for bear as he's been listed to drive four impressive contenders for tonight's lucrative stakes as Mohawk is set to host the richest night in Canadian harness racing.

The $1 million (USD) Mohawk Million is the main event of a card that also includes the $720,000 Metro Pace, $455,000 She's A Great Lady and $215,000 Milton Stakes.

If the oddsmaker at Woodbine Mohawk Park is correct, then a bettor will receive a buck for a buck bet on Abuckabett Hanover in Saturday nights $720,000 Metro Pace for two-year-old male pacers. Listed as the strong 6-5 morning-line choice, Abuckabett Hanover will start from Post 3, which was selected by driver Andy McCarthy following the colts elimination victory last Saturday. Lining up at McCarthys right in Post 4 is Highlandbeachsbest, who captured the second Metro elim.

I like the three hole; it gives you options, said McCarthy, who also drove Exploit, Abuckabett Hanovers stablemate in the barn of trainer Tony Alagna, to a third-place finish behind Highlandsbeachbest.

Everybody usually wants Post 3 or the 4, but I prefer to be inside of the other elimination winner. It just gives you another option.

A $160,000 yearling purchase, the Alagna-trained son of Betting Line finished third and second in his first two starts, but has been unbeatable since. Abuckabett Hanover has won his last four starts, including a Pennsylvania Sires Stakes leg, divisions of the Nassagaweya and Champlain (a career-best 1:50.3), and his 1:51 elimination score.

In his six starts, Abuckabett Hanover has displayed versatility, winning from both off the pace and on the front end.

Hes still a green colt and he prefers to race off cover, but his last two starts show it doesnt really matter, said McCarthy. He can go down the pike as well. Yes, hes very versatile and I can do whatever I want with him.

Hes a nice colt and progressing along nicely. Hes been winning pretty handy up here. I think hes in pretty good spot.

McCarthy also picked up a drive in the Mohawk Million for two-year-old trotters with the 3-1 second choice Venerate, who was sensational in a 1:51.4 victory last Sunday in the $250,000 Kentucky Sires Stakes final at The Red Mile. The Love You colt was driven by Andy Miller in the final, but unable to travel due to COVID-19 restrictions, Miller and his wife, trainer Julie Miller, turned to McCarthy, who was at The Red Mile on Sunday and saw Venerate in action.

It looked like he did it pretty easy, too, said McCarthy about the mile that equaled the fastest thus far in 2020 by a freshman trotter. I think hes a very nice drive to have in the race.

McCarthys predicament is he starts in the trailing post 10.

Its an unfortunate post position, but well make it work, he said. Im not a big believer in trailers; Id prefer to have the nose on the gate, even if it is on the outside. It looks like there is going to be enough speed in there, so hopefully we can get through there without too much trouble. Work our way into the race after the first quarter. Ill make sure I give him enough room to get through there.

I might have the best horse in the race, its just a matter of trying to work my way into it.

McCarthy will also start from post 10 with Caviart Ally in the $215,000 Milton final for older mare pacers. The five-year-old daughter of Bettors Delight finished third in her Milton elim last Saturday, her first start since finishing seventh in an Aug. 2 overnight at Harrahs Philadelphia. Trainer Brett Pelling prepped Caviart Ally with a pair of winning qualifiers earlier this month at the Meadowlands, and in her first start back she finished a late-closing third as the betting favourite.

She was good in the elim, and I expect her to be a lot better this week, said McCarthy.

McCarthy will also drive Scarlett Hanover in the $455,000 Shes A Great Lady final for two-year-old filly pacers. The daughter of Bettors Delight won her elim in 1:53.2 to stretch her current winning streak to three. McCarthy picks up the drive as Yannick Gingras will instead direct Caviart Audrey, who won the second Shes A Great Lady elim in 1:52.4. Scarlett Hanover starts from post 3, while Caviart Audrey is in post 4.

She looks really handy, McCarthy said of his first-time drive. Looks like she has a lot of speed. Shes been winning on the front, but Im sure she doesnt have to be on the front. She definitely looks like she has enough speed to give them a shake and give me a chance to do some good in the race.

First post time for Saturdays rich card is 7:00 p.m. To view the entries for Saturday's card, click the following link: Saturday Entries - Woodbine Mohawk Park.

(Harness Racing Weekend Preview)
The Cleveland/Bradley Chamber of Commerce announces the completion of a collaborative project to provide public Wi-Fi access in their parking lot at the Village Green Town Center to aid students who may not have reliable internet access at their homes. The project is a partnership between the Chamber, Bradley Cleveland Public Education Foundation, The City of Cleveland and its WiFi Task Force, Gibson Woods Retreat, Inc. and Cleveland City Schools.Ken Webb, City councilman and a member of the Task Force stated, I want to thank the individuals and groups involved in making WiFi available to anyone in the area around our local Chamber of Commerce.This free to the public service will benefit students and others without access to the internet in their homes. As we continue to deal with Covid-19 and access issues to the internet, we must give our area students every opportunity to pursue their education. This is a step forward in that direction.The WiFi networkCityWifi2gcan be accessed at all times from the parking lot directly in front of the Chambers office building at 225 Keith St. SW on the south side of the Village Green Town Center, extending to the Village Office Building across the parking area."I appreciate the partnership between the Cleveland/Bradley Chamber of Commerce and Cleveland City Schools. Both organizations are dedicated to ensuring a healthy and productive workforce for our community. The new public WiFi at the Chamber's office is a great way for families without home internet to access important information online. I also appreciate the Bradley Cleveland Public Education Foundation and Cleveland City Councilman Ken Webb for their assistance with this project. The school board and our students are grateful for this new opportunity," said Dr. Russell Dyer, Cleveland director of schools.Chamber President/CEO Mike Griffin added that programming for the access point was donated by Jeff Cocks, owner of Corporate Network Solutions and the chairman of the citys task force. Jeff has carved out a portion of the Chambers internet service for the access and also ensured that the appropriate content filtering and site blocking is in place. On behalf of the Chamber, we are happy to provide this service to the community," said Mr. Griffin.The Chamber asks that anyone using the WiFi access during office hours leave the Chambers reserved parking spaces open. Any service issues should be directed to a member of the City staff at 423-593-6912. Leave a message if there is no answer.
The parents of Yogi Hemanth Kumar console their daughter-in-law Avanti, after her husband was killed, at the Osmania General Hospital mortuary. (DC Photo: P. Surendra)

Hyderabad: A 28-year-old man was allegedly murdered by the family of his wife in what the Telangana police said was an honour killing.

Yogi Hemant Kumar had married 23-year-old Avanti four months in the face of opposition by her family. They belonged to different castes.

Avanti and Hemant had grown up in the locality of Chandanagar in Serilingampally mandal and fallen in love eight years ago.

Fourteen people, including Avantis uncle Yugender have been arrested by the Cyberabad police for their alleged involvement in the murder. Police said Avantis father D. Laxma, mother Archana, Yugender, and the others had been plotting ways to get rid of Hemant.

Madhapur deputy commissioner of police Venkateswarulu said Laxma agreed to Yugenders plan to hire contract killers for Rs 10 lakh.

This killing was executed in a pre-planned manner. It is an honour killing, Venkateswarulu said.

A distraught Avanti told mediapersons outside Osmania General Hospital mortuary on Friday, as she and her in-laws awaited completion of the postmortem on Hemants body, that her father and uncle and the others were against her marriage.

After our wedding, the Chandanagar police counselled both our families. After that, things quietened down. Little did I know that while staying quiet my family was hatching a plan to kill my husband. If there was a problem, since it was I who married against their wishes my family could have killed me. Why kill my husband, Avanti asked.

According to the police, on Thursday afternoon, a group of men led by Yugender, a few relatives of Avanti, and three hired killers, Minpur Buchi Yadav, Krishna, and Mohammed Pasha, reached the couples house in TNGOs Colony in Gachibowli in three cars, forced their entry into the house, manhandled Hemant and Avanti and kidnapped them.

The gang told the couple that they were being taken to Avantis house to discuss their marriage. When the car turned on to the Ring Road and began going the wrong way, Avanti and Hemanth managed to open the door and jumped out. Another car in which Yugender was seated reached the scene. Hemanth was caught and forced back into the car.

In the meanwhile, Avantis in-laws reached the spot following a phone call from her. After warning Avanti and her in-laws, Yugender and the others left the scene, leaving Avanti to rush to the police.

According to DCP Venkateswarulu, the three hired killers murdered Hemant and dumped the body on the outskirts of Kistaigudem village in Sangareddy. Then they went to a wayside shop where they began consuming liquor.

When they switched on their cellphones, we tracked their location and took them into custody. During questioning they revealed the entire plan, DCP Venkateswarulu said.
San Francisco, Sep 26 : Police in the US state of California has said that a white supremacist was killed during a shootout with authorities, it was reported.

In a statement on Friday, the San Luis Obispo Sheriff's Office said the incident took place in Templeton town on Thursday morning when officers tried to conduct a traffic stop on the 38-year-old victim, Christopher Michael Straub, a known member of a white supremacist gang, CNN reported.

On seeing the approaching officers, Straub got out of his vehicle, hid and later ambushed them, firing multiple rounds with a handgun, it said.

Additional officers arrived at the scene, after which Straub was intercepted as he tried to run towards his vehicle.

He was pronounced death at the scene, the statement added.

Authorities found multiple weapons in Straub's vehicle and later which searching his residence, it was discovered that he was illegally manufacturing weapons parts, said the CNN report.

"Straub was a wanted felon and it is illegal for felons to possess any weapons," the sheriff's office said in the statement, adding that it was already conducting an investigation before the shooting.

Straub "had a significant criminal history having been booked 28 times into jails all across California including two incarcerations in state prison", it added.
Joe Biden has warned that Donald Trump's choice of new Supreme Court justice would get rid of Obamacare, repeating once again his demand that a replacement for Ruth Bader Ginsburg not be appointed until after the election.

Biden said that Amy Coney Barrett, officially announced as Trump's nominee on Saturday evening, was known to be against Obamacare.

'[Barrett] has a written track record of disagreeing with the U.S. Supreme Court's decision upholding the Affordable Care Act,' he said in a statement posted on his website.

Amy Coney Barrett was nominated to the Supreme Court by Donald Trump on Saturday

Barrett is a 48-year-old devout Catholic who clerked for Supreme Court judge Antonin Scalia

Joe Biden warned that Barrett had a track record of disagreeing with Obamacare

He pointed out that Trump 'has been trying to throw out the Affordable Care Act for four years' and that Republicans have been trying to end it for a decade.

Twice, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the law as constitutional, he said.

'But even now, in the midst of a global health pandemic, the Trump Administration is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the entire law, including its protections for people with pre-existing conditions.

'If President Trump has his way, complications from COVID-19, like lung scarring and heart damage, could become the next deniable pre-existing condition.

'Today, President Trump has nominated Judge Amy Coney Barrett as the successor to Justice Ginsburgs seat.'

Biden said that Barrett was a critic of a 2012 decision from the Supreme Court to uphold Obamacare.

He added: 'The United States Constitution was designed to give the voters one chance to have their voice heard on who serves on the Court. That moment is now and their voice should be heard.

'The Senate should not act on this vacancy until after the American people select their next president and the next Congress.'

Biden's campaign swiftly issued a statement warning about the dangers of Barrett's rulings

Barrett, six of her seven children and her husband traveled from Indiana on Saturday

Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House, echoed his concerns.

'If this nominee is confirmed, millions of families' health care will be ripped away in the middle of a pandemic that has infected seven million Americans and killed over 200,000 people in our country,' she said.

'Every vote to confirm this nominee is a vote to dismantle health care. The American people will hold every Senator responsible for their vote at the ballot box.'

Trump, officially nominating the mother of seven, described her as 'one of our nation's most brilliant and gifted legal minds'.

Born in New Orleans, she attended Rhodes College and received her law degree from Notre Dame law school, where she later taught.

She lives in South Bend, Indiana, with her husband and seven children - two of them adopted from Haiti.

Conservatives have heralded the pick of Barrett as the heir-apparent of Justice Antonin Scalia who died in February 2016.

Barrett, who clerked for Scalia, shares his belief in an originalist interpretation of the U.S. Constitution.

Trump added: 'She is a woman of unparalleled achievement, towering intellect, sterling credentials and unyielding loyalty to the Constitution: Judge Amy Coney Barrett.'

Barrett had been a leading contender for the nomination, having been considered for the seat now occupied by Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who was confirmed in 2018.

The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals judge had met with Trump this week.

'This should be a straightforward and prompt confirmation. It should be very easy,' Trump said with a laugh, adding, 'Good luck. It will be very quick ... We said that the last time, didn't we?'

Liberals fear that Barrett could chip away the ability for women to get a legal abortion, as the landmark 1973 case Roe v. Wade revolved around a right to privacy, which is not explicitly outlined in the U.S. Constitution.

Barrett would also be replacing a Jewish member of the court with a devout Catholic, bringing the number of Catholics on the bench to six.

Overall, there are nine Supreme Court justices.

Barrett's faith will likely play a role in her forthcoming Judiciary Committee hearings.

She is a member of the People of Praise, a small Catholic group that teaches husbands are the heads of the family.

The group was inaccurately reported to be the inspiration for Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, which is now a popular television show because the term 'handmaid' was used to describe a member's personal adviser, if that adviser was female.

Members of the group also swear a loyalty oath, which some legal scholars have found problematic because they raise questions about a judge's impartiality and independence.

During her 2017 confirmation hearings for a seat on the Chicago-based 7th Circuit, Barrett testified that while she was a devout Catholic, those views wouldn't bleed into her decisions on the bench.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, famously told Barrett: 'The dogma lives loudly within you.'
BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept. 26

Trend:

Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov received EU Special Representative for the South Caucasus Toivo Klaar, Trend reports citing the ministry.

During the meeting, the sides exchanged views on mutually beneficial cooperation between Azerbaijan and the EU, and stressed their mutual interest in further development of the cooperation.

Bayramov informed Klaar about the grave consequences of the Armenian-Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, which is a serious threat not to Azerbaijan alone, but also to the security of the entire region.

Speaking about the tension observed in the region, the minister informed the special representative about a series of provocative actions carried out by the Armenian side recently, including an attempt of a pre-planned attack by the Armenian armed forces in the direction of Azerbaijans Tovuz district of the Azerbaijani-Armenian border on July 12 through July 16, 2020, provocations of the sabotage and reconnaissance group of the Armenian army in the direction of the Goranboy district on August 23, the settlement of Lebanese Armenians in the occupied Azerbaijani territories and other subversive activities of Armenia.

Azerbaijans FM noted that such activities of the Armenian leadership deal a blow to the process of resolving the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict through negotiations.

Bayramov also highlighted the importance of sending messages to the occupying Armenia and the manifestation of a decisive position on this issue from the international community.

In turn, Toivo Klaar noted the importance of conducting substantive negotiations without preconditions for resolving the conflict peacefully.

"The EU is ready, as before, to take steps to build confidence between the parties," Klaar stressed.

Bayramov and Klaar also exchanged views on issues of mutual interest.
Maratha outfits have decided to intensify their ongoing protest, demanding the restoration of reservation for its community members in jobs and education. Protests will be staged from today onwards in different parts of Maharashtra and will continue into the first week of October.

Earlier this month, the Supreme Court (SC) had stayed the implementation of the law granting reservation to Marathas and referred the matter to a larger constitutional bench. Turning down the state governments decision to bring Marathas under the 10% quota for Economically Weaker Sections (EWS), community leaders have decided to raise the issue politically and stage protests outside residences of members of Parliament (MPs) and legislators.

On Saturday, dozens of Maratha outfits under the aegis of Sakal Maratha Kranti Morcha held a day-long conference in Nashik. Among those who spoke were Bharatiya Janata Party MP and Maratha leader Chhatrapati Sambhaji Raje; former member of legislative council (MLC) Narendra Patil; Maratha Mahasanghs Rajendra Kondhare and legal experts. Starting today, Maratha outfits will stage a dharna outside the offices of all prominent political parties in Pune. Between October 5 and October 10, protests will be held outside residences of legislators and at the offices of tehsil and district collectors.

Kondhare said, We have decided to turn down the governments decision to bring us under the EWS quota as it does not serve any purpose. Our immediate demand is that the state government should immediately safeguard the interest of our youths who have secured admissions or government jobs under SEBC reservation stayed by the top court. Secondly, the schemes which are being shown as earmarked for the community are old ones and meant for other communities too. The state government can add 12% more seats in admissions to secure the quota for students from the community.

Karan Gaykar of Sakala Maratha Kranti Morcha said, We want MLAs [members of the legislative assembly] and MPs from the state to raise this issue at the appropriate forum by writing to the President, Prime Minister, Governor and chief minister. It is the responsibility of the state and Central government to ensure the stay on the reservation is vacated at the earliest. We are also planning to hold a protest rally in Delhi if we do not get the expected response.

The Maratha community has said the governments decision to extend the EWS quota to them  announced on Tuesday  to them serves no purpose. The state has also announced other socio-economic schemes that would be made available to the community once Marathas were diverted to the EWS category.

State minister Ashok Chavan, who heads a Cabinet sub-committee on the Maratha reservation issue, said the state government is fighting the legal battle and Maratha outfits should appreciate its efforts. Bringing the community under EWS was the only option readily available before the state government. The community should understand this is a temporary arrangement done by us until the stay is vacated by the Apex Court. The protests cannot be against the government as the decision was given by the court and various Maratha outfits too were interveners in the petition against reservation, which was stayed. We have been taking all the outfits, political parties and their leaders into confidence in our battle. We expect the stay to be vacated by the SC at the earliest, said Chavan.

The Socially and Educationally Backward Classes (SEBC) Act 2018 gives reservation of 12% and 13% in employment and admissions respectively to the Maratha community. On September 9, a three-judge bench of SC stayed the implementation of this reservation for the year 2020-21 and transferred the matter to a five-judge constitutional bench. Following this, on Tuesday, the state Cabinet allowed the Maratha community to be eligible for the EWS quota of 10 %, which was implemented by the Central government last year.

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As a part of the celebrations of the grand finale of the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, Indian Embassy in Antananarivo organised a Gandhi Katha on the theme The Oceanic Gandhi by renowned Gandhian Scholar Professor Makarand Paranjape, Director of the Indian Institute of Advanced Study.

The event was attended by participants from Madagascar and Comoros and was telecasted live on the Facebook page of the Embassy.

Professor Paranjape explained about the influences of oceans on the life of Mahatma Gandhi both metaphorically and literally. Mahatma Gandhi travelled as a young student across the Indian Ocean and through Atlantic Ocean to England for studying law. Thereafter he came back to India, only to travel to South Africa in 1893. He came back to India in 1915.

Prof Paranjape further talked about how oceans made Gandhi the person he was. Gandhi saw the Atlantic Ocean that was a symbol of the imperialist and colonialist mindset during that time and the Indian Ocean as an area where values of friendship, truth, reciprocity thrived.

Metamorphically, Gandhi was a personality who was open to new ideas; he was a cultural cosmopolitan but a staunch nationalist, thus reflecting that different currents merged in him.

The Professor laid emphasis on how Gandhi believed that society should be like an ocean where each individual was a centre, capable of expressing himself/herself fully and thus expanding emotionally in concentric circles with acceptance to animate/inanimate objects.

Gandhi believed that the greatest force that can bring change is the human spirit and not arms or human mind. He harnessed this force and gave birth to the practice of Satyagraha.Paranjape shared interesting anecdotes from Mahatma Gandhis life. The Katha was followed by a question-answer session where the Professor explained other aspects of Gandhian values.

Speaking on the occasion, Ambassador Abhay Kumar informed that Madagascar has over 18,000 people of Indian origin, mostly from Gujarat. Comoros has a small community of about 250 persons of Indian origin.

He added that Mahatma Gandhis words and teachings are even more relevant today in the 21st century when the planet is facing the unprecedented triple crisis of climate change, environmental pollution and biodiversity loss.

(This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text.)

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Production of the 2021 Nissan Rogue launched Tuesday at the Nissan North America vehicle assembly plant in Smyrna, Tennessee  right on schedule, despite pandemic setbacks.

President Donald Trump praised the launch in a tweet early Tuesday, prompting additional praise for the company from Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee.

"We are proud that Nissan has called Tennessee home for 37 years," Lee wrote in a tweet. "We celebrate this exciting milestone with the entire Nissan team!"

The Smyrna Vehicle Assembly Plant team had just started their first week of production trials for the new model when the pandemic hit, shutting the plant down for three months, according to Jeff Younginer, the plant's vice president of manufacturing.

Nissan North America's vehicle assembly plant in Smyrna, Tenn. launched production of the 2021 Nissan Rogue on Tuesday, Sept. 22, 2020.

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Unable to train technicians in person, the new model team recorded themselves building the vehicle. When the technicians began a staggered return in July, they learned the standardized assembly processes from written procedures and the instructional videos, something Younginer said Nissan will likely continue to use to augment training even after the pandemic.

"We really set a new benchmark for how we're going to launch vehicles going forward, and we're here today, on schedule, launching the vehicle," Younginer said in an interview with The Tennessean. "My hat's off to this team. They make me extremely proud."

Going rogue, again

The Nissan Rogue is the brand's best selling vehicle. The Smyrna plant built more than 1 million of the Rogue's last generation, and Younginer said it's "truly an honor" to produce the next generation in Smyrna.

"It really shows the confidence and trust that the senior leadership in Nissan have for the Smyrna team to produce the most important vehicle in the lineup," Younginer said. "So it's very good for us. Obviously, when you've got the highest volume vehicle along with five other vehicles, we've got a lot of production here ... it's a lot of responsibility, but a great team making it happen."

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Nissan North America's Smyrna plant is the highest-volume assembly plant in Nissan North America with an annual production capacity of about 640,000 vehicles. The plant employs about 7,000 people and produces the Nissan Altima, Maxima, LEAF, Pathfinder and INFINITI QX60 in addition to the Rogue.

Tuesday marks the beginning of the ramp-up process for the 2021 Nissan Rogue, which will reach full production in about six weeks. The plant will continue to manufacture its other five car models while producing the Rogue, three models on each line.

Technicians send about 80 cars down each line every hour, amounting to about one car every 40 seconds, Younginer said.

Nissan is rolling out its 2021 ROGUE from TENNESSEE. Great!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 22, 2020

The 2021 Rogue crossover has a heavy focus on technology, featuring a wireless cellphone charger and three digital displays, including a display that projects speed and navigation directions on its windshield. It also offers a slew of safety features and assisted driving technology that adjusts to the flow of traffic and can increase or decrease speed according to speed limits and upcoming turns and intersections.

Its "Intelligent All-Wheel Drive" system spans five driving modes, tailored for off-road adventures, commuting, eco-friendly driving, snow driving and "sport mode."

The new Rogue's interior features wider rear entry doors and has options for quilted leather seats, built-in rear window sun shades and ambient lighting.

The model should be available to consumers later this fall.

Pandemic precautions

When the Smyrna plant began welcoming workers back in a staggered startup in July, "the whole environment ... changed," Younginer said.

"From the time you walk in the turnstiles, you'll see plexiglass barriers, social distancing markers getting into the plant ... (and) the break area tables, they have partitions to keep everybody separated because you take off your mask when you eat and drink," he said.

Masks are a key part of the plant's health safety protocols, and technicians work on the line wearing masks, safety goggles and other personal protective equipment. Partitions also separate workers on the line where possible.

Every two hours, the plant shuts the line down for a break and all tools and touch points are sanitized.

But during the three-month shutdown, Nissan workers were not idle. Teams helped produce more than 100,000 face shields that were delivered to the local community, and Nissan has been active in food drives and a United Way fundraising campaign.

"It's not just about building cars here, that's one of our taglines  we build more than just cars  and that's really what I'm proud about from this team," Younginer said.

Reach Cassandra Stephenson at ckstephenson@tennessean.com or at (731) 694-7261. Follow Cassandra on Twitter at @CStephenson731.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Nissan launches Rogue 2021 production at Tennessee plant
If Barrett joins them in the fall, the court will have at least five and possibly six justices who are inclined to give the states far more authority to restrict or even forbid abortion. And the issue is likely to be tested soon, since a dozen Republican-led states have recently passed measures that would ban some or nearly all abortions.

She has strongly indicated that she takes a less strict view of when to follow precedents, a legal principle known as stare decisis.

"Stare decisis is not a hard-and-fast rule in the Court's constitutional cases," Barrett wrote in a 2013 law review article, explaining: "I tend to agree with those who say that a justice's duty is to the Constitution and that it is thus more legitimate for her to enforce her best understanding of the Constitution rather than a precedent she thinks clearly in conflict with it."

The issue of precedent has become the focus of extraordinary attention in Supreme Court confirmations, largely because of the divide over abortion.

Thomas was asked repeatedly about Roe and abortion in his hearings. He said he had not had time to debate the issue. Eight months after joining the court, he voted in dissent to overturn the Roe ruling entirely.
PHOENIX  Gov. Doug Ducey says he will not order businesses to re-close or impose new restrictions when the COVID-19 infection threat in any area returns to substantial  which is now expected, including in Pima County.

Arizonas open, the governor said Thursday. Arizonas economy is open, Arizonas educational institutions are open, Arizonas tourism institutions are open. The expectation is they are going to remain open.

Duceys comments came as state health director Dr. Cara Christ said the coronavirus numbers will get worse.

There are counties that are likely to go back into substantial spread starting next week, she said.

Threat of substantial spread led to Duceys original orders to shutter businesses in March and then, after the restrictions eased, his directive to re-close many businesses in June after a spike in cases.

We should expect a rise in cases, Ducey said Thursday, though he suggested part of the reason will be an increase in the number and types of tests available.

He added: We are not going to, due to a gradual rise in cases, be making any dramatic changes.

The problems appear to be localized.

Statewide, the rate of infection remains below 100 per 100,000 residents, enough to put it in the moderate range.

And the percentage of tests for the virus coming back positive is below 5%, showing what the state calls minimal spread.
Photo: The Canadian Press Dr. Eileen de Villa, Medical Officer of Health for the City of Toronto attends a news conference in Toronto in January.

Toronto's top public health official has ordered the closure of three downtown restaurants after contact-tracing showed some employees with COVID-19, Toronto Public Health said Saturday.

Dr. Eileen de Villa, Toronto's medical officer of health, issued the order late Friday based on data from contact tracing.

"TPH found a concerning link involving these locations where many people are connected to more than one of the businesses noted," the agency said in a statement.

"In some cases, for example, people infected with COVID-19 were employed at more than one of these locations."

In addition, the health unit said one of the restaurants has served food buffet style, which is prohibited under provincial regulations because of the pandemic.

The department identified the three closed restaurants as MARBL, Casa Mezcal and King Taps, which are all within 10 city blocks of each other on King Street West.

The health unit said it's in the process of ordering the closure of a fourth establishment, but didn't provide details.

In an Instagram post Friday night, MARBL said it was closing for the weekend "due to unforeseen circumstances."

"For those who were planning to join us, we apologize for the inconvenience and we look forward to serving you soon," the post reads.

In a post of its own on Saturday, King Taps said it was "co-operating fully with Toronto Public Health."

"To that end, a deep clean of the restaurant is being conducted and a review of onsite practices and protocols is under way," the post reads.

"Guests who visited on Sept. 6, 9, 10 and 11 may wish to contact Toronto Public Health."

In July, when Toronto was still in Stage 2 of reopening, the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario announced an investigation into MARBL after a video emerged on social media showing dozens of patrons crammed into a semi-indoor space.

The video, which also showed staff failing to wear masks, prompted outrage online.

Meanwhile, the Crews and Tangos drag bar and dance hall, in a different part of Toronto's downtown, announced that one of its customers and one of its performers have tested positive for COVID-19.

"We urge all customers of Crews between Sept. 18 and Sept. 20 to go get tested to prevent any further spreading of the virus," the company said in an Instagram post.

"To all of those who made reservations for this weekend, please rest assured, we will be offering refunds."

The news comes after the Ford government announced Friday that bars and restaurants across Ontario must now shut down by midnight and stop serving alcohol by 11 p.m. in response to a rise in COVID-19 cases.

Thousands of people protested Saturday in London against government COVID-related restrictions  which included a 10 p.m. curfew on bars and restaurants nationwide, along with tougher masking requirements and increased fines for non-compliance.

The Ontario government announced Saturday there were 435 new cases of COVID-19  making it seven days out of the last nine that the daily total has exceeded 400 cases.
State officials warned Friday that coronavirus cases have been rising in five New Jersey counties, with Ocean County and especially the township of Lakewood clearly our hotspots right now," Gov. Phil Murphy said.

Folks, this is clear evidence we are not out of the woods, Murphy said of the spikes during his latest coronavirus briefing in Trenton.

The warning came as the state announced seven more COVID-19 deaths and 612 new cases  down significantly from peak numbers in the spring but still the most the state has seen in a week.

In addition to Ocean, state Health Commissioner Judith Persichilli said there has been an uptick in cases in Bergen, Gloucester, Middlesex, and Monmouth counties.

Those five counties have recorded more than 1,000 of the states 2,5000 new COVID-19 cases since Monday.

In particular, Persichilli said, Ocean has reported 439 positive cases in that time, followed by Monmouth with 248, Middlesex with 220, and Gloucester with 130.

The commissioner said Ocean has averaged about 100 to 150 new cases a day recently. Of that number, she said, at least half or more have come from Lakewood.

The positivity rate in Lakewood is also increasing, which is a concern, Persichilli added.

Murphy said officials believe there is some amount of relationship to worship" from the Jewish holiday of Rosh Hashanah, which was last weekend. Lakewood is home to a large Orthodox Jewish community.

Another Jewish holiday, Yom Kippur, will run Sunday into Monday.

The governor warned people not to cast bias on the religious community in the area.

Every religion in this state has a right to practice and worship, Murphy said. I dont want a speck of anybody in this state, Hey, see, its because of them' or whatever. Were working aggressively with faith leaders, with community leaders. But I want everybody to leave any prejudices or biases, to check them at the door. This is about public health, and were doing our very best.

Still, Murphy stressed: We need everybody to worship and observe holidays responsibly, including from a public health standpoint.

Persichilli said she has spoken with both community and religious leaders from Lakewood and noted their collaboration and cooperation is extraordinary.

Officials also continue to warn that more younger people are contracting the virus. The main age group for the cases in Ocean and Monmouth counties are 18 to 29 years old.

While younger people are less likely to die or be hospitalized for COVID-19, officials warn they can still pass it to older, more vulnerable people.

Persichilli said the increases in Monmouth may be related to house gatherings and business operations.

We are reminding people that social distancing and masking is critical to protect people when they gather, the health commissioner said.

But Murphy on Friday warned that the recent rise in cases shows New Jersey needs to remain cautious. He also extended the states public-health emergency for a seventh time.

Still, many lawmakers  including top Republicans  as well as numerous business owners and residents have called on Murphy to lift his restrictions even further.

Brent Johnson may be reached at bjohnson@njadvancemedia.com.

More:

Americans in their 20s account for more coronavirus cases than any other age group

Is it time to get a flu shot? CDC recommends vaccines for most people before illness spreads
(AP)

The US Department of Justice published, then removed, then re-issued a press release that announced an inquiry into nine discarded military ballots in Pennsylvania, an unprecedented and unusual move that has worried election analysts and legal scholars as Donald Trump and Attorney General William Barr spread unfounded claims about vote-by-mail fraud.

Voting rights advocates also argue that the case could stem from a legal battle in which the GOP has sought to invalidate mail-in ballots cast without secrecy envelopes.

On Thursday, David Freed, US attorney for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, announced that the FBI and state police were investigating the case.

The US attorney said the Luzerne County district attorney requested an investigation into absentee ballots mailed by members of the military, who routinely vote by mail.

At this point we can confirm that a small number of military ballots were discarded, he announced.

An initial version of the announcement claimed that all nine ballots were cast for the president.

Of the nine ballots that were discarded and then recovered, [seven] were cast for presidential candidate Donald Trump, the office said in a revised press release. Two of the discarded ballots had been resealed inside their appropriate envelopes by Luzerne elections staff prior to recovery by the FBI and the contents of those [two] ballots are unknown.

But the White House had leaked the announcement hours earlier. Press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, railing against allegations of voter fraud, told reporters that afternoon that Trump ballots, ballots for the president, were found in Pennsylvania and I believe you should be getting more information on that shortly.

Despite the lack of clarity in the case, the Trump campaign and Republican allies were quick to blame Democrats.

Matt Wolking, the Trump campaign's deputy director of communications, said on social media: Democrats are trying to steal the election. He later deleted his message.

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Legal analysts were stunned that the DOJ and administration would announce an investigation that is in progress, contrary to policy, while also disclosing how the ballots were cast in an apparent attempt to connect the case to the GOPs baseless claims of widespread voter fraud, what critics believe has sought to undermine Democratic votes ahead of an election that could have a larger-than-usual mail-in ballot turnout.

This statement by a US Attorney is bananas, said Walter Shaub, former director of the United States Office of Government Ethics. It talks about an ongoing investigation, and it reveals the candidates named on ballots. Im still processing all of the levels on which this is wildly inappropriate.

Vanita Gupta, president and CEO of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, called the announcement political gamery.

DOJ doesnt announce this kind of investigation, she said. It certainly doesnt announce whom ballots were cast for, since that should be immaterial in a voting [rights] investigation.

Election analysts have argued that the error is more likely attributed to new rules for mail-in ballots to be sealed inside privacy envelopes.

The ballots were returned in envelopes similar to absentee ballot request forms and thus opened by election officials.

Analysts have argued that its probable that the ballots did not shield the voters information using the mandated secure envelope, a so-called naked ballot that has drawn intense scrutiny in the state after election officials warned that thousands of ballots cast may have been invalidated in primary elections this year because of the requirement.

A recent Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision to void so-called naked ballots mailed without envelopes that conceal the voters identity could cause electoral chaos and protracted legal battles, according to a warning from Lisa Deeley, who chairs the Philadelphia commissioners office, in a letter to state lawmakers on Monday.

The decision  part of a series of rulings that extended vote-by-mail deadlines, allowed ballot drop boxes and removed Green Party candidates from the ticket  could force as many as 100,000 votes to be tossed out in a state that Donald Trump carried by just 44,000 more votes than his opponent Hillary Clinton in 2016.

Opponents in the ruling argued that while election laws told voters to use the secrecy envelope, it did not direct officials to discard votes cast without them. Pennsylvanias Republican Party, however, said that counting those ballots would compromise the vote and encourage voter fraud.

It remains unclear why the exactly the nine ballots were discarded.

This is an ongoing investigation where there is no public interest reason to override the usual policy of not commenting  and especially not to say for whom the ballots were cast. An unprecedented in kind contribution to the president's campaign, said MSNBC election security analyst Matthew Miller. I know it's hard for the career people at DOJ, and they are not to blame, but they really do need to fight back and speak up when stuff this like [this] happens. Refuse to participate. Call the House Judiciary Committee. Call a reporter. Everything is on the line right now.

Read more

FBI director says no evidence of mail-in voter fraud, countering Trumps repeated false claims

We want to get rid of the ballots: Trump wont commit to peaceful transfer of power, pushing voter fraud claims instead

Naked ballots could invalidate thousands of votes in Pennsylvania and cost Joe Biden the election
The cry of seagulls. Wind in the sails. The creak of masts and rigging.

Images such as these have captivated Harley Stanton for more than two decades.

Since 1999, Stanton has been engrossed in a genealogical voyage of discovery, retracing the migration of his ancestors from England to Australia in the mid-1800s.

The project led him to discover and write about the illustrious history of a 168-foot sailing ship built in Saint John called the Conway.

Survived a lot in 26 Atlantic crossings

The Conway travelled more than 500,000 miles, Stanton discovered.

It crossed the Atlantic 26 times, through cyclone, mutiny, legal wrangling, attempted scuttling and cholera outbreak.

Among the many who survived their voyage on the Conway were Stanton's great-great-grandfather, Thomas Stanton, a lower-middle-class farmer from Cambridge, his wife and their four children.

They migrated to what was then known as Van Diemen's Land, now Tasmania, seeking to improve their lot in life.

Many of the fastest ships of the golden age of sail were built in Saint John.

'A wonderful ship'

But to Stanton, the Conway was a ship like none other.

"She was not really probably the truest clipper ship, but she was a wonderful ship," said Stanton.

The Conway was constructed in 1854 by partners John Owens and John Duncan, who co-owned one of the largest shipbuilding companies in the city.

At the time, Saint John was the third-biggest shipbuilding centre in the world.

It also also produced the celebrated and speedier Marco Polo, which the Conway followed in joining James Baines & Co.'s Australian line.

Submitted by Harley Stanton

The Liverpool-based line's ships collectively brought 500,000 people to Australia in the 1840s and '50s.

Aboard the Conway on the very same voyage as Stanton's ancestors, to name just one noteworthy family, were the Blundstones, now famous for bootmaking.

Australia was still a penal colony then, but by 1853, transportation of new convicts had all but stopped and a gold rush had begun.

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Land was selling for a shilling an acre, and there was an urgent, advertised need for servants, labourers, shepherds, sawyers, fishermen and tradespeople of all kinds.

"In those days, it was really important to try and make the ships arrive at the most speedy time that they could," said Stanton.

The fastest trip from England to Australia was completed in 63 days, he said.

Slower than record-breaker

The Conway didn't come close to that. It took an average of 90 to 95 days.

But it had a number of "unique features" that set it apart, including eight feet between decks and ventilators that provided air to the lower levels.

Stanton began his research hoping to find an illustration of the Conway.

He looked all over the world and couldn't find a single one.

But he did turn up a wealth of other information that he used to write a new book called My Cathedral In the Sea: A History of the Conway.

An entire chapter of the book is devoted to Saint John, which Stanton visited in 2005.

He planned to stay a couple of days and ended up staying a week.

"It was a real catharsis in my life," he said of the trip.

"I think it was one of those serendipitous moments ... you just can never forget."

"I wandered down onto the foreshore there and saw the Reversing Falls, and I met so many people of phenomenal interest to me while I was in Saint John."

Saint Johners eager to help

Among them were local historian Harold Wright and Norton Wyse, a former volunteer at the New Brunswick Museum.

Meeting others who shared his passion for shipbuilding history made him feel "much at home" in the Port City.

Submitted by Harley Stanton

People seemed to "come out of the woodwork" to provide him with material  from pictures of logs being hauled over the ice, to a lithograph map of 1864 Saint John hand-coloured by Linda Cook, and poems by Bliss Carman.

"To discover what it actually took to build the ship and to go to the museum and see the shipbuilding materials and the way the ship was actually built gave me a whole new dimension of understanding of what it was about."

Stanton said he hopes his book gives people a better understanding of the oversea voyages aboard clipper ships taken by so many migrants in the 19th century.

The Conway returned to its home port in 1866 on its way to Quebec.

It had been contracted to carry military supplies.

It set out on its final voyage in 1875, during which it was abandoned near the Sargasso Sea.
Politics are in the air, like that ominous reddish glow suffocating much of the West in recent weeks on account of all those tragic wild fires.

This coming week we get our first presidential debate. Finally. A chance for Donald Trump and Joe Biden to shake hands and have a respectful, reasoned exchange of views on the future of the unfairly maligned Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act; the need to reform the Stored Communications Act; the wisdom of replicating Europes General Data Privacy Regulation; the merits of taking antitrust action against Google for its manipulation of search results or against Amazon for its treatment of third-party sellers on its platform. Maybe we will even see the candidates reflect humbly on humanitys place in the universe, in light of the breaking news from Venus.

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A man can hope. But yes, its unlikely. The debate will probably be all tense, no futuremaybe not as heated as a debate between 2016 Lindsey Graham and 2020 Lindsey Graham, but close.

I read back through several presidential debate transcripts from recent cycles, planning to share with you some of the highlights of past exchanges around pressing technology issues  And so, um, anyone heard about Venus?

To be fair, Bill Clinton did talk a lot about building a bridge to the 21st century, and how connecting all schools to the internet was part of the effort. Sadly, hackneyed as his bridge mantra became, thats a standout from the past quarter-century.

I realize it would be unrealistic for us to expect a nuanced presidential debate about how technology is transforming society, or how government can best foster continued innovation. But it is entirely legitimate to expect a constructive, inspiring, articulation of a proposed future that we can rally behind.

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This, I worry, has been one of the victims of our increasingly polarized, destructive politics: the future. Our political discourse keeps shrinking, turning inward and backwarda politics of nostalgia, a fight over what needs to be restored. We need to figure out how to place the future back at the forefront of our politics, how to make it great again. Sell me a bridge to somewhere, anywhere, beyond the specter of post-Election Day litigation.

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Then again, there are those who feel like politics themselves have become obsolete and redundant. My former New America colleague Fuzz Hogan used to joke that we should avoid the hassle of voting and instead cede our decision-making to a collective AI of those who know us best: Twitter, Facebook, Google, Amazon, etc. The composite of you known to them could seamlessly make a choice for you, which might be more representative of your views and interests than what you come up with yourself when filling the ballot, especially when you consider how much more informed the A.I. would be about those pesky down-ballot choices.

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In The State Machine, our Future Tense Fiction story published today, Sri Lankan author Yudhanjaya Wijeratne portrays a future in which an all-knowing A.I. governs for us. Whats refreshing about Yudhas story is that he doesnt just posit this State Machine as a finished product in some distant futurehe sketches the development of the A.I. by having the storys protagonist be a grad student working on a thesis about the A.I.s development from its early days as a video game, and the many iterations that followed. Echoing Fuzzs office banter about how Google might know you better than you do, the State Machine in Yudhas story is infinitely smarter than those who think they control it. Though a facade of political activity endures for the sake of appearances, the State Machine has essentially rendered politics obsolete because it takes the input of public opinion and produces an output of corresponding laws and policies.

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At one point in the story, an estranged couple dwell on this uncomfortable realization: Neither of us see as much as the State Machine does; to each other we are just idealized versions of ourselves, projections, half-lies and half-truths, not the real data trail we all leave behind.

What is most refreshing about Yudhas remarkable story is how it breaks from the usual, slave-or-master robot dichotomy. But I wont give away the ultimate plot twist. Read the story, and then our response essay, written by machine learning expert S.B. Divya.

More from the recent past of Future Tense:

Josephine Wolff Why Are Private Companies Telling Us More About Election Interference Than the Government Is?

Pranav Malhotra The Social Dilemma Fails to Tackle the Real Issues in Tech

Joseph Jerome Facebooks New Project Aria Could Be an Augmented Reality Turning Point

Jonathan L. Fischer The TikTok Deal Stinks

Jane C. Hu What Do Two New Studies Really Tell Us About Coronavirus Transmission on Planes?

Future Tense Recommends

If youre looking for a unique sci-fi series, I highly recommend HBOs Raised by Wolves, a visually original and deeply imaginative story of a nascent human colony. The series offers a fresh angle on the future dominance of artificial intelligence. Its not always comfortable, but part of its allure lies in its refusal to give the audience an unambiguous protagonist.Jamie Holmes, Future Tense fellow and author of 12 Seconds of Silence: How a Team of Inventors, Tinkerers, and Spies Took Down a Nazi Superweapon

Wish Wed Published This

Presidential campaigns have always gone to great lengths to secure the nominations of all sorts of power brokers, but this year more than ever online influencers feel a lot more valuable as validators than a union boss or a governor. And trying to influence the influencers from your Delaware basement feels like peak pandemic politics, which is why I appreciated Rebecca Heilweils report for Vox Recodes Open Sourced project on the Biden campaigns social media effort.

What Next TBD

This week on Slates technology podcast, guest host Celeste Headlee talks to Paul Offit, co-inventor of a rotavirus vaccine and member of the FDAs vaccine advisory committee, about why a COVID-19 vaccine wont be the end of the pandemic. Last week, Celeste spoke with Abrahm Lustgarten, senior reporter at ProPublica, about the coming great climate migration.

Zoom on Over

On Wednesday, shake off your presidential debate hangover by joining Future Tense at noon Eastern for an engaging conversation on one of the topics Joe and Don should grapple with, but probably wont: whether were losing the promise of one, global internet.

Future Tense is a partnership of Slate, New America, and Arizona State University that examines emerging technologies, public policy, and society.
Charlotte Pence Bond shares her born-again experience after living double life

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In the first episode of her new podcast, Vice President Mike Pences daughter Charlotte Pence Bond opened up about her spiritual journey as the daughter of devout Christian parents and how she went through her own born-again experience to realize what it means to live for Christ.

Her new podcast program is called "Doubting It" and aims to be the start of a conversation to encourage listeners not to shy away from their spiritual doubts.

I think that doubt is something that most people experience when they are kind of going through their faith journey or they are figuring out what they believe, the 27-year-old graduate student at Harvard Divinity School, said.

It can be common  to have these questions, especially if you are raised in a religious household, in a household where everybody around you might be very devoutly religious. That can be kind of intimidating because when you get out into the real world, it can be a little different and look a little different.

Bond, who got married last December, spoke about how she grew up as a middle child in the home of Mike and Karen Pence, whom she said both grew up Catholic but have since become nondenominational Protestants.

Today, Bond is in the second year of a masters program in theological studies. During her studies, she said, she has noticed a shift among millennials and people her age having a different view of religion and faith, with a lot of people saying they are into spirituality over maybe an organized religion.

I wanted to really dig into that and figure out why. I honestly dont think I did, I dont know if we ever really will, she said. There are so many things that go into why a generation is different from another one. But what I have noticed, at least a little bit of my theory about why millennials tend to be less religious than other generations, I think is maybe partially to do with this doubt idea. We arent talking about the questions that we have.

Although her parents have always been open to discussing any doubts or questions she had about the faith and have taught her and her siblings that a personal relationship with Jesus Christ was essential, Bond stated that she felt as if for many years, she wasnt really living for Christ.

In college, she said she wasnt really living in a way that she should have been as a follower of Christ.

I think I have really looked back at that time that I think I thought, OK, I am a Christian but I dont have to follow all of the rules. I dont have to do all of these things that they tell you to do in youth group or small group or CRU or InterVarsity, she said.

I went to those things and I did not act like a Christ follower on the off days, I guess on the days that I wasnt surrounded by people who were. I really was kind of living a little bit of a double life. I was trying to get away with hanging out with people I shouldnt have been hanging out with, doing things I shouldnt have been doing and thinking that I can still believe this but I just dont have to follow these rules.

At the time, she said she felt as if the Bible was kind of antiquated because it was written a long time ago.

That was really kind of my thought process. I think that looking back, it wasnt that anything was missing in religion or Christianity for me. Something was missing in me, in my heart, she stated. I wasnt fully there.

Bond said that at times, she almost didnt want Christianity to be the truth because that would mean she would need to change the things that she was doing and the people she was hanging out with.

That was going to mean a drastic shift in my life, she stated. It was going to mean that I was going to have to answer to this God and I was going to have to lose relationships, which I did, in order to follow Him and follow after Him wholeheartedly.

Her conversion happened when she traveled to England to study for a year during her junior year in college. For the entire year, she said, she only went into a church once. For most of the year, she thought to herself: I am not doing this Christianity thing.

According to the podcast host, she even turned down invites from friends to go to church services.

I started reading atheists writings and literature. I was close with professors who were agnostic or atheist. I just started kind of trying it out, she said. I didnt fully turn away from my faith but I wanted to see if I really needed it. Looking back on that year, I looked back over this journal I kept and I noticed in the journal all of the times that things of significance happened and I felt the need to write them down.

A lot of times it had been when I would come across a Bible verse or something had happened that clearly involved God and clearly involved another encounter with religion in some way, she added. What I really realized is that during that entire year, I was running away from God very actively. But the entire year, He was running after me.

At the end of the year while on an airplane during one of her last trips before her return to the United States, she recalled that she started to cry while she was listening to a worship song.

I just felt this overwhelming presence around me, Bond detailed. I really cant describe it as anything other than that. I felt that God was accepting me back. It was almost this literal feeling of falling into somebodys arms that has forgiven you, saying: I still want you. I still want you back even though you ran away from me. I still want you. That was really when I completely gave my life to Christ.

When she returned from her trip abroad, she began reading her Bible as if it was the first time she had ever read it and often asked her parents about things she read.

Bond said she also reconnected with some of her Christian friends who were there for her during her spiritual journey.

They were watching me live this double life, loving me through it and seeing me on the other side of it and seeing me as this born-again Christian, she said. I really felt like after that experience on the plane, I couldnt deny it anymore. I couldnt pretend like it wasnt real.

Bond said that she knew she could no longer continue to live the way she was living and had to make changes.

I lost friends, moved on from relationships and kind of figured out who I was in Christ and who I wanted to be with Him at the center, she explained.

During this time abroad, that was really a time in my life when I was given the liberty and the freedom and the space to have doubts, to have questions, to wonder  if this is something that I believe and to what extent. The biggest realization I had was that Christianity was real and I couldnt be halfway in. I couldnt have one foot out the door all the time.

Bond encouraged listeners that having spiritual doubts and questions is acceptable and something the Bible speaks on in the New Testament.

Matthew 7 says, Ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will be open to you. For anyone who asks, receives. The one who seeks finds. And to the one who knocks, the door will be opened, she recited. I love this verse because it talks about how it is OK to ask and we wouldnt be asking a question and we wouldnt be knocking and seeking if we didnt have doubts.

She noted that the verse implies that it is OK for believers to admit that they dont know everything.

Trusting God doesnt mean that we never have doubts, she stressed. But we have to be honest about our doubts.
Thousands of mostly young people gathered Friday in Berlin to demand more action on climate change, part of a global day of action for the environment.

Defying gray skies, the participants, many on bicycles, brought placards and banners to a rally near the iconic Brandenburg Gate. Most wore face masks as a COVID-19 precaution. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the coronavirus.

Germany is a focal point for the demonstrations in Europe because it holds the six-month rotating presidency of the European Union, which together with Britain accounts for 22 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions caused by humans.

The climate has made headlines around the world recently, from melting Arctic ice to record Siberian heat to wildfires in California and elsewhere.

German climate activist Luisa Neubauer told the crowd, "We're here because we know that climate justice is possible as long as we keep fighting for it. That's why we're here today."
BRENDAN Gleeson initially turned down the role of Donald Trump in new TV miniseries The Comey Rule - and many American stars were afraid to take part.

Director Billy Ray said scores of actors said no to the role, fearing a backlash from the US president.

The two-part drama tells the story of former FBI boss James Comey, who was sacked by Trump before writing a tell-all book, A Higher Loyalty.

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Ray said he knew there would be consequences of bringing the story to the small screen.

"I'm almost certainly going to get audited, and that's the best-case scenario," he told Hollywood Reporter.

The magazine revealed that Anthony Hopkins was on board to play the American president at one stage, but dropped out.

Ray said The General star Gleeson turned down the role when first approached, and several others said no without even reading the script.

"The truth is, from an actor's point of view, who needs it?" he said.

"It was hard to make an argument to an American actor that, 'No, look, this is going to be great for your private life, great for your family'.

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"You can't really say that in a truthful way, so we were scrambling."

Target

In the end, the team wore Gleeson down, convincing him the project was powerful enough to make it worth his while.

Gleeson was also assured his portrayal of Trump would not be cartoon-like in any way.

"I told him, 'I'm not going to ask you to do something that makes you a target'," Ray said.

"I said, 'Our make-up is going to be more real-life than his, our hair is going to be more real-life than his and our suits are going to fit you better than his.'"

The 65-year-old Dubliner finally agreed on condition he would not have to do any publicity interviews.

Ray also said producers had trouble casting an actor to play former president Barack Obama in the drama. The role ultimately went to Londoner Kingsley Ben-Adir.

The Comey Rule is on Sky Atlantic and NOW TV at 9pm on Wednesday
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 22:13:14|Editor: huaxia

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Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, attends the third central symposium on work related to Xinjiang, in Beijing, capital of China. The symposium was held on Friday and Saturday in Beijing. (Xinhua/Ju Peng)

BEIJING, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- President Xi Jinping has called for efforts to build Xinjiang featuring socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era.

Xi, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, made the remarks at the third central symposium on work related to Xinjiang, which was held on Friday and Saturday in Beijing.

Xi underlined the need to fully and faithfully implement the CPC's policies on governing Xinjiang for the new era.

Xi demanded law-based governance and long-term efforts to develop Xinjiang into a region that is united, harmonious, prosperous, and culturally advanced, with healthy ecosystems and people living and working in contentment.

Thanks to strenuous efforts from all sides since the second symposium in 2014, major progress has been achieved in the work related to Xinjiang, Xi said, citing a series of markedly improving key indicators from 2014 to 2019, such as a sound economic momentum with an average annual GDP growth rate of 7.2 percent, people's living standards being significantly improved with an average annual 9.1 percent growth in residential per capita disposable income, and more than 2.92 million out of 3.09 million people being lifted out of poverty.

Such a sound situation where people live and work in contentment has laid a solid foundation for long-term peace and stability in Xinjiang, Xi said.

"Facts have fully proved that China's work on ethnic affairs has been successful," he said, noting the achievements are the result of the strong leadership of the CPC Central Committee, along with the concerted efforts of the whole Party and all the Chinese people including more than 25 million people from different ethnic groups in Xinjiang.

Facts prove that the Party's policies on Xinjiang in the new era, which were developed by the CPC Central Committee since the 18th CPC National Congress, are perfectly right and must be adhered to on a long-term basis, Xi stressed.

He demanded the entire Party make implementing the Party's Xinjiang policies in the new era a political task, always maintaining the correct political orientation of the work related to Xinjiang.

Xi noted that the banner of socialist rule of law must be held high to maintain lasting social stability in Xinjiang, ensuring that the requirement for fully advancing China's law-based governance covers all areas of the work related to Xinjiang.

Xi stressed efforts to focus on heightening a sense of identity of the Chinese nation to constantly strengthen ethnic unity.

The education on the sense of Chinese identity should be incorporated into the education of officials and the younger generation in Xinjiang as well as its social education, helping the officials and the general public of all ethnic groups develop an accurate understanding of country, history, ethnicity, culture and religion, to let the sense of Chinese identity take root in people, he said.

Noting that development is an important foundation for lasting peace and stability in Xinjiang, Xi stressed leveraging the region's geographical advantages to develop Xinjiang as a core area of the Silk Road Economic Belt and a hub of opening-up in the inland and border areas.

Xi urged efforts to consolidate the foundation and increase the efficiency of the industrial sector in Xinjiang, advance industrial transformation and upgrading, and boost urbanization in an all-round way while protecting the environment.

Stressing the need to coordinate epidemic containment with economic and social development, Xi called for ensuring stability on six fronts -- employment, the financial sector, foreign trade, foreign investment, domestic investment, and expectations -- while maintaining security in six areas: job security, basic living needs, operations of market entities, food and energy, stable industrial and supply chains, and the normal functioning of primary-level governments.

He also called for unremitting efforts to eradicate poverty and promote employment in Xinjiang.

Xi pointed out that the original aspiration and mission of the Party is to seek happiness for the Chinese people, including people of all ethnic groups in Xinjiang, and the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation, including various ethnic groups in Xinjiang.

He urged continuous efforts to foster a contingent of high-caliber officials from ethnic-minority groups in Xinjiang who are loyal to the Party and have both integrity and ability, saying that the officials in Xinjiang are trustworthy and capable.

Underscoring the great significance of Xinjiang-related work to the whole Party and the entire country, Xi asked for improvement in working mechanism in which the CPC Central Committee exerts the unified leadership, the central departments offer guidance and support, other provincial-level regions render support and cooperation, and Xinjiang plays its principal role.

Other senior Chinese leaders also attended the symposium, which was presided over by Li Keqiang. Li Zhanshu, Wang Huning, Zhao Leji and Han Zheng were in attendance, while Wang Yang spoke to sum up the event. Enditem
Mythical gets mod in mountain setting By Yomal Senerath-Yapa Continuing our series on the Bawa Awards shortlist, we feature Cafe UFO, a take on King Ravanas vehicle in the backpackers paradise of Ella, the town with links to the Ramayana legend View(s): View(s):

Ella has just as much mystique as it has mist. Lankas answer to Kathmandu, the town had a checkered history, beginning with legends of Ravana, whose name rings in great waterfalls and gaunt forested cliffs. Today, as a trekkers paradise, Ella is losing that touch with the ancient tales of the Ramayana. All the more reason to welcome a cafe there that perpetuates the Yakka king- albeit in cool, hipster style.

Christened Cafe UFO, this new place is a bit like a great plump-breasted bird about to soar and take to the skies. It is how two young architects- Kanishka Padmapani and Thilina Rathnayaka- reimagined the dandu monara yantra of Ravana- the peacock-shaped flying machine in which he flew to India and captured Sita.

Kanishka and Thilina both graduated from the University of Moratuwa, and each have well over a decades experience. The founding partners of RAPA Chartered Architects, a name they formed using their surnames, they work on projects from simple vernacular to high tech complex structures. They have done a number of hotels and residences as well as offices and condominiums.

In their first foray to Ella, the two architects realised the new cafe would blend in- body and soul- if it connected with Ravana who has touched this ancient hill landscape so memorably.

It was a difficult, triangular site- part of a town that had grown up so quickly and so haphazardly like a mad gold rush settlement mining for tourists. The new building in contrast, the two vowed, would be eco-friendly and sustainable. Designed in four months, the structure was finished in six.

The result can be called a resounding success. For the average traveller who arrives from the railway station, the cafe is an oasis in a kitsch desert- the two-storeyed wooden structure twinkling cosily open to the road- its roof thatched with a carpet of illuk.

The cafe today has become a byword in Ella where everyone flocks for food under that undulating roof open to views of a unique town. It has a great communal feel rather like a tribe hut: the achievement of the architects (and of course the engineer W. M. D. Ranasinghe) has been to create, out of minimal resources, a sustainable eatery that harks back to the vernacular while imbibing a whiff of the mythical from its strange mountain setting.

We got the widest road frontage in Ella town, says architect Kanishka- around 80 to 90 feet. They easily managed seating for the clients target of 120 to 150 diners.

The wood as well as the labour was local. For the main structure including the columns and supportive timber decks, we used grandis (Eucalyptus grandis- rose gum) wood grown purposefully and approved for usage by the Forest Department of Sri Lanka.

All raw material was from the area as were services such as carpentering, interior detailing and masonry.

The slender reedy rafters are micro timber branches while partitioning and interior wall decor was done with cinnamon sticks. The service area is separated with a regular mangrove curtain made of the cinnamon sticks. The one and only jarring note in the place seems to be struck by the ink drawing upstairs of Ravana- too generic and metalhead for a place so beautifully individualistic and quaint- though it does make welcome the hipster backpacker.

The tapestries on the soaring walls are simple paduru mats- as proud local arras as heraldic flags would have been. They blend with the colourful watti clustering the walls- procured from down south keeping with the shoestring budget.

An extraordinary medley of things enjoy elegant afterlives here: old metal pots, wheels and tyres as interior decor; a bottomless old kettle and a steel bucket with elegant perforations as chic chandeliers.

The seating ranges from the formal to cosy bean bags, the furniture fashioned from carved wood to degraded logs.

Prior to being shortlisted for the Bawa Awards, the cafe was adjudged second best project at the Robert Matthew Award 2019. Organized by the Commonwealth Association of Architects, it had 35 countries competing. In the same year, the project got an honourable mention at the SLIA Design Awards.

Together with Kanishka and Thilina, their team at RAPA is beginning to break out of the box with great panache. In their budding resume are such intriguing projects as The Elephant Next Door, an upcoming safari boutique villa at Udawalawe which imitates the figure and character of the pachyderm.
A pensioner has died after being charged by cows, meaning two people in northern England have been killed in such circumstances this month.

Malcolm Flynn was walking along the Pennine Way near Thirlwall Castle and Gisland in Northumberland when the animals stampeded.

The 72-year-old from Carlisle was so badly injured during the incident that he died at the scene.

The tragedy on 11 September  revealed by police on Friday  occurred just 10 days before popular school teacher David Clark was killed by a herd of cows while walking his dog near Richmond in North Yorkshire.

The deputy head at Richmond School was described by principal Jenna Potter as an enormous character, a brilliant school leader and simply a lovely man who enriched the life of everyone he came into contact with.

Recommended Popular school deputy head killed by herd of cows while dog walking

Referring to Mr Flynns death, Detective Chief Inspector Jane Fairlamb, of Northumbria Police, said: My thoughts are with Malcolms family and friends at this time as they come to terms with the loss of a loved one in what was a shocking and tragic incident.

Our investigation is very much ongoing and we have already spoken to a number of witnesses, however, we are still trying to trace a number of people who were in the area at the time who we havent yet spoken to, and think could greatly assist our inquiries.

She added that Mr Flynn was walking with a companion at the time and said officers were especially interested in speaking to a white man with grey hair and beard walking a dog who passed the pair shortly before the incident, as well as a man and woman, believed to be in their 40s.

A group of four other hikers who spoke to Flynns walking companion immediately after the incident are also urged to get in touch with police.

Some 98 people have been killed by cows in the UK over the last 20 years, according to the governments Health and Safety Executive  22 members of the public and 76 farm workers.
While domestic violence is prevalent in Luxembourg, few cases are reported in the media.

Most of the victims suffer in solitude, entrenched in their pain. One case finally alerted the authorities after a woman was attacked with a knife by her own husband in Canach three years ago.

Charlotte's survival was miraculous as the medical examiner pointed out, after she suffered serious neck injuries. Now, the woman has finally managed to talk openly about her story to the press.



She shows a 30-centimetre-long cut on the right side of her face and a 15-centimetre wound on her neck. The knife grazed the victim's carotid artery, leaving her vocal cords exposed, and she lost a lot of blood. According to several medical reports, victims with these types of injuries do not usually survive.

The external and visible wounds have healed, but inside, Charlotte is still suffering, especially from anxiety attacks.

This was an attack committed under the influence of extreme jealousy on the part of the violent husband, according to the psychiatrists' assessment. The perpetrator allegedly slit his wrists after attacking his wife, but was transferred to a cell three days after his admission to hospital. The individual was even able to see his daughter regularly before the arrival of the coronavirus pandemic. The three-year-old girl was in a creche at the time of the events.

In addition to the physical and mental scars, Charlotte now has to face the couple's debts alone, among other things by means of a wage garnishment. She sometimes thinks that her ex-husband's life in prison is easier than hers on the outside. The violent spouse was sentenced to 14 years in prison, 5 of which were suspended. The sentence was reduced to 12 years on appeal. He will be able to apply for early release in the coming months.

The report (in Luxembourgish) of RTL Tele Letzebuerg:
Prince Harry and Meghan Markles latest political stunt was carried out for Time magazines list of 100 influential people. The pair sat on a bench, spoke of compassion and the global community and the importance of everyones being nicer to each other online, and then  what else?  the U.S. election. As we approach this November its vital that we reject hate speech, misinformation and online negativity, Harry said, after Meghan implicitly endorsed Joe Biden.

Now, I dont much care about kings and queens, or the political opinions of celebrities, but I do care about slighting principled grandmothers. What the couple have done here  severing their family ties, moving to California, and becoming self-righteous wokespeople for social-justice causes  is rather like the Kushners (Ivanka having converted to Judaism in order to marry Jared) suddenly revoking their religion, publicly breaking every rule in the book, then moving off to join a hippie colony. Its very unseemly, shall we say? Though Queen Elizabeth II gave her consent, she was obviously worried (she asked the pair to drop to their royal titles) that they might cause further embarrassment. And she was obviously right.

This election Im not going to be able to vote here in the U.S., but many of you may not know that Ive not been able to vote in the U.K. my entire life, Harry said in the Time video. This, presumably, is supposed to signal how hard his life has been. To put it all in perspective: In March 2019, having split from Kensington Palace, the couple spent around $3 million of public money of upgrading their home; after stressing the importance of climate change, saying how it influenced their decisions about family size, the two jet-setted across the globe on vacations, for which they  deservedly  received negative press coverage. Soon after, Meghan and Harry effectively declared war on the press, suing the Mail on Sunday and attacking the British tabloids. In November 2019, they took a six-week vacation in Canada instead of spending Christmas with his family. This year, in January, Harry and Meghan announced that they would be departing the royal family, taking a step back, and seeking financial independence.

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This financial independence has turned out rather nicely for them. After they arrived in California from Vancouver, they set about feeding the homeless while making sure to be caught on camera, then settled down in a modest $14.7 million home in Montecito. They then founded a production company and signed a multiyear deal with Netflix. The New York Times discovered that it is unclear how much Harry and Meghan will be paid, and a Netflix spokeswoman declined to comment. But we can take a guess. Rumor has it that they are looking for a deal with Apple and Disney in the neighborhood of $100 million. In addition to his inheritance from his late mother, we know that the couple are charging $1 millionperspeech fees with the Harry Walker Agency.

Whats behind all this? Raw ambition and an insatiable hunger for power. Vanity Fair says: [Markles] representatives insist she has no plan to run for office, but a close friend suggests its the main reason she didnt give up her American citizenship when marrying into the royal family. Apparently, she may run for president as early as 2024.

Meghan complained in a documentary that she wasnt expecting to be treated so unfairly by the British press. But this is nonsense. The first heard time I heard the name Meghan Markle, I was in a London newsroom. The editors there were in a tizzy because a writer  in hindsight, a prophet  had just filed a piece saying that Meghan Markle was bad news. There seemed to be, back then, no justification for such a swipe. How rude and unkind and Oh gosh, what might readers think? Everyone wanted so badly to like Markle, to give her the benefit of the doubt. And everyone did, for a while.

But you see, the one rule for a royal family  a rule Markle was perfectly aware of when she married into it  is that they dont get involved in politics. They leave us alone. And we leave them alone. With a palace, prince, and pool included  Id say thats a pretty good deal.

More from National Review
Reporters from the World Socialist Web Site Educators Newsletter have recently been in discussion with parents and teachers in Tennessee about the reckless reopening of schools during the COVID-19 pandemic. The teachers and parents often shared similar complaints about the unsafe conditions in schools and pressure to accept the reopening policies.

As of this writing, the Tennessee Department of Education has reported 655 COVID-19 cases related to schools, with 453 students and 202 staff members testing positive. However, the number of cases is likely an underestimate of the spread of the virus throughout the school system, as there have been efforts to suppress information about outbreaks in order to tamp down opposition.

Prior to schools reopening in late August, the Tennessee Department of Health reported 2,000 new COVID-19 cases among children ages five to eighteen between August 4 and August 18. Despite the clear danger of the disease spreading, Tennessees Republican Governor Bill Lee announced that it would be up to local school districts to determine how to reopen, knowing full well the majority of boards of education would allow for some form of in-person instruction.

Current and former teachers and parents shared their thoughts and experiences about the reopening of schools with the WSWS Educators Newsletter. The names of teachers have been omitted to avoid retaliation from the administration. We encourage teachers and parents throughout the US and internationally to contact us in order to speak out about the conditions at your schools, and to attend todays meeting of the Educators Rank-and-File Safety Committee to learn more about the fight against the unsafe return to in-person classes.

A former teacher in the Nashville area, who has resigned and is currently working as a tutor, told the WSWS: It was not like I left thinking of tutoring. It was the anxiety of being back in the building; it was more and more talking about virtual teaching. I just decided this was not going to be a good situation for me. I am already disenchanted with the public school system, and now there were all the things they wanted you to do. They called it different platforms. Every day there were all these issues and it was too stressful for me to teach. It was just like a big, hot mess.

She added, They had months and months over summer, and they put all of their money into teaching virtually instead of figuring out how can you come to school safely, but now they dont have the money to make it safe to go back.

In recent years, parents and teachers have complained about building maintenance, which has become a life-and-death issue with COVID-19.

The former Nashville teacher commented: They were constantly in there repairing heating and air-conditioning units and you cant open windows because of safety issues so you cant get ventilation from the outside. You cant crack open a window, and then you have these long wall units and the air isn't circulating well. A lot of the schools are in terrible condition; they had that musty, moldy, mildew kind of smell. Even with 18 students you cant socially distance at all as is recommended.

A teacher in East Tennessee, who was hired for a remote position, explained, I was hired for virtual teaching, and they told me and everyone in this position that we would be working from home. For the first three weeks of school we all did work at home. Then they changed the policy and we all had to report to a local middle school and work in cubicles to teach.

I dont think that the school administration will keep us safe, and all the other teachers that I work with feel the same way. In my district there was a delay in opening the schools, but I dont even think that had to do with safety. My guess is that they just delayed opening because they needed more time to get the remote instruction set up.

Now everyone I work with thinks that it is absurd to put us all in harms way, since we all could do this job safely from home. Why have us risk our health by coming in to work? If there was an issue having us work from home, why were we allowed to work from home for the first three weeks?

The administration has kept us completely in the dark about the change in policy. They have not even said if the policy was changed by the district or the principal of the school. I feel like the district in general is just saying we know what is good for your health, and you dont. So, just do what we tell you.

In the course of the discussion, the East Tennessee teacher denounced the reopening as poorly planned, with little backup in the event that a teacher became seriously ill during the pandemic. He explained: If I come into contact with COVID, I am supposed to quarantine and teach from home. I have a few days of backup lessons in case Im sick, but thats it. If Im unable to teach my class, who does it? The substitutes are not in training to use the remote platform. I developed my own lesson plan for the course, so who could fill this role?

Cassie, a parent in Tennessee, stated, My husband and I are high risk and have four children under age nine at home. If we follow CDC guidelines for close-quarters caregivers, we have to keep all the kids home.

My two kids in class have RAD [Reactive Airway Disease]. One went in for AIMSweb placement testing one-on-one with his teacher yesterday. My other child goes in next week. I almost didnt send them, but our school doesnt have any cases yet, and they are wearing masks and using their own pencils. The teachers know our reasons for homeschooling.

Cassie expressed that having grown up within the same school district, there is no way that she would put faith in schools to close in response to COVID-19 cases. She further voiced her opposition to the drive of businesses to reopen schools and get parents back to work, stating, Its high time that employers in our country see their employees as people with families instead of hours on a timesheet. Employers have to fill this gap; its not on the schools to supervise students, not anymore.
CHESHIRE  The towns Norton Elementary School is one of four Connecticut schools that have been named 2020 National Blue Ribbon Schools, U.S. Department of Education officials announced Thursday.

The award is given annually to a group of schools from across the nation that demonstrate overall high achievement or success in closing achievement gaps. In addition to Norton, the three other Connecticut schools selected were:

George Hersey Robertson School in Coventry.

South Street School in Danbury.

Northeast School in Vernon.

Norton School has an enrollment of 415 students in kindergarten through sixth grade. Superintendent of Schools Jeff Solan said district officials have known about the honor for nearly six months, but had wait for the federal Department of Education to make it official .

I know how hard you have worked, Solan told about two dozen Norton teachers who gathered for the ceremony announcing the honor Thursday. I am so proud and humbled to work with all of you.

This is the third time in the last 23 years that a Cheshire school has been selected as a National Blue Ribbon School. Dodd Middle School received the honor in 1998 after Highland Elementary School was selected in 1997, according to Solan.

Principal Kelly Grillo became choked up as she addressed her colleagues about the honor.

Thank you for your passion and commitment to our students, Grillo said. This blue ribbon awards validates everything you do, every day. Lets just keep this wonderful thing going.

The school has exceeded its performance index targets for all students in English Language Arts and mathematics consistently for the last three administrations of Smarter Balanced tests. Simultaneously, academic growth measures in both subjects have improved every year.

Gov. Ned Lamont praised the achievement of the four schools and the educators who work at them.

Connecticuts public school teachers are the best in the United States, and the tools they are providing our youngest residents are enabling them to achieve success throughout their careers, Lamont said in a statement.

Every child - no matter their familys income or the neighborhood where they live - deserves access to a quality education that prepares them for achievement, the governor said. We no doubt continue to have work to do to close persistent achievement gaps that have lingered far too long, but I firmly believe that the strong work of so many of our educators is having an impact.

U.S Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos said selections recognize the extraordinary work ... to meet students needs and prepare them for successful careers and meaningful lives.

Up to 420 schools can be nominated for the designation each year. This year, 317 public and 50 non-public schools were honored with the designation, according to federal officials.

Board of Education Chairman Tony Perugini said the award shows the community that our teachers are steadfast in their mission, even in the most difficult of times.

The recognition of Norton School is the second time in as many days that town has been recognized at a national level. It was announced Wednesday that Cheshire was selected as the nations 28th best community in the United States to live in by Money magazine.

Town Manager Sean Kimball said both honors are an acknowledgment that we live in a wonderful community and that better days are ahead.

luther.turmelle@hearstmediact.com
No violations have been recorded since day-start on Saturday.

Russian-controlled armed groups twice violated the ceasefire agreement reached by the Trilateral Contact Group on July 22.

Over the past day, the invaders opened fire on the military near Avdiyivka.

That's according to a morning update by the Joint Forces Operation HQ.

Russian-led forces engaged Ukrainian troops using prohibited grenade launchers of various types, heavy machine guns, and small arms.

Read alsoUkraine intel: Commanders of occupation forces in Donbas embezzle funds, hide personnel shortageAt other sites, the Command recorded no violations. There were no losses among the Ukrainian military.

Since day-start on Saturday, September 26, no enemy shots were reported.

The situation in the area of the Joint Forces operation remains under the control of the Ukrainian defenders. Our soldiers are steadfastly adhering to the terms of the agreements reached during the meeting of the Trilateral Contact Group on July 22, 2020, the statement said.

Truce in Donbas: Background
LOS ANGELES (AP)  Regina King and Uzo Aduba used the come-as-you-are fashion edict for Sunday's virtual Emmy Awards to highlight the national struggle for social justice.

Both Black actresses wore T-shirts featuring Breonna Taylor, the 26-year-old EMT from Louisville, Kentucky, who was shot and killed by police in March. Kings T-shirt featured Taylors face.

The cops still havent been held accountable, King said in a Zoom session with media. She represents just decades, hundreds of years of violence against Black bodies. Wearing Breonnas likeness and representing her and her family and the stories that we were exploring, presenting and holding a mirror up to on Watchmen, it felt appropriate to represent with Breonna Taylor.

King won for actress in a limited series or a TV movie as the masked hero in HBO's Watchmen.

Taylor was shot in her apartment after police officers executing a no-knock warrant burst in and killed her after returning fire from her boyfriend. None of the officers has been charged. One was fired and two others were placed on leave.

Aduba, sitting behind a table at home, wore a black T-shirt with Taylor's name in gold. King and Aduba were pleased to see each other's fashion choice.

I loved when I saw her shirt and standing in it with such strength and power, which we all know she has, said Aduba, winner for supporting actress in a limited series or TV movie for Mrs. America in which she played Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm.

Aduba wanted to give a boost to the demands for social justice that have swept the nation during the coronavirus pandemic this year. Without an audience or red carpet, nominees were encouraged to wear whatever they wanted and say anything in accepting their trophies from wherever they chose to be.

I would be remiss not to bring in some of what is happening outside in the streets and the experiences of so many who look like myself, Aduba told reporters via Zoom.

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Damon Lindelof wore a black T-shirt with Remember Tulsa '21" in yellow letters while accepting the Emmy for limited series writing for Watchmen. Cord Jefferson, who shared the award, and Lindelof stood in front of a banner reading Give a Damn that was hung from a fireplace mantle.

Lindelof, who is white, was drawing attention to the race riot in Oklahoma that occurred after white residents, many of them deputized and given weapons, attacked Black residents and businesses in the city. Jefferson called it the original sin of our show.

This country neglects and forgets its own history often at its own peril, and we should never forget that, Jefferson said.

This Is Us actor Sterling K. Brown presented the show's final award for best drama series. He took the stage at Staples Center wearing a black T-shirt with white letters BLM for Black Lives Matter and a white raised fist.

Host Jimmy Kimmel and several others encouraged viewers to register and vote in the upcoming November elections.
BRUSSELS: The European Medicines Agency has been in contact this month with 38 makers of potential COVID-19 vaccines, an official at the EU drugs regulator said on Tuesday.

As of early September the EMA has been in contact with developers of 38 potential COVID-19 vaccines," Fergus Sweeney, head of clinical studies and manufacturing task force at EMA, told a hearing in the European Parliament.

Vaccines must be authorised by EMA before they can be used in the European Union. No COVID-19 vaccine has been authorised in Europe.

The World Health Organisation lists 38 candidate vaccines in clinical evaluation, including shots developed in China and Russia. Another 149 candidates are in pre-clinical evaluation.

Sweeney said EU procedures to authorise COVID-19 vaccines will follow established standards. He added that the EU was conducting enhanced monitoring on the safety of potential vaccines under development.

Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor
- Ronald Koeman says the Barcelona board was solely responsible for Luis Suarez's exit from Camp Nou

- The 33-year-old joined Atletico Madrid on a two-year deal and was unveiled earlier this weekend

Barca kick off their La Liga title campaign against Villarreal at Camp Nou in Koeman's first official game in charge

Ronald Koeman has exonerated himself from Luis Suarez's departure from Barcelona earlier this month.

The 33-year-old attacker sealed a two-year move to Atletico Madrid having spent six years at the Nou Camp.

Ronald Koeman during his unveiling as new Barcelona manager after Quique Setien's exit. Getty Images.

Source: Getty Images

Though the Dutchman was blamed by many for sacking the Uruguay international from his team, he has now come forward to implicate the Barca board in the deal.

The former Barcelona star also used the avenue to respond to Lionel Messi's anger while trying to tell people not to label him as the bad person in the whole situation. Koeman said:

"Its normal for him to be upset about the fact a great friend has left. But I have no doubts about Messi. I have seen him train.

"It seemed like I have been the bad guy in this movie and its not like that. It was the decision of the club. I respect Suarez a lot and wish him all the best at Atletico Madrid."

Having allowed players like Ivan Rakitic and Arturo Vidal to leave, Barcelona will now shift focus to strengthening their squad before the transfer window shuts.

And they have made both Memphis Depay and Lautaro Martinez their top targets but the manager will have to make do with players at his disposal, including youngsters Ansu Fati. The boss said:

"Were looking for players to improve the team, he added. But we must also understand the financial situation of the club. Regardless of possible signings, we will try to achieve everything

"We have very good forwards, but no one can play three games in a row. We have the quality to let them all play.

"For me, yes, he (Fati) is essential. Hes a great talent. Hes young and has to learn, hes a player for the future but its impressive that at his age he already has the level to play in the first team of Barcelona. It says a lot."

Meanwhile, Barcelona have reportedly concluded plans to make a move for Real Sociedad forward, Willian Jose as an alternative for Memphis Depay.

The Catalans are shopping for a quality replacement for Luis Suarez who parted ways with them this month after six years at the Nou Camp.

Inter Milan attacker Lautaro Martinez is also a major target for the Spanish League outfit as they plan to rebuild their squad.

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Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 23:59:01|Editor: huaxia

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LONDON, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- At least three protesters and one police officer were hurt and treated by medical staff on Saturday during clashes at an anti-lockdown protest in central London's Trafalgar Square as the police ordered protesters to disperse because they failed to respect social distancing.

"Crowds in Trafalgar Square have not complied with the conditions of their risk assessment and are putting people in danger of transmitting the virus," the Metropolitan Police said in a statement.

"This has voided their risk assessment and we have informed the event organisers they are no longer exempt from the regulations...Sadly, some officers have been injured while engaging with people," said the statement.

Thousands attended Saturday's protest with some throwing water and bottles at police, while chanting "pick your side", the BBC reported.

Police used batons against protesters, leaving some with visible injuries as several protesters were led away in handcuffs, according to the report.

Some media reports said that several officers were injured in the clashes.

Rules in England limit indoor and outdoor gatherings to six people. Protests are exempt from the rule-of-six restrictions, but demonstrators must maintain social distance and a risk assessment must be submitted by organizers.

On Friday, London was placed on the national COVID-19 "watch list" as an area of high concern. As the coronavirus cases continue to rise in the British capital, the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, warned that London is "at a very worrying tipping point right now."

Meanwhile, countries, such as Britain, China, Russia and the United States, are racing against time to develop coronavirus vaccines.

The British government's Chief Scientific Adviser Patrick Vallance said Monday that it is possible that some vaccine could be available in small amounts later this year, but it is more likely that a vaccine will be available early next year, although that is not guaranteed. Enditem
PARIS - Struggling to contain resurgent virus infections, European leaders decried a collective failure to vanquish the pandemic and told the U.N. General Assembly on Friday that the time has come for countries to reinvent international co-operation.

This years unusual work-from-home General Assembly  with leaders communicating only in prerecorded speeches  comes as COVID-19 cases escalate in many regions but especially in Europe, where some of the worlds most advanced hospitals in some of the worlds richest countries are again under strain.

This emergency has, more than a thousand treaties or speeches, made us suddenly realize that we are part of one single world, said Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez.

The pandemic has also revealed the fragility of countries that thought they were strong. It has thrown us all into the same sudden battle, against the same common enemy, EU Council President Charles Michel said.

And it has exposed weaknesses within the European Union, which like the U.N. was founded on the ashes of World War II to avert new conflict and encourage co-operation  co-operation that was in short supply this year. The EU has fought internally about access to equipment and vaccines, erected barriers among neighbours to keep out virus infections, and struggled to agree on collective solutions to fight COVID.

Italys prime minister, whose country became a global symbol of the crisis as the first in the West to face a vast wave of infections, said the pandemic should offer world governments the opportunity for collective renewal.

This tragedy has changed us, but has also offered us the opportunity for a new beginning that is up to us to seize, Giuseppe Conte said.

Worldwide, the confirmed COVID-19 death toll is nearing 1 million, though experts believe the real toll is likely higher. In times of global crisis, Europes rich governments are often looked to for financial and material aid for poorer ones. But this time, theyre preoccupied with troubles of their own.

As infections tick up, EU countries are again imposing quarantines on visitors from neighbouring nations. Britain and Spain are imposing local lockdowns, the French Open is curtailing access, and COVID intensive care units in the Mediterranean city of Marseille are reaching saturation.

Meanwhile the pandemic has wrecked livelihoods and darkened the worlds economic outlook, and damaged the whole concept of multilateralism that European leaders have long embraced.

In every corner of the world today, there is a young man, a young woman, looking at their cellphone screen. In the most secluded streets of Naples, in a fish market in Instanbul, in the Zocalo in Mexico City, in the Ecuadorian Amazon or in a market in India. These young people have seen their fathers, their mothers, work ceaselessly, Sanchez said. And maybe these young people wonder why their fathers, their mothers, work ceaselessly if nothing changes around them.

Exactly when did we decide that the expression to change the world had lost all sense and meaning? I wonder if any of those millions of young people are watching us right now, on their mobile phones. I wonder what theyre thinking of us, if so.

He also lamented the extra toll the virus has taken on women, who have taken on the greatest burden of care and attention.

Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis said its time for Europe to redefine its role in the world, and took aim at the World Health Organizations management of the virus.

Other leaders called for boosting the WHOs powers and its funding. Greeces prime minister appealed for more international help for its migrant crisis after feeling abandoned by fellow EU countries that closed their doors to refugees washing up on Greek shores.

And EU Council President Charles Michel used the virtual U.N. pulpit to lash out at Britain for its threats to renege on parts of the Brexit treaty it signed with the EU. Such treaties are seen as a cornerstone of the international system that the U.N. represents, and Britains threats are seen as a further unraveling of that structure in a time of growing nationalism worldwide.

In his speech Saturday, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson will call for countries to share more data on disease outbreaks and to stop slapping export controls on essential goods to help prevent future pandemics, his office said.

The prime ministers 10 Downing Street office said Johnson, who in the spring was hospitalized with COVID-19, plans to tell world leaders that nine months into the pandemic the very notion of the international community looks tattered.

Pope Francis said the world has a choice to make as it tries to emerge from the COVID-19 crisis and address the grave economic impact it has had on the planets most vulnerable: greater solidarity and multilateralism, or a self-retreat into greater individualism and elitism.

Echoing many speakers at this weeks virtual gathering, the Dutch leader said the pandemic should be a wake-up call for the world and the U.N. itself.

If were truly going to defeat this virus well have to do even more to enhance international co-operation, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said. We cant tackle todays challenges with yesterdays structures.

Other leaders used the U.N. virtual floor to call attention to conflicts from Kashmir to the Mideast to Georgia in the Caucasus. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Friday called for an international conference next year to launch a genuine peace process for his region.

___

Raf Casert in Brussels, Nicole Winfield in Rome, Barry Hatton in Lisbon, Joseph Krauss in Jerusalem and Jennifer Peltz in New York contributed to this report. Longtime Associated Press international correspondent Angela Charlton is the APs Paris bureau chief. Follow her on Twitter at http://twitter.com/acharlton

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Alhassan Adam Mubarak, headmaster of Dagbon State Senior High Technical School, commended the Ghana Education Service (GES) and Zoomlion Ghana Limited for stepping in to fumigate and disinfect all Senior High/Technical, Vocational and Special public and private schools in the region.

According to him, the exercise is a strategic move by the GES and the Ministry of Education to curb the problems associated with COVID-19 in schools across Ghana.

While commending the authorities, he appealed for the exercise to be sustained to run during every vacation to completely eradicate the bedbug menace in the schools.

He also noted that his outfit is ready to welcome the students, " we are prepared to receive our students because management has put measures in place so I will say we are ready".

He also underscored the need for parents to ensure that their wards have their face masks on from home before coming to school.

Edmond Kweku Vidjah, Zoomlion General Manager, Eastern Corridor urged school management and students to comply with precautionary measures.

"I will urge all to continue with the measures, they should make sure there is social distancing, washing of hands, wearing of face marks and frequent usage of the hands' sanitizers", he said.

According to him, there has been a reduction in the number of new cases records in the last two months which the authorities decided to continue with the exercise to eradicate the virus in the country.

He noted that getting access to some basic school is a bit of a challenge due to recent rains in the region but his outfit is putting in place to ensure every school in disinfected by the end of next week.

In all, about 1,605 schools are expected to be fumigated and disinfected within Yendi.
A known member of a white supremacist gang was killed in a shootout with police deputies in California on Thursday morning.

According to the San Luis Obispo Sheriffs office, the shootout occurred in a cemetery in Templeton, California.

The suspect Christopher Michael Straub, 38, had significant criminal history and had served 28 jail times around California including two incarcerations in state prison.

A criminal investigation had already been initiated by the Sheriffs gang task force when this incident occurred.

According to the police, they first tried to conduct a traffic stop before Straub exited his vehicle and ran into the nearby cemetery.

The suspect hid and ambushed the deputies, firing multiple rounds and continuing to evade before additional officiers arrived and were able to intercept him.

The police say multiple weapons were discovered in Straubs vehicle, including four assault rifles, a shotgun and handgun.

A search warrant was then initiated on his residence where it was discovered that Straub has been illegally manufacturing parts for weapons.

Straub was a wanted felon and it is illegal for felons to possess weapons, the Sheriffs Office said.

The deputy wounded in the altercation has been identified as Richard Ted Lehnoff, 34, who was airlifted to hospital where he underwent surgery on a leg injury.

He remains in a stable condition while investigation into the suspect continues.
Representative image

India has offered a Line of Credit worth $100 million to Sri Lanka for three solar projects in the country, according to an official statement.

India's High Commissioner to Sri Lanka Gopal Baglay called on Minister of Power Dullas Alahapperuma and reiterated India's commitment towards a strong and multi-faceted bilateral partnership including in the power sector, the Indian mission said in a statement.

They discussed various issues of mutual interest including ways to expedite progress on bilateral power projects currently under discussion between the two sides.

The Indian envoy also handed over a copy of a letter conveying an offer from India to Sri Lanka for a Line of Credit (LoC) worth $100 million for three solar projects announced during the International Solar Alliance Founding Conference held in March, 2018 in New Delhi, the statement said.

The LoC will cover financing for rooftop solar systems meant for 20,000 households and 1,000 government buildings all across the island. The combined generation capacity of these rooftop systems will be about 60 MW, it said.

The LoC will also provide financing for a floating solar power plant. The implementation of the LoC will begin with the conclusion of an LoC agreement between the two sides, it said.

The Indian High Commissioner conveyed that the $100 million LoC is in line with the national priorities of India and Sri Lanka to enhance the share of solar and renewable energy in overall energy generation, the statement added.
As he stressed the importance of the UN, Xi could not be more explicit that no nation has the right to control the destiny of others: Even less should one be allowed to do whatever it likes and be the hegemon, bully, or boss of the world .

The US ruling class obviously wont take this act of defiance lying down. The full spectrum of Hybrid War techniques will continue to be relentlessly turbo-charged against China, coupled with rampant Sinophobia, even as it dawns on many Dr. Strangelove quarters that the only way to really deter China would be Hot War.

Alas, the Pentagon is overstretched  Syria, Iran, Venezuela, South China Sea. And every analyst knows about Chinas cyber warfare capabilities, integrated aerial defense systems, and carrier-killer Dongfeng missiles.

For perspective, its always very instructive to compare military expenditure. Last year, China spent $261 billion while the US spent $732 billion (38% of the global total).

Rhetoric, at least for the moment, prevails. The key talking point, incessantly hammered, is always about China as an existential threat to the free world, even as the myriad declinations of what was once Obamas pivot to Asia not so subtly accrue the manufacture of consent for a future war.

This report by the Qiao Collective neatly identifies the process:

We call it Sinophobia, Inc.  an information industrial complex where Western state funding, billion dollar weapons manufacturers, and right-wing think tanks coalesce and operate in sync to flood the media with messages that China is public enemy number one. Armed with state funding and weapons industry sponsors, this handful of influential think tanks are setting the terms of the New Cold War on China. The same media ecosystem that greased the wheels of perpetual war towards disastrous intervention in the Middle East is now busy manufacturing consent for conflict with China.

That US military edge

The demonization of China, infused with blatant racism and rabid anti-communism, is displayed across a full, multicolored palette: Hong Kong, Xinjiang (concentration camps), Tibet (forced labor), Taiwan, China virus; the Belt and Roads debt trap.

The trade war runs in parallel  glaring evidence of how socialism with Chinese characteristics is beating Western capitalism at its own high-tech game. Thus the sanctioning of over 150 companies that manufacture chips for Huawei and ZTE, or the attempt to ruin TikToks business in the US (But you cant rob it and turn it into a US baby, as Global Times editor-in-chief Hu Xijin tweeted).

Still, SMIC (Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation), Chinas top chip company, which recently profited from a $7.5 billion IPO in Shanghai, sooner or later may jump ahead of US chip manufacturers.

On the military front, maximum pressure on Chinas eastern rim proceeds unabated  from the revival of the Quad to a scramble to boost the Indo-Pacific strategy.

Think Tankland is essential in coordinating the whole process, via for instance the Center for Strategic & International Studies, with corporation and trade association donors featuring usual suspects such as Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, General Dynamics and Northrop Grumman.

So here we have what Ray McGovern brilliantly describes as MICIMATT  the Military-Industrial-Congressional-Intelligence-Media-Academia-Think-Tank complex  as the comptrollers of Sinophobia Inc.

Assuming there would be a Dem victory in November, nothing will change. The next Pentagon head will probably be Michele Flournoy, former Undersecretary of Defense for Policy (2009-2012) and co-founder of the Center for a New American Security, which is big on both the China challenge and the North Korean threat.

Flournoy is all about boosting the U.S. militarys edge in Asia.

So what is China doing?

Chinas top foreign policy principle is to advance a community of shared future for mankind. That is written in the constitution, and implies that Cold War 2.0 is an imposition from foreign actors.

Chinas top three priorities post-Covid-19 are to finally eradicate poverty; solidify the vast domestic market; and be back in full force to trade/investment across the Global South.

Chinas existential threat is also symbolized by the drive to implement a non-Western trade and investment system, including everything from the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and the Silk Road Fund to trade bypassing the US dollar.

A Harvard Kennedy School report at least tried to understand how Chinese authoritarian resilience appeals domestically. The report found out that the CCP actually benefitted from increased popular support from 2003 to 2016, reaching an astonishing 93%, essentially due to social welfare programs and the battle against corruption.

By contrast, when we have a MICCIMAT investing in Perpetual War  or Long War (Pentagon terminology since 2001)  instead of health, education and infrastructure upgrading, whats left is a classic wag the dog. Sinophobia is perfect to blame the abysmal response to Covid-19, the extinction of small businesses and the looming New Great Depression on the Chinese existential threat.

The whole process has nothing to do with moral defeat and complaining that we risk losing the competition and endangering the world.

The world is not endangered because at least vast swathes of the Global South are fully aware that the much-ballyhooed rules-based international order is nothing but a quite appealing euphemism for Pax Americana  or Exceptionalism. What was designed by Washington for post-WWII, the Cold War and the unilateral moment does not apply anymore.

Bye, bye Mackinder

As President Putin has made it very clear over and over again, the US is no longer agreement capable . As for the rules-based international order, at best is a euphemism for privately controlled financial capitalism on a global scale.

The Russia-China strategic partnership has made it very clear, over and over again, that against NATO and Quad expansion their project hinges on Eurasia-wide trade, development and diplomatic integration.

Unlike the case from the 16th century to the last decades of the 20th century, now the initiative is not coming from the West, but from East Asia (thats the beauty of initiative incorporated to the BRI acronym).

Enter continental corridors and axes of development traversing Southeast Asia, Central Asia, the Indian Ocean, Southwest Asia and Russia all the way to Europe, coupled with a Maritime Silk Road across the South Asian rimland.

For the very first time in its millenary history, China is able to match ultra-dynamic political and economic expansion both overland and across the seas. This reaches way beyond the short era of the Zheng He maritime expeditions during the Ming dynasty in the early 15th century.

No wonder the West, and especially the Hegemon, simply cannot comprehend the geopolitical enormity of it all. And thats why we have so much Sinophobia, so many Hybrid War techniques deployed to snuff out the threat.

Eurasia, in the recent past, was either a Western colony, or a Soviet domain. Now, it stands on the verge of finally getting rid of Mackinder, Mahan and Spykman scenarios, as the heartland and the rimland progressively and inexorably integrate, on their own terms, all the way to the middle of the 21st century.
Escalating the ongoing crackdown on the Kurdish-nationalist Peoples Democratic Party (HDP), police arrested 20 people yesterday over the investigation launched by Ankaras Chief Public Prosecutor in the 2014 Kobani protests case. The office declared that 61 more people are sought by police. Furthermore, it will demand the lifting of seven HDP deputies parliamentary immunity over this same investigation.

This anti-democratic political operation came just a few days after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan met with the prosecutor.

HDP detainees include Kars Co-Mayor Ayhan Bilgen, former deputies Srr Sureyya Onder, Ayla Akat Aka, Emine Ayna, Beyza Ustun and Altan Tan, and HDP Foreign Relations Commission member Nazmi Gur. Onder was a member of Imral delegation during Turkeys so-called peace process with the PKKa strategy to use the PKK to strengthen Turkeys hand in Iraq and Syria. The peace process continued in fits and starts from 2009 to 2015, before collapsing when Washington made the Kurdish nationalists its main proxy force in Syria.

According to the Prosecutors Office, those arrested are accused of being leaders of the Kurdistan Workers Party: An investigation was launched  against the so-called executives of the Kurdistan Workers Party/Kurdistan Communities Union (PKK/KCK) terrorist organizations and some executives and members of the party.

Imprisoned former HDP co-chairs Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag are also part of the investigation. They were in jail since 2016, when Erdogans Justice and Development Party (AKP) passed a constitutional amendment stripping HDP deputies of parliamentary immunity, with Republican Peoples Party (CHP) support.

The Prosecutors Office continued: On October 68, 2014, in acts of terrorism generally known as the Kobani incidents in our country; the so-called executives, youth organization, womens organization and armed city organization of the PKK/KCK terrorist organization as well as the HDP Central Executive Committee members and co-chairs made several calls to the people to take to the streets and commit acts of violence via social media accounts and some media outlets.

The Kobani protests erupted across the country over the Erdogan governments refusal to aid the Kurdish Peoples Protection Units (YPG), the Syrian section of KCK, in Kobani during an Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) offensive. During the protests, centred in predominantly Kurdish cities, more than 40 people have killed by police or lost their lives in armed clashes with Islamist militias. However, at the end of the month, the government allowed Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga fighters to cross its territory to reinforce YPG militiasPKKs alliesin Kobani against ISIS.

Simultaneously, police arrested 24 people in several cities in a separate investigation of the Movement of the Nameless, an anti-government social media protest movement. According to the state-owned Anadolu Agency, they were arrested over provocative social media posts that allegedly incited people into enmity and hatred, degraded state officials and attempted to erode the elected government.

While Gazete RED writer Hakan Gulseven was later released, others remain in custody: they include author Temel Demirer, journalist Zeynep Kuray, attorney Tamer Dogan and Social Freedom Party (TOP) spokeswoman Perihan Koca.

These two simultaneous operations, while nominally related to separate investigations, come amid mounting social anger among workers against the governments response to the COVID-19 pandemic. In neighbouring Greece, mass protests have erupted against Athens homicidal herd immunity policy towards the disease.

The Erdogan governments other concern is a potential alliance developing between the bourgeois opposition parties, including the HDP, aiming to oust Erdogan and replace him with a regime more openly aligned with Washington and the European Union (EU) imperialist powers.

While the EU acquiesced to the Spanish states crackdown on the Catalan independence referendum in 2017 and its subsequent jailing of Catalan-nationalist politicians, European Commission spokeswoman Ana Pisonero hypocritically denounced Erdogans crackdown on the HDP. She said, We are waiting for a more formal, high level reaction.

CHPs leader Kemal Klcdaroglu has repeatedly declared that We will come to power together with our friends in the first elections. These friends includes not only its far-right electoral ally, the Good Party, but potentially the HDP as well as two recent AKP split-offs, the Future Party of former AKP Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and the Democracy and Progress Party (DEVA).

While jailed former HDP leader Demirtas has recently called for broader and more open alliances for democracy, freedom, peace and economic prosperity, the party announced last week that it has launched a struggle to create an anti-fascist bloc.

Mithat Sancar, current co-chair of the HDP, stated yesterday: These operations constitute the governments response to our Call to Peace Declaration and to our anti-fascist bloc work.

Klcdaroglu, one of the HDPs potential supposedly anti-fascist allies against Erdogan, called him to state the CHPs solidarity, declaring: Such attacks and operations against the opposition are linked to the fact that that government is trapped, whichever way it turns.

Although Davutoglu was the prime minister in 2014, his newly founded Future Partys spokesperson hypocritically denounced the crackdown on the HDP, stating: Regardless of our political views, we must stand firm in the face of injustice and cruelty. As for the DEVA, it said that such lawless conduct would only benefit terror organizations.

However, the AKP governments increased crackdown on the opposition is also bound up with broader conflicts between Ankara and its NATO imperialist allies, especially over the Syrian war.

Last Sunday, Washingtons special envoy on Syria, James Jeffrey, visited a US military base in northeastern Syria to oversee unity talks between two rival Syrian Kurdish factions, to carve up a Kurdish autonomous authority. This would serve as a political facade for a permanent US military occupation of Syrias oil-producing region.

The negotiations involved the Kurdish National Council in Syria (ENKS) and the Kurdish National Unity Parties led by the Democratic Union Party (PYD), the political arm of the YPG. Previously, Ankara accused Washington and Paris, the initiatives two main backers, of aiming to legitimise the YPG-PKK and to build a terror state in Syria. Ankara has repeatedly invaded Syria in recent years to drive US-backed Kurdish forces from Turkish-Syrian borders.

There is growing speculation that the Turkish government is a preparing new military operation against the Kurdish nationalist forces.

Commenting on this issue, PYD spokesperson Sama Bakdash told Rudaw that Jeffrey said Turkey should not attack the Eastern Euphrates or any other part that is currently not under its control. If it does, the US will prevent and sanction it, like it didnt in the past. According to the BBC Turkce, PYD leader Salih Muslim warned: With the last operation against the HDP, the door to civil war has been opened.

The direct link between war abroad and police-state policies at home shows that democratic rights, including those of the Kurds, cannot be defended without opposing imperialist war. However, bourgeois opposition parties like the CHP and the Kurdish-nationalist parties are deeply tied to imperialism and are as incapable of waging such a struggle as the Erdogan government itself. The only force capable of undertaking this struggle is the international working class, mobilized and unified on a socialist and internationalist program.
The Pakistani-born teenager arrested on suspicion of stabbing two people with a meat cleaver has admitted to deliberately targeting the former Paris office of Charlie Hebdo magazine.



The 18-year-old, named by investigators as Hassan A., reportedly tied the attack to the satirical magazines recent republication of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed, investigators said on September 26.



The stabbings came roughly three weeks after the start of the trial in Paris of 14 suspected accomplices in the January 2015 attacks on Charlie Hebdo, in which 12 were killed.



The court has heard that the suspects had sought to avenge the Prophet Muhammad, nearly a decade after Charlie Hebdo published cartoons mocking him. Ahead of the start of the trial, Charlie Hebdo reprinted some of the caricatures.



The two wounded victims of the September 25 stabbing -- a man and a woman -- were taking a cigarette break outside the Premieres Lignes news-production agency when the incident occurred.



Premieres Lignes's offices are on the same block in central Paris that formerly housed Charlie Hebdo.



A source close to the inquiry told AFP that the Pakistani teenager mistakenly believed Charlie Hebdo's offices were still in that building and wanted to attack journalists from the magazine.



Charlie Hebdo moved offices after the 2015 attack and its current address is kept secret.



The suspect, who was arrested with blood on his clothing not far from the crime scene, "takes responsibility for his action and places the attack "in the context of the republication of cartoons" of the Prophet Mohammed in Charlie Hebdo on the eve of the trial opening, sources told AFP news agency.



French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said on September 25 the knifing was "clearly an act of Islamist terrorism.



Obviously, there is little doubt. It's a new bloody attack against our country, against journalists, against this society, he said in an interview with the France 2 television station.



Anti-terror prosecutors have opened an investigation.



The interior minister said the main suspect was believed to have arrived in France three years ago as an unaccompanied minor from Pakistan. He had not been flagged for radicalization.



Investigators said he acted alone but police have detained eight other people for questioning, including the suspect's younger brother.



An Algerian man who was also arrested shortly after the stabbings for possible links to main suspect has been released. His lawyer told AFP that the man had tried to stop the attacker.



With reporting by AFP, AP, and Reuters.


Since COVID-19 reached Texas, public schools have had to use money not previously budgeted for the pandemic to purchase the necessary equipment, such as laptops, personal protective equipment, and new online learning programs, to meet standards set forth by the Texas Education Agency.

As the guest speaker at the Cy-Fair Houston Chamber of Commerce workforce and education committee virtual meeting Sept. 24, Robert Long with Raise Your Hand Texas described what the organization is doing leading up to the 87th Texas Legislative Session in 2021 to continue promoting their core goals, which include increasing teacher retention and funding for public schools.

State of the district: Cy-Fair ISD officials recap COVID-19 precautions

Teachers have had to learn how to teach in this new COVID-era environment on the fly.

However, Texas educators have been innovatively navigating through challenges such as the simultaneous teaching of on-campus and online learners so that their districts are able to accurately capture attendance data, Long, regional director for advocacy and outreach, said in an email. This is important, he stated, because of the correlation between student attendance and funding for schools.

A lot of teachers are struggling right now because of a mechanism of how our schools are funded when it comes to attendance, Long said during the committee meeting. Theyre having to teach in person and virtual students at the same time. Its not the districts fault, its a mechanism of school funding and how we get our schools funded through attendance.

Over 14 years, Raise Your Hand Texas  chaired by Charles Butt, owner of H-E-B  has aimed to improve public schools to better serve students; advocating for policy change, improved teacher education and keeping control of public schools within the hands of the local community.

The pandemic is affecting many facets of public education, whether socially, mentally or financially.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Texas school districts report scattered COVID cases, no major outbreaks

Cy-Fair ISD previously budgeted an extra $10 million for COVID-19 expenditures for the 2020-2021 school year and has provided more than 37,000 Chromebooks and 18,170 laptops along with mobile hotpots for students. Cy-Fair ISD, like other public Texas school districts, spent extra funds on delivering education and equipment for students since the COVID-19 pandemic came to the Houston-area.

The districts didnt even consider that theyre having to purchase hotspots, broadband, Long said. When Im speaking to superintendents, one thing theyre really concerned about is making sure their staff is really comfortable in the building, period, making sure that that comfort level is there.

Raise Your Hand Texas is working to gain more accessible and free COVID-19 testing for Texas educators whose insurance will not cover their test. The organization is also advocating for mental health support, including counseling sessions for all teachers.

The back-to-school adjustment has been challenging for students as well, according to Kevin Kalra, chief operating officer with Montessori Childrens School.

Its very hard for children to just jump back into the routine of school, Kalra said. They need time. Theyre overcoming anxiety. Were even seeing that with little preschoolers right now after being home for so long. Our teachers and school board members need time.

For more information on Raise Your Hand Texas, visit www.raiseyourhandtexas.org/ .

chevall.pryce@chron.com
In this TV grab released by Ukraine's Emergency Situation Ministry, an AN-26 military plane bursts into flames after it crashed in the town of Chuguyiv close to Kharkiv

A total of 26 people, most of them air cadets, have been killed in a military plane crash in Ukraine.

Footage of the crash released by officials on social media showed the smouldering remains of the Antonov-26 transport plane.

Most of the dead were students of the Kharkiv National Air Force University, the air force said in a statement.

There were 27 people on board, 20 cadets and seven crew.

On Saturday, the death toll rose after three more bodies were found under the charred remains of the plane and one of the two survivors died in hospital from extensive burns.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky described the crash as a "terrible tragedy".

"We are urgently creating a commission to investigate all the circumstances and causes of the tragedy," he wrote on Facebook.

Mr Zelensky visited the only remaining survivor in a military hospital in Kharkiv, posting a picture of the 20-year-old cadet lying in bed with a bandaged head and right arm.

He said the cadet, Vyacheslav Zolochevsky, "came to his senses near the wreckage of the An-26."

"The plane was destroyed, there was fire, darkness and bodies all around. One of the guys was burning," he said on Facebook, adding that Zolochevsky rushed to try and save him. The second cadet died in hospital.

Doctors said that Mr Zolochevsky suffered a concussion but his life was not in danger.

The wreckage of an AN-26 military plane after it crashed in the town of Chuguyiv - Kharkiv Regional State Administration via AP

The plane crashed at around 8.50pm local time (5.50pm GMT), just over a mile from the Chuhuiv military air base.

Most cadets onboard were believed to be between the ages of 19 and 22.

In photos released by the emergency services, firefighters in helmets and reflective clothing sprayed aircraft debris with jets of water.

The body of the plane burst into flames on landing and firefighters were able to extinguish the blaze after an hour.

The town of Chuhuiv is around 30 kilometres southeast of Kharkiv and 100 kilometres west of the front line where government forces are fighting pro-Russian separatists.

Story continues

The presidency said that according to preliminary information the transport plane crashed during a training flight.

Several military planes have crashed in Ukraine during training flights in recent years. A pilot was killed in December 2018 after his Su-27 fighter crashed during landing in the Zhytomyr region.

Two months earlier, the same model of fighter crashed in a neighbouring region during the Clear Sky 2018 joint military exercises between Ukraine and NATO countries, killing the American and Ukrainian pilots on board.

In 2002, a Su-27 fell into the crowd at an airshow in Lviv in the western Ukraine killing 77 people and injuring 165 others.

The Antonov-26 is a light transport aircraft designed in Ukraine during the Soviet era. It is 24 metres long and has a wingspan of 29 metres and can fly at a cruising speed of 440 kilometres per hour.

In 2014, Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 was downed killing 298 people over an area of eastern Ukraine controlled by pro-Russian separatists.

Moscow has denied the findings of international investigators that a Russian BUK missile hit the Malaysian Airlines flight.
MAYOR Michael Collins cut the tape thus officially opening Rathkeales new Welcome Centre, with a Failte Ireland Tourist Point.

Located at the Rathkeale Community Centre, the Welcome Centres friendly staff will help visitors find local attractions, services, and businesses. They will also greet tourists referred by the many Failte Ireland and Limericks Atlantic Edge European Embrace initiatives.

Sincere well done. It is so enlightening to have such a good news story at this time for Tourism, said event attendee John Fitzgerald of the Limerick Tourism Taskforce.

We have to take this time as a once in a generation opportunity to do something different and creative and listening to you guys tonight gives me reasons to cheer. I genuinely believe in community / local driven tourism projects as the secret to success.

The opening ceremony last Friday had a guest list of 27 dignitaries including Cllr Bridie Collins; Mayor Michael Collins; Minister Niall Collins; Cllr Stephen Keary; Cllr John O'Donoghue; Deputy Richard O'Donoghue; Minister Patrick O'Donovan; Aoife Potter-Cogan, councils administrative officer for tourism; and Cllr Adam Teskey.

Speakers included the mayor, Donie OConnor, manager of the Welcome Centre, as well as Pat Neville, chairperson of the Rathkeale Community Council.

Rathkeale is the start of the Greenway and will soon be at the corner of the Foynes to Limerick motorway, making the town more convenient to Limericks 94,000 people, said Mr Neville.

We want all visitors to feel welcome and have a place where they can learn about what this friendly town has to offer.

Derek Downes, owner of the towns Eurospar and founding member of a new Rathkeale business group, said: The Welcome Centre and its Failte Ireland connection is another good news story for forward looking Rathkeale.

Its the kind of event welcomed by the 45 plus business owners that are working to let people know that they can trust Rathkeale as the safest place to shop, said Mr Downes.

Ensuring everything was kept local and proud, the event was generously catered by Rathkeales Bloomers Cafe and Restaurant and the Deel Bakery.

For more Limerick news click here
A collective of nursing students at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing (SON) have published an open letter expressing opposition to the failure of university administrators to provide adequate financial support to dozens of struggling students and sufficient clinical training for confronting the coronavirus pandemic.

As of early this month, the letter had been signed by 125 nursing students and is a damning exposure of the willful neglect and callous disregard on the part of university officials toward students and young health care workers in waging its reckless school reopening drive.

The letter was released August 24 and published on a WordPress page to express the outrage growing among students in the SON toward UPenns COVID-19 policies. In particular, it points to the refusal to grant students refunds for the enormous drop-off in education quality due to the transition to remote learning.

While Penn Nursing has been named one of the premier nursing schools in the world, the letters authors say that their repeated efforts to demand adequate support and transparency, quality education, reduced costs and licensing accommodations have been met with indifference and even hostility from university administrators.

UPenn nursing students are advancing a number of demands of the university to meet its commitment to students, including the following:

an itemized bill for summer and fall 2020 delineating the costs of clinical experiences and the general fee;

a retroactive refund for all clinical-related costs for summer 2020 and a retroactive 10 percent reduction of the summer 2020 general fee commensurate with the reduction students received for fall 2020;

the formation of a nursing student working group to meet biweekly with SON administrators to discuss the impact of COVID-19 on students education and ways in which the school can provide more adequate financial and academic support.

Since the shutdown of the UPenn campus on March 17, nursing students in the latter half of the spring and entirety of the summer semesters were largely cut off from accessing vital resources and instruction. Students are claiming that even standard and basic training for nursing experiences, such as in-person simulation lab and clinical training, have not been adequately delivered to the vast majority of nursing students in the program.

Nursing students across UPenn SON programs first began voicing their anger in mid-April to the nursing school dean and dean for academic programs, as well as other Penn administration officials. Their concerns highlighted the significant drop-off of education quality following the campus-wide shutdown and the refusal of the university to alleviate the financial burdens being placed on students.

On August 11 the university announced a paltry 10 percent fee reduction to the schools $2,677 per semester general fee and other minor cost changes meant to address the financial challenges of students. This also included a cancellation of a tuition hike that was planned for the 2020-2021 school year.

The nursing students letter notes that this meager support barely equals the loss of resources due to the impact of the pandemic. The authors state that the UPenn administration claims it is supporting students by offering a fee refund of less than $300 and canceling a tuition increase that never should have been implemented in the first place.

On April 17, SON Dean Antonia Villarruel sent an email to students promising that education during the pandemic would be no different in character or quality. In fact, the transition to remote learning has been marked by decline in quality and poorly implemented coursework. Many students have pointed to the inadequacy of the online program iHuman, which was adopted for students to complete clinical trials and physical assessments virtually. Villarruel claimed that the initiative had been thoroughly vetted and has an evidence-base affirming the outcomes and values of the program.

The student letter notes, however, that the computerized nature of the application did not have any real value and does not sufficiently teach students to prepare for and apply physical assessment skills in an actual health care setting. In addition, students are forced to replace conversation and interaction with patients with artificial dropdown menu sentences which fail to reflect actual nurse-to-patient interactions.

During the summer semester, the so-called clinical experience students received consisted of only 30 hours of a variety of videos and podcasts that are available in the public domain for free. The new online format also did little to nothing to address the needs of students with disabilities.

In spite of all these glaring problems, the administration maintained that reduction of tuition and fees for the spring, summer and fall semesters was off the table. When asked in a meeting on May 7 whether the administration would consider the ways in which nursing students have struggled, Dean Villarruel refused to even address the question.

Administration officials also failed to fulfill their promises of creating work-study position referrals or other employment programs, which werent put in place until Aug. 10, four months after the start of the pandemic, despite the massive loss of income following the campus closure.

As far as financial assistance, the university directed students to an emergency funding webpage source called Emergency and Opportunity Funding. While the webpage claims students may receive a one-time grant of up to $1,000, actual funding is of a highly limited and restrictive character and cannot be used to pay for living expenses such as rent or utilities, expenses during the summer semester or to cover university tuition and fees.

SON students claimed in the letter that this funding is inadequate and not meant to address the needs we have repeatedly outlined. Emphasizing the deplorable economic conditions students face, the letter notes, many of us rely on Medicaid and EBT (food stamps). EBT qualification depends on proof of work-study, so cutting off work-study opportunities has serious implications for students.

In response to this, the university has since referred students to the Office of Financial Aid, which has encouraged students to take out more student loans, something that will certainly exacerbate already astronomical debt. Dean Villarruel responded to a question about COVID relief funding at a public meeting on August 3 with the insulting suggestion that students share the contact information of their rich aunts or uncles so the school could request funding from them. The dean also said students should make fruitless attempts to contact their congresspeople to enact legislation providing financial relief.

UPenn is one of many institutions of higher learning that have witnessed student opposition to exorbitant tuition and fee costs despite the inaccessibility of student services during the pandemic. In April, students at two colleges, Drexel University and the University of Miami, filed class-action lawsuits in South Carolina federal court against their schools in the hopes of receiving some form of reimbursements.

All over the country, anger is brewing over the high cost of undergraduate and graduate instruction on college campuses amidst the swift turn to online remote learning. At Rutgers University in New Jersey, more than 30,000 students have signed a petition started in July calling for an elimination of unnecessary fees associated with on-campus activity and a 20 percent tuition cut. In the University of North Carolina system, more than 40,000 have signed a demand for a refund of housing charges to students in the event of another COVID-19-related shutdown, which occurred in March after the virus forced the closure of campuses.

Universities have responded to the economic fallout due to the pandemic with savage austerity measures to offset shrinking revenues. At Chapman University in Southern California, President Daniele Struppa has described brutal spending cuts that have included a hiring freeze, slashing expenses and ending the retirement match for new employees.

At Temple University, the founder of the campus relief agency Hope Center for College, Community and Justice told the New York Times that the organization has been bombarded with pleas for help from students who cant cover their rent and are unable to apply for food stamp benefits.
13 films were in the running for prizes in this years San Sebastian Film Festival competition, but it doesnt appear to have been much of a contest at all. In a stunning sweep, Georgian writer-director Dea Kulumbegashvilis debut feature Beginning took four of the jurys seven prizes, including Best Screenplay, Best Director, Best Actress for star Ia Sukhitashvili, and finally the Golden Shell for Best Film.

Its a remarkable haul for a harrowing, avant-garde film that has taken critics by surprise this fall festival season, also landing the Fipresci critics prize in Toronto last week. The Franco-Georgian production centers on a close-knit community of Jehovahs Witnesses in remote rural Georgia, and tracks the growing psychological torment of its leaders wife (played by Sukhitashvili) in the wake of an extremist attack on their place of worship.

A challenging film to economically distil, it has prompted critical comparisons to the work of Chantal Akerman and Michael Haneke, and bears the imprimatur of executive producer Carlos Reygadas, though it establishes the 34-year-old Kulumbegashvili as a unique talent in her own right. Jury president Luca Guadagnino preceded the presentation of the top prize with a lavish dedication to the film, describing it as a revelation.

Beginning was one of several Cannes Label films to unspool at San Sebastian, having been intended to premiere in the French fests official competition  though had that come to pass, its hard to imagine the film would have been as spectacularly rewarded as it was tonight. It will go on to play virtually at the New York Film Festival, where it looks to be a hot ticket. The interest of international distributors will likewise have been piqued by its triumph.

Among the films fighting for the few remaining scraps left by the jury, veteran British director Julien Temples music documentary Crock of Gold: A Few Rounds With Shane MacGowan, come out on top, winning the runner-up Special Jury Prize. The film, an irreverent, loosely styled profile of the frontman of Irish punk-rock band The Pogues, matches the shambolic, hard-drinking personality of its subject with wild formal swings and animated excerpts, and is produced by Johnny Depp, who also makes an onscreen appearance.

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It was one of three documentaries in the official selection: In his speech, Temple commended the festival for breaking down the divide between fiction and non-fiction filmmaking, noting that he sees little difference between the two.

Continuing in the boozy spirit of Temples film, Best Actor was collectively awarded to the male ensemble of Thomas Vinterbergs Another Round: Mads Mikkelsen, Thomas Bo Larsen, Magnus Millang and Lars Ranthe. Mikkelsen headlines the film, playing a disaffected high school teacher who decides to juice up his life by becoming a high-functioning alcoholic. Since its Toronto premiere, the film has been widely hailed as a return to form for former Dogme 95 trailblazer Vinterberg, and looks to be major arthouse conversation piece.

It was a strong night for female directors at the festival: In addition to Kulumbegashvilis victory, women took top honors in the festivals New Directors, Latin Horizons and Zabaltegi-Tabakaleri competitions. In a high-quality, competitive New Directors section, German-born newcomer Isabel Lamberti took the prize for her moving docufiction hybrid Last Days of Spring, a powerful study of an extended real-life family on the outskirts of Madrid, facing the tumult of being rehomed by the authorities.

The Latin Horizons Award, meanwhile, went to Mexican director Fernanda Valadez for her film Identifying Features, delivering on the promise of the Films In Progress Award she won for the same project at San Sebastian in 2018. The film also landed audience and jury awards at Sundance in January. Portuguese freshman Catarina Vasconcelos landed the Zabaltegi-Tabakalera prize for her debut The Metamorphosis of Birds.

Finally, the festivals audience awards went to a pair of established Sundance hits. Florian Zellers tear-jerking Anthony Hopkins-Olivia Colman starrer The Father landed the main prize, underlining its broad appeal as it heads into Oscar season. Maite Alberdis playful documentary The Mole Agent, meanwhile, took the audience award for best European film of the fest.

OFFICIAL SELECTION PRIZES

Golden Shell for Best Film: Beginning, Dea Kulumbegashvili

Special Jury Prize: Crock of Gold: A Few Rounds With Shane MacGowan, Julien Temple

Silver Shell for Best Director: Beginning, Dea Kulumbegashvili

Silver Shell for Best Actress: Beginning, Ia Sukhitashvili

Silver Shell for Best Actor: Another Round, Mads Mikkelsen, Thomas Bo Larsen, Magnus Millang and Lars Ranthe

Best Screenplay: Beginning, Dea Kulumbegashvili and Rati Oneli

Best Cinematography: Any Crybabies Around?, Yuta Tsukinaga

OTHER FESTIVAL PRIZES:

New Directors Award: Last Days of Spring, Isabel Lamberti

New Directors Award (Special Mention): Slow Singing, Dong Xingyi

Horizontes Award: Identifying Features, Fernanda Valadez

Horizontes Award (Special Mention): One in a Thousand, Clarisa Navas

San Sebastian Audience Award: The Father, Florian Zeller

Audience Award for Best European Film: The Mole Agent, Maite Alberdi

Zabaltegi-Tabakalera Award: The Metamorphosis of Birds, Catarina Vasconcelos

Zabaltegi-Tabakalera Award (Special Mention): The Woman Who Ran, Hong Sang-soo

TVE Another Look Award: Never Rarely Sometimes Always, Eliza Hittman

TVE Another Look Award (Special Mention): Gull, Kim Mi-jo

Spanish Cooperation Award: Identifying Features, Fernanda Valadez

Irizar Basque Film Award: Where is Mikel?, Amaia Merino and Miguel Angel Llamas

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Linkedin Alya Nurbaiti (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, September 26, 2020 15:15 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c476b40d 1 Business Indonesia,BUMN,investment,Bahlil-Lahadalia,China,South-Korea,relocation,erick-thohir,footwear,adidas,New-Balance,Reebok,factories,Pati,Central-Java,BKPM Free

Garment company PT Sejin Fashion Indonesia, a subsidiary of South Korean footwear manufacturer Parkland Co., Ltd., has made the decision to relocate its production base from China to Indonesia, a top official said on Saturday.

The plan was confirmed following a visit to South Korea by Investment Coordinating Board (BKPM) head Bahlil Lahadalia and State-Owned Enterprises Minister Erick Thohir on Wednesday and Thursday.

One more company is going to relocate from China to Indonesia. Its a labor-intensive industry, it could add up to 4,000 new jobs. Hopefully, it will help the economy during this COVID-19 crisis, Bahlil said in a written statement on Saturday, adding that Sejin would also increase foreign exchange as it exported its products.

Sejin plans to relocate its factory from Dalian city in China to Pati regency in Central Java. The companys total investment value is estimated at US$35 million.

Read also: Experts warn against complacency as foreign companies plan relocation to Indonesia

The company is expecting support from the Indonesian government in the form of a survey on non-new capital goods (BMTB) machines to be relocated from factories in China, the establishment of an industrial zone, a permit on bringing in expert foreign workers during the pandemic and eligibility for a tax allowance scheme.

Bahlil further said the government had accepted Sejins application on tax incentives.

Parkland CEO Myeong-gyu Park expressed optimism that Sejin would thrive in Indonesia, just as Parkland did for the past 15 years.

The Busan-based company established its local company, PT Parkland World Indonesia, in 2005 and has since produced footwear for brands such as Adidas, New Balance and Reebok. It has factories in Serang in Banten and Jepara, Rembang and Pati in Central Java.

Sejin director Ho-jung Park said he appreciated the BPKMs quick response to the investment.

We are greatly helped by all the support given. We will do our best so that we can immediately realize our investment in Indonesia," Park said.
Rotten bananas? Mushy avocados? Pulped oranges? Talash Huijbers wants them all.

The 25-year-old is the founder of Insectipro, a Kenyan farm rearing black soldier fly larvae for animal feed. In the 10 days it takes for them to grow, the larvae need to be fed too - and fruit waste from factories and food markets in the capital Nairobi is just the thing.

"We take all the green waste in Nairobi and we turn it into something of high value, animal protein," said Huijbers at their farm in Limuru, 28 kilometers (17 miles) from Nairobi. "From waste to gold."

Every day, the farm processes around 20 to 30 tonnes per day of fruit waste and produces 2 and 2.5 tonnes of larvae, which are then dried and turned into animal feed. Any remaining waste is used as manure, some of it on the farm, and the rest is sold to farmers in neighbouring farms.

The firm is the biggest in a wave of investment into larvae farming, seen as a lucrative and environmentally friendly way to dispose of organic waste and generate animal feed as concern rises over environmental pollution and sustainable eating.

"The end product of the waste goes to produce crops. And then the larvae that you get goes in to feed our livestock," said Chrysantus Mbi Tanga, a research scientist at the Nairobi-based International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology (ICIPE).

The institute has trained 2,000 black soldier fly farmers in Kenya in the past year and a half, but almost all are small operations. Insectipro, which began with an investment of $850,000 two years ago, is the biggest. They will have their first profit before the end of the year, Huijbers said.

The company says it can't keep up with orders and hopes to double or triple production by the end of the year when it gets a bigger dryer.

Now Insectipro is researching the production of chitin, a byproduct of the black soldier fly's pupa as it turns into an adult. The pharmaceutical industry uses it in compounds for dressing wounds.

"The anti-microbial properties, anti-fungal, anti-bacterial properties, when you put them in wounds, it helps to eliminate these bacteria that are causing decay," Tanga said.
Describing the three labour codes passed by Parliament as "anti-labour", the Congress on Saturday attacked the government, alleging the legislations have "weakened" trade unions and removed the "security net" for workers. Parliament on Wednesday approved the three labour codes that will remove impediments to winding up of companies and allow firing of staff without government permission in firms with up to 300 workers from the existing 100.

Attacking the government over the bills, senior Congress leader and former minister of labour and employment Mallikarjun Kharge said the government's claim that the laws will increase ease of doing business is false.

"They have weakened trade unions and finished the security and safety for the workers," he told an online media briefing. "States' powers have been usurped by the central government with these laws. These codes are anti-worker, anti-labourer and it is important to agitate against them," the Rajya Sabha MP said.

"All parties must oppose these laws. The Modi government only listens to corporates and after these laws it will not listen to trade unions," he said. Congress spokesperson Pawan Khera alleged this government is "betraying the interests" of different sections one after another.

As the issue of injustice to farmers was ongoing, this government betrayed workers, just like farmers," he said. "The government made the excuse while bringing in the new labour laws there will be ease of doing business and it will be beneficial for all. But if you look at the laws it is clear that there is no protection and relief for workers in these laws," Khera said.

Despite the country witnessing the hardships of migrant labourers during the lockdown, there is no provision for them in these laws, he claimed. "It is in the DNA of the government to set aside democratic principles and force its decisions on the people," Khera alleged and claimed the laws were passed by Parliament in a rush.

Indian National Trade Union Congress president G Sanjeeva Reddy alleged that there is no provision for safety and security of workers in these bills. "We will protest and struggle against these unjust, anti-labour and anti-trade union laws," he said. These laws have been brought for strengthening and helping the capitalists and corporates not the workers, he alleged, claiming that under the new provisions, the workers will not be able to go on strike or raise their voice against unjust practices.

There was protection for workers earlier as permission was needed to lay off more than 100 workers, but now that "security net" is gone with the increase in threshold to 300, he said.

"About 2-3 crore small scale industries have been excluded from this protection," he claimed. On Wednesday, Rajya Sabha had passed by voice vote, the three labour codes on industrial relations, social security and occupational safety amid a boycott by opposition parties, including the Congress and the Left, over the suspension of eight MPs.

The first code on wages was approved by Parliament last year. With passage of these three codes, 29 central labour laws have been codified into four broad codes as contemplated by the government under labour reforms to improve ease of doing business and providing universal social security to workers as well.

The three codes were passed by Lok Sabha on Tuesday. "The purpose of labour reforms is to provide a transparent system to suit the changed business environment," Labour Minister Santosh Gangwar had said in the Rajya Sabha while replying to the debate on the three labour reforms bills.

The minister had also told the House that as many as 16 states have already increased the threshold for closure, lay off and retrenchment in firms with up to 300 workers without government permission.

The Opposition has also been protesting the passage of three agriculture-related bills -- Farmer's Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020, the Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020 and the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020.

They have been passed by both Houses and await presidential assent.
Were doing all right, Ravenscroft said at a Thursday briefing. But, yes, there are a lot of ill patients in here COVID-related.

This week, Dr. Cliff Robertson, CEO of CHI Health, reported that CHI Healths coronavirus patient count had grown to 68, just two more than a week ago. COVID-19 patients in ICUs had declined by four in the last week, he said.

Dr. Bob Rauner, president of Partnership for a Healthy Lincoln, said the outbreaks around the state dont stem only from Labor Day gatherings. They involve all kinds of social and sporting events, he said, and also go beyond Lincoln and Omaha into smaller communities around the state.

Douglas Countys average daily count of new cases rose to 109 this week, up from 89 a week ago. The positivity rate on COVID-19 tests rose to 10% so far this week, after dropping to 7.3% last week.

The states daily average of new cases rose to 401, up from 364 last week.

As cases keep spreading, Rauner said, they have potential to overwhelm hospital capacity in the next couple of weeks.

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Linkedin Alya Nurbaiti (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, September 26, 2020 06:12 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c47569b9 1 National tim-mawar,Indonesian-Military,defense-ministry,Prabowo-Subianto,Indonesian-Army,1998-tragedy,activists,kidnapping Free

President Joko Jokowi Widodo has appointed six military officers to strategic posts within the Defense Ministry, including two former members of the infamous Tim Mawar (Rose Team) of the Armys Special Forces (Kopassus), which was implicated in the notorious forced disappearances of activists in the late 1990s.

Defense Ministry spokesperson Brig. Gen. Djoko Purwanto confirmed the appointments  stipulated by a presidential decree on Wednesday  but said the administrative process was still ongoing.

The inauguration will take place following the approval of the Indonesian Military [TNI] commander, Djoko said on Friday, referring to TNI commander Air Chief Marshal Hadi Tjahjanto.

According to the decree, a copy of which was obtained by The Jakarta Post, former Tim Mawar member Brig. Gen. Dadang Hendrayudha, who previously served as the head of the general affairs bureau at the National Counterterrorism Agency (BNPT) secretariat, will serve as the Defense Ministry's director general for defense potential.

Brig. Gen. Yulius Selvanus, another former member of Tim Mawar who currently serves at the Praja Vira Tama military command post (Korem) in Sorong, Papua, has been appointed to helm the ministry's strategic defense installation body (Bainstrahan).

Read also: Indonesian Military deployed for coronavirus fight

The notorious Tim Mawar was implicated in a series of kidnappings and disappearances of prodemocracy activists between 1997 and 1998, at the tail end of the New Order regime, when now-Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto was heading Kopassus.

At least 22 activists were abducted during the period. Nine were eventually returned, and 13 remain missing more than two decades later.

On Aug. 25, 1998, the Armed Forces (ABRI)  since renamed the TNI  honorably discharged then-Lt. Gen. Prabowo Subianto and removed two Kopassus officers from active duty as punishment for their suspected roles in the abduction of prodemocracy activists.

In 1999, the Jakarta High Military Court sentenced the commander of Tim Mawar and all ten of its members to between 12 and 22 months in prison. Five of the members were to be stripped of their positions and discharged from the TNI, including Yulius.

However, after they appealed the courts verdict, none were dismissed.

In 2016, four Tim Mawar members  Dadang, Yulius, Fausani Syahrial Multhazar and Nugroho Sulistyo Budi  were promoted to strategic posts in the government.

Read also: How democracy dies

Yulius was promoted to head of the Riau Islands branch of the State Intelligence Agency (BIN), while Dadang was promoted to a position in the BNPT.

The appointment of Yulius and Dadang to the Defense Ministry came after Prabowo appointed Chairawan Kadarsyah Kadirussalam Nusyirwan, the former commander of Tim Mawar, as one of the ministry's special assistants in December of last year.

Rights activists lambasted the appointment of the military generals to the positions, with Amnesty International Indonesia executive director Usman Hamid saying that Jokowi had violated his own promises to resolve past human rights abuses in the country.

Instead of bringing the suspects of past human rights abuses to court, the government has placed them in power. Those who are involved in human rights violations should not be given leadership positions in either the military or other structural positions in the government, Usman said.

He demanded that the government immediately investigate past human rights violations, including the cases of the disappeared activists. The governments lack of commitment in settling the cases, Usman said, would only prolong the culture of impunity.
When we were children, my grandmother regaled us with ghost stories. Not the ones made up merely to scare and entertain, but real ghost stories, ones experienced and retold by her family and friends in Gonzales.

One of our favorites was about why, for decades, the four faces of the courthouse clock seemed to always be broken. It was, my grandmother told us, because of a curse put on them by a man hung for a crime he insisted he did not commit.

While waiting for his hanging day, the man stared at the north face of the clock from his cell window in the Gonzales County jail. Focusing all his fear and anger on the clock, watching it count down his life to its final days and hours, he vowed that the proof of his innocence would be that after his death, it would never, again, keep accurate time.

He was hung, and the clock was often broken.

In my grandmothers telling, the man never had a name or ethnicity, nor was it said of what crime hed been accused. But I always assumed he was Black.

Years later, as an adult, I was reading Ed Syers Ghost Stories of Texas when one of his tales gave me the thrill of recognition  it was the one my grandmother had told.

Syers filled in some of the details. The mans name was Albert Howard, and on March 18, 1921, he became the last man hanged in the old Gonzales County jail. Syers also talked to someone from the Gonzales Chamber of Commerce who confirmed that for years, the clocks were out of sync, despite repeatedly having been fixed. Syers said that as he was leaving Gonzales, he circled the courthouse and saw the clock had four different times.

A few years ago, I did some research and learned that Howard was a young Black man whod been accused of sexually assaulting an elderly white woman.

One of the things that fascinates me about Howards story is how in its telling and retelling, passed down through generations, his ethnicity is never mentioned and he stops being Black.

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Yet his being Black is important to the story. When telling the story of a man feeling so wronged that his only recourse is to put a curse on the courthouse, its important to note that he was a young Black man accused of sexually assaulting a white woman. In Texas. In 1921. It may explain a lot.

Its as if the whitewashing would spare people from making the connection between Black men and nooses, and keep them from knowing that the long history of Black men protesting their innocence before being hanged is as American as Jim Crow, Black codes, and white vigilantes on horseback and in cars.

If Howard was killed for something he didnt do, then the second-worst thing that has happened to him is being stripped and denied his Black identity, which may have been what led to his being falsely accused, convicted and executed.

That would transform him from a local tale to one of the countless, anonymous ghosts who have drifted across Americas haunted landscape of racial injustice for centuries.

Breonna Taylor will never be one of those anonymous figures using signs beyond the grave to prove the injustice of her death. Shes become one of those tragic iconic posthumous figures produced too often by Black America, people who became icons by death and through the marches and protests of people demanding justice for their killings.

Breonna became the first person other than Oprah to be on the cover of Omagazine, and a painting of her is on the new issue of Vanity Fair. The city of Louisville is paying her family $12 million and promising significant police reforms, and on Aug. 12, radio stations across the country played her favorite song, Everything by Mary J. Blige.

On ExpressNews.com: Exclusive: Ted Cruz explains 2016 Trump endorsement

Breonna Taylor is everywhere  except in the indictment charges brought by the grand jury considering her death. One officer was charged with firing shots into apartments, which could have wounded people. No one was charged for the shots fired into Breonna Taylors apartment that killed her.

Shes been removed from the narrative of her death, a death that made this a story but one for which there is no accountability.

The night she was shot, Breonna lay on her apartment floor for several minutes before she was given medical care.

Six months later, the one officer indicted was charged for endangering the lives of Breonnas neighbors. The only charges in the case had nothing to do with Breonna Taylor.

Its almost as if her Black life didnt matter. Justices clock is still out of sync.

cary.clack@express-news.net
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 17:11:20|Editor: huaxia

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GENEVA, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- A Chinese diplomat on Friday deplored and rejected the accusations of a British official made earlier at the United Nations (UN) Human Rights Council session, saying that the Hong Kong and Xinjiang related issues are not human rights issues in any definition.

Liu Yuyin, spokesperson for the Chinese Mission to UN at Geneva, said that the essence of the issues is China's determination to safeguard its sovereignty, security and unity, uphold rule of law, and ensure that people live in peace and contentment.

"On Sept. 25, the Minister of State of the UK made wanton accusations against China on Hong Kong and Xinjiang related issues at the Human Rights Council, abusing the platform of the Human Rights Council to spread disinformation and distort history. The UK side fully exposed its arrogance, bias and ignorance. China deplores and categorically rejects the accusations," Liu said.

According to the Chinese diplomat, since the outbreak of "Fugitive Offenders Law" incident in Hong Kong in June last year, radical separatist forces, with the support of certain external forces, have become increasingly rampant in escalating violent and terrorist activities in Hong Kong.

These acts challenged the bottom line of the "one country, two systems" principle and posed a serious threat to China's national security. The legal system and enforcement mechanism for safeguarding national security in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) that China has established and improved are designed to plug the legal loopholes, safeguard national security and sovereignty, as well as ensure prosperity and stability in the HKSAR, he said.

He added that it reflects the will of all Chinese people including Hong Kong compatriots.

"The National Security Law for Hong Kong brings to justice only a very small number of criminal offenders who severely endanger national security. It protects the rights and freedoms of the vast majority of Hong Kong citizens who abide by law," he said.

"Desperately frustrated and outraged since the enactment of the National Security Law for Hong Kong, certain external forces went all out to attack and discredit China. They did so only because they could no longer use Hong Kong as a bridgehead to engage in activities that undermine China's national security as unscrupulously as they did before," he added.

As for China's Xinjiang region, the Chinese diplomat said that Xinjiang has been plagued by ethnic separatism, violent terrorism, and religious extremism. Thousands of terrorist attacks took place in the 1990s that severely threatened human rights of people of all ethnic groups in Xinjiang.

"To reverse the situation, the local government of Xinjiang carried out a series of anti-terrorism and de-radicalization measures in accordance with law. These measures restored security in Xinjiang and enabled people of various ethnic groups to enjoy fully human rights in a safe environment," Liu said.

According to him, since the end of 2018, more than 1,000 diplomats, officials of international organizations, journalists, and religious personages from over 90 countries have visited Xinjiang and seen a region of stability, prosperity and development where people of various ethnic groups live in happiness.

"Certain western countries and politicians have fabricated too many lies about Xinjiang. They maliciously slandered China and pepped up anti-China separatists in an attempt to drag Xinjiang into instability and insecurity and deny the right of local people to a peaceful and happy life. This is something that no one in China will ever accept," he said.

Noting that China is willing to have dialogues with other countries on human rights issues on the basis of mutual respect, Liu said that China firmly opposes unwarranted accusations against others by using disinformation for political purposes.

"We urge the UK side to stop meddling in Hong Kong affairs and interfering in domestic affairs of others," Liu said. Enditem
Rajkots death data disparity: In Gujarats Rajkot, the Covid-19 death toll will change depending on who you ask. According to the Municipal Corporation, 94 people in the city have died of Covid-19 as of 25 September, while state government data pegs that number at 131 people. According to data from the four crematoriums and six burial grounds across Rajkot, however, 1,247 Covid-related bodies have been cremated so far.

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Delivering a virtual address at the annual UN General Assembly on Saturday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi called for reforms" in the United Nations and said the people of India have been waiting for a long time for the process for the reforms to get completed.

People of India are worried whether this process will ever reach the logical end. After all, how long India will be kept separate from the decision making structures of the United Nations," he said.

The prime minister questioned what has the international body done for the world as it has been struggling to fight Covid-19.

Here are the top quotes from his speech:

- For the last 8-9 months, the whole world has been struggling with the global epidemic. Where is the United Nations in its efforts to combat this global epidemic? Where is an effective response?"

- A country which is the worlds largest democracy, a country where more than 18 percent of the worlds population lives, a country with hundreds of languages, hundreds of dialects, many creeds, many ideologies."

- The country that has lived for years leading the global economy and years of slavery, a country where changes are effected on a large part of the world. How long will that country have to wait?"

- When India extends a hand of friendship to someone, it is not against any third country. When India strengthens the development partnership, there is no thought of forcing a partner country behind it. We never lag behind in sharing experiences from our development journey."

- As the worlds largest vaccine producing country, I want to give another assurance to the global community. Indias vaccine production and vaccine delivery capability will work to take the whole humanity out of this crisis."

- In this difficult time of Pandemic, Indias pharmaceutical industry has sent essential medicines to more than 150 countries."

- We will use the prestige and experience of being the largest democracy in the world for world interest. Our path is from Janakalyan to Jagakalyan. Indias voice will always rise for peace, security, and prosperity."

- Starting from January next year, India will also fulfil its responsibility as a non-permanent member of the Security Council. India will always speak in support of peace, security and prosperity."

- Voice of India is raised against the enemy of humanity, human race and human values - terrorism, illegal arms smuggling, drugs, money laundering."

- India is running a campaign to deliver drinking water from pipes to 150 million homes in its villages. A few days ago, India has started a very big plan to connect its 6 lakh villages with broadband optical fiber."

- There are large-scale efforts in India to promote women entrepreneurship. Today, women of India are taking the most benefit of the worlds largest micro financing schemes. India is one of the countries where women are being given 26 weeks of paid maternity leave."

- In India, the rights of transgenders are also being secured through necessary legal reforms."
Oman said on Thursday it will resume scheduled international flights on Oct. 1 with strict measures to protect the country and aviation staff from the coronavirus, the Gulf state's aviation authority said in a statement.

Domestic flights between the capital Muscat and the city of Salalah will also resume on the same date, official media reported.

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It appears the ruling New Patriotic Party Member of Parliament for Akwatia in the Eastern Region, Mercy Ama Gyamfi Bello, popularly called Ama Sey, is carrying through her threats to ditch the ruling party and contest the forthcoming parliamentary elections as an Independent candidate.

Some posters and banners of the Akwatia MP have been splashed at all vantage points in the constituency, announcing her entry into the parliamentary race after claiming that she was cheated in the NPP parliamentary primaries.

After the supposed gang up machination, her supporters asked her to stand solo

and following the persistent calls on the incumbent MP to contest as an independent parliamentary candidate in the December polls, she is believed to be ready to contest as an independent candidate.

The posters and banners prepared by a group called Friends of Ama Sey have a logo of a Nursing mother feeding a baby with the Ghana Flag at the background and quotes as The Greediness Must Fade.

Ama Sey narrowly lost by four votes margin to Ernest Kumi in a four aspirant race of the constituency parliamentary primary.

After the end of the primaries, she reportedly complained that she was cheated, accusing the party machinery of replacing some ghost names in the party album to vote which cause her defeat

However, she has not publicly declared her intention to contest as an independent candidate but a source close to her confirmed she will pick the parliamentary forms when the Electoral Commission opens nominations even though the party hierarchy has called on her to change her decision.

While consultations are ongoing to calm her down, some party members and sympathizers are also mounting pressure on her to contest the general election as an Independent candidate.

Interactions with some of the party faithful and floating voters, revealed the incumbent MP has not been treated fairly by the party leaders during its parliamentary primaries.

The aggrieved supporters of the NPP drawn from Wenchi, Takrowase, Dwenase, Topremang, Appinamang, Akwatia, Boaduaas and Kusi last month stormed her residence after a float to had a word with her.

The floating voters including the aged and the physically challenged said they would do everything within their powers to persuade Ama Sey to contest solo in the parliamentary polls in December.

The group Friends of Ama Sey, at a presser, over the weekend claimed some level of greediness, naivety and barbarism have entered into some NPP bigwigs within the constituency and is time to pay back.

The group claims the parliamentary candidate elect, Ernest Kumi is unknown and only surfaced recently in the district level elections.

They are therefore urging Mercy Gyamfi to shut the beaks by running on the thicket of an independent parliament candidate.

They therefore vowed and threatened to vote skirt and blouse in the December polls.

---Daily Guide
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 21:18:35|Editor: huaxia

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HANOI, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Vietnam reported no new cases of COVID-19 infection on Saturday, with its total confirmed cases standing at 1,069 with 35 deaths from the disease so far, according to its Ministry of Health.

As many as 999 patients in the country have been given all-clear as of Saturday, said the ministry.

Meanwhile, 18,000 people are being quarantined and monitored in the country, the ministry said.

Vietnam has gone through 24 straight days without any COVID-19 cases in the community, according to the ministry. Enditem
Amid the ongoing protests by farmers and Opposition parties against the agriculture bills recently passed by the Parliament, Uttarakhand BJP will go among the farmers of the state through its Kisan Morcha to explain its benefits. The party also accused Congress of misleading the farmers.

The decision was shared by party state president Bansidhar Bhagat in a virtual press conference at party headquarters in Dehradun on Saturday.

We will go among the farmers through our Kisan Morcha to explain them the three bills and make them aware of their benefits. The NDA government, under PM Narendra Modi, is the first to think about the welfare of the farmers and these bills are in regard to that only, said Bhagat. He added that the party is likely to start the Kisan Morcha campaign from October first week.

Describing the bills as extremely beneficial for the countrys farmers, Bhagat lashed out at the Congress for misleading the farmers.

Also read: Five factors which could shape the Bihar poll results

Congress has never thought of the farmers welfare. Now when PM Modi and our Union agricultural minister has thought to empower them, it is spreading misconceptions and rumours about the three bills among the farmers, he said.

Bhagat, while assuring the farmers added, The farmers need not worry and should be assured that PM Modi has worked in their favour only and not against them as claimed by the Opposition.

It is ridiculous! The Congress had included the promises on the same in the 2019 elections manifesto and when our government has passed bills on them they are protesting. It is just a political gimmick, he said.

Meanwhile, the Congress said, The NDA government has passed the anti-farmers bills by killing the democracy.

Pritam Singh, Congress state president said, The NDA government passed the three bills under the uncontrolled addiction of power without thinking about the farmers. The manner in which it was passed in Rajya Sabha, it was the strangling of all Parliamentary procedures.

Singh said, If Bhagat is accusing us of misleading the farmers then they should first explain why a minister from their ally Akali Dal resigned against those bills? He is saying that the party will explain the bills to farmers when they failed to do the same to their allies only.

Also read: Former Bihar DGP meets Nitish Kumar, may join JD(U) in run-up to polls

Singh lashed out at the BJP accusing it of working against the small farmers of the country.

The bills talk of opening the market for farmers but is it possible that a small farmer from the hills of Uttarakhand will sell his produce in Tamil Nadu or Maharashtra? Also, if its so beneficial for the farmers then why didnt they add the provision of continuing the MSP in the bills? he said.

Congress will march towards the Governor house against these agriculture bills on September 28 and continue to protest against them, Singh stated.

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Cocaine addiction is a chronic disorder with a high rate of relapse for which no effective treatment is currently available.

Scientists from the Institut Pasteur, the CNRS, Inserm and the Paris Public Hospital Network (AP-HP) recently demonstrated that two gene mutations involved in the conformation of nicotinic receptors in the brain appear to play a role in various aspects of cocaine addiction. The results of the study were published in Progress in Neurobiology.

There are approximately 18 million users worldwide, and cocaine is implicated in more than 50% of overdose deaths in the United States and 25% in France. It is also one of the only drugs for which there is no approved pharmacological treatment.

Cocaine acts primarily in the brain by blocking the dopamine transporter, thereby increasing the concentration of this "pleasure" molecule in the reward system. But cocaine can also act directly on the nicotinic receptors1 in the brain.

Several human genetics studies have recently suggested that a mutation in the gene encoding the 5 subunit of nicotinic receptors, hereafter referred to as '5SNP', already known to increase the risk of tobacco dependence,2 may conversely also confer "protection" against cocaine addiction.

This mutation is highly present in the general population (approximately 37% of Europeans and up to 43% of the Middle Eastern population carry it), so it is important to determine how it affects cocaine addiction and, more generally, to better understand the role of the 5 nicotinic subunit in the effects of cocaine.

Scientists of the Integrative Neurobiology of Cholinergic Systems Unit (Institut Pasteur/CNRS) began by evaluating the role of the 5 nicotinic subunit and the impact of the 5SNP mutation on various processes involved in the development of cocaine addiction in animal models. The results obtained were then used to characterize more specifically its impact on humans.

The scientists observed that the 5SNP mutation reduces the voluntary intake of cocaine upon first exposures.

These preclinical data suggest that the mutation protects against cocaine addiction by modulating an early phase in the addiction cycle." Morgane Besson, Study Lead Author, Institut Pasteur

Working in collaboration with the Paris Public Hospital Network (AP-HP) and Inserm, the scientists then confirmed this significant effect in approximately 350 patients with cocaine addiction: those with the mutation exhibited a slower transition from first cocaine use to the emergence of signs of addiction.

At the same time, the authors showed that a total absence of the 5 nicotinic subunit increased the risk of relapse after withdrawal in preclinical models. This led the scientists to identify another mutation in another nicotinic subunit, 4, associated with a shorter time to relapse after withdrawal in addicted patients.

Taken together, these results elucidate the role played by both a highly frequent mutation in the 5 nicotinic subunit and the subunit itself in various stages of cocaine addiction. The research suggests that drugs modulating nicotinic receptors containing this 5 subunit could represent a novel therapeutic strategy for cocaine addiction.
President Trump plans to announce that Amy Coney Barrett will be his nominee to the Supreme Court to fill the seat vacated by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, multiple sources told Fox News on Friday.

The president is expected to make the announcement during a White House event on Saturday. Barrett currently serves as a judge on the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Trump, who has a campaign rally scheduled later Friday night in Virginia, declined to say who he will announce when pressed by reporters at Joint Base Andrews. "Youll find out tomorrow, he said.

The announcement is certain to ignite a bruising election-year confirmation battle, as Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has vowed to put up Trump's nominee for a vote.
Lebanons prime minister-designate Mustapha Adib has announced his resignation on Saturday, September 26, after he failed to form a government following a dispute that arose over naming ministers in the new cabinet. As per Associated Press, Mustapha on Saturday after meeting with President Michael Aoun announced on live television that he was stepping down from the position.

Mustapha, a former diplomat was chosen on August 31 to form the next government in Lebanon after former PM Hassan Diab stepped down following explosions that rocked Beirut on August 4.

Read: Lebanon: Funeral For Children Who Died At Sea Of Hunger And Thirst

Mustapha was reportedly facing pressure from Hezbollah and Amal movement, both Shi'a parties, to name Shi'a ministers in the cabinet. Mustapha was appointed after the French government and the international community put pressure on Lebanon's ruling elite to bring reforms in the country's politics and urged them to move away from sectarianism.

French President Emmanuel Macron's office called it a "collective betrayal" by the political parties of Lebanon. The European Union had earlier said that the second phase of aid to the country would not be released until a credible government is formed.

Read: US Sanctions 2 Lebanon-based Firms, Hezbollah-linked Person

Lebanon's politics

Lebanon is not an ordinary democracy as the country is divided into religious lines and so are the public offices. Following the civil war in Lebanon, the warring factions agreed to a pact that divided the seats in the parliament on the basis of religions and sects, including the top three positions of the President, the Prime minister, and the Speaker of the House. The President in the country should be a Maronite Christian, PM should be Sunni Muslim and the Speaker should be a Shi'a Muslim as per the pact.

Read: EU Plans To Hold Next Round Of Funding Until 'credible' Govt Formation In Lebanon

Lebanon was already suffering from a massive economic crisis before the Beirut blast shook the country, killing nearly 200 people and injuring thousands of others. The blast brought the incompetency among officials and politicians under the spotlight and set off protests across the nation. The international community too joined in the people of Lebanon in demanding reforms following which the government resigned. However, with the latest development, reform seems a far-sighted idea now in Lebanon.

Read: Family Of Man Held Lebanon Starts Foundation To Help Others
S ome 1,700 students at Manchester Metropolitan University have been forced into self-isolation after 127 tested positive for coronavirus.

The Birley campus and Cambridge Halls have been locked down, with residents told to stay in their rooms for 14 days even if they have no symptoms and police patrolling the area.

It comes after around 300,000 students in Scotland were banned from pubs and socialising this weekend as a series of outbreaks sent hundreds into quarantine.

Dozens of institutions across the country have recorded clusters over the past week as around one million students return to campus for the autumn term.

Meanwhile, freshers at the University of Manchester have been told curfews could be introduced and rule-breakers evicted from halls after late-night parties.

Members of the public are seen at Glasgow University / Getty Images

University officials and the police had to shut down another large gathering at the institution on Friday, a video of which was captioned Covid wah? on Snapchat.

Most halls in Greater Manchester are already subject to curbs on households mixing under local lockdown restrictions to tackle surging case rates.

The University and College Union said enough is enough and called for urgent action from ministers and for institutions to move teaching fully online.

Jo Grady, UCU general secretary, said: This is the latest catastrophe in a week where wholly predictable  and predicted  Covid outbreaks have caused havoc on campuses across the UK.

Some MMU students said they were worried about getting food and a breakdown of communication with the university. Manchester City Council said it would ensure the students in self-isolation get the support they need.

The rate of Covid-19 spread in Manchester was 185.6 per 100,000 people in the week up to September 22, when 1,026 positive tests were recorded, nearly double the previous week.
Thiruvananthapuram:

Former West Bengal Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi on Sunday said forcible singing of the national anthem would turn the passionate hymn into a humdrum chant.

Delivering the 2nd Justice VR Krishna Iyer Memorial Lecture, the grandson of Mahatma Gandhi said monoculturalism cannot work in India and it was impossible for anyone to homogenise and monopolise the great diversity and plurality of the country.

I love my national anthem. It is among the greatest anthems in the world. And I will sing it with full heart...but to be asked to sing it under an order is to turn the passionate hymn into a humdrum chant of official lining, Gandhi said.

According to the former diplomat, fear, distress and money ruled the country these days.

Stating that monoculturalism cannot work in India and monopolies were wrong in themselves, Gandhi said there were people who believed that the country could be brought under a particular kind of rule and domination.

Such people would like to see the diversity of India frozen and shrunken to one particular kind of language, one script, one predominant identity, one dominant language and one mega book, he added.

India is about variety. It is also about choices...and if India denies those choices, India denies itself. Diversity is equally important and a hallmark of civilisation, Gandhi said.

He said it would be equally ridiculous if neighbouring Pakistan or Bangladesh made their people speak only one language, profess only one religion, read only the Holy Quran and sing only their national anthem.

Gandhi also batted for bringing all the political parties within the ambit of the Right to Information Act.

The governments and political parties had some kind of a fear to face the statute, he said.

The governments intention to whiten the cash composition of the country could be considered genuine only if it made it obligatory for all the political parties, including the ruling party, to disclose the identities of its donors, he added.

Activists Prashant Bhushan, Aruna Roy and Madhava Menon also took part in the event organised by the Campaign for Judicial Accountability and Reforms (CJAR), along with the National Campaign for Peoples Right to Information, Common Cause and Deseeya Vivaravakasha Kottayam-Keralam.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.
Some investors rely on dividends for growing their wealth, and if you're one of those dividend sleuths, you might be intrigued to know that The Scottish Investment Trust PLC (LON:SCIN) is about to go ex-dividend in just four days. You can purchase shares before the 1st of October in order to receive the dividend, which the company will pay on the 2nd of November.

Scottish Investment Trust's next dividend payment will be UK0.057 per share. Last year, in total, the company distributed UK0.31 to shareholders. Calculating the last year's worth of payments shows that Scottish Investment Trust has a trailing yield of 4.4% on the current share price of 7.09. We love seeing companies pay a dividend, but it's also important to be sure that laying the golden eggs isn't going to kill our golden goose! That's why we should always check whether the dividend payments appear sustainable, and if the company is growing.

View our latest analysis for Scottish Investment Trust

Dividends are usually paid out of company profits, so if a company pays out more than it earned then its dividend is usually at greater risk of being cut. Scottish Investment Trust's dividend is not well covered by earnings, as the company lost money last year. This is not a sustainable state of affairs, so it would be worth investigating if earnings are expected to recover.

Click here to see how much of its profit Scottish Investment Trust paid out over the last 12 months.

Have Earnings And Dividends Been Growing?

Businesses with shrinking earnings are tricky from a dividend perspective. Investors love dividends, so if earnings fall and the dividend is reduced, expect a stock to be sold off heavily at the same time. Scottish Investment Trust reported a loss last year, and the general trend suggests its earnings have also been declining in recent years, making us wonder if the dividend is at risk.

The main way most investors will assess a company's dividend prospects is by checking the historical rate of dividend growth. Since the start of our data, 10 years ago, Scottish Investment Trust has lifted its dividend by approximately 13% a year on average.

Story continues

Get our latest analysis on Scottish Investment Trust's balance sheet health here.

The Bottom Line

From a dividend perspective, should investors buy or avoid Scottish Investment Trust? It's definitely not great to see that it paid a dividend despite reporting a loss last year. Worse, the general trend in its earnings looks negative in recent times. These characteristics don't generally lead to outstanding dividend performance, and investors may not be happy with the results of owning this stock for its dividend.

With that in mind though, if the poor dividend characteristics of Scottish Investment Trust don't faze you, it's worth being mindful of the risks involved with this business. To help with this, we've discovered 3 warning signs for Scottish Investment Trust (2 are concerning!) that you ought to be aware of before buying the shares.

A common investment mistake is buying the first interesting stock you see. Here you can find a list of promising dividend stocks with a greater than 2% yield and an upcoming dividend.

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.



Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com.
Riyadh, Sep 26 : The Indian diaspora community in the Saudi Governorate of Hafr Al Batin have donated blood in a gesture to celebrate the Kingdoms 90th National Day, according to a media report.

Dozens of Indian residents in the eastern governorate donated blood at various health facilities in coordination with the local health department, Gulf News on Friday quoted the Saudi news portal, Ajel as saying.

Health authorities in Hafr Al Batin thanked the Indian donors for their initiative, reflecting their sharing of Saudis' joy on the occasion, the report said.

The Saudi National Day, celebrated annually on September 23, marks the foundation of the Kingdom by King Abdul Aziz Bin Abdul Rahman Al Saud.

There are between 2 to 2.5 million Indians in Saudi Arabia.
Dozens of students at McGill University are testing positive for COVID-19 according to their peers, but the university is not counting most of those cases in its official tally, because they happened off-campus.

Jacob Rothery, a student living in the so-called McGill ghetto in Montreal's Milton Park neighbourhood next to the university, tested positive for COVID-19 this week. So did his three roommates.

Rothery says he knows of at least 20 other students who tested positive, and suspects more numbers are going to come from the popular and crowded student neighbourhood.

"There were a decent amount of students going to student bars," he said. "And then on top of that, you don't necessarily know who the people that you think you're in your bubble with are seeing, so they could be seeing a bunch of other people, who are putting themselves in riskier situations."

Rothery says he and his friends did not violate public health guidelines, but that didn't stop an outbreak in his group of friends.

"People may have had it, but had no symptoms. So they had no reason to get tested. And then you have gatherings that aren't that big, maybe fifteen people or 10, but those 10 people see other people and their bubbles are a lot bigger than they think they are," he said.

Submitted by Jacob Rothery

Thom Haghighat is another McGill student who is self-isolating, after he and his roommate tested positive for COVID-19.

He figures he caught the virus from one of the students returning to the "ghetto" from Toronto or elsewhere in Montreal.

Haghighat says he also knows of at least 25 students living in the area who tested positive, with a dozen in his immediate group of friends.

Like Rothery, Haghighat says he and his friends were limiting personal gatherings and keeping a small circle of people to interact with.

Despite this, he said, he still saw cases rise among his peers in the past week. He believes false negatives are part of the problem.

Story continues

"The first time we got tested, we tested negative. We still self-isolated, but I know a lot of people who would think they were in the clear to go see other people," he said, noting that he knew others who also got false negatives.

Rothery had also received a false negative test result earlier this week, before testing positive.

Only "on-campus" numbers

Despite these anecdotal reports, McGill University has officially recorded just six COVID-19 cases this week on campus, and says there is no evidence of community transmission on its campuses.

McGill's main campus is downtown. The Macdonald campus, which houses agricultural and nutrition programs among others, is in Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue in the West Island.

A spokesperson for the university said the number includes staff and students who were present on campus in the week preceding their positive COVID test.

Most classes at McGill have moved online, which means far fewer people are frequenting the campus.

Justin Hayward/CBC

Some students say the university should include the numbers of students who test positive off-campus, as well.

"It's important for them to at least take responsibility for the things that are going on in their student body, whether or not they're technically on campus, because I think that distinction is pretty useless," said Rothery.

For its part, McGill says it is working with public health authorities on strict protocols to limit the spread.
A British firefighter has become one of the first people in Europe to be fitted with a Bluetooth device which will allow doctors to monitor her heartbeat from afar.

Sian Jones, 34, had the device fitted to her ticker during a ten minute operation this week at the University Hospital Southampton.

The new device will record her heart's activity and then send it to a smartphone which can upload the data via the MyCareLink app.

Firefighter Sian Jones with the implant which sends data on her heart to her mobile phone

The device is no larger than a standard paper clip. It is designed to be used by people who need long-term monitoring due to issues such as blackouts or heart palpitations.

Firefighter Sian Jones had the Medtronic implant fitted to record her heart's activity

The firefighter broke her neck in a car crash when she was 18 and she has experience unexplained blackouts ever since.

Ms Jones, of Totton, near Southampton, told The Telegraph: 'The crash was very serious. I was told I was millimetres away from being disabled or even dying from my injuries.

'I was left with metal plates in the front and back of my neck and I've also had these often erratic episodes ever since.

'I can sometimes go for months without it happening and then I will blackout numerous times.

The Bluetooth implant is the same size as a standard paperclip

Sian Jones, 34, is shown by a nurse how to view the implant's data on her mobile phone

'Hopefully this will help find out what is causing it as I can't risk it happening me to when we are on a fire call.

Medtronic Bluetooth heart implant facts The implants are fitted with Bluetooth technology that allows them to communicate directly with the MyCareLink mobile phone app. The MyCareLink mobile app lets patients stay in constant contact with a clinic. The devices use wireless communication to transfer the data. Data is encrypted to ensure patient's details are passed securely. Advertisement

'I can feel the implant but not as much as I thought I would.'

Medtronic, the American technology business, designed the implant. It will share up-to-date information with Ms Jones' health team.

Paul Roberts, a consultant cardiologist at the hospital, said the device meant that people with heart monitors would no longer need to go to hospital to have the data recorded.

He said: 'We are one of the first in Europe to implant this pioneering device that will now allow us to see 24/7 what is happening.

'It's different to the Bluetooth that we have on our earphones and speakers. Bluesync technology is low-energy and a new and novel form which also has the rigorous high level cyber security measures in place.

'Once it's implanted we pair it up the same way you would pair up other devices, and all the patient needs to do is keep the app open in the background on their phone or tablet.'

Consultant cardiologist Paul Roberts praised the device

David Southworth, 73, from Colchester, became the first person in the world to be fitted with a Medtronic Cobalt implant that can monitor his heartbeat.

Since then several more people have been fitted with the device.
Pope Francis intervenes at the 75th General Assembly of the UN with a video message, extolling the United Nations as a "bridge between peoples". The pandemic is "a concrete opportunity for conversion, for transformation, for rethinking our way of life and our economic and social systems". At the root of everything is the "throwaway culture", which determines exploitation, marginalization, humiliation of human dignity and even abortion and violations of religious freedom. It is time to move from "declarationist nominalism" to the effectiveness of solidarity.

Vatican City (AsiaNews) - The United Nations is the place "to rethink the future of our common home and our common project "; they are "a bridge between peoples" and it is necessary to give substance to this "common project" with facts and not only with words.

In a video message in Spanish, released yesterday at the 75th General Assembly of the United Nations, which this year is celebrated only in a virtual way due to the pandemic, Pope Francis outlined a varied program for the international community, underlining what he is most concerned about: an anti-Covid vaccine for all, above all for the poor; a technology that saves people's work, making it more worthy; responding to the structural and global crisis of refugees and migrants; to develop an "integral ecological sensitivity"; care for children, so that they can all "have the right to life and to school"; for the promotion of women; nuclear deterrence; the easing of international sanctions to allow "adequate support" to the citizens of the affected countries ...

For the pontiff, the moment we live in, marked by the pandemic, which has created an economic, health and social crisis, is "opportunity for conversion, for transformation, for rethinking our way of life and our economic and social systems, which are widening the gap between rich and poor based on an unjust distribution of resources".

We are faced - he said - with a choice between two possible paths. One path leads to the consolidation of multilateralism as the expression of a renewed sense of global co-responsibility, a solidarity grounded in justice and the attainment of peace and unity within the human family, which is Gods plan for our world. The other path emphasizes self-sufficiency, nationalism, protectionism, individualism and isolation; it excludes the poor, the vulnerable and those dwelling on the peripheries of life That path would certainly be detrimental to the whole community, causing self-inflicted wounds on everyone. It must not prevail..

The pontiff's invitation is to overcome the "throwaway culture", which causes the humiliation of human dignity and pushes for "absolute power and control" of society. For the pope this is "an attack on humanity itself". One important fact: in addition to the violations of labour rights, Francis also mentions the rights to religious freedom. Even in denouncing the violence against children, the Pope does not stop at "exploitation, abuse, malnutrition"; he cites the spread of abortion, promoted as an "essential service" and solution to the pandemic: " It is troubling to see how simple and convenient it has become for some to deny the existence of a human life as a solution to problems that can and must be solved for both the mother and her unborn child.

Francis also asks to move from words to deeds, from "declarationist nominalism" to the effectiveness of solidarity. He recalls his visit to the UN headquarters five years ago, in a period "marked by a true multilateralist dynamic" and "on the eve of the adoption of the 2030 Agenda for sustainable development". But he notes that "the international community has shown itself largely incapable of honouring the promises made five years ago". Almost like a refrain, the Pope often says: "Solidarity must not be an empty word". And towards the conclusion, he says: The present crisis has further demonstrated the limits of our self-sufficiency as well as our common vulnerability. It has forced us to think clearly about how we want to emerge from this: either better or worse.
Updated 20:43

People in cities have been told to reduce their social contacts if they want to avoid further restrictions.

NPHET is examining measures for Cork, Waterford, Limerick and Galway cities which may be different from the rest of their counties.

Taoiseach Micheal Martin says they are seeing a trend in large urban areas:

"In places like Cork city it has been going up in a straight line over last two weeks. It is worrying with between 20 and 30 cases a day.

"That is a worrying trend and it is the same in other city areas. We are flagging that and making it very clear to people that they are danger areas right now."

It comes as a further 326 new cases of Covid-19 were confirmed this evening by the Department of Health.

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It was also announced that there were no new deaths from the virus.

There is now a total of 34,315 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Ireland.

The total number of Covid-19 related deaths remains at 1,797. There are also currently 16 people in ICUs with the virus and a further 94 in hospital.

The department said of the the cases notified today: 162 are men and 152 are women, The majority of cases (69 per cent) are under 45 years of age, 33 per cent are confirmed to be associated with outbreaks or are close contacts of a confirmed case

They also said that 49 cases have been identified as community transmission.

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Dublin has by far the largest amount of new cases this evening with 152.

Elsewhere there are 32 in Cork, 22 in Donegal, 21 in Galway, 15 in Meath, 11 in Kildare, nine in Kerry, eight in Louth, eight in Westmeath, six in Limerick, six in Mayo, six in Tipperary and five in Wexford, with the remaining 25 cases in eight.

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Speaking this evening, Dr Ronan Glynn, acting chief medical officer said:

Today I am asking people everywhere but particularly in Donegal and Dublin to pay special attention to the public health advice.

I ask every individual to take personal responsibility to prioritise who you need to see, limit the size of your social network and reduce your social contacts over the coming days and weeks.

Because while there is every chance that other areas will have to move to level 3, there is nothing inevitable about it. We have seen previously how people working together can turn the tide on this virus and bring increasing trajectories back under control.

Know how valuable your individual actions are. Your choices and your actions are part of how we will succeed.

Three deaths and an additional 324 cases of Covid-19 were confirmed yesterday evening.

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Officials and university researchers, worried Missouris wild turkey population is on the edge of calamity, are embarking on an extensive study of the fowl, even preparing to track the birds with GPS backpacks.

Missouri turkeys were once a species on the rebound. But over the last several years scientists have seen signs of a pronounced decline: Theyre counting fewer young turkeys in the states forests and fields. And that tally, nosediving toward record lows, is falling faster than experts predict, sagging inexplicably short of official forecasts that had proven reliable for decades.

Only in the last five to seven years have we seen this problem, said Mitch Weegman, one of the University of Missouri professors conducting the study. We really dont know why.

Turkey numbers appear to be crashing in other states, too  Illinois, South Carolina and New York, for instance. But Missouri was on the front end of widespread turkey restoration efforts in the middle of the 20th century, which makes conservationists here keenly interested in this decline. And the state has an outsized population of turkey hunters, state officials said: More than 133,000 hunted in this springs turkey season, harvesting 41,000 birds.

The turkey hunting culture in Missouri is monstrous compared to other states, said Weegman. Theres a massive number of people concerned about these birds.

There are too many turkeys in Missouri to count individually. Instead, the state relies on staff, hunters and volunteers to calculate another key indicator: the number of young turkeys  called poults  seen with each mother hen in the field. The state then uses those ratios to forecast turkey breeding success each year, plan hunting season and guide wildlife management.

Missouris highest statewide poult-to-hen ratio, at least since the species rebound, was observed in 1971, when each hen had an average of 4.6 poults. By the late 1980s, though, a long-term decline had begun. 1987 was the last year when the state saw more than three poults per hen, and 2001 was the last time the numbers exceeded two. In 2016, poult ratios reached their lowest level in 56 years  less than one per hen  and have remained near record lows since.

Also troubling, the states breeding forecasts have failed to accurately predict the extent of the collapse. Even in recent years, when conditions seemed favorable, turkey brood sizes were not as strong as expected.

Reina Tyl, a resource scientist with the Missouri Department of Conservation, called the recent numbers mind-boggling.

Theres something going on here that were not understanding and that were not accounting for, said Tyl, who is also a board member for the state chapter of the National Wild Turkey Federation.

The department of conservation, which issued the $1.3 million grant, will assist the universitys research.

Its something the agency understands is a problem, said Tyl. Were willing to invest a decent amount of money to find out whats going on.

The team begins this month testing strategies for attaching the monitoring devices to captive turkeys. One technique will glue small, one-gram devices to poults, so as not to interfere with their growth or development. Another will stitch the devices on.

Larger backpack versions will strap around the wings of adult turkeys.

Researchers will also set up weather stations and wildlife cameras.

Together, the stations, cameras and backpacks will allow researchers to cross-reference turkey locations with weather events, temperature and common turkey predators.

Weegman said researchers are considering multiple factors in the crashing poult counts.

Extreme rain or cold may affect their survival.

Some predators may have gained subtle advantages recently  theres evidence, for example, that adult turkeys smell more pungent when wet, meaning that increases in rainfall could make them more easily detected by predators.

Even a drop in the price of raccoon pelts since the 1980s could play a role. With fewer racoons getting trapped, more might be free to raid turkey nests.

But the culprit may also be harder to detect by weather station or wildlife camera: Turkey habitat may be getting crowded out.

In northern Missouri, for instance, more land is being farmed, thanks partly to changes that made marginal areas more profitable. In the Ozarks, meanwhile, the decline of local logging activity has allowed forests to mature and choke out brushy undergrowth that provides turkeys with shelter and camouflage.

Fieldwork is set to start in January and continue for several years on public and private land near Lancaster, in northern Missouri.
The claim: The 'truth' about Breonna Taylor's background and alleged ties to drug trafficking have not been reported.

Several social media posts have posted the "truth" about Breonna Taylor, who was shot during a police raid on her Louisville apartment in March.

A meme posted June 25 on Brandon Tatum's @TheOfficerTatum Instagram account was widely shared across social media after the Kentucky Attorney General's Office on Wednesday announced it would bring charges against one of three officers involved in Taylor's death  but not for charges directly related to her killing. The meme, which has over 69,000 likes, was reposted on Facebook by Conservative Hangout, where it has more than 3,500 shares, and Peggy Hubbard, who has 23,000 shares, among others.

USA TODAY has reached out to Tatum for comment.

That meme, along with other similar social media posts, lay out several assertions about Taylor and her background.

We'll assess the truth told in each claim.

Claim: 'She wasn't an EMT, she was terminated in 2017'

Taylor was a 26-year-old emergency room technician at two local hospitals. She joined the city as an EMT recruit in January 2016, became a full EMT by June and left the Louisville Metro Government in November 2016.

According to WAVE 3 News, city documents show that Taylor had called in November and resigned. A termination form also has a box checked stating do not rehire. But, it does not state a reason why that box was checked, WAVE reported.

The state licensure agency said Taylor's EMT license was never suspended, and there is no disciplinary action in her file.

Local attorneys for Taylor's family have clarified that she was working as an ER technician at two area hospitals at the time of her March 13 death, with aspirations of becoming a nurse, according to The (Louisville) Courier Journal.

Ruling: PARTLY FALSE. It is false that she was fired. While her EMT license was current, it is true that she wasn't an EMT at the time of her death.

Story continues

Claim: 'She was knee deep in criminal/drug dealing activities with her ex-boyfriend'

Taylor, who has no drug offenses on her record, shared her apartment with her younger sister, Juniyah Palmer. Neither Taylor nor Palmer has any history of drug offenses.

Taylor's boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, did not live in the apartment, according to the address listed on his arrest citation. He also has no history of drug offenses, and Walker was not named in the search warrant.

The search warrant for Taylor's home includes her street address, apartment number and photos of her apartment door, which police later broke using a battering ram.

In addition to listing Taylor's name, birth date and Social Security number, the warrant included the names of the narcotics investigation's main targets: Jamarcus Glover, Taylor's ex-boyfriend, and Adrian Walker. Kenneth Walker and Adrian Walker are not related.

In January, Glover, who had past drug trafficking convictions in Mississippi, was among three men charged with trafficking and weapons offenses after police received a tip from a confidential informant that they were hiding drugs and firearms in abandoned homes adjacent to a "trap house" they allegedly operated at an Elliott Avenue address in Louisville. Police seized five handguns and three rifles, according to evidence filed in the case.

Jamarcus Glover with Breonna Taylor in 2018, when the two were dating.

Glover, who was out on bail from earlier charges, was arrested at the house in a simultaneous raid the night of the Taylor killing on March 13.

According to, Sam Aguiar, an attorney for Taylors estate, Glover and Taylor had dated two years earlier and maintained a "passive" relationship. Records and recorded jail calls since January show they had remained in contact. Glover said in a March 13 call, however, that he didn't have "nothing going on with Bre no more." In an email to The Courier Journal, Aguiar apologized to the public and to Breonnas family for mischaracterizing the relationship, saying it was based on an erroneous conclusion he drew without the benefit of the jail recording.

According to the affidavit Louisville Metro Police Detective Joshua Jaynes wrote for the search warrant, Glover used Taylor's apartment as his home address. Jaynes also wrote that he "verified through a U.S. postal inspector that Glover has been receiving packages" at Taylor's apartment.

The Courier Journal reported May 12 that a sworn affidavit from Jaynes said Glover was seen walking into Taylor's apartment one January afternoon and left with a "suspected USPS package in his right hand" then drove to a "known drug house" on Muhammad Ali Boulevard.

But Louisville's U.S. postal inspector, Tony Gooden, told WDRB News in May that a different agency (which he did not identify) had asked in January to look into whether Taylor's home was receiving suspicious mail. The office had concluded that it wasn't, Gooden said.

Glover has since told the Courier Journal and USA TODAY that Taylor had no involvement in drug trafficking. Glover said he only had clothes and shoes sent to Taylor's apartment because he was afraid they would be stolen if they were left at his home.

The police report reviewed by the Courier Journal goes beyond the information in the affidavit, detailing evidence into police surveillance of Taylor and Glover, as well as the recorded phone conversations from the jail involving Glover and Taylor.

The Courier Journal reviewed the undated report on Taylor compiled by the LMPD's new Place-Based Investigations unit, which targets violent crime at specific locations, as part of its investigation of Glover. The Courier Journal also reviewed transcripts of jailhouse calls Glover and other defendants made from Metro Corrections.

Glover made a call from jail about 12 hours after he was arrested March 13 at 2424 Elliott Ave.  the same day Taylor was shot and killed by police executing a search warrant at her apartment signed by Jefferson Circuit Judge Mary Shaw.

Our ruling: FALSE. While Taylor and Glover had a "passive" relationship, she was not "knee deep" in drug dealing with him.

Claim: 'She was on jailhouse recordings running drugs for her ex-boyfriend'

On Jan. 3, following Glovers arrest on trafficking and weapons charges, he called Taylor from jail and asked her to contact one of his co-defendants to get bail money.

Taylor responded. according to recordings reviewed by the Courier Journal, that the associate was already at the trap  slang for a house used for drug trafficking,

Glover told her to be on standby to pick him up if he made bail. I'm going to get

me some rest in your bed, he said, according to the recording.

Love you, he said, at the end of the call.

Love you, too, she replied.

Video: Kentucky grand jury indicts 1 officer in Breonna Taylor case, not for her death

The Courier Journal has corroborated that on Dec. 30, 2019, five days before her recorded jail conversation with Glover, Taylor posted a $2,500 bond for another man charged in the same case, 34-year-old Darreal Forest. His attorney, Casey McCall, did not immediately respond to a question about how his client knew Taylor.

Police had seized five handguns and three rifles, according to evidence filed in the case.

The jail recordings the Courier Journal reviewed show that on March 13, Glover, while trying to round up cash to make bail on a new set of trafficking charges, called a girlfriend and told her Taylor had his money.

"She had the eight grand I gave her the other day, and she picked up another six," Glover said.

Did she tell you where it was? the caller asked him.

She didn't have the chance to tell me nothing, he replied. She dead.

When the caller asked Glover why he had left the money with Taylor, he said: Dont take it wrong but Bre been handling all my money. She has been handling (expletive) for me and  it aint just me."

But in a different recorded phone call from the jail on March 13, Demarius Bowman, who was arrested with Glover, told his sister that another woman, Alicia Kesha Jones, 24, had been given the groups money.

Breonna Taylor

We put all the money on Kesha, said Bowman, also 24. We dumped everything on her.

Jones was holding $3,413 in cash when she was arrested earlier following the search at a suspected drug house on Elliott Avenue, according to police records.

Jones, Glover and Bowman, along with three other defendants  Rayshawn Lee, 33; Anthony J. Taylor II, 31; and Adrian Walker, 28  are charged with complicity in trafficking in a controlled substance and running an organized crime syndicate.

They have all pleaded not guilty.

Video: Breonna Taylor's mom says, 'the system as a whole has failed her'

As mentioned in the claim above, Glover has since told The Courier Journal and USA TODAY that Taylor had no involvement in drug trafficking. Records previously examined by The Courier Journal show no money or drugs were found in the search of Taylors apartment after her death.

And nothing in the recordings or other evidence recently obtained by The Courier Journal substantiates Glovers claim that Taylor was handling money for him.

Our ruling: FALSE. Nothing in recordings from jail indicates Taylor was running drugs for Glover.

Claim: Taylor was 'under surveillance for months running drugs'

Records obtained by The Courier Journal show the search warrant, signed by a judge one day before Taylor's death, includes Taylor's address based on LMPD's belief that Glover, one of the main narcotics investigation suspects, used her home to receive mail, keep drugs or stash money earned from the sale of drugs.

The undated LMPD report examined by The Courier Journal includes the results of a tracking device placed on Glovers Dodge Charger that shows it was driven to Taylors apartment six times in January.

The report includes photographs of Glover entering and exiting Taylors building. In the application for the search warrant of Taylor's apartment, police said they suspected drugs and money were being held at the residence.

Video: Biden pleads for 'no violence' as protests continue after Breonna Taylor decision

In an interview with The Courier Journal and USA TODAY, Glover noted that LMPD had a surveillance camera outside of 2424 Elliott Ave., so he said police could see that Taylor wasn't doing anything illegal when she came over.

"We're literally standing outside," Glover said in the interview. "They had their camera.  They seen everything. No illegal activity. A hug is not illegal.  She's not bringing me no boxes, she's not bringing nothing."

Our ruling: FALSE. The report notes that Taylor's house was under surveillance, but does not find Taylor was "running drugs."

Claim: Taylor 'was on the warrant, as was her car and her apartment'

The search warrant for Taylor's home includes her street address, apartment number and photos of her apartment door, which police later broke using a battering ram, and her car.

Taylor's name, birth date and Social Security number are listed on the warrant, alongside the names of the narcotics investigation's main targets, Jamarcus Glover and Adrian Walker.

Adrian Walker and Kenneth Walker, who was in the apartment at the time of the fatal shooting, are not related.

Taylor's car was listed in the warrant, but it was her former car  a white Chevy Impala  not her new black Dodge Charger, indicating that the surveillance was outdated.

Our ruling: TRUE

September 2020 cover of "O, The Oprah Magazine" pays tribute to Breonna Taylor.

Claim: 'The officers did in fact knock & announce despite obtaining a "no knock" exception on the warrant.'

Court records show that Louisville police obtained a warrant with a no-knock provision for Taylor's apartment approved by Jefferson Circuit Judge Mary Shaw, though police and prosecutors have said that the officers knocked and announced themselves before breaking down the door. Authorities said that at least one person other than police confirmed that officers announced their presence before going in.

But in interviews with several of Taylor's neighbors, The New York Times found only one who reported hearing police announce themselves and he only heard them say it once, the newspaper reported. The Times and lawyers for Taylor's family talked to as many as 11 other neighbors who said they didn't hear police identify themselves.

Our ruling: INCONCLUSIVE. There are conflicting reports among authorities, lawyers and media over whether police announced themselves.

Claim: 'Breonna's boyfriend fired at officers, striking an officer, officers fired back & Breonna took the shots. She was NOT asleep in her bed.'

Commonwealth's Attorney Tom Wine played partial recordings of police interviews with Walker, Taylor's boyfriend, during a May 22 news conference in which Walker told police that he and Taylor were watching a movie in bed  it was watching them more than we were watching it, he said  when they heard a loud bang at the door, scaring both of them.

Walker said he initially thought it mightve been Taylor's former boyfriend, but that there was no response when Taylor twice called out, Who is it?

Then, Walker said he grabbed his Glock handgun (it was registered to Walker) saying he was, "Scared to death."

More: Louisville cop injured in Breonna Taylor shooting threatens lawsuits over being called 'murderer'

Taylor yelled again "at the top of her lungs," asking who it was, Walker said in the recording. He said he was asking, too.

They got out of bed and were going toward the door when it comes off its hinges. Walker fired one shot, unable to see who he was shooting at, he told police, according to his arrest citation.

Police fired in response, striking Taylor six times, according to her autopsy report. She died in the hallway of her apartment, the report states.

Our ruling: TRUE

Overall ruling: Partly false

The seven claims made in one viral meme are a mix of true, false and inconclusive, based on our research. Overall, we rate this claim as PARTLY FALSE.

Our fact-check sources

Thank you for supporting our journalism. You can subscribe to our print edition, ad-free app or electronic newspaper replica here.

Our fact check work is supported in part by a grant from Facebook.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Fact check: Posts with Breonna Taylor 'truths' include misinformation
An inebriated driver turned over his own vehicle in Luxembourg City, while another driver in Differdange had consumed both alcohol and drugs before taking the wheel.

Police had to confiscate a total of three driving licences on Friday evening and early Saturday morning respectively due to cases of DUI.

In Rue de Cessange in Luxembourg City, a driver turned over his own vehicle at about 7.30 pm. He received first aid on site and was admitted into hospital for further treatment. After an alcohol test came back positive, his licence was confiscated.

Shortly before 10 pm, a driver ignored a police patrol's right of way in Boulaide. The individual also turned out to be intoxicated and thus had to hand over his driving licence.

A driver in Rue Victor Hugo in Differdange tested positive both for alcohol and drugs at about 2.40am on Saturday morning. Police officers confiscated his licence and issued a fine.
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A group of Black Lives Matter protesters were filmed in a tense confrontation with a Louisville store owner after they demanded he voice his support for the movement during a third night of Breonna Taylor demonstrations in the city.

Footage of the incident, shared on Twitter by a reporter for conservative news site Daily Caller, shows a small crowd of BLM activists grilling business owner Fadi Faouri, as he stands outside his store holding a rifle.

During the encounter, the group is seen ganging up on Faouri for several minutes as they challenge his views on the BLM movement and the police shooting of Breonna Taylor after he refuses to say he supports the cause.

The exchange kicks off after a man asks Faouri, 'do black lives matter?' to which he replies: 'If you're a good person I will care about you, if you're a bad person....' before shrugging.

The man then asks him if 'Breonna Taylor matters'. Faouri hesitates for a few seconds before responding: 'Does it matter? I don't know.'

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A group of Black Lives Matter protesters were filmed confronting Louisville store owner Fadi Faouri (far right) as he defended his business amid another night of unrest on Friday

Faouri was grilled over his views on the BLM movement and the injustice surrounding the shooting of Breonna Taylor

The confrontation turned tense after Faouri repeatedly skirted the question and refused to say directly if he did or did not support Black Lives Matter

The conversation turned tense after a woman comes into frame questioning his response and more members of the crowd start urging Faouri to explain what he means.

'Are you trying to intimidate me? I'm not playing that game,' Faouri says, as he explains that he is trying to protect his business.

An argument then ensues as the group starts to close in on the store owner and continue to demand he say whether or not he believes in their cause. A person in the background can be heard shouting, 'we don't want your business'.

Faouri turns his attention to the initial male protester telling him he will not be forced to say anything he doesn't believe. 'Nobody can intimidate me,' he says.

The two parties continue to argue for several seconds but Faouri remains defiant in his refusal to engage in their debate and the protesters eventually disperse, with the exception of one woman.

At one point, a woman claiming to be a documentary filmmaker approaches Faouri and criticizes him for his stance, or lackthereof, as she lectures him over the injustice surrounding Breonna Taylor's death

Faouri retorted by saying Breonna Taylor's shooting was 'not my business', further escalating the argument

A building that was being leased by Fadi Faouri, a small business owner, was firebombed around 1 am during last night's "unlawful assembly" declared by @LMPD. Investigation is underway in #Louisville

PC : @realblairnelson pic.twitter.com/27AzGjU2Kl  Jorge Ventura Media (@VenturaReport) September 25, 2020

The woman, who claimed to be a documentary filmmaker, approaches Faouri and criticizes him for his stance, or lackthereof, as she lectures him over the injustice surrounding Breonna Taylor's death.

'That's not my f**king business!' Faouri replies.

'It should be your business because all lives matter right?' the woman says, as she starts to debate Faouri on racial disparities. 'You can say that, but it's the color black that is the issue,' she adds.

'You have an issue with that, I don't have an issue,' Faouri says in response. 'I don't care, white or black bulls***t, I see you as a human being, that's all that I care about.'

The debate finally comes to an end after a fellow protester urges the woman to leave the area.

Faouri had been defending his business on Friday after a building he was leasing was reportedly destroyed in a 'firebomb' set off by protesters the previous night, according to the Daily Caller journalist.

It is unclear if protesters specifically targeted his building.

LOS ANGELES: Footage was captured showing an LAPD deputy using his riot shield to slam a Black Lives Matter protester into the ground on Friday night

LOS ANGELES: Around 100 people were seen marching in the Hollywood area of Los Angeles on Friday evening

Protests continue to rock the city and other areas of across the country days after a grand jury refused to charge Louisville police officers with Breonna Taylor's murder.

Violent clashes have broken out between police officers and demonstrators over the last week, as some activists have taken to the streets to target businesses and cause chaos.

On Friday, footage emerged of a police officer with the Los Angeles County Sheriff's office using his riot shield to slam a BLM protester who was already lying on the ground. The footage showed the deputy forcefully using their riot shield to subdue a protester.

The incident took place in West Hollywood area of the city which saw more than 100 protesters gathered on Friday evening as they marched along Santa Monica Boulevard.

Meanwhile, across the other side of the country, hundreds of Black Lives Matter staged a 'sit-in' on the Brooklyn Bridge in New York City.

Hundreds of angry demonstrators marched through from the Barclays Center in Brooklyn to the Brooklyn Bridge where they sat and refused to move for more than hour.

And in Oakland, California, police said more than 250 protesters became 'immediately violent' and threw bottles and cans at officers in the downtown area.

NEW YORK: Hundreds of angry demonstrators marched through from the Barclays Center in Brooklyn to the Brooklyn Bridge where they sat and refused to move for more than hour

NEW YORK: A woman holds a portrait of Breonna Taylor during the march for Breonna Taylor

NEW YORK: Protesters exit the Brooklyn Bridge during the march for Breonna Taylor in New York City

NEW YORK: People participate during the march for Breonna Taylor in New York City on the Brooklyn Bridge

Cops deployed smoke to counter the demonstrators, and a downtown Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) station was closed.

Friday's rally was held in solidarity with protests taking place in Louisville, where large demonstrations are planned for the weekend.

Several other demonstrations took place around the rest of the country including Boston and San Diego to protest a grand jury's decision not to charge the Louisville, Kentucky, police officers in the death of Breonna Taylor.

OAKLAND: Cops deployed smoke to counter the demonstrators, and a downtown Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) station was closed

OAKLAND: Police said more than 250 protesters became 'immediately violent' and threw bottles and cans

NEW YORK: People are pictured protesting on the Brooklyn Bridge during the march for Breonna Taylor on Friday night

NEW YORK: Police wait at one end of the bridge as protesters attempt to leave the massive structure after the demonstration

NEW YORK: The march started off at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn and slowly moved towards the famous bridge

'This is extremely traumatizing. I have been out here since June, almost every day on the streets, marching for my Black life to show people that I matter, that it could be me, it could be him, it could be him, it could be any Black face that you see in this crowd,' protester Sophie Michel said to CBS2.

'I think we need to send a message that it's unacceptable that no one was charged with Breonna Taylor's death,' said John Donahue to PIX11.

Taylor, an emergency medical worker, was shot multiple times by white officers in Louisville who entered her home during a narcotics investigation in March.

BOSTON: Demonstrators march past Boston Police headquarters during a 'Stand Against Racist Police Murders' demo

BOSTON: Protesters could be seen gathered downtown with even large protests planned for Saturday

In Kentucky on Friday, a crowd surrounded Breonna Taylor's family. Her aunt, Bianca Austin, wore Taylor's emergency medical technician jacket while reading a message from Taylor's mother, who was too distraught to speak.

'I'm angry because this nation is learning that our Black women are dying at the hands of police officers,' said Bianca Austin, 'and this is not okay.'

'I was reassured Wednesday of why I have no faith in the legal system, in the police, in the law that are not made to protect us Black and brown people,' Austin read.

In Boston, demonstrators gathered in Nubian Square to at part of the nationwide protests.

The protest remained peaceful as they marched to the Boston Police Headquarters later in the night. The group then moved onto City Hall Plaza for a sit-in.

The gathering appeared to be among the larger groups the city of Boston has seen in some time.

Some carried signs with messages such as 'Justice 4 Breonna,' 'Black Lives Matter,' and 'Let Black women dream.'

The demonstration was largely peaceful with no arrests had been reported as of 10:45pm.

'I feel like that message being sent that cops can do whatever they want and not be held accountable so this is just an attempt to reenergize the city and reenergize anyone that sees this to get back out on the streets to fight and increase the antiracist movement because this is not ok,' organizer Ernest Jacques Jr. said to WHDH.

LOUISVILLE: Protests over the killing of Breonna Taylor continued for the third day in a row Friday

LOUISVILLE: Protesters marched to First Unitarian Church and stayed there past the cities 9pm curfew. Pictured is protest organizer in front of the First Unitarian Church

LOUISVILLE: Protests over the killing of Breonna Taylor continued for the third day in a row Friday. Pictured are protesters marching down Market Street in the city

LOUISVILLE: Protests over the killing of Breonna Taylor continued for the third day in a row. Pictured is a woman holding a BLM flag in front of the First Unitarian Church

The mayor of Boston Marty Walsh urged calm and asked demonstrators to respect the city ahead of the protest.

'I'm asking people planning to demonstrate in Boston tonight and over the weekend to respect the city and respect each other,' he said. 'I'm asking you to keep it peaceful, I'm asking you to keep it powerful. People are deeply upset, but we cannot turn to violence to express our pain.'

'We want to maintain law and order and at the same time protect everyone's ability to peacefully assembler and make their voices heard. So in case, there is a need for us we're a little bit closer than we were perhaps in May,' Lt. Colonel Bryan Pillai said.

'Start charging police officers for murder. You in your house sleeping, you ain't safe. Usually the rebuttal is don't fight the police, cooperate. How the hell do you do that sleeping?' community activist Monica Cannon-Grant said to NBC Boston.

LOUISVILLE: A woman holds a BLM flag in front of the Breonna Taylor memorial at Jackson Square Park
WASHINGTON - As Democratic senators begin mapping out how they will wield their limited procedural weapons in the fight over President Donald Trump's Supreme Court nominee, they are grappling with a central question: How much legitimacy do they give his candidate?

With little power to actually derail Trump's pick, Democrats are coming under considerable pressure from their activist base to use every tactic at their disposal to not just throw sand in the gears of the confirmation fight, but to portray the consideration of expected nominee Amy Coney Barrett as a farce that shouldn't even occur.

In a sense, they are playing the role of the GOP in 2016, when most Republicans outright ignored Merrick Garland - declining to meet with Barack Obama's final Supreme Court pick as Democrats staged events, showed off the paperwork filed by Garland and even held a semi-mock confirmation hearing in an effort to move his nomination process along.

Democrats also point to polling indicating that the public sides with them on timing. According to a Washington Post-ABC Poll released Friday, 57% of Americans say the successor to the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg should be chosen by the winner of the November election, while 38% say the choice should be nominated by Trump and confirmed by the current Senate.

But in the Senate, Democrats are not in the majority, and Republicans have 51 senators in favor of at least proceeding with the nomination process and holding a confirmation vote before the Nov. 3 election. Facing that difficult obstacle, Democrats are weighing skipping courtesy visits with the nominee, while being fiercely pressured by the base to go as far as boycotting the confirmation hearing.

"We believe Democrats need to demonstrate that this is an illegitimate process, and all options to do so should be on the table," said Christopher Kang, the chief counsel for Demand Justice, one of the more prominent advocacy groups on the left battling Trump's judicial nominees.

Trump has told people around him that he plans to name Barrett, a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit, as his nominee at a White House ceremony on Saturday. Administration officials and campaign advisers were preparing for a Barrett announcement, and some remarks for the president disclosing her as his choice have already been written, according to officials familiar with the matter.

One of the first strategic decisions will be whether to give the nominee her standard courtesy visits, many of which occur before a confirmation hearing, particularly with members of leadership and of the Judiciary Committee. Some, like Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., have said they won't meet with the nominee.

"This is not normal because Trump and my Republican colleagues have robbed this process of any legitimacy," Blumenthal said in an interview Friday. "The selection of the next justice should be done by the next president and the next Congress."

A spokesman for Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California, the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, said he could not comment on a potential meeting when there was no nominee.

Aides to most Democratic senators on the Judiciary Committee did not return a request for comment on whether they planned to meet with the nominee, although a spokesman for Sen. Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii, confirmed that she will not meet with the nominee. Among those whose offices did not comment was Sen. Kamala Harris of California, the party's vice-presidential candidate who is a member of the committee that will hold the Supreme Court confirmation hearings.

Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, one of just two Republicans who oppose confirming a new justice before Election Day, would meet with the nominee if she requested it, according to an aide.

Some moderate Democratic senators may be inclined to sit down with the nominee, although a robust debate about whether to do so has percolated through the Democratic caucus in recent days, according to officials familiar with the discussions.

Other Democrats took umbrage with the White House's effort to schedule meetings between the nominee and Democratic and Republican senators on the Judiciary Committee before the nominee had been named, and before memorial services had concluded for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, whose death last week created a vacancy on the high court.

"This entire process is unprecedented and offensive, but it is especially unseemly to be scheduling meetings even before Justice Ginsburg has been interred with her husband at Arlington National Cemetery," Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., the former chairman of the committee, said Friday.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., who will be observing the Yom Kippur holiday Sunday and Monday, may not announce whether he or other senior Democrats will welcome Trump's choice into their offices until Tuesday.

The comments from some Democratic senators that they will decline to meet with the eventual pick drew criticism from the White House.

"The president has not even put forward a nominee yet," said White House spokesman Judd Deere. "This is pure politics from Senate Democrats and shows they do not take their constitutional duty to advise and consent seriously."

Democrats say they have not made any final decisions about how much attention to show the nominee and the overall process. Some liberal activists want them to use a range of tactics that, at first glance, might delay the process - yet could also make it easier for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., to confirm the nominee.

Once the nominee gets to the hearing stage of the process, Democrats must decide whether to essentially protest the entire nomination and largely refuse to participate, or to engage and try to expose flaws in the judge's background during what would probably be more than a dozen hours of questioning over two days.

Some activists are pushing Democrats to either boycott the hearings completely, or to use a rare maneuver to short-circuit the hearings after just two hours.

But Senate veterans know that each of those decisions is fraught with peril, given that it will open up countermoves by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and McConnell that could only accelerate the process to confirmation.

Though some Democratic senators off the committee and activists had floated the idea of a hearing boycott, there was little appetite to do so among most Democrats who actually sit on the Judiciary Committee, according to Democratic officials.

"I intend to go to the hearings and participate," Blumenthal said. "I believe all of my Judiciary colleagues will."

If Democrats refuse to attend the hearings, Republicans would probably speed through a couple hours of friendly questions, not challenging the nominee's background or past rulings, then adjourn the hearings and move toward a committee vote.

A boycott would also deprive Harris, who has drawn much attention for her rigorous interrogation of Trump nominees, of using her questioning to serve as a boost in her dual role as Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden's running mate.

Instead, veteran Democrats will push to extend the questioning as far into the two days as Graham will allow, focusing on issues that might illustrate to the public how much a new conservative justice could tilt the court to the right.

The other option - using their ability to cut short committee meetings at just two hours - would be likely to produce high drama. But it would also result in just four hours of questioning of the nominee, half of that time coming from friendly Republicans.

A number of Democrats - from liberals such as Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts to moderates such as Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado - have publicly stated that they want to use the confirmation process to highlight the outcome of a conservative replacing Ginsburg, particularly on health care. Some Democrats have argued privately that the best way to highlight that issue is at a confirmation hearing that will be watched by millions of voters.

"What a bitter irony that at this moment, in the middle of a raging pandemic, Senator McConnell can't even be bothered to come to the negotiating table to work on a covid-19 relief package," Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) said this week. "But it seems he'll spare no effort to rush through a nominee to sit on the Supreme Court when Republicans try to wipe out the critical health care protections in the Affordable Care Act."

Josh Dawsey contributed to this report.
Schools Using Fake History to Kill America

Commentary

This is part 17 in a series examining education in the United States.

Americans educated by government today are, for the most part, hopelessly ignorant of their own nations historyand thats no accident. Theyre beyond ignorant when it comes to civics, too. On the history of the rest of the world, or the history of communism, Americans are generally clueless as well. This was all by design, of course.

After generations of flying under the radar, the ongoing corruption of history education in public schools is now suddenly the topic du jour. With the spread of The New York Times discredited 1619 Project aiming to reframe history through the lens of slavery, which even The New York Times own fact-checker called out, Americans everywhere are suddenly paying attention to whats being taught to impressionable children at taxpayer expense.

President Donald Trump recently blamed the escalating mayhem in the streets on indoctrination by schools and the media. In September, he blasted the toxic propaganda being peddled as history in American classrooms. To deal with it, the president even said he will sign an executive order to promote patriotic education.

The reason why history is being rewritten is hardly a mystery. In George Orwells classic dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, the totalitarian ruling Partys motto explaining its strategy is Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past. And its very truewhoever controls the historical narrative will be able to shape the future. Liberty-minded Americans and truth are currently losing the battlebig time.

Totalitarians have long understood the power of historical narratives. Consider Chairman Maos Cultural Revolution in communist China. Under the guise of purging remnants of the old ways of capitalism and tradition, Maos communist storm troopers did their best to destroy the records and evidences of thousands of years of Chinese history. Books were burned and monuments destroyed in an orgy of destruction.

After true history was erased and disfigured, the Chinese Communist Party was able to rewrite history on a blank slate to suit its own agenda. Especially important to that effort was the indoctrination of children in government schools. Everything ancient and traditional was portrayed as primitive or even evil, while the new party line surrounding the supposed glories and progress of communism was force-fed to Chinas youth.

Americas ongoing cultural revolution hasnt been quite as dramatic, violent, or thoroughso far. But if left unchecked, the results of this long-term operation may turn out to be just as deadly. And there should be no doubt in anyones mind about the effectiveness of the effort to rewrite the history of the United States, Western civilization, and even the world.

Consider the data. According to the U.S. Department of Educations 2018 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), known as the nations report card, just 15 percent of American students were at or above the proficient level in history. When it comes to civics, less than 1 in 4 U.S. eighth-grade students performed at or above proficient in 2018 on the NAEP, the latest year for which scores are available.

Keeping in mind the wild bias of the Education Department (some 99.7 percent of the bureaucrats contributions to a presidential candidate in the 2016 election went to Hillary Clinton), even those numbers probably drastically overstate the true level of historical and civic understanding of U.S. students.

Contrast the dismal scores with previous generations. There was a time when Americans were the best-educated people on the planetespecially when it came to history and civics. According to prominent French scholar Alexis de Tocqueville, who visited America in the early-to-mid 1800s and recorded his observations in two volumes before government hijacked education, every citizen  is  taught the doctrines and evidences of his religion, the history of his country, and the leading features of the Constitution.

Some areas on the Western frontier and the deep South werent quite as advanced educationally. However, in the more populous and developed areas, it is extremely rare to find a man imperfectly acquainted with all these things, and a person wholly ignorant of them is a sort of phenomenon, de Tocqueville continued.

Today, its just the opposite: Finding a person who understands the history of America or the leading features of its Constitution is a sort of phenomenon.

The Rewriting of History in America

The process of rewriting history was a long one. Unlike Maos Cultural Revolution, which took about a decade, those seeking to erase and distort Americas incredible and unique history were forced to proceed slowly, working over decades and generations rather than accomplishing it all in one fell swoop. But concrete evidence of this deliberate plot has surfaced periodically since at least the 1940s.

In the early 1950s, Congress became suspicious about the scheming of the major tax-exempt foundations, a subject covered extensively in part 7 of this series on education. To deal with the issue, lawmakers formed the Select Committee to Investigate Tax-Exempt Foundations and Comparable Organizations, sometimes referred to as the Reece Committee after its chairman.

What investigators found should have shocked America to the core. In its final report, the select committee reported that the major foundations of the day, which still exist, had supported a conscious distortion of history. The foundations also sought to hijack education for the purpose of undermining American constitutional principles and liberty, investigators found.

One of the expert witnesses who testified during the select committees investigation, attorney and investigator Aaron Sargent, an expert in subversion through education, put it clearly. They sought to create a blackout of history by slanting and distorting historical facts, Sargent testified about the goals of the major tax-exempt foundations in the education field. They introduced a new and revolutionary philosophyone based on the teachings of John Dewey.

By the time of the congressional probe, the situation was so serious that Norman Dodd, the chief investigator for the committee, said the foundations had orchestrated a revolution in the United States. The revolution could not have occurred peacefully or with the consent of the majority unless education in the United States had prepared in advance to endorse it, Dodd told lawmakers in his sworn testimony. The attack on real history in school was a crucial element of that.

Of course, the situation only got worse from there. By 1980, pseudo-historian Howard Zinn, a radical exposed in declassified FBI documents as a Communist Party member, had published his book A Peoples History of the United States. Its a favorite in public schools. More than 3 million copies have been sold so far, shaping the minds and attitudes of countless millions of Americans while turning them against their own nation and their own political institutions that guaranteed individual liberty for so long.

The propaganda history book was full of obvious lies, as exposed most recently by scholar Mary Grabar in her book Debunking Howard Zinn. The deception was strategic, too, and powerful. The lies begin right at the start of the book, portraying Columbus as a genocidal monster, and continue onward from there.

We were really no better than the Nazis in the way Zinn presents it, Grabar told The Epoch Times.

It was carefully calculated. Rewriting history is what communists do, continued Grabar, who also serves as a resident fellow at the Alexander Hamilton Institute for the Study of Western Civilization. They dont want people to know about any other form of government or to remember a time when there was freedom and abundance. Like Zinn, the Marxists of today want young people to be so disgusted with their own country that they become inspired to overthrow it.

While demonizing the United States and Western civilization more broadly, Zinn and other communists work hard to conceal the history of communismthe horrors of starvation, gulags, repression, and mass murder, Grabar said. Interestingly, there were clear parallels between Zinns fake history and a history written by Communist Party USA chief William Z. Foster published in 1951 dubbed Outline Political History of the Americas. Foster wrote openly about how crucial hijacking education would be for the Soviet-style communist regime he envisioned for America.

When starting the project, Grabar said she already knew Zinns book was biased. But even I was surprised by how blatantly and deliberately Zinn lied, she said, urging students, parents, and community members to use her book to refute the propaganda with facts.

More recently, The New York Times released its 1619 Project, the brainchild of Nikole Hannah-Jones. Like Zinns book, its essentially fake history, as historians from across the political spectrumand even The New York Times own fact-checkerpublicly confirmed. Like Zinns book, it seeks to reframe Americas history as one based on oppression, slavery, and racism rather than liberty. And like Zinns fake history, the 1619 Project is now being used in public schools across America.

Perhaps most alarming about Hannah-Joness false narrative is the notion that racism and evil are embedded in the very DNA of America. In other words, theres nothing short of the complete annihilation of the United States very foundations and essence that could possibly resolve the real and imagined shortcomings. The message of the project was obvious and clear: Death to America!

In reality, the truth about American history is almost exactly the opposite of what the project presents. The principles upon which the nation was foundedall men are created equal, for instance, and are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rightspaved the way for abolishing slavery worldwide while facilitating the greatest expansion of human freedom and prosperity in world history.

Despite the obvious lies and deception, Hannah-Jones received a Pulitzer Prize for her work on the 1619 Project. Ironically, though, New York Times writer Walter Duranty also won a Pulitzer Prize for peddling lies and communist propaganda. In Durantys case, he infamously parroted Stalins obvious propaganda and covered up the Soviet genocide in Ukraine that killed by some estimates up to 10 million people.

Effects of Fake History

This strategic rewriting of history in public schools across America has led to dramatic shifts in Americans attitudes, values, beliefs, and worldview. For example, national pride among Americans, who arguably live in the richest and freest nation in human history, has reached historic lows, according to a Gallup poll released this summer. Among younger Americans, just 1 in 5 are extremely proud to be American, while among those 65 and older, just over half are extremely proud.

But the real dangers are becoming clear, too. A 2019 survey by the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation found that 7 in 10 millennials said they are likely to vote for a socialist. Fully 36 percent of millennials support communism, the survey found. And just 57 percent of them believe the Declaration of Independence guarantees freedom and equality better than the Communist Manifesto. A generation ago, these numbers would have been inconceivable.

When we dont educate our youngest generations about the historical truth of 100 million victims murdered at the hands of communist regimes over the past century, we shouldnt be surprised at their willingness to embrace Marxist ideas, explained Victims of Communism (VOC) Memorial Foundation Executive Director Marion Smith.

We need to redouble our efforts to educate Americas youth about the history of communist regimes and the dangers of socialism today.

In comments to The Epoch Times, VOC Director of Academic Programs Murray Bessette explained that American public schools simply dont teach the true history of communism. Part of the reason for that, he said, is the ideological character of many involved in developing and delivering curricula for American schools. Parents must insist on a full account of history, and teachers must seek out programs and materials that teach the whole truth, added Bessette.

The effects of these false narratives pushed on children in government schools are becoming more and more obvious. Just think of the brainwashed armies of young Americans rampaging through the streets rioting, looting, killing, protesting, and destroying. Funded by rich and powerful individuals, companies, and foundations, their goal is to fundamentally transform what they view as an evil America. And because they dont know the truth about their own nation or its history, many genuinely believe in what theyre doing.

Speaking at an Independence Day celebration this summer, the president of the United States hit the nail on the head. The violent mayhem we have seen in the streets of cities that are run by liberal Democrats, in every case, is the predictable result of years of extreme indoctrination and bias in education, journalism, and other cultural institutions, Trump explained. Against every law of society and nature, our children are taught in school to hate their own country, and to believe that the men and women who built it were not heroes, but that they were villains.

Their goal, the president correctly observed, is not to improve America, but to destroy it.

Fortunately, now that the problem has been identified, steps are being taken to address it. And at the core of that process will be ensuring that young Americans understand the truth about their own nations history. During remarks made on Constitution Day, Trump blasted the lefts distortion of American history with lies and deception.

There is no better example than The New York Times totally discredited 1619 Project, said Trump, calling it toxic propaganda that would destroy America. This project rewrites American history to teach our children that we were founded on the principle of oppression, not freedom.

In reality, as Trump correctly pointed out, nothing could be further from the truth.

Americas founding set in motion the unstoppable chain of events that abolished slavery, secured civil rights, defeated communism and fascism, and built the most fair, equal, and prosperous nation in human history, the president declared.

Trump also promised action to reverse the progress of the history destroyers and rewriters. We must clear away the twisted web of lies in our schools and classrooms, and teach our children the magnificent truth about our country, he said. We want our sons and daughters to know that they are the citizens of the most exceptional nation in the history of the world.

To accomplish that, grants are being awarded by the National Endowment for the Humanities to help develop a pro-American curriculum that celebrates the truth about our nations great history, Trump said. He also said he would soon sign an executive order to create a national 1776 Commission that will promote patriotic education that will encourage our educators to teach our children about the miracle of American history.

Whether the rot and corruption that has taken over the teaching of history and civics in Americas government schools can be reversed remains to be seen. But diagnosing an illness is the first step to treating and curing it. Now that Americans are starting to understand whats killing their nation, serious efforts can be made to stop the bleeding. Teaching children the truth about U.S. history will be a good first step.

Alex Newman is an award-winning international journalist, educator, author, and consultant who co-wrote the book Crimes of the Educators: How Utopians Are Using Government Schools to Destroy Americas Children. He is the executive director of Public School Exit, serves as CEO of Liberty Sentinel Media, and writes for diverse publications in the United States and abroad.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
File photo

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on September 26 held a virtual bilateral summit with his Sri Lankan counterpart Mahinda Rajapaksa and discussed a wide range of topics, including relations between the two neighbours and the COVID-19 pandemic.

In his opening remarks at a virtual bilateral summit, PM Modi said he was confident that the massive electoral victory of the ruling party in Sri Lanka, backed by the Rajapaksa government's policies, will facilitate deeper cooperation between the two countries.

Rajapaksa was sworn in as Sri Lankan prime minister for a fresh term on August 9 after his party, the Sri Lanka People's Front, secured a two-third majority in parliamentary polls.

"The relations between India and Sri Lanka are thousands of years old. According to my government's neighbourhood first policy and SAGAR doctrine, we give special priority to relations between the two countries," PM Modi said.

"I express my gratitude for the way in which India worked for other countries during the COVID-19 pandemic," Rajapaksa said, adding that the operation to douse the fire on MT New Diamond "provided an opportunity for greater cooperation between the two countries."

The fire on board an oil tanker off Sri Lanka's coast was brought under control with India's help, the Indian Navy had said on September 5. The ship was carrying 270,000 tonne of crude oil from Kuwait to India.

PM Modi, the Ministry of External Affairs said later, also announced grant assistance of$15 million for promotion of Buddhist ties between the two countries.

"In the current COVID imposed restrictions, the successful conduct of the virtual summit reflects the high degree of commitment at the leaders' level on taking forward the bilateral relations," MEA's Joint Secretary for Indian Ocean Region Division Amit Narang said.

"India and Sri Lanka are working to strengthen bilateral financial cooperation. India has extended $400 million currency swap facility to Central Bank of Sri Lanka to assist with the economic recovery and tackle COVID-19 related disruptions," the MEA added.

India will facilitate the visit of a delegation of Buddhist pilgrims from Sri Lanka in the first inaugural flight to Kushinagar in Uttar Pradesh, the MEA said after the meeting.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 17:19:51|Editor: huaxia

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UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Driven by pure self-interests, the United States has once again spread its "political virus" in front of the international community, exposing its desperate blame-shifting intrigues amid its epidemic crisis.

What Kelly Craft, the U.S. permanent representative to the United Nations, said at a summit-level debate of the UN Security Council was nothing fresh but parroting previous China-smearing rhetoric by other Washington politicians. Her accusations are as groundless as they are brazen.

Washington cannot expect to beat the novel coronavirus through such practices. On the contrary, by stoking confrontation and division, the United States has seriously disrupted the international community's joint efforts to fight the pandemic.

Since the onset of the pandemic, the United States, with the world's most advanced medical technologies and system, has largely failed to contain the pathogen, as the country is tragically leading the world in terms of both COVID-19 caseload and death toll, leaving its global image tarnished.

To shift blame for their hellish pandemic response, those politicians have left no stone unturned to smear China and the World Health Organization (WHO). Washington's overbearing bullying has prompted the world to see clearly their political scheme behind the trick of blame-shifting.

The timeline of China's response to COVID-19 outbreak is clear. The Chinese people have stood together and made huge efforts and sacrifices in combatting the disease. China's contribution to the global battle against the pandemic has been widely recognized by the international community, including the United Nations and the WHO.

"The United States should understand that blaming others will not solve its own problems. All countries have their problems along the way of development. And these problems should first and foremost be solved through one's own efforts. By shifting responsibilities, or 'lying, cheating, stealing,' one will not solve any problem, but only drift further down the wrong direction," said Zhang Jun, China's permanent representative to the United Nations, in his response to Craft.

As a major country in the world, the United States should set a good example for the 193 members in the UN family. However, its behavior is utterly rejectable.

It is the United States that has time and again undermined the international order by departing from international institutions and treaties at will.

It is also the United States that has stirred up unilateralism and exceptionalism at a time when the global community faces so many threats and challenges that need to be tackled together.

As the world marks the 75th anniversary of the United Nations, those U.S. politicians should seriously revisit the purposes and principles of the UN Charter and thoroughly reflect on the fundamental reasons why the law of the jungle was universally rejected by the international community after World War II.

Those U.S. politicians should stop their self-designed "political show" and instead shoulder due responsibilities for the world. Enditem
New Delhi, Sep 26 : Terming the Monsoon Session of the Parliament undemocratic and truncated, the Congress party on Saturday said it ran a nationwide online campaign -- "Speak Up For Farmers" -- against the Central Government's dubiously and undemocratically passed anti-farmers legislations.

In a statement, the Grand old Party said it opposed the three draconian anti-farmer bills tooth and nail in the Parliament and insisted its campaign, challenging the legislations, will amplify the voice of millions of farmers' protest.

Terming the farming Bill a black law, the party said: "It was indeed a loud wake up call for the BJP Government which is hell bent upon destroying the farmers and farming sector in the country to suit the interests of a handful of crony capitalists." Congress MP K C Venugopal and AICC General Secretary said that over 250 farmers' organisations, keeping aside their political differences, were protesting against these oppressive legislations across the country.

The Congress party stand is that the bills aim at Scrapping of Minimum Support Price (MSP) mechanism and abolish the Agriculture Produce Market Committees (APMC), which will be a big blow to the farmers.

"For the benefit of a handful crony capitalist friends, the Modi government has unleashed a diabolical conspiracy by denying democratic discussions and voting in the Parliament on these bills", said Venugopal.

The Congress party on Saturday launched a nationwide online campaign, "Speak Up India" demanding the BJP Government to immediately withdraw these anti-farmer legislations.

Congress president Rahul Gandhi had tweeted, "Let us raise our voices together against the atrocities and exploitation of farmers by the Modi government." Gandhi, attacking the BJP government, said after demonetization, GST and corona, the farmers are being targeted, andA they are going to be enslaved by the corporates. He added that the Congress party is with the farmers and it will fight against these laws.

The party in a statement said that the PCCs will be holding protests on September 28 and its top leaders will walk from the PCC office in different state capitals to the Raj Bhavan and submit a memorandum to the Governor addressed to the President of India on the anti-farmers bills.
President Trump holds up the text of an executive order on healthcare after speaking in Charlotte, N.C., on Sept. 24, 2020. (Chris Carlson / Associated Press )

Less than six weeks before election day, President Trump traveled to North Carolina on Thursday to announce his commitment to protecting Americans with pre-existing medical conditions and to issue another round of executive orders related to healthcare.

"We are delivering better care, with more choice, at a much lower cost and working to ensure Americans have access to the care they need, Trump told supporters in Charlotte, saying his plan "always protects patients with pre-existing conditions."

But it remains unclear what kind of protections Americans may receive. Here's a rundown of what the president's words really mean for Americans with pre-existing medical conditions.

Why are pre-existing conditions such a big deal?

Before the advent of the Affordable Care Act in 2010, health insurers would routinely refuse coverage to people who had pre-existing medical conditions, such as diabetes, cancer or allergies.

Even pregnancy could be deemed a pre-existing condition that an insurer could refuse to cover.

The healthcare law, often called Obamacare, barred insurers from this kind of discrimination, protecting the millions of Americans who live with medical conditions.

According to one estimate by the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation, about a quarter of non-elderly adults have a health condition that an insurer could decline to cover, if that were still allowed.

And nearly half of non-elderly families in the U.S. have at least one member with a health condition that could provide the basis for denying coverage, according to the foundation.

If Americans are already protected by Obamacare, why is Trump announcing an executive order on pre-existing conditions?

Trump has been calling for repeal of the health law for years and has been under growing pressure to lay out an alternative.

He never produced an alternative in 2017, when Republicans in Congress tried to roll back the law. And despite multiple promises since, he still hasnt laid out a plan to replace the law and its many consumer protections, including the ban on denying coverage to people with pre-existing conditions.

Story continues

Currently, the administration, joining Texas and other conservative states, is asking the Supreme Court to wipe out the whole law. The justices are scheduled to hear arguments in that case shortly after the election.

With the recent death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who has defended the health law in the past, the outcome of the case is much less clear.

Former Vice President Joe Biden, the Democratic presidential nominee, has been intensifying criticism of Trump for trying to repeal the law and its consumer protections.

Could the executive order actually replace the healthcare law?

In a word, no.

While a president can use an executive order to direct federal agencies to do certain things, he or she cant change the law or place new legal requirements on how health insurers act in a commercial market.

That means Trump cannot simply tell insurers they must offer coverage to someone with a pre-existing medical condition.

If the Supreme Court strikes down the 2010 law, Congress would need pass a new law to bar insurers from denying coverage to people with pre-existing conditions, a fact acknowledged on Thursday by Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar.

Whats so hard about that?

One of the reasons why the health law was so difficult to pass a decade ago is that health insurance is very complicated. Making coverage available to more people takes more than simply directing health insurers to cover people with pre-existing medical conditions.

The most important issue is that requiring insurers to cover people with pre-existing conditions makes health insurance much more expensive.

The healthcare law deals with that problem in two ways: It bars insurers from charging people with pre-existing medical conditions more than people who dont have such conditions. That spreads the extra cost among more people.

And, very importantly, the law provides subsidies to low- and moderate-income Americans to help them buy health plans. These subsidies are critical because they make insurance more affordable, at least for those whose incomes make them eligible for the government help.

Those who earn too much for the subsidies face higher premiums  caused largely by the pre-existing condition requirement. Those higher costs have helped drive much of the criticism of the law.

Does Trumps order do anything about those issues?

No.

The presidents order does not address the cost of insurance or the other consumer protections that are linked to protecting people with pre-existing conditions, such as the law's ban on charging women more than men or its limits on how much more older people can be charged than younger people.

So, what does Trumps order do?

Administration officials said Thursday the executive order merely states that it is the policy of the United States to protect people with pre-existing medical conditions.

That makes the order more of a symbolic statement, with no real effect on health insurers or people with pre-existing conditions.





This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Pop icon Michael Jackson was quite friendly with Princess Diana long before she devastatingly died in a car accident. In an interview. Jackson stated that he canceled one concert in honor of her and paid tribute to her in another concert.

Jackson's concert was supposed to be held in the Belgian coastal town of Ostend. He canceled it due to his shock Princess Diana's death, a spokeswoman for his record label stated.

"[Jackson] said he would have a difficult time performing and did not want to do the concert because of her sudden death," according to Hannelore Van Staen of Sony Epic Belgium, reported Irish Times.

'Kindred Spirit'

The King of Pop felt that the Princess of Wales was a kindred spirit and believed she was one of the mere people who understood his ways.

Jackson and Princess Diana shared late-night phone calls as they found solace in each other's trifles in the public eye.

'Dirty Diana'

He admitted that he once took the song "Dirty Diana" out of his concert setlist because Princess Diana was in attendance at his show. The song was not inspired by Princess Diana but Jackson explained that he did not want to somehow disrespect her, reported World ABC News.

However, when Princess Diana later met with him, she demanded him to play the song.

Friendship Between Michael Jackson, Princess Diana

Michael Jackson and Princess Diana forged a strong friendship with the global music sensation because of her love of his songs, their shared experience of having their individual lives play out under the searing media, and their mutual passions for creating good in the world. Thus, it would make sense that he would cancel one concert to commemorate her.

Also Read: Prince Harry, Meghan Markle Break Royal Protocol After Persuading Americans to Vote

First Meeting

Princess Diana was a huge man of the music artist as she reportedly listened to his albums "Thriller" and "Bad" constantly. The pair met on July 16, 1988, when, towing along with her then-husband Prince Charles, she was present at the Wembley Stadium for Jackson's "Bad" tour.

Michael Jackson's Reaction to Princess Diana's Death

In 1997, shortly following Princess Diana's death, he told in an interview with Barbara Walters regarding what he did next. He reportedly "collapsed in grief" when he was informed.

When he returned to the stage after canceling one of his concerts, his follow-up concert saw him honoring the entire performance to the Princess of Wales' memory.

According to him during the concert, "In my heart I was saying: 'I love you Diana. Shine and shine on forever. You are the true princess of the people.' In words I did not say, but I said it in three minutes by showing a big picture [of Diana] on the jumbotron screens," reported Express.

Michael Jackson had been staying in Paris but his spokeswoman stated that she could not confirm a report that he had been at the Ritz Hotel where Princess Diana and friend Dodi al-Fayed dined together prior to their fatal car accident and Jackson's canceling of his concert.

Related Article: Prince Harry Joins US Helicopter Club to Take Meghan Markle and Son Archie to Rides

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Bollywood actor Deepika Padukone on Saturday deposed before the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) in a drugs related case after her alleged chats came to the fore.

Deepika, was summoned for questioning by the drug law enforcement agency on Wednesday.

She arrived at the NCB office before 10 a.m.

An NCB official said that she will be questioned about the alleged drug chats with her former manager Karishma Prakash.

She will also be asked if she consumed drugs and from whom and where she procured them, and whether the drugs were procured for self use or for someone else.

She will also be questioned if she still consumes drugs, who all were there at the Koko club in 2017 when she asked Karishma to bring drugs.

Besides Deepika, the NCB has also summoned Shraddha Kapoor and Sara Ali Khan for questioning later in the day.

The NCB has also summoned Karishma for questioning on Saturday. She was questioned for several hours by the NCB on Friday.

The NCB has questioned actor Rakul Preet Singh, former Dharma Production executive producer Kshitij Prasad Ravi and Karishma.

The NCB has also recorded the statements of Kwan Talent Management Agency CEO Dhruv Chitgopekar and noted producer Madhu Mantena Varna, and others.

The NCB registered a drugs case under the NDPS Act after the Enforcement Directorate was probing the money laundering charges in actor Sushant Singh Rajput death case.

The NCB was shared the alleged chats of Sushant's girlfriend Rhea Chakraborty, her brother Showik and others.

Rhea, Showik, Samuel Miranda and several others have been arrested in the case so far.
Tattoos aren't illegal in Japan, but the social stigma against them is severely strong.

Associated with yakuza and crime, tattoos can get individuals  guests from overseas or not  barred from certain establishments such as hot springs, gyms, swimming pools, and even beaches.

Tattoo artists also face the burden of this stigma, and in the case of one tattoo artist from Osaka, Taiki Masuda, tattooing without a medical license led to a 150,000 yen fine (US$1,433).

His case was moved to Japan's Supreme Court in 2017, and after nearly three years the country's highest court has made its decision: tattoo artists are no longer required to obtain medical licenses to practice their art.

The Supreme Court's logic for their ruling was that tattooing isn't a medical practice, and is not something exclusively practiced by doctors, thus the law forbidding tattoo artists without a medical license from their craft lost its legal grounding.

For Taiki, who is also part of Save Tattooing, an advocacy group created to support the country's 3,000 tattoo artisans, the ruling is certainly a win. But what exactly makes this ruling so important for tattoo artists in Japan?

In many countries, such as South Korea and now previously Japan, tattoo artists were legally barred from their craft if they didn't obtain a medical license. Basically, you had to become a doctor to be a tattoo artist. Otherwise, if you were a tattoo artist in Japan caught without a medical license, you could be fined up to 1 million yen ($9,563) and/or receive up to three years of jail time.

The main logic behind this law was that since tattoo artists have to use a needle to tattoo their customers, they need to go to medical school first to learn how to handle a needle properly.

Considering how tattoo artists who simply want to make body art without ties to the yakuza already have a hard time getting a steady flow of clients due to social stigma, the law necessitating a medical license acts more as a deterrent than an actual measure for safety and hygiene practices, given the burgeoning costs of medical school as well as the time and labor needed to graduate.
Press Release

September 26, 2020 Dispatch from Crame No. 921:

Sen. Leila M. de Lima's Comments on PRC's response to her dispatch on MOA between PRC and PhilHealth 9/25/20 "They're just towers," says National Security Adviser Hermogenes Esperon, Jr., on fears of espionage if China-owned Dito is allowed to build cell towers inside our military camps. "Ginagamit lang ang SALN para siraan ang opisyal ng pamahalaan," says Ombudsman Samuel Martires, defending his decision to restrict access to SALN of public officials. "So where is the conflict [of interest]?" says the Philippine Red Cross (PRC) board of governors, defending Sen. Gordon's role as both lead Senate investigator of PhilHealth anomalies and PRC signatory in the Memorandum of Agreement with PhilHealth. Is there anyone left in this administration who is looking out for the interests of our country and our rule of law? Are we living in the age of denial and naivete? The questions on the MOA between PRC and PhilHealth are simple: what is the legal justification which supports the PhilHealth's discretion to agree to advance payments? How can a public official with PENDING investigation into PhilHealth's misdeeds and irregularities negotiate and sign an agreement with the latter? On this score, Sen. Gordon's defenders seem to espouse a myopic view of what constitutes conflict of interest (Read: delicadeza). The Bayanihan to Heal as One law only allowed procurements by government institutions to be exempt from the Procurement Act and related laws. The MOA does not require the PhilHealth to procure anything. Public office is a public trust. The funds we spend on COVID-19 pandemic response represent charges against our present and our future. Our country deserves to know how these funds are spent and whether they are spent in accordance with our laws. It is our duty to be transparent about public spending and respond to any and all of the allegations of impropriety. We are, after all, public servants. We owe our people our utmost honesty. ### Access the handwritten copy of Dispatch from Crame No. 921, here: https://issuu.com/senatorleilam.delima/docs/dispatch_no._921
New Delhi: Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Saturday said that a consultant would be appointed to suggest measures for 24X7 water supply across the national capital.



He also dismissed the allegation that the water supply in the capital was being "privatised."

"In a recent meeting with officials of Delhi Jal Board, we have decided that a consultant will be appointed to suggest measures that can ensure a 24X7 water supply to every house. We will try and achieve this goal within five years," he said.

"Some Opposition leaders are saying water supply in Delhi is being privatised. It can never happen and I assure you of this," the Delhi Chief Minister added.

Kejriwal further informed in a press briefing that his government is in talks with nearby states such as Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand to increase the availability of water in Delhi.

"We are in talks with different state governments, such as Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh to increase the availability of water in the national capital. But, at the same time, we need better management of the water already available in Delhi," Kejriwal added.
Governor of Borno State, Babagana Zulum, on Saturday confirmed the attack on a convoy of government officials by suspected Boko Haram which led to the death of many security personnel.

PREMIUM TIMES had reported how at least 15 security personnel, comprising soldiers, police officers and operatives of the Civilian-JTF were killed in an ambush while on escort duty to officials of the state government as they headed towards Baga town.

Governor Zulum was billed to officially return the people of Baga to their communities nearly three years after Boko Haram sacked them.

The governors spokesman, Isa Gusau, in a statement issued on Saturday explained what happened.

He said three separate convoys, one of the governor, the second, that of a government committee, and the third, a security escort team, were arranged for the trip.

Mr Gusau explained the security team was attacked long after the others had arrived Baga.

Mr Gusau said his boss was saddened by the loss of lives.

Governor Babagana Umara Zulum is saddened by this unfortunate carnage. He shares the grief of families of these 11 priceless heroes to whom Borno shall remain grateful, the statement read in part.

Local sources had earlier confirmed that soldiers too died in the attack.

Mr Gusau said his boss was in Baga to supervise the return of IDPs to the reclaimed communities

He said, Baga is Bornos largest fishing community in the shores of the Lake Chad with waterways to neighbouring countries is considered strategic to Boko harams operation.

He said the Governor was already in Baga performing his duties when the rear convoy of backup security got attacked.

The governor and his entourage did not travel by road. They were flown from Maiduguri to Baga by a military chopped at about 11 a.m.

ALSO READ: 15 security personnel killed after Boko Haram attacked Borno officials

Mr Gusau said the two convoys- one belonging to the governor and another for a committee on Baga reconstruction had safely plied the Maiduguri-Baga route before the third convoy of security men was ambushed.

Governor had on August 31 inaugurated a resettlement committee, which was mandated to commence immediate reconstruction and rehabilitation of Baga.
This is usually a busy month for the luxury industry. Not long after glossy fashion magazines publish their all-important September issues, thousands of retail buyers, journalists and clients embark on a tour of New York, London, Milan and Paris.

Rolling from city to city to attend fashion weeks, they decide the trends that will power a global luxury goods market worth hundreds of billions  in 2019, 281 billion euros, or $334 billion.

Not this year. The ground beneath the industry is heaving under the weight of a pandemic that has caused a plunge in sales, shocked global supply chains and pushed American household names such as Brooks Brothers and Lord & Taylor to bankruptcy.

Those shifts have prompted big questions about the business model of luxury fashion. Should fashion weeks be dismantled and rebuilt? Are cycles of new items every six months still the best approach, at a time when garment overproduction is under scrutiny, restricted lifestyles are commonplace and runway spectacles can feel out of step in a world with different priorities?

The second quarter of 2020 was the luxury fashion industrys worst. According to estimates by Boston Consulting Group, global luxury sales are set to contract by 25% to 45% this year, with industry growth unlikely to return to pre-pandemic levels until at least 2023 or 2024. At a time when many companies are battling for survival, many designers feel they cannot afford to skip an opportunity to show new wares.

So as the latest fashion week season began in New York last week, blockbuster catwalk shows and big crowds were out, replaced with a handful of small-scale or online-only presentations. In Italy and France, some brands have said they plan to host larger physical events, despite having only a handful of international guests, a number of high-profile designer absences and rising infection rates in Europe.

Showing is not essential. However, sometimes you do need to show what youre actually creating, Antoine Arnault, head of communications at LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton, told The New York Times on Sept. 9. Theres a whole economy around these shows. That should not be underestimated, he added, alluding to the thousands of freelance makeup artists, seamstresses, drivers, security guards and photographers who rely on fashion weeks for a sizable part of their incomes.

Large groups like LVMH, which owns brands including Dior, Louis Vuitton and Fendi, and its rival conglomerate Kering, which operates the likes of Gucci, Saint Laurent and Balenciaga, have been more insulated from the bitter pandemic headwinds than most smaller stand-alone businesses. (LVMH, though, has entered a court battle in an effort to extricate itself from a $16 billion commitment to buy the jeweler Tiffany & Co.)

In its latest quarterly earnings report, LVMH said it had seen a strong uptick in sales in the summer from Asian countries like mainland China, Japan and South Korea, where recent virus rates have stayed low. But sales for its fashion and leather goods unit fell by 37%, as international tourism ground to a halt and footfall into global stores was slow to recover. The impact has been even worse for brands in turnaround efforts like Salvatore Ferragamo and Burberry, debt-ridden department stores like Neiman Marcus, and the cash-poor independent brands with large exposure to those types of retailers (many of whom scrambled to cancel and return orders). Most companies are now struggling with a large glut of unsold inventory from the spring and summer collections this year.

China, which was already the fastest-growing luxury market before the pandemic, will become even more vital to brands success as North American and European markets remain unpredictable. And everywhere, offline retail has had to go online  and fast  as consumers turned rapidly to digital shopping.

Amazon, whose customers have ordered over 1 billion fashion items via its mobile app in the last 12 months, has long looked for a way to become partners with luxury names, which had in the past largely rebuffed its advances. Last week, Amazon launched its mobile-only Luxury Stores with one brand: Oscar de la Renta. It said that more labels would be announced in the weeks to come.

Farfetch, the digital marketplace that allows upmarket vendors to sell their goods online, reported last month that it had seen a 60% surge in traffic for the second quarter compared with the same period last year  and 500,000 new customers.

E-commerce represented just 12% of luxury sales in 2019. Since then there has obviously been a complete paradigm shift, Jose Neves, Farfetchs chief executive, said. Luxury used to be heavily associated with an in-store experience, he added. But for many consumers in 2020, convenience and safety are now front of mind, prompting many brands to fast-track their digital strategies. For those who arent able to do that, it is going to be a struggle, Neves said.

As the industry starts to offer up new looks, TikTok is hosting its own online fashion month for a potential audience of roughly 800 million users, with shows by Saint Laurent and JW Anderson. Expect to see smaller collections with more timeless pieces that can have extended shelf lives if necessary. Demand for evening wear and suits has plummeted now that no one has a reason to dress up, though many brands say they expect people to start buying high-priced items that arent sweatpants, despite a severe recession and ongoing layoffs.

With no fixed timeline for a COVID-19 vaccine, it will be hard to predict what customers will want six months from now. But for luxury fashion, the shows must go on.

c.2020 The New York Times Company
Banking and finance sector undergo significant changes View(s):

Sri Lankas banking and finance sector will undergo significant changes next year following the replacement of the specialised bank licence with commercial licences and introduction of mergers of licensed finance companies.

The banking sector has been directed to get ready for necessary changes in the current banking industry landscape under the new Banking Act which will come into effect in 2021, Central Bank (CB) sources divulged.

Under the new set up, the CB will be gaining more power to impose fines on delinquent licensed banks and financial institutions. A resolution framework will be introduced by the CB which will get the teeth to impose monetary penalties/fines, ring-fencing of banks to mitigate risk.

The main areas proposed in new Banking Act include an overall mandate for supervision and regulation and a differentiated regulatory framework to facilitate proportionality, strengthening corporate governance, consolidated supervision,

It has provisions for strengthening of mergers, acquisitions and consolidation, subsidiarisation of large foreign banks and inculcating company structure for banks, a senior Finance Ministry official said.

A common banking licence for both licensed commercial banks and specialised banks would be introduced in accordance with the provisions of the Act, he added.

Licensed specialised banks with limited foreign exchange transaction capacities have no authority to open current accounts for customers.

They cannot deposit surplus liquidity or borrow through the CB overnight window, he said.

Six licensed specialised banks and 26 licenced commercial banks are operating in the country.

The licensed specialised banks are National Savings Bank, Sri Lanka Savings Bank, Housing Development Finance Corporation Bank, State Mortgage and Investment Bank, Regional Development Bank and Sanasa Development Bank.

The new Act is transforming licensed specialised banks into licensed commercial banks in order to increase financial system stability, as specialised banks currently adhere to lower risk capital adequacy requirements.

The reforms in the non bank financial institutions include voluntary mergers, ownership limits for licenced finance companies and a comprehensive resolution framework for all financial institutions among other changes.

(BS)
Democratic nominee Joe Biden has called Donald Trumps attempts to undermine the integrity of the Novembers presidential election irresponsible, outrageous, after the president has twice this week refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power should he lose.

The people in this country are going to be heard November 3, Biden told MSNBC. Every vote in the country is going to be heard and theyll not be stopped. He continued, What I am concerned about is whether he [Trump] generates some kind of response in a way that unsettles the society or causes some kind of violence.

Trump told reporters at the White House on Thursday hes not sure the election can be honest, and called voting a scam.

We have to be very careful with the ballots, he said. The ballots  you know, thats a whole big scam.

These comments follow an exchange with a reporter yesterday, where Trump said Were going to have to see what happens about a peaceful transfer of power.

The comments quickly alarmed elected officials across Washington and beyond. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, usually a staunch Republican ally of the president, tweeted Wednesday, The winner of the November 3rd election will be inaugurated on January 20th. There will be an orderly transition just as there has been every four years since 1792.

You are not in North Korea; you are not in Turkey; you are not in Russia, Mr. President, and by the way, you are not in Saudi Arabia, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat, told the New York Times. You are in the United States of America. It is a democracy, so why dont you just try for a moment to honor your oath of office to the Constitution of the United States?

The comments occur amid a heated partisan conflict over whether the Senate should fill Ruth Bader Ginsburgs seat on the Supreme Court before the election. Trump has implied part of his motivation to fill the ninth seat before the election is to guarantee a favorable balance of Republicans on the court if the vote is contested.

I think this will end up in the Supreme Court, he said on Wednesday. And I think having a four-four situation is not a good situation, if you get that.

Trump has routinely assailed, without evidence, the credibility of US elections and various forms of legal voting like mail-in ballots.

On Monday, a federal judge in New York ordered the administration to reverse operational changes at the Postal Service which wouldve slowed down mail delivery and potentially affected mail-in ballots.

Trump has previously called voting by mail a scam, while also encouraging voters in Florida, which went for him in the 2016 election, to vote by mail in comments this Thursday

In March, he said his opposition to policies like vote-by-mail, same-day registration, and early voting were because they might help Democrats get more votes by expanding turnout.

The things they had in there were crazy, Trump said about a Democratic push to prepare elections for COVIDs impact on turnout. They had things, levels of voting that if youd ever agreed to it, youd never have a Republican elected in this country again.

Earlier this month, Facebook and Twitter also flagged his posts for spreading incorrect voting information.

The comments about the transfer of power echo his previous statements about voting from the 2016 election, which he called rigged," and which he also said he wasnt sure he would concede .
Former Home and Away actress Pia Miller looked glamorous as she posed for a lavish photo shoot on Sydney's Palm Beach on Wednesday.

The brunette beauty, 36, flaunted her incredible physique in a series of outfits as she posed up a storm on the shore.

During the photo shoot, Pia showed off her tiny waist in a dark brown dress while she wore a necklace from jewellery brand Paspaley.

Glamorous! Pia Miller showed off her figure as she posed for a lavish photo shoot on the beach in Sydney on Wednesday

Her long hair was styled straight and she appeared to be wearing a neutral palette of makeup for the shoot.

The actress had all eyes on her as she posed for a series of photos on the sand, while holding onto her long dress.

After posing for several photographs, Pia changed into a glamorous beige coloured flowy dress.

Stunning: Pia had all eyes on her as she posed for a series of photos in a long beige flowy dress on the sand

The photo shoot comes after Pia reunited with her multi-millionaire agent boyfriend Patrick Whitesell, 55.

The former Home and Away actress spent a week with her beau, before Patrick flew back to the US on a private jet, last week.

Pia was first linked to the Hollywood power agent in August last year, following her split with her longtime fiance, Tyson Mullane, 32, in April.

Beauty: Her long hair was styled straight and she appeared to be wearing a neutral palette of makeup for the shoot

The couple made their public debut at a Halloween party in Los Angeles in October, amid reports they'd started dating back in May.

She made their relationship Instagram official on Christmas Eve, sharing a loved-up photo with him outside of the Louvre in Paris, and captioning it 'P'.

The couple made their red carpet debut when they attended the Oscars together in February this year in Los Angeles.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued a warning Thursday over "serious problems with high doses" of the common over-the-counter allergy medication Benadryl in the so-called "Benadryl Challenge" on the social media platform TikTok.

The FDA warns that too much diphenhydramine (Benadryl) can lead to severe health problems, including serious heart problems, seizures, coma and even death.

The FDA cited reports of teenagers ending up in hospital emergency rooms or dying after participating in the "Benadryl Challenge."

"We are investigating these reports and conducting a review to determine if additional cases have been reported," the agency said in a news release.

The FDA said it had contacted TikTok and "strongly urged" it to remove videos of the "Benadryl Challenge" from its platform and to monitor for any new posts.

"Health care professionals should be aware that the 'Benadryl Challenge' is occurring among teens and alert their caregivers about it," the agency said.
Photo credit: BBC

All rise: this cultural round-up is now in session.

Perhaps one of the reasons courtroom dramas are so reliable is that, much like a court case, these films follow a time-honoured protocol. Whether theyre plaintiffs or defendants, were on the side of a plucky upstart protagonist who needs the help of studied legal hand to fight an injustice.

When we get into the courtroom, we see all the establishment machinery that were going to have to fight: bastard judge, bastard main prosecutor in a very fancy suit, arcane procedure and, most importantly, the assumptions of the jury  and, the implication runs, you too.

You know how it tends to go. After much shouting, surprise witnesses and unexpected revelations on the stand, the bastard judge and the bastard main prosecutor grudgingly come to accept that, whatever the law says, the Plucky Protagonist was in the right all along.

It says something that if you watch a representation of a British trial then you feel short-changed if nobody bangs a gavel (purely an American thing), calls the judge your honour (in nearly every instance its sir, madam, my lord, or my lady) or starts screaming about objections in the middle of the other sides case (just doesnt happen).

Its not just the characters being put on trial either. Its the establishment, the system, a whole country, and me and you watching on.

Anyway, here we go: I swear by Sidney Lumet that I will faithfully try these films and give a true verdict according to the evidence.

Falsely Accused! (1908)

Photo credit: Topical Press Agency - Getty Images





This is one of the earliest surviving courtroom dramas, and intriguingly it shows that cinema as a technology has been tied up with ideas of truth and reality since its very earliest days. A scientist is showing off his cinema camera in his lab to some friends. They go to leave, but when one walks back into the room, the scientist is dead. The woman who found him is hauled in by the police, but she protests that she's innocent. So who killed him? The answer lies in the camera, which has its starring moment in the climactic courtroom scene as we watch the assembled masses watch the evidence. It's only three minutes long and while it's not on any of the streamers, you can dig it up if you do some nosing around yourself. There's also a cameo from early directing pioneer DW Griffith (pictured in the hat, with Mary Pickford, Charlie Chaplin and Douglas Fairbanks after founding United Artists), who did the extremely yikes-y Birth of a Nation.

Story continues

Mangrove (2020)

Photo credit: BBC

The first of Steve McQueen's Small Axe anthology films for the BBC tells the story of the Mangrove Nine, a group of protestors who in 1970 rallied to the aid of a Notting Hill restaurant which was repeatedly raided by police in a concerted effort to intimidate and degrade the Caribbean community in the area. The police didn't appreciate their protests, and prosecuted nine people on charges of riot and affray. The case is flimsy, and the courts stacked against the nine Black defendants, but they take on the system. The cast is led by Black Panther's Letitia Wright as British Black Panthers leader Altheia Jones-LeCointe, and McQueen's direction is as sure-footed and beautiful as you'd expect.

WATCH NOW

Anatomy of a Murder (1959)

Photo credit: Archive Photos - Getty Images

Along with 12 Angry Men this is probably the foundation stone of the classical courtroom drama. A folksy, charming lawyer takes on a near-impossible case which strikes at the very heart of our notions of morality, and in the process of defending the little man points to how brutal the big man  usually the state  can be. This folksy, charming lawyer is the impossibly folksy and charming Jimmy Stewart, and his little man is Lieutenant 'Manny' Manion, who's accused of murdering innkeeper Barney Quill. Without wanting to give anything away, the truth is anything but folksy and charming; it's a bleak, harrowing apex which is a reminder of the fallibility of everyone involved in the search for the truth.

WATCH NOW

The Devils Advocate (1997)

Keanu Reeves is in his cocky-and-confused pomp as a hotshot and morally ambiguous lawyer presented with the career opportunity of a lifetime by a charismatic, enigmatic and possibly demonic New York CEO, played by Al Pacino. Its flashy, kitschy and hammy in the best possible ways, as Pacino alternates shouting and mumbling in an attempt to seduce Keanu into his coven. As a supernatural horror it has its moments too, particularly in a disturbing sequence involving Reeves wife played by Charlize Theron. Its long and laid on thick, but if you overlook its flaws and surrender to it, this is Hollywood filmmaking of the most entertaining order.

WATCH

My Cousin Vinny (1992)

From the lesser-known courtroom-comedy-drama stable (of which we cant think of many more entrants), this hugely likeable and often very funny film has a plot straight out of a brainstorm meeting; what if two New York college students driving through rural Alabama were accused of a murder they didnt commit, but could only afford to hire their unconventional cousin to defend them, who had only just passed his bar exam? It might just have easily been screwed up and thrown in the bin, but we should be grateful it came to pass. Joe Pesci is excellent as the Vinny of the title as hilarity ensues, with special props to Marisa Tomei in an Oscar-winning supporting role as his girlfriend and confidante.

Jagged Edge (1985)

This seemingly forgotten Eighties courtroom thriller is a classic of its type; scripted by Joe Eszterhas (Basic Instinct) as a modern take on Anatomy of a Murder, it stars Glenn Close as a trial lawyer reluctant to take on the case of a man (a young and inscrutable Jeff Bridges) accused of brutally murdering his wife. The reason shes uncertain because she cant decide if he did it or not, which provides much of the escalating tension  sexual as well as legal  as the plot-points come thick and fast to keep you guessing until a very satisfying twist.

WATCH

The Trial of the Chicago 7 (2020)

Aaron Sorkin knows his way around a rat-a-tat walk-and-talk drama, and his new one for Netflix opens with perhaps the most rat-a-tat walk-and-talk sequence hes yet attempted. This is the story of how seven anti-Vietnam protestors (plus Black Panthers founder Bobby Seale, who was cut out part-way through the trial) were tried for conspiracy and inciting riots at the 1968 Democratic National Convention. In Sorkins hands, the trial becomes a locus of arguments about the very fundamentals of America. Who gets to protest, and how? Can you reform broken systems? And should you compromise your principles with pragmatism?

WATCH

Just Mercy (2019)

Michael B Jordan is young Harvard grad Bryan Stevenson, who heads to Alabama to give ordinary people a chance to represent themselves properly in court. The case of Walter McMillian (Jamie Foxx) soon gives him exactly the cause he was looking for: McMillian is on Death Row based on the shakiest of evidence. On taking up the cast, though, Stevenson finds himself subjected to all of the white establishments darkest arts of dissuasion. Based on a true story, this is urgent stuff.

WATCH

Belle (2013)

Amma Asantes mid-Georgian period piece is a fictionalised slice of the life of Dido Lindsay (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), daughter of an enslaved African woman in the West Indies and a white Royal Navy officer. As she grows up she becomes an heiress and slightly uneasy society staple. She learns about an atrocity at sea in which enslaved people were thrown from a ship and left to drown in the Atlantic, and sets about making sure some measure of justice comes to the men responsible.

WATCH

Bridge of Spies (2015)

In his late period, Steven Spielbergs pretty conclusively shifted gears into assured and quietly impressive political dramas. Between Lincoln and The Post came Bridge of Spies, about the 1957 trial of alleged Russian spy Rudolf Abel. Tom Hanks does his Tom Hanks thing as the folksy small-time insurance lawyer trying to stoutly defend a man most in America thought utterly indefensible, but really this was all about Mark Rylances Hollywood coming out party as Abel. On top of the skilfully evoked Cold War paranoia, its got the style and panache of Catch Me if You Can, plus  with Ethan and Joel Cohen contributing to the script  wit to spare.

WATCH

Denial (2016)

An under-seen gem. When noted Holocaust denier David Irving was called a Holocaust denier by historian Deborah Lipstadt, Irving retaliated by suing her for libel. Libel laws being what they are in the UK, the only way Lipstadt and her team could win was to prove that not only are Irvings claims false, but that hes maliciously manipulated evidence to speak how he wants it to. With the distressing rise news that two thirds of young adult Americans dont know six million Jewish people died in the Holocaust, Denial is perhaps even more pertinent now than it was four years ago.

WATCH

Marshall (2017)

Another frustratingly under-appreciated film, this time following a case in the early career of the later Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, here played by a magisterial Chadwick Boseman. In 1940, Marshall was an NAACP lawyer helping Black defendants wrongly accused of crimes by an institutionally racist police and justice system. Joseph Spell, a chauffeur accused of rape by his white employer, is his next case, and the one has electrified the press and public.

WATCH

A Few Good Men (1993)

Sorkins first bravura legal drama is about abuse and secrecy at Guantanamo Bay leading to a young soldiers unlawful death, but, really, its almost completely about Jack Nicholsons turn as Screamin Colonel Jessup, so heres an anecdote.

While warming up to film that endlessly parodied You cant handle the truth! moment, director Rob Reiner was getting some single shots of Tom Cruise doing his side of the argument. Take after take, Nicholson kept launching himself into a full-blooded rendition of his big rant, despite not actually being on camera. Reiner suggested he chill out and save it for the real take.

Rob, you dont understand, Nicholson told Reiner. I love to act.

WATCH

12 Angry Men (1957)

Still as endlessly rewatchable and relevant as it ever was, Sidney Lumets dissection of how the flaws, biases and uncertainty inherent in a trial by jury are both its weakness and its strength is an essential part of the 20th century canon. Lumets direction is at once exacting and almost imperceptibly light-fingered, allowing each of the dozen clashing personality and perspectives to stand apart before coalescing into a microcosm of postwar America.

The dozy dozen of the title are all sure that a young man has killed his father and are ready to send him to the electric chair  well, nearly all of them. Henry Fonda leverages all of his good guy aura (check the all-white suit) to show that doubt isnt necessarily an admission of weakness.

WATCH

Liar Liar (1997)

No, look, honestly. I'm not saying this is a great film. If you like Jim Carrey, it's probably in or around your top five Jim Carrey films. No, what I'm saying  if you'd just listen  is that the glossiest of Carrey's films from his stupid-tit-about era climaxes in a genuinely very, very well put-together bit of legal showmanship. Hes not going to Atticus Finch you out of any era-defining civil rights cases, true, but the man knows his way around the technicalities of divorce law. His kids made a birthday wish that stops him lying, you see, which means hes a bit hamstrung as a lawyer and as a general gadabout. Doesnt explain all the screaming and gurning though. Maybe the kid got another wish.

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in Punjab continued their rail roko agitation at several places on Saturday as the Congress in Haryana announced over a month-long agitation against the Centre's farm-related Bills from September 28.

The Haryana Congress will launch a signature campaign, hold a state-level farmers' conference besides holding in its drive against the farm Bills till October 31.

On Friday, a near total "bandh" was observed in Punjab while blocked several roads in Haryana.

The movement of trains remained suspended in Punjab on Saturday as have extended their rail roko agitation by three days till September 29. Earlier, farmers had decided to block trains from September 24 to 26.

Meanwhile, the Ferozepur Railway Division decided not to run trains on Sunday in the wake of the farmers' stir.

We have decided not to operate trains on September 27 as farmers are still squatting on some rail tracks in Punjab, Divisional Railway Manager Rajesh Agrawal said.

The next decision will be taken on Sunday evening as per prevailing circumstances, he said.

In Punjab, the call for the rail roko agitation was given by the Kisan Mazdoor Sangharsh Committee after which 20 trains were partially cancelled and five short terminated till September 26 by the Railways.

On Saturday, farmers squatted on the Amritsar-Delhi rail track and went shirtless in protest against the Bills.

They shouted slogans against the BJP-led Union government and demanded the rollback of the farm Bills which they described as black laws.

Farmers have taken off their 'kurtas' and shirts to make the government hear our voice, said Kisan Mazdoor Sangharsh Committee general secretary Sarwan Singh Pandher over the phone.

Farmers under the banner of Bharatiya Kisan Union (Ekta Ugrahan) blocked rail tracks in nine districts.

BKU (Ekta Ugrahan) general secretary Sukhdev Singh Kokri Kalan said the rail tracks were blocked at Mansa, Barnala, Nabha (Patiala), Chhahjli (Sangrur), Rampura (Bathinda), Ajitwal (Moga), Kotkapura (Faridkot), Gidderbaha (Muktsar), Jalalabad (Fazilka).

He said elders, women, youth and children also participated in

Farmers would force the government with a series of to withdraw the farm Bills, he said, adding that the legislations will only benefit big corporates.

Meanwhile, announcing its over a month-long agitation from September 28 to October 31, the Haryana Congress said the legislations will "ruin" the lives of farmers, commission agents and labourers.

The party said on September 28, a "foot march" to the Haryana Raj Bhavan under the leadership of its state president Kumari Selja will be held.

The Congress said party activists will observe "save farmers and labourers" events at every assembly and district headquarters on October 2.

A state-level farmers' conference will be held on October 10. From October 2 to October 31, the party will launch a "signature campaign" against the Bills.

Farmers have expressed apprehension that the Centre's farm reforms would pave a way for the dismantling of the minimum support price system, leaving them at the "mercy" of big corporates.

Parliament had recently passed the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill; Farmers' Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill; and Farmers' (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill.

These are yet to get the assent of the President.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
After a week of far-reaching climate promises measured over decades, four of the worlds six largest economies have now proposed ending dates for their carbon emissions.

President Xi Jinpings surprise announcement at the annual United Nations climate meeting this week committed China to reaching carbon neutrality by 2060. That brings the third-biggest economy by nominal GDP into a loose but vitally important consensus with the second largest (EU), fourth largest (Japan), and fifth largest (California). The end of emissions has been set even if the target dates remain variedand at least a generation into the future.

Every new country that joins this carbon-neutral group puts more pressure on holdouts to align their policies with global goals. Two of the biggest economies remain outside of the consensus: India, at No. 6, and the national US economy that remains the largest by size and historical contribution to warming.

We aim to have CO2 emissions peak before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality before 2060, Xi declared by video conference on Tuesday at the UN General Assembly, without providing details on what neutrality will mean in practice. But the mere fact of the pledge by China keeps alive the chance that the world may be able to hit the most ambitious target set under the 2015 Paris climate agreement: holding warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius compared to preindustrial levels. Current global average is around 1C of warming.

If Chinas emissions didnt go to zero, then 1.5 would not have been an option, said Glen Peters, research director at the Center for International Climate Research. The fact remains that China, as the worlds biggest emitter and energy consumer currently, exerts enormous pull on the prospects for limiting future warming. And falling short of the 1.5C target by just half a degree would cost the world $20 trillion by 2100, according to an analysis published in the journal Nature.

For all of the economies now linked in aspirations to end emissions, reaching net zero will mean a fundamental rewiring that accelerates clean-energy investments and dials back fossil fuels. In Chinas case, sweeping reforms will have to be carried out across dozens of regions run by local governments that may not share the zeal for reaching the 2060 goal. Beijing has long struggled with implementing grand plans from the center in a continent-sized country of 1.4 billion people. Local officials often have more to gain by appeasing interest groups than listening to the national leaders, especially when those policies could affect local industries such as coal mining.

Announcing a carbon neutrality target is just the first step on a long road, wrote analysts from BloombergNEF, in a note detailing the arduous and challenging route ahead. To reach this goal, China requires new technologies such as carbon-free hydrogen, BNEF concluded, and it will need to make its economy much more efficient.

Implementation of long-range goals is going to be a challenge everywhere. California became one of the earliest large economies to set a carbon neutrality goal, resolving two years ago to reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2045. Recent wildfires that have devastated much of the Western US injected a new level of urgency, and this week California Governor Gavin Newsom issued an executive order banning the sale of new gasoline-fueled cars after 2035.

That decision makes California the first US state to join the UK, France, Canada and several other nations in putting an end date on the sale of internal combustion engine cars. It also marks a big global shift since California consumes about 1% of global oil productionroughly 1 million barrels per day. Even after years of policy incentives to encourage the sale of zero-emission vehicles, however, less than 8% of cars registered in the state are electric.

Just how California will bring about this 15-year shift away from gasoline cars and what opposition it might face from the federal government remains unspecified, but the state is large enough to be a significant trendsetter for the US as a whole.

There are questions, too, for how the EU will fulfill its proposal to reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 in March, then set out an even more ambitious goal earlier this month to cut its emissions 55% by 2030. The bloc is already behind on an earlier goal to cut emissions 40% compared to 1990 levels by the same end date, so this new benchmark represents a renewed commitment to making deep, drastic changes quickly.

Over the summer, meanwhile, EU heads of state approved the worlds greenest stimulus plan to date, promising to pour more than 500 billion euros ($580 billion) into measures that will help fight global warming. The money will go toward everything from scaling up green hydrogen to making agriculture more sustainable.

The scale of Chinas undertaking will be immense, since the nation alone accounted for 28% of the global greenhouse gas total in 2019. Simply reducing the share of fossil fuels in its energy mix from 85% today to less than 25% would require $180 billion of investment each year through 2050, according to Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Similar investments will be required in everything from electric vehicle production and infrastructure to cleaning up industrial processes such as cement- and steel-making, which require enormous amounts of energy that can only be supplied reliably by fossil fuels right now.

The impact from Chinas decisions will be huge. Even if the rest of the worlds nations proceed with their current climate policies, China going carbon neutral by 2060 will lower global-warming projections by as much as 0.3C. Thats the biggest single reduction ever estimated as the result of a policy change, according to Climate Action Tracker.

The possibility of monumental policy swings looms over the climate debate. While the U.S. has retrenched significantly on climate policy under President Donald Trump, cheap natural gas and cheaper renewable energy have largely kept the countrys emissions in check. Should Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden defeat Trump in Novembers election, the global picture would again change dramatically.

Yet even without federal engagement on climate, at the state level leaders like Californias Newsom have moved in the opposite direction to Trump. In states such as Washington and New York there are now net-zero goals, and major U.S.-based companies have also made commitments to zero-out emissions. Even Americas utility behemoths are pledging to go carbon neutral, most recently New Orleans-based Entergy Corp., which did so on Thursday.

Its like personal actions but on steroids, said Noah Kaufman, a research scholar at Columbia Universitys Center on Global Energy Policy. Its very directionally helpful, but itll never be enough if you dont have the policies to back it up.

Biden has vowed to restore a national level of policy action, proposing a carbon-free electrical grid by 2035 and net-zero emissions no later than 2050. If Biden rejoins the Paris Agreement, which the U.S. is set to leave on Nov. 4, pressure will grow on other major emittersmost significantly India, the largest besides the U.S. with no stated net-zero targetto make similar commitments.

The UN framework allows developing countries to lower their emissions much later than developed countries, which bear much more of the blame for current atmospheric carbon levels. Though India isnt ready to set a net-zero emissions goal, its shown a willingness to participate in the global conversation on emissions.

India sees climate change as an area where, to put it simply, it can win points geopolitically, said Thomas Spencer at the Energy and Resources Institute, a think tank in India. Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, India has been setting records for low-cost solar installations and become a role model in deploying energy efficiency measures, although it still doesnt have strong policies in place to electrify transport.

The next major UN climate meeting, set to be held in Glasgow, has already been postponed until 2021. Global leaders have tried to maintain momentum, and UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson called on Thursday for a virtual meeting this December to mark the fifth anniversary of the Paris Agreement. It would be the next big moment for countries to strengthen their commitments to reduce emissions.

This week also saw European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen call for the creation of a high ambition coalition that would include the EU and China, similar to a group assembled in 2015 to help reach a deal in Paris.

Most of these climate goals are audaciousand entirely voluntary. Theres no guarantee that the promised reductions will come to pass. Still, the non-binding resolution created by the Paris climate agreement has fundamentally changed the conversation on climate action.

Thats the beauty of the Paris Agreement, said Spencer. Part of its strength is its weakness as well. It appeals to so many different sectors, so many different levers of action and just sets the direction. It doesnt actually say you have to do it.

Once that direction is set, it often means ratcheting ambition up, not down. The British government is behind on its short-term emissions targets, for instance, and it is now considering bringing forward its ban on the sale of gasoline and diesel cars to 2030.

That means those who assume Chinas 2060 target is too late to keep the hope for 1.5C alive may be in for a surprise. Peters of the Center for International Climate Research suggested it might be only the start: I dont think this is the final offer from China, and then they walk away and dont budge for 40 years.
Growing concerns over 20A clauses View(s):

The Retired Judges Association and the Bar Association have come out with some negative observations on the 20th Amendment now before the Supreme Court to test the constitutionality of the wide-ranging provisions contained therein.

They have both questioned the Presidents sole power to appoint senior judges, including the Chief Justice, but while the retired judges prefer civil society members vetting the process, the Bar has an interesting rider to their concerns. They say if the President gets the approval (or rubber stamping) of what is seemingly a puppet Parliamentary Council, then thats fine by them.

The prerogative of selecting The Chief and senior judges has long been with the Head of Government even during a prime ministerial system of yesteryear though there were underlining conventions involved.

The holders of those exalted positions also had something to do with how their office was respected  or not, by all and sundry. The names of Justices Victor Tennakoon, Neville Samarakoon and Raja Wanasundera stand out among a galaxy of recent upright judges immortalised at Hulftsdorp Hill and in the lore of the law. They were great examples of upright judges, like the entire bench that adjudicated in the 2018 Constitutional crisis, while there were others in the past whose names are best unmentioned who disgraced the Judiciary and themselves in the process by kowtowing before the political apparatus. Constitutional law evolved in recent decades after the introduction of the Executive Presidential system. It adjusted this imbalance in the appointment of senior judges to make competence and merit the gold standard and independence their security of tenure. It might not have worked that way all the time yet it was not for the want of trying to better perfect the system. This process is again being thrown out of the window.

In the United States, right at this moment, a huge debate is raging over a Presidents right to appoint a Supreme Court Justice just before an election. The US President argues he has a mandate to do so but the uproar continues nevertheless.

The US Supreme Court is different in some ways to the same court in Sri Lanka in that it doesnt hear all the appeals, is ideologically constituted and sits largely on inter-state disputes and policy issues. It can make law just like Congress. Such a Presidential nominee is subjected to a grilling by a Senate Judicial Committee and then sent to the whole Senate before confirmation. None of that will exist with the 20A.

The state auditors have also made some scathing remarks about 20A neutralising the financial scrutiny of more than 100 State-Owned Enterprises (SOE) while media organisations across the board have raised issue on what appears a move, intended or not, to muzzle the Press at the crucial time of an election. The 20th Amendment has introduced what seems to be ham-handed attempt to control Press freedom and freedom of expression also guaranteed by the Constitution by constitutionally tying it to whatever guidelines an Election Commission appointed by a partisan President may gazette.

Media groups have denounced this infringement on the Constitutional guarantees of a free and unfettered Press. They have, however, recognised the fact that the state media in general and the private broadcast and television media are different because they are funded by the people and the frequencies or airwaves they use also belong to the people. Still, what guidelines are given to them and who implements them become of paramount importance. To tie up the independent print media with a set of unknown guidelines and to be subjected to control by some Commission appointed by a partisan President is the very antithesis of media freedom and strikes directly at the Franchise and the right of voters to make informed choices at an election.

Growing cold war in our midst

The United Nations Organisation (UN) celebrates its Diamond Jubilee (75th anniversary) next month. Its annual General Assembly sessions this year got underway this week with the theme The Future We Want; The UN We Need. It was an eerie setting with an empty hall  a sombre reminder of what a precariously fragile planet we Earthlings live in.

Absent were the annual pilgrimages to the Big Apple (New York) by cavalcades of Third World leaders and their hangers-on busting up the limited financial resources of their unfortunate citizens, living it up at the Waldorf Astoria and similar plush hotels. In fact, the UN session was like a mega theatre with a huge screen but no audience. World leaders holed up in their respective capitals were having their say due to COVID-19 through pre-recorded video presentations.

The US President given the second slot on the opening day after Brazil, the US being the host nation of the UN headquarters, true to form, launched straight into a tirade against China accusing that country of exporting the virus while locking down its own citizens. He did his best to shift mounting criticism of his own mishandling of the virus spreading at home.

Calling it the China virus, he said China unleashed this plague into the world. He slammed the UNs World Health Organisation (WHO) saying it was virtually controlled by China. In todays increasingly virtual world, if this had any greater significance than the ordinary meaning of the word is open to interpretation. He went further to accuse China of overfishing, dumping plastics in the oceans and emitting more toxic mercury than any other country. As the UN Secretary General warned of an impending new Cold War, 75 years after World War II that saw the birth of the world body, and a period soon after that saw a Cold War between the US and the former USSR (a war that the US eventually won with the collapse and disintegration of the former socialist empire), the Chinese leader said, also in a pre-recorded video speech the same day, that China has no intention to fight either a Cold War or a hot one with any country.

The once isolationist China spoke of multilateralism as the way of the future, a jibe at the US that used to be at the forefront of a global village now increasingly isolationist.

The French and German leaders weighed in to refer to Chinas appalling human rights record and battle lines were being drawn in the UN for the whole world to see via television channels and the worldwide web. World peace was no closer at hand.

Sri Lankas President had a message for the UN. Calling upon the world body whose agencies have been endlessly needling the country guided by different agendas of essentially Western powers, he asked that democratically elected Governments be supported and helped to bring sustainable solutions for the needs of their people.

He said Sri Lanka was committed to a neutral foreign policy. Only last week the Maldives signed a Defence Treaty with the US as India, the US, Japan and Australia gang up against China in the seas close to Sri Lanka. The Presidents public pronouncement seems intended to avoid the diplomatic coercions at play in this looming Cold War the UN Chief referred to.
Hours after Bollywood actor Deepika Padukone appeared before the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) in a drugs case, Shraddha Kapoor and Sara Ali Khan also arrived at the office of the drug law enforcement agency for questioning here, on Saturday.

Shraddha arrived at the NCB office here around 11.45 a.m. while Sara came at 12.15 p.m. at the NCB office in Ballard Pier area here.

Deepika's former manager Karishma Prakash also joined the probe at the NCB guest house in Colaba area here for the second day.

Shraddha, daughter of Bollywood veteran actor Shakti Kapoor has been summoned for questioning after her alleged chats with Sushant's former manager Jaya Saha came to the fore during the NCB probe.

According to NCB sources, Shraddha is likely to be quizzed if she allegedly procured drugs from Saha or some other sources.

The NCB will also ask for whom she procured the CBD oil and who the 'SLB' in her alleged chat was.

Shraddha, who starred in "Chichhore" with Sushant may also be queried on how long she knew the late actor and whether they reportedly joined any party or gatherings where drugs were consumed.

She may be asked to throw light on whether she ever went to the Pawna Resort where the alleged parties were said to be hosted by Sushant.

Besides, the NCB had last Wednesday also sent summons to Sara for questioning.

Sara is the daughter of Bollywood actor Saif Ali Khan and Amrita Singh, and she had starred with Sushant in "Kedarnath".

The NCB sources said that Sara will be asked about the drug consumption by her, where and how she allegedly procured it, etc.

During a television interview Sushant's girlfriend Rhea Chakraborty had claimed that the late actor started smoking marijuana during the shooting of the blockbuster film "Kedarnath".

Earlier this morning, Deepika Pahukone arrived at the NCB guest house for questioning after she was summoned for questioning on Wednesday.

Deepika is the daughter of badminton icon Prakash Padukone and is married to actor Ranveer Singh.

She has been asked to join the probe as her alleged chats with her former manager Karishma Prakash discussing drugs came to the fore.

Deepika will be quizzed why she asked Karishma to bring drugs at the Koko Club in October 2017 and for how long she was consuming the drugs.

The NCB will also ask her if she sought the drugs for her own consumption or for someone else, who paid for it, how, etc.

After Rhea, these three actresses are the biggest ones to have come under the NCB radar, which is attempting to unravel the alleged drug nexus in Bollywood since the past nearly two months.

The NCB has also questioned Bollywood actor Rakul Preet Singh on Friday for over four hours after her name came to the fore in the alleged chats.

The NCB has registered a case after the Enforcement Directorate (ED) registered a case of money laundering into the death of Sushant and then found the alleged chats of drugs on the phones of Rhea, her brother Showik and Sushant's house manager Samuel Miranda.

The ED wrote to NCB to probe the drug case. After registering the case, the NCB questioned several people and arrested Rhea, Showik, Miranda, Sushant's personal staff Dipesh Sawant and 16 others.

The NCB has also questioned Sushant's former manager Shruti Modi, Dharma Productions former executive producer Kshitij Prasad Ravi, Kwan Talent Management Agency CEO Dhruv Chitgopekar, noted producer Madhu Mantena Varma and several others in the case so far.

Besides the NCB, the CBI and the ED are probing the separate cases into the death of Sushant. Sushant was found dead on June 14 in his Bandra's Mont Blanc Apartment.
First year and returning Waterford Institute of Technology (WIT) students will be able to apply for the laptop loan scheme from September 30 via the WIT website.

In August, Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science Simon Harris announced up to 17,000 laptops will be distributed to third0level students to assist with online learning.

WIT received 522,000 of the 15 million fund, which was described by Minister Harris as going some way to bridging the digital divide, support students and ensure equality of access to education.

The institute will have a limited number of laptop units available to loan to eligible students, whether they are on campus or studying from home.

WIT will have blended delivery for courses for the 2020/2021 academic year, which means that there will be a mix of online and on-campus learning. The mix is dependent on the programme of study, but as a guideline activities like labs and studios will be on campus, and lectures and tutorials will be delivered online.

Robin Croke from WITs Access Office in the Student Life and Learning Department, which is administering the scheme, says that the interest in the scheme is huge.

This scheme to support disadvantaged students in the higher education sector is very welcome, and there has been huge interest from students. We are expecting far more applications than there are devices, and advise students they will need to present appropriate and supporting documentation when applying to the laptop scheme. These documents may include proof of the students/parents income, as appropriate, and receipts for costs such as rent, bills or childcare and other forms of supporting documentation/ proof of circumstances," Ms Croke says.

The devices will remain the property of WIT and will be distributed to eligible students by means of an appropriate lending/rental scheme.

Full-time and part-time students (both undergraduate and postgraduate) who may fall under the following criteria are eligible to apply to receive a device under this scheme:

Students disadvantaged by socio-economic barriers

First-time mature students

Students with disabilities

Part-time/flexible learning students

Students who hold further education qualifications

Students who are lone parents

Students who are members of the Traveller and Roma communities

Members of ethnic minorities groups

International, non-EU fee-paying students would not be considered eligible for support under this grant.

A loan agreement including the terms and conditions will apply. Devices can be retrieved from students if they pause or discontinue their studies.
Hey everyone,

I browse these forums all the time so I figure its my obligation to give you all my trip report from the first few days of transit into the Maldives from DFW.

We left DFW at 615 PM on Monday to Doha non stop. DFW was not packed at all. The flight however was full for Covid terms lots of empty middle seats but more people flying than I imagined. It wasnt bad though by any means. Service and food was excellent and they actually were pretty lenient on wearing a face shield during night time. I for one think a face shield requirement should really be optional since its more protection for the individual than herd. We traveled with our 23 month baby and father in law. The baby did great; she is in fact a world traveler so didnt expect anything less lol.

We arrived in Doha and had a 8 hour layover. We stayed at the Oryx hotel for $230 for the 8 hour stay. A bit steep, but with a baby it is recommended. The north side of airport was closed but the South duty free shops and food court was open.

We left at 2AM and took the 5 hour flight to Male. This was a good flight. The baby was a bit tired but understandable due to time zone change. We made it into Male and took a Seaplane to our resort island, Kudafushi.

There was only a 45 min wait at the seaplane airport lounge. It was hot but tolerable. We were ready to be on our island! We were the only passengers on our seaplane and they didnt police our weight. That was cool of them. The flight to the Raa Atoll was amazing. We had a great view. Once we got near our island though there was some bad weather but the pilot managed to navigate through it as best as he could.

We are on our first full day on the island and the resort is great! Great food and drinks however the weather has been cloudy and rainy at times. All well though because we understand the circumstances and time of year. We are here for 10 days so hoping for the best!

P.S. we did fly on Qatar airways with the hero promotion (free flight for healthcare workers). If anyone has any questions on that process feel free to ask away.

Stay tuned..
Stating that the salary and security amount of an assistant professor had been illegally withheld, an additional district and sessions court has directed a private university to release her salary amounting to 86,000.

Twinkle Manhas of Sector 21D, Chandigarh, said that on January 22, 2018, she had joined as an assistant professor in psychology at the University School of Social Sciences, at a consolidated salary of 21,600 per month. She was again hired for one more semester up to December 31, 2018.

Manhas alleged that the university did not pay her salary from March to June 2018, amounting to 75,600, and the security amount of 10,800.

As defendants (university and senior administrative officers) did not appear, case proceeded ex-parte. And on February 3, 2020, the civil suit was dismissed by the trial court after which she appealed.

The court of additional district and sessions judge Rajesh Sharma observed: There is no reason as to why oral and documentary evidence produced by a plaintiff must not be relied and acted upon. So there was no reason for the trial court to decline relief of recovery along with interest being arrears of salary and security amount lying with the defendants, which has been illegally withheld by them.

The court accepted the appeal, thus setting aside the trial courts order.

The varsity and the administration have been ordered to pay Manhas 86,400 at 6% interest per annum from the date of filing the suit till its realisation.
This story is part of an ongoing series  The Road to a Vaccine  that looks at Canadas quest to secure a COVID-19 vaccine amid the global pandemic, as well as the hurdles and history it faces to do so.

As the race for a COVID-19 vaccine kicks into high gear, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has announced that Canada will chip in $440 million to a global effort to share vaccines and make sure poorer countries arent left behind.

Trudeau told reporters Friday said the money for the COVAX Facility will be divided between the global procurement effort  which could mean as many as 15 million additional doses for Canadians  and the sharing program by which vaccines will be sent to countries that wouldnt otherwise be able to afford them.

To eliminate the virus anywhere, we need to eliminate the virus everywhere, Trudeau said. Thats why Canada is helping ensure vaccines are distributed quickly and fairly around the world.

There are now more than 100 teams around the world at work on potential vaccines, known as vaccine candidates, a handful of which are moving into the final stages of clinical testing. But its a competition some say is at risk of being overshadowed by the nation-versus-nation battle for doses, as a weakened global response has spurred richer countries to seek out vaccine deals of their own.

Listen to Alex Boyd discuss the road to a vaccine

COVAX is the major global attempt to try to avoid having all the vaccines go to the highest bidders.

Launched this spring by, among others, the World Health Organization and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundations Gavi alliance, its since emerged as the only real international effort to get countries to work together on both procuring, manufacturing and distributing vaccines. While Canada had officially signed on as of Monday, details of the financial commitment were unclear until now.

For a country such as Canada, which can afford to buy in, the benefits of the program are arguably twofold: Canada gets the option to share in any successful vaccines the group obtains access to, but is also able to support the sending of vaccines to poorer countries.

For countries that cant afford vaccines any other way, it could be a lifeline.

The fear that countries with shallower pockets are going to be left out when the time comes was back in the spotlight this week at the UN Virtual Summit.

Are people to be left to die? asked Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez, a COVID-19 survivor, referring to the problems that may lie ahead.

If all goes to plan, COVAX is aiming to deliver two billion vaccine doses by the end of 2021 to countries around the world, distributing them based on population and need rather than ability to pay.

But that goal is highly dependent on the money they have yet to get from donor countries and philanthropists.

Half of Canadas financial commitment, or $220 million, will go to COVAXs financial arm, known as the COVAX Advance Market Commitment, which is in charge of funding vaccines for low and middle-income countries. But it has yet to meet its initial $2-billion goal, raising questions about who will be left out if the needed money isnt raised.

The program was dealt some early blows, when major players such as the U.S., China and India all declined to sign on, choosing instead to focus on their own vaccine needs.

The United States, for example, has dubbed its own vaccine effort Operation Warp Speed and poured an estimated $10 billion into it while making clear that the fruits of its labour will be for Americans only.

Canada hasnt escaped accusations of selfishness either.

A public letter signed by more than 100 health and policy experts and released last week accuses the federal government of undercutting efforts such as COVAX by participating in the global jockeying for vaccines.

In fact, before announcing the COVAX funding, Trudeau revealed Canadas latest advance purchase agreement, this time with a company called AstraZeneca, which has been working with Oxford University on a potential vaccine. Should it pass clinical trials, Canada will be able to acquire as many as 20 million doses.

Canada now has agreements with six different biopharmaceutical companies, in addition to any doses obtained through COVAX. If every vaccine candidate ends up successful (which is admittedly unlikely) and Canada buys the maximum number of doses to which its entitled through these contracts, it could end up with almost 300 million vaccine doses.

What happens when COVAX bumps up against all those advance purchase agreements remains murky.

Early on in the pandemic, Canada got stung by a general lack of preparation when it came to acquiring personal protective equipment, notes Colin Furness, an infection-control epidemiologist and assistant professor at the University of Toronto.

Now, he says, the government is moving hard to make sure the same thing doesnt happen with vaccines: Aggressively negotiating and throwing around the fact that weve got a currency that has purchasing power and throwing out elbows (to) get in line, thats an understandable thing to do, he said.

Though the consequences to those who are then behind us in line, I mean, ethically, that can get a little bit complicated.

For Jason Nickerson, a humanitarian affairs adviser with Doctors Without Borders, the litmus test for whether its possible to have these purchase agreements without jettisoning global responsibilities will be whether or not health-care workers and people who are high risk are able to get vaccinated first and in a timely manner  no matter where they are in the world.

I think the major concern is that vaccines are going to be delivered to high-income countries to use before they are delivered to low-income countries to vaccinate their high risk populations, he said.

Karina Gould, Canadas minister of international development, says that vaccine companies have already committed certain doses to COVAX, so its not a matter of Canadas orders bumping them out of the queue. The exact delivery timelines are still under discussion.

Canadas position is that we expect vaccines to be affordable, accessible and equitable around the world, she said.

And if it looks like funding will be falling short?

Well, then, well be on the phone, trying to encourage partners around the world to step up and to make a contribution. I know that were still waiting on announcements from some of significant players, and Im confident that theyre going to deliver.

Last spring, Canada assembled a group of experts on everything from public health to pharmaceuticals and charged them with advising the government on how to lock down a safe and effective vaccine as soon as possible.

But while members of this Vaccine Task Force maintain that their first job is to get a vaccine for Canadians, they believe in the need for global access, and for Canada to strike a balance between protecting its own while doing its part for the global community.

We recognize that if the disease exists anywhere, it exists everywhere. So its also important, and our advice is around that, for Canada to support international global efforts, says co-chair J. Mark Lievonen, who is also the former president of Sanofi Pasteur Ltd., the Canadian vaccine division of global biopharmaceutical company Sanofi.

How these vaccine deals start playing out is something that Nickerson, of Doctors Without Borders will be watching closely.

If history is any indication of what can happen during a pandemic, I think that we ought to be concerned, he said, nodding to the H1N1 pandemic, when rich countries bought up a lot of the early vaccines, and only donated to other countries once their own needs were met.

In the same way that COVID has exposed the cracks in our education and health systems, he said that this pandemic risks underscoring how medication and health care are just easier to come by if youre a richer country: We need better systems of fair distribution and allocation, and pricing. Its just not right.

That said, he says COVAX, and Canadas commitment, could be a meaningful step in the right direction.

Its clear that countries are striking these bilateral deals because they think that its the quickest way of gaining access, but theres also a momentum behind COVAX that I dont think that weve ever seen before, he said.

So if its properly funded, and if there is a fair, equitable allocation process, then I'm hopeful that this is the start of something good.

With files from The Associated Press
Three self-described counter-protesters and one photojournalist on Friday filed a lawsuit against three men they say are associated with the far-right group Proud Boys, alleging assault and battery stemming from two prior encounters in Portland in August.

The suit seeks $1.25 million in damages against Alan Swinney, Corey Wyatt and David Willis.

It was filed in Multnomah County Circuit Court, one day before the Proud Boys plan a large End Domestic Terrorism rally in North Portlands Delta Park.

This is a lawsuit about conduct and consequence, and it is about law and order, the plaintiffs' lawyers wrote in the suit.

Defendants, who are not residents of Portland, descended upon its downtown streets, sowing chaos, shooting at passers-by, spraying people with chemical weapons, and lobbing explosives with seeming impunity from local authorities. Their actions are neither lawful nor do they enhance public order; in fact, it is the exact opposite. They harmed the named Plaintiffs, and they harmed others. This is their call to account.

Rex Fergus, president of the Proud Boys, who is based in Washington state, said the three named defendants are not associated with the Proud Boys.

The suit, brought by lawyers from the Oregon Justice Resource Center, stems partly from violent clashes between far-right demonstrators and left-wing, anti-fascist protesters outside the Justice Center on Aug. 22. That day, Portland police said they were too short-staffed to move in to break up the fights.

Albert Lee, one of the plaintiffs, says he was shot with a pepper ball and sprayed with bear mace by Swinney at the downtown Portland demonstration on Aug. 22. Lee said he later received death threats when he tried to use social media to identify his alleged assailant.

The Proud Boys are free to express their bigotry and hatred, but not to assault me and deny my rights, Lee said in a statement.

Amanda Seaver, another plaintiff who attended rallies in Portland as a counter-protester, said Swinney and Corey Willis sprayed bear mace at her on Aug. 15.

Counter-demonstrator Evelyn Bassi said she suffered a severe burn and required surgery when someone, who remains unidentified, lobbed an improvised explosive where Bassi was standing in downtown Portland on Aug. 22, according to the suit.

The final plaintiff, Melissa Lewis, who is an independent photographer and journalist, said Swinney sprayed bear mace in her face and inside her ear as she was covering the Aug. 22 demonstration in Portland.

Swinney, Wyatt and Willis could not be reached immediately for comment Friday.

-- Maxine Bernstein

Email at mbernstein@oregonian.com; 503-221-8212

Follow on Twitter @maxoregonian

Subscribe to Facebook page
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 04:55:32|Editor: huaxia

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An empty highway is seen during a lockdown in Tel Aviv, Israel, on Sept. 25, 2020. Earlier on Friday, tightening of the ongoing three-week anti-coronavirus lockdown took effect in Israel. Under the new lockdown, all markets and businesses were shut down except for factories and services defined as "essentials". Residents are required to stay within a 1,000-meter radius of their homes, except for special cases such as receiving medical care or an emergency. (Gideon Markowicz/JINI via Xinhua)

CAIRO, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases increased to 439,882 in Iran on Friday. Meanwhile, Israel tightened the ongoing anti-coronavirus lockdown as the total infections surged to 217,899 in the country.

Iran, the hardest-hit country in the Middle East region, reported 3,565 new cases, bringing the total number of infections to 439,882.

The pandemic has so far claimed 25,222 lives in Iran, up by 207 in the past 24 hours. A total of 369,842 coronavirus patients have recovered, with 4,023 still in critical condition.

In Israel, 5,784 new COVID-19 cases were recorded, taking the tally of coronavirus infections to 217,899, which included 1,412 deaths and 153,574 recoveries.

Earlier in the day, tightening of the ongoing three-week anti-coronavirus lockdown took effect in Israel, which will last at least until Oct. 10.

Under the new lockdown, all markets and businesses were shut down except for factories and services defined as "essentials," and residents are required to stay within a 1,000-meter radius of their homes, except for special cases such as receiving medical care or an emergency.

Saudi Arabia announced 472 new cases and 26 more deaths, raising the tally of confirmed cases to 332,329 and the death toll to 4,625.

The kingdom also reported 843 more recovered patients, taking the total recoveries to 315,636.

The total number of COVID-19 cases in Turkey climbed by 1,665 to 311,455, Turkish Health Minister Fahrettin Koca tweeted.

The death toll from the coronavirus in the country rose to 7,858 after 73 new fatalities were added in the past 24 hours, Koca said, adding the total recoveries increased to 273,282.

The ICU bed occupancy rate of the country's hospitals has reached 68 percent during the novel coronavirus outbreak, while the intubation occupancy rate is 33 percent, the minister noted.

In the mean time, 4,593 new COVID-19 cases were detected in Iraq during the past 24 hours, bringing the total nationwide infections to 341,699.

The Iraqi health ministry reported 4,505 recoveries from the virus, the highest in a single day since the outbreak of the disease, raising the tally of recoveries to 273,266.

The death toll from the coronavirus in Iraq rose to 8,867 after 68 fatalities were added.

In Qatar, 225 new coronavirus cases were detected, increasing the total number to 124,650, including 212 deaths and 121,512 recoveries.

In the mean time, Kuwait reported 590 new cases, bringing the country's total number of infections to 102,441, including 595 deaths and 93,562 recoveries.

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) announced 1,008 new cases, raising the total confirmed cases in the country to 89,540.

The tally of recoveries in the UAE rose to 78,819 after 882 more patients have recovered from the virus and the death toll reached 409 with two more deaths.

In Morocco, the tally of COVID-19 cases rose to 112,522 after 2,423 new cases were added, which included 1,998 fatalities and 91,932 recoveries.

Algeria on Friday reported 175 new COVID-19 cases, the lowest daily increase since June 29, bringing the total tally of infections to 50,754, including 1,707 deaths and 35,654 recoveries.

On the same day, Palestine reported 452 new coronavirus cases, taking the tally of infections in the Palestinian territories to 48,282, including 35,709 recoveries and 327 deaths.

In Lebanon, the number of COVID-19 infections increased by 1,143 to 33,962, while the death toll went up by four to 333. It is the highest single-day increase since the outbreak of the novel coronavirus in Lebanon on Feb. 21.

Libya registered 658 new COVID-19 cases, raising the total confirmed cases in the country to 31,290.

Moreover, 666 more patients have recovered and 17 died, increasing the total recoveries in the country to 17,508 and the death toll to 491.

In Jordan, 620 new COVID-19 cases, increasing the tally of cases to 7,211 with 4,035 recoveries and 39 fatalities.
Beijing, Sep 26 : Chinese smartphone maker Huawei is reportedly working on its second-generation foldable smartphone Mate X2 and now, a new patent suggests that the device may arrive with an inward folding screen, which is similar to the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 2.

The patent filed before China's CNIPA features rough schematics of a foldable phone that has an inner foldable display without any camera whatsoever, reports LetsGoDigital.

The images make it clear that "the smartphone features a foldable design and will be a premium grade flagship".

The phone folds like a book, just like the Galaxy Z Fold 2. It also has a large secondary display, with a display camera hole.

Unlike the Galaxy Z Fold 2, this phone's camera hole is pill-shaped.

According to Ross Young, Founder and CEO of DSCC (DisplaySearch), the Mate X2 will not arrive this year due to the restrictions placed by the US government.

These restrictions have made it near impossible for Huawei to get components for its products.

The foldable smartphone is expected to feature the same screen size as its predecessor, a more powerful processor the Kirin 9000, upgraded cameras, and a stylus.
By Express News Service

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The state police has reportedly recommended X category security cover on BJP state president K Surendran in the wake of a fresh assessment that he faces a security threat.

X category security means two personal security officers deployed with the protectee round the clock.

The intelligence wing of the state police is learnt to have recommended the security cover on Surendran as he was at the forefront of recent agitations against the state government on various issues.

It is believed that Surendran"s pro-active role in raising these issues as BJP chief paved way for central agencies to take up investigation into cases that have put the state government and the CPM in the dock. The intelligence wing believes such interventions could invite attacks from political opponents.

However, K Surendran said there was no need for any security cover. "Other than the threats issued by the Chief Minister, I don't think there is any other security threat," Surendran told TNIE in a lighter vein when asked about the move by the state police. He said he will not accept any security cover given by the state police.

The BJP leadership feels the security issue has been raised now with the ulterior motive of dissuading Surendran from carrying out further agitations against the government and the CPM.

Meanwhile, a top source in the intelligence wing said Surendran was eligible for X category security cover and it has been offered to him earlier as well. But the BJP president chose not to accept it, the source said.
WASHINGTON - The Latest on the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to the U.S. Supreme Court (all times local):

9:50 p.m.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Lindsey Graham says he hopes his committee will approve Amy Coney Barretts nomination to the Supreme Court by the week of Oct. 26, setting up a final confirmation vote on the Senate floor one week before the Nov. 3 presidential election.

Trump nominated Barrett on Saturday to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Graham said after Trumps announcement that his committee will hold four days of confirmation hearings the week of Oct. 12, and it would likely take another week to approve the nomination, under committee rules.

Graham said on Fox News Justice with Judge Jeanine: Hopefully well come to the floor around the 26th, and that will be up to (Senate Majority Leader) Mitch McConnell.

Graham said Barrett had called him and the top Democrat on the committee, California Sen. Dianne Feinstein. Graham said he and Barrett had a pleasant conversation, and he congratulated her.

Graham says, Shes just a complete superstar when it comes to the law, and elections do have consequences.

___

8:30 p.m.

Chants of fill that seat erupted as President Donald Trump opened his first campaign rally after nominating Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Trump told several thousand supporters at the event at an airport hangar in Middletown, Pennsylvania, that the federal appeals court judge is a brilliant legal mind.

He also turned the celebration of Barrett -- his third Supreme Court nominee -- into a jab at Democratic rival Joe Biden.

Trump told the packed and largely mask-free crowd that one of Barretts professors had praised her as the best student hed ever had, then added: Thats a little better than Biden, wouldnt you say?

The president chose the conservative Barrett to succeed Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who led the courts liberal wing until her death on Sept. 18.

____

7:35 p.m.

President Donald Trump says he thinks Judge Amy Coney Barrett will be confirmed to the Supreme Court before Election Day on Nov. 3.

Trump told reporters as he left the White House for a rally in Pennsylvania Saturday evening that its going to go fast and argued it would be difficult for Democrats to take issue with his pick as he praised her credentials.

He says, I think this will be done before the election, and said that would send a great signal to a lot of people.

Trumps comments came not long after a Rose Garden ceremony to formally announced his pick to fill the seat left vacant when Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died of cancer last week

Trump also said that he had not discussed the issue of abortion rights with Barrett, claiming that would not be appropriate to discuss.

But he said on the topic that, Theyre going to have to make a decision and thats going to be for the judges do .

___

7:20 p.m.

Sen. Kamala Harris says shell oppose Amy Coney Barretts nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court. Harris is a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee tasked with vetting the nominee and the Democratic vice-presidential candidate.

It would be travesty to replace (Ginsburg) with a justice who is being selected to undo her legacy and erase everything she did for our country, Harris said in a statement through her Senate office.

Harris and Joe Biden have focused on what a shift in the courts ideological makeup would mean for the Affordable Care Act. The high court is set to hear a case aimed at striking down the law shortly after the election. Harris said she opposes Barrett because of both Republican efforts to overturn the health law and to role back abortion rights.

___

6:30 p.m.

No Democratic senators are expected to vote to confirm Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court ahead of the Nov. 3 election, even though some did support her in 2017 for the federal appeals court.

Two Democrats still serving in the Senate who voted to confirm Barrett in 2017, Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia and Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, now say its too close to the election to consider her nomination. Republicans control the Senate 53-47, so Barrett could still be confirmed without Democratic support.

Kaine said voting is already underway in his and other states. Rushing a confirmation vote before the American people have weighed in would be reckless, he said in a statement.

Said Manchin, I cannot support a process that risks further division of the American people at a time when we desperately need to come together. He said he would not vote to support Barrett or any nominee before Nov. 3.

In 2016, Republicans said it was too close to the election to confirm President Barack Obamas pick to replace Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court. Scalia died 237 days before the election. Ruth Bader Ginsburg, whom Barrett would be replacing, died 46 days before the election.

___

6:20 p.m.

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden is responding to Amy Coney Barretts nomination to the Supreme Court by calling for the Senate not to act until after the presidential election.

But in a lengthy written statement Saturday, Bidens only explicit criticism of President Donald Trumps nominee turned on health care.

Biden framed Trumps choice as another move in Republicans effort to scrap the 2010 health care law passed by his old boss, President Barack Obama.

She has a written track record of disagreeing with the U.S. Supreme Courts decision upholding the Affordable Care Act, Biden said in a written statement. She critiqued Chief Justice John Roberts majority opinion upholding the law in 2012.

___

6:15 p.m.

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi are warning that a vote to confirm Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court is a vote to strike down the Affordable Care Act.

Schumer said Saturday that President Donald Trump is once again putting Americans healthcare in the crosshairs even while the coronavirus pandemic rages.

Pelosi said all the protections offered with the Affordable Care Act, including its ban on insurers denying coverage to those with preexisting conditions and the ability for young adults to remain on parents plans, will be gone.

The Supreme Court is expected to take up the Trump-backed case challenging the health care law in November.

The Democratic leaders warn that with Barrett, the court will almost surely tip rightward and could strike down the law.

___

6:10 p.m.

The Senate Judiciary Committee will hold confirmation hearings for Judge Amy Coney Barrett, President Donald Trumps Supreme Court nominee, the week of Oct. 12. Thats according to three people familiar with the schedule.

The panel plans to start the hearing with opening statements on Monday, Oct. 12, and continue with two days of questioning. The hearings are scheduled to end on Thursday, Oct. 15 with statements from outside groups.

The people spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the schedule before it is officially announced.

The hearings will come less than a month from the Nov. 3 presidential election. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has not yet said whether the Senate will vote to confirm Barrett before the election, but Republicans are privately aiming for a late October confirmation vote.

Barrett would replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died Sept. 18.

 AP writer Mary Clare Jalonick

-__

6 p.m.

President Donald Trumps pick to the U.S. Supreme Court says she is mindful she would be taking the seat vacated by the death of departed liberal icon, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Speaking moments after President Donald Trumped nominated her to the high court during a Rose Garden news conference Saturday, Amy Coney Barrett promptly mentioned Ginsburg and said she was mindful of who came before her.

Barrett is a polar opposite of Ginsburg when it comes to judicial philosophy. Barret hailed conservative icon, former Justice Antonin Scalia, as her mentor.

But she called Ginsburg a justice of enormous talent and consequence. And she praised Ginsburg as a trailblazer for womens rights, saying she not only broke glass ceilings, she smashed them.

She also lauded Ginsburg for being able to disagree with colleagues on principles but without rancour.

___

5:45 p.m.

Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett says her judicial philosophy is the same as that of her mentor, Justice Antonin Scalia.

Barrett was a clerk for Scalia, who died in 2016.

Barrett said Saturday as President Donald Trump nominated her to the countrys highest court that Scalias judicial philosophy is mine, too.

Judges must apply the law as written. Judges are not policy makers, she said.

Scalia was a proponent of originalism, the method of constitutional interpretation that looks to the meaning of words and concepts as they were understood by the Founding Fathers.

___

5:25 p.m.

President Donald Trump has called Amy Coney Barrett a woman of unparalleled achievement as he announces her nomination to the Supreme Court.

Trump said Saturday that she is one of the nations brilliant and gifted legal minds. And he called her very eminently qualified for the job.

Barrett is his third nomination to the high court after Justice Neil Gorsuch and Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

Barrett would replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died earlier this month. Trump called Ginsburg a legal giant and a pioneer for women.

Barrett, a judge on the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and a devout Roman Catholic, has been hailed by religious conservatives and others on the right as an ideological heir to conservative icon Antonin Scalia, the late Supreme Court justice for whom she clerked.

But liberals say her legal views are too heavily influenced by her religious beliefs and fear her ascent to the nations highest court could lead to a scaling back of hard-fought abortion rights.

___

5:20 p.m.

President Donald Trump says Amy Coney Barrett would be the first mother of school-age children to serve on the Supreme Court.

The president introduced Barrett in the White House Rose Garden on Saturday as his nominee to take the place of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died last week.

Barrett is 48 and has seven children, including two adopted from Haiti and a son with Down syndrome.

She would be the fifth woman to serve on the high court.

Her husband, Jesse, and her children are at the White House for Saturdays ceremony.

___

5:15 p.m.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell says the Senate will vote in the weeks ahead on President Donald Trumps nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court.

The Republican leader said Saturday that Trump could not have made a better decision in nominating the appellate court judge.

McConnell says he looks forward to meeting Barrett next week.

Barrett would replace the late liberal Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the court. She died of cancer on Sept. 18.

Barrett, a judge on the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and a devout Roman Catholic, has been hailed by religious conservatives and others on the right as an ideological heir to conservative icon Antonin Scalia, the late Supreme Court justice for whom she clerked. But liberals say her legal views are too heavily influenced by her religious beliefs and fear her ascent to the nations highest court could lead to a scaling back of hard-fought abortion rights.

___

5:05 p.m.

President Donald Trump has nominated Amy Coney Barrett to fill the Supreme Court seat vacated by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Trump announced the news Saturday. The selection is likely to energize the presidents base weeks before Election Day.

Barrett, a judge on the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and a devout Roman Catholic, has been hailed by religious conservatives and others on the right as an ideological heir to conservative icon Antonin Scalia, the late Supreme Court justice for whom she clerked. But liberals say her legal views are too heavily influenced by her religious beliefs and fear her ascent to the nations highest court could lead to a scaling back of hard-fought abortion rights.

Barrett was considered to be a finalist in 2018 before Trump nominated Justice Brett Kavanaugh for the seat vacated when Justice Anthony Kennedy retired.

At just 48, Barrett would be the youngest justice, and her tenure could last for decades.

___

4:05 p.m.

An airplane believed to be carrying likely Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett and her family has arrived at Joint Base Andrews.

Barrett is expected to be nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court on Saturday evening by President Donald Trump. The plane left from South Bend, Indiana, where Barrett and her family live.

The seat was made vacant by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg last week at the age of 87.

Barrett is a justice on the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. She was previously a law professor at Notre Dame and has been hailed as the heir to the late conservative Justice Antonin Scalia.

She met with Trump at the White House earlier this week.
By Trend

Over the past 24 hours, Armenian armed forces have violated the ceasefire along the line of contact between Azerbaijani and Armenian troops 48 times, Trend reports referring to Azerbaijani Defense Ministry.

Armenian armed forces were using large-caliber machine guns and sniper rifles.

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, 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 the withdrawal of its armed forces from Nagorno Karabakh and the surrounding districts.

--

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
Ruth Bader Ginsburg became, late in her long and illustrious career, more than just a Supreme Court justice. She was a cultural symbol, a human distillation of an era and a cause, her special celebrity rooted in the way her fight for legal opportunities for women combined with her own extraordinary success in the spheres she opened up. As a jurist Ginsburg was one of the courts four liberals, important but not singular; as the Notorious R.B.G., she embodied liberal feminism, a history of struggle and achievement condensed into three initials and one life.

Amy Coney Barrett, President Trumps choice to take her seat, is a signifier of a different sort. In her combination of elite accomplishment with a faith and a family life thats unusual among her high-achieving peers, what she condenses isnt the recent history of feminism but a question that its success has created: Namely, can there be a conservative feminism thats distinctive, coherent and influential, at least beyond quirky religious subcultures like the faculty at the University of Notre Dame?

By conservative feminism I mean something different from 1970s-era female resistance to the womens movement, whether in its arch Joan Didion form or its mass-movement Phyllis Schlafly incarnation. Schlaflys anti-feminism, the core womens conservatism of the 70s, argued that the push for female advancement was either unnecessary or destructive, that it gave women things they didnt really need and it took from them  from mothers, especially  protections that they relied upon. Its icon was the beleaguered homemaker; the fact that Schlafly was herself such a vigorously public figure didnt change her fundamental identity as a defender of the domestic sphere.

A conservative feminism today, on the other hand  again, if we can say that it exists  is adaptive rather than oppositional. It takes for granted that much of what Ginsburg fought for was necessary and just; that the old order suppressed female talent and ambition; that sexism and misogyny are more potent forces than many anti-feminists allowed. It agrees that the accomplishments of Barretts career  in academia and now on the federal bench  could have been denied to her in 1950, and it hails that change as good.
The firestorm over controversial Netflix film Cuties, which led to a huge spike in U.S. customer cancellations following its debut earlier this month, burned out after a few days, according to new data.

Cuties tells the story of an 11-year-old Senegalese girl living in Paris who struggles to find her identity, torn between her familys Muslim traditions and her peer groups attempts to emulate the sexualized personae of women as portrayed in Western culture and on social media. The film includes scenes of the protagonist, Amy, performing highly sexualized dance routines with the Cuties dance crew and shows the underage characters in other adult situations  and, predictably, a backlash ensued. That caused the hashtag #CancelNetflix to trend on Twitter following its Sept. 9 release worldwide on the streaming service.

But while there was a temporary escalation in cancellations, the Netflix churn rate in the U.S. died down within a week after the social-media uproar, according to research firm 7Park Data. The data indicates the overall impact on the streamers subscriber base has not been material.

In the days following Netflixs release of Cuties, account cancellations hit a peak of about five times the churn rate of Jan. 1, 2019, a 7Park Data analysis found. After about a week (by Sept. 18) the cancellations had subsided to previous levels, per 7Park. As previously reported, data from research firm YipitData showed that Netflix cancellations on Sept. 12 soared to about eight times higher than the average daily rate in August 2020 (which was a different baseline than 7Park used).

Netflix U.S. Cancellation Trends (Jan. 2019-Sept. 2020)

Netflix-US-Cuties-cancellations-rate



Source: 7Park Data

The Netflix cancellations in the U.S. were concentrated in central and southern parts of the country (and also overindexed in Maine and Alaska), according to 7Park Data.

Netflix Cancellation Index by U.S. State (Sept. 10-13)

Netflix Cuties cancellations US map



Source: 7Park Data

New York-based 7Park Data tracks consumer behavior across multiple industry sectors, including streaming services. To measure activity among Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and Hulu subscribers, the research firm uses a census-balanced panel of 15,000-25,000 U.S. households watching via internet-connected TV (either smart TVs or devices such as Roku).

Story continues

Netflix has defended Cuties, written and directed by French filmmaker Maimouna Doucoure, calling it a powerful story. The production had a counselor on set and the project had received approval from the French governments child-protection authorities, as noted by the Washington Post.

Cuties is a social commentary against the sexualization of young children, a company rep said in a statement earlier this month. Its an award-winning film and a powerful story about the pressure young girls face on social media and from society more generally growing up  and wed encourage anyone who cares about these important issues to watch the movie.

Doucoure has repeatedly said that the purpose of her film  quite the opposite of promoting a view of children as sexual subjects  is to show the world through the eyes of young girls and shine a spotlight on the problem of social media encouraging children to assume hyper-sexualized identities.

We need to protect our children. What I want to [do] is to open peoples eyes on this issue and try to fix it, Doucoure said, speaking at a Sept. 14 event hosted by UniFrance. The most important [thing] is to watch the film and understand we have the same fight.

Cuties raised hackles a month before it was even released over Netflixs promotional poster showing the young dancers in provocative poses. The company apologized for the inappropriate artwork and said it was not representative of the film. The controversy started with that artwork, Doucoure said on the UniFrance panel.

On Netflix, the movie is rated TV-MA (for mature audiences only). The films critics have included Republican Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii), both of whom labeled the film child porn. (Cruz also urged the Justice Department to investigate Netflix.) In addition, the film has drawn condemnation from groups including the Parents Television Council, the National Center on Sexual Exploitation, and the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

Cuties (original title: Mignonnes) premiered at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival, where Doucoure won the world cinema dramatic directing award. Netflix bought worldwide rights (excluding France) to Cuties prior to its Sundance screening.
Lucknow: Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Saturday (September 26, 2020) said that those opposing the Centre's agriculture-related Bills are "anti-farmer".

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had promised to double the income of farmers and the Bills have been passed with this aim in mind, he said, addressing BJP workers at a school auditorium in Jaunpur.

The chief minister said the legislation will free farmers from the grip of middlemen and provide them with an option to sell their produce as per their choice.

"The opposition is misleading people but they will not be allowed to succeed," he said, terming those opposing the Bills as "anti-farmer".

Without taking names, the chief minister in Deoria said, "Those who exploited farmers and mocked migrants... Those who don't know whether sugarcane is grown on land or trees are pretending to be warriors of farmers and labourers."

Speaking about the work done by his government during the coronavirus pandemic, he said those who have been with the people in the most difficult times will be in power and claimed that in the last six months, the state government has distributed free foodgrain 12 times so that no one faces hunger.

Referring to the upcoming by-polls in the state, he said there will not be any big rallies or public meetings.

"So, every BJP worker and office-bearer will have to take responsibility for every booth."

If you win a booth, you will win an election, he said, exhorting party workers to win the Malhani (Jaunpur) and Deoria Sadar assembly seats for the BJP.

"We are dedicated to the development and in this by-election, you all have to think about who will bring development and who will provide employment," he said.

Bypolls to eight Assembly seats in Uttar Pradesh are likely to be held soon.

Enumerating the achievements of the BJP-led government at the Centre and in Uttar Pradesh while speaking in Deoria, he said, "We took the development work forward with the establishment of Medical College in Deoria. By next year, classes will also start with 100 students and people will get high-quality medical facilities."

He said that due to government focus on water drainage, potable water and cleanliness, the number of deaths due to encephalitis has reduced substantially in comparison to 2014.

"The world is appreciating our management during COVID-19 challenge and the government not only provided employment to 40 lakh migrant workers but also provided them free food (ration)," he said.
The Google Pixel 5 is going to be announced on September 30 alongside a 5G-enabled variant of the Pixel 4a. On Friday, we heard from both @Jon_Prosser and @evleaks that Google might price the Pixel 5 at $699 in the US and even more for Canada. A new claim from Prosser suggests that Google wont have the Pixel 5 available until October 15 and that the Pixel 4a 5G might not be available until November.

Pixel 5 5G

(Just Black & Subtle Sage)

- Preorder: Sep 30

- Launch: October 15



They made an oopsie with the 4a 



Pixel 4a 5G (Just Black)

- Preorder: Sep 30

- Launch: Nov 19



Pixel 4a 5G (Clearly White)

- Delayed to 2021 

(Will most likely be canceled altogether) pic.twitter.com/Qh4L0TZ3Ry  Jon Prosser (@jon_prosser) September 25, 2020

Both the Pixel 5 and Pixel 4a 5G are expected to open for pre-order on September 30, the same day as the event is set to take place. Meanwhile, the Pixel 5 (which will arrive in Just Black and Subtle Sage) will officially become available on October 15.

The Pixel 4a 5G has a different situation. The phone will come in Just Black but wont be available to purchase until November 19. At the same time, Prosser reports that a Clearly White variant of the phone might arrive, but it would be delayed until 2021  that is, if it isnt cancelled altogether.

Weve previously seen white variants of the Pixel 4a from even the first leaked renders of the phone that surfaced back in December. This render showed the same Pixel 4a in white with an orange power key.

With the Pixel 4a already out with an attractive price point, we dont see the need to rush the release of the 5G variant. We sure would love to see a Clearly White Pixel 4a, even if it is exclusive to the 5G variant, which will reportedly run $//499

Via Twitter
Honda has been meaning to launch a strong competitor for the Royal Enfield for quite some time now. Well, that moment has finally arrived. Honda will launch a bike in India on September 30 trying to take on Royal Enfield in what is an extremely competitive segment.

According to a report published in Autocar India, the powerful two-wheeler has been named as HNess. This name will be pronounced as Highness. In all its promotional posts, the Japanese automaker has been using the term Highness. The only possible reason for changing the spelling of the name is the fact that the term Highness was opposed in the trademark application while Hness was accepted.

One of the social media posts for the promotion of the new bike read, If it sounds so powerful, you can imagine how it looks. The date for the most majestic arrival of the year has been set. Your Highness is arriving on 30th September 2020, 11:55 am onwards. Stay tuned! #YOURHIGHNESS.

As of now, there have been no updates regarding the specifications of the upcoming two-wheeler. However, it is worth mentioning that the bike will be sold through Honda Big Wing dealer network. Usually, the bikes that are sold through Honda Big Wing are premium, but this one will be an exception as it is going to be perhaps the most affordable motorcycle sold through the said network. In November, Honda had mentioned that they aggressively wanted to expand this Big Wing to 75 cities across India. So the HNess could be a reason for that.

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As far as the design and the make of the Honday HNess is concerned one cannot say a lot about it. Reports say that it could possibly be a 350cc bike based on a sound clip that has been made available by the brand.

Till now it is being believed that it will be a motorcycle meant especially for India with top-of-the-line design. People are also divided over whether the bike will be an all-new platform or if it uses a modified version of something like the Honda Rebel 300 that is sold overseas.
Students in the Detroit Public Schools Community District (DPSCD) engaged in a virtual sickout on Thursday in opposition to the districts back-to-school plan. The virtual sickout meant that students did not log in to online learning for the entire day in order to call attention to their demands.

It is unclear exactly how many students participated in the action. One Detroit High School teacher, who wished to remain anonymous, told the World Socialist Web Site that she had 9 to 12 students missing from most of her classes on Thursday. The teacher noted, Many of my remaining students indicated that they wanted to participate, but that they were scared of reprisals.

A Detroit Public Schools Community District (DPSCD) student speaking at Thursdays press conference

I think the students strike is the first of many such actions. These students have seen firsthand the malice of the profit system and should recognize that this is not a local, or even a state issue. I think that teachers and students should unite our opposition to these policies and fight to make virtual learning as healthy and accessible as possible.

Eva Oleita, a senior at Cass Technical High School, told our reporters: Students took part in the sickout from Cass, Marygrove, Mumford, Davison and other schools. We dont know the exact number because the school district keeps the data. A lot more kids wanted to participate, but couldnt because of their parents or worries about their grades, but they helped out anyway by sending our list of demands to the school board.

At a press conference held on Thursday morning in downtown Detroit, DPSCD students explained that students and teachers alike were burnt out from the haphazard way in which online learning was being conducted by the district. Under the current set-up, students and teachers are required to be in front of their computer screens for 8 hours at a time, with their cameras turned on. In many cases, the district is also continuing to enforce the dress code.

These striking students are demanding the district adopt a new schedule which would reduce the amount of screen time and allow for independent study. The students are also demanding funding for extensive programming to support student mental health, removing the requirement to use cameras during online classes, and to provide extensive training to students and teachers in the proper use of a select number of apps and online programs.

While Thursdays student strike was limited to one day, the students involved are determined to continue and expand the strike if their demands are not met: We made an impact. We went public with our demands and if the district does not implement them, we will strike again.

At the press conference, one student explained: We are giving the district until October 2. If our demands are not met by then, we are going to strike indefinitely. The same student later explained that the strike date was based on what is called count day. This is the day that the county officials register the number of students who are present in schools throughout the district. Schools with low absentee rates generally receive more funding.

While the demands laid out by the students are limited to immediate measures, there is no doubt that they are motivated by much broader issues.

Eva referred to the nature of the situation in Detroit public schools before COVID-19 hit the city: Weve had funding problems way before COVID. It makes no sense. The rich are making more money than ever and Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has a net worth of almost $200 billion. His workers are not getting paid enough and theyre working under inhumane conditions. I saw a video of an Amazon delivery driver just saying he was fed up and walking away from his truck with all the packages in it. Its disgusting when the rich have more money than they know what to do with, but were told there is nothing for schools or our community.

There is no doubt that the issues animating the students involved are broadly felt among the student body, teachers, parents and workers. However, there has been a continued effort by various organizations around the Democratic Party, such as the Detroit Area Youth Uniting Michigan (DAYUM) and Black Lives Matter In All Capacities (BLMIAC), to frame the issue of the school reopenings in entirely racial terms. A press release put out by these groups states that the aim of the opposition must be to stop the draining and unequal online schools targeted at Black students.

In fact, what is involved is not an attack on Black students, but on workers and working-class students of all races.

The mounting opposition of students in Detroit to the reckless school reopening plans is just one example of a much broader opposition building across the country and throughout the world.

Starting Monday, 276 teachers in Kenosha Unified School District (KUSD) in Wisconsin engaged in a sickout strike in opposition to increasing COVID-19 outbreaks and deadly conditions in the school district. The majority of teachers who called in sick did so on Sunday evening, forcing the district to close seven schools and switch to remote learning for this entire week.

Since the onset of the pandemic Wisconsin has had 104,170 COVID-19 cases and 1,251 deaths. In the past week alone, there have been a reported 4,200 new positive cases and 34 deaths. Just last week, Heidi Hussli, a 47-year-old Bay Port, Wisconsin, teacher died. She contracted the virus teaching in person under a hybrid model.

In South Carolina, the Facebook group SC for Ed is organizing a statewide sickout strike to be held today to protest unsafe conditions and low pay. There are now 622 students or staff COVID-19 cases tied to the reopening of K-12 schools in South Carolina, including 90 since last Friday alone.

In Californias Irvine Unified School District, a petition is circulating calling for a halt to plans to reopen schools. So far it has garnered over 2,000 signatures of teachers, parents and community members.

In Greece, hundreds of high school students joined by workers in a wide array of industries marched Thursday in protests explicitly against the governments policy of herd immunity.

The homicidal policy of herd immunitythat is the conscious decision to allow the virus to spread without restrainthas been adopted by capitalist governments around the world. Even conservative estimates say this policy will lead to more than 23 million deaths globally in the coming years.

This policy is being driven by the need to get workers back to work in order to pump out profits for the rich.

In opposition to this reckless campaign, the Socialist Equality Party has called for the formation of a nationwide network of Educator Rank-and-File Safety Committees to organize broad-based opposition independent of the two bourgeois parties and their representatives in the trade unions.

Committees have already been formed throughout the US, including in the two largest school districts in the country, New York City and Los Angeles, California. Committees have been formed in Michigan, Texas and Florida as well as in Germany, the UK and Australia.

In direct opposition to the reckless policy of herd immunity of the ruling class, the demands put forward by these committees are based not on the best interests of Wall Street and the bank accounts of corporate America, but what is necessary to protect the lives and well-being of children, educators and the entire working class.

These committees demand full income protection to all parents and caregivers who stay home with their children and for the trillions of dollars which have been handed over to the rich to be redistributed to provide full funding for public education, online instruction, high-speed internet, food security, mental health care, special education support and all other resources needed to provide the best quality remote learning for every student and educator.

Educators with the Detroit Rank & File Educators Safety Committee (DRAFEC) are appealing to all students in the Detroit area to broaden their struggle and join the committee.

In statement to the WSWS the DRAFEC said, We formed the Detroit Educators Rank-and-File Safety Committee to protect the lives of our students, families and the most vulnerable members of our community.

We urge all those students who are looking for a way to fight back to link up their struggle with teachers, bus drivers, school staff, counselors and other sections of the working class by joining our committee.

We urge students to reject all efforts to divide the working class along racial and ethnic lines. Instead, take up the fight to unite all workers and youth in a common struggle to protect our lives and social rights.
Peoples Bank, first state bank to accept fingerprints for pensioner verification View(s):

Peoples Bank has made history by becoming the first state bank to accept fingerprints of pensioners for verification purposes, in lieu of the conventional life certificate.

The official launch ceremony of this product was held at the Peoples Bank Head Office under the patronage of chief guests former Auditor General  S. Swarnajothi and veteran musician  Edward Jayakody, Director General of Pensions  A. Jagath D. Dias, Additional Director General  K. A. Pathmapriya, Peoples Bank Chairman  Sujeewa Rajapakse, Chief Executive Officer / General Manager  Ranjith Kodituwakku together with Peoples Bank Corporate and Executive Management and officials of the Pension Department.

In keeping with the Vistas of Prosperity and Splendour manifesto of the government which aims to utilise technology to enhance the efficiency and output of the state sector, the Department of Pensions recently introduced a facility that enables pensioners to use their fingerprint as verification instead of the time consuming process of obtaining and submitting a life certificate to the department, the bank said in a media release.

Accordingly, with this new facility any of the nearly 650,000 pensioners in the country, irrespective of whether they are a Peoples Bank customer or not, can walk into any of the selected Peoples Bank branches and conveniently provide their fingerprint on a specialised electronic device. The fingerprint is accepted as equivalent to the submission of the life certificate and is instantly updated in the Department of Pensions records. The facility is initially available at 75 Peoples Bank branches across the island and will be subsequently expanded to other branches in the future. The new technology-driven process using the fingerprint is a welcome relief to all pensioners as they will be able to attend to this verification matter conveniently by making a quick visit to a Peoples Bank branch.

The obtaining of the life certificate by the pensioner is annual occurrence and plays an important role in the Department of Pensions efforts to regulate the process of pension payments. All pensioners are expected to obtain this life certificate through a tedious process that involves their respective Grama Niladhari Officer and Divisional Secretariat. Initially, all pensioners are mailed applications for the Pensioner Life Certificate during a particular time period of the year. This application has to be duly completed by the pensioner, certified by the Grama Niladhari and sent to the Divisional Secretariat. The main objective of this process is to verify the pensioners details and avoid overpayments, the release said.

Pensioners can call Peoples Bank on 1961 or visit www.peoplesbank.lk or the Peoples Bank branches currently offering this fingerprint verification facility.
New Delhi, Sep 26 : Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Saturday said the city government is working towards providing round-the-clock supply of water to the people, and also pressed on the need to improve both the management and accountability of water.

The Delhi Chief Minister said that there should be accountability for even one drop of water which goes out of a water treatment plant as a lot of water gets wasted and there is no management or accountability in the capital city.

Addressing a press conference, Kejriwal said, "We need to bring state-of-the-art-technology to the city. We are currently living in old times. We are working in the direction of providing 24-hour supply of water. No privatization is being done." "In a recent meeting with Delhi Jal Board officials, we decided that a consultant will be appointed to suggest measures that can ensure 24x7 water supply to every house. We will try and achieve this goal within five years," he added.

He further claimed that the water in the capital city either gets stolen or leaked. "We want to improve its management and accountability. The consultant that we are hiring will tell us how to improve both." The 52-year-old leader also took to the micro-blogging website, Twitter, and wrote that with 24-hour supply of electricity, Delhiites will now get 24-hour water supply. He added that a Delhiite consumes 176 liters of water every day.

"We want to increase the availability of water in the capital, so that there is sufficient water. For this we are in talks with Uttar Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand government," he added.
French president Emmanuel Macron will hold a news conference on Sunday on the political situation in Lebanon, the French presidency said.

Lebanon's prime minister-designate, Mustapha Adib, quit on Saturday after trying for almost a month to line up a non-partisan cabinet, dealing a blow to a French plan aimed at rallying sectarian leaders to tackle the worst crisis since the nation's 1975-1990 civil war.

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London, Sep 26 : A list of 38 new areas in England, including the entire city of London, has been added to a coronavirus "watch list" due to recent spike in the number of confirmd cases, the media reported on Saturday.

The new figure has increased the total number of areas on the list to 92 places , including all 33 London boroughs, the Metro newspaper reported.

Four areas -- Leeds, Stockport, Wigan, Blackpool -- have been escalated to the "areas of intervention" on list.

Meanwhile, Darlington, Hartlepool, Middlesbrough, Redcar and Cleveland and Stockton-on-Tees have been added to "areas of enhanced support", which means they could placed under a local lockdown.

Corby, Northampton, Peterborough and Stoke-on-Trent have been removed from the watch list.

Currently, there are around 17 million Britons living under some kind of restrictions due to the pandemic.

The development comes as scientists have warned the UK's 'R' rate, which measures how quickly Covid-19 is spreading, is up once again from last week, reports the Metro newspaper.

According to data released the Government Office for Science and the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) on Friday, showed the estimate for 'R' for the whole of the UK was between 1.2 and 1.5.

On Friday, the UK registered another single-day case recorded.

With 6,874 new cases, the overall tally has increased to 425,766, while the death toll stood at 42,025.
WATERLOO  One person has died following an early Saturday shooting at an unauthorized downtown club that also injured at least 11 other people.

Waterloo Police Chief Joel Fitzgerald talked about the shooting during an 11 a.m. press conference at City Hall, where he announced the death.

He said the gathering at 501 W. Fourth St. allegedly involved urban motorcycle clubs who were using the building as a night club, a purpose for which it is not authorized by the city.

The incident happened at 3:17 a.m. Police, already in the area for a traffic stop, responded in less than a minute to the address, Fitzgerald said. Our officers actually heard gunshots.

Among the injured, eight had gunshot wounds.

Unfortunately, as of the time of this press conference, one person has succumbed to their injuries, said Fitzgerald. No other details about the victim were released as police work to inform relatives.

Pray for the victims, pray for the family members, he added. But also pray that folks step up and speak out and give us the information we need to solve this crime.

I never thought that I would mutter the words that I cant believe this would happen here, said Mayor Quentin Hart, speaking at the press conference. But it has, and gun play is for keeps and people get hurt. We as a community have to be diligent in supporting our families, but also be diligent in bringing justice to perpetrators of this heinous and cowardice crime.

The shooting occurred at the end of about a 24-hour period that included two other gunshot incidents Friday morning, which police said they do not believe were connected to Saturdays events.

A man shot in the ankle was found outside a liquor store in the area of West Fourth Street and Kimball Avenue shortly after 2 a.m. At 7:30 a.m., a bullet struck the roof of a car occupied by a woman and two children as she drove through an alley behind the 800 block of Riehl Street.

On Saturday, police arrived at the West Fourth Street location to find a chaotic scene with people hurt and others fleeing the area, and officers began administering aid as paramedics and firefighters pulled up.

There was a huge crowd in the property, estimated at about 100, said Fitzgerald, ranging in age from their 20s to upwards of 40-, 45-years-old.

Officers needed to determine who was injured.

Inside of the location there was some kind of confrontation. We do know that gunfire was exchanged inside, Fitzgerald said. It wasnt immediately clear how many people were shooting, though.

We also know that one of the exits had to be destroyed in order for people to get out, he added. Police believe there are more people who were injured but left the scene and havent sought medical care.

Fitzgerald said the public isnt in danger from the shooter or shooters. We believe its isolated to this incident, he said.

One person was flown to University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics in Iowa City for further treatment, police said. It was unclear if that is the person who died. Other victims were taken to area hospitals and are receiving treatment for a variety of injuries.

Fitzgerald said one of the victims is still in critical condition.

Aside from the gunshot wounds, injuries occurred from debris, glass, and people fleeing the scene.

It was a pretty dynamic scene, said Battalion Chief Ben Petersen with Waterloo Fire Rescue. Coming into something like that, you are trying to size up the patients and triage the scene.

Medics found two gunshot victims inside the club and a third outside and took them to local hospitals. Other less-severely injured victims went by private vehicles and soon inundated the emergency rooms, officials said.

While police havent announced any arrests from the shooting, three people were taken into custody after officers responded to a disorderly conduct call outside the emergency room at MercyOne Waterloo Medical Center, where some of the victims were taken.

Sgt. Brooke Carter said a fight started between some of the people who came to the hospital after the victims were transported there, but no major injuries occurred.

Dumarkcus Dewayne Gibbs, 27, and Sincere Lanae Jones, 20, were arrested for disorderly conduct and assault on a peace officer.

Law enforcement officers from about every agency in the county  Cedar Falls, Evansdale, Hudson, LaPorte and Gilbertville police as well as the Black Hawk County Sheriffs Office  headed to the shooting scene to assist Waterloo police.

Everybody jumped in, Capt. Joe Leibold said. Whatever we needed, we just all did together, which is typical of how we work.

The shooting location had been a bar that closed several years ago and has been operating as a private establishment.

Cedar Valley Crime Stoppers is offering a $2,500 reward for information leading to an arrest or arrests in the shooting. Officials urged people to come forward with information about the incident.

Violence is no way to deal with problems and silence is no way to bring justice for those who may have been hurt, said Hart.

What we know is that several hundred potential witnesses are out there, Fitzgerald noted. They may be able to provide information as to what exactly transpired inside the location, how the gunfire erupted. ... I encourage you, I beseech you, call us.

Anyone with information is asked to call the Waterloo Police Department at (319) 291-4340 or Cedar Valley Crime Stoppers at (855) 300-TIPS (8477). Tips may also be left at WWW.CVCRIMESTOP.COM Tips may also be sent with TipSubmit or by texting the word CEDAR plus the information to CRIMES (274637).

This is the fourth fatal shooting of the year in Waterloo.

On May 15, Terrell Bernard Flower, 30, was shot at 323 Crescent Place. He was taken to the hospital by private vehicle where he was pronounced dead.

Cortez Harrison, 15, was shot in an alley behind the 2800 block of East Fourth Street on July 20 and later died at the hospital.

Vincent J. Hemenway, 49, was shot outside 556 Adrian St. He later died at the hospital.







PHOTOS: Private Club Shooting, Sept. 26, 2020

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The wireless charging market is anticipated to reach around USD 95.6 billion by 2026 according to a new research published by Polaris Market Research. In 2017, the consumer electronics segment dominated the global market in terms of revenue. Asia-Pacific is expected to be the leading contributor to the global wireless charging market revenue during the forecast period.

The wireless charging market has substantial potential for the present and future applications, owing to the rise in the mobile phone usage across the world, especially emerging regions such as India, China and South-East Asia. The growing demand for mobile devices and consumer goods drives the growth of the market during the forecast period.

Request For Sample Copy & All Related Graphs & Charts @ https://www.polarismarketresearch.com/industry-analysis/wireless-charging-market/request-for-sample

The wireless charging market is expected to grow significantly during the forecast period owing to increasing popularity of electric vehicles. Wireless charging has multiple applications in the EV technology including fuel supply, and in-car electronics. However, factors such as lack of standardization of mobile devices and their charging potentials, longer charging duration, and limited portability hamper the market growth to a certain extent. Growing demand from emerging economies, increasing adoption of IoT and smart devices are expected to provide numerous growth opportunities in the coming years.

Asia-Pacific generated the highest revenue in the market in 2017, and is expected to lead the global wireless charging market throughout the forecast period. The economic growth in countries such as China and India, leading to rising living standards and high disposable income has increased the penetration of smart phones and other mobile devices in the region, thereby increasing the demand for wireless charging. The increasing environmental concerns and depletion of traditional fuel sources have encouraged consumers to use electric vehicles in the region. China exhibits the highest penetration of electric vehicles, which supports market growth of wireless charging.

Browse for full research summary: https://www.polarismarketresearch.com/industry-analysis/wireless-charging-market

The key players operating in the market include Integrated Device Technology, Mojo Mobility, Powercast Corp., Texas Instruments, Energizer Holdings, Leggett & Platt, Incorporated, Qualcomm Incorporated, Powermat Technologies Ltd., ConvenientPower, and Murata Manufacturing Co. Ltd. These companies launch new products and collaborate with other market leaders to innovate and launch new products to meet the increasing needs and requirements of consumers.

Wireless Charging Market Size and Forecast by Technology, 2018-2026

Inductive Radio Frequency Resonant Others



Wireless Charging Market Size and Forecast by End-User, 2018-2026

Consumer Electronics Automotive Healthcare Defense Industrial Others



Wireless Charging Market Size and Forecast by Region, 2018-2026

North America US. Canada Mexico Europe Germany UK France Italy Rest of Europe Asia-Pacific China India Japan Rest of Asia-Pacific Latin America Brazil Middle East & Africa



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About Polaris Market Research

Polaris Market Research is a global market research and consulting company. We provide unmatched quality of offerings to our clients present globally. The company specializes in providing exceptional market intelligence and in-depth business research services for our clientele spread across different enterprises. We at Polaris are obliged to serve our diverse customer base present across the industries of healthcare, technology, semi-conductors and chemicals among various other industries present around the world.

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Wednesday, September 9

History will be kind to me, said Winston Churchill, for I intend to write it.

In similar vein, I plan to pen a posthumous volume of diaries, to be published immediately after I leave the world, saying what I really think about everyone.

Are you OK? asked a panicky Holly Willoughby. Ive been asked to record an obit message about you? Its a fake, I chuckled. Out of interest, what would you have said in your tribute? Id have said you were a wonderfully beloved part of the ITV daytime family who will be sorely missed, Holly replied, and that Im available to take over presenting Life Stories

Of course, the main purpose of this tome will be to get in first before the torrent of jubilant vitriol inevitably pours in from my many gleeful adversaries.

Oddly, as I amused myself this week by pondering exactly who Id take down from beyond the grave, I began receiving a flurry of messages from famous friends, including Susanna Reid, Kevin Pietersen and Holly Willoughby, worried that my departure from Planet Earth might be more imminent than I would like.

It transpired that some pranksters have been firing off requests for advanced obituary tributes about me, supposedly for ITN.

These interviews are taped and edited now, the very professionally created invitation reads, so that they can be broadcast immediately in the event of the subjects passing. As you can imagine, its rather a sensitive area so wed respectfully ask that you keep this request confidential.

Fortunately, my friends concern for my health marginally outweighed their natural craving to be on camera, or at least it did for the ones I know about.

Are you OK? asked a panicky Holly. Ive been asked to record an obit message about you?

Its a fake, I chuckled. Out of interest, what would you have said in your tribute?

Id have said you were a wonderfully beloved part of the ITV daytime family who will be sorely missed, Holly replied, and that Im available to take over presenting Life Stories.

Monday, September 14

The furore over Diversitys performance on Britains Got Talent makes me sick.

The young, talented, hard-working, humble and dynamic dance group, led by the brilliant Ashley Banjo, were one of my favourite acts when I was a judge on BGT (they won the third series).

They epitomised the spirit of the show and Ive watched with great pride as theyve gone on to achieve huge success.

Now theyre at the centre of a pathetic firestorm after performing a stunningly powerful routine on BGT that depicted the huge events which have rocked the world this year, from the pandemic to George Floyds death at the knee of a police officer.

I loved it, but more than 20,000 viewers complained to TV regulator Ofcom that it was inappropriate  and the troupes members have been bombarded with disgusting racist abuse. Ashley responded by posting this quote from Martin Luther King Jr: Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.

To which I would simply add: if you were more outraged by Diversitys performance than you were by what happened to George Floyd, then youre the problem, not them.

Tuesday, September 15

An update in my ongoing 12-year battle to persuade Sir Michael Caine to do Life Stories.

When I bumped into the great man several weeks ago, he promised to watch my interview with another national treasure, Captain Sir Tom Moore, and if he liked what he saw, hed possibly do the show.

Well, Sir Michael did watch the show.

And he really enjoyed it.

And hes kept his word and agreed to now appear on it too.

Theres just one problem He saw and loved it, said his agent, and said he also wants to wait until he is 100 to do his one.

Thursday, September 17

Ive been voted the celebrity the British public would least like to live next to  beating the likes of Gemma Collins, Boris Johnson, Dominic Cummings, Liam Gallagher and Jeremy Clarkson in a survey by charity fundraising platform, Omaze. Apparently, along with Meghan and Harry, Im peoples idea of the worst nightmare neighbour, which I can only presume is because they think Id be the same noisy, argumentative, confrontational person that I am on Good Morning Britain. But in fact, when at home, I like to think Im a very quiet, discreet, helpful-when-needed neighbour.

Except when Arsenal lose. Thats not a good time to pop round for a bag of sugar.

Friday, September 18

On a happier note, Ive been shortlisted for Favourite Presenter in the TV Times Awards. However, my five rivals include those insufferable trophy-guzzlers Ant and Dec, so obviously I have more chance of becoming Pope.

Stars who lose awards usually say: Its not the winning that matters, its being nominated! But speaking as someone who has lost virtually every single award for which Ive ever been nominated  usually to Ant and Dec  thats the biggest lie in showbiz, after I havent had any work done.

Of course, its the winning that matters.

And Ive had enough: if those snivelling, smug Geordie b******* beat me again, theyll be having their next Saturday Night Takeaway from a tube.

Sunday, September 20

It was an anxious time for everybody, Susannas told Stella magazine, those early days were very frightening. I started to have really vivid, terrifying nightmares where I would wake up screaming and crying. GMBs staff were surprised to learn this referred to Covid-19, not my joining the programme.

Monday, September 21

Watching Boris Johnson disintegrating into a blustering, blathering, bulls******* clown during the greatest crisis of my lifetime has been an unsettling spectacle, and even usually supportive media friends are now openly mocking his woeful leadership.

We cant say we werent warned.

When I interviewed Boris for GQ magazine back in 2007, I put the following statement to him: I dont really buy into this buffoon act. I think you play it all up to make money and charm the public, when underneath it all lurks a calculating, ambitious and very serious brain. Thats very kind of you Piers, he replied, but you must consider the possibility that underneath it all there really may lurk a genuine buffoon.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 26)  The country is seeing improvements in the number of COVID-19 cases listed daily, but authorities should still be careful about easing restrictions as it could record up to over a hundred thousand more infections in the next month, experts said on Saturday.

The University of the Philippines OCTA research team presented new findings on the country's COVID-19 situation, noting a downward trend with less than 3,000 infections posted per day. Metro Manila, the country's outbreak epicenter, especially showed a decline of over 50 percent in its daily cases compared to five weeks ago, the team said in its report.

However, they were quick to note that some restrictions, such as the general community quarantine status in the capital region, must remain to sustain the gains in the past month.

"We are healing now but we are not there yet na fully healed," UP OCTA Fellow and UP Professor Guido David told CNN Philippines' Newsroom Weekend. "We would be careful not to move to MGCQ muna [yet] because we are not yet fully healed."

Government officials earlier floated the idea of downgrading the quarantine status in NCR to modified general community quarantine, relaxing more restrictions in areas.

UP OCTA projected in August that the total COVID-19 count would hit 310,000 or up to 330,000 by September 30. However, recent data showed that the most number of cases the country could have by that time would be between 310,000 and 315,000, which the experts said was a "very positive sign."

But the country's reproduction number, or rate of coronavirus transmission, is now at 0.82, which is still above the World Health Organization's ideal rate. With the current rate, the country could still see its total rising to 380,000 or at most 410,000 cases by October 31, according to the experts.

"Based on past data and trends, a premature downgrading of the quarantine status in the NCR may increase the risk of a surge in December around Christmas time," the UP OCTA report stated.

Apart from Metro Manila, which posts about 1,200 cases per day, the researchers also identified Bulacan, Batangas, Cavite, Laguna, Negros Occidental and Rizal as high-risk areas or places that record more than 100 cases per day, although these have decreased compared to previous figures. The team advised intensified testing, tracing and isolation to prevent a surge of infections.

Some provinces were also tagged as "emerging hotspots", such as Benguet (Baguio City), Iloilo (Iloilo City), Leyte (Tacloban), Misamis Oriental (Cagayan de Oro) and Nueva Vizcaya, where the number of new cases rose over a two-week period and was at least ten per million of the population per day.

Meanwhile, previously reported hotspots like Agusan Del Norte, Capiz, Davao Del Norte, Lanao Del Norte, Lanao Del Sur, Oriental Mindoro and South Cotabato have seen a decreasing trend.

The experts urged the government to monitor compliance with minimum health standards, such as the wearing of face masks and face shields, implement localized lockdowns with stricter border controls, and scale up capacities of the healthcare system.
Some lesbians numbering about eleven are in the custody of the Aflao divisional Police command in the Ketu South Municipality of the Volta Region after a video of two of them emerged.

The lesbians are in police custody since Wednesday, September 23.

According to a source close to , the lesbians were apprehended after a video of two of them engaging in the act popped up.

The Paramount Chief of the Aflao Traditional Council, Torgbi Fiti (V) after watching the video invited the lady whose face showed in the video, the source revealed.

The lady, who bowed her head in shame during questioning at the Chief's palace was asked to name everybody who also engaged in same illegal act in the town.

The lady, whose name and age is yet to be known then mentioned the names of her colleague lesbians in the town. They were also invited to the chief's palace and later, all of them were handed over to the police.

Some of the ladies are reported to be on the run, having heard their names were mentioned.

However, when this portal visited the district police command for further information on the arrests, the station commander refused to talk, saying he doesn't speak for the police.

Some relatives of the arrested lesbians were at the police station at the time of 's visit to the station.

Source: || Contributor on ModernGhana
Some armed men believed to be members of the Western Togoland secession group, the political wing of Homeland Study Group Foundation seeking independence from Ghana, on Friday, September 25 attacked the Aveyime and Mepe Police Stations in the North Tongu District of the Volta Region.



The group is said to have attacked the Police stations as a warning signal because they have been yearning to become a sovereign nation but all their attempts have been foiled.



The armed men blocked some major roads and burnt lorry tyres on the ECOWAS road at Tademe, some kilometres away from the Sogakope Bridge in the South Tongu District impeding vehicular movement amidst claims that parts of the Oti and Volta Regions are within their territory.



Commenting on the issue on Peace FM's ''Kokrokoo'', seasoned journalist Kwesi Pratt condemned the protesters for carrying out such actions.



He registered his displeasure with the behaviour of the group saying ''I don't support this trans-Volta Togoland issue. It won't help Ghana. It won't help the residents and all of us. There is no sense in it; it'll have dire consequences on Ghana.''



Mr. Pratt also called on all Ghanaians to unite and kick against the secessionist group, stressing ''this is not something to be tolerated''.



Meanwhile, the Police have arrested about 20 persons associated with the attacks.





Source: Ameyaw Adu Gyamfi/Peacefmonline.com/Ghana









Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority.

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Almost 10 months since coronavirus first emerged in the Chinese city of Wuhan, citizens are suing the government for an alleged cover-up of the outbreak.

Once the coronavirus Ground Zero, Hubei province was locked down for more than two months  from 23 January until 8 April. Authorities have been accused of knowing about the outbreak weeks before.

Zhang Hai said he decided to file a lawsuit to get justice for his father, who passed away suddenly after catching Covid-19 when he went to hospital for orthopedic surgery on 23 January.

He just became sicker and sicker, and the hospital finally gave him a nucleic acid test on 29 January, almost a week after he began to show symptoms of Covid-19, Mr Hai told the Independent.

He tested positive on 30 January and passed away on 1 February.

Mr Hai has sought help from Yang Zhanqing, a Chinese activist based in the US, who is helping affected families form a legal team.

The WeChat group soon gathered more than 40 people who wanted to demand justice for their family members who passed away because of the pandemic, Mr Zhanqing said.

However, local police soon began to intimidate all participants by threatening them not to share any relevant information on social media, not to contact any lawyer, and not to talk to me.

Mr Hai says he was interrogated several times by local police and his social media accounts were all removed, but still went ahead and filed a lawsuit against the Wuhan City government, Hubei provincial governor and the Chinese PLA Central Theater General Hospital, seeking a 2 million RMB (230,000) compensation.

However, only a few days after he mailed the legal documents to Wuhan Intermediate Court, a clerk from the court called Mr Hai and told him that they had rejected his lawsuit because it didnt meet the criteria for setting up a case.

The court didnt even bother to send me a formal copy of the rejection notification, Mr Hai recalled.

My lawyer told me that their behaviour has violated existing laws in China.

Mr Hai said he then filed another lawsuit in the Hubei Higher Peoples Court in mid-August, but until now, hasnt received a response.

Four more people have filed lawsuits against the Wuhan City government and the Hubei provincial governor, also seeking compensation.

Hubei province was the worst-hit in China, with 4,512 deaths and nearly 70,000 cases. Life in Wuhan has since slowly returned to normal, while deaths worldwide creep up to the 1 million mark.
Forrest Gump will go down as one of the most beloved movies of all time. It has it all: comedy, drama, romance, and everyones favorite actor and movie star, Tom Hanks. But did you know the film could have been wildly different if the studio had gotten their first choice in some key roles? There were some big-name actors who passed on the part that eventually went to Tom Hanks. Here are the actors who passed not just on the role of Forrest, but also some other key supporting roles in the film.

Tom Hanks as Forrest Gump | Sunset Boulevard/Getty Images

The worldwide phenomenon of Forrest Gump

At the time of its release in 1994, Forrest Gump was one of the most popular movies of all time and still to this day remains a favorite among movie fans. According to IMDb, it grossed well over $24 million its opening weekend, $330 million domestically, and $1 billion worldwide. It also cleaned up during the Oscar season. The film received Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Actor in a Leading Role (Tom Hanks), Best Director, Best Editing, and Best Visual Effects. To call this film a classic is almost an understatement.

The actors who passed on the role of Forrest Gump

Amazingly enough, as iconic as Hanks was in the role, he was not the studios first choice to play the role of Forrest. John Travolta was reportedly their first choice. He passed it up to star in another classic film  Pulp Fiction, directed by Quentin Tarantino. No one could fault him for that, and it was likely the right career move for Travolta. While he may have done a fine job in the role of Gump, Pulp Fiction help put him back into the public consciousness, making him a star again after his career hit a cold streak.

Jayni thinks I look handsome and no one would think Im over 70. What do you think? pic.twitter.com/ry0YiiCczp  Chevy Chase (@ChevyChaseToGo) September 19, 2019

RELATED: Tom Hanks on the 5 Captains Hes Played in His Movies

Other actors who were up for the role include Bill Murray and Chevy Chase. Both of those actors have their background in improvisational comedy. Seeing their take would have been interesting, but it was Hanks dramatic chops that helped ground the character.

The actors who passed on the role of Bubba and Jenny

As much as Forrest is defined by what happens to him, hes also defined by the people in his life that he loves. Two of those people were his childhood sweetheart, Jenny, and his war buddy in Vietnam, Bubba.

Jenny was played expertly by Robin Wright, but as with Hanks, she wasnt the first pick. The studio offered the role to both Jodie Foster and Demi Moore, who ultimately passed. They also expressed interest in Nicole Kidman, but she wouldnt even read for the part or do a screen test.

An all-star crew of actors also passed on the role of Bubba, including Tupac Shakur, David Alan Grier, Ice Cube, and Dave Chappelle. Mykelti Williamson landed the role, and his touching but understated performance as Bubba was another great component of the film.

How Forrest Gump would have been different with other principal actors

Forrest Gump is such an iconic film that its impossible to imagine it being the success it was with different actors in the major roles. For one, Tom Hanks did a great job skirting the line between a great comedic performance and a fine dramatic one. The role of Forrest is a precise one  while in some respects hes got below-average intelligence, in other aspects he seems wise beyond his years. Few actors could pull off that role with the same skill that Hanks did. While the film may have been successful with someone else, its safe to say no one else playing Forrest would have led the film to be as successful as Hanks did.

While the roles of Jenny and Bubba were also critical and well done, they could have been played by other performers. Forrest Gump is Tom Hanks movie through and through, and hes the main reason it was the cultural touchstone it was.
In an unprecedented step late Friday, South Korea suggested a joint investigation with North Korea into the mysterious death of a South Korean official, hours after a rare apology from Kim Jong Un.

As public and political outrage grew in the South, the country's presidential office said in a statement that there were discrepancies in accounts of the incident and called for further inquiries.

South Korea's Defense Ministry said Thursday that the North had shot and burned a 47-year-old man's body after he disappeared from a government boat earlier in the week. He was reported missing while on duty on a fisheries boat near the island of Yeonpyeong, close to South Korea's sea border.

The government has said he may have been trying to defect to the North but his family have denied this.

The incident prompted an apology from Kim in a letter to South Korea's presidential Blue House on Friday, where he was quoted as saying he was "very sorry" for the "unfortunate incident that happened in our waters."

Image: South Korea's government ships are seen near Yeonpyeong island, South Korea, (Baek Seung-ryul / AP)

The letter also admitted that North Korea's military had fired blanks and later "ten rounds" of gunfire into the unidentified "intruder," as he did not reveal his identity and appeared to flee. It added that for safety reasons due to the coronavirus pandemic, they had burnt the floating device the official washed up on but did not find his body.

The message did not appear to placate his southern neighbors.

After a National Security Council meeting, South Korea's presidential office said that they had "decided to make the request to North Korea to conduct additional investigations and also request for a joint-investigation with North Korea, if necessary."

The two Koreas have never before conducted joint probes into previous incidents and have been technically at war since the 1950-53 Korean War ended in a truce.

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Earlier this week, South Korean President Moon Jae-in called the incident "shocking" and "very regretful," as it fueled anti-North sentiment and sparked a public backlash.

Moon's administration is facing pressure over how it responds to the incident, which coincided with a renewed push by Seoul for engagement with Pyongyang.

South Korea's main opposition People Power Party said on Saturday Kim's apology was not genuine and called on the Moon government to refer the case to the International Criminal Court.

The South Korean coast guard said Friday that their ships were searching the waters near the western sea boundary in case the official's body drifts back.

Several bloody inter-Korean naval skirmishes and deadly attacks have occurred there in the past. Seoul said it would strengthen surveillance and military preparedness in the west sea areas, to prevent a future recurrence.

Tensions were already high between the two countries, as Pyongyang cut off communication hotlines with the South this summer and dramatically demolished an inter-Korean liaison office set-up to foster better ties between the two.

North Korea has also lashed out at the South and North Korean defectors living there for propaganda leaflets and balloons that were parachuted into the clandestine communist country.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
Vote-by-mail rates are up for Black voters, but the numbers also come with a warning sign

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP)  Shirley Dixon-Mosley had never sent a ballot through the mail. She always treasured casting her ballot in person. But for Novembers election, she voted early and by mail because she didnt want to take any chances.

I want to make sure my vote got in and it counted, said the 75-year-old retired teachers aide in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Black voters are among the least likely to vote by mail nationally, but there are early signs they are changing their behavior as the shadow of the coronavirus hangs over the presidential race. The evidence is clearest in North Carolina, the first state in the nation to send out mail-in ballots and where voting has been underway for almost three weeks. But there are hints in other battleground states like Georgia and Pennsylvania.

The signals are good news for Democrats, who will need a robust turnout by Black voters in these states to win both the White House and control of the U.S. Senate. With coronavirus increasing the risk of in-person voting, African American mail voting rates are one indicator of whether that key part of the Democratic coalition will participate at its regular clip.

In North Carolina, Black voters cast 16.7% of the more than 173,000 ballots returned so far, a jump from the 9% of mail votes cast by Black voters in 2016. They are 21% of North Carolinas registered voters.

Theyre changing their dynamics, said Michael Bitzer, a political scientist at Catawba College in North Carolina who tracks state elections. It seems like theres a shift going on which will certainly help Democrats.

In this Thursday, Sept. 3, 2020 file photo, workers prepare absentee ballots for mailing at the Wake County Board of Elections in Raleigh, N.C. (AP Photo/Gerry Broome, File)

But the numbers also come with a warning sign. North Carolinas Black voters are four times more likely than whites to have their ballots not yet accepted due to missing witness information. Just under 5% of absentee ballots returned by Black voters either still have missing witness information or are in the process of having ballot requirements corrected, compared with just 1.3% of ballots returned by white voters.

Story continues

It is, of course, very early  the votes so far in North Carolina translate to only about 5% of those cast in the entire 2016 presidential election. Its unclear how much Black voters early embrace of the new method will increase overall turnout and whether issues will persist as more votes roll in.

Alarmed by the not-accepted figures, Democratic-leaning groups are already shifting their messaging to help Black voters resolve the witness requirements. North Carolina made this process easier on Tuesday, settling a lawsuit from the North Carolina Alliance for Retired Americans seeking to ease absentee guidelines on the states witness component. County boards of elections now mail an affidavit for a voter to return to resolve ballot problems. Both Republicans on the states five-person Board of Elections resigned after the settlement.

READ MORE: Rejected absentee ballots higher for minority voters, study finds

Theres been a big push to get Black voters to use the option of vote-by-mail, said Adrianne Shropshire of VoteBlackPac, one of several groups trying to boost the use of mail-in ballots among Black voters. The group sent absentee ballot applications to 400,000 North Carolina voters. The problems that people are having is related to the fact that this is new to people.

Jeffrey Brooks, a 49-year-old Democrat from Durham, said hes previously voted in person. But when he sent in his mail-in ballot earlier this month, he failed to have a family member sign it as a witness.

I didnt know that, Brooks said. I thought it was just for young people. I didnt get them to sign it because I did it at home. I didnt know you had to have a witness.

Voters like Brooks have until Nov. 12 to correct their ballots and get them received by their local county elections board.

In this Sept. 3, 2020, file photo, stacks of ballot envelopes waiting to be mailed are seen at the Wake County Board of Elections in Raleigh, N.C. (AP Photo/Gerry Broome, File)

The North Carolina Democratic Party and Democratic nominee Joe Bidens campaign have established hotlines for confused voters. Both groups also have volunteers working on the ground to help people remedy witness issues.

Tonya Foreman, an activist whose group CAREE has been registering people to vote in barbershops and a pop-up registration tent in the eastern part of the state, worries that some of these Black voters, already deeply suspicious of a system they see as rigged against them, will just decide I knew it and not fix their ballots.

Foreman has seen shifts in Black voters interest and trust in voting by mail, saying it seemed high last spring but then tapered off after controversy over mail delays due to changes at the United States Postal Service.

Black voters have traditionally preferred to vote in-person and see their ballot being accepted, a certainty sought after generations of voter suppression, discrimination and fighting to win the right to vote. In 2018, only 11% of African American voters cast their ballots by mail compared with 24% of white voters, according to the U.S. Census.

READ MORE: Trump requests absentee ballot after attacking mail-in voting

But Black people have been disproportionately killed by the coronavirus, and many older Black Americans are now trying to balance safety with their rights, said Marcus Bass, an activist with the group Advance Carolina.

Fayetteville State University students get off a Black Votes Matter bus at Smith Recreation Center on March 3, 2020 in Fayetteville, North Carolina. (Photo by Melissa Sue Gerrits/Getty Images)

The most faithful bloc of voters are older Black voters, Bass said.

Still, Bass group has acquired 250,000 pieces of protective gear because he thinks many Black voters will want to vote in-person again.

There are hints of the shift in other data on mail voting. In Georgia, about one-third of all absentee ballot requests so far have come from African Americans, slightly higher than their share of registered voters, said Tom Bonier, a Democratic data analyst. In Pennsylvania, 7.38% have  which is also precisely the Black share of that states electorate.

Bonier said the early data suggests that Democratic investments in educating Black voters about mail-in ballots may be paying off. The rates, he added, are also an early indicator of very high engagement by Black voters.

Dixon-Mosley is one of those engaged voters. She was happy to have the option to vote by mail, but she added she would cast her ballot in person if she had to.

Our parents and forefathers fought too hard to get the vote, she said. To not do it is to dishonor them.

Have you subscribed to theGrios podcast Dear Culture? Download our newest episodes now!

The post Early vote shows signs of Black voters shift to mail voting appeared first on TheGrio.
Mumbai:

The Bhiwandi court has adjourned the hearing in the defamation case filed by RSS against Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi till March 3, 2017.

Earlier, Rahul Gandhi on Monday had reached Bhiwandi Court for hearing in the defamation case against him over remarks on RSS. The case has been filed over his alleged comment against the RSS regarding Mahatma Gandhias assassination.

At the last hearing, the Bhiwandi magistrateas court had granted him a bail after he appeared before it. The court had adjourned the hearing to January 30.

RSS defamation case: Bhiwandi Court adjourns hearing till 3rd March 2017 #RahulGandhi a ANI (@ANI_news) January 30, 2017

Rahul would be appearing at the court again today, confirmed his lawyer Narayan Iyer as well as Mumbai Congress chief and former MP Sanjay Nirupam.

The case against Rahul was filed by a local RSS functionary, Rajesh Kunte, over the formeras speech in Bhiwandi on March 6, 2014, in the run-up to Lok Sabha polls.

During the rally, Rahul had allegedly claimed, aThe RSS people had killed Gandhi.a

Earlier, the Congress vice president had said he was ready to face the trial after the Supreme Court refused to interfere in the criminal proceedings at the court at Bhiwandi. He also withdrew the appeal filed against the Bombay High Court judgement refusing to quash the defamation case.

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The Narcotics Control Commission (NACOC) has intercepted 152kg of substance suspected to be cocaine at the Tema Harbour.

The illicit drug consignment was concealed in a shipment of sugar from Brazil.

NACOC said in a statement issued on Saturday, 26 September 2020 that the interception was a result of intelligence sharing with the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) and the National Security Council Secretariat.

NACOC said some arrests have been made in connection with the drug bust after laboratory tests confirmed the substances were cocaine.
For the past 10 weeks, Nigeria seems to be riding firmly along a plateau in its coronavirus epidemiological curve. At least four of the countrys 36 states has officially gone over 20 days without recording a single COVID-19 infection or a death attributable to the virus.

This is according to the coronavirus situation report published by the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) on Friday.

The latest NCDC data, which builds on previous ones suggesting that Nigerias coronavirus pandemic curve may be taking a downward turn, showed that the states of Borno, Kebbi, Zamfara and Kogi have not appeared in the daily coronavirus update for at least 23 days.

In stark contrast to several predictions suggesting that the pandemic will wreak havoc in Nigeria and much of the African continent, Africas most populous country has not been badly hit seven months into the outbreak, unlike many European and American countries.

Instead, there has been a steady decline in COVID-19 cases and fatalities recently.

Daily coronavirus cases have been stuck below 500 since late July. Likewise, deaths have been hovering around 30 per week over the past month, even as hospitalisations have continuously declined, since peaking at over 20,000 in mid-July. On the other hand, recoveries have improved significantly.

Of the over 58,000 total COVID-19 infections so far, nearly 50,000 persons have been discharged from hospitals after treatment while a little over 7,000 active cases remain in the country.

The recent improvement has given a lift to the countrys reopening plans.

Students are fully returning to schools in many states, as prospective youth corps members are told to prepare for camp. While local flights resumed about seven weeks ago, Nigeria has reopened its skies for international flights.

Restaurants and hotels can now open while parks, gyms, and cinemas are allowed to open at half capacity.

While these are considered a welcome development, relaxing too much can be dangerous, if it breeds a false sense of security, health experts say.

They, in fact, believe the steady decline in infections and deaths poses more questions than answers.

On Thursday, the NCDC warned that there is likely to be an even more devastating second wave of coronavirus in states such as Adamawa due to the non-compliance to COVID-19 health guidelines.

The health agency said it is only when more persons are tested that the spread of this deadly disease can be addressed and tamed.

Currently, Nigeria has tested just nearly 500,000 of its 200 million population.

The Lucky States  Report

The five states of Borno, Kebbi, Zamfara and Kogi have not recorded a single COVID-19 infection in over 20 days. Likewise, no fatality attributed to COVID-19 complications has been reported within the period.

Borno

Even before it reported its index case, Borno was a major concern for even the international community.

The state is at the heart of a humanitarian crisis in the northeast of Nigeria with a large number of people displaced by the over-a-decade long violent insurrection of the extremist group Boko Haram.

Approximately 1.5 million displaced people live in vastly overcrowded camps with poor water and sanitation facilities, limited supplies of hygiene essentials, such as soap and water, and often no individual space at all.

Functioning health infrastructure in Borno is scarce and the capacity to refer patients is extremely limited.

With so many people already vulnerable to outbreaks of severe malnutrition, and diseases such as malaria, measles and cholera, the potential impact of the coronavirus, which has overwhelmed some of the best healthcare systems in the world, was a big worry.

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Nonetheless, Borno State has not been badly hit by the contagion. Of the 741 infections reported in the state, 703 have been discharged after treatment while 36 fatalities have been reported.

Only two active cases remain in the state of over five million. And now, Borno has gone 23 days without a single case or death.

How has Borno managed to keep the numbers down? It is likely due to a joint effort of the state government and international donors.

Following the confirmation of the index cases in the state, the World Health Organization (WHO) and partners moved in rapidly to help Borno contain the contagion.

The efforts have helped identify, test, and treat cases of COVID-19 in order to prevent and control the further outbreak of the disease, said Collins Owili, WHOs northeast emergency manager in a statement.

However, there are fears of an outbreak in community clusters especially since Borno is one of the states flagged for inadequate testing due to the inaccessibility of some areas.

Healthcare workers in the northeast of Nigeria face an additional threat  being attacked by insurgents.

Kebbi

Asides COVID-19, natural and manmade challenges in Kebbi state are multifaceted.

The state is battling with floods, which has so far destroyed 90 per cent of the two million tonnes of rice that officials expected to harvest this autumn, amounting to some 20 per cent of the rice Nigeria grew last year, according to Aljazeera. The waters are still rising.

On the other hand, the state is among the major hotspots for Lassa fever, an acute viral haemorrhagic illness caused by the Lassa virus, a member of the arenavirus family of viruses.

In late May, health authorities were put on alert after Lassa fever claimed 17 lives and infected dozens of people in the northwestern state.

However, the Kebbi government appear to have managed to keep the coronavirus at bay and is now gearing for full reopening of schools and other social activities.

The state has reported 94 infections thus far, of which 85 have been discharged after treatment while eight people succumbed to the contagion.

Only one active case remains in the state of over three million. Kebbi has gone 26 days without a single case or death.

While credit goes to the state government and international donors for the fine containment, health experts believe the poor testing capacity in the state will continue to raise concerns, especially as a second wave of infections is being considered imminent by the NCDC.

Zamfara

Zamfara has always been among states modelled for their fine response to COVID-19. Between May and July, the state did not report a single locally transmitted coronavirus case in more than 50 days to mark a major turning point in Nigerias battle against the virus.

On April 25, the Zamfara governor, Bello Matawalle confirmed two index cases of COVID-19 in the north-western state.

This came a few weeks after the state government announced the purchase of 12 ventilators and 20,000 test kits for its isolation centres, according to a statement by the spokesperson of the governor, Zailani Baffa.

In late May, the Zamfara branch of the Nigeria Medical Association (NMA) said eight of its members tested positive for coronavirus while treating patients at various health facilities in the state.

On June 8, authorities in Zamfara celebrated 14 days of no new local infections after the state reported 76 confirmed cases, leading to five deaths.

As of the time of reporting, the north-western state has now gone 34 days without a reported infection or death, NCDC data showed.

There are no more active cases of the disease in the state. Of the 78 total infections in Zamfara thus far, 73 has been successfully treated while five patients died.

The milestone will likely be held up as proof of the state governments ongoing success in limiting the spread of the virus to less than a hundred, despite allegations that local officials are not turning in enough test samples.

Kogi

Kogi has not reported new coronavirus infections in the past 82 days, NCDC data showed. The last time a case was reported in the state was in late June.

The state is the least impacted across the country with a total of just five infections. Only two patients have died with the last fatality recorded in early June.

The north-central state would have been a model for a near-perfect containment of the contagion but for several loopholes and controversies, including allegations that local officials are not adhering to NCDC guidelines.

The COVID-19 situation in the state has been enmeshed in controversies especially before the index case was recorded. At the time, the states COVID-19-free status raised a lot of concern especially because the north-central state borders states with rising numbers of infection.

The government in Kogi has, at least once, scuttled efforts by the NCDC to coordinate COVID-19 testing.

Medical experts and federal officials said the low number of test samples turned in from the states is making it difficult to ascertain if they are actually coronavirus-free but state authorities believe there is a plot to compulsorily report COVID-19 cases in the state.

Even when the index case was eventually reported in late May, state officials said it will not accept any test result conducted outside the state.
Former Real Housewife Bethenny Frankel recently revealed to dear friend Andy Cohen that she was 'still married' to ex Jason Hoppy after filing for divorce eight years ago.

After dropping the bombshell on Watch What Happens Live, Frankel, 49, indulged in some retail therapy with her daughter, Bryn, 10 in The Hamptons on Friday.

Dressed for comfort with an edgy twist, Bethenny sported an all black ensemble as she walked out of TJ Maxx with her daughter closely behind.

Retail therapy: Former Real Housewife Bethenny Frankel, 49, was seen shopping in The Hamptons with her daughter Bryn, 10, on Friday

The Skinnygirl CEO donned heavily distressed black leggings that were embellished with studs, pairing the pants with a black crew neck sweatshirt.

She threw on fleece lined heeled booties to complete the look, wearing a tie dye face mask with a decorative chain for a splash of color as she protected herself.

The petite mom carried her belongings in an oversized silver and white tote bag, as she made her way out of the store with her purchases.

Frankel looked to be shopping for her Hamptons home as she carried a plush blanket, a hairdryer and a pair of black house slippers.

Stocking up: Frankel looked to be shopping for her Hamptons home as she carried a plush blanket, a hairdryer and a pair of black house slippers as daughter Bryn walked closely behind

Dressed for comfort with an edgy twist, Bethenny sported an all black ensemble as she walked out of TJ Maxx with her daughter closely behind.

Opting for a no fuss look, Bethenny wore her brown hair back in a ponytail, as she showed off her big pair of diamond earrings.

Right behind her was daughter Bryn - who she shares with ex Jason - who seemed to be carrying a lamp stand for her room after finishing her first day of school.

For the after school shopping trip Bryn opted for comfort in a pair of white sweatpants and a black tank, rocking a patterned mask and carrying a black down jacket.

She threw on a pair of tie dye converse as the 10-year-old and her mom walked to the car.

WWHL: On Thursday the former New York ball buster appeared on Andy Cohen's Watch What Happens Live to dish it out and shockingly shared that she is still married to ex Jason Hoppy

New man: Bethenny has been linked to film producer boyfriend Paul Bernon for two years. The relationship started to develop in private when Bethenny was on her last season of RHONY

On Thursday the former New York ball buster appeared on Andy Cohen's Watch What Happens Live to dish it out.

When Cohen, 52, asked Frankel if she had any plans to marry her boyfriend of two years, film producer Paul Bernon, Bethenny replied 'umm I'm still married' which caused Andy's jaw to drop.

'Your'e killing me' he said as Bethenny playfully bantered back.

Bethenny first married Jason Hoppy, 50, in 2010 before ending things two years later in 2012.

The bitter divorce battle finally ended in 2016, but the couple are still warring over custody of 10-year-old Bryn.

Bitter battle: In 2017, Hoppy was charged with harassment and stalking for reportedly harassing Bethenny with emails and texts, in addition to showing up at Bryn's school to confront her

As played out on the show, the divorce process has been plagued with drama, and the press has caught many stories of their tumultuous feud.

In 2017, Hoppy was charged with harassment and stalking for reportedly harassing Bethenny with emails and texts, in addition to showing up at Bryn's school to confront her.

In an excerpt from their 2019 court hearing, Bethenny said 'He tortured me every single day. Tortured me every day' which prompted Jason to respond.

'I look back and I was overboard, sending her emails. It was about phone calls, this, these things. I look back two and a half years later and it was like, I was an ass. I was a jerk' he said.

Despite not being officially divorced, Bethenny has been very open about her current happiness with boyfriend Paul, as the pair have been making plans for the future.
L abour has called on the Government to promise that university students will be able to return home to their families at Christmas.

Shadow education secretary Kate Green has written to Education Secretary Gavin Williamson calling for urgent clarity and reassurance from the Government that university environments will protect students.

Her intervention follows warnings from Sir Mark Walport, a Government scientific adviser, that students may have to stay in halls when term ends to ensure the infection does not spread to older relatives.

It comes as 1,700 students at Manchester Metropolitan University were told to stay in their rooms for 14 days after 127 tested positive for coronavirus.

Coronavirus hits the UK - In pictures 1 /81 Coronavirus hits the UK - In pictures A deserted Westminster Bridge PA A man wearing a face mask or covering due to the COVID-19 pandemic, walks past customers sat outside a restaurant AFP via Getty Images Boris Johnson addresses the nation on the Coronavirus lockdown Andrew Parsons Runners pass cardboard cutouts of Britain's Queen Elizabeth II and Prince William during the London Marathon in London AP An empty escalator at Charing Coss London Underground tube station Jeremy Selwyn Electronic bilboards displays a message warning people to stay home in Sheffield PA A sign is displayed in the window of a student accommodation building following the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Mancheste Reuters People take part in a 'We Do Not Consent' rally at Trafalgar Square, organised by Stop New Normal, to protest against coronavirus restrictions, in Londo AP People sing and dance in Leicester Square on the eve on the 10PM curfew Reuters Hearts painted by a team of artists from Upfest are seen in the grass at Queen Square, following the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Bristol Reuters Graffiti reads 'good luck and stay safe', as the number of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) cases grow around the world, under a bridge in London Reuters A sign is pictured in Soho, amid the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in London Reuters Prime Minister Boris Johnson gestures, during a coronavirus briefing in Downing Street, London AP A person runs past posters with a message of hope, as the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues in Manchester REUTERS Riot police face protesters who took part in a 'We Do Not Consent' rally at Trafalgar Square, organised by Stop New Normal, to protest against coronavirus restrictions in London AP An image of The Queen eith quotes from her broadcast to the UK and the Commonwealth in relation to the Coronavirus epidemic are displayed on lights in London's Piccadilly Circus PA Military vehicles cross Westminster Bridge after members of the 101 Logistic Brigade delivered a consignment of medical masks to St Thomas' hospital Getty Images Durdle Door in Dorset Reuters Captain Tom Moore via Reuters Mia, aged 8, and Jack, aged 5, take part in "PE with Joe" a daily live workout with Joe Wicks on Youtube to help kids stay fit who have to stay indoors due to the Coronavirus outbreak PA An NHS worker reacts at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital during the Clap for our Carers campaign in support of the NHS Reuters Goats which have taken over the deserted streets of Llandudno @AndrewStuart via PA Tobias Weller PA Novikov restaurant in London with its shutters pulled down while the restaurant is closed London Landscapes: Hyde Park and the Serpentine, central London. Matt Writtle A newspaper vendor in Manchester city centre giving away free toilet rolls with every paper bought as shops run low on supplies due to fears over the spread of the coronavirus PA Theo Clay looks out of his window next to his hand-drawn picture of a rainbow in Liverpool, as the spread of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continue Reuters A young man cuts another man's hair on top of a closed hairdresser in Oxford Reuters General view of the new NHS Nightingale Hospital, built to fight against the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in London via Reuters Jason Baird is seen dressed as Spiderman during his daily exercise to cheer up local children in Stockport, as the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues Reuters A woman wearing a face mask walks past Buckingham Palace Getty Images A man holds mobile phone displaying a text message alert sent by the government warning that new rules are in force across the UK and people must stay at home PA Medical staff on the Covid-19 ward at the Neath Port Talbot Hospital, in Wales, as the health services continue their response to the coronavirus outbreak. PA Prime Minister Boris Johnson taking part in a virtual Cabinet meeting with his top team of ministers PA A shopper walks past empty shelves in a Lidl store on in Wallington. After spates of "panic buying" cleared supermarket shelves of items like toilet paper and cleaning products, stores across the UK have introduced limits on purchases during the COVID-19 pandemic. Some have also created special time slots for the elderly and other shoppers vulnerable to the new coronavirus. Getty Images People on a busy tube train in London at rush hour PA Mia, aged 8 and her brother Jack, aged 5 from Essex, continue their school work at home, after being sent home due to the coronavirus PA Children are painting 'Chase the rainbows' artwork and springing up in windows across the country Reuters Social distancing in Primrose Hill Jeremy Selwyn A general view of a locked gate at Anfield, Liverpool as The Premier League has been suspended PA Homeless people in London AFP via Getty Images A piece of art by the artist, known as the Rebel Bear has appeared on a wall on Bank Street in Glasgow. The new addition to Glasgow's street art is capturing the global Coronavirus crisis. The piece features a woman and a man pulling back to give each other a kiss PA The Queen leaves Buckingham Palace, London, for Windsor Castle to socially distance herself amid the coronavirus pandemic PA A general view on Grey street, Newcastle as coronavirus cases grow around the world Reuters Matt Raw, a British national who returned from the coronavirus-hit city of Wuhan in China, leaves quaratine at Arrowe Park Hospital on Merseyside PA Britain's Chief Medical Officer Professor Chris Whitty (L) and Chief Scientific Adviser Patrick Vallance look on as British Prime Minister Boris Johnson gestures as he speaks during a coronavirus disease (COVID-19) news conference inside 10 Downing Street Reuters The ticket-validation terminals at the tram stop on Edinburgh's Princes Street are cleaned following the coronavirus outbreak. PA Locked school gates at Rockcliffe First School in Whitley Bay, Tyne and Wear PA A sign at a Sainsbury's supermarket informs customers that limits have been set on a small number of products as the number of coronavirus (COVID-19) cases grow around the world Reuters Jawad Javed delivers coronavirus protection kits that he and his wife have put together to the vulnerable people of their community of Stenhousemuir, between Glasgow and Edinburgh AFP via Getty Images A sign advertising a book titled "How Will We Survive On Earth?" Getty Images A man who appears to be homeless sleeping wearing a mask today in Victoria Jeremy Selwyn A pedestrian walks past graffiti that reads "Diseases are in the City" in Edinburgh AFP via Getty Images Staff from The Lyric Theatre, London inform patrons, as it shuts its doors PA A quiet looking George IV Bridge in Edinburgh PA A quieter than usual British Museum Getty Images A racegoer attends Cheltenham in a fashionable face mask SplashNews.com A commuter wears a face mask at London Bridge Station Jeremy Selwyn A empty restaurant in the Bull Ring Shopping Centre Getty Images A deserted Trafalgar Square in London PA Passengers determined to avoid the coronavirus before leaving the UK arrive at Gatwick Airport Getty Images

Hundreds of students are also self-isolating after outbreaks at Glasgow, Edinburgh Napier and other universities.

Ms Green said: Leaving home to go to university should be a momentous and exciting step for young people and their families. Universities have done all they can to prepare for students safe return, but the Government has again let young people down.

Students around the country have been told to self-isolate amid outbreaks at universities / PA

It is unthinkable that students will be locked in their rooms and unable to return home to spend Christmas with their families. The Government must promise that this will not happen, and work with universities to enable every student to access tests so that they can travel home safely.

The Government should also consider a delay to the start of term or a pause in migration for universities where term has not yet begun to allow improvements in testing capacity and remote learning provision.

Gavin Williamson must urgently come to Parliament and set out how he will resolve the critical situation in our universities that is causing such anxiety for families across the country.

A Department for Education spokeswoman said: The Government is working closely with universities to ensure they are well prepared for the return of students, and we have published guidance to help them keep students and staff as safe as possible.

Students should follow the latest health advice, just like the wider public, which means they should stay at university in the event that they have symptoms, have to isolate, there are additional restrictions imposed locally, or there is an outbreak on campus or in their accommodation.

We will continue monitoring the situation very closely and follow Public Health England advice, adapting policies to best support students and providers.
Bengaluru: Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa on Saturday said he would resign from politics if there is any iota of truth in the corruption allegations levelled against his son B Y Vijayendra, who is also BJP state vice president.

Yediyurappas outburst was against leader of opposition Siddaramaiah's allegation during the no-confidence motion, moved by the Congress veteran against the BJP government, that Vijayendra took bribe from a Bangalore development authority contractor.

The charge was based on a sting operation by a Kannada news channel alleging that the contractor who bagged a Rs 666 crore project had paid crores of rupees through RTGS to Vijayendra. "If there is an iota of truth that my family is involved, then I will resign from politics. If it is wrong then you resign. You should be ashamed of making baseless allegations," Yediyurappa said.

He challenged Siddaramaiah to prove the charge and lodge a complaint with the Lokayukta and the Anti-Corruption Bureau. The Chief Minister said that Siddaramaiah was referring to an individual who was not a member of the House.

Pandemonium broke out following the allegation with BJP members slamming Siddaramaiah for his accusation. Soon Congress MLAs jumped to Siddaramaiah's defence.

Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister J C Madhuswamy intervened and said the contractor, whom Siddaramaiah accused of paying bribe, has registered a case against the television channel. Not convinced with the reply, Siddaramaiah said he referred to the individual's name because it was in the public domain put up by the television channel.

"Let there be a fair inquiry," Siddaramaiah said.
A judge has denied shamed Democratic donor Ed Buck's request to be released on Friday, claiming he posed a danger to the community.

Buck is charged with nine federal counts, including giving drugs to 26-year-old Gemmel Moore - one of two black men who died of an overdose at Buck's West Hollywood home

U.S. Magistrate Judge Rozella A. Oliver said that the conditions presented by Buck's attorney were 'insufficient' to ensure that the embattled donor would show at trial, KCAL reports.

Oliver also said that Buck's legal team failed to show how the medical staff at the Metropolitan Detention Center were incapable of handling their client's medical needs, after the defense expressed concern about Buck getting COVID-19.

She added that he did not appear to have any medical conditions that seemed to put him at risk for catching the virus at 66 years of age.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Rozella A. Oliver denied Ed Buck's request to be released from jail on Friday, claiming the embattled donor was a danger to the public

'Ed Buck was asking to be confined to his home,' Jasmyne Cannick, who has advocated for the victims, shared.

'Home is where his crimes were committed. Home is where his drugs were delivered to. Home is where he was injecting people and sexually assaulting people. Home is where two Black men died. So we're excited and happy that the judge saw fit to deny his bail.'

On Friday, at a bail reconsideration hearing, Buck's defense attorneys argued that Buck, 66, is at high-risk of contracting coronavirus if he remains locked up.

According to court papers obtained by City News Service, Buck said he was willing to pay a $400,000 signature bond as well as be electronically monitored and confined to his home.

The attorneys also argued that Buck suffers from gum disease and needs specialized cardiac care that the criminal justice system is unable to provide.

Federal prosecutors were against his release, claiming Buck is a flight risk and he represents a potential danger to the public.

Ed Buck is expected to be asked to be released from jail at a bail reconsideration hearing on Friday due to the coronavirus pandemic. Pictured: Buck appears in Los Angeles Superior Court on September 19

Buck is charged with nine federal counts, including giving drugs to 26-year-old Gemmel Moore (left and right), who died of an overdose at Buck's West Hollywood home in July 2017. Another count alleges that Buck enticed Moore to travel to engage in prostitution

District attorneys say Buck has a history of luring men to his apartment, injecting them with drugs and then performing sexual acts with the victims. Pictured: Protesters argue for the arrest of Buck outside his apartment, January 2019

Since 2017, two African-American men have been found dead from drug overdoses in Buck's West Hollywood home.

Prosecutors allege Buck would bring the black men to his home and then inject them with crystal methamphetamine for sexual gratification.

In July 2017, 26-year-old Gemmel Moore, who was working as an escort, was found dead in Buck's apartment, lying naked on a mattress in the living room.

Just a year-and-a-half later, in January 2019, a second man, 55-year-old Timothy Michael Dean, was found dead in Buck's home.

LaTisha Nixon, Moore's mother, poses with an image of her son during a protest

Buck was arrested in September 2019, and charged with three counts of battery causing serious injury, administering methamphetamine and maintaining a drug house.

In August 2020, a federal grand jury charged Buck with four additional felonies, bringing the total number of federal charges to nine counts.

This includes a count alleging Buck knowingly enticed Moore to travel to engage in prostitution as well as another man.

He is also charged with one count of knowingly and intentionally distributing meth and one count of using his home to distribute meth as well as the sedatives gamma hydroxybutyric acid (GHB) and clonazepam.

Prosecutors say Buck 'engaged in a pattern of soliciting men to consume drugs that Buck provided and perform sexual acts at [his] apartment,' according the court papers viewed by City News Service.

He allegedly met victims on gay dating websites and social media platforms, and even hired a recruiter to scout men for him.

Buck, 66, says he will pay a $400,000 signature bond, and consent to being electrically monitored and confined to his home, but prosecutors say he is a flight risk. Pictured: Buck with Hillary Clinton, September 2015

If convicted of the narcotics charges, Buck faces a minimum of 20 years in prison and a maximum of life without the possibility of parole. Pictured: Buck appears in Los Angeles Superior Court on September 19

When the men arrived at his apartment, Buck would allegedly fill syringes with meth and inject the victims with or without their consent.

If found guilty of the narcotics charges, Buck faces a minimum of 20 years in federal prison and a maximum of life without parole.

The trial is currently scheduled for January 19, 2021.

He also faces charged in Los Angeles County for allegedly running a drug den out of his apartment, but the federal trial will take place first.
Nigeria: Suspected Islamist militants killed at least 11 people in northeastern Nigeria in an attack on a security convoy that was taking people displaced by an insurgency back to their homes, police and security sources said on Saturday.

Islamic State, to whom a breakaway faction of Nigerian militant group Boko Haram pledged allegiance in 2016, said on its Amaq news agency that 30 police officers and soldiers were killed in the attack on Friday on a road leading to the strategic fishing town of Baga in Borno state.

In a statement on Saturday, Borno state police said eight police officers and three members of a government-approved militia were killed, and 13 people were wounded in the attack around noon on Friday.

Two soldiers, a police officer and a member of the government-approved militia - all speaking anonymously because they were not authorised to speak to journalists - told Reuters at least four soldiers were also killed.

Two Nigerian military spokesmen did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
More than a quarter of the UK population will be living under extra coronavirus restrictions when new measures on socialising come into force in parts of the country.

A ban on households mixing in each others homes came into effect at midnight in Wigan, Stockport, Blackpool and Leeds.

Residents in those areas are also advised not to meet people outside their household or bubble in any other settings including bars, shops or parks.

It comes as the UK recorded its highest single-day figure of coronavirus cases, with 6,874 lab-confirmed cases.

Restrictions are already in force across large swathes of north-west England, West Yorkshire, the North East and the Midlands, as well as parts of west Scotland.

And a ban on households mixing indoors was extended across Northern Ireland earlier this week.

Cardiff and Swansea will go into local lockdown from 6pm on Sunday, the Welsh Government has confirmed.

People will not be able to enter or leave the areas without a reasonable excuse. They will not be able to meet indoors with anyone they do not live with, with extended households suspended.

(PA Graphics)

The total number of people set to be living under stricter rules will rise to 17 million.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock said there had been an acceleration of Covid-19 cases across the country, especially in the North West and the North East.

Working alongside our scientific and public health experts and local leaders, we are prepared to take swift and decisive action to reduce transmission of the virus and protect communities.

I recognise the burden and impact these additional measures have on our daily lives but we must act collectively and quickly to bring down infections.

It comes as all London boroughs were added to the Governments list of areas of concern following a rise in cases in the city.

The new status means the capital could receive extra testing and other help such as engagement with high-risk groups as a result of rising Covid-19 cases.

Story continues

Elsewhere:

 Manchester Metropolitan University students at two accommodation sites in the city have been instructed to self-isolate for 14 days following a spike in coronavirus cases.

 Prime Minister Boris Johnson will urge world leaders to overcome their differences and unite in the battle against coronavirus in a speech to the United Nations General Assembly on Saturday.

 The Office for National Statistics (ONS) infection survey suggested the number of coronavirus cases across England has jumped 60% in one week.

The seven-day rolling average of cases in Blackpool has risen from 48.8 per 100,000 a week ago to 69.6 per 100,000 on Friday, the Governments coronavirus dashboard shows.

The latest seven-day Covid-19 rate in Leeds was found to be 113.3 per 100,000 people, according to Government figures, while Leeds director of public health Victoria Eaton said there was an 8.4% positive test rate.

The dashboard also shows the seven-day Covid-19 rate in Wigan has risen to 122.6 per 100,000 people, while in Stockport it is up to 77.4 per 100,000 people.

Meanwhile, infectious disease modelling expert Professor Graham Medley warned there would be 100 coronavirus deaths a day in a few weeks time.

Prof Medley, who attends meetings of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), told BBC Radio 4s Today programme that the new restrictions would not stop the deaths but would prevent the toll getting even higher.

A level of 10,000 (cases) we are seeing now means that in three or four weeks we are going to see 100 deaths a day.

In order to stop that process increasing again, then we need to make sure that that transmission comes down now because that doubling time will carry on. The things that we do now will not stop 100 people dying a day but they will stop that progressing much higher.

He also said he had never heard the 10pm curfew for hospitality discussed during Sage meetings.
Three days after taking voluntary retirement from service, former Bihar DGP Gupteshwar Pandey is all set to join the ruling JD(U).

Pandey met Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar at the party office on Saturday and interacted with him for close to 30 minutes. Speculations were rife that the former DGP may join the JD(U) and receive membership, but it did not happen today.

Stepping out after the meeting, Pandey ruled out the rumours that he would join the party. I came here to thank chief minister Nitish Kumar as he gave me full freedom to work. There was no talk related to polls and I have not yet decided on my joining the JD (U), Pandey said.

Watch | Bihar polls: Met CM Nitish Kumar, did not discuss politics, says ex-Bihar DGP

However, JD(U) sources confirmed that the former DGP would be joining the JD (U) at the earliest. It remains to be seen whether he contests the Lok Sabha by-polls from Valmikinagar, the seat that fell vacant after sitting JD(U) MP Baidynath Mahtos death in February or the assembly election from Buxar.

If Pandey joins the JD(U), he will be the second IPS officer of DG rank after Sunil Kumar to join the party. Kumar retired from service recently.

Pandey had also made up his mind soon after taking VRS that he wanted to stay in public service. I am the son of Bihar. I will serve Bihar, he had said.

Of late, Pandey had been heaping praise on Kumar and had described him as the best CM. He had praised the governments work in the field of prohibition, power, roads and other sectors.

The opposition Congress was quick to react to the meeting. Bihar DGP who pushed for a CBI probe into Sushant Singh Rajputs death case is being made a candidate for upcoming elections by the ruling party in the state. We are hearing that NCB officials probing the drug issue are very close to BJP and PM Modi, tweeted Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury.
Zalmay Khalilzad, the U.S. envoy for Afghanistan, has predicted the Taliban will not accept a permanent truce until a political deal is reached with the Afghan government.

"I think you're right that the Talibs will not accept a cease-fire, comprehensive and permanent, until there's a political settlement," Khalilzad said on September 25.

His comments to the U.S. public broadcaster PBS came as Taliban militants continue to carry out attacks across the country despite taking part in peace talks with the Afghan government in Qatar.

Khalilzad said despite the current spike in violence, it was still at lower levels than the same time last year.

"Compared to the first six months of last year to this year, despite a recent increase in violence, the number of casualties, both military and civilians, are down this year," Khalilzad, a veteran diplomat, said.

"So, yes, the violence is high at this point. And both sides need to bring down the level of violence. And we're committed, when I return to work with both sides, to get an agreement on reduction of violence," he added.

When asked why the militants have not yet publicly cut ties with the terror network of Al-Qaeda as set out in their deal with the United States, Khalilzad said that Washington will assess the situation in the next couple of months after the number of its troops in Afghanistan drop to 4,000-5,000 from the current level of 8,500.

The comments came as dozens of members of the Afghan security forces were killed or wounded across the country in a series of Taliban attacks.

Taliban militants on September 26 claimed to have killed an unspecified number of troops in central Bamyan Province and northeastern Badakhshan Province.

On September 23, the Taliban launched a wave of attacks on security checkpoints in southern Afghanistan overnight, killing a total of 28 Afghan policemen, officials said.

The violence comes even as Taliban leaders and Afghan government-appointed negotiators are holding historic peace talks in Qatar, a Mideast country where the Taliban set up a political office after they were toppled from power in the 2001 U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan.

The negotiations, which started earlier this month, are meant to end the fighting and establish a roadmap for a postwar society.

In the negotiations in Qatar, the two sides have so far have spent more than a week deciding agendas and the manner in which the two sides will be conducting the negotiations.

With reporting by AP and AFP
Idaho police arrest 3 Christians singing hymns during outdoor worship event

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Police in Moscow City, Idaho, arrested three Christians and cited two others for participating in a Psalm sing outdoor worship service organized by a church earlier this week.

Gabriel Rench, a church deacon and Republican candidate for a Latah County commissioner seat in the November election, was one of the three who were arrested for participating in the worship event organized by Christ Church, according to Moscow-Pullman Daily News.

Moscow Police Chief James Fry was quoted as saying that none of the five cited were wearing masks or social distancing, and the arrests were made for suspicion of resisting or obstructing an officer. Between 150 and 200 people attended the event.

According to the citys Amended Public Health Emergency Order, attendees at any public gathering must maintain a 6-foot physical distance or cover their faces with a mask.

Ben Zornes, a pastor at the church who organized the event, was quoted as saying that the church hosts Psalm or hymn events about once a month and that the Psalm sing held at the city hall parking lot was also to show that residents wanted normalcy back.

Zornes called the ongoing COVID-19 lockdown restrictions largely groundless."

On Thursday, the church wrote on its Facebook page: Yesterday Christ Church sponsored a flash psalm sing at city hall. We were going to appear there at quarter to five, sing three psalms or hymns, then the doxology, and then out. The songs were Psalm 20, Psalm 124, and Amazing Grace. When we arrived, the police were waiting for us. One of them informed me that people either had to social distance or wear a mask or otherwise face a citation.

Douglas Wilson, who wrote the post, added: I told him that I would inform everyone of that, which I did. I said a brief prayer, and we began to sing. Over the following fifteen minutes of singing, three of our people were arrested, and two others were cited.

Several states have restrictions in place on religious gatherings, which have led to legal battles for the religious freedom of churches and other houses of worship.

In California, several churches are fighting Gov. Gavin Newsoms COVID-19 orders banning indoor services.

In an earlier statement, Liberty Counsel Founder and Chairman Mat Staver called Newsoms orders unconstitutional.

 Gov. Newsom supports tens of thousands of protestors, saying, God bless you. Keep doing it. This is wrong, and the governors unconstitutional hostility and discrimination against religious worship must end, he said.

In San Francisco, Mayor London Breed is only allowing one person at a time to enter houses of worship.

In response, the U.S. Justice Department on Friday sent a letter to the mayor saying that the citys COVID-19 lockdown policy is contrary to the Constitution and the nations best tradition of religious freedom.

The Justice Department said in its letter that Breed could not limit places of worship to a single congregant while allowing multiple patrons in other indoor settings including gyms, tattoo parlors, hair salons, massage studios, and daycares.
BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept. 26

Trend:

Over the past 24 hours, Armenian armed forces have violated the ceasefire along the line of contact between Azerbaijani and Armenian troops 48 times, Trend reports referring to Azerbaijani Defense Ministry.

Armenian armed forces were using large-caliber machine guns and sniper rifles.

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, 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 the withdrawal of its armed forces from Nagorno Karabakh and the surrounding districts.
Metropolitan Police Sergeant Matiu Ratana died after being shot at Croydon Custody Centre in south London (Aaron Chown/PA)

A police officer shot dead by a handcuffed suspect at a south London station had moved into custody work because he thought it was safer as he approached retirement, a friend said.

Tributes have poured in for Metropolitan Police Sergeant Matiu Ratana following his death after a 23-year-old gunman opened fire at Croydon Custody Centre in south London in the early hours of Friday.

Investigations are continuing into how the suspect, who had been detained for possession of ammunition and possession of class B drugs, was able to access the weapon.

Sgt Ratana, known as Matt to family and friends, thought working in the custody suite was his safest option as he neared the end of his lengthy police career, friend Neil Donohue said.

Mr Donohue told BBC Breakfast: He thought it was his safest option just to see him through to his retirement and no-one expected this to happen  certainly not within the police cells.

He described the officer as the most nicest, generous man you could meet, and said he was just a really genuinely nice guy.

Sgt Ratana, 54, was originally from New Zealand and joined the force in 1991.

Met Commissioner Dame Cressida Dick, who with the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, led police officers across the capital in a minutes silence on Friday, described Sgt Ratana as a talented police officer.

He was big in stature, big in heart, friendly, capable, a lovely man and highly respected by his colleagues, and leaves behind a partner and adult son, Dame Cressida said.

His partners sister told The Sun he was aware of the dangers of being a police officer but saw it as all part of the job.

Describing the news of his death as devastating, she told the newspaper: He was dedicated to being a police officer and had almost 30 years of service.

He knew the dangers of working in London but for him it was all part of the job.

Sgt Ratanas cousin Adrian Rurawhe, a politician in New Zealand, said his relative was a natural-born leader.

He told Stuff news website: Were all devastated that weve lost our cousin, but also to hear about the way he has been killed.

He was awesome, very outgoing and a natural-born leader. Some people have to learn how to be a leader, but it just came naturally to him.

Expand Close A police officer lays flowers outside Croydon Custody Centre (Aaron Chown/PA) PA / Facebook

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The suspect also shot himself during the incident at about 2.15am on Friday and is in a critical but stable condition in hospital.

No police firearms were fired and the case is not being treated as terror-related.

He was not regarded a subject of interest by security services, the PA news agency understands, but reports suggest he may have previously been referred to the anti-extremism Prevent programme.

A murder probe has been launched and investigators from the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) watchdog attended the scene.

The IOPC have obtained CCTV from the custody centre as well as body-worn video footage from the officers present.

These will now be reviewed in the coming days and initial accounts from the officers present will also be taken.

The suspect was arrested by regular officers following a stop and search, then handcuffed behind his back before being taken to the station in a police vehicle.

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The IOPC said he was taken into the building and sat in a holding area in the custody suite, then opened fire while still in handcuffs as officers prepared to search him with a metal detector.

IOPC regional director Sal Naseem said: It is at that point that shots were fired resulting in the fatal injuries to the officer and critical injuries to the man.

A non-police issue firearm, which appears to be a revolver, has been recovered from the scene. Further ballistic work will be required.

Leroy Logan, a former Met superintendent, said there were questions to be answered around the circumstances which led to the shooting.

How did that person come to be in the station, whether its in the yard or the building itself, and be able to produce a weapon, whether its on them at the time? he told BBC News.

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Meanwhile Andy Trotter, former deputy assistant commissioner of the Met and also a former chief constable of British Transport Police, said increasing sentence lengths was not enough to prevent crime against emergency workers.

He told Times Radio: We are increasingly becoming a very difficult society to police.

We need to look right across the board on this and just saying were going to put the sentences up will not solve that. Its got to be about prevention and detection, and much more than just that.

Sgt Ratana is the eighth police officer in the UK to be shot dead in the last 20 years and the first to be murdered by a firearm in the line of duty since Pcs Fiona Bone, 32, and Nicola Hughes, 23, in September 2012.

The Met sergeant is the 17th from the force to be killed by a firearm since the end of the Second World War, according to the National Police Memorial roll of honour.
- MP Owen Owen had been holding the highly sensitive position of the National Executive Committee deputy organising secretary

- ODM secretary general attributed the MP's suspension to his recent conduct which he said had put his membership into question

- TUKO.co.ke understands the lawmaker was among six coast politicians whom Deputy President William Ruto hosted on Thursday

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The Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) National Executive Committee (NEC) has concluded a two-day retreat in Machakos with a raft of changes within its ranks.

Among the key changes announced by the party Secretary General Edwin Sifuna was the suspension of Kilifi North MP Owen Baya's membership from the committee.

READ ALSO: You are the DP: Netizens ask Ruto what he's done for Kenya after poetic Kajiado speech

Owen Baya (in blue suit) when he visited Ruto at his Karen residence on Thursday. Photo: William Samoei Ruto.

Source: Facebook

READ ALSO: Uhuru Kenyatta tells religious leaders to boldly condemn corruption, national prayer day set for October 10th

Sensitive position

Prior to the September 26 development, Owen had been holding the highly sensitive position of the NEC deputy organising secretary.

Sifuna did not divulge more details regarding the MP's suspension and why the party had lost confidence in him, but said his recent conduct put his membership into question.

"The NEC resolved to suspend Hon. Owen Baya, the MP for Kilifi North constituency from membership of this critical organ and from his position as the deputy organising secretary given his recent public utterances and conduct that have cast doubt on his commitment to this party and its objectives," he explained.

READ ALSO: Nairobi: Woman dies after spending night at lodging with husband's brother

ODM leader speaking at the NEC retreat on day one. The party announced a raft of changes. Photo: Raila Odinga.

Source: Facebook

READ ALSO: David Maraga rejects Malala's 3 goats donation, reminds senator he has case in court

The party also reconstituted its legal affairs committee which will be chaired by Westlands MP Tim Wanyonyi.

Meeting at Ruto's residence

TUKO.co.ke understands the lawmaker was among coast politicians whom Deputy President William Ruto hosted on Thursday, September 24, at his Karen residence.

The agenda of the early morning deliberations was apparently to lay ground work for the Msambweni by-election which Ruto's Jubilee Party had pulled out.

Owen was in the company of Feisal Abdallah Bader who declared his intention to run for the vacant seat as an independent candidate.

Other leaders present were Malindi MP Aisha Jumwa, Nyali's Mohamed Ali alias Jicho Pevu, Khatib Mwashetani (Lunga Lunga) and Athman Shariff (Lamu East).

"I have met an aspirant for Msambweni parliamentary seat Feisal Abdallah Bader in company of coast MPs Athman Shariff (Lamu East), Mohammed Ali (Nyali), Owen Baya (Kilifi North), Khatib Mwashetani (Lunga Lunga) and Aisha Jumwa (Malindi) at Karen, Nairobi county,"Ruto would later post on his social media handles.

Previous suspensions

The Orange brigade had previously cut ties with rebel Jumwa following a decision made by the National Governing Council on March 1, October 2019.

The Malindi politician and her Msambweni counterpart Suleiman Dori (now deceased) were placed on chopping board for disloyalty and succumbing to Ruto's Tanga Tanga melodies.

Dori, however, apologised and survived the expulsion by a whisker on the 11th hour.

"Party NGC unanimously votes to expel Malindi MP Aisha Jumwa from the party. The meeting however deferred the decision to expel her Msambweni counterpart Suleiman Dori following his letter in which be apologised to the party for his rebellion," the party stated.

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The Ambernath police have arrested five persons on Thursday in connection with child trafficking and kidnapping case.

The five kidnapped a two-and-a-half year old boy from Circus Maidan area in Ambernath and sold him for 70,000. The boys mother had registered a missing complaint report on September 15. The toddler was rescued by Ambernath police and handed over to the mother.

The five accused, which include three women, Puja Shettiyar, (28), Jaynatabi Khan, (33), Sheru Saroj, (45), Mukesh Kharwa, 36 and Maya Kale, 30, are allegedly small-time thieves and drug addicts, claimed the police.

The boy, Vikas Mandal, is the son of Vijaya Mandal, 30. She stays in a slum near Circus Maidan. According to police, Kale has a small pan shop in the area and sees Vikas regularly when he used to come and play on the ground near her shop.

Shettiyar was the customer to whom the remaining four tried to sell the toddler. She works as a labourer.

A police official requesting anonymity said, As per Shettiyars statement, her husband left her three years ago when she was pregnant. She was unwell after her delivery and unable to take care of the baby, so she sold him to someone in Mumbai. Her in-laws recently told her that they were ready to accept her and the child, so she wanted a child around Vikass age to show them as her own. In her statement, she told us that she mortgaged her house and could afford to pay 70,000 for a child that age.

Shettiyar circulated the message that she was looking for a child. Saroj and Khan, along with Kharwa, devised a plan to kidnap Vikas and took Kales help for the same. They took him on September 15 when he was playing outside his house.

Senior police inspector, S Dhumal, said, After the childs mother lodged a complaint, we conducted a search in the same area. We found no trace of the child. Later, we asked all the auto rickshaw drivers and shopkeepers about the boy. We came to know that Kale was seen with the boy and arrested her and the remaining accused. We also found the boy with Shettiyar, who also resides in Ambernath.

Dhumal said that the accused have being changing their statements constantly and they were still verifying the claim that the baby was taken for Shettiyar, as the police suspect that Shettiyar might be further selling him to someone else.

Dhumal said, All the accused have been booked for kidnapping and child trafficking, and remanded in police custody till October 2.
Father Tom Suriano, 82, cited children in cages, people dying homeless and hungry on the streets, and cutbacks to Obamacare as other pro-life issues.

Marylouise Felhofer, a retired Navy nurse, said health care was a top priority. The Affordable Care Act could be enhanced, but I dont think it should be repealed, she said.

MILWAUKEE  In a state where Mr. Trump won by less than one percentage point in 2016, any bloc of voters could swing this years election, and in Wisconsin, older voters comprise a formidable group.

Not only does Wisconsin have a larger share of older adults than the national average  and in many counties, 30 percent or more of the population is age 60 and over  but the states older voters also head to the polls in big numbers.

In the 2018 midterm elections, 76 percent of Wisconsin citizens age 65 and older voted, according to census data  more than in all but six other states.

In interviews, many older Wisconsinites said they had already safely voted.

My ballot was mailed to me and my son took me to City Hall to drop it off, said Grace Clausen, 92, of Greenfield, a Milwaukee suburb. The slot went right into the building like a mail slot, and it was marked with a great big sign.

A poll of Wisconsin this month by The New York Times and Siena College showed Mr. Biden with a double-digit advantage among voters over 65, 53 percent to 42 percent.

Both candidates have campaigned in Wisconsin in the races final days. And television ads from both parties compete for senior voters in the state, each insisting that its candidate will protect Medicare and Social Security.

But many voters said their life experiences influenced their choices more than political ads. And the interviews suggested that Mr. Trump might be in trouble among this older demographic.

For two retired priests who, like Ms. Clausen, live in a Catholic senior community, Mr. Biden was an easy choice.

For me, the environment is the biggest issue  if we dont take care of that, there is no future, said Father Ed Eschweiler, 99. Certainly, no right to life is going to be effective if we cant breathe or drink the water or eat the food from the soil. I dont think our president has done anything significant on right-to-life, other than the appointment of three Supreme Court judges.

Father Tom Suriano, 82, said there were other pro-life issues to be concerned about, like children in cages, people dying homeless and hungry on the streets, and cutbacks to Obamacare.

First of all, Donald Trump is a newcomer to the pro-life camp, but secondly, once the baby is born, he seems to lose interest, Father Suriano said. I get angry at people who equate pro-life with being anti-abortion.

The president is not very well-liked, observed Shirley Cohen, 92, a resident of a Jewish senior community in Milwaukee. Gun control is absolutely her top issue, she said, citing her disgust over images of pro-Trump militias carrying long guns at protests.

Memories of marching for civil rights during the 1960s influenced a vote for Mr. Biden by Cindy Labucki, 76, of Milwaukee. I certainly condone the peaceful demonstrations for Black Lives Matter, said Ms. Labucki, a retired teacher.

Marion Jaeger, 96, of Oconomowoc remembers the Great Depression and how grateful her father, an immigrant, was for President Franklin D. Roosevelts social programs. Although she has voted over the years for both parties, Mr. Bidens respect and presentation won her over.

I dont know that most people in this building appreciate some of the comments that Republicans have been making, whether their agenda is good or not, said Ms. Jaeger, who lives in a Lutheran senior complex. Mr. Trumps demeanor is not presidential.

And Health care was a top priority for Marylouise Felhofer, 68, a retired Navy nurse, also of Oconomowoc. The Affordable Care Act could be enhanced, but I dont think it should be repealed, she said.

But Ms. Felhofers neighbor, Mickey Laughland, 83, cast her vote for Mr. Trump. Hes not a politician  he doesnt owe people favors, Ms. Laughland said. I wish hed quit tweeting, but by gum, hes done what he said he would do.

Wesley Martin Jr., 77, president of the Great Lakes Native American Elders Association, predicted that most voters in Wisconsins Menominee and Oneida reservations would choose Mr. Biden, as he did. He cited environmental protections as a key issue, along with Mr. Trumps history of clashing with tribal-run casinos.

In Wisconsins far north, tourists and wealthy people with lake homes belie the areas rate of poverty, said Erv Teichmiller, 82, a Methodist minister and former Vilas County Board supervisor.

Our area tends to be Republican, probably two to one, said Mr. Teichmiller, who predicted that Mr. Trump would win in the region, but by a smaller margin than in 2016. A fair number of people are tired of his bullying and lying and are concerned about Obamacare being taken away.
DFCC Bank supports Watawala Tea Ceylon Ltds leveraged acquisition financing of Daintee Ltd View(s):

DFCC Bank PLC recently completed the acquisition financing for Watawala Tea Ceylon Ltd, a 100 per cent-owned subsidiary of Sunshine Holdings, one of the most established corporate entities in Sri Lanka. Watawala Tea Ceylon Ltd acquired a leading Sri Lankan confectionery company Daintee Ltd, adding several brands to its portfolio including Daintee, Milady and Bensons.

The transaction was valued at Rs.1.7 billion. The term loan of Rs 1.6 billion was structured by DFCC Bank to finance the acquisition. DFCC has been involved in large scale transactions with both the private and public sector during the last 12 months and is a preferred bank for long-term financing for corporates, Watawala Tea said in a media release.

The acquisition of Daintee Ltdd comes at a time where Sunshine as a group looks to selectively expand its presence in Sri Lankas fast-growing FMCG segment by extending its portfolio beyond tea.
Christian college to slash tuition to lowest in 20 years to reduce students financial burdens

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At a time when high college sticker prices might be keeping potential students away, a Christian college in western New York is cutting its tuition costs to the lowest its been in 20 years.

Houghton College, a Christian liberal arts school founded over 137 years ago by a dedicated Christian farmer and located about an hour-and-a-half drive from Rochester, announced this week that it will reset tuition for the 2021-2022 school year to make pricing more transparent, affordable and straightforward.

Starting next fall, the schools tuition rate will be $15,900 before financial aid awards. According to the school, the new pricing model represents a 53% decrease in published tuition costs for students enrolled in the on-campus residential undergraduate program compared to the current academic year.

In a statement, the institution stressed that the move demonstrates that a high-quality, Christian education is a real possibility for students from all backgrounds and circumstances. It also said its new tuition model is straight forward and offers clear information about what their college education is going to cost.

This price reset makes Houghton College the best-priced Christian college in the nation, the colleges statement explained, citing the most recent tuition survey done by the Council of Christian Colleges and Universities, to which the school is a member.

In addition, Houghton is offering one of the lowest tuition rates of any college in the Western New York region.

Houghton College President Shirley Mullen, who also chairs CCCUs board of directors, said the move makes a Houghton education truly a possibility for todays learners who would not otherwise have considered the opportunity.

In this moment, we are taking a very deliberate step to make our pricing more transparent, Mullen, a former history professor, explained. We are also making certain that, in the process, a Houghton education will actually be more affordable, not simply appear to be more affordable.

She said the decision allows the school to reclaim the original mission of our college to provide a high-quality, deeply-Christian education for students who are not being served as readily by other institutions of higher education.

[Willard J. Houghton] founded this institution that we now know as Houghton College with the idea of reaching the young people who were not already being reached, she said in a video announcement. He had a vision of the fact that education was a key part of enabling young men and women to develop their God-given potential and to make a difference in the world.

Houghton is ranked as a top-10 performing college in the nation by U.S. News & World Report for social mobility, which is defined as colleges that graduate large proportions of disadvantaged students awarded with Pell Grants.

The majority of Pell Grant recipients are students who come from families with adjusted gross family incomes under $50,000.

Houghtons tuition and fees for the current academic year are listed at $34,466 with the additional cost of room and board listed at $9,856 by U.S. News & World Report.

However, the average net cost of the university after need-based aid and scholarship funds are discounted is about $27,520. But for families with incomes between $30,001 and $48,000, the average annual cost for students at Houghton is around $17,749 for the 2020-2021 school year.

According to a fact sheet, the new tuition rate itself will be $15,900, while room and board will still cost about $9,856 for the 2021-2022 school year. Additionally, students will have to pay $546 in fees for a total cost for the year of about $26,302.

According to a CCCU report, the mean tuition costs for the 2017-2018 school year were $34,740 for private four-year schools, $27,466 for CCCU schools, and $ 9,970 for public four-year schools.

In its statement, the college noted that a lower tuition rate means that federal and state financial aid will cover a greater percentage of the students annual bill and will enable students to incur less student loan debt and fewer out-of-pocket expenses.

Any annual percentage tuition increases will be based on the reset rate, the college vowed in the statement.

The stories of students struggling with the new economic realities of COVID-19 hastened the colleges efforts to help alleviate some of their burdens, Jason Towers, Houghtons chief officer of enrollment and marketing, said.

At the same time, Houghton will reinforce our historical mission to train and equip underserved students through an excellent Christian college education so that they can impact the world for Christ.

Through the generosity of its alumni and supporters, over $41 million has been raised for student scholarships, enabling Houghton College to make more scholarship funds available to students in need.

In the fall of 2019, the college had a total enrollment of 969 students, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.

Across the nation, Christian colleges are making changes amid a decline in enrollment for evangelical institutions. Over 62 institutions that participated in the 2019 Annual Financial Aid Survey of CCCU Institutions, more than half of those surveyed, reported a decline in traditional undergraduate enrollment.

Over half of enrollment at surveyed institutions now consists of undergraduate degree completion and graduate programs, including some seminaries. The survey also found that the median unfunded discount rate at the surveyed CCCU institutions increased over the last decade from 29.6% in 2007-2008 to 43.3% in 2017-2018.

As CCCU communications specialist Morgan Feddes Satre stated last year, the increasing unfunded discount rate is not a good sign in light of growing operational expenses but is a trend reflective of higher education broadly.
A New Jersey congressman targeted in a controversial ad by the National Republican Congressional Committee portraying him as a protector of pedophiles denounced it as a crazy and crap attack designed to exploit the fears stoked by the QAnon conspiracy cult.

The more I watched it the more disgusted I became, said Democratic Rep. Tom Malinowski during an interview for Yahoo News Conspiracyland podcast. I remembered these ads play not just on cable television, they play on YouTube. At some point probably every 10-year-old kid in my district is going to see that ad when theyre watching their shows, and as much as I think its gonna hurt my opponent more than me its still really unpleasant that that kind of darkness, that that kind of fear, is being propagated in my community because of a political campaign.

The ad  titled Shadow and for which, according to Malinowski, the NRCC has spent up to $500,000 to air  accuses the Democrat of opposing the National Sex Offender Registry. It shows a series of dark images of suburban neighborhoods and then delivers the menacing message that sex offenders are living among us. Malinowski, the ad states, tried to make it easier for predators to hide in the shadows.

The ad also claims that Malinowski, as the Washington director of Human Rights Watch 14 years ago, led an effort to stop the National Sex Offender Registry. In fact, another lobbyist at Human Rights Watch had written a letter in 2006 opposing certain provisions in a crime bill that would have required even those convicted of minor misdemeanor offenses to be listed on the registry for up to 20 years  not for dismantling or stopping the registry in its entirety. That lobbyist, Jennifer Daskal, who worked on domestic U.S. programs, told Yahoo News that Malinowski  who lobbied on national security and foreign policy issues  played no role in drafting or approving the letter, and Malinowski said he had nothing to do with it.

Story continues

In the interview for Conspiracyland, a production of the Yahoo News Skullduggery podcast, Malinowski called the ad an obvious play by Republicans to appeal to the QAnon movement, whose followers believe that President Trump is saving children from an international cabal of pedophiles and Satan worshipers. QAnons startling rise has included the recent victory by one of its followers, Marjorie Taylor Greene, in a House GOP primary in Georgia. (Trump would go on to call Greene a future Republican star.)

What this [ad] is doing is playing on and amplifying the paranoia and fear that this conspiracy-mongering cult is promoting to millions and millions of Americans and then taking advantage of it to help a political candidate, Malinowski said.

QAnon conspiracy theorists at a protest at the state Capitol in Salem, Ore., in May. (John Rudoff/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)

Malinowski, a freshman, is locked in a close reelection campaign in a swing district against New Jersey state Sen. Tom Kean Jr., the son of former Gov. Tom Kean, who chaired the 9/11 Commission.

Michael McAdams, a spokesman for the NRCC, rejected Malinowskis assertion that the attack ads are designed to appeal to QAnon followers. Trying to excuse Democratic candidates decisions to lobby on behalf of sex offenders ... and vote against legislation protecting children from sex offenders because of an online conspiracy theory is truly pathetic, McAdams said in an email to Yahoo News when asked about the ad and others run by the NRCC attacking Democratic candidates as being soft on sex trafficking and pedophiles.

Malinowski recently introduced a bipartisan resolution condemning QAnon and encouraging the FBI and other federal law enforcement to focus on preventing violence and harassment caused by fringe political conspiracy theories.

Malinowski said about 70 explicitly pro-QAnon candidates ran for Congress this year and a few are probably going to be elected.

There are several million people who take part in QAnon forums on social media, Malinowski said. Thats a substantial number of people. It sounds absolutely crazy, but you know what else was crazy? The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and the ancient anti-Semitic blood libel, which is exactly what this is. ... Yes, its totally crazy but this has been around forever and it has contributed to really some of the worst events in all of human history.

Malinowski said he has spoken with a number of Republican colleagues in the House of Representatives who privately roll their eyes at QAnon and who share his worry and disgust about what Trump is doing to their party. But, he added, these Republicans feel helpless and unsure how to fix things when the president himself has signaled his support for the movement.

Malinowski believes that Trump bears responsibility for how QAnon has grown.

Remember one of the main things that he has led his followers to believe is that mainstream media and institutions cannot be trusted, Malinowski said of Trump. There is nothing true. And you know the saying: If nothing is true, anything is possible.

Malinowski said he is contemplating legislation to attack the problem. He said social media companies merely shutting down accounts affiliated with QAnon is not enough because its just a game of whack-a-mole.

What they need to be doing and are unwilling to do is change the way their algorithms work, Malinowski said. Most recruitment to extremist groups, including QAnon, in the U.S. is driven by Facebooks algorithm or Googles algorithm, because what these algorithms do is they know what everybodys searching for, they have massive amounts of data on all of us, and they feed us precisely the information and the content that is most likely to keep us glued to the screen.

Facebook itself estimates that more than 60 percent of recruitment to extremist groups is due to its algorithm, Malinowski said.

Many of the ideas for reform build on the understanding that the algorithm is vital to the movements growing power. Malinowski said that options include requiring people to opt in to algorithmic promotion so that they have more control over what content is pushed on them. He also said reformers have discussed taking away some of the immunity that federal law now gives social media companies for content they promote.

The theory is they may not be responsible for the content, but if they write an algorithm that causes that content to reach millions of people based on data that suggests those people will like that content, then they are the recruiters, Malinowski said. Get a clean computer, look at some really nasty videos on YouTube like white supremacy stuff, and then watch the recommendation engine go to work, and sure enough its recommending more stuff just like that. And that is the driver of much of this problem.

Download or subscribe on iTunes: Skullduggery from Yahoo News

_____

Read more from Yahoo News:
Nearly a quarter of all babies born in NSW hospitals are born via elective caesarean, as older mothers with private health insurance ask for the procedure.

The latest figures from NSW Health's Perinatal Data Collection unit show more than 35 per cent of the 95,133 children born in NSW in 2019 were delivered via C-sections.

The biggest drivers of the record caesarean rate are mothers who had already given birth via c-section to their older children and a growing trend in women requesting the procedure.

Almost one in four of all deliveries were elective C-sections (22.7 per cent) and 12.4 per cent were emergency caesareans.
At the end of the second week of the community campaign, United Way continues to gain momentum. Pledges totaled $1,862,888, representing 41% of the overall campaign goal of $4.5 million.

Dow employees have shown their commitment to the community with swift and overwhelming response. After a robust pacesetter campaign, they successfully met their campaign goal this week, five days before the official end of their employee campaign.

With Dows employee campaign ending Sept. 30, they have raised the bar and established a new goal: reaching 110% of campaign goal, or $1.2 million in employee pledges. Recognizing the need is great, they are pressing forth with purpose.

Team Dow has shown what it means to be Stronger Together during our employee campaign so far, and I couldnt be more proud, shared Mary Draves, chief sustainability officer and vice president of Environment Health & Safety at Dow. This year has been difficult, but the amazing part has been watching our community come together to support each other. I am inspired by the resilience and selfless service demonstrated as we continue navigating uncertainty.

The community at large is also showing up in new and unique ways to show their support of our neighbors.

Earlier this week, The Herbert H. and Grace A. Dow Foundation announced they are matching 50 cents for every dollar donated by new donors or existing donors who increase or sustain their individual gifts. This exciting news is game-changing as stated by Jim Nigro, United Way of Midland County board president, as it stretches the impact of individual gifts even further.

Companies and organizations have also showed how playing a part in the campaign isnt just about filling out a form: Its personal. Plus, its fun, too.

Dow partnered with United Way to host a virtual cooking demonstration with Chef Theo from The H Hotel. Attendees watched Chef Theo and Kali Cochran of United Way make pan-seared salmon and pan roasted honey lime chicken live from The Hs kitchen. They learned helpful information about food insecurity and nutrition, thanks to representatives from Hidden Harvest, the Arnold Center and Senior Services, all partner agencies with United Way.

Dedicated to learning about the needs and how their dollars are invested back into our community, AMPM, Inc. hosted a Play United trivia event with nearly full employee participation. The ROCK Center for Youth Development  another United Way partner agency  is selling candy bars at their sites to help get the word out and add a little sweetness to campaign efforts.

The fun doesnt stop there.

MidMichigan Health is hosting an array of activities to engage employees, including a virtual 5K, a bake sale, a cookie bake-off and Jeans Day stickers for employees. Their dedication to making the campaign fun and versatile helps boost morale and provide creative choices for how employees can get involved.

At the end of the day, our communitys heart and compassion is what makes the campaign what it is, said Holly Miller, president and CEO. The beauty of the campaign is there are many creative ways to participate: special events, shared stories, virtual games, volunteering and diverse ways to give. Its all coming from a place of togetherness and hope, which is especially encouraging after this years events.

Throughout the campaign, The Reverend Wally Mayton and Sara Eastman  the first campaign co-chairs in history  will be hitting the campaign trail while filming updates at various campaign hot spots around Midland County. The video series will be shared each Friday on United Way of Midland Countys Facebook page.

I travel the campaign trail with a colleague I trust and respect, Mayton said. We share devotion toward the community. We encounter our neighbors in service. This trip becomes an adventure, and we couldnt be more excited to show how our community is working together towards this unified goal.

The campaign will continue through Friday, Oct. 30. For more information about how you can help improve lives in our community, visit unitedwaymidland.org.

 Processed by Victoria Ritter, vritter@mdn.net
Indeed. Now the second wave is almost behind us, it is possible to say, once again, that we are doing well enough. It is the counter-example of Europe that provides the best perspective of Australias current standing. Europe is suffering a second wave that is larger, and more persistent than its first. This week, Spain, France, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands were among the most prominent examples to record their highest ever daily cases. These countries had all bent their infection curves the first time around. But they didnt flatten them to the same extent as Australia. Now their second waves appear more stubborn and combine to form an elevated plateau. Australias experience, by contrast is represented by two rolling hills, separated by a comforting valley of ultra-low infections between April and June.

Unfortunately, the evidence is building that the virus has a strong seasonal bias. The second wave in Europe was unleashed as summer holidaymakers returned home, schools reopened and the cooler weather kept people indoors. Now Victorian-style lockdowns are being mooted across the continent, and in the UK. Connecting these dots, our next moment of acute vulnerability will come in late February, early March next year.

The nations leaders may not want to look that far ahead. But they should start thinking about the virus in the way they do the bushfire season, and use the lead-up to next autumn to prepare plans in the event of an outbreak. The Victorians will have some insights, most notably on the value of masks. Anticipating risk, and setting public expectations accordingly, is surely preferable to another last resort lockdown. Another lockdown would create the perfect storm for a double-dip recession next year.

Victorias absence from the national economy over the past three months is expected to slash gross domestic product by 2 per cent in the September quarter. The other states are unlikely to make up the difference, although, as the Reserve Bank pointed out this week, some are already on track to recovery. The banks deputy governor Guy Debelle said Western Australia businesses are reporting skilled labour shortages in some areas. Ordinarily they would fill those vacancies by luring workers from other states, or overseas, but border closures make this impossible from the time being.
SHAKER HEIGHTS, Ohio -- Warrant arrest: Warrensville Center Road

At 12:45 a.m. Sept. 19, an officer spotted a car being driven without activated headlights and without rear illumination. The car was seen near Thornton Park, 3301 Warrensville Center Road.

The officer conducted a traffic stop and learned that the driver, a Warrensville Heights woman, 26, was wanted on a Cleveland police warrant for assault. The woman was cited for the equipment violations and turned over to Cleveland police.

Theft: Van Aken Boulevard

At 4:55 p.m. Sept. 18, the director of the Shaker Heights Library, 16500 Van Aken Blvd., reported that someone stole from a customer an Apple iPad valued at $649.

Carrying a concealed weapon: Warrensville Center Road

At 7:05 p.m. Sept. 19, an officer watched as a car was driven through a red light at the intersection of Warrensville Center and South Woodland roads. The officer conducted a traffic stop and during that stop, smelled the odor of marijuana coming from inside the car. The driver, a Cleveland man, 29, was found to have a handgun concealed in his waistband.

The man did not have a conceal/carry license. A K-9 officer was called to the scene and uncovered the marijuana. Police later learned that the gun had been reported stolen. The man was charged with carrying a concealed weapon and was cited for marijuana possession and for the red light violation.

Felonious assault: Chagrin Boulevard

At 11:55 p.m. Sept. 19, police were called to the Touch of Italy restaurant, 16822 Chagrin Blvd., where a Garfield Heights man, 33, reported that he had been assaulted by a man he did not know. During the assault, the suspect stole unspecified belongings from the victim.

The victim was taken to the hospital. Police are investigating.

Auto theft: Hildana Road

At 10:40 a.m. Sept. 20, a woman, 21, reported that someone stole her 2013 Kia Sportage, which had been parked on the street outside her home. The car had been left unlocked.

Improper discharge of a firearm: South Park Boulevard

At 4:20 p.m. Sept. 20, a man, 47, reported that he found his homes window damaged by gunfire. No one was injured.

Theft: Van Aken Boulevard

At 11:15 a.m. Sept. 23, police were called to Walgreens, 20200 Van Aken Blvd., where a Cleveland man, 35, was found in possession of goods he stole from the store. The property was returned to Walgreens and the man was issued a summons for theft.

See more Sun Press news here.
As many as 4,412 fresh Covid-19 cases took Uttar Pradesh's infection tally to 3,82,835 on Saturday, while 67 more deaths pushed the toll to 5,517.

There are 57,086 active cases in the state, according to officials.

A total of 4,412 fresh cases were reported. The death toll due to the virus has mounted to 5,517, Additional Chief Secretary, Health, Amit Mohan Prasad said.

The number of active patients in the state stands at 57,086. Currently, 29,266 patients are under home isolation, he said.

As many as 3,20,232 patients have recovered and been discharged from hospitals, Prasad said, adding that the state's recovery rate has gone up to 83.64 per cent.

On Friday, over 1.56 lakh samples were tested, taking the total number of Covid-19 tests conducted in the state to over 94 lakh, he said.

Stressing that the positivity rate in the state is coming down, the officer said since the past one week, a declining trend has been seen in the number of daily cases.

In a meeting with senior officials earlier in the day, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath expressed satisfaction over the declining positivity rate.

He said it is an indication that the state's strategy to contain the infection is showing good results.

He asked officials to continue testing in the same manner and ensure that there is no shortage of manpower or medicines in COVID-19 hospitals.

Adityanath directed the officials to pay special attention to Lucknow, which has reported the maximum number of cases and deaths in the state, and prepare a better model for containing the infection after consulting the district's nodal officer.

Chief Secretary, home, Awanish Awasthi said the chief minister has set a target of conducting one crore tests by September 30.
A pediment on the U.S. Supreme Court building with sculptural reliefs pertaining to law and order. Below the reliefs is the inscription "Equal justice under law." (The History Press)

Lawmakers Propose Amendment to Limit Supreme Court to 9 Justices

Reps. Denver Riggleman (R-Va.) and Collin C. Peterson (D-Minn.) are proposing to amend the U.S. Constitution in order to permanently set the number of Supreme Court justices at nine, a move that is aimed at undermining efforts to pack the nations top court.

The congressman said they were worried that partisan efforts to expand the courts size could set off a battle that could further polarize the country.

If one party succeeds in packing the Court, the next party to hold a majority may choose to do the same in retaliation. My amendment will preserve the integrity of the Court and permanently protect Americans from these dangerous proposals, Peterson said in a statement on Friday.

Several Democrats from both chambers have threatened to expand the Supreme Court if Senate Republicans move forward with filling a vacancy left by liberal Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

The move to expand the court size, in efforts called court-packing, would be aimed at reshaping the bench in favor of liberals or at the very least balance the ideological makeup of the bench if Democrats were to regain control of the Senate and White House in the next election. After Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh were confirmed to the bench, the court has been widely viewed to have a conservative lean, although Chief Justice John Roberts has in recent terms voted with his liberal colleagues on a number of controversial issues.

Democrats and progressives fear that if President Donald Trump is successful in confirming a third justice on the high courts bench, the court will have a conservative lean for years to come.

Court-packing had previously been attempted and had proved to be unpopular. In 1937, President Franklin D. Roosevelt proposed a bill to expand the size of the Supreme Court to a maximum of 15 justices. Roosevelts motive was to shift the ideological balance of the court so that it would stop striking down one of his New Deal programs.

Although the Supreme Court and the federal judiciary are set up by the Constitution, it also gives Congress the authority to pass laws to set up the judicial branch, including how many justices on the top court.

The Constitution states, The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme Court, and in such inferior Courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish.

The bar to amend the Constitution is very high as it requires two-thirds of the House and Senate to approve the text of the amendment and then requires three-quarters of the states to ratify the amendment. Given the current division in the country, such as effort is unlikely to succeed.

Riggleman and Petersons proposed amendment text states The Supreme Court of the United States shall be composed of nine Justices.

This is not the first time lawmakers have set out to propose constitutional amendments to limit the number of Supreme Court justices. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) wrote an editorial last year to warn about the dangers of court-packing and introduced an amendment limiting the number on the bench at nine.

Trump is scheduled to name his nominee at 5 p.m. on Saturday. Some are predicting that he would choose Amy Coney Barrett, a federal judge in Indiana, to fill the vacancy.
By Harichandran Arakali

India has banned over 175 mobile apps with links to China as the border confrontation between the two escalates. A recent media report suggested India could bar Chinese telecom equipment gear makers as well. The concern could be that China-made technology and telecom equipment would be amenable to the country snooping on India. There is also growing awareness in India about the need to protect sensitive data and keep it in-house.

Chinas Huawei Technologies and ZTE will be kept out of Indias plans to roll out its 5G telecom network. India will apply investment rules amended on July 23, which cite security concerns to restrict bidders from countries it shares land borders with to keep out these companies, says a Bloomberg report.

Analysts tell Forbes India such a ban will come with a cost in the short term. Indian companies must strike partnerships, move to cloud-based alternatives, and invest in their own technologies. China is well placed and ready to lead the 5G adoption and growth around the world, says Jayanth Kolla, founder of Convergence Catalyst, a telecom and internet technologies consultancy in Bengaluru. Products and solutions of Chinese telecom equipment manufactures have advanced features, functionalities and capabilities. Indian companies have been customers of Chinese equipment makers, and this ban would adversely impact Indian telcos from accessing highly functional and capable equipment.

Bharti Airtel and Vi (formerly Vodafone Idea) have always relied on a mix of vendorsZTE, Huawei, Nokia, and Ericsson across all 23 circleswhich promotes risk diversification, low cost, and some level of vendor neutrality, says Yash Jethani, research manager, telecommunications, IDC Asia Pacific. If a formal ban is imposed, Ericsson and Nokia might have to engage in a swap deal with Huawei and ZTE under the operators purview. But that might lead to contract cancellation charges under a force majeure clause, and hurt the already stretched cash flows. For now, things are at status quo; there is no immediate rip-and-replace.

However, as a strategic lever, Indian operators might have to consider the growing clout of Huaweis patents in the 5G space, hence there is an inherent need to push for true open-source solutions that have higher security. Both Airtel and Vi have shown interest in developing 5G solutions with IBM and RedHat open-cloud standards. This might help as IBM has been a long-standing partner for telcos even in the US. So low-cost innovation with return-on-investment-backed 5G use-cases need to be developed for the Indian market, Jethani says. In the event of a ban, alternative equipment vendors include European and North American manufacturers such as Nokia, Ericsson and Alcatel-Lucent, whose equipment and solutions are usually costlier than Chinese ones. If their prices prevail for 5G as well, the ban could hit the profitability of Indian telecom operators, Kolla says.

(This article first appeared in Forbes India, here)
Washington:

A 53-year-old Indian has been taken into custody by police in the US state of North Dakota for allegedly making a bomb threat at an airport as he told a travel agent that there was an explosive in his bag.

The suspect identified as Paraman Radhakishan, from India, was taken into custody at the Grand Forks International Airport. He faces terrorism charges.

Police said Radhakishan was taken into custody after he told a travel agent at the Grand Forks International Airport around 5:14 AM yesterday that there was a bomb in his bag.

As a precautionary measure, operations were suspended.

The Grand Forks Regional Bomb Squad evaluated the validity of the threat, a statement said.

Airport operations were soon normalised. Radhakishan was on his way from Grand Forksthe third largest city in North Dakotato Minneapolis. Radhakishans motive is still under investigation, however, police said it is possible he became upset with airport staff. Police said whatever the reason, any threat of this kind is taken seriously.

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COLLINSVILLE  Illinois State Police (ISP) District 11 Commander Capt. Mark Doiron has announced a number of state police initiatives in October.

The ISP will conduct Nighttime Enforcement (NITE) patrols in Madison and St. Clair counties. Officers working the patrols will be watchful for drivers who are operating vehicles in an unsafe manner, driving with a suspended or revoked drivers license, transporting open alcoholic beverages, not properly buckled up and driving under the influence.

Alcohol and drug impairment is a significant factor in nearly 40 percent of all fatal motor vehicle crashes in Illinois. The ISP has zero tolerance for impaired drivers.

The ISP will conduct Alcohol Countermeasure Enforcement (ACE) patrols in both counties during. The patrols allow the ISP to target an area with saturation patrols that focus on preventing, detecting, and taking enforcement action in response to violations associated with impaired driving and illegal transportation or consumption of alcohol and other drugs.

Across the country, an average of one alcohol-related traffic death occurs every 51 minutes. Alcohol and drug impairment remain significant factors in nearly 40 percent of all fatal motor vehicle crashes in Illinois.

The ISP will conduct Occupant Restraint Enforcement Patrols (OREP) in both counties. The program allows the ISP to target an area with saturation patrols that focus on traffic violations and related compliance with safety belt and child safety seat laws. Safety belt enforcement zones will also be set up to ensure the driver and passengers are buckled up.

Since Feb. 1, Illinois law requires all vehicle passengers (front and back) to be buckled up. Safety belts are estimated to save more than 16,000 lives each year. Over half of vehicle occupants killed in a traffic crash were not properly buckled up.

The ISP also will conduct Roadside Safety Checks in both counties during October.

A roadside safety check is an effective tool for generating voluntary compliance by the motoring public. The potential to come across these checks encourages motorists to arrange designated drivers, keep their consumption of alcohol within the allowable limits, or not drive a motor vehicle after drinking. Safety checks are designed to keep our roads safe by taking dangerous DUI offenders off the road.

The programs are funded through grants from the U.S. Department of Transportation, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
New Delhi, Sep 26 : Bollywood actor Rakul Preet Singh has moved the Delhi High Court seeking urgent interim directions from the court restraining media from running shows or publishing articles against her in connection with the drug probe which emerged out following the death of Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput.

The matter is likely to come up for hearing in the coming week.

The petition filed through advocates Himanshu Yadav, Aman Hingorani and Shweta Hingorani claims that Rakul Preet has been in Hyderabad for a film shoot and was shocked to see media reports in the evening of September 29 to the effect that the Narcotics Control Bureau, Mumbai has summoned her to appear before it in Mumbai on September 24 in connection with the ongoing investigation in the Rhea Chakraborty's drugs case.

"...the Petitioner had received no such summons from the NCB at either of her Hyderabad or Mumbai addresses, and accordingly she remained in Hyderabad. The Petitioner's father, Col. Kulvinder Singh (Retd), decided to take the morning flight on 24.9.2020 to Mumbai from Hyderabad to ascertain the truth of such reports," the plea said.

"...however, from the evening of 23.9.2020 itself, the media started running fake news to the effect that the Petitioner, who was in Hyderabad, had supposedly reached Mumbai on the evening of 23.9.2020 for the NCB investigation," it said further.

It added that around 11.20 a.m. on September 24, the Petitioner received summons under Section 67 of the NDPS Act dated September 23 through WhatsApp in Hyderabad which said that she had to appear in person before the NCB, Mumbai at 10 a.m. on September 24.

It is from the email dated September 24 from the NCB that the Petitioner learnt that case in which she has been required to appear has been registered as Crime No. MZU/NCB/15/2020, the plea said.

Earlier this month, Rakul had approached the High Court seeking its direction in order to ask the media not to telecast, publish or circulate on the TV channels, cable, print or social media, as the case may be, any content in context of Actress Rhea Chakraborty's narcotic drugs case that maligns or slanders the Petitioner or which contains anything defamatory, deliberate, false and suggestive innuendos and half-truths in respect of the Petitioner, or to use sensational headlines, photographs, video-footage or social media links which invade the privacy of the Petitioner.

While issuing notice on the said plea, a single judge bench of the high court presided by Justice Navin Chawla had said, "There has to be some restraint. Media gets to know info even before the officers themselves. Reputations are getting tarnished." "It is hoped that media houses and TV channels would show restraint and abide by the Program Code and other guidelines while making any report in connection with Rakul Preet Singh," the bench had said further.

Latest updates on Sushant Singh Rajput Death Mystery
In what may be read as reference to some strategic alliances India has struck after the violent face-off with China in Ladakh, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday said that a gesture of friendship by India towards one country is not directed against any third country. The prime minister also emphasised that when India strengthens its development partnership with a country it was not with any "malafide intent" of making the partner country "dependent or hapless."

Modi said this while addressing the historic 75th session of the UN General Assembly through a pre-recorded video message. This year's high-level UN General Assembly is being held in a largely virtual format as world leaders did not travel to New York for the annual gathering due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The prime minister explained that from India's Neighbourhood First Policy' to views on the Indo-Pacifc region, the country has always worked for the interests of humankind. "Any gesture of friendship by India towards one country is not directed against any third country. When India strengthens its development partnership, it is not with any malafide intent of making the partner country dependent or hapless, Modi emphasised.

We have never hesitated from sharing experiences of our development, he said. In his address to the 193-member UN General Assembly, Modi said that on October 2, India initiated the International Day of Non-Violence' and on June 21 the International Day of Yoga'.

The initiatives for the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure and the International Solar Alliance are realities today due to efforts of India. India has always thought about the interests of the whole humankind and not about its own interests. This philosophy has always been the driving force of India's policies, he said.

Modi stressed that from India's Neighbourhood First Policy to its Act East Policy, as well as the idea of security and growth for all in the region, or its views towards the Indo-Pacifc region, we have always worked for the interests of humankind and not driven by our own self-interests. India's partnerships are always guided by this very principle, he said.

Last year at the UN General Assembly session in New York, Modi had invited UN member states to join the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure that was launched by India. The Coalition works towards the common goals of having infrastructure that is resilient to climate and disaster.

Heads of State and Government and Ministers sent in pre-recorded video statements for the high-level week, including the special commemoration of the UN's 75 years and the General Debate. Earlier, India's Permanent Representative to the UN Ambassador T S Tirumurti introduced Modi's pre-recorded statement from the General Assembly Hall. Modi was the first speaker to give his virtual address to the 193-Member UN General Assembly Saturday.

(With PTI inputs)
26.09.2020 LISTEN

GOOD NEWS is so rare in the world  but particularly in Africa  that we must breathe a sigh of relief (whilst crossing our fingers!) that the World Health Organisation (WHO) says that social and environmental factors have contributed to give Africa a relatively low number of COVID-19 cases.

According to the WHO Africa Regional Office in Brazzaville, COVID-19 transmission in Africa has been marked by relatively fewer infections. Also, infections have been on the decline over the past two months. This is due to a variety of socio-ecological factors, as well as early and strong public health measures taken by African governments.

The WHO report adds: QUOTE The pandemic has largely been in a younger age group and has been more pronounced in a few countries, suggesting [that] country-specific aspects are driving the pattern of disease and death. About 91% of COVID-19 infection in sub-Saharan Africa are among people below 60 years, and over 80% of cases are asymptomatic.

....Low population density and mobility, hot and humid climate, lower age group, interacting to accentuate their individual effects, are likely [to be] contributing to the pattern seen in Africa. Since 20 July, the region has seen a steady decline in new COVID-19 cases. Over the past four weeks, 77,147 new cases were reported, down from 131,647 recorded in the previous four weeks.

Some of the most-affected countries including Algeria, Cameroon, Cote dIvoire, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Nigeria, Senegal and South Africa, have all seen infections drop every week over the past two months. Deaths attributed to COVID-19 have also remained low. UNQUOTE

The WHO explains that the downward trend seen in Africa over the past two months is undoubtedly a positive development, and speaks to the robust and decisive public health measures taken by governments across the region.

The figures given for the downward trend are almost miraculous  77, 147 new cases were reported, down from 131,647 recorded in the previous four weeks. That works out, in percentage terms, to nearly a fifty percent reduction in the infection rate in just four weeks.African Governments and their people deserve a lot of credit for this spectacular reduction in the number of cases.

However, Dr Matshidiso Moeti, World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Director for Africa, took pains to warn that we must not become complacent. Other regions of the world (she pointed out) have experienced similar trends, only to find that as social and public health measures are relaxed, cases start ramping up again.

The regions statistics on testing have been useful for policy, [because] they reflect the patterns of infection within a country, the report adds. The missed COVID-19 cases, it point out, are largely because they are asymptomatic. In addition, there is no evidence of miscalculation of death figures, which are more difficult to miss statistically.

Dr Moeti went on: Africa has not witnessed an exponential spread of COVID-19, as many initially feared.  But the slower spread of infection... means we expect the pandemic to continue to smoulder for some time, with occasional flare-ups.

For instance (Dr Moeti revealed) Cameroon and Cote dIvoire (which are among the countries that have recorded a decline in infections since mid-July) have seen a slight increase in cases in recent weeks. It is crucial therefore that countries maintain public health measures that have helped curb the spread of COVID-19 .

Dr Moeti concluded: The response in African countries needs to be tailored to each countrys situation, moving forward, as we see different patterns of infection even within a country. Targeted and localized responses that are informed by what works best in a given region of a country, will be most crucial, as countries ease restrictions and open up their economies.

WHO has reaffirmed that it is continuing to support countries to scale up public health response, particularly in high-risk locations. As a testimony to that commitment, the organisation held a virtual press conference at which Dr Moeti was joined by some of the best experts on COVID-19. They included Professor Francisca Mutapi, Professor in Global Health Infection and Immunity, University of Edinburgh; Professor Mark Woolhouse, Professor in infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh; and Dr Sam Agatre Okuonzi of Arua Regional Referral Hospital in Uganda.

While we in Africa must be careful not to let our guard down because of the good figures we are recording regarding our fight against the Virus, some of the world's media are not holding their horses. Ghana's President, Nana Addo-Dankwa Akufo-Addo, in particular, has been singled out for high praise on the Internet. Medium.com says that the leadership he has shown, not only in enacting measures to curb the disease but also, in taking the trouble, in an election year, to broadcast a total of seventeen times (so far) to share with his people, the true COVID-19 situation, are note-worthy.

The writer of the article said: As The Lancet wrote, according to WHO, Africa is the least affected region globally, with 1.5% of the worlds reported COVID-19 cases and 0.1% of the worlds deaths. This is not just luck. Yes, the continent has some advantages (youth; being under a de-facto travel ban). But those advantages only buy you time.... The main advantage Africa had was that the African people used their time wisely. Within the African Union, Ghana stands out....

[Ghana has proved that in this battle against Covid] we just have our brains and our ability to cooperate. We have no cure. Thats why leadership matters.

We must ensure therefore that the measures we took on the basis of good sense will continue. For only thus can Ghana avoid a new spike in the onslaught of the pandemic.
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The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said on Friday that 124 illegal immigrants have been rescued off Libya's western coast.

"A total of 124 refugees and immigrants were intercepted or rescued yesterday (Thursday) by the Libyan Coast Guard aboard a rubber boat off Libya," UNHCR said in a statement.

"UNHCR and its medical partner, the International Rescue Committee, provided humanitarian assistance and medical care to survivors, who embarked from Al Khums (in western Libya). Survivors were from Mali, Ghana and Sudan," it added.

The UNHCR estimated that more than 8,300 migrants have been returned to Libya so far.

Following the 2011 fall of former leader Muammar Gaddafi's government, Libya has been plagued by a state of insecurity and chaos that prompts thousands of illegal immigrants to attempt to cross the Mediterranean Sea toward Europe.

Many illegal immigrants, who were either rescued at sea or arrested by authorities, remain detained in overcrowded reception centers in Libya despite repeated international calls to close those centers.
The Pennsylvania Department of Health reported 1,029 new coronavirus cases Saturday, raising the statewide total to 155,232.

Its the first time in a week the state has reported more than 1,000 new cases in a day, a mark the state has hit a few times in September. The health department reported more than 1,100 cases on Sept. 19. By comparison, the state didnt register 1,000 new cases in day in the month of August.

The state has reported 5,520 positive cases over the previous seven days, an average of 788 per day. Thats below the peak in the spring, when the state regularly reported well over 1,000 new infections each day.

Across Pennsylvania, 8,103 deaths have been tied to COVID-19, including 22 newly reported fatalities Saturday. More than two-thirds of the states deaths have occurred in long-term care facilities, such as nursing homes.

More younger adults are contracting the coronavirus, according to the health department. Health officials say theyre particularly concerned about the spike in adults between the ages of 19 and 24. Officials have also been concerned about the number of college students being infected.

In southeastern Pennsylvania, 29% of the new cases in September have occurred among those between 19 and 24 years old. In April, only 5% of cases came in that age group. In northcentral Pennsylvania, more than two-thirds of the new cases in September have involved those 19-24.

In southcentral Pennsylvania, those 19-24 account for about 17% of this months new cases.

Fewer people are being hospitalized due to the coronavirus. The health departments only dashboard reports 444 people are being treated in hospitals for COVID-19. In late July, 700 people were in hospital beds due to the virus. At the peak in the spring, about 2,800 coronavirus patients required hospital care.

Statewide, 82% of those who have contracted the coronavirus have recovered, according to the health department. The department considers patients to be fully recovered when they are 30 days past the date of infection or the onset of symptoms.

There were 26,337 test results reported to the department through 10 p.m. Friday. The state has administered 182,437 COVID-19 tests from Sept. 19-Sept. 25.

More than 1.8 million people have tested negative for the coronavirus.

Gov. Tom Wolf and Health Secretary Dr. Rachel Levine continue to stress the importance of social distancing, wearing masks and washing hands to curb the spread of the virus.

On Friday, Wolf criticized President Donald Trump for his scheduled rally at Harrisburg International Airport Saturday night, saying it is risky to gather a large group during the pandemic. To hold this event is not just misguided, it is dangerous, it is manipulative and it is wrong, Wolf said.

Earlier this week, a federal court declined Wolfs request for a stay of an order overturning his limits on the size of gatherings. Wolfs administration had set forth limits of 250 people for outdoor events and 25 for indoor gatherings. The governor is appealing that decision and asking schools to voluntarily follow those guidelines.

Republican lawmakers, and some Democratic lawmakers, say local school officials can be trusted to make responsible decisions on how many spectators can attend games and extracurricular activities.

Statewide, 5,430 deaths tied to the coronavirus have occurred in long-term care facilities, including nursing homes, according to the health department.

There are 22,680 residents in those facilities who have contracted COVID-19, along with 4,988 cases among employees. A total of 27,668 people have been infected in long-term care facilities.

Coronavirus cases have been found at 973 facilities in 61 counties.

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New Delhi: Superstar Shah Rukh Khan's daughter Suhana is an avid social media user. Recently, she put up an Instagram story hitting out at misogyny with a tweet repost. She wrote 'double standards are scary' on the post.

Here's a screengrab of the story:

The post reads: "Misogyny is not only conscious hate towards women, it's also subconscious conditioned hateful behavior towards women. You don't have to consciously think you hate women but ask yourself why when a woman does something you feel more triggered than if it was done by a man."

Suhana Khan's cryptic post comes in at a time when a lot of debate is heating up social media over why only female actors are being targetted by the media in relation to the controversies surrounding narcotics use. Also, the witch-hunt allegations levelled by Rhea Chakraborty in the death case of Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput has been questioned by some.

Coming back to the young and pretty Suhana. Well, she is a popular star kid on social media. Her pictures and videos often break the internet. There are various fan pages dedicated to her as curiosity around her movie debut is high amongst followers.

SRK and Gauri Khan's darling daughter headed to New York University last year where she is studying acting. She completed her graduation from Ardingly College in England.

Speculation of her making her starry entry into movie business has always been around and now that she is studying acting as a course, looks like very soon the pretty girl will be making her big-screen debut.

She has acted in several plays and also in a short movie.




Washington: US President Donald Trump has nominated Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, capping a dramatic reshaping of the federal judiciary that will resonate for a generation and that he hopes will provide a needed boost to his reelection effort.

Republican senators are already lining up for a swift confirmation of Barrett ahead of the November 3 election as they aim to lock in conservative gains in the federal judiciary before a potential transition of power. Trump, meanwhile, is hoping the nomination will serve to galvanise his supporters as he looks to fend off Democrat Joe Biden.

President Donald Trump walks with Judge Amy Coney Barrett to a news conference to announce Barrett as his nominee to the Supreme Court. Credit:AP

Trump told reporters as he left the White House for a rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday evening that its going to go fast and argued it would be difficult for Democrats to take issue with his pick as he praised her credentials.

He says, I think this will be done before the election, and said that would send a great signal to a lot of people.
Some pharmacies in Niagara will be offering free COVID-19 testing for asymptomatic people, Premier Doug Ford announced Friday.

The drug stores will be in St. Catharines and Niagara Falls, but exact locations have not yet been released.

Ford announced earlier in the week that up to 60 pharmacies in Ontario would begin offering testing to help expand capacity beyond assessment centres, but Niagara locations were not among them at that point.

On Friday, Ford said up to 18 more pharmacies in southwestern Ontario and Niagara region will begin to offer testing as early as Tuesday.

Were going to keep expanding to more pharmacies in the province in the coming weeks, Ford said during his daily briefing with media that is broadcast on the premiers YouTube channel.

Pharmacies can choose to be part of the program, which offers testing to people with no COVID-19 symptoms, to help meet demand.

Niagara Health, which runs assessment centres in St. Catharines, Niagara Falls and Welland, will no longer take walk-ins after facing a massive increase in demand in recent weeks and having to turn people away. To book an appointment through Niagara Health, phone 905-378-4647, ext. 42819.

Ford said the biggest thing everyone can do to make sure surgeries are not delayed and that there are enough hospital beds, is to follow public health measures that ask people to wash their hands, practise physical distancing, wear a mask and get a flu shot.

Its these simple things that can save lives and its up to all of us to do our part.
Queen Elizabeth II and the royal family are set to suffer from a huge financial blow caused by the global pandemic.

Following the drastic decline of tourists in their royal residence over the past few months, the Queen and the monarchy are facing a $45 million loss in their finances.

In the annual financial statement released by royal treasurer Sir Michael Stevens, who is the current Keeper of the Privy Purse and Treasurer to The Queen, it was revealed that the decrease in tourists means a shortfall of $19 million over the next three years.

"If we look at our core Sovereign Grant and the income that we generate to supplement the Sovereign Grant, both of which support the official duties of The Queen, we are expecting a significant reduction in income from the Royal Collection Trust due to the impact Covid-19 has had on their visitor numbers," the reports stated. "This forms the bulk of a projected shortfall in income, which we estimate will be around 5 million per year for the next three years."

The royal residence refers to the British royal estates -- including Windsor Castle and Frogmore House which are the most popular royal attractions, followed by the Queen's London residence and Buckingham Palace.

The royal estates generate income from the ticket admissions. In 2018 to 2019, the properties generated $61 million or 48 million in addition to retail sales estimated to $26 million or 21 million.

The financial statement also indicated that with the health crisis, the palace is $25 million short (20 million) of their projected income, which will affect the 10-year plan to refurbish Buckingham Palace. For what it's worth, the Palace has a 369 million program that is scheduled to restore outdated plumbing and heating, as well as renovating the Queen's London residence that has not undergone significant changes since World War II.

Sir Michael Stevens also set the record straight and emphasized that the monarchy will not seek financial assistance from the government as well as the Sovereign Grant.

"In responding to these challenges, we have no intention of asking for extra funding but will look to manage the impact through our own efforts and efficiencies," he mentioned.

Furthermore, the Queen assured that the royal family would not be taking a pay cut despite the "significantly down" income at the Crown Estate this year.

"In the event of a reduction in the Crown Estate's profits, the Sovereign Grant is set at the same level as the previous year," a Treasury spokesperson explained to CNN Business.

"The Sovereign Grant funds the official business of the Monarchy, and does not provide a private income to any member of the royal family."

This came after the Brits criticized the monarchy and demanded that the taxpayers should not cover the royal family's financial losses due to the decline of income of the royal residence.

In a poll conducted by Express.co.uk, seven out of 10 people believe that Queen Elizabeth II should not receive millions from the Treasury over the pandemic losses.

READ MORE: Henry Cavill Swoons Twitterverse With Sherlock Holmes Role
New Orleans police have arrested one of their own on allegations that he sexually molested a minor.

Rodney Vicknair, 53, faces counts of sexual battery, indecent behavior with a juvenile and malfeasance in office, police said in a statement Saturday.

UPDATE: New Orleans police officer accused of sexually molesting teen girl

Police said their investigation into the 13-year veteran began when the departments Public Integrity Bureau received information that Vicknair had an inappropriate relationship with the victim at the center of the case. After reviewing preliminary findings of the ensuing investigation, the PIB obtained a warrant to arrest Vicknair on Friday.

Deputies with the St. Tammany Parish Sheriffs Office then arrested Vicknair at his home on the northshore, police said.

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Police said Vicknair has been suspended from his job pending the outcome of the case.

At the time of his arrest, Vicknair was working for the New Orleans polices 1st District, which patrols areas such as Mid-City and Treme.

No other details were immediately available. Check back for any updates.
NEW YORK: At a University of Maryland lab, people infected with the new coronavirus take turns sitting in a chair and putting their faces into the big end of a large cone. They recite the alphabet and sing or just sit quietly for a half hour. Sometimes they cough.

The cone sucks up everything that comes out of their mouths and noses. Its part of a device called Gesundheit II that is helping scientists study a big question: Just how does the virus that causes COVID-19 spread from one person to another?

It clearly hitchhikes on small liquid particles sprayed out by an infected person. People expel particles while coughing, sneezing, singing, shouting, talking and even breathing. But the drops come in a wide range of sizes, and scientists are trying to pin down how risky the various kinds are.

The answer affects what we should all be doing to avoid getting sick. Thats why it was thrust into headlines a few days ago when a U.S. health agency appeared to have shifted its position on the issue, but later said it had published new language in error.

The recommendation to stay at least 6 feet (2 meters) apart some authorities cite about half that distance is based on the idea that larger particles fall to the ground before they can travel very far. They are like the droplets in a spritz of a window cleaner, and they can infect somebody by landing on their nose, mouth or eyes, or maybe being inhaled.

But some scientists are now focusing on tinier particles, the ones that spread more like cigarette smoke. Those are carried by wisps of air and even upward drafts caused by the warmth of our bodies. They can linger in the air for minutes to hours, spreading throughout a room and build up if ventilation is poor.

The potential risk comes from inhaling them. Measles can spread this way, but the new coronavirus is far less contagious than that.

For these particles, called aerosols, 6 feet is not a magic distance, says Linsey Marr, a leading researcher who is studying them at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg. But she says its still important to keep ones distance from others, the farther the better, because aerosols are most concentrated near a source and pose a bigger risk at close range.

Public health agencies have generally focused on the larger particles for coronavirus. That prompted more than 200 other scientists to publish a plea in July to pay attention to the potential risk from aerosols. The World Health Organization, which had long dismissed a danger from aerosols except in the case of certain medical procedures, later said that aerosol transmission of the coronavirus cant be ruled out in cases of infection within crowded and poorly ventilated indoor spaces.

The issue drew attention recently when the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention posted and then deleted statements on its website that highlighted the idea of aerosol spread. The agency said the posting was an error, and that the statements were just a draft of proposed changes to its recommendations.

Dr. Jay Butler, CDCs deputy director for infectious disease, told The Associated Press that the agency continues to believe larger and heavier droplets that come from coughing or sneezing are the primary means of transmission.

Last month Butler told a scientific meeting that current research suggests aerosol spreading of the coronavirus is possible but it doesnt seem to be the main way that people get infected. Further research may change that conclusion, he added, and he urged scientists to study how often aerosol spread of the coronavirus occurs, what situations make it more likely and what reasonable steps might prevent it.

Marr said she thinks infection by aerosols is happening a lot more than people initially were willing to think.

As a key piece of evidence, Marr and others point to so-called superspreader events where one infected person evidently passed the virus to many others in a single setting.

In March, for example, after a choir member with coronavirus symptoms attended a rehearsal in Washington state, 52 others who had been seated throughout the room were found to be infected and two died. In a crowded and poorly ventilated restaurant in China in January, the virus evidently spread from a lunchtime patron to five people at two adjoining tables in a pattern suggesting aerosols were spread by the air conditioner. Also in January, a passenger on a Chinese bus apparently infected 23 others, many of whom were scattered around the vehicle.

Butler said such events raise concern about aerosol spread but dont prove it happens.

There could be another way for tiny particles to spread. They may not necessarily come directly from somebodys mouth or nose, says William Ristenpart of the University of California, Davis. His research found that if paper tissues are seeded with influenza virus and then crumpled, they give off particles that bear the virus. So people emptying a wastebasket with tissues discarded by somebody with COVID-19 should be sure to wear a mask, he said.

Scientists who warn about aerosols say current recommendations still make sense.

Wearing a mask is still important, and make sure it fits snugly. Keep washing those hands diligently. And again, staying farther apart is better than being closer together. Avoid crowds, especially indoors.

Their main addition to recommendations is ventilation to avoid a buildup of aerosol concentration. So, the researchers say, stay out of poorly ventilated rooms. Open windows and doors. One can also use air-purifying devices or virus-inactivating ultraviolet light.

Best of all: Just do as much as you can outdoors, where dilution and the suns ultraviolet light work in your favor.

We know outdoors is the most spectacularly effective measure, by far, says Jose-Luis Jimenez of the University of Colorado-Boulder. Outdoors it is not impossible to get infected, but it is difficult.

The various precautions should be used in combination rather than just one at a time, researchers say. In a well ventilated environment, 6 feet (of separation) is pretty good if everybodys got a mask on and nobody stays directly downwind of an infected person for very long, says Dr. Donald Milton of the University of Maryland School of Public Health, whose lab houses the Gesundheit II machine.

Duration of exposure is important, so theres probably not much risk from a short elevator ride while masked or being passed by a jogger on the sidewalk, experts say.

Scientists have published online tools for calculating risk of airborne spread in various settings.

At a recent meeting on aerosols, however, Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association, noted that preventive steps can be a challenge in the real world. Keeping apart from other people can be difficult in homes that house multiple generations. Some old buildings have windows that were nailed shut years ago, he said. And we have far too many communities where they simply dont have access to clean water to wash their hands."

It might seem strange that for all the scientific frenzy to study the new coronavirus, the details of how it spreads can still be in doubt nine months later. But history suggests patience.

Weve been studying influenza for 102 years," says Milton, referring to the 1918 flu epidemic. We still dont know how its transmitted and what the role of aerosols is."

___

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institutes Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content
Suffolk District Attorney Rachael Rollins announced the expansion of a database that lists law enforcement personnel in the county who have prior conduct that could impact their credibility as witnesses in a court proceeding.

The database, which is called LEAD - Law Enforcement Automatic Discovery, now has the names of 136 names of law enforcement officers who work, have worked, or could work in Suffolk County. More than 115 names have been added in the last year, Rollins' office said in a statement.

The list currently includes 70 Massachusetts State Police troopers, 54 Boston police officers, five MBTA Transit Police officers, three Revere police officers, two Chelsea police officers, one special police officer and one IRS agent.

Some names included on the database include Matthew Sheehan, a Massachusetts State Police trooper who is on indefinite suspension after making racist comments online and was also indicted last year for allegedly shooting at an ATV rider during a police confrontation; Dana Pullman, the former president of the Massachusetts State Police union who was indicted last year by a federal grand jury on charges of racketeering, fraud, obstruction of justice and tax crimes; and Leigha Genduso, a former trooper who resigned two years ago after an internal affairs investigation found that she did not disclose during her hiring process her past involvement with a drug-dealing operation.

It also includes the nine current and former Boston police officers who were charged in federal court earlier this month in connection with an overtime scheme that netted the defendants more than $200,000.

The database will be one pillar of my offices Integrity Review Bureau. As members of law enforcement, we are held to a higher standard. We in law enforcement cannot adequately perform our duties if the community does not trust us or believes that we lack integrity. That does nothing to keep our communities safe; to solve crimes; and to foster, cultivate, and build mutual trust and respect between the police and the people and communities they serve, Rollins' said in the statement.

"The LEAD database will help us ensure that the legal process works and people charged with crimes by our office receive all of the information they are entitled to in order to properly defend themselves. The constitution requires as much,'' Rollins continued. If testimony provided by prosecution witnesses is suspect then the criminal legal system itself is suspect. All of us in law enforcement must be beyond reproach because what we do impacts matters of life, death, and freedom for the general public.

The district attorney offered several reasons an officer could be added to the database:

An investigation or prosecution into criminal conduct in any jurisdiction;

An investigation in any jurisdiction based on discriminatory or defamatory actions, language or conduct targeting any protected category or class (including but not limited to: race; color; religious creed; national origin; immigration status; sex; gender identity; sexual orientation; pregnancy; ancestry; or status as a veteran);

An investigation, including a law enforcement agencys internal affairs or anti-corruption units/divisions in any jurisdiction casting doubt upon truthfulness or integrity; or

A finding in any jurisdiction by a judge, an administrative agency, review board, or any oversight entity created by the legislature, federal, state, county, local or municipal elected official(s), or the like, that the individual employed by a law enforcement agency is not credible.

The overwhelming majority of law enforcement officers and employees in Suffolk County are dedicated and compassionate professionals who provide exemplary service to the communities they serve," Rollins said. "The database is not voluminous, but the actions of the officers within LEAD are harmful, or potentially harmful to the community and the criminal legal system. When the credibility of law enforcement is in question, all participants in the system  and the public  should be aware of that. The people of Suffolk County deserve to know that the public officials they rely on for their safety are truly invested in it. Anything less is a betrayal of their trust and our obligation to serve.

Rollins said the database is a living document that will have names added to it when her office becomes aware of an investigation. Names can also be removed from the list if an investigation exonerates someone or an appeal is sustained.

Since the death of George Floyd in police custody in May, conversations and protests across the nation have focused on the way police officers treat Black people, with calls for justice and reform.

In these uncertain times we as a nation find ourselves in, with so much tension and mistrust between law enforcement and the communities we are sworn to protect, we must maintain credibility in everything we do, Rollins said.

The district attorney said her office is committed to ensuring that law enforcement agencies are kept apprised of their officers' activities that come under scrutiny, as well as that defendants have access to information concerning alleged misconduct of prosecution witnesses, regardless of its admissibility in court.

Inclusion or removal from the database will mirror statutory time guidelines concerning the admissibility of prior convictions that is set forth in state law, Rollins' office said.

The clock starts running from disclosure," Rollins said. Whether the incident is learned of from an internal investigation or a media report, she said, "the clock starts running from the article date, not the infraction or investigation date. This should hopefully encourage disclosure and cooperation.

Officers can appeal in writing to Rollins' office when they believe that they should be excluded from the list. Those appeals will be reviewed initially by the first assistant district attorney and general counsel, and then by the district attorney.

Related Content:
Small Bites returns with news on area restaurants and food trends. Got a pic or a tip? Send it to jlewis@mrt.com.

Now open

Vegans, vegetarians and meat lovers can all come together at Coras Bistro. The breakfast and lunch spot opened Monday at 305 W. Ohio Ave. Owner Ana Armendariz said she wanted the menu to have options for everyone.

I feel like opening a little place and offering something for everyone like meat lovers, vegans and vegetarians, she said. I feel very grateful to give people what they want.

The breakfast menu features a Monster Burrito, Keto Burrito with a crispy cheese wrap, avocado toast and more. The lunch menu features a tapa/huarache, which Armendariz said is a must try and is similar to the popular puffy tacos. Enchiladas, burgers and chicken fried steak are also available. Squash blossoms, vegan nachos and armadillo eggs are featured on the appetizer menu. The bistro also serves sweets such as cinnamon rolls made out of crescent dough. She also has a booth at the Midland Downtown Farmers Market and shops there for produce.

I found a lot of stuff (at the farmers market) I felt like I was never going to find in Midland, she said. I wanted to introduce foods that are seasonal, like squash blossoms.

Armendariz moved to Midland from Guanajuato, Mexico, when she was 18 years old to attend the University of Texas Permian Basin. She got her degree in accounting but decided she wanted to do something different.

I like to cook, and I feel closer to home somehow when Im cooking, she said. Creating these recipes reminds me of my mom and dad and brings up memories.

Coras Bistro is open 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday through Friday.

Just announced

Opals Table has announced lunch will be served again beginning Monday. Lunch is from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.



Happy hour begins at 3 p.m. in The Basement.



Opals Table has also set dates for wine dinners including one that will benefit the West Texas Food Bank during Hunger Action Month. The menu on Tuesday includes beef bourguignon, fall greens and chocolate walnut fudge pie with vanilla ice cream. The bar menu will have $12 orange drinks. Proceeds will go to WTFB.



Other dinners are as follows:

--Oct. 8 the Nickel and Nickel wine dinner

--Oct. 29 the Prisoner wine dinner

--Nov. 19 the Caymus wine dinner

Pi Social has started serving brunch on Sundays. The pizza and cocktail spot will serve brunch from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Menu items include salmon latkes, nutella crepes with bananas and candied pecans, chicken and waffles and the Pi Lorraine, which has aged dough, mozzarella, gruyere, bacon and chives. Brunch drinks include mango cheladas, grapefruit hibiscus ranch waters, clarified bloody Marys and more.

For sale

Basin Burger House has closed after eight years serving Midland. The popular burger and brunch spot was a gathering place for trivia nights and young professionals. The Green Chili Burger was featured in Texas Monthlys The 50 Greatest Burgers in Texas in 2016.
Lebanon's prime minister-designate quits in blow to French initiative Lebanon's Prime Minister-designate Mustapha Adib speaks at the presidential palace in Baabda

By Edmund Blair and Raya Jalabi

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Lebanon's prime minister-designate quit on Saturday after trying for almost a month to line up a non-partisan cabinet, dealing a blow to a French plan aimed at rallying sectarian leaders to tackle the worst crisis since the nation's 1975-1990 civil war.

Mustapha Adib, former ambassador to Berlin, was picked on Aug. 31 to form a cabinet after President Emmanuel Macron's intervention secured a consensus on naming him in a country where power is shared out between Muslims and Christians.

A source close to Macron said the situation that led to Adib's resignation amounted to "collective betrayal" by political parties but said France, the former colonial power, would not abandon Lebanon.

Under the French roadmap, the new government would take steps to tackle corruption and implement reforms needed to trigger billions of dollars of international aid to fix an economy that has been crushed by a mountain of debt.

Lebanon faced a further knock when a huge explosion at Beirut port on Aug. 4 ruined a swathe of the capital.

Adib - a Sunni Muslim, as the prime minister has to be under the sectarian power-sharing system - announced he was stepping down but said Lebanon must not abandon the French plan or squander Macron's goodwill.

"I stress that this initiative must continue," he said after meeting President Michel Aoun, a Christian. He wished his successor well in the "hard task" of forming a government.

Politicians, whose loyalties tend to follow confessional lines, had promised Paris they would have a government in place by mid-September.

But Adib's efforts stumbled in a dispute over appointments, particularly the post of finance minister, who will have a key role in drawing up economic rescue plans.

"It's a setback, but we're not giving up," a French diplomatic source said.

DEADLOCK

Talks with the International Monetary Fund on a vital bailout package stalled this year, and one of the cabinet's first tasks would have been to restart the negotiations.

Story continues

The street value of the Lebanese pound, which has plunged from an official peg of 1,500 to the dollar since the economic crisis erupted last year, weakened further. One trader said it was trading at 8,200, from 7,700 on Friday.

Lebanon's Al-Jadeed TV reported protests by small groups burning tyres and blocking roads in the northern city of Tripoli and Sidon in the south, particularly over the currency whose tumble has driven many into poverty.

The cabinet formation hit a deadlock over a demand by Lebanon's two main Shi'ite groups, Amal and the heavily armed Iran-backed Hezbollah, that they name several ministers, including finance, a position previously held by a Shi'ite.

Adib held several meetings with Shi'ite politicians but failed to reach agreement on how the minister would be chosen.

Shi'ite leaders feared being sidelined as Adib sought to shake up appointments to ministries, some of which have been controlled by the same faction for years, politicians said.

Mohanad Hage Ali of the Carnegie Middle East Center said Iranian-backed factions might have wanted to stall the cabinet formation to await the result of a U.S. election on Nov. 3.

U.S. President Donald Trump, seeking re-election, has taken a tough line on Iran and its allies, and his administration imposed sanctions on Lebanese politicians who back Hezbollah.

Amal leader and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri said his group still backed the French plan. The Free Patriotic Movement, founded by Lebanon's president and allied to Hezbollah, also said it backed the French initiative and a new cabinet had to secure broad support. Critics said Adib did not consult enough.

(Additional reporting by Ellen Francis and Laila Bassam in Beirut and John Irish and Michel Rose in Paris; Writing by Edmund Blair; Editing by Jason Neely, Helen Popper and Andrew Heavens)
BJP National President Jagat Prakash Nadda on Saturday announced the names of the party's new national office-bearers. Tejasvi Surya, an MP from Karnataka, has been appointed as Yuva Morcha President and Rajkumar Chahar as Kisan Morcha President.

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) national president Jagat Prakash Nadda on Saturday announced the names of the partys new national office-bearers. Dr Raman Singh, Mukul Roy, Annapurna Devi, Baijyant Jay Panda are among those appointed as national vice presidents of the party.

While Tejasvi Surya, an MP from Karnataka, has been appointed as Yuva Morcha President and Rajkumar Chahar as Kisan Morcha President. Bhupendra Yadav, Kailash Vijayvargiya, CT Ravi are among those appointed as national general secretary of the party. The reorganisation comes ahead of the crucial Bihar assembly elections.

Extending wishes to the new team members, Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted that he was confident they would uphold the glorious tradition of their Party of serving the people of India selflessly and with dedication.

Also read: India records single-day spike of 85,362 COVID-19 cases; tally crosses 59-lakh mark

Congratulations and best wishes to the new team. I am confident they will uphold the glorious tradition of our Party of serving the people of India selflessly and with dedication. May they work hard to empower the poor and marginalised. https://t.co/5beiCTkcsA  Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) September 26, 2020

Also read: PM Modi to address UNGA today, likely to focus on global action against terrorism

The new team announced by BJP chief JP Nadda on Saturday has former chief ministers of states, where the party lost assembly polls in the last nearly two years, as national vice presidents.

While former Chhattisgarh chief minister Raman Singh and former Rajasthan chief minister Vasundhara Raje continue as national vice presidents, former Jharkhand chief minister Raghubar Das has now been appointed vice president.

Party sources said senior leaders have been accommodated to posts matching their stature. The appointments also indicate that the party wants to use the services and experience of these senior leaders in the party organisation and take their guidance and suggestions on important issues.

Eight months after assuming office, BJP national president Jagat Prakash Nadda has announced a new team on Saturday. Major revamps were expected in the team. Moreover, women and youth were expected to be given an opportunity in the new structure, sources predicted earlier.

Nadda took over as party president in January this year. He was unanimously elected national president of the party at the culmination of the partys organisational poll process.

A former Himachal Pradesh minister, Nadda has the organisational experience and became partys working president in June 2019 after the ruling party swept the Lok Sabha elections.

With names of several senior leaders like Ram Madhav, Anil Jain, Saroj Pandey and P Muralidhar Rao missing from the new list of national office bearers announced by the Bharatiya Janata Party chief JP Nadda on Saturday, speculation is rife that an imminent union cabinet reshuffle is on the cards.

Several other senior leaders like Uma Bharati, Om Mathur, Prabhat Jha, Vinay Sahastrabhuddhe, Shyam Jaju and Avinash Rai Khanna are also missing from the new national team.

Sources said a Cabinet expansion could take place in the next few weeks or after the Bihar Assembly polls. A few of these leaders are likely to be accommodated in the new cabinet.

Party sources said that leaders from several key states like West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, and Telangana are expected to be accommodated in the expansion as the BJP aims to grow in these states in the future.

It is also learnt that Prime Minister Narendra Modi may also rejig the portfolios of several of his ministers. Currently, several ministers have been burdened with multiple portfolios. This may change and some of these may be allocated to the newly inducted ministers, sources added.

The much awaited cabinet reshuffle would be the first such rejig of the Narendra Modi cabinet after it was voted back to power in 2019 Lok Sabha polls.

Also read: India has always given priority to Sri Lanka says PM Modi at virtual bilateral summit
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Sri Lankan counterpart Mahinda Rajapaksa held the first-ever virtual bilateral summit on Friday and discussed a whole range of issues from COVID-19 and financial assistance to cultural ties and maritime security.

The one-hour long virtual interaction, Indias first such summit with a neighbour, was also attended by External Affairs Minister Dr. S Jaishankar and National Security Advisor Ajit Doval. "The discussions were held in a friendly, frank, and cordial manner. The outcomes of the Summit are substantial, forward-looking, and also help to set an ambitious agenda for bilateral ties," the MEA said in a statement.

PM Rajapaksa expressed his firm resolve to use the opportunity provided by the strong 2/3rd majority achieved by his ruling alliance in the Parliament to take bilateral engagement to new heights. Concurring with him, PM Modi also added that the current moment provided a unique opportunity for both countries to work more closely with each other in dealing with the economic impact of COVID-19 and deepening engagement on regional and international issues.

#WATCH The relations between India and Sri Lanka are thousands of years old. According to my government's neighbourhood first policy and SAGAR doctrine, we give special priority to relations between the two countries: PM Narendra Modi at Virtual Bilateral Summit pic.twitter.com/ivBdKTyvE6  ANI (@ANI) September 26, 2020

Links in the sphere of Buddhism

To promote Buddhist ties between the two countries, PM Modi announced a grant assistance of USD15 million which will assist in deepening people-to-people linkages between the two countries in the sphere of Buddhism through constructions/renovations of Buddhist monasteries, capacity development, cultural exchanges, archaeological cooperation, reciprocal exposition of Lord Buddhas relics, strengthening of Buddhist scholarship, and supporting the clergy.

It was agreed that the Indian side would facilitate the visit of a delegation of Buddhist pilgrims from Sri Lanka in the first inaugural flight to the sacred city of Kushinagar, the MEA said. Kushinagar Airport was designated as an international airport recently recognizing its importance as a Buddhist site. PM Rajapaksa also extended an invitation to PM Modi to inaugurate the Jaffna Cultural Centre built with Indian assistance.

READ | Sri Lankan PM Mahinda & President Gotabaya Rajapaksa Wish PM Modi On His 70th Birthday

READ | PM Modi Replies To Sri Lanka's Mahinda Rajapaksa; Says 'looking Forward' To Sept 26 Talk

Economic assistance

Both leaders discussed the economic dimension of the challenges posed by COVID-19 and acknowledged the need for close coordination on issues such as trade and investment including the facilitation of an enabling environment for economic enterprises on both sides and deepening the integration of supply chains for mutual benefit. Prime Minister Modi expressed his hope that the temporary restrictions imposed by the Sri Lankan side on the imports of some products will be relaxed soon since this will also benefit the Sri Lankan economy.

The ongoing infrastructure and connectivity projects were discussed and PM Modi expressed his confidence that the government in Sri Lanka will take early and decisive steps for their early implementation in accordance with existing understandings and in the mutual interest of both sides.

Moreover, technical discussions on Colombo's request for debt deferment is underway and an additional request for a bilateral currency swap arrangement worth around USD 1 billion by the Sri Lankan side to assist with economic recovery and to tackle the Coronavirus related disruptions is under consideration, the MEA said.

The two sides also agreed to strengthen cooperation in the areas of agriculture, animal husbandry, science and technology, sports, health care, and AYUSH as well as skill development by increased training of professionals thereby realizing the full potential of the demographic dividend in both the countries.

READ | Sri Lanka Navy Plugs Fuel Leak From Fire-damaged Oil Tanker Off The Island's East Coast

READ | PM Modi Holds Virtual Summit With Sri Lankan PM Rajapaksa, Hails '1000-year Old Relations'

Both leaders also exchanged views on reconciliation in Sri Lanka and PM Modi called on the new government to "work towards realizing the expectations of Tamils for equality, justice, peace, and dignity within a united Sri Lanka by achieving reconciliation nurtured by the implementation of the Constitutional provisions."

They also exchanged views on the fishermen related issues and agreed to continue and strengthen the ongoing constructive and humanitarian approach to address this issue through existing bilateral mechanisms and instructed relevant officials on both sides to this effect.
Only his daughter yawned. When the 44th President of the United States of America stood, in the bitter cold, in front of 900,000 people, and told them what he wanted to do for their nation, only his youngest daughter yawned. She was cold, and tired, and 11 years old, and had probably heard quite a lot of it before. But for everyone else, and the millions watching around the world, it was the kind of speech to wake you up.

Even if you didnt listen to the words, it was the kind of speech to wake you up. Even if you just listened to the rhythms of the words, which were sometimes like the rhythms of poetry, and sometimes like the rhythms of music, and which made you feel that youd started in one place when you started listening and ended, when it finished, somewhere else. But if you did listen to the words, it could only make you think of something that was mentioned an awful lot when the President was trying to get elected the first time, but which hadnt been mentioned for quite a while. It could only make you think, in fact, of hope.

Making history

When, for example, Barack Obama said that a free market only thrives when there are rules to ensure competition and fair play, it made you think that maybe there was some alternative to a market that always puts profit first. When he said that a great nation must care for the vulnerable, and protect its people from lifes worst hazards, it made you think that maybe it was possible for a country to face economic realities, and still make sure that it wasnt always the poorest who faced them most. And when he said that his country would respond to the threat of climate change and the overwhelming judgement of science, it made you think that, even in a country where quite a lot of people think the world was made in seven days, reason could sometimes win.

And when he talked about all people being created equal, and then said that those people included our gay brothers and sisters, it made you think that this was a way for a man who had already made history to make history again. It made you think that making sure some people werent treated differently to other people just because of who they slept with was exactly the kind of thing the most powerful nation in the world should be doing.

It made you think, in fact, that it was a much more important thing to be doing than sending soldiers to fight wars which even the most powerful nation in the world couldnt seem, any more, to win. It made you think of the decade of war Barack Obama said was ending, and that it was probably best for everyone, and particularly for the relatives of the soldiers who had died, not to think too much about what that decade of war had achieved.

It made you remember what he said about enduring security not coming about through perpetual war. And that he seemed to think it was better to show the courage to try and resolve our differences with other nations peacefully and strengthen the institutions that extend our capacity to manage crisis abroad than to declare wars, on things like terror, that are very, very, very hard to win.

It also made you think that it was a shame that David Cameron hadnt heard the speech before he said on Monday that he would completely overcome violent groups like the one which took hostages at a gas plant in Algeria last week. We must, he said, frustrate the terrorists with our security, beat them militarily, address the poisonous narrative they feed on, and close down the ungoverned space in which they thrive. Since six British workers had just been killed, you could understand why hed want to sound as though it was the kind of thing he wouldnt want to happen again. Youd be surprised if anyone, except violent groups who liked taking people hostage, did. But you also wanted to ask him if he realised that that ungoverned space was really quite big.

Dealing with poison

You wanted to say that it was, of course, a good thing that the number of terrorist plots against Britain that started in Afghanistan and Pakistan had, in the past four years, fallen from three-quarters to less than half, but that it was a shame that they had started in Yemen, Somalia and a lot of North Africa instead. And that what that seemed to show was that what he called a poisonous ideology wasnt something you could destroy with guns and tanks, and that if you did manage to get rid of it in one place, it would just spring up somewhere else.

You wanted to remind him that taking action in someone elses country always had consequences you didnt quite expect. That intervening in Libya, for example, looked as if it might have added to the strength of Islamist militant groups across North Africa, which was part of the problem you now faced. You wanted to ask him if he listened to the interview with a man whose brother had just been killed in Algeria. You cant guard every installation across the world, said Bob Whiteside, just because of these fanatics. If theyre going to attack, theyll do it.

Yes, they will. It would be nice if we could stop bad people from doing bad things, but we cant. It would be nice if we could crush poisonous ideologies in other countries around the world, but we cant do that either. We are, as the 44th President of the United States has made clear, and as even his youngest daughter would probably, if she could keep awake, agree, better off trying to tackle the challenges, and injustices, and economy, and inequalities, and, of course, the poisonous ideologies, in our own.
Vyacheslav Zolochevskyi stayed alive despite a fireball explosion when an Antonov An-26 military aircraft

Transport plane was carrying 28 passengers when it crashed and caught on fire in town of Chuhuiv, Ukraine

Deputy Interior Minister said 'it's impossible to establish the cause' of the crash which killed 22 people

An urgent investigation into the crash has been commissioned by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky

A Ukrainian air force cadet today told how he was the miracle lone survivor in a plane crash in which 26 died when he felt he was 'in a computer game'.

Vyacheslav Zolochevskyi stayed alive despite a fireball explosion when an Antonov An-26 military aircraft with a 'faulty engine' came down one mile short of its airfield.

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New footage has emerged showing the moment the military craft slammed to earth and exploded into flames.

After the crash Zolochevskyi looked round to see his friend covered in flames and tried to put out the inferno.

Vyacheslav Zolochevskyi (pictured) is the lone survivor of the crash after an Antonov An-26 military aircraft with a 'faulty engine' came down one mile short of its airfield

Fellow cadet Nikolai Mikitchenko (pictured) died earlier today as he became the 25th victim of the air crash

Head of Kharkiv administration Oleksiy Kucher, who spoke to the cadet in hospital, said: 'He said it was like a computer game, that when he got to his feet, he saw his friend burning.

'And he was actually helping to put out the flames on this guy who was also brought into hospital.'

The cadet he tried to save - named Nikolai Mikitchenko died today, the 25th victim of the air crash.

Kucher said the miracle survivor - in his early 20s - 'doesn't remember everything, he lost consciousness at some point.

'After he regained cam roundhe began to put out the flames on his colleague.

'He survived while being inside the plane. But physically he is in a satisfactory state.'

His mother Irina Zolochevskaya told how she feared he had died.

She said: 'He is alive. He jumped [out of the plane], he managed to survive

'When I heard about the catastrophe, and read it was training flights for cadets, I didn't know what to do.I was afraid that my son was gone too.'

Military doctor Eduard Khorshun said: 'His condition is medium grave. There is no threat to life, his condition is stable.'

One of two military cadets who survived the tragic plane crash near Kharkiv in the Ukraine yesterday after they jumped out of the plummeting aircraft has died

At least 22 people including military cadets were killed and two others seriously injured on Friday when a Ukranian air force plane crashed near Kharkiv in the east of the country

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky (pictured), who arrived at the crash site, declared September 26 a national day of mourning for the victims of the crash

Crash site: The remains of the Ukrainian military aircraft which crashed on Friday killing most of the passengers on board, some of which were cadets

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, who arrived at the crash site, declared September 26 a national day of mourning for the victims of the crash.

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The transport plane was carrying a total of 28 passengers when it crashed and burst into flames in the town of Chuhuiv in Ukraine.

Deputy Interior Minister Anton Gerashchenko said: 'Twenty-two people died, the search for two other people is continuing'.

The transport plane was carrying a total of 28 passengers when it crashed and burst into flames in the town of Chuhuiv in Ukraine

Deputy Interior Minister Anton Gerashchenko said: 'Twenty-two people died, the search for two other people is continuing'

Wreckage of an AN-26 military plane seen after it crashed in the town of Chuguyiv after it crashed and burst into flames on Friday night

Click here to resize this module

The transport plane was carrying a total of 28 passengers when it crashed, including 21 military students and seven crew, he said.

'It's a shock,' he added. 'At the moment it's impossible to establish the cause' of the crash.'

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he would travel to the region on Saturday.

'We are urgently creating a commission to investigate all the circumstances and causes of the tragedy,' he wrote on Facebook.

Firefighters at the crash site of the Antonov An-26 plane on Friday night as they desperately tried to extinguish the flames

It took firefighters about an hour to put the burning wreckage of the plane out

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he would travel to the region on Saturday. 'We are urgently creating a commission to investigate all the circumstances and causes of the tragedy,' he wrote on Facebook

The Antonov-26 transport aircraft crashed at around 8:50 pm local time (5.50GMT), two kilometres from the Chuhuiv military air base, the emergency services said

The town of Chuhuiv is around 30 kilometers southeast of Kharkiv and 100 kilometres west of the front line with the pro-Russian separatists

Pictured is a Slovak AIrforce Antonov AN-26 troop carrier aircraft (the same type which crashed last night in Ukraine)

The Antonov-26 transport aircraft crashed at around 8:50 pm local time (5.50GMT), two kilometres from the Chuhuiv military air base, the emergency services said.

The plane caught fire after the crash and was extinguished after one hour.

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The town of Chuhuiv is around 30 kilometers southeast of Kharkiv and 100 kilometres west of the front line with the pro-Russian separatists.
Sept 21 (Reuters) - Gold miner B2Gold on Monday sought to reassure investors that Mali's political situation was improving after a military coup last month hit shares in the company and other Mali-focused miners.

Shares in B2Gold and other miners in the West African country, including Barrick Gold, AngloGold Ashanti and Hummingbird Resources, slid on the day of the coup but the companies said their operations were unaffected by the political upheaval.

"The political situation is headed in the right direction," B2Gold CEO Clive Johnson told the Gold Forum Americas conference on Monday.

"The new military leadership is ... working closely with the business community and others to make this a seamless transition."

Retired colonel Bah Ndaw was named interim president of Mali on Monday while Colonel Assimi Goita, the leader of the junta that seized power on Aug. 18, was appointed vice president.

It was unclear whether the appointments would satisfy the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), which has threatened to impose a total embargo on landlocked Mali if its conditions are not met.

B2Gold expects its Fekola mine in Mali to produce between 590,000 and 620,000 ounces of gold this year, according to the company's website, up from 455,810 ounces in 2019.

Earlier on Monday Kinross Gold said it sees a very low risk of political unrest spreading from Mali to its northern neighbour Mauritania, where the Canadian company has a gold mine it plans to expand.

(Reporting by Helen Reid and Jeff Lewis Editing by Jonathan Oatis and David Goodman)
A group of human rights lawyers in Warri, southern Nigeria, is seeking compensation for four hotel workers who were allegedly stripped naked by their employer.



They had been accused of stealing some money, but local media are reporting that they had been tipped by some guests.



The four, three women and a man, were allegedly ordered to undress and were left wearing only their knickers or underpants as others, including the police, looked on.



The lawyers have written to the hotel owner - a former Nigerian minister - threatening legal action over the violation of the privacy and dehumanization of their clients.



They are asking for compensation and a public apology.



The victims said that the photos and videos were shared on the internet to humiliate them.

Source: BBC









Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority.

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We are witnessing the slow demise of one of the great conceits of the modern world: the notion that the big-hearted State can protect us against every misfortune and that human beings are mere tools of State policy to be pushed about like pawns on a chessboard according to the changing impulses of its ministers.

The attempt to control the spread of Covid-19 by coercion has failed. It has failed in Britain. It has failed throughout Europe and North America.

It has failed in Israel. It has failed in Australia. The measures which these countries have taken have varied in their severity, but not in their outcome.

What is the plan, now that the risk of overwhelming the NHS has subsided? Where is the exit route? These are all important questions. But all we get for answers are sub-Churchillian blather from the Prime Minister and snarling threats from Mr Hancock

A lockdown is the most extreme form of social distancing in the State's armoury. Yet wherever it has been imposed, the virus has simply bounced back to hit us when it was lifted.

Some of the most repressive measures, like those imposed in Spain and Israel, have seen the worst outcomes.

If lockdowns do not work, what hope is there for lesser measures like the rule of six and pub curfews, which are like fighting off a tiger with a feather duster?

Aggressive measures of social distancing have failed for two straightforward reasons.

Principally, they conflict with the most basic instincts of humanity. We are social animals.

The attempt to control the spread of Covid-19 by coercion has failed. It has failed in Britain. It has failed throughout Europe and North America. It has failed in Israel. It has failed in Australia. The measures which these countries have taken have varied in their severity, but not in their outcome. Health Secretary Matt Hancock is pictured above

Our instincts and our culture are based on interconnections with other humans.

The whole organisation of our lives, in cities, workplaces, schools and families depends on physical proximity.

It is possible to isolate limited numbers of people who are diagnosed as infectious.

Human societies have done this from time immemorial. But the whole population cannot be turned into hermits at the Government's command.

Also, aggressive measures of social distancing can only have a significant impact on the spread of an endemic disease if they are kept in place indefinitely.

This would not only crush the social dimension of our humanity. It would destroy our economy and the education and job prospects of our children.

It would also require brutal methods of enforcement which would violate basic standards of decency.

There must be a price which is too high to pay, even for saving lives. In the long run, the Government's measures will not even do that.

Theoretically, Covid-19 might spontaneously mutate in ways which will make it less dangerous. But short of that, no serious epidemiologist thinks that it will simply go away.

Even a vaccine will not necessarily provide long-term or universal protection. There is a growing consensus that we will have to live with Covid-19 long term. The State can prepare its health services.

It can fund scientific research. But in the long run, it cannot save us from infection by new pathogens.

This is an unwelcome mesSage for the many people who instinctively believe in the universal efficacy of State action. But we have to face facts.

Unfortunately, public debate is descending into a polarised slanging match reminiscent of the worst of the arguments about Brexit.

People who object to social distancing resort to abuse of those who are nervous of the disease, dismissing them as craven wets and cowards.

If lockdowns do not work, what hope is there for lesser measures like the rule of six and pub curfews, which are like fighting off a tiger with a feather duster? People are pictured above in Soho, London

On the other hand, those who support aggressive measures of social control just get cross when presented with unpalatable truths.

They appeal to social solidarity, bandying epithets like 'selfish'. The problem about solidarity is that it is really a call to abandon rational thought and logical analysis in favour of emotion. Solidarity in an ill-thought out cause helps no one.

I am getting used to being labelled a 'libertarian' as if this was a self-evidently bad thing to be. I would not like to live in a country where people rejected liberty. Nor, I suspect, would those who use 'libertarian' as a term of abuse.

In fact, I have never believed that liberty is an absolute value, overriding all other considerations. But I regard it as an important value, which is the fundamental condition of human happiness and creativity.

It follows that those who press for measures to curtail it can reasonably be expected to produce convincing evidence that those measures are likely to work and will not be worse than the effects of the disease.

What kind of evidence has our Government ever produced?

At an early stage, it claimed to be 'guided by the science'. This would have been a specious claim even if it were true because the issue is not just scientific. It is also moral, social, constitutional and economic.

We could not just leave it to scientists, even if the scientists were agreed. But they are not agreed. To name only the more prominent dissenters, Professors Carl Heneghan and Sanetra Gupta of Oxford University, Professor Mark Woolhouse of Edinburgh University, the Nobel Prize winner Professor Michael Levitt of Stanford University, the Swedish state epidemiologist Anders Tegnell and the behavioural scientist Professor Robert Dingwall have all questioned some of the basic assumptions underlying the Government's measures.

Their arguments have been rational and evidence-based, but have received no coherent answer to date.

One reason for that is that the Government has not, in fact, been guided by the science. The published minutes of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) suggest that there were three main themes of the advice that was given in March, when the lockdown was imposed.

All three have been borne out by subsequent events, but all three were ignored by ministers.

The first was the importance of trusting to the public's good sense and instinct for self-preservation. On March 13, ten days before the lockdown, Sage advised that 'citizens should be treated as rational, capable of taking decisions for themselves and managing personal risk'.

The Government has never accepted that. It has throughout resorted instinctively to coercion.

The second theme of Sage's advice was that we are not all in this together. The main risks are faced by the old and clinically vulnerable, but the burden of universal measures of control is borne mainly by the young and healthy, for whom the symptoms were likely to be mild and the risk of death tiny. Government measures should recognise the distinction.

On March 10, Sage advised that 'social distancing ('cocooning') is for those 70 and over, as well as those of any age in vulnerable groups'.

Three days later, the Government's Chief Scientific Adviser Sir Patrick Vallance told Radio Four's Today programme that the aim was to build up some herd immunity among the young and healthy who could safely be exposed to the disease while protecting the most vulnerable who could not.

This would have been a rational policy based on a real distinction. The latest bulletin of the Office for National Statistics records that more than 89 per cent of deaths associated with Covid-19 have been of people aged over 65.

In the overwhelming majority of cases, they also had serious underlying conditions. But the Government's measures have been applied indiscriminately to everyone. This is not rational policy-making.

The third theme was that aggressive social distancing measures would have little effect in the long term unless they remained in place until a vaccine was available, something which would need careful thought about the social and economic cost.

'Measures which are too effective,' the Imperial College team advised on February 25, 'merely push all transmission to the period after they are lifted, giving a delay but no substantial reduction in either peak incidence or overall attack rate.' That advice was repeated on several subsequent occasions and repeatedly ignored.

The Government was blown off course by two things.

I am getting used to being labelled a 'libertarian' as if this was a self-evidently bad thing to be. I would not like to live in a country where people rejected liberty, writes Lord Sumption, pictured above

Initially, there was rage in the media about the notion of herd immunity, although it is no more than a factual description of the way epidemics have come to an end throughout history.

And then there was Government scientist Professor Neil Ferguson's statistical model suggesting a 'reasonable worst case scenario' of 510,000 deaths. That prediction assumed that vulnerable people would take no distancing precautions if left to themselves, which was never a realistic assumption.

It also assumed that infections would increase exponentially, a view supported by no reliable data at the time and contradicted by the experience of China, where infections had levelled off quite early.

They are making the same mistake now. The fancy charts produced by [Chief Medical Officer] Chris Whitty and Sir Patrick on Monday assumed an exponential growth of infections, with cases doubling every week. Yet the recent experience of France and Spain, which they claimed to be studying, contradicts this.

There, taking the onset of symptoms as the relevant time, infections have been doubling every three weeks for a limited period before levelling off.

This kind of briefing undermines public trust in the information that we are being given, some of which seems designed more to terrify us into submission than to present the real risks.

The Government says that if it does not control every one, the disease will spread from the young and healthy to the old and vulnerable.

This is a big risk in care homes, where people cannot shield themselves against infection by staff and where, shamefully, more than 40 per cent of Covid-related deaths have occurred.

But care homes are the one environment where public authorities ought to be in control, with proper supplies of PPE and frequent tests of staff. Outside care homes, the risk to the old and vulnerable depends on the choices which they make.

With a few exceptions (such as those living in multi-generational households), they can shelter themselves if they wish. Many of them will prefer to take the risk. Those who have less time remaining to them may rationally prefer quality of life to quantity.

They may prefer to hug their grandchildren than to treat them as angels of death. Why should they not be allowed to make that choice for themselves, instead of having some distant minister make it for them?

We all know our own situation and that of the people around us, and can manage the epidemic better than Messrs Johnson and Hancock if we are allowed to.

Yet we are told that they will lock us down if we not do the Government's bidding and possibly even if we do. We are menaced with 10,000 fines at the discretion of any policeman in the land.

We are advised to inform on our neighbours. In Scotland, students are ordered in strident tones not to go to pubs or socialise, and in England we are told that they might not be allowed home for Christmas.

What kind of country have we become where arrogant bullying of this kind is regarded as a proper function of ministers?

We now learn that the Government expects current restrictions to last six months. Until what?

Until the virus obligingly departs? Until there is an effective vaccine, whenever that may be?

Until the next ill-considered idea for reordering our lives? What is the plan, now that the risk of overwhelming the NHS has subsided? Where is the exit route?

These are all important questions. But all we get for answers are sub-Churchillian blather from the Prime Minister and snarling threats from Mr Hancock.

This is all about covering politicians' backs. Ministers cannot retreat from the policy of coercion without implicitly admitting that it never was a good idea.

They think that they will be criticised for inaction even if action is useless and propels millions into misery and financial disaster.

They hope that they will still be able to say 'At least we did what we could'.

I suggest that this is a miscalculation. When the final accounts are taken, the only country where people are likely to feel gratitude for their rulers is Sweden.

In Britain, those who believe that wise governments can triumph over epidemic disease will say that this Government failed because it was not wise enough.

Those who believe that governments cannot, Canute-like, bid the incoming tides to retreat, will blame them for their blighted job-prospects, increased taxes, empty pockets and lost months.

Either way, the Government will be damned.

So it might as well try acting in the public interest for a change.
The Lebanese security forces killed at least two militants during a heavy exchange of fire on Saturday with an armed group in northeast Lebanon, close to the Syrian border, security sources said, Trend reports citing Reuters.

Three members of the Lebanese security forces were also injured in the clash, which began after Lebanese forces raided a house in the Wadi Khaled area, where the group that was suspected of planning attacks was holed up, the sources said.

The group included Syrians and Lebanese, the sources said, adding that the scale of the clash, in which militants fired rocket propelled grenades, prompted the Lebanese army to cordon off the area.

The sources said the group included people linked to the militant Khaled al-Talawi, who was killed earlier this month in a shootout with security forces. Four Lebanese soldiers were killed in that clash.

Talawi was described as a former member of the Islamic State group and leader of a cell behind the killing in August of three people in north Lebanon.
New Delhi: Actress Bhumi Pednekar is an environmentally conscious citizen who has taken up climate conservation as a cause to raise awareness among fellow Indians. Bhumi has launched a lauded online and offline initiative called Climate Warrior through which she is mobilising citizens of India to contribute towards protecting the environment.

Now, Bhumi Pednekar is reaching out to school students to involve them towards climate conservation and has collaborated with a key global initiative, Climate Action Project, which reaches out to 10 million students across 107 countries!

Bhumi says, The changes we are observing are a real and are an undeniable threat to our entire civilization. This current year we have witnessed the Australian bushfires burning 18 million hectares of land, one billion animals were killed and many endangered species in the country were driven to extinction. We saw the Oil spill in Russias Arctic region, Uttarakhand forest fires burning 51 hectares of land, we faced the Cyclone Amphan in West Bengal and Odisha, strongest to hit the West Bengal in over a decade, with 86 deaths in the state and finally we witness the California wildfires, where 3,154,107 total acres burned.

She urges students to come forward and raise their voice on climate conservation globally.

Bhumi says, The effects are already visible and will be catastrophic unless we act now. We need everyone joining hands together to ensure that we leave behind barrels of hope and prosperity for the current generations and generations to come and education is the significant channel to achieve this goal. Let us join hands and us make a difference.

The Climate Action project was launched in October 2020 and is supported by governments in 15 countries. The project is free, student-centred and aims to lead to a change of behaviour through education. The project has collaborated with WWF and NASA and allows teachers to connect and interact with other teachers from every continent.
Matara hotel owner slams officials over COVID scare By Kumudini Hettiarachchi, Ruqyyaha Deane and Meleeza Rathnayake View(s): View(s):

The Matara hotel owner, who lodged a COVID-suspect Russian airline crew member and 14 others, has accused the authorities of trying to make them the scapegoat for failure in health procedures at the Mattala airport (MRIA) as buck-passing continued amidst an official inquiry.

Chief Epidemiologist Dr. Sudath Samaraweera said an antibody test done on the Russian came positive today and this meant that he had a past COVID infection.

The crew member, who had flown with others on a return flight to the BIA and then MRIA from Bangalore in India, and was warded at Hambantota, has been discharged and was due to fly back to Russia from the BIA yesterday. The others have already left Sri Lanka to a still undisclosed destination.

The Russian tested positive on Wednesday when the 15 of them had got tests done at a private hospital prior to their scheduled departure the next day. Subsequent tests, after he was taken to the Hambantota COVID-19 Treatment Centre, had turned out to be negative.

The crew had visited supermarkets in and around Matara triggering fears mid-week that the southern city would have to be placed on a lockdown after the discovery of the COVID positive pilot.

Chairman of the 20-room Amaloh Beach Boutique Resort told the Sunday Times he had been given the go-ahead to house the crew by the MRIA and he knew something was wrong only after soldiers surrounded his hotel.

Airport and Aviation Services Chairman (Ret) Major General G.A. Chandrasiri admitted to what he called a small mistake in the documentation and said the matter was being sorted out.

Public Health Inspectors and health officials said they were unaware of the presence of the Russians.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 16:25:34|Editor: huaxia

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Photo taken on Sept. 9, 2020 shows the street view of the Chinatown at noon in San Francisco, the United States. (Xinhua/Wu Xiaoling)

Given Friday's new numbers, the state projected an 89-percent increase in hospitalized COVID-19 patients, from nearly 2,600 patients to more than 4,800 in late October.

LOS ANGELES, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- California's top health official said Friday that the latest data of COVID-19 in the state was worrisome, since it could be an early sign showing a "second wave" of the virus is coming.

California's Director of Health and Human Services Mark Ghaly updated the pandemic situation in the golden state at an online video briefing on Friday evening, saying 3,400 new cases were reported in the previous 24 hours, which marks a slight uptick from recent lows.

Meanwhile, the state's positivity rate begun to rise, he said, adding that state-wide coronavirus-related emergency department visits and new hospitalizations due to the virus are on the rise in the past week as well.

The more concerning number is the 14-day rolling average of new cases, which begun to climb by 100 or so daily in the past few days.

Photo taken on Sept. 9, 2020 shows the street view at noon in San Francisco, the United States. (Xinhua/Wu Xiaoling)

Ghaly said these numbers could be the first indication of a rising trend, which has been warned by local health experts for weeks after Labor Day.

During the big holiday early this month, many residents gathered for parties and barbecues. Moreover, wildfires across the state, which occurred at almost the same time, forced some people out of their houses and into more communal settings.

Given Friday's new numbers, the state projected an 89-percent increase in hospitalized COVID-19 patients, from nearly 2,600 patients to more than 4,800 in late October.

In California's largest county -- Los Angeles -- health officials reported this week that the transmission rate, or the number of new cases seen for every current case, had risen above one for the first time in weeks. 
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 21:22:11|Editor: huaxia

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by Dana Halawi

BEIRUT, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Experts said the failure of the newly appointed Lebanese Prime Minister Mustapha Adib to form a government comprised of specialists will plunge the country into the unknown.

Adib declared on Saturday his failure to form a cabinet due to the insistence by the two Shiite political parties to hold the Finance Ministry portfolio while rejecting Adib's proposal to change the sectarian leadership of the Finance Ministry.

Adib declared that he had accepted to be appointed as prime minister on the basis that he would have the freedom to form a totally independent government away from political parties to enable it to work on implementing proper reforms. But the continuous intervention of parties was a major obstacle facing his mission.

Lebanese President Michel Aoun accepted Adib's resignation while assuring that the presidency is committed to carrying on with the French initiative which aims at securing a neutral cabinet capable of undertaking major structural reforms to save the country from its current collapse.

In a Xinhua interview, Ibrahim Halawi, lecturer on Middle East politics at Royal Holloway, University of London, said he believes that the French Initiative is unlikely to be revived, as the hurdles it faced are structural ones, which pertain to Lebanon's post-war consociational power-sharing arrangement.

"We are now in a phase where sectarian leaders are giving up any form of real governance just to avoid the collapse of the consociational order," he said.

"In other words, society will have to endure harsh repercussions of economic downfall in return for maintaining a political order that is structurally incapable of governing," he continued.

Political analyst from the Lebanese University Youssef Diab told Xinhua that the French initiative is failed, as the failure of Adib to form a neutral cabinet will make it impossible for any Sunni figure to assume the role of prime minister in the near future.

Adib was appointed as prime minister on Aug. 31 following the resignation of Hassan Diab after the blasts that rocked Beirut on Aug. 4.

Adib has tried since then to form a cabinet but political interventions aimed at protecting different parties' interests obstructed his mission.

In Lebanon, the division of post-war political benefits on the basis of confessional and sectarian equality has only served to strengthen the logic of sectarianism throughout state institutions across the country over the past years.

Political analysts do not see an imminent solution in Lebanon without a complete overhaul of the political system in the country.

"It takes the initiative to build a civil state and rid society from this counter-productive power-sharing order, otherwise there is very little that my imagination can produce," Halawi said when asked about solutions to the Lebanese crisis.

Likewise, journalist and independent political analyst Amine Kammourieh emphasized the need for an overhaul in the political system in Lebanon to be able to implement reforms in the country and catch up with other countries capable of implementing various projects in different sectors including oil and gas, electricity, and railway.

"Otherwise, we will be stuck with a caretaker government or a one-color government similar to that of caretaker prime minister Diab," he said. Enditem
TROY  The 20-year-old Cohoes man charged with fatally shooting an 11-year-old boy in Troy earlier this month had been released from jail in June  where he was being held on robbery, weapons and reckless endangerment  because he had not been indicted within 45 days of his arrest last October.

Jah Quay E. Brown has a lengthy criminal history dating to at least 2016 that includes arrests for a shooting as well as assaults, robbery and larceny charges, according to court records.

Shane Hug, a local attorney and former Rensselaer County assistant district attorney, was appointed as a special prosecutor in Brown's case for the weapons and reckless endangerment charges in the city of Albany connected to a drive-by shooting.

Troy Police Department

Hug on Friday confirmed that Brown was released from jail in June after his attorney, Gennaro Calabrese, filed a writ of habeus corpus motion seeking his client's release from custody due to the amount of time that he had been behind bars without being indicted.

The release took place not long after the coronavirus pandemic had brought New York's court system to a crawl, including the empaneling of grand juries.

Hug said he had no grounds to oppose Calabrese's motion and added that Brown's release from custody "had nothing to do with bail reform."

Brown's defense attorney, Gennaro Calabrese, could not be reached for comment.

Brown's arrest last October took place about two weeks after he was shot in the head on First Street in Albany. That shooting left Brown briefly hospitalized. He was shot less than a month after the drive-by shooting in Albany in which he was identified by police as the driver of the vehicle from which the shots where fired. Those charges, first-degree assault and reckless endangerment, both felonies, led to Brown's arrest on Oct. 21.

He was also arraigned on Oct. 24 for an unrelated robbery in Guilderland. Brown had been in custody at Albany County jail from late October until he was released on a court order in early June granting the writ motions  one for a robbery charge in Guilderland and the second in the Albany shooting case.

There was also no grand jury impaneled in Albany County from roughly March to July. But an executive order from Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo had stayed pre-trial and speedy trial requirements during the pandemic. That means the special prosecutor could have asked for a stay on the motions for a writ that were filed by Brown's attorney, but apparently did not.

Hug said the robbery and shooting-related charges are both active cases and that Brown's release from custody in June does not mean he will not face indictment.

"I know that everyone is looking for someone to blame for this heinous act," Hug said of the boy's shooting death. "The bottom line is the only person responsible for the death of this innocent child is the person who pulled the trigger; allegedly that person is Mr. Brown. Ayshawn's family has my deepest sympathies."

While he was at Albany County jail earlier this year, Brown also was charged with felony gang assault for an attack on another inmate. That case remains pending in Colonie and is also assigned to a special prosecutor.

On Thursday morning, Brown was charged with killing 11-year-old Ayshawn Davis in a drive-by shooting on Old Sixth Avenue on Sept. 13, according to Troy police.

Brown faces a maximum sentence of life in prison if convicted of second-degree murder. Brown told the judge during his arraignment that he was "concerned about my safety and my well-being."

Troy's deputy police chief, Dan DeWolf, said a handgun that police believe was used in the boy's shooting was recovered from Brown's residence.

Police declined to say whether Brown was the shooter in the drive-by shooting, or if others may have been involved.

Troy police credited the State Police Special Investigations Unit and other law enforcement agencies for providing assistance that helped lead to Browns arrest.
The disruption caused by the Covid-19 pandemic must be seen as an opportunity to radically reform the health sector by effectively harnessing the power of technology and artificial intelligence powered tools, Vice President M Venkaiah said on Saturday.

Addressing an event of American Association of Physicians of Indian Origin (AAPI) online, he called for digitisation of health records and creation of a national platform to facilitate collection of comprehensive healthcare data across the country.

This, Naidu said, will ensure that all stakeholders in the health sector are digitally connected.

He felt that the analysis of data collected can produce valuable information, which can be used to improve the effectiveness of the health system.

"Disruption caused by the pandemic must be seen as an opportunity to radically reform our health sector," Naidu said.

For latest updates on Coronavirus outbreak, click here

The vice president opined that as the world's second most-populous country with a track record of rapid economic growth, India faces both unique challenges and unprecedented opportunities in the sphere of public health.

Asserting the need to deliver quality healthcare to all irrespective of where one is living, Naidu said that healthcare and medical facilities should be accessible and affordable for all.

He cautioned that these challenges are not simple enough to be tackled by the government alone and called for concerted and coordinated efforts from both the private and public sectors.

Naidu asked private sector players to strengthen the hands of the government in its quest to deliver quality healthcare to the last citizen.

Observing that countries with strong primary healthcare systems have better health outcomes, the vice president emphasised the need to strengthen India's primary healthcare system.

"The private sector must collaborate with various state governments in establishing state-of-the-art primary healthcare facilities in each district, he said.
Mikhail Klimentyev/Getty

MOSCOWRussia these days may look frightening to Americans, who hear often of election meddling and poisoning among other ill deeds. But consider for a moment the view from the other side of the divide, or at least the view presented to Russians by their television sets.

The looming potential for World War III has become a regular topic on Russian state propaganda shows. Night after night, Vladimir Soloviev, who is often described as the Kremlins top propagandist, condemns the Wests economically suffocating strategy of imposing sanctions and suggest war is the logical outcome.

The conclusion reached by Soloviev and his like-minded panel of guests is that the countrys politicians and titans of business should break all ties with the West, including communicating with their relatives. A long history of grievances spills out; Soloviev says the conflict between Russia and the West started in the 13th century: They believe we are barbarians and they are civilized, so they have a right to point out to us how we should live and behave.

Trump Followed Russian Medias Lead on SCOTUS Prediction

The show, which is broadcast nightly on state channel 1, heats up quickly. This week, Sergei Kurginyan, a pro-Kremlin political expert close to the secret services, accused the West of tearing Russia apart by creating a fifth column in the Far East, where thousands of Russians have been marching in anti-Putin rallies for two months. Putins nemesis Alexei Navalny was out East bolstering the opposition rallies when he was poisoned with a deadly nerve agent.

Kurginyan has been consistently criticizing the Russian elite for pursuing naive dreams about becoming part of European society: Our elites have grown together with Europe through family connections, children, grandchildren. But in the current situation they will have to tear these connections apart. That will be terribly painful but you will have to do that, he said.

A popular newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda announced in plain language on Friday that: The world is under a threat of the Third World War over the Russian COVID-19 vaccine. The paper claimed the European Union and the U.S. were furious about Russia selling millions of doses of its vaccines to Brazil and Africa.

Story continues

The Russian nationalist publication Tsargrad also carried an overheated headline on Friday, claiming an invented military victory: NATO Exercises Failed: Russian Ships Scared Americans and Ukrainians Away.

What has caused this latest storm of anti-Western propaganda?

This week, the U.S. imposed new commercial restrictions on Yevgeniy Prigozhin, the oligarch known as Putins chef. The companies operated by Prigozhin, one of Putins most trusted lieutenants, are linked to the Wagner mercenary army and troll farms responsible for U.S. election interference. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo also suggested this week that the order to poison Navalny came from senior Russian officials, the pressure grows on Putin to explain the poisoning or face yet more sanctions. Both the European Union and Britain are also preparing sanctions against Putins partner in Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, after a violent crackdown on the opposition and a fraudulent election.

The age-old theme of a conflict of civilizations between East and West has been resurfacing on state media outlets. This undercurrent is at the core of the Wests issues with Russia, the propaganda outlets insist.

If the West continues to punish Vladimir Putins allies with economic sanctions and block Russian movement around the world, they say, Moscow will come up with a new strategy building on alliances with other Western antagonists. We have not sent forces to Ukraine, to Kyiv only for the sake of our relations with Europe. By the new strategy we would deploy the forces and surely our allies in Turkey and China would respect us for such a strong decision, prominent Kremlin-aligned political analyst Sergey Markov tells The Daily Beast.

Russian Media Is Rooting for Civil War in America: The Worse, the Better

The propaganda outlets portray Putin and his allies withdrawing from the world, as if in a besieged castle, to isolate and defend themselves.

Russias ability to respond in kind with sanctions is limited. A few weeks ago, the Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov imposed sanctions against Pompeo after the U.S. State Department sanctioned members of his family. But this was widely seen as little more than a joke since Pompeo has no property or bank accounts in Chechnya. Still, the story made the Russian-speaking news. Olga Skobeyeva, a host of one of the more popular political talk shows, 60 Minutes, praised Kadyrovs cool sanctions.

Germany and France are demanding that the Kremlin investigate last months poisoning of Navalny with the Soviet-era chemical weapon Novichok. But the last two decades of Russian history show how strongly Putin resists any demand imposed by the West. Instead, they are ramping up the propaganda. They say, Oh, you once again want to tear us apart, here is our answer to you. And Putin comes out with a speech about the most powerful hypersonic weapon, a commentator on independent Rain TV, Pavel Lobkov, told The Daily Beast.

Last weekend, on Russias Day of the Gunsmithan obscure holiday which is usually ignoredPutin went on television to discuss Russias latest nuclear weapons. They can reach anywhere in the world, he said. The Avangard hypersonic glide vehicles can wipe out a territory the size of Texas or France, viewers were told. Putin blamed the U.S. for the withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic-Missile treaty back in 2002. We had to create these weapons in response to the U.S. deploying a strategic missile defense system, which in the future would be able to actually neutralize, nullify our entire nuclear potential, Putin said.

On Friday, Putin asked the White House for a truce on the information war, which is laughable since Western intelligence agencies say the Kremlin has already been targeting the 2020 presidential election. Nonetheless, Markov explains that Moscow is expecting incoming rhetorical fire during the height of the American election season: Russian intelligence has informed Vladimir Putin earlier this year of rough attacks on him personally coming up, he said. That might happen during the U.S. elections, the conflict might enter a hot phase, so it is time to buy canned food.

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More than 60,000 Britons are unable to tell the long-awaited NHS Test and Trace app whether they have tested positive for coronavirus, the Government has admitted in the latest fiasco to engulf the UK's 'world-leading' testing system.

Results from swabs examined by NHS hospitals and Public Health England - more than 70,000 a day - cannot be entered into the app as they are not supplied with a test code, the Department of Health has confirmed.

The oversight means sufferers are unable to send out alerts to people they have been near to advise them to self-isolate to curb the spread of coronavirus.

It also means that those who have alerted the app to their symptoms - either a high temperature, new continuous cough or loss of taste and smell - cannot turn off its 14-day self-isolation countdown.

More than four million people have downloaded the app since it was made available on Thursday, after its launch was delayed by four months.

The Department of Health said they had now fixed the problem, and advised NHS Track and Trace would continue to contact people who had tested positive to locate their contacts.

The oversight exposes a major flaw in the test and trace system as users are unable to send out an alert advising others to self-isolate - limiting the spread of coronavirus - or turn off an emergency 14-day countdown on the app.

Users are unable to turn off an alert telling them to self-isolate if they book their test without using the device and then test negative

The NHS Test and Trace app will tell people their local area risk level (left), allow them to check in to places they visit (centre) and will warn people if they have been in contact with someone who tests positive or if they report symptoms themselves (right)

The official @NHSCovid19app Twitter account has been swamped with complaints from frustrated Britons saying they are unable to enter their negative result.

One angrily wrote after receiving a notification from the app requesting a test code: 'There was no code on the email or sms I received for my test result so I can't update my app.'

In response to one angry Tweet, they wrote: 'You can only input the result from a positive test if you received a code.'

On their website, they say: 'If your test took place in a Public Health England lab or NHS hospital, or as part of national surveillance testing conducted by the Office for National Statistics, test results cannot currently be linked with the app whether they're positive or negative.

'We are working to make this available as soon as possible.'

Professor Deborah Ryan, from the University of Portsmouth, told the BBC the bug was 'confusing' as 'the app doesn't tell you that you can't enter negative tests booked outside of it'.

She added: 'And the app still tells you to quarantine if you entered symptoms. So this means I can't turn off the self-isolation alert in the app?'

The coronavirus apps launched in Scotland and Northern Ireland have not encountered these problems.

A DHSC spokesperson said: 'Everyone who receives a positive test result can log their result on the app.

'A minority of people, such as hospital patients, who were unable to log their positive result can now request a code when contacted by NHS Test and Trace to input on their app.'

'NHS Test and Trace will continue to contact people by text, email or phone if your test is positive advising you to self-isolate and for those who don't have a code, the contact tracers will shortly be able to provide codes to insert in the app.

'If you book your test via the app the results will be automatically recorded in the app and the isolation countdown will be updated.'

They also insist that a negative test 'does not need to be recorded on the app' despite users saying they want to turn off the warning to self-isolate.

At a press conference on Thursday Professor Christophe Fraser, who helped design the app, said it would be effective at curbing the spread of the virus if it was downloaded by just 15 per cent of people.

'This is about the benefit to the individual in your local network,' he said. 'The answer is you need to download the app for it to have an effect for you and on your personal social network, and you need to encourage your friends and family to do the same.'

Pilots of the app on the Isle of Wight found it brought Covid-19 'really under control', reducing the virus R rate there from one to just 0.25, according to a study by the University of Oxford published in July.

The dramatic reduction took just 18 days as cases tumbled after the introduction of a contact tracing system and a mobile app while lockdown was still in force.

The R later rose to around 0.54  but still below the critical threshold of 1.0 that may see an outbreak spiral out of control  by the middle of June as lockdown measures loosened around England.

But Test and Trace on mainland England appears to be having 'no particular impact', the Oxford researchers said, with the outbreak not shrinking as rapidly in June as it did on the island in May.

HOW DOES ENGLAND'S CONTACT TRACING APP WORK? Bluetooth technology will keep a record of which phones spend 15 minutes within 2metres (6'7') of one another and then alert people if they have been near someone who later tests positive for Covid-19. People's phones are only recognised by the system if they are running the app themselves - it cannot detect others. The contacts it keeps track of are all anonymous and phones exchange digital 'tokens' with every app-using phone within Bluetooth range. If one person develops symptoms of the coronavirus or tests positive, they will be able to enter this information into the app. The phone will then send out a notification to all the devices they have exchanged tokens with during the infection window, to make people aware they may have been exposed to COVID-19. Each phone keeps an individual log of the Bluetooth profiles someone has come close to. These will then be linked anonymously to people's NHS apps and alerts can be pushed through that even after the person is out of bluetooth range. People can delete their data from this app at any time. Users will also have an 'isolation companion' which has countdown timer if someone has to self-isolate, and will be able to 'check in' to places such as pubs and restaurants using QR codes. They will also be shown what the risk level is in their local area based on the first half of their postcode, with places being categorised as low, medium or high risk. Will the app tell me what to do? The app can only react to data that people put into it, and it will only ever offer guidance. If a user reports that they have symptoms of coronavirus - a new continuous cough, a fever, or a changed sense of smell or taste, they will be urged to self-isolate for 10 days from the start of the symptoms and to get tested. If they test positive for Covid-19 at any time, they should report this to the app. The app then sends out an anonymous alert to everyone with whom that person has been within 2m (6'7') of for 15 minutes or more since they started feeling ill. That person may then be asked to self-isolate or to get tested if they feel unwell. How well does it work? The app is far from perfect, with the Department of Health has admitted that around half of people who are warned they have been near an infected person will actually not have been within the 2m for 15 minutes danger window. And three out of 10 people who were put at risk - 31 per cent - won't receive a notification at all. In trials it had a 69 per cent accuracy rate at detecting people who had been at risk, and it was 55 per cent accurate at detecting people who had not. Advertisement

This, they suggested, might be because the UK as a whole does not have a contact tracing mobile app. An app was trialled on the Isle of Wight  where it sent out more than 1,000 warnings to people who may have been infected  but was later abandoned.

Government officials scrapped their app because they said it didn't work on iPhones and the technology has now become a contentious issue. Officials say the app is still 'urgent' but refuse to say when one might become available.

One researcher in the Isle of Wight study said digital contact tracing could have 'an incredible impact, in theory' and another added 'we are supportive of the getting the app out in the UK'.

The app's launch was repeatedly delayed after the NHS chose to work on its own, instead of with tech giants Google and Apple.

Officials initially promised the app would be ready in May but, after ongoing technical problems, the launch had to be rolled back to September 24.

It has added to the NHS Test & Trace service, which aims to track down people that have been exposed to coronavirus and isolate them in order to prevent a further spread of infection.
How she would rule, though, is by no means certain. In 2013, she said it was very unlikely that the court would reverse itself: The fundamental element, that the woman has a right to choose abortion, will probably stand. But she has indicated that not all precedents deserve equal deference. I tend to agree with those who say that a justices duty is to the Constitution and that it is thus more legitimate for her to enforce her best understanding of the Constitution rather than a precedent she thinks clearly in conflict with it, she wrote in 2013.
Amid the pandemic, actor Mouni Roy escaped for a quick trip to the Maldives. The actor has been enjoying her time abroad as she visits beaches and spends her time lazying around curled up with a book. Mouni Roy recently shared a slow-mo video of herself enjoying at the beach as she shimmered in a beautiful turquoise backless dress. Take a look at Mouni Roy's slow-mo video below:

Mouni Roy enjoys at the beach in a turquoise dress

Dressed in a turquoise backless dress with her hair let loose, Mouni Roy ran around the beach in the most dramatic way possible. The song Perfect by Ed Sheeran played in the background as she enjoyed herself. Along with the video, Mouni Roy, being an avid reader quoted a few lines by Jose Chaves in the caption. She wrote, "The ocean taught her to love and let go" (sic).

Also Read: Mouni Roy Announces Release Of 'London Confidential', Her New Espionage Thriller Film

Mouni Roy is known to add perfect captions to her photos on Instagram. It did not come as a surprise when she put up this caption to her slow-mo post with the song by Ed Sheeran playing in the background. Mouni Roy's fans on Instagram were thrilled by her post and left several comments under the video. Some of Mouni Roy's fans called her 'beautiful' while many who could not express themselves through words left heart and love emojis under her picture. Check out some of Mouni Roy's fans comments below:

Fan Reactions to Mouni Roy's slow-mo video

Also Read: Mouni Roy Gives Cues On Spending 'happy Sunday' With Beach, Book And Cuppa

Also Read: Mouni Roy Spends Her Friday Evening Shooting Some Hoops, Fans Call It 'fabulous'

On the professional front, Mouni Roy who was seen in Rajkummar Raos movie Made In China, will be next seen in the film Brahmastra. Directed by Ayan Mukerji, the film also stars Alia Bhatt, Ranbir Kapoor, Nagarjuna and Amitabh Bachchan in the lead roles. The upcoming film is an action fantasy fiction film which is expected to release in December this year. The film will explore the story of a young Telugu woman who falls in love with a man who comes from Karnataka. As her family finds a rich suitor for her, she runs away from home.

Also Read: Mouni Roy Shares A Thrilling Clip From Her Latest Film 'London Confidential'
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 20:13:54|Editor: huaxia

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ABUJA, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Nigerian authorities said on Saturday that several people were missing after a truck plunged into a river in Lagos, northwest of the country.

The six-tyre truck plunged into the Epe river after falling off a bridge late Friday, said the Lagos State Emergency Management Agency (LASEMA).

Nosa Okunbor, the spokesman for LASEMA, told Xinhua the truck was loaded with sand and several people, possibly including the truck driver and the driver's assistants.

"The exact number of people in the truck can't be ascertained at present," Okunbor said.

A combined team of responders, including divers, has begun a search for the victims, he added. Enditem
Wreckage of an AN-26 military plane seen after it crashed in the town of Chuguyiv close to Kharkiv, Ukraine, on Sept. 25, 2020. (Kharkiv Regional State Administration via AP)

Ukraine Plane Crash Death Toll Rises to 26, With 1 Survivor

MOSCOWSearchers combing the area where a Ukrainian military aircraft crashed found two more bodies on Saturday, bringing the death toll to 26. One person survived.

The plane, a twin-turboprop Antonov-26 belonging to the Ukrainian air force, was carrying a crew of seven and 20 cadets of a military aviation school when it crashed and burst into flames Friday night while coming in for landing at the airport in Chuhuiv, about 400 kilometers (250 miles) east of the capital Kyiv.

Two people initially survived the crash, but one later died in a hospital. No cause for the crash has been determined.

A view of the scene where the AN-26 military plane crashed Friday night, in the town of Chuguyiv close to Kharkiv, Ukraine, on Sept. 26, 2020. (Emergency Situation Ministry via AP Photo)

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy declared Saturday to be a day of mourning for the crash victims and ordered that flights of An-26 planes be halted pending investigation into the cause of the crash.

Zelenskiy, who visited the crash area on Saturday, called for a full assessment of the condition of the countrys military equipment. Prime Minister Denis Shygal called for an official report on the crash by Oct. 25.

Yesterday we lost young cadets and experienced military men, who had their whole lives and, I am sure, more than one military feat ahead of them, Zelenskiy said in a statement released by his office. The whole country will mourn today with their families.

Deputy Defense Minister Igor Starobinksy said the families of the dead would each be paid compensation of about 1,500,000 hryvna ($56,000).

Flowers lay at the scene where the AN-26 military plane crashed on Friday night, in the town of Chuguyiv close to Kharkiv, Ukraine, on Sept. 26, 2020. (Emergency Situation Ministry via AP Photo)

The An-26 is a transport plane used by both military and civilian operators. Nearly 1,400 of the planes were manufactured from 1969 to 1986, according to the companys website. Defense Minister Andrei Taran said the plane that crashed was built in 1977.

An An-26 chartered by a contractor for the World Food Program crashed on Aug. 22 while taking off from Juba in South Sudan, killing seven people.

The crash was the second large air disaster to afflict Ukraine this year. In January, a Boeing 737 belonging to Ukraine International Airlines was shot down shortly after takeoff from the airport in Tehran, Iran, killing all 176 people aboard.

The plane was shot down by Irans Revolutionary Guards amid high tensions after the United States killed a top general in a drone strike.
Vietnam will host the ITU Digital World 2020, expecting to attract hundreds of technology businesses from across the globe.

The press conference on ITU Digital World 2020 on September 25

The Ministry of Information and Communications (MIC) on September 25 held a press conference about the organisation of ITU Digital World 2020.

The event will be hosted online and will feature numerous events such as the ministers roundtables with ITU member countries, forum sessions, virtual exhibitions with the participation of international giants from the US, the EU, Japan, South Korea, and others.

At the press conference Pham Tam, Deputy Minister of Information and Communications said, This is the first time that the ITU collaborates with a country to host such an event. ITU Digital World 2020 is wide open to all businesses, creating an opportunity for business exchanges between Vietnamese and international businesses.

Pham Tam, Deputy Minister of Information and Communications, made speech at the press conference

ITU Digital World 2020 has significant meaning, improving the countrys position and affirming its important role as one of the fastest-developing countries in ICT and an active and responsible member of ITU, he added.

This is also an opportunity for Vietnamese firms to promote their image, thus enabling them to expand their market share globally.

Specifically, the virtual exhibition will include virtual booths, introducing digital products and services, and solutions of overseas businesses.

Meanwhile, the Ministerial Roundtables will include discussions about digital strategies during COVID-19 and in the post-COVID-19 landscape, as well as orientations in boosting cooperation among ITU member countries in the implementation of digital transformation programmes.

This will also provide opportunities for the ministers and leaders of businesses to enter dialogues on the policies and the strategies to maintain the role of ICT in the prevention and fight against the pandemic and to serve economic recovery.

The forum will be divided into three sessions in three days, focusing on three key topics, namely connectivity, digital transformation, and sustainable development. VIR

Bich Thuy
Delhi University

As the admissions for various courses in affiliated colleges were postponed by nearly three months owing to the Covid-19 pandemic, DU has released the schedule for the under-graduate and post-graduate courses admissions to various colleges on the basis of merit as well as entrance examination.

The first cut-off list for various undergraduate (UG) courses will be released on October 12. The university Registrar has released the schedule for admissions to the university.

The Registrar said, "For the admissions to the various undergraduate courses in DU, the first cut-off list will be released from 10 a.m. on October 12 to October 14, 2020 till 5 p.m. The fee for the first cut-off list must be deposited on October 16 till 11.59 p.m."

The admissions for the second cut-off list will be held from October 19 morning to October 21. The last date for depositing the fees for the second cut-off is October 23 till 11.59 p.m.

The admissions for the third cut-off will be held from October 26 to 28 till 5 p.m. Fees for the third cut-off can be deposited till October 30 midnight.

Admissions will be held from November 2-4 for the fourth cut-off list. If seats for admissions to various undergraduate courses were not filled then admissions for the fifth cut-off list will be held between November 9-11.

According to the DU administration, the admissions for the first merit list will be conducted from October 19-21, 2020 on the basis of entrance tests. Admissions for the second merit list will be held from October 26-28 while for the third merit list they will be held from November 2-4.

As per the schedule released by the DU administration for admissions to various post-graduate (PG) courses, admissions will be conducted from October 26-28 for the first merit list, while for the second cut-off list admissions will be held from November 2-4. Admissions for the third merit list will be conducted from November 9-11. The current academic session will commence from November 18, 2020.

--IANS

gcb/anm/khz/bg

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
A new proposal could require Californians to work remotely three days a week - even after the COVID-19 pandemic - to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to aid in environmental efforts.

A number of Bay Area residents, including employees at large tech firms, were concerned over a new proposal approved by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission on Wednesday.

The controversial proposal would effectively ensure that sizable, office-based companies kept 60 per cent of their workers at home on any given workday to curb climate change.

'Given the changes in travel patterns during the coronavirus pandemic, there was strong support for bolder policies on this front in the Final Blueprint, including a mandate for office-based employers,' the proposal read.

'To ensure this strategy achieves equity goals, a complementary strategy to expand internet access in underserved communities was added to the Economy Element as well.'

The Metropolitan Transportation Commission voted on a proposal Wednesday to require partial work from home operations at large companies to curb greenhouse gas emissions

This latest proposal underscores a larger shift towards remote work that became commonplace after the COVID-19 pandemic hit the United States in January.

By March, entire office buildings shuttered and industries stumbled as employers struggled to transfer in-person operations to out of the workplace.

But now, six months later, city officials and some employers viewed the forced transition as a unrealized benefit that could reshape office culture and transportation.

'There is an opportunity to do things that could not have been done in the past,' said Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf, a commission member and proposal supporter, per NBC News.

Studies have noted that carbon dioxide emissions, a greenhouse gas, were down in April when lockdown orders were strictly enforced

MTC proposal: 'Given the changes in travel patterns during the coronavirus pandemic, there was strong support for bolder policies on this front in the Final Blueprint, including a mandate for office-based employers'

A May 2020 study from the Nature Climate Change Journal noted that daily carbon dioxide emissions plunged by 17 per cent in the United States during April.

'The estimated decrease in daily fossil CO2 emissions from the severe and forced confinement of world populations of 17% (11 to 25%) at its peak are extreme and probably unseen before,' the study said.

The commission's proposal was found inside a larger policy package titled 'Plan Bay Area 2050 Final Blueprint,' in which officials theorized what the Bay Area could look like in 30 years and what could be done about reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Members voted 11-1 to approve the overall policy package, including the mandate.

Bay Area is home to Silicon Valley, the central hub of Big Tech firms that have taken different approaches to working from home.

Facebook quickly embraced remote working as a longterm plan and advised its 50,000 staffers to work from home to avoid spreading the coronavirus.

CEO Mark Zuckerberg later announced that the company had extended its work-from-home plan until 2021, allowing employees to avoid the Menlo Park office for the next several months.

Similarly, Twitter, which reported 5,100 employees in its most recent earnings report, ordered employees to work from home .

A number of Big Tech firms, including Google, have headquarters in California and were among the industries that transitioned operations online

It was later revealed by CEO Jack Dorsey that the company will allow most of its employees to work from home permanently.

'Opening offices will be our decision. When and if our employees come back, will be theirs,' a spokesperson for the company said.

But companies like Apple, that have invested loads of money on its campuses and facilities, have been less eager to fully welcome remote work.

Tim Cook revealed in a recent interview at The Atlantic Festival that he hoped employees would be back in the office by next year and pointed out that remote work doesn't allow for certain employee interactions.

When word of the plan reached Bay Area residents, many were concerned and logged onto the virtual commission meeting on Wednesday to object.

'We do not want to continue this as a lifestyle,' said Steven Buss, a Google software engineer who lives in San Francisco, according to NBC News.

'We are all sacrificing now to reduce the spread of the virus, but no one is enjoying working from home.

'Its probably fine if you own a big house out in the suburbs and youre nearing retirement, but for young workers like me who live in crowded conditions, working from home is terrible.'

Steven Buss: 'Its probably fine if you own a big house out in the suburbs and youre nearing retirement, but for young workers like me who live in crowded conditions, working from home is terrible'

Some residents noted that the strategy enforces workplace inequality since some jobs cannot be performed at home, while others worried about the effects it would have on other industries as a result.

Stacey Randecker called into the meeting on Wednesday and questioned why the proposal included all commute alternatives if the main focus was on car emissions.

'Yes, yes, yes, we want to reduce greenhouse gases, but why arent you considering transit? Walking? Biking?' she said.

Duston Moskovitz, co-founder of Facebook, shared the sentiments on Twitter.

'We tried nothing, and we're all out of ideas,' he wrote on Tuesday.

Some California residents were concerned by the proposal and its provisions during the virtual meeting on Wednesday

Commission member Nick Josefowitz said the work-from-home proposal was a late addition into the policy package.

NBC News reports that Josefowitz attempted to amend the proposal to allow transit and walking from home as alternatives, but critics worried that a delay could result in the commission missing emission reduction targets and an important funding deadline.

'If we start amending this plan at this late hour, do you have any rabbits in your hat thats going to get us to the finish line,' asked commission member Jim Spering.

The proposal added that the work-from-home strategy 'was not included in the Draft Blueprint and was added based upon public feedback this summer.'

MTC executive director Therese McMillan said there would be opportunities to later go over the strategy's details and include alternative transportation.

The commission will meet against before the end of the year and then it would need to be implemented over time.
Thiruvananthapuram, Sep 26 : After questioning Bineesh Kodiyeri, the son of CPI-M Kerala State Secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan on September 9 for over 11 hours, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Saturday sent him a notice under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act.

The ED has asked him to give the list of his assets and has also directed the State Registration Department to prepare a list of his assets and to see that there is no transfer or sale of his assets (properties) without their knowledge.

After the 11-hour questioning ended, it was only a matter of time for the follow up action by the ED and it has now happened, leaving the ruling CPI-M red faced, as Bineesh in all likelihood would be called in again.

Trouble started for the high profile son of Balakrishnan ever since four national agencies started probing the two cases -- gold smuggling and drug dealing -- which were unravelled in Bengaluru by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB).

The ED is trying to find out if there was a common thread in the two cases and if Bineesh had a role in them.

Bineesh has denied any role in locating a hiding place for the prime accused in the gold smuggling case, Swapna Suresh, in Bengaluru. She was arrested along with her business partner by the NIA in July.

Another reason why the ED started to concentrate on Bineesh was that he has registered a few companies dealing with the financial matters, but had not undertaken the regulatory compliance and they were recently blacklisted by the authorities.

One more reason is the wide ranging business connections that he has, and also partnership ventures in many areas with others.

When the now controversial gold smuggling case surfaced in July after the Customs first arrested a former public relations officer -- P.S. Sarith -- of the UAE Consulate and the NIA picked up Swapna Suresh, who has links with top police officers and bureaucrats, the speculation in the media was whether Bineesh was also involved.

But it was not until the end of August that his name first surfaced when a Kerala youth Anoop Mohammed was picked up by the NCB in Bengaluru. And then came the statement from Bineesh that he and Anoop were friends, and Bineesh had given a loan of Rs six lakh to him and another Rs 15,000 very recently as he had no money to return home from Bengaluru.

Even though Balakrishnan is trying to put a brave face by saying that his son will deal with all the issues, the opposition -- the Congress and the BJP -- is aggressively pursuing the case as two crucial elections are round the corner.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Estee Lauder Cos. is sending its newest skincare formula into space, and itll cost only about as much as paying a big influencer for a few Instagram posts.

The U.S. cosmetics giant is spending $128,000 (U.S., or $171,361 Canadian) for NASA to fly 10 bottles of its skin serum to the International Space Station. Once there, astronauts will take pictures of Estee Lauders Advanced Night Repair in the cupola control tower, which has panoramic views of the cosmos. The images will be used on social media, with the company planning to auction one bottle off for charity when the items return to Earth this spring.

The global recession, triggered by the coronavirus pandemic, has pushed brands to get more creative with their advertising because consumers are cutting back. Within beauty, several companies are spending less on traditional ads, while looking for new ways to break through the glut of content out there. In a press release, Estee Lauder highlighted it being the first beauty brand to go into space as a means to tout its skincare innovation.

The Northrop Grumman Antares rocket that will transport the skin serum as part of a supply run is scheduled to launch on Tuesday night from Wallops Island, Virginia. The Cygnus cargo craft will then dock on the space station early Saturday.

Estee Lauders push into micro-gravity is part of NASAs effort to commercialize low-earth orbit and make it a domain where private enterprise eventually does business as routinely as the government conducts spacewalks. Companies from Goodyear Tire & Rubber to Merck & Co have used space for research, and NASA is hoping to expand its use, including private citizens visiting the space station.

We need to expand peoples perspective on what we can accomplish in space, said Phil McAlister, NASAs director of commercial spaceflight development.

Read more about:
US President Donald Trump is set to unveil his Supreme Court nominee on Saturday, barely five weeks out from the November 3 presidential election, with US media reporting that he has chosen conservative judge Amy Coney Barrett for the job.

If the 48-year-old law professor is indeed nominated and confirmed, her appointment would consolidate a conservative majority in the country's top court.

Citing sources close to the process, various media outlets, including The New York Times and CNN, said Trump would put forward the 48-year-old judge.

"We are going to be announcing somebody great," the US president said in Virginia on a whirlwind three-state campaign tour Friday.

"Tomorrow [Saturday] I think is going to be a big day!" he added, as the crowd roared with approval.

The president did not name his nominee but earlier said his decision was made. Barrett was "outstanding" he said.

Media reports noted the mercurial Trump could still change his mind before the official announcement, expected at 5 pm (2100 GMT) Saturday.

Democratic opponents, led by presidential candidate Joe Biden, have demanded that Republicans back off on replacing Ruth Bader Ginsburg -- a liberal icon -- until after the November 3 election.

Leaders of the Republican majority in the Senate, which is tasked with confirming Supreme Court nominees, said they have enough support to hold a vote on the nomination either before the election or at worst during the "lame duck" session between the election and the inauguration of the next president in January.

"We will certainly do that this year," Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell said.

If Barrett is confirmed, the Supreme Court would have a 6-3 conservative majority.

Barrett was only appointed to the bench for the first time in 2017. A deeply conservative Catholic, she is considered hostile to abortion rights -- a key issue for many Republicans.

The left-leaning government watchdog group Accountable US was unimpressed with the reported choice. "Barrett has proven time and again that protecting businesses -- not people -- is her top priority," said group president Kyle Herrig.

In 2018, the mother of seven was on the shortlist presented by Trump for a seat vacated by the retirement of justice Anthony Kennedy, a position ultimately filled by Brett Kavanaugh after a ferocious confirmation battle.

- A full bench -

For Trump, nominating a conservative judge to the Supreme Court is a way to fire up his base heading into November's election.

But at Friday's whirlwind campaign outings, the US president also looked beyond his core supporters and in Florida -- where the Latino vote is all-important -- said his Democratic challenger Joe Biden has been "very bad to Hispanics."

"I'm a wall between the American dream and chaos," he said.

Later in Georgia he insisted that as president he had exceeded his promises for African Americans.

"I did more for the black community in 47 months... than Joe Biden did in 47 years," he said, repeatedly swiping at Biden's legislative record in co-sponsoring 1990s tough-on-crime legislation that many experts say resulted in high incarceration rates for black Americans.

Biden himself did no in-person campaigning Friday, but traveled from his home in Delaware to Washington for a ceremony in the US Capitol, where Ginsburg lay in state -- the first woman and Jewish person to do so.

Ginsburg's last wish, reportedly relayed to her granddaughter, was for her seat to be decided by whoever wins the next election.

Trump cast doubt upon the veracity of that in an interview Monday, suggesting it could have been a ploy made up Democratic leaders.

Republican leaders have said that if the fate of a disputed election rests with the Supreme Court, they will need a full bench of judges to prevent a deadlock.

Trump refused Wednesday to clearly guarantee a peaceful transfer of power if he loses, stirring outrage among Democrats.

The Democratic leadership has vowed to do everything in their power to prevent the confirmation of a new justice before the election, but with a 53-47 Republican majority in the Senate, there is little they can do to stop it.

This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text. Only the headline has been changed.

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Why the coronavirus affects children much less severely than adults has become an enduring mystery of the pandemic. The vast majority of children do not get sick; when they do, they usually recover.

CORONAVIRUS SPECIAL COVERAGE ONLY ON DH

The first study to compare the immune response in children with that in adults suggests a reason for childrens relative good fortune. In children, a branch of the immune system that evolved to protect against unfamiliar pathogens rapidly destroys the coronavirus before it wreaks damage on their bodies, according to the research, published this week in Science Translational Medicine.

The bottom line is, yes, children do respond differently immunologically to this virus, and it seems to be protecting the kids, said Dr. Betsy Herold, a pediatric infectious disease expert at Albert Einstein College of Medicine who led the study.

In adults, the immune response is much more muted, she and her colleagues found.

When the body encounters an unfamiliar pathogen, it responds within hours with a flurry of immune activity, called an innate immune response. The bodys defenders are quickly recruited to the fight and begin releasing signals calling for backup.

Children more often encounter pathogens that are new to their immune systems. Their innate defense is fast and overwhelming.

Over time, as the immune system encounters pathogen after pathogen, it builds up a repertoire of known villains. By the time the body reaches adulthood, it relies on a more sophisticated and specialised system adapted to remembering and fighting specific threats.

For latest updates and live news on coronavirus, click here

If the innate immune system resembles emergency responders first on the scene, the adaptive system represents the skilled specialists at the hospital.

The adaptive system makes sense biologically because adults rarely encounter a virus for the first time, said Dr. Michael Mina, a pediatric immunologist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Epidemiology in Boston.

But the coronavirus is new to everyone, and the innate system fades as adults grow older, leaving them more vulnerable. In the time it takes for an adult body to get the specialised adaptive system up and running, the virus has had time to do harm, Herolds research suggests.

She and her colleagues compared immune responses in 60 adults and 65 children and young adults under the age of 24, all of whom were hospitalised at the Montefiore Medical Center in New York City from March 13 to May 17.

The patients included 20 children with multisystem inflammatory syndrome, the severe and sometimes deadly immune overreaction linked to the coronavirus.

Overall, the children were only mildly affected by the virus, compared with adults, mostly reporting gastrointestinal symptoms like diarrhea and a loss of taste or smell. Only five children needed mechanical ventilation, compared with 22 of the adults; two children died, compared with 17 adults.

Children had much higher blood levels of two particular immune molecules, interleukin 17A and interferon gamma, the researchers found. The molecules were most abundant in the youngest patients and decreased progressively with age.

We think that is protecting these younger children, particularly from severe respiratory disease, because thats really the major difference between the adults and the kids, Herold said.

In some adult Covid-19 patients, she added, the lack of a strong early response also may be setting off an intense and unregulated adaptive reaction that may lead to acute respiratory distress syndrome and death.

All viruses have tricks to evade the innate immune system, and the coronavirus is particularly adept. Produced early in the course of infection, interleukin 17A may help children thwart the virus attempts to evade the innate response and to ward off the later adaptive response.

15 countries with the highest number of cases, deaths due to the Covid-19 pandemic

We think that also protects them from sort of making the more vigorous adaptive immune response thats associated with that hyper-inflammation, Herold said.

Other experts said the study was well done but suffered  as most studies of the coronavirus do  from enrolling patients too late in the infection.

The innate immune response is set off hours after exposure to a pathogen, but people generally dont come to the hospital until about a week after infection with the coronavirus, when symptoms are severe, said Akiko Iwasaki, an immunologist at Yale University.

Thats too late to study how the innate immune system responds to the virus, she said, adding, By the time people are sick, its way past that time point.

Still, the new data negate a couple of popular theories about why children are protected from the virus, she said.

Some scientists have suspected that children may fare better because they tend to have had more recent exposure to coronaviruses that cause common colds, which might offer them some protection.

But the new study found no significant differences in the immune responses to those viruses between the groups, Iwasaki noted.

Another theory held that children generate a stronger antibody response that clears the virus more efficiently than in adults. But the new study found that the sickest older people actually produced the most powerful antibodies.

That result may confirm a nagging worry among researchers: that the presence of those potent antibodies contributes to the illness in adults, instead of helping them fight the virus  a phenomenon called antibody-dependent enhancement. Vaccine manufacturers are carefully monitoring trial subjects for signs of this problem.

Thats a theme that everybodys been dancing around, said Dr. Jane C. Burns, a pediatric infectious disease expert at University of California, San Diego. Is it possible that high titers of some antibodies actually are bad for you, as opposed to good for you?

Researchers also must learn what happens in children after the initial immune surge, Burns said. Children produce a strong immune response, but their bodies must turn it off quickly after the danger has passed.

If this virus becomes endemic, like the coronaviruses causing common colds, children eventually will develop adaptive defenses so strong that they will not experience the problems that adults are having now, Mina said.

We will eventually age out of this virus.
HEALY When this conversation is published, well have less than six weeks until Election Day. What are you most intent on keeping an eye on through Nov. 3?

SAUL I think its going to be interesting to monitor absentee ballot rejection rates. Theres some early data coming out suggesting that some states are rejecting young people and people of color at a higher rate than other voters.

CORASANITI Im both most worried about and most intent on keeping an eye on all the pending litigation and attempts to challenge how the election will play out in November. Were getting new decisions daily, but its rarely the end of the story.

EPSTEIN Just how many people are going to vote in 2020 is a huge question that will have ramifications for contests up and down the ballot. By all accounts, turnout will be through the roof. We havent seen 60 percent of voting-age Americans participate in a presidential election since 1968. Democrats keep saying that if more people vote, they will win. Republicans keep doing whatever they can to make voting harder. This election may show us which theory is the winning one.

SAUL I would also like to watch early voting sites. Im wondering if well see any more gatherings of Trump supporters like the recent one in Fairfax, Va. And Ill also be watching to see what the turnout is at early voting locations.

HERNDON I want to see places where Democrats and Republicans work together. There were some real success stories in the primary  Kentucky comes to mind  where bipartisan deals were struck to make voting more accessible. It requires some political risk, and for Republicans it may mean crossing the president.

HEALY What are the best ways for people to vote safely?

CORASANITI If voting by mail, make sure to get your ballot back with enough time  a minimum of seven days before election. If voting in person, try early voting to avoid a line, and if voting on Election Day, wear a mask.
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LONDON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 22nd September, 2020) A witness for the defense of Julian Assange on Monday told the UK court deciding on the whistleblower's extradition to the United States that the removal of the WikiLeaks founder from the Ecuadorean embassy in London in April 2019 was coordinated on direct orders from US President Donald Trump.

The testimony was presented by Cassandra Fairbanks, a US journalist that in her written statement said that in that period of time she used to work for a pro-Trump news organization and was also in a direct message group with then US Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell and Arthur Schwarz, a prominent Republican Party donor and an informal adviser for Donald Trump Jr.

According to Fairbanks, whose statement was read in the courtroom by one of Assange's lawyer, Schwarz told her as early as October 2018 that the US government would be going into the Ecuadorean embassy to get Assange.

"I responded that entering the embassy of a sovereign nation and kidnapping a political refugee would be an act of war, and he responded 'not if they let us,'" the witness said.

She said that at that time, she did not know that Grenell himself had already worked out a deal for Assange's arrest with the Ecuadorean government.

"Schwarz informed me that in coordinating for Assange to be removed from the Embassy, Ambassador Grenell had done so on direct 'orders from the President,'" the witness added.

According to her statement, the adviser told her that the US government had said they will not pursue the death penalty, because that would have prevented the Uited Kingdom and Ecuador from extraditing the whistleblower to the United States.

The hearing to decide whether Assange should be sent to the United States resumed on September 7 at the London Central Criminal Court, after six months of delay due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The US Department of Justice is seeking the whistleblower's extradition on 17 espionage and one count of computer misuse, which carry a maximum sentence of 175 years in prison, for the publication of classified information on the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and thousands of US diplomatic cables in 2010 and 2011.

The WikiLeaks founder, who has been locked up at the maximum-security prison of Belmarsh since his arrest at the Ecuadoran embassy in London, is attending the trial from behind a glass panel, away from his defense team.

The hearing is expected to last another two weeks, and it is highly probable that the verdict will be appealed.
Also - and I know Swiss place names are hard for foreigners! - you need to get the spelling right so you can look them up on train schedules.

Iseltwald

Grindelwald

Now for the places themselves:

Gstaad is not that great but nearby Saanen is lovely. (Gstaad is glitz! ). A longish day trip from the Oberland though IF you want to do more in that area than just to walk around the village.

Lauterbrunnen - easy to get to from Grindelwald but in a deep valley. Restricted mountain views though lovely views of the Staubbach falls.

Iseltwald - right on lake Brienz. Boats go from Interlaken Ost to Brienz and you can see Iseltwald from the boat. It is a small village. Probably not enough to do in the village itself to keep you busy between boats? Perhaps getting off at Giesbach and walking up to the falls there would be a better use of your time?

Grindelwald - largest village in the mountains of the Oberland and has motor traffic. Spectacular views of the Eiger, a good base for hiking and from there you can get to First easily (and on to the Bachalpsee too)

Jungfraujoch - a very expensive trip no matter how you do it! And better views from the Schilthorn though in summer if you want to be IN the snow the Jungfraujoch is a good choice.

Mt Pilatus - is not in the same area at all. It is near Luzern. And it doesn't have the best views of any moutain around Luzern. For those go to Mt Rigi instead. You could I suppose at a stretch leave Grindelwald early in the morning, travel to Luzern and then Pilatus and return to Grindelwald for dinner.

10 days is a nice long time to be here. Why not plan to see things in other regions too? For example the Suisse Romande (French speaking) or the Ticino (Italian speaking ?? the myswitzerland site is a goldmine of information for places like these...
Victorian Minister for Mental Health, Martin Foley at a press conference at Treasury Theatre, in Melbourne, Australia on July 13, 2020. (Quinn Rooney/Getty Images)

Martin Foley to Replace Mikakos as Victorias Health Minister

Martin Foley will be sworn in today as the state of Victorias new health minister after Jenny Mikakos resigned in response to the premiers statements regarding the states COVID-19 hotel quarantine inquiry.

Premier Dan Andrews is confident Foley, who is currently the minister for the mental health, will carry on the states strict COVID-19 suppression strategy.

Weve got to push forward and get this strategy done, Andrews told the press on Sept. 26. He (Foley) has the absolute will to see this strategy through.

Foley said he was honoured to be asked by Andrews to take over as health minister.

I want to acknowledge the great efforts that Victorians have collectively in a community coming together driven down those numbers faster than the roadmap out had forecasted, Foley said.

Foley said he looked forward to building a health system in Victoria that can keep infection rates down.

Outbreaks from Melbournes hotels resulted in the second wave of COVID-19 in Victorias capital city, Melbourne, triggering the Labor government to introduce draconian lockdown rules.

Citizens have protested the lockdown rules for weeks, copping millions of dollars in fines. Meanwhile, the states opposition and cross bench, as well as federal politicians who are concerned about the economic and mental health impact, and human rights organisations, have challenged Victorian government ministers over the lockdown rules.

Mikakos acknowledged this in her statement, writing, I am deeply sorry for the situation that Victorians find themselves in. In good conscience, I do not believe that my actions led to them.

Andrews refused to answer questions about the hotel quarantine inquiry that led to Mikakos resignation. However, Jennifer Coate, the head of the inquiry, has previously said people can answer questions publicly.

Theres an inquiry going on and Ive made a judgement that I would not be answering questions, the premier said.

He did, however, say that Mikakos resignation was the appropriate course of action to take and thanked her for her contribution to the state Parliament, the people of Victoria, and to the Labor Party.

When asked if any other ministers should resign, the premier said: Ive not made the point about shared accountability. Ive made the point repeatedly about the ultimate accountability is with me.

When asked if he will also resign, Andrews said: No I will not. I dont run from problems and challenges.

I dont run from challenges. I have a very important job to do, he added.

Andrews said Mikakos resignation was her choice and that he did not put that to her.

She made that choice, he said, while also saying that he and Mikakos did not speak before she resigned but that she did send a text message.

I did not speak with [Mikakos] before she resigned and I have not spoken with her since. Shes resigned. Shes no longer a minister, he said.

Andrews refused to be drawn into commentary about hotel quarantine inquiry until he received its report in the next 4-5 weeks.
TACOMA, WA / ACCESSWIRE / September 25, 2020 / IONIC BRANDS CORP. (CSE:IONC)(OTC PINK:IONKF)(FRA:1B3) ("IONIC BRANDS" or the "Company") announces the temporary discontinuation of the Company's Directors and Officers ("D&O") Insurance policy due to the exorbitant cost of premiums to the operations as of July 1st 2020. While this is a difficult decision for the Company to make, it is a necessary financial decision for the short term. Consequently, the Company will be reducing the number of Directors, down from seven to five, where Christian Vara was the last Company appointment, Board ratified member added on February 25, 2020.

Ionic Brands hopes to reinstate the D&O Insurance policy sometime in the 4th quarter this year, at which point the Company will evaluate adding additional board members. Mr. Brian Lofquist and Mrs. M. Carroll Benton have chosen to relinquish their board positions as Directors of the Company effective immediately. The resignations were not the result of any disagreement with the Company or any of its affiliates on any matter relating to the Company's operations, policies, or practices. Mr. Lofquist and Mrs. Benton have agreed to assist in an advisory capacity as needed. In connection with the departure of Mr. Lofquist and Mrs. Benton from the Board, the size of the Board has been reduced from seven to five members.

John P. Gorst, Chairman and CEO of Ionic Brands Corp commented, "While the temporary discontinuation of our D&O Insurance is not ideal, I would like to thank Brian and Carroll for their contribution in assisting with the navigation of the Company through a challenging period in the Company's history. We are grateful for their contributions to Ionic Brands and wish them the very best in the future."

About IONIC BRANDS CORP.

The company is dedicated to building a regionally based multi-state consumer-focused cannabis concentrate brand portfolio with strong roots in the premium and luxury segments of vape concentrates and edibles. The cornerstone Brand of the portfolio, IONIC has aggressively expanded throughout the Pacific Northwest of the United States. When combined with Dabulous, they occupy a spot with the top ten vaporizer brands in Washington State. The brand is currently operating in the States of Washington and Oregon. IONIC BRANDS' strategy is to be the leader of the highest-value segments of the cannabis market.

On behalf of IONIC BRANDS CORP.

John Gorst

Chief Executive Officer & Chairman

For more information visit www.ionicbrands.com or contact:

John Gorst

investor.relations@ionicbrands.com

+1.253.248.7927

To stay better informed with the current events of the company you can join our investor community at https://www.ionicbrands.com/investor-community

The CSE does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

All statements, other than statements of historical fact, included herein are forward-looking statements that involve various risks and uncertainties. There can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate and actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. The risks are without limitations the price for cannabis and related products will remain consistent and the consumer demand remains strong; availability of financing to the Company to develop the retail locations; retention of key employees and management; changes in State and/or municipal regulations of retail operations and changes in government regulations generally. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the Company's expectations are disclosed in the Company's documents filed from time to time with the Canadian Securities Exchange, the British Columbia Securities Commission, the Ontario Securities Commission and the Alberta Securities Commission.

SOURCE: IONIC Brands Corp.

View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/607340/Ionic-Brands-Announces-Changes-to-Its-Directors-Officers-Insurance-and-Resulting-Modifications-to-Its-Board-of-Directors
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Linkedin Sergei Bobok and Ania Tsoukanova in Kiev (Agence France-Presse) Chuguiv, Ukraine  Sat, September 26, 2020 13:13 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c47663cf 2 World accident,Ukraine,airplane,plane-crash Free

At least 22 people including military cadets were killed and two others were seriously injured on Friday when a Ukrainian air force plane crashed near Kharkiv in the east of the country, the interior ministry said.

Deputy Interior Minister Anton Gerashchenko confirmed the death toll to AFP, describing the incident as a "shock", and saying that the cause of the crash was being investigated.

Footage of the crash released by officials on social media showed the smoldering remains of the Antonov-26 transport plane.

"Most of [the dead] were students" of the Kharkiv National Air Force University, the air force said in a statement.

There were 27 people on board, 20 cadets and seven crew, it added.

Twenty-two have been confirmed dead, two are injured and "the search for three more people continues", the emergency services said.

The injured are in a "critical" condition, regional governor Oleksiy Kucher said on Facebook.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky described the crash as a "terrible tragedy" and said he would travel to the Kharkiv region on Saturday.

"We are urgently creating a commission to investigate all the circumstances and causes of the tragedy," he wrote on Facebook.

The plane crashed at around 8:50 pm local time (17:50 GMT), two kilometers from the Chuhuiv military air base, the emergency services said.

In photos released by the emergency services, firefighters in helmets and reflective clothing sprayed aircraft debris with jets of water.

Read also: Human error caused Pakistan plane crash that killed 97: Initial report

Training flight

The body of the plane burst into flames on landing and firefighters were able to extinguish the blaze after an hour.

The town of Chuhuiv is around 30 kilometers southeast of Kharkiv and 100 kilometers west of the front line where government forces are fighting pro-Russian separatists.

The presidency said that according to preliminary information the transport plane crashed during a training flight.

The EU's top diplomat Josep Borrell sent his condolences on behalf of the bloc.

"My thoughts are with the families and friends of those who lost their lives," he tweeted.

Several military planes have crashed in Ukraine during training flights in recent years.

A pilot was killed in December 2018 after his Su-27 fighter crashed during landing in the Zhytomyr region.

Two months earlier, the same model of fighter crashed in a neighboring region during the Clear Sky 2018 joint military exercises between Ukraine and NATO countries, killing the American and Ukrainian pilots on board.

In 2002, a Su-27 fell into the crowd at an airshow in Lviv in the western Ukraine killing 77 people and injuring 165 others.

The Antonov-26 is a light transport aircraft designed in Ukraine during the Soviet era.

It is 24 meters long and has a wingspan of 29 meters and can fly at a cruising speed of 440 kilometers per hour.

In 2014, Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 was downed killing 298 people over an area of eastern Ukraine controlled by pro-Russian separatists.

Moscow has denied the findings of international investigators that a Russian BUK missile hit the Malaysian Airlines flight.
As wildfires raged throughout western Oregon, claims of anti-fascists wanting to burn the suburbs and eviscerate rural populations spread.

The Clackamas County Sheriffs Office presented rumors of leftist violence as fact in at least two forums. Weeks later, the agency still hasnt explained where the debunked information came from or why personnel deemed it credible enough to share publicly. But it fits within a broader political narrative being pushed from the highest office in the nation.
All you need to know about the NDPS Act and how it is playing out in the Bollywood drug case

India

oi-Vicky Nanjappa

New Delhi, Sep 26: The Bollywood drug case linked to the death of Sushant Singh Rajput is the talk of the town. With big personalities from the industry being summoned by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), it would be a good idea to take a look at the Narcotics Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act (NDPS) of 1985.

No person shall cultivate any coca plant or gather any portion of coca plant; cultivate the opium poppy or any cannabis plant or produce, manufacture, possess, sell, purchase, transport, warehouse, use, consume, import inter-State, export inter-State, import into India, export from India or tranship any narcotic drug or psychotropic substance, except for medical or scientific purposes and in the manner and to the extent provided by the provisions of this Act. Any person found violating these measures can be charged under the NDPS Act, Section 8 (c) says.

In general a person is charged under the NDPS Act after being caught red-handed with drugs or money meant for commercial usage. If a person is caught in the act while consuming drugs, he or she is asked to undergo a blood and urine test. The seizure of the contraband and the blood test report is used as evidence in the case to correlate the charge.

In the case of Rhea Chakraborty, the NCB arrested her Section 27(A) of the Act. This deals with illicit financing and there is no need for a narcotic seizure and cash seizures are enough. The NCB had said that they had details of her allegedly making payments to drug peddlers using credit cards. Her lawyer had however countered this charges and said that these payments do not make her part of a drug cartel. The court while denying her bail had said that under Section 27 (A), no particular quantity is required to prove the offence.

Under the law there are three types of charges- possession of small quantity, intermediate quantity and commercial quantity. If a person is found in possession of a cannabis up to 1 kilogram, he or she may be jailed for a term that may extend up to six months or with fine which may extend up to Rs 10,000 or both.

In the case of an intermediate quantity that is between 1 kg to 20 kgs, the imprisonment would be for a term up to 10 years and with fine which could be extended up to Rs 1 lakh. In the case of a commercial quantity, which is above 20 kilograms, rigorous imprisonment for a term of not less than 10 years but which may extend up to 20 years will be granted. The person could be fined not less than 1 lakh but may be extended up to Rs 2 lakh.

Now coming to Section 64 (A) of the NDPS Act. This section says, any addict, who is charged with offences involving small quantity of narcotic drugs or psychotropic substances, who voluntarily seeks to undergo medical treatment for de-addiction from a hospital or an institution maintained or recognised by the Government or a local authority and undergoes such treatment shall not be liable to prosecution under any other section for offences involving small quantity of narcotic drugs or psychotropic substances: Provided that the said immunity from prosecution may be withdrawn if the addict does not undergo the complete treatment for de-addiction.

It may be recalled that in 2001, actor Fardeen Khan was charged with possession and consumption of a small quantity of cocaine. He was given an exemption after undergoing a de-addiction programme under Section 64 (A) of the NDPS Act.

However, immunity can be applied for only once a chargesheet is submitted by the agencies. It will not have any bearing during the process of investigation.

In the case of Deepika Padukone, Sara Ali Khan, Shraddha Kapoor and Rakul Preet Singh, the NCB has summoned them on the basis of WhatsApp chats found on the phones of Chakraborty and Jaya Saha. Further, the confessional statements made by them was also a basis for the summons.

The NCB's further course of action would largely depend on the statements given by these persons. In this case, the maximum they could be charged is for consumption.

They could seek immunity by willing to under rehabilitation. This is provided they do not contest the charge.
Sanduns Sci-Fi to premiere at Screamfest Film Festival Vikaarifirst Lankan film to compete at the US horror film festival View(s): View(s):

The Screamfest Horror Film Festival, one the worlds biggest genre film festivals, recently announced its selection of Vikaari, a Sri Lankan movie by Sandun Seneviratne and British Filmmaker Charlie Bray to be screened in its competition later this year.

This makes it the first Sri Lankan film to be selected by Screamfest, placing it in legendary company with horror sensations such as Paranormal Activity and The Grudge which made their premieres in previous years. Often referred to as The Sundance of Horror, legendary directors such as Clive Barker, Wes Craven and John Carpenter sit on the advisory board while the coveted trophy was designed by the late Stan Winston, master of special effects on many classic Hollywood movies.

Vikaari features Sri Lankan stars Ashan Dias, Bimsara Premaratne and British actor Richard Dee Roberts. Revolving around the widespread birth of babies with similar deformities, the movie follows the ensuing worldwide panic. The children, nicknamed Vikaari, all share a remarkable set of characteristics and may even possess paranormal abilities.

Sandun Seneviratne who also wrote and directed Sri Lankas first big budget sci-fi web series Seer: Death Sight says he aims to produce Hollywood inspired sci-fi genre films in Sri Lanka that can compete in the international market in terms of storytelling and production value.

Vikaari, will premiere at Screamfest in LA in October.

Born and raised in Sri Lanka, Sandun first studied film-making under Internationally acclaimed director Sammy Pavel. His first short film Opinion was about the devastation caused by the Tsunami in Sri Lanka. He then went to London Film Academy to further develop his skills in film-making where he made several Short films in Super 16 and HD.

One of the short films he wrote and directed called The Seer, a post-apocalyptic sci/fi action film starring Joey Ansah from the hit Hollywood film The Bourne Ultimatum, was selected to be screened at several international genre film festivals including the Phoenix Comicon Film Festival. The Seer was released on Facebook with added footage as a web series called Seer: Death Sight and has become a viral sensation in Sri Lanka.

Sandun returned to Sri Lanka to opne his own production company Synhedrion Studios, in order to write, direct and produce Hollywood style genre pictures, against the contrasting and beautiful backdrop of Sri Lanka.

His goal is to produce films that can compete with Hollywood in the international market in terms of storytelling and production value.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 14:17:53|Editor: huaxia

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BEIJING, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- As of the end of last month, a total of 199,478 people have been indicted in 31,840 cases involving organized crime or local bullies in China since the country launched a targeted crackdown in 2018.

The first-instance trials of over 151,000 people have been concluded, and final sentences for over 83,000 people have been issued after an appellate trial, according to a statement from the national office against organized crime.

Money and assets worth about 43.6 billion yuan (6.4 billion U.S. dollars) involved in such cases have been ordered by the courts to be seized or confiscated, the office said, adding that there were still 14.6 billion yuan under enforcement procedures. Enditem
We've seen Antifa and Black Lives Matter activists and their supporters contend that, when they burn down buildings and loot stores, nobody is hurt. They're confident that insurance will cover all the damages. That people in the poorer communities may not have insurance or that the insurers will have to raise rates to cover their extraordinary 2020 outlay eludes the mob. On Thursday, an Antifa-supporter who had clearly never learned about Bastiat's Parable of the Broken Window took his ignorance one step farther by insisting that looting and burning is actually a jobs' program.

A tweet has been circulating in which one of Antifa's brainiacs takes offense at the idea that the looting, burning, and other destruction he and his friends have caused might be a problem. It's not a problem at all, he claims. It's a good thing, because "burning down a building is a symbolic act" that then provides work for people who must "build it back up." Yes, he said that:

Burning down buildings is good because you can employ a bunch of people to build it back up. This is your brain on Antifa. pic.twitter.com/KJxfWcEvfC  Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) September 25, 2020

Before I get to the Parable of the Broken Window, I'm willing to bet that the speaker is a college graduate or, at the very least, that he attended college. His understanding of economics rivals Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's, and she graduated cum laude with degrees in economics and international relations from Boston University.

Frederic Bastiat was a French economist who wrote the Parable of the Broken Window in an 1850 essay entitled "Ce qu'on voit et ce qu'on ne voit pas" ("That Which We See and That Which We Do Not See"). (As an aside, I've long contended that the problem with the left is that its members see so little.) The following is the whole parable, and it explains everything that's wrong with the Antifa guy's simplistic economics:

Have you ever witnessed the anger of the good shopkeeper, James Goodfellow, when his careless son has happened to break a pane of glass? If you have been present at such a scene, you will most assuredly bear witness to the fact that every one of the spectators, were there even thirty of them, by common consent apparently, offered the unfortunate owner this invariable consolation  "It is an ill wind that blows nobody good. Everybody must live, and what would become of the glaziers if panes of glass were never broken?" Now, this form of condolence contains an entire theory, which it will be well to show up in this simple case, seeing that it is precisely the same as that which, unhappily, regulates the greater part of our economical institutions. Suppose it cost six francs to repair the damage, and you say that the accident brings six francs to the glazier's trade  that it encourages that trade to the amount of six francs  I grant it; I have not a word to say against it; you reason justly. The glazier comes, performs his task, receives his six francs, rubs his hands, and, in his heart, blesses the careless child. All this is that which is seen. But if, on the other hand, you come to the conclusion, as is too often the case, that it is a good thing to break windows, that it causes money to circulate, and that the encouragement of industry in general will be the result of it, you will oblige me to call out, "Stop there! Your theory is confined to that which is seen; it takes no account of that which is not seen." It is not seen that as our shopkeeper has spent six francs upon one thing, he cannot spend them upon another. It is not seen that if he had not had a window to replace, he would, perhaps, have replaced his old shoes, or added another book to his library. In short, he would have employed his six francs in some way, which this accident has prevented.

When people repair things that should not have needed repair, there is no wealth creation. Instead, there's just money running around in a circle.

It's increasingly clear that Antifa is as much an I.Q.-signaler as belonging to Mensa. If you're at the uppermost end of the I.Q. scale, congratulations: you qualify for Mensa. And if you're at the lowest (but still functional) end of the I.Q. scale, they've got a place for you in Antifa. It's therefore long past time for our governing class to take pity on those morons and get them off the streets before their sheer stupidity causes even more damage than it already has.

Item: Antifa dude saying arson is good for the economy. Twitter screen grab.
The Congress said on September 26 that it is ready to fight the elections on all 243 seats in the Bihar state assembly, with the polls scheduled for the end of October. The party said it will contest in alliance with its partner, the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), if a "respectable" understanding is forged.

"Congress is fully prepared to fight the elections on all 243 seats in Bihar Assembly. If we reach a respectable understanding with RJD, we will contest the elections with them," Avinash Pande, Congress' screening committee chairman for the Bihar polls, said.

Earlier, reports had suggested that the Congress had not taken a decision on who could be the Grand Alliance's Chief Ministerial face in Bihar. One of the members, the Rashtriya Lok Samta Party's (RLSP) Upendra Kushwaha, who had broken ties with the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government in Bihar, had said that he "cannot accept the leadership of Tejashwi Yadav", who heads the RJD.

There were also reports suggesting discontent within the Grand Alliance, led by the RJD, with the Left parties stating that RJD is yet to respond to a list of seats they wanted to contest.

The Election Commission had announced dates for the 2020 Bihar Legislative Assembly election on September 25. The polls will be held in three phases starting from October 28, amid the novel coronavirus pandemic . The counting of votes will happen on November 10.
MOLALLA, ORE.Brock Ellis was getting ready for bed on Labour Day Monday when a neighbour knocked on the door with the news that a house across the street was on fire.

Ellis, who works in forestry services, and his buddies got into their trucks to see how far the fire stretched along the rural road outside the town of Molalla, not sure yet exactly what they were going to do, but knowing they wanted to do something.

They didnt know much about wildfires, but they had all been raised here, in the foothills of the Cascade mountain range, where their parents taught them to take care of themselves and their neighbours above all else.

Ellis remembers cresting a hill on one neighbours property to open a gate and let cattle escape from the descending fire.

That night, when we went up there to open the gate for that old guys cows, you could see that Beachie Creek Fire just glowing red right up there behind my grandpas place, he said.

It didnt look good. I called them and said, If you see it coming over the top of whats called High Hill, you need to get the hell out of there. 

As the first night blended into the next days, and the threat from the 78,000-hectare fire got closer and closer to Molalla, forcing thousands of evacuations, Ellis and his friends kept working 20 hours a day  transporting belongings, digging fire trenches, trucking water up hills to fight a blaze.

As a matter of course, each volunteer carried a pistol, in case they spotted would-be looters to warn.

This is not the dense cityscape of Portland, some 45 minutes to the north, where self-proclaimed weird hipsters frequent cafes and craft breweries  a city that has seen sustained protests under the Black Lives Matter banner and which last week was labelled an anarchist jurisdiction by the U.S. Justice Department.

Nor is it the suburbia of Clackamas County, with its big-box stores and subdivisions.

This is the outer reaches of the county  where cattle-grazing fields, generational family houses, and a city centre with a handful of wooden-doored saloons paint a quintessential picture of small-town Americana.

Towns such as Molalla and Estacada are dotted with self-built houses on large fields grazed by cattle, and lawn signs promising homeowners are prepared to protect themselves with guns. And, ample signs in support of U.S. President Donald Trump.

Travelling between these areas of Oregon is like crossing a border between two different Americas.

Its not something youd see in an old western film or anything like that, but I guess its held off to how things were 20 years ago in a lot of areas, Ellis said. You can use all the slang. Really its a hillbilly, rural-type, redneck area. Its a place where generally you can leave your truck unlocked and have a gun rack in the back.

Ellis would spend more than a week working all day with his neighbours in a community effort to fight the fire, secure belongings and ward off looters. It was an all-hands-on-deck effort.

In his town, the volunteer crews gained a number of affectionate nicknames  the redneck crew, the Molalla Militia  conveying a sense of community pride and duty, but also a feeling that, without visible help from the government, small towns had to protect themselves.

In a way, Ellis said, the fires accentuated a divide thats long existed in the state of Oregon, between the cities and their liberal ethos, and places such as Molalla, more prone to a conservative outlook and way of life.

I dont like to bring any politics up. But when you think of it that way, its pretty obvious how different things are from one place to the next, Ellis said, turning to the divisions among the states electorate. Basically, three counties in the whole state of Oregon decide votes for the whole state. But then youve got all these communities out here who think 180 degrees opposite.

Politics and its echoes seem to reach every corner these days.

At the moment when hundreds of hectares in the state were on fire and there was not yet any sign of respite, even the origin of the toxic red smoke blanketing every town was a matter of contention between these two versions of America  another point of contested truth in a country where the deepest divisions are no longer just political, but extend to what is true, and what is false.

As the state burned, communities in the rural parts of the state most deeply affected by the fires came to believe widespread but discredited rumours that the fires were started by far-left groups wanting to attack them.

To many townspeople in rural Oregon, it didnt matter when local police and the FBI came out to say the rumours were unfounded, or when podcaster Joe Rogan recently apologized for amplifying the unfounded ideas.

To them it all felt real. And they cant be convinced otherwise.

Rumours that left-wing extremists were starting fires along the West Coast originated with social media accounts citing QAnon  a far-right conspiracy theory that preaches against a left-wing deep state.

The message was amplified by figures such as Paul J. Romero Jr., who has run for Republican candidacy for both the Congress and Senate in Oregon, and who tweeted messages that Oregon is under attack from arsonists associated with the antifa.

For those living in small communities, its not the statements of officials or would-be politicians  or even anonymous social media accounts  that matter.

Its what they see and hear every day from their neighbours, combined with the cumulative effect of seeing images of the police-protester confrontations in Portland for 110 days.

Tonja Stradley, a project manager who lives with her husband in Sandy, Ore., said she believes wholeheartedly that at least some of the fires that forced evacuations and destroyed property in her area were set by antifa, or people inspired by antifa.

She said this knowing that law officials say its not true, and admitting that she doesnt have any proof.

We have this huge antifa presence in Portland, she said. Theyve torn our city down, and its mind-boggling to me.

Stradley said she gets most of her information from local community Facebook groups, where neighbours she knows have shared posts about sighting suspicious cars followed by sightings of fires.

She knows law enforcement have not tied any of these reports to any political groups, but to her, the sense that her community is under attack was real.

My husband slept outside for two nights with an AK next to him. I didnt sleep for three days, she said. I believe to the bottom of my core that there was an orchestrated attack on some of the outlying areas of Portland.

All the people I know  and weve lived here for decades  believe the same thing, she said.

To Craig Roberts, the local sheriff in Clackamas county, the fires themselves posed enough of a challenge without the widespread fear over how they started.

He was immediately concerned by reports that vigilante types were patrolling areas such as Molalla and Estacada, fearful of would-be arsonists and looters.

We had citizens reporting it, and we have investigations going on when people were inappropriately contacted at gunpoint and detained, Roberts said.

As of Friday, those reports were still under investigation, and no charges had been laid. The Multnomah County sheriff's office, where the city of Portland is located, has issued at least three criminal citations for illegal roadblocks set up by residents.

The Clackamas County sheriffs office also came under fire when a deputy was recorded talking to some of the armed patrollers, seemingly advising them on how far they could push confrontations with suspected antifa without getting in trouble themselves.

Roberts put the deputy on administrative leave  a move that drew angry messages from members of the community who thought the deputy had been in the right.

To Roberts, the vigilantism and the statements of the deputy were inappropriate. But he doesnt think those actions characterize the community broadly. He empathizes with members of the community who have gotten sucked into rumours that arent substantiated.

I dont want to create a false impression without really having facts to support it, he said. Its just a sad point in this country right now that, I believe, that there is such a strong divide.

He places some of the blame for the spread of the rumours not on community members who believe them, but on those specifically looking to stoke divides online.

There are different groups out there that want to cause this chaos, to put out false information, to start panic, he said. To me, we have a lot of citizens that have good intentions. We have good-hearted citizens wanting to look out for their neighbours.

Thats how Brock Ellis and his family and friends viewed their weeklong foray into fire response.

Now that he thinks about it, Ellis describes that first night and the following morning  before they knew the extent of the devastation the West Coast fires would rage on their home and across the west coast  as the most surreal.

Ellis mass texted the group of men he goes hunting with. Soon they were all pitching in to dig fire routes, truck water up to fire lines and rescue livestock and possessions from the blazes.

It was pretty neat to see everybody band together, pull together, all these people that you know are around who still have it  that, I dont know  hometown family roots that you see something that needs done or people that need help and you go do it, Ellis said from outside his truck, about a week after the fire had calmed and Molalla residents were able to return from their evacuation.

Sticking around to fight the blazes was a matter of course to Ellis. He and his friends knew the hills where the fire was burning better than anyone, he said. They go up there to hunt multiple times a year; its where they teach their kids to be self-sufficient.

It was equally apparent to Ellis that everyone volunteering to fight the fires would carry a pistol with them, in case they spotted looters and had a reason to defend their neighbours property.

Ellis said that at the time he wasnt thinking about the conspiracy theories, or the looting, or the politics of whether better forest management could have prevented the level of damage seen across Oregon and the western states.

Hes barely had time to process the burn damage to his own home. Amid all the fear, he and his friends were just focused on the task at hand, he said.

Thats something we do. Its just kind of in the community out here, he said. With a lot of these families its self-sustainability, you know, being able to process your own meat, have your kids to a point where they can go up in the woods and survive a couple days by themselves, that kind of thing.

A lot of people, they forget about small-town America, he said. And this is kind of it.

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New York Democrat AOC said Ms Greene had taken a 'swing' at her but missed (Getty Images)

New York Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC) on Friday pulled out of an event commemorating the former Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin, who was assassinated in 1995 at a Tel Aviv rally.

A spokesperson for AOC told The Times of Israel (TOI) the popular congresswoman, 30, would not attend the event, organised by Americans for Peace Now (APN), and scheduled to take place next month.

The spokesperson did not explicitly outline to the TOI why AOC, considered a rising star in the Democratic party, cancelled her appearance. The Independent has contacted AOC's representatives for additional comment.

Earlier on Friday AOC, representative for New York's 14th district, had said in a tweet that her team was "taking a look" at the event, due to be held close to 25th anniversary of Rabin's death.

"Hey there - this event and my involvement was presented to my team differently from how its now being promoted," AOC tweeted on Friday afternoon. "Thanks for pointing it out. Taking a look into this now."

She had been responding to a comment from the journalist Alex Kane - a contributor to the Jewish currents magazine - who said that, for many Palestinians, Rabin would be "remembered his brutal rule suppressing Palestinian protest during the First Intifada, as someone who reportedly ordered the breaking of Palestinian bones".

Mr Kane said in a follow-up tweet a source told him the event was sold to AOC as focusing on Oslo and Rabin, and APN wanted her to speak on her congressional work on the issue. "It wasn't framed to her as a Rabin memorial. That's why she canceled," he added.

Palestinian activists heavily criticised AOC after her attendance at the event was announced.

Hey there - this event and my involvement was presented to my team differently from how its now being promoted.



Thanks for pointing it out. Taking a look into this now.  Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) September 25, 2020

Ali Abunimah, a leading BDS activist and co-founder of The Electronic Intifada, a website covering Palestinian issues, said AOC's attendance was just disgusting and called Rabin an unrepentant war criminal.

Story continues

His legacy is one of violence and dispossession for Palestinians, Adalah Justice Project, a Palestinian advocacy group wrote on Twitter, after news of AOC's withdrawal filtered through. Thank you AOC for listening to the lived experience of the Palestinian people.

Rabin, the 5th prime minister of Israel, was elected to office in 1992. He was the first PM to recognise the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) as legitimate representative for the Palestinian people.

He formed a strong relationship with former PLO chairman Yasser Arafat, who died in 2004. Rabin was assassinated by Yigal Amir, an Israeli ultra-nationalist opposed to the Oslo Accords.

Read more

Rabin assassinated

In the vicious circle of exile: A tale of Palestinian and Israeli dispossession that reveals the complexity of the task facing Arafat and Rabin in their peace talks today

Rabin ponders Golan withdrawal
By Express News Service

CHENNAI: In a shocking incident, a 20-year-old youth who was pushed from the second floor of building by a woman and her son, in Arumbakkam, succumbed to injuries on Thursday evening. According to the police, Kuppusamy of Thiruvengada Krishna Nagar in Arumbakkam owns a two-storey building, which he had leased. He lived with his son, Sriram, a second year BCom student.

Kuppusamy had leased out the first floor of his house to one Raja for Rs 5 lakh, said a police officer. Raja lived there with his son Shankar (20) and wife Banu (48). According to the police, Kuppusamy had taken Rs 2 lakh as debt from Raja. In the meantime, the housing lease got over. Kuppusamy neither paid the lease amount nor returned the money he received as debt, added the police. This led to frequent quarrels.

Recently, the second floor tenant vacated and Raja locked the house and told Kuppusamy that the house belongs to them until he pays the money back, said a police officer. On Thursday, Sriram went to the second floor to break open the lock. On seeing him, Shankar and his mother Banu followed suit. Raja was out at the time.

"A argument broke out between the youth and soon turned into a fist fight. In the melee, Shankar and his Banu pushed Sriram from the corridor of the second floor. Sriram who suffered grievous head injuries was rushed to a private hospital and later shifted to the Kilpauk Medical College and Hospital, where he succumbed at around 6 pm," said the police. Arumbakkam police registered a case and sent the body for postmortem and Shankar and Banu were arrested on charges of murder. They were later remanded in judicial custody.

Clarification

A report in Chennai edition of The New Indian Express, 'Demolish Olive Beach bungalows by Saturday', dated September 25, made a reference to demolition of five bungalows at Olive Beach in Muttukadu. This was following a Madras High Court order dated August 14, 2020, and not after an expose carried in the previous day's edition, titled, Swanky bungalows rising high along ECR coastline.
Lima: The Peruvian Navy is carefully watching a fleet of around 250 Chinese fishing vessels sailing just outside the Andean country's waters, angering the domestic fishing industry and sparking a Twitter war between Washington and Beijing.

The fleet, previously fishing for giant squid near the Galapagos Islands off Ecuador, was detected this week some 370 kilometres off the coast of Peru, the local maritime authority reported on Friday (Saturday AEST).

"Our Navy is making overflights ensuring there are no such vessels within the scope of our jurisdiction, which is 200 miles," Defence Minister Jorge Chavez said.

A Peruvian flag flies on the beach in Chorrillos, Lima, as a couple dances on the sand. More than 250 Chinese fishing vessels are operating just outside Peru's maritime zone. Credit:AP

The commander of the Coast Guard operations, Rear Admiral Jorge Portocarrero, said the fleet was identified and located after a low-altitude flight of an exploration aircraft and a patrol vessel between Sunday and Wednesday.
Television has been responsible for some of the biggest cultural shifts in history. It has the ability to change how we see celebrities, or discuss subjects that were previously deemed taboo. It can launch careers and also end them.

One of the most recent controversies was dance troupe Diversity's performance on Britain's Got Talent. While the group were widely praised for the dance that paid tribute to the Black Lives Matter movement, the routine also sparked 24,500 complaints to Ofcom last year. Members of Diversity including leader and temporary BGT judge Ashley Banjo said they received racist comments in response to their performance.

Ofcom has since announced it will not be investigating the complaints, with a spokesperson commenting: Diversity's performance referred to challenging and potentially controversial subjects, and in our view, its central message was a call for social cohesion and unity.

Any depictions of violence by the performers were highly stylised and symbolic of recent global events, and there was no explicit reference to any particular political organisation  but rather a message that the lives of black people matter.

In the wake of the Diversity row (and complaints over Matt Lucass impression of Boris Johnson on The Great British Bake Off), here are 10 more of the most controversial TV moments.

Sansa rape scene in Game of Thrones

Iwan Rheon as Ramsay Bolton in Game of Thrones

Game of Thrones was already infamous for its graphic scenes of sex, torture and murder by the time the fifth season aired on HBO in 2015. But even so, fans were left reeling at the horrific moment that the evil Ramsay Bolton (Iwan Rheon) rapes his new bride, Sansa Stark (Sophie Turner), while Theon Greyjoy (Alfie Allen) is forced to watch.

Many critics reviewing the episode condemned showrunners David Benioff and DB Weiss, saying it undermined Sansas character development. Others questioned why there was more uproar over this particular scene than the many previous sexual assaults against other characters. Some viewers, including then-US senator Claire McCaskill, claimed they would stop watching the show because of the scene. Ok, I'm done Game of Thrones, she tweeted. Gratuitous rape scene disgusting and unacceptable.

Celebrity Big Brother, punchgate

 Celebrity Big Brother 2018: The moment Ryan Thomas 'punches' fellow housemate Roxanne Pallett

Celebrity Big Brother received a massive 25,327 complaints regarding its 2018 scandal, which was dubbed punchgate. During an episode, a tearful Roxanne Pallett accused her housemate and fellow soap actor Ryan Thomas of physically assaulting her. She then accused him of lying and manipulating the other housemates when he denied intentionally hurting her.

Replays of the incident later revealed that Pallett had heavily exaggerated the incident, and it was in fact a playfight. After a national uproar, Pallett was removed from the house and Thomas ended up winning the competition. The incident became the most-complained about TV moment of the decade.

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Seinfeld insulting Puerto Ricans

Aired in 1998, one of the final episodes of Seinfeld managed to mire itself in controversy. Titled The Puerto Rican Day, the episode sees the shows characters stuck in traffic due to the annual Puerto Rican Day Parade. At one point, Kramer sets a Puerto Rican flag on fire then stomps on it.

The episode sparked a major backlash and anger from the then-president of the National Puerto Rican Coalition. Broadcaster NBC was forced to apologise, and the episode was banned for several years.

Ellen coming out

The Ellen DeGeneres Show is currently in the midst of its own controversy, due to allegations of bullying and harassment behind the scenes. But Ellen DeGeneres made history in 1997 on her sitcom The Ellen Show, when her character  also called Ellen and based on herself  came out on national TV. While DeGeneres herself had come out publicly a few days before, in Time magazine, gay characters on scripted shows were still rare. There were reports that the show lost some of its sponsors as a result, while DeGeneres and her co-star Laura Dern experienced career setbacks.

Spike tries to rape Buffy

The original cast of Buffy the Vampire Slayer

In 2002, Buffy the Vampire Slayer upset many fans with a scene that showed main character Spike, a vampire, try to rape the show's hero, Buffy. In the scene, Spike tells Buffy how he feels about her, shortly after she ended their relationship. After insisting that shes hiding her true feelings for him, he violently attacks her and tries to rape her. Buffy manages to free herself and yells at him, telling him this was why she cannot trust him.

While the episode as a whole was considered important for Spikes character, as he seeks to find a way to make himself a man worthy of Buffy, it caused considerable controversy and debate among fans, and still does to this day. Actor James Marsters, who played Spike, said shooting the scene was the hardest day of his professional life.

Mister Rogers talking about the Cold War

Mister Rogers Neighbourhood tackled myriad issues in a way that made them easy for the shows young audience to understand and process. However, presenter Fred Rogers, or Mister Rogers, broached a major hot-button topic when he decided to tackle nuclear war. He believed there was growing concern among his young fans over Cold War headlines, and so came up with a five-episode plot for the summer of 1983.

This show gives us a chance to talk about war, and about how its essential that people learn to deal with their feelings and to talk about things and resolve conflicts, Rogers said in the episodes, which addressed bombs, war, and air-raid drills. Due to the controversial subject, the episodes were removed from syndicated airings. Two of the episodes resurfaced in 2017, around the time that US president Donald Trump was planning to increase military spending.

Lois gets an abortion in Family Guy

Family Guy is known for being controversial

Like Game of Thrones, Family Guy was already known for being controversial when it aired this 2010 episode in which Lois gets an abortion. During the show, Lois agrees to be a surrogate for a couple who are later killed in a car accident, and then has to decide whether to keep or abort the baby. Peter tries to persuade her to keep it after being swayed by anti-abortion activists, but Lois decides to get the abortion. While critics reacted favourably to the plot, it was banned from airing on the Fox Broadcasting Company.

Jimmy Fallon ruffling Trumps hair

Jimmy Fallon musses Donald Trump's hair in his controversial 2016 interview (YouTube/screengrab)

During the run-up to the 2016 presidential election, Donald Trump was doing the rounds on a number of talk shows, including Jimmy Fallon. Many expected that Fallon would use the opportunity to mock Trump, who was already causing concern with his extreme views. However, Fallon was criticised for what was deemed a softball interview, in which he asked the now-president for permission to ruffle his hair. While he later said in 2018 that he regretted the way he handled the interview, Fallon also defended himself and said the shows interviews had always been conducted in that style. Trump himself was furious at Fallons backtracking, and tweeted a demand that he be a man.

The Simpsons Rio episode

The Simpsons, typically less controversial than other animated sitcoms such as South Park and Family Guy, was accused of depicting a distorted vision of Brazilian reality by then-president Fernando Henrique Cardoso. The offending episode, which aired in 2002, followed the family as they experienced a number of ordeals in Rio, including Homer being kidnapped, and he and Bart being mugged by children. The shows executive producer, James L Brooks, later issued an apology, albeit a tongue-in-cheek one.

Tom Cruise sofa jumping incident

Few TV moments are more memorable than Tom Cruise declaring his love for Katie Holmes on the set of Oprah. In 2005, it became one of YouTubes first hits, after a clip of the incident was uploaded to the then-new website. Cruise, one of the worlds biggest film stars, was scheduled on the show to discuss his new movie, War of the Worlds. Things went awry when he started gushing about his new girlfriend, instead, and abruptly jumped onto Oprahs sofa, prompting screams from the live audience and stunning his host. The moment was so huge that it was parodied on Sesame Street, and galvanised the gossip press at a time when celebrity culture was undergoing a drastic shift.
Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) FinTech Hive has announced the launch of AccelerateHer, a female-focused career mentorship accelerator programme aimed at empowering women in financial services.

The first and largest financial technology accelerator in the Middle East, Africa and South Asia region, DIFC FinTech Hive said the programme equips young, aspiring female executives with tools and experience to broaden their knowledge and reach in the industry.

It allows them to play a more active role in shaping the future of the financial landscape, said the statement from DIFC.

AccelerateHer also offers the 14 selected participants one-on-one mentorship from executives, where the cohort will be exposed to a diverse range of experiences such as workshops, mentorship and other activities. These allow participants to build their networks, skills, and knowledge.

Women are currently underrepresented in senior roles across the finance industry globally and gender inclusion has been a focus for DIFC since it was established in 2004.

The DIFC Authority leads by example by having strong representation of women on its Management Team, and over 60 per cent of DIFC Authority staff and 33 per cent of the workforce in the regions largest financial centre ecosystem are female.

Commenting on the launch, Executive VP Raja Al Mazrouei said: "Following the massive success of the first edition of the programme in 2019, we have worked with our DIFC FinTech Hive partners to encourage women to apply from across the world."

"AccelerateHer allows young and ambitious women to build their careers in financial services and play a more influential role in driving the future of the industry. It is another way that DIFC is shaping the future of finance," he stated.

Standard Chartered Bank CEO for UAE region Rola Abu Manneh said: "We are very pleased to be collaborating with DIFC FinTech Hive on this exciting initiative. At Standard Chartered, we believe that including and empowering women, particularly in senior roles, would be key to unlocking positive trickle-down effects for generations."

"This programme is an excellent platform for distinguished women in the UAEs financial services to gain a multitude of insights on the working world and, more importantly, build their networks, skills, and knowledge," he noted.

Applications were received from young women across different areas within financial services, who mostly have less than three years work experience.

The mentees will shadow aspects of the DIFC FinTech Accelerator Programme and take part in over 20 workshops provided by partners in areas such as legal, Tech, HR, compliance, marketing and more.

The second edition of AccelerateHer which kicked off last month will run for the next two months, wrapping up on November 30.-TradeArabia News Service
Weve taken a little bit of heat from folks who have driven by, Littlejohn said. We dont want to give the impression that its unsafe in any manner. We really just want to show proactivity.  Its about as safe as this gets in this environment.
The chiefs and good people Sewhi Akontombra in the Wioso municipality of the newly created Western North region, have in a splendid fashion, endorsed and pledged unwavering support to the second term bid of President Akufo-Addo.



Speaking for and on behalf of the chiefs and people of Akontombra and surrounding townships, Nana Kwabena Ebie II, the Akontombra manhene, said, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has proved himself an honest and trustworthy leader and so his reward is not only in heaven, but that, all the chiefs and their subjects will unite to reward him (Akufo-Addo) and his government with the thumb during the December, 2020 polls.





The chiefs and people of Akontombra and its catchment towns; Bokaso, Nsawora, Edumefua, Kofikrom, Ackaakrom, Yawkrom, Aprutu and etc., who defied the heavy rains, biting cold and intermittent power outages, chanted and sung for well over five hours until President Akufo-Addo gingerly mounted the wet platform to take the national salute and address the charged gathering.



The visibly elated President, clad in his trademark African print, danced to the ever-rich melodies of Asempa pa bi a mate, oye oye. before addressing the gathering. The chiefs and people who could just not hold back their delight, kept shouting in unison, FOUR MORE FOR NANA, FOUR MORE FOR TETTEH! (The sitting NPP MP for the Sewhi Wioso constituency).



President Akufo-Addo responded to the address by the chiefs and promised to hold discussions with his ministers on the various requests made, especially on the need for a nursing training school in Akontombra.



The gathering, most of whom are in various levels of the Cocoa production chain, went into wild jubilations when honorable Boahen Aidoo, CEO of COCOBOD and a native of the land, announced the price increase for a bag of cocoa, from Ghc515.63 to Ghc660.00 per cocoa bag. They quickly resumed the chorus of, FOUR MORE FOR NANA, FOUR MORE FOR TETTEH.



The President was blessed with two fattened white sheep and a beautifully weaved kente cloth in appreciation of his sincerity to the people of Akontombra and Ghana over the past four years.



And so, it was, on Thursday 24th September, 2020, even as the rains poured down, Akontombra poured out to endorse the second term bid of an honest and visionary President, Akufo-Addo.















Source: Michael Nana-Sasu/Danquah Institute









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Michael Lonsdale, a versatile veteran of French cinema who was known abroad for his villains and antiheroes, including the sad-eyed and subtly psychotic Hugo Drax in the James Bond film Moonraker and the mysterious intelligence broker in Steven Spielbergs Munich, died on Monday at his home in Paris. He was 89.

The death was confirmed by Olivier Loiseau, his longtime agent.

Over his long career, Mr. Lonsdale appeared in nearly 200 films, including Day of the Jackal (1973), in which he played the dogged detective Claude Lebel, and worked with a Whos Who of directors, including Mr. Spielberg, Francois Truffaut, Orson Welles, Luis Bunuel, Jean-Jacques Annaud, and James Ivory, for whom he appeared as Dupont dIvry, a French diplomat, in The Remains of the Day (1993).

He was as much a presence as an actor, J. Hoberman, the American film critic, said in a phone interview, a big hulking man, sometimes bearded, whose movements and voice were distinctively delicate.

That incongruity was his calling card (as were his paintbrush eyebrows).

In the avant-garde films that he loved, most notably Marguerite Durass India Song (1975), a gorgeously soapy tragedy that is a touchstone of the eras European art cinema, Mr. Lonsdales shambling presence was a kind of ballast. He played a heartbroken vice consul in thrall to the adulterous wife of an ambassador, played by the equally compelling Delphine Seyrig.
Once again, demonstrations have erupted throughout the United States in response to a brutal police murder that has been whitewashed by the state. In this case, the popular anger is in response to the announcement Wednesday that there would be no charges against police officers for killing Breonna Taylor in her Louisville, Kentucky home in the early hours of March 13.

The protests come four months after the police murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota sparked massive multi-racial and multi-ethnic protests over police violence, and one month after the police shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

According to Kentuckys Republican Attorney General Daniel Cameron, who acted as a special investigator in the case and presented evidence to the grand jury, no charges could be brought against the two officers who unleashed the hail of bullets that killed Taylor because her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, fired first. Walker maintains he was acting in self-defense against police who stormed into the home without identifying themselves.

The only charge in the case is for reckless endangerment by one of the police officers, not for shooting Taylor, but for firing bullets that entered another apartment where a family was sleeping. In other words, police have impunity to burst into workers homes in the middle of the night and kill anyone they find.

Once again, police in riot gear and in heavily armored vehicles have fired tear gas, pepper spray and rubber bullets at protesters and journalists. Hundreds of protesters have been arrested and brutalized by the police in Louisville and across the country. In Portland, federal police agents, as they have done for most of the summer, aided the police in assaulting protesters Thursday night, firing pepper balls and mace well beyond federal property.

The downtown area of Louisville was placed on lockdown on Monday and a state of emergency declared ahead of the grand jury decision. Kentuckys Democratic governor placed the National Guard on alert, and Louisvilles Democratic mayor has implemented a 9 p.m. curfew.

The whitewash of Taylors murder raises fundamental political issues for the working class in the US and internationally.

The incitement of police violence and the brutal crackdown on opposition is an integral part of the Trump administrations coup plotting. On June 1, Trump seized on the mass protests over the killing of Floyd in an attempt to invoke the Insurrection Act and deploy military forces throughout the United States against domestic opposition. Trump subsequently mobilized federal police in the Department of Homeland Security to kidnap protesters in Portland.

Last month, Trump openly defended 17-year-old militia member Kyle Rittenhouse, who killed two protesters in Kenosha. Earlier this month, Trump praised the targeted assassination of Portland protester Michael Reinoehl, urging his supporters to carry out similar forms of retribution.

Trump is now attempting to turn the elections, just over five weeks away, into a coup detat, declaring that he will not accept results that go against him. On the streets of Louisville and other cities, the methods the administration is planning to deploy on and around Election Day are being tested out. These include the mobilization of far-right vigilante organizations and the instigation of violent confrontations.

The Democratic Party responded to the massive eruption of protests following the murder of Floyd by hijacking them and diverting popular anger behind the politics of race, and ultimately into the election campaign of former Vice President Joe Biden.

Democratic politicians claim that police violence is the outcome of white supremacy and systemic racism, which can be resolved through the hiring of more minority officers and police chiefs, as well as the election of more black officials. At the same time, Biden and his running mate, Senator Kamala Harris, have made clear their unyielding support for the police, rejecting demands for defunding the police and launching a law-and-order campaign in which they denounce protesters as anarchists and arsonists.

The promotion of the politics of racial division goes hand-in-hand with the effort of the Democrats to prevent any mobilization of the working class that threatens the interests of Wall Street. While Trump is actively plotting a coup, the Democrats are seeking to derail any mass movement against the administration.

The racialist politics of the Democratic Party and the organizations that surround it are aimed at obscuring the basic class issues. The problem of police violence plagues the working class around the world, from South Africa and Kenya to Brazil and the European Union. The persistence of police violence and its global character speak to the nature of the capitalist state and the class exploitation at the heart of capitalist society, which the police, as special bodies of armed men, are tasked with upholding.

There is no doubt that African Americans are disproportionately the victims of police violence. This is a result primarily of the fact that they make up a disproportionate section of the most oppressed and impoverished layers of the working class.

Racism plays a role, and it is well known that fascistic elements are recruited and nurtured in the police forces at the local and federal level. However, the idea that electing more black politicians will solve the problem is refuted by the role of Kentucky Attorney General Cameron, who is African American and a rising star in the Republican Party, in leading the grand jury to its decision. Trump praised his handling of the Taylor case as fantastic.

Under President Barack Obama, the first black president, police violence continued unabated. Protests in the wake of the killing of Michael Brown in 2014 were viciously suppressed by police with the aid of the federal government.

Senator Kamala Harris, the Democrats first African American pick for vice president, has a long recordfirst as San Francisco district attorney and then as California attorney generalof not prosecuting killer cops and defending the states overcrowded prison system. Most notoriously, she refused to investigate the 2014 murder of Ezell Ford by Los Angeles police and the 2015 killing of Mario Woods in San Francisco, deferring to local Democratic Party prosecutors who decided not to bring charges against the officers involved in either case.

In line with the narrative in the media that the issue of police violence is one of trust between officers and communities of colorand a conflict between white America and black Americais an exclusive focus on police brutality against African Americans, ignoring violence against people of other racial or ethnic backgrounds.

The police shooting of a white 13-year-old autistic boy, Linden Cameron, in Salt Lake City, and the killing of 26-year-old convenience store attendant Hannah Fizer, also white, by a sheriffs deputy in Missouri have received scant national attention, despite protests by family members and supporters.

Regardless of their race, those who are killed and brutalized are overwhelmingly working class.

The ubiquity of police violence in the US, with approximately 1,000 people killed every year, is bound up with the growth of class tensions and social inequality to unprecedented heights. The police are the state's first line of defense of capitalist property relations.

The intensity of protests against police violence over the last four months cannot be understood outside of the growing anger and opposition in the working class and among the youth. A social and economic catastrophe is overtaking the United States. Millions are unemployed and face poverty and eviction. The pandemic is raging out of control, as a result of the herd immunity policy of both parties. There is growing opposition among teachers and students to the efforts to reopen the schools under unsafe conditions.

Opposition to police violence cannot be quarantined from the broader class issues. The struggle against police violence is the struggle against capitalism, which requires the unification of the working class across racial, ethnic and gender lines to fight for socialism.
In what looks more like a movie trailer for the next Hollywood blockbuster than a campaign ad, Houston Congressman Dan Crenshaw is trying to use his fame in the GOP  and maybe more importantly share his donor base  to help five fellow Texas Republicans running for Congress.

In the nearly 4-minute video clip, Crenshaw, a retired Navy SEAL, plays the role of an action hero as he literally jumps out of an airplane on the way to recruit other Texas Republicans to run for office.

Who says campaign ads have to suck? Crenshaw said in promoting the video on social media that directs his 1 million followers to a website called Texasreloaded.com to donate to a fund to help the five other candidates.

Crenshaw, 36, said they were going for a Mission-Impossible-meets-the-Avengers look.

Within 24 hours after it was posted, the video had already been viewed more than 500,000 times on YouTube, Twitter and other social media platforms. And Crenshaw said the joint fundraising committee has already raised far more money than it took to make the ad.

That money is critical in several of those races, where the Democrats have bankrolled more money than Republicans heading into the final five weeks of the campaign.

Texas Veterans in Congress Brian Babin, R-Woodville - Air Force Pete Olson, R-Sugar Land - Navy Louie Gohmert R-Tyler - Army Michael Conaway, R-Midland - Army Dan Crenshaw, R-Houston - Navy Van Taylor, R-Plano - Marines See More Collapse

Election Day is Nov. 3 with early voting set to begin on Oct. 13.

Ad aims to balance the scales in battleground Texas races

Crenshaw said with all the outside money pouring in to help Democrats in those five races, the Republicans could use a fundraising boost.

Were trying to balance the scales a little bit, Crenshaw said.

Although just a freshman in Congress, Crenshaw has become a rising star in the party with a prolific fundraising operation. Crenshaw had already raised $9.3 million as of July 1 for his re-election  more than all but 6 of the 435 members of Congress. Among the few ahead of him are top congressional leaders such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat, and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, a Republican.

In the ad, after parachuting onto an airbase, Crenshaw recruits Houston Republican Wesley Hunt, a retired U.S. Army Apache helicopter pilot. Next is August Pfluger, a retired F-22 Air Force pilot, as their military experience and campaign districts flash on the screen. Hunt is running for the 7th Congressional District in Houston against U.S. Rep. Lizzie Fletcher, D-Houston. Pfluger is running in the 11th Congressional District, which extends from just outside of Fort Worth to Midland, against Democrat Jon Mark Hogg.

TEXAS TAKE: Get political headlines from across the state sent directly to your inbox

Later, Republicans Beth Van Dyne, Navy veteran Tony Gonzales and Genevieve Collins make appearances. Van Dyne is running in the 24th Congressional District in Dallas-Fort Worth against Democrat Candace Valenzuela. Gonzales is running in the 23rd Congressional District, a swing district stretching from San Antonio to El Paso against Democrat Gina Ortiz Jones. And businesswoman Genevieve Collins is running in the 32nd Congressional District, also in Dallas, where she is trying to knock out U.S. Rep. Colin Allred.

In three of those races, Democrats are seen as having an edge heading into November, according to the Cook Political Report in Washington, D.C. Fletcher, Allred, and Jones are all favored in their races, while Van Dyne and Valenzuela are in a races considered toss-ups. Pfluger is considered the favorite over Hogg.

Fletcher, Jones and Allred all had massive fundraising advantages over their Republican opponents. Fletcher and Jones both had three times as much campaign money heading into the fall than Hunt and Gonzales, respectively. Allred wasnt far behind, with nearly triple the funding of Collins.

Six Texas veterans now serve in Congress  down from 16 in the 1970s

Crenshaw himself has a race on his hands, facing Democrat Sima Ladjevardian in Houstons 2nd Congressional District, which runs from Humble to West Houston. In 2018, Crenshaw won the seat by 7 percentage points. The Cook Political Report favors Crenshaw to hold the seat but has listed it among nearly 100 most-competitive races in the nation.

Financially, Crenshaw has a massive edge over Ladjevardian, with more than 7 times as much money.

The military theme in the video also highlights the service background in key races. That comes as Texas has seen the number of veterans it has in Congress plummet for decades. Only 6 members of the states 36 U.S. House members have a military background. Two of them  U.S. Reps Pete Olson, R-Sugar Land, and Michael Conaway, R-Midland  are retiring from Congress this year.

Olson is a Navy veteran and Conaway was in the Army.

The other Texas veterans in Congress are U.S. Reps Louie Gohmert, R-Tyler; Van Taylor, R-Plano; and Brian Babin, R-Woodville.

The drop in veterans is particularly notable for Texas because of the militarys huge footprint here. Texas has 15 active military bases, 1.6 million veterans and over 220,000 troops stationed in Texas bases, including both active duty and reserves.

In the 1970s, Texas had 16 veterans among its ranks in Congress.

Crenshaw said he only wishes he could have highlighted more of the veterans running for Congress in Texas. He said veterans in Congress have different problem-solving skills than others and have a camaraderie that helps them build coalitions that cross party lines. He said there is a common bond and common trust from the start with veterans, whether they are Democrats or Republicans.

Democrats have their share of veterans running as well, including Air Force veterans Jones, of San Antonio, and U.S. Senate candidate MJ Hegar, a decorated Air Force pilot from Cedar Park, just north of Austin.
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- The Olmsted-Beil house in Eltingville has been added to the New York State Register of Historic Places.

This listing acknowledges the historical significance of the structure and begins a pathway for future review and potential inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places by the National Park Service.

The farmhouse, designated a New York City landmark in 1967, was once home to landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted Sr. Central Park and Prospect Park are his best-known creations in New York City.

The house was also once home to naturalist and American Museum of Natural History educator Carlton Beil.

The Olmsted-Beil House was unanimously recommended by the New York State Historic Preservation Board earlier in September.

The house received support in its nomination from a range of individuals and groups, many associated with the Friends of Olmsted-Beil House (FOBH), a non-profit organization formed in 2018 by concerned neighbors and former residents of the farmhouse.

We are very excited that the Olmsted-Beil House, already a New York City landmark, is now listed on the New York State Register of Historic Places, said Eileen Monreale, president of the FOBH. This not only recognizes the historic property and Olmsteds time on Staten Island, but also gives the house greater prominence in the story of Olmsteds life and legacy. We hope that this will lead to greater support for the complete restoration and re-opening of the house for future generations.

The Olmsted-Beil House dates to the 1680s, when Dominie Petrus Tesschenmaker, a pastor in the Dutch Reformed Church, built a simple stone dwelling on a bluff overlooking the Raritan Bay.
BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept.26

Trend:

Worthless statement of Armenian Foreign Ministry can't deny the truth said by the president of Azerbaijan, Spokesperson for Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry Leyla Abdullayeva said.

Abdullayeva made the remark commenting on the statement by the Armenian Foreign Ministry regarding Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev's speech at the UN General Assembly, Trend reports on Sept.26.

"In his speech at the general debate of the 75th session of the UN General Assembly, President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev clearly and with facts informed the world community about the failed policy of Armenia and its current leadership," Abdullayeva said.

She noted that the present Armenia is a country facing a deep demographic, social and economic crisis, the main reason for which is the implementation of an aggressive policy against Azerbaijan.

"Despite the fact that two years ago the regime changed in Armenia, the current government continues the policy of the previous, criminal junta regime, the spokesperson pointed out. In Armenia, where human rights are grossly and widely violated, judges are exposed to pressure, opposition activists and political opponents are arrested, a dictatorship regime has been created. The authorities declaring that they received a mandate from the people, are very far from ensuring the interests of the people."

While the hands of the previous Armenian president are stained with the blood of the crimes committed during the war against Azerbaijan, especially against women, children and the elderly, killed with utter cruelty in Khojaly, the blood of a 76-year-old man who was killed in Tovuz district on July 14 this year is on the conscience of the current leadership, she noted.

"Lies, duplicity, falsehood, provocation and finally, war crimes are the main qualities peculiar to the current Armenian leadership, Abdullayeva said. The absurd statement of the Foreign Ministry of the country ruled by a man who is unable to fulfill any of his promises given to the people when coming to power, pushes the country to the abyss."

As the spokesperson stressed, Azerbaijan understands that Armenia, enviously observing the development, success and progress achieved by the Azerbaijani state from the outside, has no choice but to make such absurd statements.

"Instead of engaging not in chatter, but in demonstrating concrete activities, the current leadership of Armenia, which has declared that it came to power on the basis of the peoples mandate, must first of all stop territorial claims to neighboring states, put an end to the occupation policy and respect international borders of neighboring states, she concluded.
A Welland man suspected of intentionally striking two St. Catharines pedestrians on Thursday was still being sought by police Friday, but the car he was last seen driving was located.

Niagara Regional Police said they found the white, four-door Hyundai Elantra in Niagara Falls on Friday.

The location of 21-year-old Gage Young, though, was still unknown.

The white vehicle was not the one involved in the crash that saw two men in their 20s injured in downtown St. Catharines on Thursday morning. That car crashed into a tree after striking the pedestrians. It was abandoned at the scene by the driver, who ran away.

The incident unfolded just before noon Thursday in the area of Court and Church Streets.

Police said a 21-year-old man was driving a black Chevrolet Cobalt when it struck two male pedestrians, ages 23 and 25, before hitting the tree.

The driver took off and was seen getting into another vehicle near Church Street.

Police said Thursday night the investigation revealed the collision was a deliberate attempt to strike one of the pedestrians.

The 25-year-old pedestrian was transported to a hospital outside the region with non life-threatening injuries. The 23 year old suffered minor injuries.

Police said they located the female driver who picked up the male suspect. She was unharmed.

The male suspect was later seen by police in a white Hyundai Elantra in the Fonthill area. He was then spotted on the QEW Toronto-bound around Appleby Line in Oakville. Police said they were unable to stop the vehicle for safety reasons.

On Friday, police tweeted out that they were getting reports of sightings of the suspect in the Elantra in Niagara Falls. The Elantra had significant front-end damage and was missing its front plate.

RELATED STORIES Niagara Region Driver wanted for allegedly hitting pedestrians on purpose in St. Catharines

They later found the vehicle, but not the driver.

Young remains wanted for two counts of assault with a weapon, failing to remain at the scene of an accident, dangerous driving and theft of a motor vehicle.

Police said he is white, 5-foot-11, slim with brown hair.

Police are asking anyone with information to contact investigators at 905-688-4111, ext. 4322.
Boris Johnson has ordered diplomats to launch a new drive against Chinese expansionism after Beijing was accused of placing pressure on Barbados to remove the Queen as its head of state.

The island is one of dozens of countries which form part of Chinas Belt and Road Initiative, under which Beijing lends money to poorer countries to help them to fund critical infrastructure projects such as ports and high speed rail lines.

With China able to seize control of the finished project if the countries default  and frequently demanding preferential terms in trade deals as a condition of the loans  it has led to what one No 10 source described as a Chinese chokehold over much of the developing world.

Mr Johnson, who fears that the economic damage caused by Covid-19 will make countries even more vulnerable to domination, is to demand that China is more transparent about its financial dealings with other countries.

Boris Johnson has ordered diplomats to launch a new drive against Chinese expansionism after Beijing was accused of placing pressure on Barbados to remove the Queen as its head of state. Pictured: Chinese President Xi Jinping with Queen Elizabeth II at a state banquet at Buckingham Palace, London, during his state visit to the UK in 2015

Barbados, which gained independence in 1966, announced last week that it would become a republic in 2021: Governor-General Dame Sandra Mason said that the time has come to fully leave our colonial past behindBarbadians want a Barbadian Head of State.

US intelligence, which has been shared with the UK, has indicated that pressure was brought to bear on Barbados by its Chinese paymasters to cut their colonial ties.

Tom Tugendhat, Tory chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, says that the incident showed how the Chinese are tying new nations into their own imperial order by deploying debt diplomacy.

Writing in todays Mail on Sunday, he says: Barbados may be the latest trophy in Beijings imperial string of pearlsthe Great Game has given way to the Great Gamble as countries are taking loans from Chinese state banks and betting they can pay them back before the default clauses come due.

A No 10 source has described China's 'Belt and Road' initiative as a 'chokehold' on the developing world

He adds: We should remind our Caribbean cousins that a constitutional monarch, particularly under our peerless Queen, is the best defence against tyrants.

Figures seen by the MoS have revealed for the first time the true scale of Chinas reach over poorer countries, with money owed to China accounting for nearly one third of some countries GDP.

Pakistan is top of the list of recipients, with Islamabad owing China a total of 27 billion. The most leveraged country is Cambodia: the 5 billion it owes accounts for 29.5 per cent of GDP.

Other major recipients include Laos, with 26.1 per cent of GDP, Zambia with 23.4 per cent, Ethiopia with 17.7 per cent, and Belarus with 13 per cent.

Mr Johnsons new drive marks a sharp change of policy from previous Tory Governments: Theresa Mays Chancellor, Philip Hammond, pushed for Britain to fully endorse Chinas global investment drive.

A No 10 source said: As coronavirus devastates developing countries, many are finding themselves in a Chinese chokehold as a result of the huge debts they owe'

Mr Hammond complained recently about an outbreak of anti-Chinese sentiment in the party after Tory MPs objected to technology firm Huawei being given a key role in building the UKs 5G network.

And in 2017, the year after leaving Downing Street, David Cameron announced that he was helping to set up a $1 billion UK-China Fund to seek opportunities for co-operation between the two countries in technology.

A No 10 source said: As coronavirus devastates developing countries, many are finding themselves in a Chinese chokehold as a result of the huge debts they owe.

The Belt and Road Initiative is an expansionist Chinese Marshall Plan  for instance Beijing is funding a high speed rail line in Laos which is costing the equivalent of more than a quarter of the countrys GDP.

'China is doing this in the least transparent way  providing high-interest and unsustainable loans collateralised against countries natural resources. They are in danger of being forced to sell out future generations to meet their present debts.

The source added: As a member of both the UN Security Council and G20, China needs to step up to its obligations and end its chronic lack of transparency.

Charlie Robertson, the author of The Fastest Billion: The Story Behind Africas Economic Revolution and an expert on Chinese debt diplomacy, said: China is doing what Britain did in the Victorian era  exporting its savings to other countries as an exercise in global domination.

It has inevitably led to conspiracy theories about China hoping that the countries will default so they can seize critical infrastructure.

TOM TUGENDHAT MP: Beijing wants to do with loans what the Soviet Union failed to achieve with tanks

By TOM TUGENDHAT, CHAIR OF FOREIGN AFAIRS COMMITTEE FOR THE MAIL ON SUNDAY

Around the world, the Communist rulers of China are planting flags with the speed of a Victorian adventurer claiming lands and seas that others once thought their own or neutral.

Using debt instead of gunboats, the Chinese are tying new nations into their own imperial order.

It looks like Barbados may be the latest trophy in Beijings imperial string of pearls.

Last week, the island announced that, after nearly 400 years, the monarchs of Great Britain would no longer rule over them. Not that this Queen ever really did.

Chinese President Xi Jinping with the Duchess of Cambridge and Queen Elizabeth II at a state banquet at Buckingham Palace, London, during the first day of his state visit to the UK

As a constitutional monarch, Queen Elizabeth has never exercised any power over the 300,000 inhabitants.

Barbados is, and has been for decades, an independent constitutional realm and a democracy in the Commonwealth.

So why the change? What has triggered the Barbadians to find a new head of state and end the symbolic rule of the worlds most respected head of state?

If theres one thing we know for certain, its nothing the Queen said or did that triggered the change. In fact, its nothing the British Government did either.

The move were seeing has everything to do with a new scramble for power. The Great Game has given way to the Great Gamble as countries are taking loans from Chinese state banks and betting they can pay them back before the default clauses come due.

The Queen and Prince Philip bid farewell to Chinese President Xi Jinping and his wife Peng Liyuan at Buckingham Palace in 2015

Ports, stadia, roads and railways are being built on the never-never with the firm expectation that the loan will never be called in.

But like the Pied Piper, the lure of free money is masking a hidden agenda  this isnt about development, its about domination.

Around the world, were beginning to see the real cost of cheap loans. Its true the Sri Lankan government werent asked to abide by any good governance principles when they signed for the loans that built the port at Hambantota, as more principled lenders might have demanded. But that didnt mean the money came without strings attached.

Unlike a World Bank loan, or UK development aid, there was no renegotiation when they defaulted. It triggered immediate repossession. China secured a 99-year lease on a major Indian Ocean harbour.

The same has happened in countries around the world as debt is cheaper than gunpowder  a Chinese invention, of course  and much more effective. Chinese bankers and their cheap cash loans are doing the work once carried out by Royal Navy officers and company men on sloops and frigates sailing out of London and Amsterdam.

Queen Elizabeth ll inspects a guard of honour as she arrives in Barbados on October 31, 1977

Theres no shortage of flattery, of course. Last year, Prime Minister Andrew Holness of Jamaica signed up to Beijings Belt and Road Initiative  a series of vast infrastructure projects financed with Chinese cash  and was given the all-star treatment at the Shanghai trade forum.

A few years earlier, it had been Freundel Stuarts turn. Barbadoss then prime minister signed up to the scheme, known as the new silk road, and even discussed co-operation with the Peoples Liberation Army.

China is attempting what the Soviets failed to achieve with guerrillas and revolutionaries. Theyre trying to rewrite the global operating system. And theyre succeeding. International co-operation from trade to technology doesnt just happen, its organised.

Groups with dreary names meet in dull rooms to discuss regulations for everything from the wavelengths of radio communications to the naming of websites. Its not exciting but it matters.

Chinese President Xi Jinping with the Duchess of Cambridge at a state banquet at Buckingham Palace, London

Until now, this has been based on principles that we wrote. British lawyers, insurers and bankers were the inky lifeblood of the empire and the rules they scribbled underwrote global trade.

Their principles of individual rights, privacy, and the rule of law they encoded into our way of life still dictate the way we work. Chinas Communist rulers have taken against such principles, and the international rules-based order they make possible.

Beijings new colonists have no time for independent actors on the world stage, seeing central control as the key to success. And thats a challenge to us all. Because its not just those who have agreed to bow to the new Emperor who will live with the change.

We are all under the shadow of a new throne. China is looking to replicate its own repressive system of internal command and control on a global scale. Just as their 34 provinces (35 with Taiwan) must obey the rules of the General Secretary of the Communist Party, so the new colonial outposts must vote as directed too.

In just a few years, China has gone from leading one UN agency to four  and their decisions are being felt.

Take the case of one of them, the 155-year-old International Telecommunication Union.

This recently discussed moving away from the Western distributed network model for the internet, over which the state has little power, to one based around capital cities around the world  reflecting the authoritarian outlook of its Chinese Secretary-General Houlin Zhao.

India is in no doubt what all this really means  Chinese princes are threatening their borders once again. And we should wake up, too. So, what should we do about it? How do we avoid another imperial clash or  worse  conquest?

The Queen pictured with Governor-General of Barbados Dame Sandra Mason at Windsor Castle in 2018

We can learn from our past. Just as we built the biggest empire the world has ever known, we dismantled it too.

We know that the principles we encoded into the post-war treaties and institutions have helped nations to succeed and determine their own futures.

They prevented Soviet expansion and helped bring about the longest period of peaceful global growth in history. We can do that again.

We need to bring people together under the rule of law and the principles of individuality, sovereignty and freedom.

And if were going to disentangle Chinas debt traps, well need generous support for real projects, and well have to stop corrupt profits  and those who control them  from hiding in British jurisdiction.

Foreign policy, from the Indian Ocean to the Caribbean is not just about foreigners. Its also about us and protecting our values and interests. Its also about remembering what matters and letting our friends know we care.

Today, in Bridgetown, Barbados we should remind our Caribbean cousins that a constitutional monarch, particularly under our peerless Queen, is the best defence against tyrants that we know.
When questioned why the sick dogs were required to be shipped back to Jordan, Hubbard said, "Dogs that are imported into the United States must be vaccinated against rabies at 12 weeks of age or older and must wait 28 days after initial vaccination before entering the country. Dogs coming from countries and political units with a high risk of rabies need a valid rabies vaccination certificate. "
France on Friday reported 15, 797 new cases of the coronavirus in 24 hours. It was slightly less than the previous day's record of over 16,000 infections but serious enough to prompt health officials to confirm an upward trend in Covid-19 and could add weight to calls for stricter measures.

Fifty-six people died of Covid-19 in a single day in France on Friday, four more than the day before.

The number of people who have now died from the virus now stands at 31,661, representing a death rate of 150  triple the daily levels of the past week.

Daily Covid-19 deaths however still lag behind new infections, with France recording nearly 150,000 new Covid-19 cases in the past two weeks, compared to the 132,000 recorded during the two-month lockdown in the spring.

The country registered 15,797 new confirmed cases on Friday, just shy of a daily record of 16,096 set a day earlier.

The news came as fresh restrictions to curb the outbreak were due to come into force.

France has already made wearing masks compulsory in public places  indoors countrywide as well as outdoors in hard-hit areas like Paris.

Unpopular move

It has also forced bars and restaurants in maximum alert zones such as Marseille and Guadeloupe to shut.

The measures have angered residents in Marseille who demonstrated on Friday against what they described a "sanitary dictatorship".

But with more than 500,000 confirmed cases and over 31,600 deaths to date, French authorities insist the tighter restrictions are necessary.

I am fully aware that some of these measures are controversial, sparking worry and even anger, but they are not arbitrary", Health Minister Olivier Veran told reporters Friday during a visit to Marseille.

We cannot allow ourselves to dither, he said.

Nevertheless, restaurant owners were given an extra 24 hours before closing their businesses for two weeks, after the government delayed shutdown orders until Sunday.

Hospital capacity

With new cases surging, concern is growing about whether hospitals will be able to cope with a second wave since dmissions have started to rise again after being contained during the March-May lockdown.

The amount of people in hospital with Covid-19 has continued its steady ascent of the past month, rising by 97 to 6,128, with the number of people in intensive care up by 50 to 1,098.

Both hospital numbers though are still well below their highs of more than 32,000 and 7,100 respectively set during the peak of the crisis in April.
After being in the news amid NCB's ongoing drug probe, Karan Johar on Friday issued a statement on his social media addressing the matter. The Producer-Director has been making headlines over the employees from Dharma Production being summoned by the NCB.

Karan Johar in his statement also addressed the 2019 party video that SAD leader Manjinder Singh Sirsa has filed a complaint on and is under scrutiny.

READ FULL STATEMENT HERE -

"I had already clarified my position way back in 2019 that the allegations are completely baseless and false. No narcotics substance was consumed in the party. I would like to unequivocally once again state that I do not consume narcotics and I do not promote or encourage consumption of any such substance. All these slanderous and malicious statements, have unnecessarily subjected me, my family, and my colleagues, and Dharma Productions, to hatred, contempt and ridicule. I would like to further state that Kshitij Prasad and Anubhav Chopra  I do not know these individuals personally and neither of these two individuals are 'aides' or 'close aides'. Neither I, nor Dharma Productions can be made responsible for what people do in their personal lives. These allegations do not pertain to Dharma Productions. I wish to further state that Anubhav Chopra is not an employee at Dharma Productions. He was briefly associated with us for only two months in the capacity of 2nd assistant director for a film, between November 2011 and January 2012 and as assistant director for the short film in January 2013. He has thereafter never been associated with Dharma. Mr. Kshitij Ravi Prasad joined Dharmatic in November 2019 as one of the executive producers on contract basis for a project which eventually did not materialise. However, in the past few days, the media has resorted to distasteful and false allegations. I hope the members of the media would exercise restraint else I will be left with no option but to legally protect my rights against this baseless attack on me." Karan Johar said.

Manjinder Sirsa claims, 'NCB will soon summon Karan Johar' over 2019 drug party video

Dharma's employee Kshitij Ravi Prasad was picked up from his Versova residence on Friday after the agency conducted raids there. Marijuana and small amounts of weed have also been seized from Kshitijs place during searches. He was seen being escorted by NCB officials from his residence and is currently on the way to NCB's Ballad Pier Office.

The NCB officials have also revealed that so far Kshitij Ravi Prasad has not been detained or arrested. Since Kshitij Prasad was summoned for today, he accompanied the NCB to their office after the raids. However, they also confirmed that the Dharma Productions Executive Producer will be taken into custody after his interrogation.

News of Anubhav Chopras questioning came after the NCB carried out searches at Kshitij Ravi Prasads Versova residence. Small amounts of Marijuana was seized from the residence, as the aide was taken to the NCBs Ballad Pier Office.
Mumbai, Sep. Sep 26 : The Mumbai Police on Saturday warned media vehicles against pursuing vehicles of celebs who are being summoned for the drugs probe by the Narcotics Control Bureau.

In a stern statement, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Zone I) Sangram Singh Nishandar said that today (Sep. 26), the police observed several media vehicles "chasing" people called for the NCB inquiry.

"This afternoon, we saw some mediapersons chasing the vehicles from the rear, front, sides, getting off their vehicles, posing great risk to themselves, the people in the vehicles and also the common persons. We will not tolerate this anymore," said Nishandar.

He warned the media against chasing any vehicles henceforth but if anyone was found violating it, he threatened to seize the vehicles and take action against the drivers of those vehicles.

In the past couple of months, since the probe into the death case of the Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput, there have been many such 'road chases' by some media-vehicles.

They included celebs like Rhea Chakraborty, Deepika Padukone, Sara Ali Khan, Shraddha Kapoor and several others called in connection with the drug angle probe into the Sushant case.

Hot-tempered arguments and even scuffles have been witnessed among the media fraternity as all vie to get their bytes, shots or videos of the celebs, often their family members or even lawyers.
Grab launches Merchant Academy and GrabFood Bank to support more F&B merchant-partners to go digital

Grab launches an all-new Grab Merchant Academy and a GrabFood Bank campaign aimed at supporting more merchant-partners in their digitalisation efforts.

Merchant Academy aims to help 3,000 merchant-partners pick up and grow digital skills and capabilities by end 2020

GrabFood Bank campaign to create an online repository of community-generated visuals for merchant-partners to drive more orders

Grab launches new support programmes announced at Grabs first merchant conference

grab launches

Grab launches Merchant Academy and GrabFood Bank to support more F&B merchant-partners to go digital (image: Grab)

On 8 September, Grab announced an all-new Grab Merchant Academy and a GrabFood Bank campaign aimed at supporting more merchant-partners in their digitalisation efforts. The Merchant Academy is a training programme featuring more than 20 modules as a start to help merchants pick up skills and knowledge to grow their digital business, while GrabFood Bank will leverage Grabs wide user community to build up an online image repository for which digital resource-strapped merchant-partners can use for their menu listing and promotions to drive sales conversion.

The new series of training and marketing support was announced at Grabs first-ever Merchant Conference. Held virtually, the half-day conference is part of the Merchant Academys offerings for participating business owners and decision makers. Attendees underwent introductory sessions on menu optimisation, achieving greater online visibility through ads, as well as creating effective marketing campaigns.

It is important to recognise that Food and Beverage (F&B) businesses have to swiftly adapt and pivot their business model to create an online presence. However, being successful online requires a different strategy and approach from the traditional way of driving traffic to brick and mortar stores. This is increasingly apparent as the online F&B scene becomes more crowded. Business owners will need to learn more digital skills to be able to stand out. We understand our merchant-partners have very different levels of digital proficiency and this is where we hope to help. Through our Small Business Booster Programme, and now the Grab Merchant Academy as well as our various marketing campaigns, we hope to support them to succeed in the digital space, said Dilip Roussenaly, Senior Director, GrabFood Singapore

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Grab Merchant Academy and GrabFood Bank complement the earlier announced Small Business Booster Programme offering tools and resources including an updated GrabMerchant app to help businesses better navigate digital opportunities. In addition, merchant-partners can opt for the GrabFood Capability Development Pack offered in collaboration with Enterprise Singapore, the government agency driving enterprise development. The Capability Development Pack includes training resources, marketing support, as well as data and insights reports to help them optimise their offerings for deliveries.

We applaud Grab for their efforts in continuing to support F&B businesses in building up their online capabilities through initiatives such as the Small Business Booster Package and Grab Merchant Academy. These programmes to help businesses enhance their online sales are timely and critical now as online channels become an important source of revenue stream. Enterprise Singapore is also pleased to partner Grab to offer the Capability Development Pack, an initiative under our Food Delivery Booster Package. This provides targeted support that helps our businesses build longer-term digital capabilities as they accelerate efforts to adapt to a new environment, said Ms Yeoh Mei Ling, Director for Food Services, Enterprise Singapore.

Grab launches charting the growth of a digital-first business via Grab Merchant Academy

Grab Merchant Academy is a self-serve, on-demand learning platform for F&B business owners to pick up skills and knowledge relevant to their digital operations such as online store management, menu optimisation, community management, and online marketing, among others. These modules have been designed to cater to merchant-partners needs at different growth stages.

Grab hopes to help 3,000 merchant-partners grow their digital skills and capabilities by the end of 2020. Partners will be able to access the Merchant Academy through the GrabMerchant App and modules will be progressively rolled out from mid-September. Grab will also continue to update these learning modules in the longer term based on merchants and consumers needs.

When we diversified our business, we realised we needed to have digital capabilities and tools to optimise our operations such that we are able to meet the needs of our online customers. By working with Grab, not only did we have access to a highly engaged customer base and wide delivery fleet, we also have tools that provided insights into customers purchase trends on the app. We were then able to create menu items  including meal combinations  that were able to increase our average sales per order as these offerings were more aligned with online food delivery users behaviours. We are looking forward to maximising the GrabMerchant tool to further enhance our delivery operations, said Keegen Chung, Director, Maki-san.

Expanding marketing support to help GrabFood merchant-partners drive online orders

The GrabFood Bank campaign is a community-led movement which aims to curate pictures for merchant-partners who may lack the resources to create original visuals for their virtual storefront and menu. According to a completed pilot, GrabFood merchant-partners that have accompanying images with their menu items can see up to 2x sales as compared when they run their storefront without visuals.

Users can donate the rights to their photos by hashtagging their pictures with #GrabFoodBank and tagging the merchant-partner on Instagram, so that these businesses can repost or use these images for their digital marketing efforts.

We are glad to have participated in the various marketing campaigns GrabFood had rolled out during this period, especially with Islandwide Delivery, which helped boost our sales at a time when Singaporeans were working from home, while also introducing our brands to more Singaporeans without them having to leave their homes. This has resulted in the majority of our online orders coming through GrabFood in the last few months. We also started to invest in online advertising in GrabAds which included $50 complimentary credits from Grab. We found that it boosted our visibility in-app thus funnelling into sales conversion, said Michele Chang, Head of Marketing Communications, Les Amis Group. (See Appendix for more details of support rendered to GrabFood merchant-partners)

We have developed these initiatives based on our merchant-partners feedback and hope they will find them useful as they navigate the new normal. We are committed to using our technology and reach to help them succeed, and will continue to iterate our support to ensure it meets our merchant-partners needs in this volatile environment, added Dilip.

The post Grab launches Merchant Academy and GrabFood Bank appeared first on iCompareLoan Resources.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 26)  The Department of Health on Saturday rejected calls to exempt workers in offices and factories from wearing face shields, arguing that such measure could reduce a persons risk of spreading or getting coronavirus disease.

Ang amin pong punto at position mula nung umpisa, iyon pong pagsusuot ng mask at iyong pagsusuot ng face shield, iyong physical distancing, iyong paghuhugas ng kamay, iyan po ay aming sinusulong. Hindi po namin iko-compromise ang position na ito, Health Undersecretary and Spokesperson Maria Rosario Vergeire said in a briefing.

[Translation: We will not compromise on our position that people must wear face shield and face mask, practice physical distancing and wash hands.]

Vergeire noted that these non-pharmaceutical interventions, which are backed by evidence and science, must be followed especially since a vaccine or treatment for the virus is not yet available.

Citing a study, Vergeire said that wearing a face mask and face shield as well as keeping at least three feet of space from others reduces a persons risk of getting COVID-19 by 99 percent.

The officials statement was in response to a suggestion from four business groups for the policymakers to implement practical workplace protocols.

In a joint letter to the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Infectious Diseases, Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Philippine Silk Road International Chamber of Commerce, Employers Confederation of the Philippines, and Philippine Exporters Confederation said they support the government in ensuring workplace safety.

But except for the frontliners, we respectfully take exception to the wearing of face shields inside the office and factories for the rest of our employees, since this can adversely affect their vision, physical safety and productivity, they pointed out.

The letter was signed by PCCI President Emeritus George Barcelon, PSRICC chairman Francis Chua, ECOP chairman Edgardo Lacson and PhilExport President Sergio Ortiz-Luis, Jr.
Pupils will be taught that 'Cancel Culture' is a form of bullying and 'no platforming' an attack on our freedoms.

As part of the Government's drive to protect freedom of speech, secondary school students will learn that people with controversial opinions should be respected.

In Department for Education training manuals, teachers are instructed to tell pupils that the 'cancel culture' which has taken root at many universities  where individuals call for a boycott of a person or company whose views they don't agree with, in the hope they lose their job or clients  is not part of a 'tolerant and free society'.

Pupils will be taught that 'cancel culture' is a form of bullying and 'no platforming' an attack on our freedoms [File photo]

The move appears to be a direct response to incidents where mainstream speakers, including former home secretary Amber Rudd, have been blocked from speaking at universities by political opponents.

The comments are part of a slide presentation in a module on 'respectful relationships', as part of the new relationships and sex education curriculum beginning this year.

One slide says: 'Reinforce that everyone needs to show the same respect to others regardless of how different they are to them. Explain the harm caused by 'cancel culture' and the importance of freedom of speech and freedom of association to a tolerant and free society.

'Teach that censorship and 'no platforming' are harmful and damaging. Explain that seeking to get people 'cancelled' (e.g. having them removed from their position of authority or job) simply because you disagree with them, is a form of bullying and is not acceptable.'

Education Secretary Gavin Williamson has repeatedly threatened legislation unless universities do more to protect freedom of speech on campus.

In another section, the department says teachers must not suggest that 'children might be a different gender based on their personality and interests'.

It also warns schools not to work with organisations that promote the idea that 'non-conformity to gender stereotypes should be seen as synonymous with having a different gender identity'.

The move appears to be a direct response to incidents where mainstream speakers, including former home secretary Amber Rudd, have been blocked from speaking at universities by political opponents

The rules appear to be a response to increasing criticism of activist groups seen as pushing children and young people into transitioning gender, with many children saying later they regret their decision.

'We are aware that topics involving gender and biological sex can be complex and sensitive,' the guidance says.

'You should not reinforce harmful stereotypes, for instance by suggesting that children might be a different gender based on their personality and interests.

'Resources used in teaching about this topic must always be age-appropriate and evidence-based.

'Materials which suggest that non-conformity to gender stereotypes should be seen as synonymous with having a different gender identity should not be used and you should not work with external organisations that produce such material.

'While teachers should not suggest to a child their non-compliance with gender stereotypes means either their personality or their body is wrong and in need of changing, teachers should always seek to treat students with sympathy and support.'
For all their popularity, Manchester's The Hollies only made the top of the UK charts once in their heyday - with 'I'm Alive' in 1965.

In 1988, touring the 'classic rock' circuit and without a chart hit in a decade and a half, they found themselves back at the top thanks to the use of one of their past hits in a TV beer ad for Miller Lite.

'He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother' had previously been released by the Hollies in 1969, reaching No. 3 in the UK charts and No. 7 in the US.

In reaching number one, the re-release created a chart record for the length of time between chart-topping singles for one artist of 23 years.

The success of the single spurred EMI to release the compilation 'All The Hit & More: The Definitive Collection' in September 1988. It made No. 51 in the UK albums chart - the first Hollies album to chart since the '20 Golden Greats' compilation a decade earlier.

'He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother' wasn't a Hollies original. The ballad was co-written by American songwriters Bobby Scott and Bob Russell and introduced to the Hollies by Russell's son-in-law Jefferey Spearitt, who was living in London at the time.

Bob Russell was dying of lymphoma when he and Scott collaborated on 'He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother'. He passed away in February 1970, just months after the Hollies first scored a hit with the song. Famously, Elton John - then a session musician - played piano on both 'He Ain't Heavy...' and Hollies' 1970 hit 'I Can't Tell The Bottom From The Top'.

The top ten this week in 1988 was also second chance saloon for Bill Withers whose best-known song was back at No. 4 thanks to a 'Sunshine Mix' remix by Dutch DJ Ben Liebrand.

'Lovely Day' - notable for Withers' sustained 18-second long note towards the end - was first released in late 1977 when it peaked at No. 6 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the US and at No. 7 in the UK. Withers' note is believed to be the second-longest in UK chart history: Morten Harket of A-ha's 20-second note in their 2,000 single 'Summer Moved On' is thought to be the longest

Liebrand's remix of 'Lovely Day' resulted in renewed interest in the Withers original, which saw a surge in airplay into the early 1990s and came to firmly overshadow the radio presence of Liebrand's version.

1 He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother The Hollies

2 Groovy Kind Of Love Phil Collins

3 Teardrops Womack and Womack

4 Lovely Day (Sunshine Mix) Bill Withers

5 Nothing Can Divide Us Jason Donovan

6 I Quit Bros

7 The Race Yello

8 Big Fun Inner City

9 Domino Dancing Pet Shop Boys

10 The Only Way Is Up Yazz and the Plastic Population
A New Jersey nurse who shot and killed her husband before dumping his remains in the Chesapeake Bay, has insisted she is innocent in a rare interview from behind bars, 13 years after her conviction.

Melanie McGuire, 47, was sentenced to life in prison in 2007 after she was found guilty of murdering husband Bill McGuire, 39, at their Woodbridge apartment in 2004.

Prosecutors said McGuire, who was 31 at the time, used her expertise as a nurse to drug Bill before shooting him, dismembering his body and stuffing it into designer suitcases.

Melanie McGuire spoke to ABC's 20/20 in a rare interview behind bars that aired this week

McGuire was sentenced to murdering husband Bill McGuire in 2004, but she maintains she's innocent and the killer remains at large

McGuire spoke out from Edna Mahan Correctional Facility in Clinton, for the first time since she was jailed, in an interview with ABC's 20/20 revealing she is fighting to overturn her conviction.

'I'm doing this because there's a murderer walking around,' she said. 'The killer is out there and it's not me.'

'After all these years, I still feel hurt. I still feel bothered. Like, how could somebody think that I did that?'

During her trial, McGuire was revealed to be having an affair with a doctor at the fertility clinic where she worked, which the prosecution believed was the motive behind killing her husband.

They alleged McGuire had wanted to start a new life with her lover Dr Bradley Miller.

McGuire, who admitted to the affair, however, argued the two were in an unhappy marriage and claimed Bill was a gambling addict who was killed over unpaid debts.

During her trial, McGuire was revealed to be having an affair, allowing prosecutors to establish a motive

She also claimed Bill had asked her to purchase a gun for him since a previous felony conviction did not allow him to buy one, two days before he disappeared.

His cut up remains washed up in three Kenneth Cole suitcases on Virginia Beach, almost 300 miles away from their home, in May 2004.

McGuire told Robach that the timing of when she acquired the gun and Bill's disappearance was a 'coincidence.'

'However, he was on me for a while about that, about trying to get that.

'And if something was happening, if he was in some sort of trouble, that may very well have been the reason why he was so intent on getting it,' she said.

The interview follows the launch of a new podcast, Direct Appeal, which re-examines the murder case and whether McGuire was wrongfully convicted.

While McGuire told Robach she is 'terrified to hope' she could be released one day, she is hopes the podcast could help acquit her.
San Francisco: Microsoft is planning to release a new Xbox app for iOS that allows users to stream their Xbox One games on their iPhones. The new Xbox app will arrive in the App Store soon that includes a remote play feature, which lets Xbox One console owners stream their games to an iPhone, reports The Vege.

This new app and its remote play capability is different from Microsoft`s xCloud gaming service.

Whereas xCloud allows players to stream Xbox games directly from Microsoft`s servers to their phone in any location, remote play on the new Xbox app on iOS requires players to be connected to their own Xbox.

Live TV

One will be able to access an Xbox console over Wi-Fi, or even an LTE or 5G connection, too.

Just like the recently-launched Xbox app on Android, the iPhone version will also include the same new design and new features.

One can quickly download or share game clips and screenshots captured on an Xbox One or Xbox Series X/S console, and can even manage console space and delete games.

In addition, this new Xbox app is also a lot faster than the previous iOS version.

Currently, Microsoft is testing the Xbox app with TestFlight members and will be available generally in the App Store soon for everyone to download.
A farm worker monitors the burning of rice crop stubble in Punjab, India, in 2019. (Bloomberg)

Farmers in Amritsar's Devi Dasspura village continued to burn their field stubble, causing plumes of smoke to emanate.

in has taken place unusually early this year, due to an early Kharif harvest. Such incidents are likely to increase in the coming weeks from the southern part of the state as farmers prepare for Rabi season. Lack of resources compels many to take the drastic step as alternative equipment is expensive without support from the government.

"Farmers here don't want to burn stubble, but we are compelled to do it because the government is not providing us with a different solution. We asked the district administration to take the stubble and dispose of it properly, but they did not take any action. After continuously asking for 10 days, we burnt it," said Jeet Singh, a farmer.

"The government should set up a plant to produce something useful from the stubble.

Due to the COVID-19 lockdown, the air was very clean and fresh but we have been forced to do this as we don't have any other choice. Our children also breathe this air. We appeal to the government to do something," he added.

As many as 297 incidents were reported between September 21 and 25 this year, Dr Brijender Pateriya, Director of the Remote Sensing Centre informed on Saturday. This is 100 more than the 197 incidents that were reported last year in the same time frame

During the last few years, the worsening quality of air in the capital caused by has been a cause for contention.

In November last year, the Supreme Court had slammed the Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, and Uttar Pradesh government for failing to curb the practice and came down heavily on the Central government for not taking concrete steps to improve the deteriorating air quality in the capital.

Despite the distribution of over 28,000 agro-machines by the government in August last year, and the ban of the practice by the state government in October thereafter, farmers continued to burn stubble due to lack of alternative methods.

After the early burning of crop residue was brought to notice on Tuesday, the Environment Pollution Control Authority (EPCA) wrote to the chief secretaries of Punjab, Haryana, and Uttar Pradesh to take stock of the situation and take action.

"We have written to chief secretaries of all the three states to take stock of the situation and start acting. We have asked them to implement the Supreme Court's order which is a state's responsibility," Bhure Lal, chairman of the EPCA said.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Oman's Ministry of Higher Education, Research and Innovation has signed a programme with the Public Establishment for Industrial Estates  Madayn to boost cooperation between the two in various fields that serve education, scientific research and innovation.

The agreement, which comes in line with the significance of establishing robust partnership and integration between various bodies, was signed by Dr Rahma bint Ibrahim Al Mahrouqiyah, the Minister of Higher Education, Research and Innovation, and Hilal bin Hamad Al Hasani, Chief Executive Officer of Madayn.

The cooperation programme aims to develop joint plans for linking the outputs of higher education institutions with the investing companies in the industrial cities of Madayn.

It will also help strengthen integration between the current and future development plans of the industrial cities and fields of higher education, scientific research and innovation, said the statement.

According to experts, this cooperation programme will play a major role in developing the curricula of higher education institutions regarding the various specialisations that are linked with the industrial needs of the sector and the companies in the industrial cities.

As per the agreement, Madayn will provide training opportunities at the industrial cities for the undergraduates, and vocational colleges students.

The cooperation programme also aspires to enhance the exchange of consultations and expertise to support the development of scientific research and innovation in the industrial fields, and adopt the results and outputs of innovative and viable research and project ideas and transform them into investment projects and opportunities according to mechanisms agreed upon by the related parties, they added.

Additionally, the programme will encourage the investing companies in the industrial cities to offer scholarships for higher education studies, in order to meet the employment requirements in the companies, sectors and industrial cities that fall under the umbrella of Madayn.

Moreover, an electronic interactive platform will be formed with the participation of the relevant parties to exchange data and information related to the implementation of this programme.

Following the signing of the cooperation programme, Dr Al Mahrouqiyah toured Nizwa Industrial City, which pertains to Madayn, in the presence of the ministry's undersecretaries Dr. Muna bint Salim Al Jardaniyah, Dr Bakhait bin Ahmed Al Mahri and Dr Saif bin Abdullah Al Haddabi as well as Madayn CEO Hilal bin Hamad Al Hasani.

Nizwa Industrial City Director General Engineer Saleh bin Salman Al Abri said the total investment volume of Nizwa Industrial City has exceeded RO369 million ($956 million) during the first half of 2020, marking a growth rate of 1.13% compared to the same period last year.

The total workforce in the industrial city has surged to 6,100 and the total area of the industrial city has surpassed 3 million sqm, he stated.

The number of projects in Nizwa has reached 150 during the first half, of which 128 are operating, 10 are under construction and 12 been allotted with space, noted Al Abri during the tour.

The minister later visited Al Anwar Ceramic Tiles, Sledgehammer Gulf, and Gulf Energy nits in the industrial city.-TradeArabia News Service
Politics: All about monkey tricks View(s):

Brilliant! Just brilliant! I would have missed the whole episode had it not been for the picture of the monkeys. There they were, about six of them seated on a rock as if in conference. Okay it may not have looked like an ancient convecticle as in the days of Socrates. But then it did not resemble a cabinet meeting either. The numbers were not enough. And the monkeys did not seem to be chattering away either. They appeared to be strangely silent.

So I read on, the story that appeared below in this newspaper titled Colombo Times which I had not seen before. It certainly was a more newsworthy and entertaining story than any I had read in recent days  you know the ones about the 19th Amendment, the 20th Amendment, who can sack the whole ruddy lot without a by-your-leave and who can kick anyone upstairs, downstairs and into his ladys chamber.

All the budding and budded lawyers those in search of briefs and medical experts who are still trying to make up the numbers of the corona dead, seemed to be beating their brains (what is left that is) out in the print and electronic media and boring the self-isolated into contemplating hara kiri.

Then along came my long-time friend Nihal Jayawickrama, legal academic and Coordinator of the UN-sponsored Judicial Integrity Group and throws a damper on the years long debate. Just the other day Justice Minister Ali Sabry gets up in parliament (for the first time as an MP and minister if I am correct) on September 22 and moves 20A amidst plenty of ho ha and ha ho or whatever from the opposition.

Before the dust can settle on the black shawls of the Sajith Premadasa-led Samagi Jana Balawegaya on display for desecrating parliamentary democracy, Dr Jayawickrama, a regular writer on legal/political affairs, puts pen to paper as we used to do in our Peradeniya days and announces that there is no such thing called 19A.

There is no 19A capable of being amended or repealed. It does not exist, writes Dr Jayawickrama. So what on earth did Justice Minister Ali Sabry PC table in the House? The coronavirus we know exists. Our leaders and others have been telling the world how valiantly they fought to bring it under control.

Equally valiantly our new leaders and their supporters from Viyathmaga and other such intellectual groups like the Socratic gatherings of the past, had flattened the non-existent 19A and left Sirisena and Wickremesinghe athara maga.

So while legal luminaries like Udaya Gammanpila and Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe several doctorates  honorary or otherwise  under his belt make a rebuttal to the Jayawickrama argument, we must return to the monkeys that first caused the distraction. At a media conference, former minister and current MP Dilan Perera drew attention to the nuisance caused by troops of monkeys not only in provincial towns and villages but even in the capital city where reside Colombos gliterrati and its incessantly chattering classes.

MP Dilan Perera seems not only annoyed by the chaos, damage and mischief caused by this breed of four-legged mammals but the fact that the master craftsmen who put together the new cabinet had paid little or no attention to the problem the monkeys invading the mansions of the high and mighty and the others too.

Perhaps Mr Perera who in early years managed migrant labour and even deftly tackled those who managed to travel abroad with fraudulent passports and doctored documents, felt genuinely peeved that he was not good enough to be found a seat at one of the renamed and newly created ministries.

He was offering to kill several monkeys with one stone, as it were. He was not asking for much. After all, the former minister was only offering to tame the monkeys. He is not asking for the ministry to solve the human-elephant conflict or even the ministry of batik-making, or the ministry of gam miris or kaha wagawe.

So detailed were those ministerial posts that it seemed like war maps pinned to the walls of a war room before a military manoeuvre. Nothing wrong in that of course! If you are fighting a war against corona you cannot be lax about following the medical advice. I mean one cannot gather kos ata without marshalling the jackfruit. But it seemed that somebody had dummied past an inattentive back row exposing the gaps in the portfolios.

Anyway here was this former minister and current MP wailing, as it were, not about being dropped from the team but about a critical issue of the troublesome mammals. Anybody who knows anything about monkeys and their kind should know they are a tricky and clever lot. They often act in unison especially when they go out on a foray. They have increasing turned into extremely sharp lot.

So what does Dilan Perera do? He offers to take on the post of Minister or State minister overlooking the control of the fast expanding monkey army if it is offered to him. He is clever as a monkey. After all he went to a school where he would have learnt all the tricks of the trade and outside it.

So first he alerts the multitude to what havoc these animals could cause as they advance farther into areas of human livelihood and learn more and more about human behavior. That should frighten our two-legged mammals and alert then to take sustainable precautions.

Having driven concern and fright into people everywhere he delivers the coup de grace. He says that before long monkeys would enter parliament. So what is there to be concerned about? Scant wonder, President Gotabaya Rajpaksa appears to have little respect for parliament. I mean monkeys have long entered parliament. It was not too long ago that MPs started throwing bibles and Hansards around. A day or two later they were throwing chilli powder at other MPs and the police who had entered the chamber to protect the Speaker. So much like monkeys, really.

Is this the way that respectable parliamentarians behaved in the past? Hardly! If monkeys are roaming around Mattegoda as Dilan Perera says then they  I mean the monkeys  cannot be far from Diyawanna Oya if they have not already crossed the waters.

Once 20A gets over the hurdles as Justice Minister Sabry expects and new ministers/state ministers are added to burgeoning portfolios, Dilan Perera might well get his wish  Minister of Monkeys as the media calls it but minister for monkeys as we would like it to be.

(Neville de Silva is a veteran Sri Lankan journalist who was Assistant Editor, Diplomatic Editor and Political Columnist of the Hong Kong Standard before moving to London where he worked for Gemini News Service. Later he was Deputy Chief-of-Mission in Bangkok and Deputy High Commissioner in London before returning to journalism.)
By PTI

MUMBAI: Actor Sara Ali Khan reached the NCB office in south Mumbai on Saturday afternoon to record her statement in connection with drugs probe linked to film star Sushant Singh Rajput's death, an official said.

#WATCH: Actor Sara Ali Khan reaches Narcotics Control Bureau zonal office in Mumbai.



She has been summoned by NCB to join the investigation of a drug case, related to #SushantSinghRajput's death case. pic.twitter.com/QTu5CFSBrr  ANI (@ANI) September 26, 2020

She reached the NCB's zonal office in Ballard Estate around 1 pm. Officials said that her name cropped up during the questioning of Rhea Chakraborty, Rajput's girlfriend who has been arrested by the NCB in the drugs case along with over a dozen others.

ALSO READ| After Deepika Padukone, Shraddha Kapoor reaches NCB office to record statement in drugs case

Sara was Rajput's co-star in "Kedarnath" film. Rajput (34) was found hanging in his apartment in suburban Bandra on June 14.
State officials warned Friday that coronavirus cases have been rising in five New Jersey counties, with Ocean County and especially the township of Lakewood clearly our hotspots right now," Gov. Phil Murphy said.

Its fair to say we got a few counties that are rising to a level of concern, Murphy said during his latest coronavirus briefing in Trenton. Folks, this is clear evidence we are not out of the woods.

The warning came as the state announced seven more COVID-19 deaths and 612 new cases  down significantly from peak numbers in the spring but still the most the state has seen in a week.

In addition to Ocean, state Health Commissioner Judith Persichilli said there has been an uptick in cases in Bergen, Gloucester, Middlesex, and Monmouth counties.

Those five counties have recorded more than 1,000 of the states 2,500 new COVID-19 cases since Monday.

In particular, Persichilli said, Ocean has reported 439 positive cases in that time, followed by Monmouth with 248, Middlesex with 220, and Gloucester with 130.

The commissioner said Ocean has averaged about 100 to 150 new cases a day recently. Of that number, she said, at least half or more have come from Lakewood.

The positivity rate in Lakewood is also increasing, which is a concern, Persichilli added.

Murphy said officials believe there is some amount of relationship to worship" from the Jewish holiday of Rosh Hashanah, which was last weekend. Lakewood is home to a large Orthodox Jewish community.

Another Jewish holiday, Yom Kippur, will run Sunday into Monday.

The governor warned people not to cast bias on the religious community in the area.

Every religion in this state has a right to practice and worship, Murphy said. I dont want a speck of anybody in this state, Hey, see, its because of them' or whatever. Were working aggressively with faith leaders, with community leaders. But I want everybody to leave any prejudices or biases, to check them at the door. This is about public health, and were doing our very best.

Still, Murphy stressed: We need everybody to worship and observe holidays responsibly, including from a public health standpoint.

Persichilli said she has spoken with both community and religious leaders from Lakewood and noted their collaboration and cooperation is extraordinary.

CORONAVIRUS RESOURCES: Live map tracker | Newsletter | Homepage

Officials also continue to warn that more younger people are contracting the virus. The main age group for the cases in Ocean and Monmouth counties are 18 to 29 years old.

While younger people are less likely to die or be hospitalized for COVID-19, officials warn they can still pass it to older, more vulnerable people.

Persichilli said the increases in Monmouth may be related to house gatherings and business operations.

We are reminding people that social distancing and masking is critical to protect people when they gather, the health commissioner said.

Persichilli said the state has sent 6,000 test kits to enable increased testing and additional contact tracers to Ocean County and will send more contact tracers next week. Monmouth also asked for more contact tracers, she said.

Meanwhile, Persichilli said student housing at Rowan University in Glassboro is related to increases in Gloucester County. She said state officials are working closely with the college, and they are seeing a significant decline in new cases.

New Jersey, once a coronavirus hotspot and home to the second-most COVID-19 deaths in the nation, has seen its daily numbers of deaths, hospitalizations, and cases fall significantly from April, when officials routinely announced hundreds of new fatalities and thousands of new positive tests a day.

On Thursday, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the White Houses leading infectious disease expert, told the governor during an interview that New Jersey is in good shape and can continue to reopen its schools and economy gradually, prudently, and carefully despite America facing a possible second wave of the virus.

But Murphy on Friday warned that the recent rise in cases shows New Jersey needs to remain cautious. He also extended the states public-health emergency for a seventh time.

Still, many lawmakers  including top Republicans  as well as numerous business owners and residents have called on Murphy to lift his restrictions even further.

New Jersey has reported 202,100 COVID-19 cases out of more than 3.47 million tests administered in the nearly seven months since the outbreak here started in early March. Thats the eighth most cases among U.S. states.

The state of 9 million people has reported 16,097 deaths related to the virus  14,306 lab-confirmed and 1,791 considered probable. New Jersey has the nations highest COVID-19 death rate per 100,000 residents.

Our journalism needs your support. Please subscribe today to NJ.com.

Brent Johnson may be reached at bjohnson@njadvancemedia.com.
Niagaras public school board has confirmed that Eastdale Secondary School in Welland has a third case of COVID-19

In a media release issued late Friday afternoon, the board said the latest case had previously been identified as having contact with one of the earlier Eastdale cases.

The board has not indicated if this third person at the school is a staff member or student. The two previous cases identified at the Welland high school were staff members, according to a provincially maintained database listing school-related COVID-19 cases in Ontario.

Contact tracing assessment by Niagara public health has not revealed any additional contacts, said the school board release. No additional staff or students will be required to self-isolate.

On Monday, public health completed a thorough assessment of the school and advised then that no further health and safety measures were required.

On Sept. 21, public health officially declared an outbreak at Eastdale with the confirmation of its second case. As a result, five classrooms were closed. People who encountered the individuals are now in a 14-day quarantine.

Eastdale and the board will continue to work with public health and the school community will continue preventative COVID-19 practices such as physical distancing, hand hygiene, and daily health screening, said the release.

This marks the fifth school-related COVID-19 case in Niagara since classes resumed on Sept. 8. Three schools have been involved.

Three of the five confirmed cases were identified by the Ministry of Education website as staff or teachers.

The first COVID-19 case hit Niagara schools on Sept. 17 at Mary Ward Catholic Elementary School in Niagara Falls. Then on Wednesday, the DSBN reported a case had been identified at William H. Merritt Public School on Linwell Road in St. Catharines.

Both elementary school cases have also been identified by the provincial database as being staff persons.
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Linkedin (Agence France-Presse) Khartoum, Sudan  Sat, September 26, 2020 18:01 483 e22cd4161040e111d73a5626c476f927 2 Entertainment Sudan,artist Free

A Sudanese court has sentenced six artists to two months in jail for "creating a public nuisance", a lawyer said Friday, bringing the total number convicted in the case to 11.

Thursday's sentence, which also saw the group fined 5,000 Sudanese pounds (US$90) each, comes a week after the court issued the same ruling for five other artists, including prize-winning Sudanese filmmaker Hajooj Kuka.

In August, Kuka had said on Twitter that he and others were "attacked during a theater workshop in #khartoum by islamists instigators. The police stood by the attackers and arrested us".

Defence lawyer Othman al-Basri told AFP on Friday that the assailants had accused Kuka and his colleagues of "holding mixed-gender workshops".

The artists were taken to a Khartoum police station, where they chanted slogans including "Freedom, peace and justice," a catchphrase of the months-long protest movement that brought down president Omar al-Bashir in April 2019.

"All 11 artists were then charged with creating a public nuisance and violating public safety at a police station," Basri said, adding that the defense would appeal.

The case has drawn widespread criticism from writers, directors and others in the film community in Sudan and abroad.

Read also: Gold-hunting diggers destroy Sudan's priceless past

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the body responsible for the Oscars, said on Twitter earlier this week that it "supports the efforts to release Academy member Hajooj Kuka" and those jailed with him.

Steven Markowitz, who produced Kuka's recent film "aKasha", slammed the charges against the Sudanese artists as "fake".

Sudan is undergoing a precarious political transition under a joint civilian-military government that was formed on the back of months of protests following Bashir's ouster.

The strongman came to power in an Islamist-backed coup in 1989.

Topics : Sudan artist
By Andrew Galbraith

SHANGHAI (Reuters) - China's recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and a flurry of market reforms are creating an ideal backdrop for the possible inclusion of its government bonds in a major global index this week.

Index provider FTSE Russell is widely expected to add Chinese government bonds (CGBs) to its flagship World Government Bond Index (WGBI) after an annual review on Thursday, a potentially major step for Chinese bonds as investors seek safe-haven assets in a zero-interest-rate world.

"If China is included into WGBI, it indicates that it has passed FTSE Russell's rigorous index inclusion criteria, particularly around market access and tradability," said Danny Suwanapruti, rates strategist at Goldman Sachs.

"This opens the doors for several global fixed income investors beyond index trackers, such as total return funds, multi-asset funds, DM bond funds and central banks."

China fumbled inclusion in last year's WGBI review over long-standing investor concerns, in particular the poor liquidity, limited flexibility in foreign exchange settlement and tight bond settlement cycles.

Since then, regulators have addressed many sticking points, simplifying regulations, scrapping quotas, extending trading hours and bringing market structures more in line with global norms, including a raft of measures in the past few weeks.

"A couple of weeks ago, people would have thought inclusion is going to be a close call because there were still some outstanding issues," said Suwanapruti. The recent changes have improved the chances of being included in the index, he said.

Chinese government bonds are already becoming a part of the J.P Morgan and Bloomberg Barclays index suites. But the FTSE WGBI has a far larger passive band of investors following it.

Goldman Sachs estimates there is $2.5 trillion of global cash following the WGBI, and China's inclusion could drive $140 billion into mainland bonds.

Story continues

PANDEMIC PREMIUM

A WGBI inclusion would help to legitimise Chinese bonds for more investors, particularly as the People's Bank of China keeps policy steady while the rest of the world is cutting rates.

Hiroshi Yokotani, managing director of State Street Global Advisors, said Japanese investors seeking to diversify away from U.S. assets have begun to look at China as a possible destination, noting that "of course, investors are desperate for yields."

Ten-year CGBs yield 240 basis points more than their U.S. equivalents, and expectations of a strong yuan mean hedging costs are low.

Foreign interest is rising. On Monday, the largest exchange-traded fund to invest purely in CGBs listed in Singapore..

It took foreigners 22 months to go from 1 trillion to 2 trillion, official data shows. Just fourteen months later, at the end of August, foreigners held Chinese bonds worth 2.8 trillion yuan ($412.61 billion), nearly 3% of all outstanding bonds, and 9.2% of CGBs.

The structure of inflows has also shifted. In 2017, short-term debt instruments, such as certificates of deposit, made up a large proportion of inflows as "less sticky" investors bet on the yuan appreciating, said Min Dai, Morgan Stanley's head of Asia ex-Japan macro strategy.

There are now more mutual funds and pension funds investing primarily in bonds, Dai said. He expects foreigners to own around 20% of CGBs by the end of 2030.

($1 = 6.7861 Chinese yuan)

(Reporting by Andrew Galbraith; Additional reporting by Hideyuki Sano in Tokyo; Editing by Vidya Ranganathan and Simon Cameron-Moore)
Every Thursday, a stretch of Alabama Street on the edge of the Mission District transforms into the epitome of a smart, proactive, culturally sensitive response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The block between 19th and 20th streets shuts down to cars. Valerie Tulier-Laiwa, a coordinator of the Latino Task Force, stands in the middle of the pavement, burning sage and thanking God for another day of life. Four lines form just beyond the circle: for the general public, essential workers, elders in folding chairs, and those whove come into contact with someone who tested positive for the coronavirus.

Theyre residents of the Mission, many of them Latino, and theyre there to get tested at a site designed for them. Many of the volunteers speak Spanish. Health insurance, identification and appointments arent required. A food bank inside offers tortillas, rice, beans and masa. Just one ingredient is missing: money to ensure they can quarantine if their results come back positive.

The citys widely hailed Right to Recover program is supposed to allow those who test positive but dont have paid sick leave to quarantine for two weeks. But its not built into the citys budget  and funding it hinges on the whims of the wealthy. San Francisco has done spectacularly well in containing the virus compared with other American cities, but our continued success depends on the ability of everyone, including essential workers, to safely quarantine as our businesses open up.

The city in July started asking those who tested positive anywhere in San Francisco if they needed money to be able to quarantine, and anybody who answered yes got two weeks of minimum wage  or $1,285 total. The $2 million for the program came from the citys Give2SF fund, which directs private donations to people and businesses needing help during the pandemic.

Constanza Hevia H. / Special to The Chronicle

It was enough to cover 1,555 people. But with one person living in poverty testing positive, on average, every hour in our wealthy city, the money evaporated in seven weeks. By mid-August, the city no longer asked those who tested positive if they needed money to quarantine because there was no money to offer.

Anybody who has tested positive since then was sent off to quarantine on the honor system but with no help to make it a reality. So the so-called Right to Recover was not a right at all, and everybody else in the city was put at more risk.

City officials hit up foundations and private donors for weeks, hat in hand. Yes, a multibillion-dollar government entity with a budget larger than many states had to beg wealthy people to ensure its restaurant workers, janitors and housekeepers could be paid minimum wage for two weeks to prevent the spread of a deadly virus. The Department of Public Healths budget alone totals roughly $2.5 billion.

Finally, this week the city secured a $2 million donation to restart Right to Recover. It comes from the Crankstart Foundation, the philanthropic venture of Silicon Valley investor Michael Moritz and his wife, novelist Harriet Heyman. Public health workers will probably start asking people if they need financial help to quarantine in about 10 days.

The donation from Moritz and Heyman is generous, but the money will most likely be gone again in several weeks, and the begging will begin anew. It should be funded by the city like any other crucial program, but its inexplicably not part of the new budget. (In the meantime, if any other rich people want to donate, email me. A column mention awaits!)

Right to Recover should also have administrative money built in so its somebodys job to disburse the funds. Currently, nonprofits are charged with the task with no extra money to accomplish it  and some people have received their $1,285 weeks after their quarantine was over.

Diane Jones, a retired nurse who pioneered San Francisco General Hospitals renowned patient care program at the start of the AIDS epidemic, is helping the Latino Task Force and said that somehow Right to Recover has turned into a charity program when its actually a critical public health intervention. The money needs to be ready immediately when a low-income person tests positive to persuade them to go into isolation right away and limit the spread of the virus.

If they get it six weeks later or two weeks later, it defeats the purpose, she said.

Joaquin Torres is the director of the citys Office of Economic and Workforce Development and a member of the Give2SF committee. He sought the Right to Recover donations for weeks before securing the Crankstart money and explained that the citys general fund, which has taken a huge whack due to the COVID-19 pandemic, cannot support every worthwhile program. He said hes hopeful that philanthropists will continue to see the benefit of funding Right to Recover.

Hope, though, doesnt cut it these days. If it did, 2020 wouldnt be nearly this wretched.

The COVID-19 pandemic has laid bare the economic inequities in San Francisco that were already pretty obvious. Latinos make up just 15% of San Francisco but comprise 50.2% of the positive coronavirus tests. Conversely, white people make up about 45% of San Francisco but just 14.8% of the positive coronavirus tests.

Thats largely because Latinos are far more likely to be essential workers and live in crowded homes. Jon Jacobo, another leader of the Latino Task Force, said he knows of living situations in the Mission in which 30 people are squeezed into three bedrooms.

Constanza Hevia H. / Special to The Chronicle

A UCSF study at the 24th Street BART Station last month tested 2,622 people, and 9% tested positive. Latinos at the site had an 11% chance of testing positive. Thats much higher than San Franciscos overall test positivity rate last month of 2.61%.

Of those who tested positive at BART, 93% were Latino, and 85% said Spanish was their preferred language. They were nearly all low-income, and just 22% had paid sick leave. Two-thirds of the people who tested positive were referred to the Right to Recover program, but nobody received the money because it was gone.

Jacobo said it does little good to test people but give them no way to quarantine if theyre positive. He said there should also be food delivery for people in quarantine since they now often have to come back to the Alabama Street food bank to pick up supplies while theyre supposed to be isolating.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

Those people arent the only ones whove come up short. Jacobo said he and other members of the task force had to pay for the testing sites chairs, tables, canopies and other supplies out of their own pockets when it started in early July  and still havent been reimbursed by the city.

Just one person at the Thursday testing site is paid  in theory. The site coordinator has gone unpaid for several weeks, Jacobo said. He described a constant battle to get resources from the Department of Public Health including more tests because they often run out.

Its the equivalent of giving a bucket of water to fight a five-alarm fire, Jacobo said.

These issues came to a head at a Sept. 11 meeting between Jacobo, other members of the Latino Task Force and Mayor London Breed. Breed seems to have gotten the message and on Thursday announced a commitment of $28.5 million to support the Latino community through more neighborhood testing sites, more contact tracers who speak Spanish, eviction prevention, food help, small business loans and more community hubs to support kids who are distance learning.

We can do more to support those who have been going to work day after day and who too often live in crowded conditions that make it hard to isolate, Breed said in a statement.

The mayors commitment includes $2 million for Right to Recover  which is the new Moritz money. Theres no mention in her lengthy news release about what happens to the program when those funds inevitably expire.

Separately, the Department of Public Health last week committed $30,000 to reimburse the Latino Task Force members for their expenses.

Supervisor Hillary Ronen, who initially pushed for the creation of Right to Recover, wants to figure out how it can get money to people in quarantine more quickly.

We have two months to find additional funding, she said. This should be a top priority.

It should be  which is why the city needs to ensure that it is.

San Francisco Chronicle columnist Heather Knight appears Sundays and Tuesdays. Email: hknight@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @hknightsf Instagram: @heatherknightsf
Just 2% of millennials hold a biblical worldview, lowest among all adults: study

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Although 61% of American millennials consider themselves to be Christian, just 2% of them were found to hold a biblical worldview, according to a recent study released by the Cultural Research Center at Arizona Christian University.

A biblical worldview, as previously defined by Barna, includes believing that absolute moral truths exist, and that such truth is defined by the Bible, as well as firm belief in six specific religious views. Those views are that Jesus Christ lived a sinless life; God is the all-powerful and all-knowing Creator of the universe and He stills rules it today; salvation is a gift from God and cannot be earned; Satan is real; a Christian has a responsibility to share their faith in Christ with other people; and the Bible is accurate in all of its teachings.

The American Worldview Inventory 2020 study found that while 6% of American adults in general hold a biblical worldview, millennials (18- to 36-year-olds) were the least likely among all adults to hold a biblical worldview.

Data for the annual study was collected in January 2020 through an assessment based on 51 worldview-related questions drawn from eight categories of worldview application, measuring both beliefs and behavior. It included a nationally representative sample of 2,000 adults.

Along with the stark rejection of traditional Christian belief, millennials were also found in the study to reject most basic American values, like respect for others and obligations of civic engagement. While millennials have shown the most radical shift away from the Bible, other generations did not fare much better.

Only an estimated 9% of adults in both the Elder (75 and older) and Boomer generations (56 to 74 years of age) hold a biblical worldview. Among Generation X (37 to 55 years of age), the percentage of subscribers to a biblical worldview drops to 5%.

These profiles are profoundly disturbing, George Barna, director of research at the Cultural Research Center said in a statement Tuesday.

The significantly divergent worldview perspectives and applications of the four generations  especially how different the Millennials are from all of their predecessors  suggests a nation that is at war with itself to adopt new values, lifestyles, and a new identity. In other words, there is a war for worldview dominance. But, as the Scriptures remind us, a nation at war with itself cannot persist, he noted.

Compared to other groups of adults, millennials are significantly less likely to believe in the existence of absolute moral truth or that God is the basis of all truth; to believe that human beings were created by God, in His image, and that He loves them unconditionally; pray and worship regularly, or seek Gods will for their lives.

Also, they are significantly more likely to wonder if God is really involved in their life, to believe that human life has no absolute value and to believe that having faith matters more than which faith they have.

The data also point out that America is losing its spiritual unity at a rapid pace, Barna said. Even a rudimentary understanding of the foundations of the American republic reminds us that unless the United States maintains spiritual unity under the hand of God, we will not be able to sustain the freedoms that have made this nation unique and desirable. The heart and soul of the nation pursue other gods and beliefs to our detriment as a nation. 
SpaceX has been reusing rockets for years, but theyve been off-limits for some crucial launches. Theyll get more use soon, however. The private spaceflight company has signed a contract with the US Space Force to reuse a Falcon 9 booster rocket for the first time on a National Security Space Launch mission. The previously-launched vehicle will carry the fifth GPS III satellite to orbit in 2021.

The firm had been allowed to recover boosters for GPS III missions, but had to use fresh examples for new launches.

Theres clearly a pragmatic incentive to allow reused rockets. The Space Force expects to save $52.7 million for the GPS III missions alone. It might also be difficult to insist on brand new rockets. SpaceX is shifting its focus to Starship, and might not be eager to make more Falcon 9 rockets than necessary.

This also reflects added trust in SpaceX. Although the company has clearly played a crucial role in US government launches through projects like Crew Dragon, the contract represents another level of confidence.
Hamilton paramedics plan to roll out a mobile flu shot initiative with the added urgency of preventing illness during the coronavirus pandemic.

A flu season combined with a second COVID-19 wave makes it especially important for people to be immunized as early as possible, says Mike Sanderson, the citys EMS chief.

So our goal is really to step up our game on this, Sanderson told councillors this week about the third annual outing of the mobile flu shot program.

Starting Oct. 15, two paramedics solely dedicated to the flu shot will aim to reach 2,400 people over 60 days.

The focus is on seniors and vulnerable residents in nine CityHousing buildings, but the plan is to also reach those in congregate settings such as homeless shelters.

Its not easy for some to travel to regular flu shot locations, Sanderson said, but people want to do the right thing.

Other health officials have noted concern about the upcoming flu season compounding the already complex COVID-19 pandemic with surging daily case counts and already stretched hospitals.

Dr. Elizabeth Richardson, the citys medical officer of health, told The Spectator this week residents should get the flu shot so theyre protected against the flu itself, but also to protect the system.

A petition by 1,400 pediatricians in Ontario urges government to step up and ensure more people get the flu shot citing an emergent public health crisis looming before us.

On Tuesday, Premier Doug Ford pleaded with Ontarians to get the flu shot as it becomes available over the next three weeks.

The province say its spending nearly $70 million on 5.1 million flu vaccines this year. That includes high-dose shots for seniors in pharmacies for the first time.

On Thursday, councillors at the citys emergency and community services committee meeting backed the mobile flu shot program. It needs final approval at council next week.

Sanderson hopes the Ontario Health West team will cover the $40,000 cost.

Coun. Tom Jackson, who initially proposed seniors building visits, called it a really fantastic, worthy program.

Sanderson expects a list of locations to be posted to the citys website before roll-out.
Ahead of President Donald Trumps rally in the Harrisburg area Saturday night, Joe Biden is criticizing the presidents leadership and response to the coronavirus pandemic.

Biden, the Democratic presidential nominee and former vice president, issued a statement Saturday morning denouncing Trumps refusal to take strong, swift action to combat COVID-19. Biden said Trump has worsened a pandemic that has claimed 200,000 American lives, including more than 8,000 deaths in Pennsylvania.

This crisis didnt have to be this bad, Biden said in the statement. Were it not for President Trumps failed leadership, thousands of Pennsylvania families would not have suffered such horrific loss and countless others would not be faced with economic hardship, including the nearly 20,000 people out of work in Dauphin County today.

Biden also attacked the Trump administrations efforts to overturn the Affordable Care Act, which ensures those with pre-existing conditions can get health care coverage. The law is one of the key achievements of President Barack Obamas administration and Biden has made protecting the Affordable Care Act a central tenet in his campaign. Biden hammered Trump for working to undermine the law in the midst of a pandemic.

To make matters worse, President Trump is actively trying to strip away health care for Pennsylvanians when they need it most and putting at risk protections for the 5 million Pennsylvanians with preexisting conditions, including Pennsylvanians experiencing long-term side effects from COVID-19, Biden said.

Trump has pledged to continue the Affordable Care Acts protections to ensure people with pre-existing conditions can obtain health care coverage without excessive charges. The president has also defended his response to the coronavirus pandemic and said hes best poised to help the country recover from the economic fallout.

Trump is holding a rally at Harrisburg International Airport Saturday night. Before the HIA event, Trump is slated to announce his nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court. Hes expected to name Amy Coney Barrett, a federal judge, as his pick, according to multiple media reports.

Both Trump and Biden have made repeated visits to Pennsylvania, widely regarded as one of the battleground states in the presidential election.

Polls show Biden holding a lead over Trump in Pennsylvania but some surveys show the gap within the margin of error. Trump won Pennsylvania in 2016 by less than a percentage point, but he still became the first GOP presidential candidate to win the Keystone State in nearly 30 years. Political analysts have said the race for Pennsylvania is wide open.

Biden, a Scranton native, is counting on a win in the Keystone State to deny Trump a second term.

To that end, Biden has consistently focused on the coronavirus pandemic and health care as key elements in his campaign, as evidenced by his statement Saturday morning.

Families in Harrisburg and across Pennsylvania deserve a president that will put their health and economic wellbeing above his own political gain, Biden said in the statement. As President, I will take action to combat COVID-19 and rebuild our economy so Harrisburg workers and families have access to good jobs with good benefits and the option to join a union. And Ill make sure Pennsylvanians are cut into the deal of our economic recovery, not left to fend for themselves.

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The Rivers State Police Command said a 20-year-old up-and-coming artiste, Daniel Ikeaguchi (aka Sleek), died of gunshot complications following an autopsy conducted on his corpse.

A consultant pathologist for the state police command, Musa Stevens, told journalists that the autopsy was conducted at the University of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital.

He said a missile object consistent with a metallic bullet was found in the deceaseds body.

Stevens further said he saw a penetrating wound on the back of the late artiste, noting that he (Ikeaguchi) died of complications from the injuries he sustained.

Stevens added, The body before me that was examined showed a single penetrating wound from the back. I recovered a missile object consistent with a metallic bullet. From my examination, he (Ikeaguchi) died of complications from the injury.

Ikeaguchi was allegedly shot by Special Anti-Robbery Squad operatives of the Rivers command in the Elelenwo area of Port Harcourt, the state capital, last Saturday.

The incident has since sparked protests, especially by youths and civil society organisations, demanding justice for the slain musician.

Meanwhile, father of the late musician, Mr Dominic Ikeaguchi, who broke down in tears after seeing the lifeless body of his son, has also demanded justice, saying he was heartbroken.

Somebody just wasted my son. There was no war; there was no fight; there was no riot. The boy wasnt involved in any fracas or robbery.

Follow Us on Facebook  @LadunLiadi; Instagram  @LadunLiadi; Twitter  @LadunLiadi; Youtube  @LadunLiadiTV for updates
TDT | Manama

On spot, resolutions were reached in several of the issues raised by Indian community members during a virtual open house held yesterday by the Indian Embassy in Bahrain. Led by Indian Ambassador Piyush Srivastava with his consular team, the session focused on urgent, non-routine consular, and labour issues raised by community members.

The issues not resolved yesterday, the envoy said, will be rectified after collecting required documents. The embassy, he said, would revert to the concerned person in due course. Complaints also reached the embassy through the consuls twitter account @IndiaInBahrain. In one such posts, a user @ Sanju_80 wrote, I have been stuck in Bahrain without any job and any kind of financial and mental support.

Dont have money buy food & medicines, No place to stay. I am from poor family, I have two small kids, god knows when I will leave Bahrain and meet my small children or I will be spending rest of my whole life here in Bahrain.  During the session, the ambassador encouraged community members to follow the embassy through its website and social media accounts to get updated on COVID-19 developments.

He also urged community members to make use of the current Amnesty being provided by Bahrain till 31 December 2020. On this note, Srivastava reminded participants on the air-bubble arrangement in place between India and Bahrain since 11 September 2020. The deal allows national carriers of both countries to operate a specific number of flights from India to Bahrain and vice-versa, the envoy added.

He also reminded that passengers who wish to make use of the opportunity could book their tickets directly through Airlines websites or travel agents. Till date, more than 27000 Indian nationals have travelled from Bahrain to India through various flights under Vande Bharat Mission (VBM), and over 3500 Indian nationals have returned from India to Bahrain.
It was announced last month that Melissa Doyle would be leaving Seven after an incredible 25 years of service with the network.

In her first interview since her shock departure, the 50-year-old journalist told The Sunday Telegraph's Stellar magazine this week that the axing wasn't out of the blue.

'I wouldn't say it came as a total shock, I just felt really sad,' she admitted.

'I just felt really sad': Melissa Doyle (pictured), 50, revealed how her firing from Seven wasn't a 'total shock', in an interview with The Sunday Telegraph's Stellar magazine this week

Melissa also revealed how she allowed herself one day to 'wallow on the couch'.

'I let myself have one day when I wallowed on the couch and had a gin and tonic a little earlier than I should have,' the mother-of-two said with a laugh.

The wallowing was short-lived, with Melissa telling Stellar how grateful she is to have had such an illustrious career with Seven.

'I've had more opportunities than I could've imagined. I've covered more stories, been to more places and met more people than the 16-year-old girl who wanted to be a journalist could've dreamt of,' she said.

Honest: 'I let myself have one day when I wallowed on the couch and had a gin and tonic a little earlier than I should have,' the mother-of-two said with a laugh

Impressive: During her career, Melissa hosted several of Seven's flagship programs, including Sunrise, Today Tonight, 7News, Sunday Night and The Latest

During her career, Melissa hosted several of Seven's flagship programs, including Sunrise, Today Tonight, 7News, Sunday Night and The Latest.

Her departure is believed to be the result of the economic downturn caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, which has hit Seven particularly hard.

Melissa first joined Seven's Canberra bureau as a political reporter back in 1995. She then moved to Sydney, working as a newsreader on the 11AM program.

Class act: As news broke of her departure from Seven, Melissa said in a statement last month: 'For 25 years, I have called Channel Seven home. I've had the privilege to share stories that mattered, meet incredible people and be there for significant moments in history'

'She reimagined breakfast TV': David Koch (pictured), 64, praised his former Sunrise co-host Melissa in a heartfelt tribute on Seven News last month (pictured), after her shock departure

After 11 years working alongside David Koch on Sunrise, she announced she was leaving Sunrise, departing in August 2013.

Melissa remained with the network, however, presenting Seven Afternoon News and Seven News at 7.

In 2015, she was announced as host and senior correspondent for Sunday Night, but the current affairs show was cancelled in October 2019, as a cost-cutting measure.

Talent: 'Sunrise wouldn't be what it is today without Mel Doyle. She was part of the founding group that sort of reimagined breakfast television,' he said in the tribute that also aired footage of the pair throughout the years

Endearing personality: David added of Melissa (pictured early on in her career): 'She's incredibly warm and she's compassionate. She's family oriented. [Got] a great sense of humour, great values. And we almost became part of each other's family'

David Koch praised Melissa for her talent in a heartfelt tribute aired on the 7pm News last month.

'Sunrise wouldn't be what it is today without Mel Doyle. She was part of the founding group that sort of reimagined breakfast television,' the 64-year-old said.

David went on to commend Melissa for her endearing personality off-camera.

'She's incredibly warm and she's compassionate. She's family oriented. [Got] a great sense of humour, great values. And we almost became part of each other's family.'

Former colleagues: After 11 years working alongside David on Sunrise, Melissa announced she was leaving Sunrise, departing in August 2013. Pictured with Sunrise's Natalie Barr and David in 2005
Actor Rhea Chakrabortys lawyer Satish Maneshinde demanded that a new medical board be set up by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to keep investigation into Sushant Singh Rajput death case impartial. He also claimed that the agencies were being pressurised to reach pre-determined results in view of the upcoming Bihar Assembly elections.

The disclosure of a 200% conclusion by an All India Institutes of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) doctor on the forensic team headed by Dr Sudhir Gupta in Sushant Singh Rajputs death case, on the basis of photographs, is a dangerous trend. To keep the investigations impartial and free from inference, the CBI must constitute a new medical board. The agencies are being pressurised to reach a pre-determined result for obvious reasons in view of upcoming Bihar elections. We have seen the VRS of DG (Gupteshwar) Pandey unfolding a few days back. There should not be a repetition of such steps, said Maneshinde.

Maneshinde was responding to a tweet by Rajputs family lawyer Vikas Singh. Getting frustrated by the delay in CBI taking a decision to convert abetment to suicide to murder of SSR. The doctor who is part of AIIMS team had told me long back that the photos sent by me indicated 200% that its death by strangulation and not suicide, he claimed in a tweet.

In a press conference held on Thursday, Singh had said that the family of late actor Rajput was disappointed that the investigation had derailed. The family feels that the investigation is going in such a way that the truth is not coming out. The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) case has become like the Mumbai Police investigation, all stars are now being called. The people called in and not are a part of a syndicate and not distributors. It is just a Mumbai Police type of investigation. Sushants case has taken a back seat, Singh said, according to news agency ANI.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 19:40:44|Editor: huaxia

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YANGON, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Myanmar authorities seized a large haul of controlled chemicals from a truck in the eastern Shan state, said a statement by the Central Committee for Drug Abuse Control (CCDAC) on Saturday.

A joint narcotics police force confiscated 1,500 liters of Acetic Anhydride acid, 2,640 liters of Dichloromethane and 975 kg of Theophylline from a six-wheel truck in the Hseni township in the state on Friday evening, the statement said.

A suspect was charged in connection with the seizure.

According to the latest statistics released by the presidential office, a total of 2,051 people were arrested in connection with 1,342 drug-related cases as of Sept. 19 this year since the launch of the Drug Activity Special Complaint Department in June 2018. Enditem
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has stood firm on his calls for China to be investigated over the origins of COVID-19, while also urging all nations to share a vaccine once it is found.

Mr Morrison took to a virtual stage on Saturday morning to address the 75th United Nations general assembly, praising the World Health Organisation for establishing an inquiry into the global response to coronavirus.

'There is also a clear mandate to identify the zoonotic source of the COVID-19 virus and how it was transmitted to humans,' he said in the pre-recorded speech.

'This virus has inflicted a calamity on our world and its peoples. We must do all we can to understand what happened for no other purpose than to prevent it from happening again.'

Scott Morrison said whoever finds the vaccine first should share it with the rest of the world (Pictured: University of Oxford COVID-19 vaccine trial)

The inquiry resolution backed by 145 countries in May does not mention China, instead committing to an impartial, independent and comprehensive evaluation of the pandemic.

China eventually supported the European Union motion.

When Mr Morrison pushed for the inquiry into COVID-19, China's deputy ambassador compared Australia's support with the murder of Julius Ceasar.

'Approximately identical to Julius Caesar in his final day when he saw Brutus approaching him. ''Et tu, Brute?'',' ambassador Wang Xining said, news.com.au reported.

'More importantly, it hurts the feelings of the Chinese people.'

There are also claims that the origin of COVID-19 had evolved naturally due to contact with animals and humans rather than escaping a lab.

Mr Morrison (pictured) said there has to be an investigation into how COVID-19 started

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison tours the Astra Zeneca laboratories in Macquarie Park, Sydney, Wednesday, August 19, 2020

Ties between the two nations have since been fraught, with tariffs being imposed on some goods and Australian journalists being evacuated from China.

Mr Morrison urged other leaders to share a coronavirus vaccine if they discover one.

He has previously said if Australia found a vaccine, it would be shared across the world.

'This is a global responsibility and it's a moral responsibility for a vaccine to be shared far and wide,' Mr Morrison said.

'Some might see short term advantage or even profit.

'But I assure you to anyone who may think along those lines, humanity will have a very long memory and be a very, very severe judge.'

Mr Morrison's speech also focused on the dangers of disinformation, urging for more to be done to prevent it.

'Disinformation costs lives and creates a climate of fear and division,' he said.

'It goes against Australia's values and beliefs as a free, open society.'

The University of Oxford samples from coronavirus vaccine trials are handled inside the Oxford Vaccine Group laboratory in Oxford, England Thursday June 25

The prime minister also touched on trade rules and the need to peacefully resolve disputes through dialogue.

'As an outward-looking, sovereign, trading nation, Australia also values the rules and institutions that enable international trade,' Mr Morrison said.

'We know that trade creates wealth and brings nations together. It makes us more prosperous, all of us.

'We won't retreat into the downward spiral of protectionism in Australia.'

Mr Morrison says Australia is leading efforts to reform the World Trade Organisation to create non-discriminatory trade rules as well as a digital guide.

'We need to make sure these standards serve all countries rather than any single power and that they are developed in line with the fundamental principles of the global order.'

On reform of the UN itself, Mr Morrison said Australia wanted to see multilateral institutions deliver 'for us and all nations'.

'We're committed to ensuring they are fit for purpose, that they're effective, that they're open and transparent and, most importantly, that they are accountable to the sovereign states that form them.'
Julianne Hough and Brooks Laich confirmed their personal heartbreak in May: that they had decided to separate after nearly three years of marriage.

The hope was that they could remain loving friends, which appeared to be exemplified by their continuing to spend time together whenever possible.

But now, some four months on since the split, there's talk the pair are 'definitely working on their marriage again' and that 'a reconciliation is looking more and more likely,' according to People.

Giving it another try? Julianne Hough and husband Brooks Laich are 'working on their marriage again', a source told People; they are pictured in February 2019

The first public sign that Hough and Laich's marriage may be in trouble was when they confirmed they were quarantining separately just after the COVID-19 crisis was deemed a pandemic in March.

Hough, 32, remained at their home in Los Angeles while Laich, 37, bunkered down in rural Idaho.

Another source revealed to People that they decided to take the next step, and part ways, after realizing they were 'perfectly happy and fine being apart' during the pandemic.

Hopeful: 'A reconciliation is looking more and more likely,' the source also shared some four months after Hough and Laich announced their split; they are pictured in May 2018

'We have lovingly and carefully taken the time we have needed to arrive at our decision to separate,' the estranged couple said in a joint statement on May 29.

'We share an abundance of love and respect for one another and will continue to lead with our hearts from that place. We Kindly request your compassion and respect for our privacy moving forward.'

At no point during their time apart did the estranged couple ever go public with any negative comments or actions against each other.

'There is honestly no ill will. He loves her. She loves him. I can truly say they always will,' the source said at the time.

Self discovery: The Dancing With The Stars alum admitted to being on a journey of self-discovery and personal exploration since about four months after they married in July 2017

The Dancing With The Stars alum admitted to being on a heightened journey of self-discovery and personal exploration since about four months after they tied-the-knot in July 2017, in an interview for Women's Health September 2019 issue

Part of her effort to become more emotionally and physically intimate included revealing to Laich that she was 'not straight' when it comes to her sexuality.

During their time apart, Laich has been described as being open to the possibility of giving the marriage another shot.

'Julianne likes the idea of freedom but doesn't want to lose such a good, solid guy,' an insider said.

'Everyone who knows him knows how grounded and great he is. Her friends and family don't want her to lose someone like that.'
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Global Travel Insurance Market was valued US$2.6Bn in 2017 and is expected to reach US$9.6Bn by 2026 at a CAGR of about 17.34% during a forecast.



Global Travel Insurance Market is segmented into by Product Type, by Industry, By Channel, and by region. Based on Product Type, Travel Insurance Market is classified into Medical expense, Trip Cancellation, Trip Delay, Property Damage & Other. Industry type is divided into Domestic Tourism & Oversea Tourism. By Channel section are into Direct Sales & Distributor. Geographically into North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Middle East & Africa, and Latin America. Global Industry Analysis and forecast 2018-2026.



Driving factors for the travel insurance market is Travelers are more likely to travel with an assurance of financial protection during the trip, rise of low-cost airlines, an increase in the number of airport passengers, travelers can easily check out the benefits conditions applicable to the same, and even compare the premiums of various travel insurance policies and provides an extensive range of benefits for events, such as trip cancellation due to a medical emergency, loss of baggage, evacuation due to a medical condition or hijack, and loss of travel documents these factors can create more opportunity in the travel insurance market.

Huge expenses and lengthy process of claiming the bill can hamper the growth of Travel Insurance Market.

Request for Report Sample: https://www.trendsmarketresearch.com/report/sample/10350





In terms of Industry, Oversea Tourism segment share the highest market during the forecast period. Rise in disposal income, changing lifestyle, rising better options for tours and travels, connecting the world via cheaper flight and better facilities, rising business standard at world level and the travel insurance policy of nature also compensates against passport or baggage loss, flight delays, and cancellations will open more opportunity in the travel insurance market.



In terms of Channel, Direct Sales segment share the fastest growing market during the forecast period. Direct sales via online platform in travel insurance is a cost-effective way and less time consume to book, targeting a specific audience, helps to build relationships with new customers and offer customers with compelling content they can share with potential customers.



Among region, Asia Pacific is expected to grow at the highest CAGR during the forecast period. Advances in technology, holiday entitlement, increased disposable incomes, an effect of media and easy availability of holiday packages, the governmentas scheme visa on arrival scheme, rising population and emerging economies. The World Tourism Organization has predicted international tourist arrivals to reach 10 billion to reach 2030

Generali, AXA, Allianz, Munich RE, Hanse Merkur, AIG, CSA Travel Insurance, Groupama, Mapfre Asistencia, USI Affinity, Seven Corners, MH Ross, Tokio Marine, Sompo Japan, Pingan Baoxian, STARR, InsureandGo, Aviva PLC, American Express Company, MS&AD Insurance Group Holdings, China Pacific Life Insurance Co., Ltd, Atlas Travel Insurance Services Ltd.

Scope of the report for Global Travel Insurance Market:

Request for Report Discount: https://www.trendsmarketresearch.com/report/discount/10350



Global Travel Insurance Market: By Product Type

Medical expense

Trip Cancellation

Trip Delay

Property Damage

Other

Global Travel Insurance Market: By Industry

Domestic Tourism

Oversea Tourism

Global Travel Insurance Market: By Sales Channel

Direct Sales

Distributor

Global Travel Insurance Market: By region

North America

Europe

Asia Pacific

Middle East & Africa

Latin America



Key Player analyzed in the Global Travel Insurance Market:



Generali

AXA

Allianz

Munich RE

Hanse Merkur

AIG

CSA Travel Insurance

Groupama

Mapfre Asistencia

USI Affinity

Seven Corners

MH Ross

Tokio Marine

Sompo Japan

Pingan Baoxian

STARR

InsureandGo

Aviva PLC

American Express Company

Ping An Insurance Company of China

MS&AD Insurance Group Holdings

China Pacific Life Insurance Co., Ltd

Atlas Travel Insurance Services Ltd

More Info of Impact Covid19@ https://www.trendsmarketresearch.com/report/covid-19-analysis/10350
The prime minister also asserted that as one of world's largest vaccine manufacturer, India is ready to use its capacity for the betterment of all of humanity during the coronavirus pandemic

From raising pertinent questions about the role of United Nations in organising a combined global response to the current pandemic, to making India's pitch for a stronger role in global decision-making, Prime Minister Narendra Modi touched several key points in his 21-minute-long speech at the UNGA.

Modi said that India has never shied away from taking on a global role, and is ready to shoulder its responsibility as a non-permanent member starting January next year. The prime minister also asserted that as one of world's largest vaccine manufacturer, India is ready to use its capacity for the betterment of all of humanity during the coronavirus pandemic. He said that India has already supplied vital medicines to 150 nations during the pandemic.

Here is the full text of his speech.

Respected President of the General Assembly. On behalf of over 1.3 billion people of India. I would like to congratulate every member country. on the 75th anniversary of the United Nations. India is proud of the fact that it is one of the founding members of the United Nations. On this historic occasion, I have come to this global platform to share the sentiments of 1.3 billion people of India.

Your Excellency

The world of 1945 was significantly different from todays world. The global situation, sources-resources, problems-solutions; all were quite different. And as a result the form and the composition of the institution, established with the aim of global welfare, were in accordance with the prevailing situation of those times. Today we are in a completely different era. In 21st century, The requirements and challenges of our present as well as our future are vastly different from those of the past. Therefore, the international community today is faced with a very important question: Whether the character of the institution, constituted in the prevailing circumstances of 1945, is relevant even today? If century changes and we dont, then strength to bring changes becomes weak. If we assess the last 75 years of the United Nations, we see several achievements

But at the same time, there are also several instances that point to a serious need for introspection for the United Nations. One could say that we have successfully avoided a third world war, but we cannot deny that there have been several wars and many civil wars. Several terrorist attacks shook the world and there have been bloodsheds. The people who lost their lives in these wars and attacks were human beings, like you and me. Thousands of children, who would have otherwise enriched this world, left us prematurely. So many people lost their life savings and became homeless refugees. Were the efforts of the United Nations sufficient during those times or are these efforts adequate even today? The whole world is fighting the global pandemic of Corona for the last 8-9 months. Where is the United Nations in this joint fight against the pandemic? Where is its effective response?

Your Excellency,

Reform in the responses, in the processes, in the character of the United Nations is the need of the hour. It is a fact that the faith and respect that the United Nations enjoys in India are unparalleled. But it is also true that the people of India have been waiting for a long time for the completion of the reforms of the United Nations. Today, people of India are concerned whether this reform-process will ever reach its logical conclusion?

For how long will India be kept out of the decision-making structures of the United Nations? A country, which is the largest democracy of the world, A country with more than 18% of the world population, A country, which has hundreds of languages, hundreds of dialects, many sects, many ideologies, A country, which was a leading global economy for centuries and also one which has seen hundreds of years of foreign rule.

Your Excellency

When we were strong, we did not trouble the world; when we were weak, we did not become a burden on the world.

Your Excellency

How long would a country have to wait particularly when the changes happening in that country affect a large part of the world?

Your Excellency

The ideals on which the United Nations was founded are quite similar to that of India and not different from its own fundamental philosophy. The words Vasudhaiv Kutumbakam, the whole world is a family, have often reverberated in this hall of the United Nations. We treat the whole world as one family. It is part of our culture, character and thinking. In the United Nations too, India has always given priority to the welfare of the whole world. India is the country, which sent its brave soldiers to about 50 peacekeeping missions. India is the country that has lost the maximum number of its brave soldiers in the course of establishing peace. Today every Indian, while seeing the contribution of India in the United Nations, aspires for Indias expanded role in the United Nations.

Respected Chairman

It was India that initiated the International Day of Non-Violence on 02 October and International Day of Yoga on 21 June. Similarly, the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure and the International Solar Alliance are realities today due to efforts of India. India has always thought about the interests of the whole humankind and not about its own vested interests. This philosophy has always been the driving force of Indias policies. One can see the glimpses of this philosophy in Indias Neighbourhood First Policy to our Act East Policy, in the thought of Security and Growth for All in the Region, and in our approach towards the Indo Pacific region. Indias partnerships are also guided by this very principle. Any gesture of friendship by India towards one country is not against someone else. When India strengthens its development partnership, it is not with any malafide intent of making the partner country dependent or hapless. We have never hesitated from sharing experiences of our development.

Your Excellency

Even during these very difficult times of a raging pandemic, the pharma industry of India has sent essential medicines to more than 150 countries. As the largest vaccine producing country of the world, I want to give one more assurance to the global community today, Indias vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis. We are moving ahead with phase 3 clinical trials in India and in our neighbourhood. India will also help all the countries in enhancing their cold chain and storage capacities for the delivery of Vaccines.

Your Excellency

From January next year, India will also fulfil its responsibility as a non-permanent member of the Security Council. I express my gratitude to all our fellow countries who have bestowed this trust upon India. We will use the prestige and experience of the largest democracy for the benefit of the whole world. Our path goes from human welfare to the welfare of the World. India will always speak in support of peace, security and prosperity. India will not hesitate in raising its voice against the enemies of humanity, human race and human values  terrorism, smuggling of illegal weapons, drugs and money-laundering. Indias cultural heritage, tradition, thousands of years of experience will always stand in good stead for the developing countries. Indias experiences, Indias developmental journey with its ups and downs will strengthen the way towards world welfare.

Your Excellency

In the past few years, following the mantra of Reform-Perform-Transform, India has made great efforts to bring about transformation in the lives of millions of its citizens. These experiences are as useful for many countries of the world as they are for us. Connecting 400 million people to banking system in just 4-5 years was not an easy task. But India proved that it can be done. It was not easy to free 600 million people from Open Defecation in 4-5 years. But India achieved it. It was not easy to provide access to free health care services, within 2-3 years, to more than 500 million people. But India was able to do this. Today, India is one of the leaders in Digital Transactions. Today, India is ensuring empowerment and transparency by providing Digital Access to its millions of citizens. Today, India is implementing a huge campaign for tuberculosis-free India by 2025. Today, India is implementing a programme for providing piped drinking water to 150 million rural households. Recently, India has initiated a huge project for connecting its 6 Lakh villages with broadband optical fibre.

Your Excellency

We are moving forward with the vision of Self-reliant India in the changed circumstances of the post Pandemic era. A Self-reliant India will also be a Force Multiplier for the Global Economy. Today, it is also being ensured that there is no discrimination in extending the benefits of all the schemes to every citizen of the country. Large scale efforts are being made in India to promote Women Enterprise and Leadership. Indian women, today, are the biggest beneficiaries of the largest Micro Financing Scheme of the world. India is one of those countries where women are provided Paid Maternity Leave of 26 weeks. The rights of Transgenders are also being secured through necessary Legal reforms.

Your Excellency

In its journey towards progress, India wants to learn from the world as well as share its own experiences with the world. I am confident that on the occasion of its 75th anniversary, the United Nations and its member countries will endeavour with a strong commitment to maintain the relevance of this great institution. Stability in the United nations and empowerment of the United Nations are essential for the welfare of the world. On the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the United Nations, let us once again pledge to dedicate ourselves for the welfare of the world.

Thank you
The competition to become the face of Boris Johnsons new daily White House-style televised press briefings is now a two-horse race  with the Prime Minister set to use a chemistry test to decide the successful candidate.

Former ITV presenter Allegra Stratton, who works as Chancellor Rishi Sunaks director of communications, is on the final shortlist following a day of interviews and screen tests at No 10 on Friday.

The Prime Minister is expected to interview Ms Stratton and the other candidate for the six-figure salaried position  a left-field BBC presenter, according to sources  to test their personal chemistry.

Former ITV presenter Allegra Stratton (pictured), who works as Chancellor Rishi Sunaks director of communications, is on the final shortlist following a day of interviews and screen tests at No 10 on Friday

Downing Street hopes to start the new briefings later next month.

Ms Stratton, a 39-year-old mother-of-two, quit ITV News to join Mr Sunaks increasingly powerful Treasury operation this year.

The Cambridge University graduate, who is married to James Forsyth, the political editor of The Spectator, has been the favourite since No 10 said that it was introducing the afternoon TV briefings as part of a bid to communicate more directly with voters.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson (pictured) is expected to interview Ms Stratton and the other candidate for the six-figure salaried position  a left-field BBC presenter, according to sources  to test their personal chemistry

Mr Johnson has declared himself to be impressed by Ms Stratton, and recently invited her to join him at Chequers.

Downing Street has struggled to attract a wide field of experienced broadcasters to apply for the job because of the lavish pay packets of the television industry  and the risk they will become the public face of the Governments pratfalls.

The new briefings will take place in a revamped No 9 Downing Street, which is currently being turned into a media centre.
Defence minister Rajnath Singh on Saturday said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has pledged that by 2022 every poor person in the country will have a roof over their head.

Now our Prime Minister has pledged that by 2022, when the country will be celebrating the 75th anniversary of independence, then every poor person in the country will have a roof over their head. The country had to wait so long for this economic planning. Whereas Deendayalji was saying the same thing in the 1960s, Singh tweeted (roughly translated from Hindi).

Today, in the Deendayal Smriti Lecture, I spoke on the topic of Sankalp Bharat Ka Sankalp. The relevance of the national goals that Deendayalji had set after attaining independence has not diminished from any point of view. Those goals are important in fulfilling the resolve of self-reliant India, he tweeted.

Deendayal Upadhyaya had said that there should be a system that protects political freedom, Singh added.

For this, an ordinary Indian can also get a chance to live a life of honor. Prime Minister Modi has started many schemes, due to which the poor of the country have an account in the bank, have gas facility in their homes, electricity facility in the villages, road facilities, now internet facility is being provided, Singh tweeted.

In a country where half of the population are farmers, agriculture was neglected for such a long time that farming became a profitable business. Due to vested interests, agriculture and farmers of this country have never been given the land where the farmers of this country can also get the full fruits of their hard work, the defence minister stated.

Now, Prime Minister Modi has taken some such steps which will help the farmers of this country to get a better price for their produce, he added.

In the last session of Parliament (monsoon session), two agricultural bills have been passed, through which farmers have got freedom to sell their produce in the true sense, Singh wrote.

Our commitment for the welfare of the farmers of India dates back to the days of Deendayal Upadhyay. No one can deter us from this path. For the first time after independence, Atalji had made the countrys village, poor and farmer the centre of his policies. Now Modiji is working on the same path and in a big way, he added.

Recently, I released a negative list of 101 defense equipments, through which this policy was decided, that all these equipments and platforms will no longer be imported in India. Only one decision has led to manufacturing opportunities of Rs 52,000 crore in a year, Singh tweeted.

The Defence Minister further stated that the second major policy announcement in the defense sector is the approval of FDI up to 74 per cent in the field of defense. This has made the path of Make in India easier for foreign defense companies as well. Soon we are also going to introduce new Defense Production and Procurement Policy.

Self-reliance is very important in the field of defense. A country that depends on imports for its defense equipment will never be strong and self-respecting. Therefore, being self-sufficient in the defense sector is linked to the self-respect and sovereignty of our country, Singh tweeted. Today at the UNGA meeting, Prime Minister has kept the points of people of India with full clarity and strength. Today, the whole world has heard and appreciated his message as the lofty voice of self-respecting India. I heartily congratulate him for his effective address, he added. (ANI)
Recap: With $15 billions in back taxes sitting in an escrow account ready to be paid to Ireland at a moment's notice, Apple could still end up keeping the money and giving the European Commission the middle finger. However, the European Commission isn't giving up the fight, and will appeal a recent ruling in Europe's General Court that sided with Apple and Ireland.

Back in July, Apple and Ireland won an appeal against a $15 billion tax bill imposed by the European Commission. The Cupertino giant paid the amount plus interest -- a whopping $16.7 billion -- in 2016, representing unfair tax breaks and benefits received in Ireland between 2003 and 2014. What followed was a multi-year battle to overturn that decision, which is now heating up after a judge in EU's general court ruled that the Commission had failed to prove that Ireland has given a tax advantage to Apple.

Today, the European Commission announced it will appeal the July 2020 decision made by the General Court in Luxembourg and bring it before the European Court of Justice. EU vice president of digital policy Margrethe Vestager explained in a statement that while the General Court's assessment revealed important legal issues in its ruling, the Commission intends to prove the General Court has made "a number of errors of law."

Specifically, the EC will draw attention to the fact that while EU member states are allowed to determine their own taxation laws as they see fit, they must do so in respect of EU law, including rules on state aid. Failing that, multinational companies can engage in anti-competitive deals that represent illegal state aid -- in the case of Apple, its effective tax rate went from an already lowly 1 percent in 2003 to 0.005 percent in 2014.

This is possible thanks to Ireland's famous quality of being a tax haven for multinational corporations. While the country does have a corporate tax rate of 12.5 percent (versus 21 percent in the US), it also provides generous base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS) tools that allow foreign companies to achieve an effective tax rate of less than 2.5 percent on global profits that are routed to Ireland.

According to a 2019 study conducted by the International Monetary Fund, almost 40 percent of the worldwide "foreign direct investment" can be considered "phantom capital," and amounts to $15 trillion that is passed through shell companies with no real business activities in the countries where they've been established. In Ireland, two thirds of the inward investment is phantom capital, and half of the biggest users of BEPS tools are US multinationals -- including Apple.

As for the Cupertino giant, it believes "the General Court categorically annulled the Commissions case in July and the facts have not changed since then. This case has never been about how much tax we pay, rather where we are required to pay it. We will review the Commissions appeal when we receive it, however it will not alter the factual conclusions of the General Court, which prove that we have always abided by the law in Ireland, as we do everywhere we operate."

In the meantime, Apple has raised developer fees in Europe in response to new digital taxes implemented in several countries. Furthermore, the OECD is racing to rewrite international tax rules by the end of the year to coerce multinational companies into paying their fair share in every country they operate in.
Modis remarks to the U.N. General Assembly  pre-recorded because the gathering is virtual this year  also said nothing about growing tensions with neighboring Pakistan, whose prime minister, Imran Khan, devoted much of his speech Friday to assailing India, leading to a sharp exchange between the two countries diplomats in the Assembly hall. Nor did Modi discuss Indias dispute with China over the border region of Ladakh, where a months-long standoff has seen the deadliest violence between the two sides in decades.
Chinese peacekeeping police officers conduct an armed patrol at a community in Monrovia, capital of Liberia, on Feb 7, 2018. ZHAO XIAOXIN/XINHUA

Officers overcome difficulties as most assignments are in less-developed areas

China's peacekeeping police have become a "pillar force" for United Nations peacekeeping missions, impressing the world body and host countries with their professionalism and strict discipline, a senior official from the Ministry of Public Security said.

"China is a peace-loving country and is willing to contribute forces and resources to peacekeeping missions. Also, it is China's duty to participate in such activities as it is a permanent member of the UN Security Council," said Yu Chengtao, deputy director-general of the ministry's Department of International Cooperation.

"Upholding peaceful development, China will always be a contributor to world peace."

China is now the second-largest financial contributor to UN peacekeeping, after the United States.

"The job of peacekeeping police officers includes protecting civilians, quelling riots and conducting security patrols," Yu said.

"Most of the assignments were in less-developed areas, where officers overcame poor conditions to carry out difficult missions."

Chinese police officers have been deployed for UN peace operations since 2000, when 15 were sent to East Timor.

Over the past two decades, more than 2,600 of them have taken part in nine peacekeeping operations. Eight have died during their missions.

Currently, 33 Chinese police officers are on peacekeeping operations in Sudan, South Sudan and Cyprus, and some serve at the UN headquarters.

A 160-member police squad will soon be dispatched to Abyei, a disputed area on the border of Sudan and South Sudan.

When President Xi Jinping attended the summit meetings for the UN's 70th anniversary in 2015, he announced several measures to support UN peacekeeping missions, including contributing to the UN's standby force mechanism, training 2,000 international peacekeepers split evenly between soldiers and police officersand setting up a fund to sponsor UN work.

All have been delivered.

In June 2016, China established the first permanent police squad for UN peacekeeping operations, consisting of 330 members, to support the UN's standby force.

In addition, China has trained more than 1,000 police officers from around the world for peacekeeping, from high-level experienced officials to new officers with limited understanding of the UN system.

The China-UN Peace and Development Fund has provided $67.7 million for over 80 projects, supporting the UN's efforts in areas including peacekeeping and counterterrorism.

There are three types of UN peacekeepers: soldiers, police officers and civilians.

According to the UN peacekeeping program's website, UN police provide operational support to host-state counterparts in various fields including the protection of civilians; the facilitation of secure elections; the investigation of incidents of sexual and gender-based violence; and the prevention of serious organized crime and violence.

They also assist with the reform, restructuring and development of host-state police services and other law enforcement agencies.

Although China has been a great contributor to world peace, some foreign analysts have claimed that China's participation in peacekeeping is driven by pragmatic reasons, such as protecting assets and Chinese people abroad.

"People who understand the deployment procedure will know this argument is unreliable," Yu said."China is not taking the State's interests as a standard to choose an area to deploy peacekeepers."

The procedure is usually initiated by an international dispute. The UN Security Council will evaluate whether the disputed area is a threat to international peace and security and vote for a resolution. The UN secretariat then sends out invitations to UN member states based on the resolution.

"China will make a full evaluation based on our capacity and strength to answer the call, such as language skills," said Lu Cong, deputy head of the department's peacekeeping police division. "For instance, China has a shortage of French-speaking police officers and cannot offer much help to French-speaking areas."

Lu said that after China submits its response to the UN, and the UN acknowledges it, assignment details will be sent to a provincial public security department to recruit qualified police officers to join the team.

Yu said the deployment of peacekeepers to a certain area was a UN decision and not based on any Chinese initiative. He added that the UN evaluates the capacity of responsive member states to make contributions in areas where assistance is needed.

Assessments are mostly based on technical matters, such as if the state has previous experience in the areas. The UN would then determine the number of personnel to be deployed.

"It is a reality that most mission areas are less developed and less attractive to foreigners," he said. "Even in a mission area with Chinese businesses and people, it is more likely a coincidence. We peacekeeping police officers protect local civilians, including the ones who happen to be Chinese."

It can seem like a no-win situation, said He Yin, associate professor at the China Peacekeeping Police Training Center of the People's Police University of China.
Another prestigious Sydney school has been embroiled in muck-up day controversy with students allegedly found to be planning a spate of 'criminal' pranks.

Students at St Aloysius College in Milsons Point, on Sydney's lower North Shore, are the latest to be told they could be expelled or face police action after plans for end of year celebrations were uncovered.

The elite school's rector, Father Ross Jones and Principal Mark Tannock sent an email to all Year 12 students and their parents at the all-boys school condemning the plans.

Some of the challenges at the $20,000-a-year school were labelled as 'inappropriate and concerning activities'.

Year 12 students St Aloysius College (pictured) in Milsons Point on Sydney's lower North Shore, were found to be engaging in 'very inappropriate and concerning activities' on September 25

The elite school's rector, Father Ross Jones and Principal Mark Tannock sent an email (pictured) to all year 12 students and their parents condemning the disgusting behaviour

'In particular, we have been made aware of an overnight competition that invites criminal, manifestly dangerous, and highly offensive behaviours (a number of which are acutely sexist in nature),' the St Aloysius' leaders wrote, The Sydney Morning Herald reported.

The pair said the boys should not be excused for their actions under the belief that 'boys will be boys'.

'Clearly, if any student should engage in these activities, the College will have no hesitation in contacting the police and then banning him from the College for the remainder of 2020.

'This will include the voluntary study programs, the Valete Dinner and the Year 12 Formal. Furthermore, it will mean he will be required to sit the HSC examinations as an independent candidate at another examination centre.'

After the initial email was sent out, Mr Tannock (pictured) said some students came forward and apologised for getting involved

After the email was sent out, some students came forward and apologised for getting involved in the activities.

'Yes, these young men have made a serious error of judgment,' Mr Tannock wrote in another email, The Daily Telegraph reported.

'However, we expect them to grow and learn as a result of our forgiveness and their reflection.'

The strict warning to students at St Aloysius comes after Pymble Ladies College, on Sydney's north shore, also warned its pupils about their muck-up day plans.

A document allegedly circulated among students at the all-girls school encouraged them to 'swallow a goldfish', 'streak down a highway' and to even 'have sex with someone's dad' as part of a graduation challenge.

Many of the challenges in the document believed to be associated with the $33,000-a-year school were sexual or criminal in nature.

Students would be split into teams and would gain points for every task they could prove they had completed.

Graduating students at elite private girls' school Pymble Ladies' College (pictured), on Sydney's north shore, allegedly created a vulgar muck-up day challenge

Some of the alleged challenges by the students at Pymble encouraged girls to 'have sex with someone's dad' and 'eat someone's vomit'

A spokesperson for the school said students would face punishment for carrying out the muck-up day plan, 7NEWS reported.

'We are horrified and disappointed that any student would have their name associated with what was apparently a competitive list between students at a number of schools,' they said.

A similar scavenger hunt was also organised as part of a muck-up challenge for the elite Shore School on Sydney's lower north shore.

The 'official rule and challenge book' - created by students in a PDF document - revealed they planned to meet between 5pm and 6pm on Wednesday at Waverton Park for the series of 'treacherous' challenges.

The 'Scavenger Hunt' required girls to divide into teams and perform a variety of sexual and illegal acts in order to score points (Pymble Ladies' College pictured)

The school leavers would then be split into teams of five or six before carrying out a series of tasks to compete for points.

The rule book stated all participants from the $33,000-a-year school were required to chip in $10 and the team who gathers the most points would be awarded the total cash prize.

Before starting the challenges, the groups would be required to finish a case of 30 beers in 15 minutes.

The competitors would then be given seven hours of 'hunting' from 6pm to 1am.

There were more than 150 challenges listed in the scavenger hunt rule book and the tasks range in difficulty.

Students from elite private boys' school Shore, in Sydney's lower north shore, also attempted to complete a controversial challenge named the 'Triwizard Shorenament' (pictured)

The school is among the top ranked in New South Wales and regularly features impressive Year 12 results

One challenge called the 'Pakistan Sacrifice' read: 'Eat two laxatives and a Phaal Curry (spicy curry) from Lavender Bay Curry.

'Warning: Will be s***ing all night and probably will want to die.'

Another challenge was dubbed the 'trifecta spit' which included a 'spit roast', spitting on a homeless man and jumping off the Spit Bridge.

For 10,000 points, students could 'get on a plane to Melbourne'.
A quarter of the people infected with the novel coronavirus while at a hospital or personal care home has died from COVID-19.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 25/9/2020 (483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A quarter of the people infected with the novel coronavirus while at a hospital or personal care home has died from COVID-19.

A Free Press analysis of provincial data and reports from long-term care home operators shows that since March, 36 people have acquired SARS-CoV-2 while being treated at a hospital or while residing in a personal care home.

Twenty-three were residents of personal care homes and 13 people acquired the virus at a hospital. Nine of those patients and residents died.

In the same period, 88 health-care workers in the province were diagnosed with COVID-19, with nurses and health-care aides most likely to get the virus, according to available provincial data current as of Sept. 12.

Cases among health-care workers have been increasing, especially in the past six weeks, as personal care homes across the province coped with consecutive outbreaks.

Fifty health-care workers were diagnosed with COVID-19 from Aug. 2 to Sept. 12.

The fatal outbreaks

Personal care home operator Revera Inc., which has seven facilities in Manitoba, is managing its second deadly outbreak in six months.

Parkview Place Long Term Care Home in downtown Winnipeg has gone into lockdown after it announced an employee was diagnosed with the virus on Sept. 15.

Five days later, COVID-19 tests in seven residents returned a positive result, and on Sept. 22, Revera said a resident, a woman in her 90s, had died from the disease.

"The team at Parkview Place is heartbroken and offer their most sincere condolences to the person we have lost to the pandemic," Revera chief medical officer Rhonda Collins said in a statement.

As of Sept. 24, the outbreak at Parkview Place had grown to 11 residents and two staff members, both of whom are isolating, Revera said.

With 11 seniors battling COVID-19 at the 277-bed home, the outbreak has the potential to surpass the provinces most fatal outbreak so far at Bethesda Place Personal Care Home in Steinbach.

While case counts climbed outside the Perimeter Highway in mid-August  driven by outbreaks on multiple Hutterite colonies and clusters in Brandon connected to the Maple Leaf Food processing plant  seven cases of COVID-19 were discovered at Bethesda Place.

The first case was reported on Aug. 17, with six subsequent cases announced on Aug. 23. As the week wore on, additional cases in residents and staff cropped up. And then, a death: a woman in her 90s who lived in the home.

Two days later, another woman in her 90s died from the virus. Six days later, on Sept. 3, it was announced two more women, in their 80s and 90s, succumbed to the disease.

In all, nine staff and six residents (four of whom died) at Bethesda Place came down with COVID-19, as of Sept. 24, with infections identified in both wings of the 60-bed home.

The severity of the Bethesda outbreak, which has yet to be resolved, eclipsed even the 25-person outbreak at the Health Sciences Centre, which lasted more than a month.

Manitoba Health said the outbreak at HSC was declared on March 30 and was resolved on May 8.

RUTH BONNEVILLE / FREE PRESS FILES Manitoba's first COVID-19 outbreak and death at a long-term care facility was reported on April 2 at Poseidon Personal Care Home in Winnipeg. A second resident tested positive a few days later.

By the first week of April, four patients and 10 staff had tested positive for the virus with the cluster, adding six more cases in workers, one patient and four household contacts over the course of the outbreak.

Two patients, who had been in a medicine unit, died after becoming infected.

In all, 40 nurses, 30 allied health professionals, 20 support staff, 15 security guards and an untold number of physicians were off work for two weeks while self-isolating due to potential exposures.

The provinces first COVID-19 outbreak at a long-term care facility was reported on April 2 at Poseidon Personal Care Home in Winnipeg.

Revera published details of the outbreak and said a man in his 70s, whose death was announced on April 10, had lived at the home and died in hospital. A second resident tested positive for the virus on April 6 and was put into isolation. By May 5, Revera said the case was resolved.

And a ninth COVID-19 death has been connected to the Brandon Regional Health Centre, where public health announced five cases were linked to the second floor of the Assiniboine Centre on Aug. 30.

The province said two health-care workers and three patients were diagnosed with COVID-19; the first patient was infected while at the facility.

On Sept. 21, the patient of the Assiniboine Centre died of COVID-19 while in hospital.

Personal care home outbreaks involving staff

On Friday, nine health-care facilities and personal care homes were listed as "critical" under the provinces pandemic response system and slapped with additional restrictions.

Most sites have reported one or two cases among staff, but have taken the extra step of bringing in outbreak protocols to control the spread of the contagion to co-workers and residents.

A request for up-to-date data on personal care home outbreaks Friday was not provided by the province.

In Winnipeg, the current COVID-19 hot spot of Manitoba, the infections in staff members have prompted outbreaks at five long term care homes, including Beacon Hill (one employee, as of Sept. 2), and Actionmarguerite (one employee, as of Sept. 15).

A single case in a staff member at St. Amant Health and Transition Services, which provides support and housing for people who have developmental disabilities, was reported on Sept. 15, sparking outbreak protocols. Subsequently, a volunteer who last worked at the building on Sept. 18 tested positive for COVID-19, extending the outbreak for 28 days.

In Steinbach, Maplewood Manor, about 500 metres away from Bethesda Place, had two cases of the virus among employees as of Sept. 22.

STEVE LAMBERT / CANADIAN PRESS FILES In mid-September, Manitoba Health Minister Cameron Friesen unveiled all-season visitation shelters, repurposed from shipping containers, for personal care homes.

Meanwhile in Brandon, the Fairview Personal Care Home and Hillcrest Place Personal Care Home have declared outbreaks. The latest information from the province indicates Fairview has two cases among employees (as of Aug. 31), as does Hillcrest.

Outbreaks that were brought under control include: Rideau Park Personal Care Home in Brandon (one health-care worker, announced Aug. 27), Donwood Manor in Winnipeg (tenant at neighbouring assisted living facility, Sept. 6), Fred Douglas Lodge (one employee, as of Sept. 2, declared ended on Sept. 25), Concordia Place (one employee, as of Sept. 5, declared ended Sept. 25), and Parkview Place (one staff member, declared over April 17).

Other instances of COVID-19 in health-care settings

On Sept. 23, Revera said a resident at its Heritage Lodge Long Term Care Home, in Winnipeg's Crestview neighbourhood, was asymptomatic, but had a positive test result. On Friday, the province declared an outbreak at the home.

In some circumstances, a positive COVID-19 case in a health-care worker wont trigger an outbreak at their workplace or require additional restrictions to be put into effect.

Manitoba Health defines a personal care home COVID-19 outbreak as one or more cases among staff, volunteers, or residents, who have been in the home while infectious, and is only declared if the person was in the home while infectious, or in public health terms, during the period of communicability.

Jen Zoratti | Next A weekly look towards a post-pandemic future delivered to your inbox every Wednesday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

In mid-September, an employee at Deer Lodge Centre was diagnosed with the virus, but no outbreak was declared. A case was also reported in Riverview Health Centre in April and did not require a formal outbreak to be announced.

On Sept.12, Carberry Plains Health Centre in Carberry was forced to close after infections in an employee and an outpatient sent most other staff into self-isolation. The centre was reopened to acute and emergency care on Sept. 23.

danielle.dasilva@freepress.mb.ca
"First and foremost, I would like to extend an apology on behalf of the District and the Board of School Directors to the student who was involved and to his family. They did not ask for this incident to occur, nor do they deserve the negative attention that it has brought." - school board President Tina Stoll
Camp Ashland is set to be rebuilt after successive waves of destructive floods damaged it, with a project worth $35 Million being granted recently for this purpose. It will be the Camp's centerpiece project under the $62 Million flood reconstruction project for the Camp.





Resiliency Through Disasters

The Camp experienced several waves of disasters, including two devastating floods within five years. It also housed the Americans who were the first to be quarantined from the COVID-19 pandemic coming from Wuhan. A total of 57 Americans were quarantined here.

Through it all, Camp Ashland has been resilient. According to Pete Ricketts, Governor of Nebraska, the National Guard has been very flexible in keeping Nebraska citizens safe and commended for its actions.

READ: Climate Change Threatens Cultural Landmarks and Heritage Sites in Africa





35-Million-Dollar Restoration

The Guard awarded the camp with a contract to replace 28 buildings inundated by floodwaters in 2015.

These buildings have already been previously rebuilt, but they were again destroyed in 2019's Great Nebraska Flood, where the Platte River overflowed. The base was filled with water coming from Platte's tributary, Salt Creek. Water as high as eight feet damaged the buildings.

Start of Construction

The groundbreaking ceremony was conducted last Friday, and the training camp is looking forward to the start of its much-needed renovation and facelift.

Colonel Shane Martin of the Army National Guard said that the current plan calls for putting down the 28 buildings mentioned above, which are to be replaced entirely. Also, a land area of 71,000 square feet will be dedicated to constructing seven entirely new facilities outfitted with a much-improved configuration.

New Infrastructure

The seven planned buildings to be constructed from scratch will stand on stilts, and they will be towering 12 feet above the ground as a preventive measure for future floods.

According to Col. Martin, this will also be a tremendous opportunity to let the camp soldiers have a bit of genuinely usable and flexible space.

READ ALSO: Experts Warn of Future With Worse Natural Disasters Than 2020





Levee Renovation

The Army Corps of Engineers of Nebraska is also planning to renovate the final levee, which runs along Platte. It was breached during the 2019 flooding, creating a trench measuring 30 feet.

According to Major Aaron Ellinger, the most extensive renovation to the levee will be its sheet pile. Closing the breach will be a significant milestone in repairing the damage caused by last year's flood to this infrastructure.

Ellinger says they will continue to collaborate with their levee sponsors in repairing the damaged systems, and they assured them that these systems would return to their pre-disaster conditions. He explained that the levee systems are critical to the landowners and the local communities.

A Bright Future

Jeff Fortenberry, Congressman, and Deb Fischer, Senator, lauded the future of the Camp. According to Fortenberry, things became uncertain during the 2019 flooding, when the waters swept the Camp. He says that they are glad that the rebuilding is taking place this fast.

According to its proponents, the levee project will be completed around April of 2021. Meanwhile, the rebuilding project for Camp Ashland that will repair the damage incurred from the destructive floods is expected to be finalized in two years.

READ NEXT: Real Estate Website Provides Flood-Risk Score for Every American Home

Check out more news and information on Climate Change on Nature World News.
Uttar Pradesh (UP) and Bihar have been the two biggest beneficiaries of the free ration  cereals and pulses -- distributed under 1.7 lakh crore Prime Minister Garib Kalyan Package (PMGKP) announced in March to provide immediate relief to the poor in view of the Covid-19 pandemic.

While UP distributed about 34.98 lakh metric tonnes (MT) of food-grains among over 150 million from April 1 to September 7, Bihar gave 17.28 lakh MT to over 80 million, according to data compiled by the Union finance ministry.

Maharashtra is the third on the list in terms of offering free food-grains to the poor during the pandemic followed by West Bengal and Madhya Pradesh (MP).

The relief package announced on March 26 aimed to ease the economic distress of the poor by providing them free food and cash security. Among other things, the government promised free distribution of 5 kg wheat or rice to about 800 million individuals every month and 1 kg of pulses per month to every family till June this year. Later, the scheme was extended till November.

Also Read: Vigilance panel formed to ensure fair distribution of subsidised food grains in Chandigarh

Under the scheme, Maharashtra has distributed 15.35 lakh MT of grains among 70 million as of September 7, West Bengal over 12.19 lakh MT of grains among over 60 million poor, and MP 10.62 lakh MT grains among over 50 million people.

When it comes to the number of people getting pulses for free, UP tops the list with over 30 million beneficiaries availing 1.39 lakh MT pulses, followed by Bihar over 10 million people getting 54.23 thousand MT pulses.

So far 178.85 lakh MT of foodgrains and 6.82 lakh MT of pulses have been distributed free of cost to approx 75 crores [750 million] beneficiaries under NFSA [National Food Security Act] and this scheme will continue till November 2020, minister of state for finance Anurag Singh Thakur told the Lok Sabha last week.

Besides distributing foodgrains for free, the Union government has so far provided cash assistance of 68,820 crore to 420 million poor under PMGKP till September 7, he said. The package is a part of 20.97 lakh crore comprehensive stimuli the government had announced between March and May this year.

UP and Bihar have been given the maximum advantage in this distribution. Perhaps it is because of how larger groups of beneficiaries were identified in these states, said Vasundhara Sirnate Drennan, co-founder and director of research at The Polis Project Inc, a New York City headquartered non-profit think-tank.

However, it could also point to the distribution of patronage to states for political reasons which are something we should always keep in mind. India has long been identified as a patronage democracy where public goods are seen as tradable commodities for political gain.

Many state and national governments have practised this in India over time, she said. So, this isnt new. However, as always distributional biases of this nature are to be viewed as a part of emergent populist politics.
Members of the Proud Boys and Chairman Enrique Tarrio, holding a megaphone, along with other right-wing demonstrators, march across the Hawthorne Bridge during a rally in Portland, Ore., on Aug. 17, 2019. (Noah Berger/AP Photo)

Oregon Governor Declares Emergency Ahead of Proud Boys Demonstration

Oregon Gov. Kate Brown declared an emergency on Friday as state and local law enforcement prepare to try to prevent a planned demonstration and counter-demonstration in Portland from turning violent.

The Proud Boys, an all-male fraternity, is set to hold a rally in the states largest city on Saturday afternoon. Counter-demonstrators, including members of the anarcho-communist Antifa network, plan on holding a counter-demonstration.

The Proud Boys and Antifa have clashed in the past, including a street brawl in Portland last month. A self-described Antifa member fatally shot a supporter of another group, Patriot Prayer, in Portland on Aug. 29.

Brown, a Democrat, said in her emergency order that she believes theres an imminent risk of civil disturbance this weekend that threatens injury or possible loss of life.

The emergency is in place from 12:01 a.m. on Saturday to 12:01 a.m. Monday, unless it is extended.

The Proud Boys and Patriot Prayer groups have come to Portland time and time again from out of town looking for a fight, and the results are always tragic, Brown said at a press conference.

Let me be perfectly clear, we will not tolerate any kind of violence this weekend. Left, right, or center, violence is never a path toward meaningful change. Peaceful protest is the only path toward change. Those stoking the flames of violence, those coming to Portland looking for a fight will be held accountable.

Oregon Gov. Kate Brown speaks in Salem, Ore., on Feb. 24, 2020. (Andrew Selsky/AP Photo)

Portland police officers evade a Molotov cocktail amid rioting in Portland, Ore., Sept. 23, 2020. (Mathieu Lewis-Rolland/Reuters)

The order gave Portland police officers the ability to use tear gas to control crowds, about two weeks after Portland Mayor and Police Commissioner Ted Wheeler banned them from doing so.

It also gave Brown control of local law enforcement, including the Portland Police Bureau, as needed. Brown placed Oregon State Police Superintendent Travis Hampton and Michael Reese, the Multnomah County sheriff, in charge of coordinating the law enforcement response to the planned gatherings.

Hampton promised a massive influx of state troopers, who he said would be saturating parts of North Portland.

We will not talk specifics of our tactical plan tomorrow. Much of it, quite frankly, is still in the planning phase. But I just want to let Portland residents know that your state troopers, your Portland Police officers and Multnomah County deputy sheriffs will be out in force to keep you safe, he said.

And we also want to send a message that, well before the event: if your intent is to come to Oregon to bring incendiary devices, to bring narcotics, to bring firearms, unlawfully, we will do our best to take those off the streets. So if that is your intent, please dont come.

Hampton said in an emailed statement to The Epoch Times that Portland police officers were being deputized as part of the preparation to deal with the demonstrations.

Portland Officers have been serving on the front lines of nightly protests for months, sustaining injuries and encountering unspeakable violence. If I am to send them into harms way this weekend on my authority, Im going to ensure they have all the protections and authority of OSP Troopers. I want violent individuals thinking about about the enhanced penalties they may face if they harm a PPB Officer, he said.

A flag used by Proud Boys and Patriot Prayer is seen on the sidewalk following clashes with counter-demonstrators, including members of Antifa, in Portland, Ore., Aug. 22, 2020. (Maranie Staab/Reuters)

Pro-police demonstrators and others (L) and counter-protesters clash in front of the Multnomah County Justice Center in Portland, Ore., on Aug. 22, 2020. (Nathan Howard/Getty Images)

Proud Boys Chairman Enrique Tarrio told reporters in a separate press conference on Friday that his groups priority was to have a safe event.

And how do we do that? We communicate that with local law enforcement, he said.

Another member said one of the goals was to get state officials to declare an emergency, deploy National Guard members to Portland, and restore law and order in the city.

U.S. Attorney Billy Williams said in a statement that violent agitators have on many nights since May attacked police officers and firefighters, damaged buildings, and repeatedly attempted to set public buildings on fire.

Williams said the gatherings on Sept. 26 would include numerous groups with opposing ideologies  at time when our community and state continue to grapple with the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, a major uptick in gun violence, and, now, massive wildfires burning across the state.

The attorney warned that people who commit crimes would be prosecuted, noting that more than 80 people face federal charges for violence committed during unrest over the summer.

Portland Police Chief Chuck Lovell told reporters the goal is to keep the groups separate, something the additional law enforcement officers will help with.

Because police officers have been required to respond to near-nightly protests and riots since May, the beleaguered force was unable to intervene on Aug. 22, officials said previously.

Everything we do is in response to the actions or someone in the crowd or someone engaging in criminal activity, the police chief said. So if that activity doesnt take place, well be well resourced for a safe event.
A federal judge on Thursday ruled that counting for the 2020 census would continue extending the deadline until Oct. 31.

The Census Bureau will comply with the Courts order and continue our Nonresponse Followup Operation (NRFU), read an online statement by the Bureau.

Q&A with Mayor Andrew Mitcham: Jersey Village continues forward trajectory during pandemic

Our office of general counsel is evaluating the ultimate impact of the order on the 2020 Census. Field staff have been instructed to continue with current operations until updates can be provided, it said.

Its a date that census officials had anticipated back in June.

The deadline was originally July 31, but theyve extended the self-respond deadline to Oct. 31, said Terry Bennett with the U. S. Census Bureau back in June.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Trump administration must honor its own pandemic-era census deadline, federal judge rules

The decennial quest for counting and obtaining information from residents in the United States slowed significantly in April and officials point to the coronavirus pandemic as the major distraction.

More Information AREA RESPONSE RATES CITY S-R RATE INTERNET 2010 RATE Fulshear 81.2% 78.3% 61.0% Houston 58.0% 48.6% 63.5% Jersey Village 76.5% 70.6% 74.6% Katy 73.5% 67.2% 71.9% Missouri City 79.3% 72.7% 75.4% Rosenberg 64.6% 51.5% 66.3% Spring Branch 52.4% 42.7% 58.2% Stafford 62.1% 56.7% 69.4% Sugar Land 80.9% 76.0% 79.1% Tomball 65.4% 55.7% 65.1% West University Place 82.4% 77.8% 81.7% WANT TO FOLLOW THE NUMBERS? If you have an interest in how your community is participating in the 2020 Census, here's how: 1. Go to 2020Census.gov 2. Hover over the first tab, Get The Facts and go to the bottom of the list and click on Response Rates. 3. That takes you to the interactive map. You now have access to every state, city, county and tribal nation throughout the U.S. 4. Interested in your community numbers? Click on state and enter Texas. Then go to city and click on the city you're interested in the drop-down menu. There are two lines at the bottom: the response rate and the rate of participants using the internet to submit their information. REGISTER HERE: Toll-free numbers to complete the census: ENGLISH 844-330-2020 SPANISH 844-468-2020 Or go to 2020census.gov See More Collapse

Bennett was emphatic on the postponement being derived from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Back in June, field representatives began their door to door quest throughout the northwest Harris County area including Cypress, Jersey Village and Tomball.

They were required to wear protective masks and only knocked on doors and left packets for homeowners who hadnt filled out the questionnaire.

All eight regional census offices were opened slowly through the summer after being closed due to the coronavirus pandemic.

We are being cautious, and safety is a priority, she said.

The response rate across the country is 66.3 percent, but Texas falls behind the national average with 62.0 percent, ranking them 38th in the nation for total self-responded.

The Census Bureau continues to progress with an estimated 97 percent of all households enumerated.

In Jersey Village, City Manager Austin Bleess is encouraged by the citys response rate thus far. The city has a 76.5 percent self-response rate with 70.6 percent of that coming from online users on computers, tablets, or their cell phones.

It exceeds the citys 2010 self-response numbers of 74.6 percent by nearly two percent as of Friday.

Weve used a number of ways to reach our residents, Bleess said. Those included information in the monthly newsletter the Jersey Village Star, email updates, website, and social media presence.

Weve also created a quick link on our mobile app for people to complete the census questionnaire from there, he said.

The city manager also said it has been discussed during the regular meetings of the city council.

Despite the challenges presented by the coronavirus, citizens continued to respond.

Weve had a great response rate so far. We feel that early on the pandemic made it a bit easier to complete the survey online, since many people are working remotely, he said.

Entering the final month of census counting the city is prepared to launch a campaign to get to the finish line.

We are planning a social media push and will use other events coming up to remind people about the census, Bleess said.

The home-rule charter community is just over 3.43 square miles and in 2010 had an Anglo population of 86.6 percent, with 7.3 percent Hispanic or Latino, 5.09 percent Asian, 4.1 percent African American, 0.1 percent Native American, and 0.06 percent Pacific Islander. The median income per household in 2010 was $68,431.

The census helps guide us in our future planning for the city, the city manager said.

As part of our current process in updating our comprehensive plan, we are looking at demographic data that is available. When the census numbers come out, that will help us to better understand where our residents are at in their life stages, along with all the other great information the census collects, he said.

Some $1.5 trillion is divvyed out amongst the 50 states, Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia and for each community throughout the nation to receive their fair share, an accurate accounting is necessary.

It really helps us drive towards the future ensuring that we are meeting the needs of our residents, he said.

Bleess said they werent satisfied with the numbers and will continue to push the questionnaire.

We would love to get our participation rates over the 90 percent threshold for self-response. It will take more communication efforts to get there, he said.

He said over the next four weeks they will push information out through all of their available platforms including their regular events like the farmers market.

We wont do anything too special or crazy, he said.

dtaylor@hcnonline.com
Chandigarh, Sep 26 : Taking a jibe at the SAD and the BJP for what he called a "public spectacle" of the blame game between the two long-time allies over the controversial Farm Bills, Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on Saturday said the continued refusal of the Akalis to quit the NDA showed the "extent of their greed to cling to power".

"The fact that the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) is holding on to vestiges of power it continues to enjoy at the cost of Punjab and its farmers, despite being publicly humiliated by the alliance partner, the BJP, had exposed the Akalis' dual standards and total lack of concern for the farming community," Amarinder Singh said in a statement.

He was referring to the BJP's statement that it had left the task of convincing the farmers about the agricultural Bills to the Akalis.

"Why else are the Akalis still a part of the anti-farmer and anti-people BJP-led government at the Centre, which conspired with large corporate houses to deprive the farmers of their livelihood and, in the process, ruin Punjab?" the Chief Minister asked, adding that the SAD was still trying hard to stay politically afloat by hook or crook.

Taking a dig at SAD chief Sukhbir Badal's remark that Harsimrat Kaur's resignation from the Union Cabinet was like an "atom bomb that had shaken the Prime Minister", Amarinder Singh said it was not even a damp squib.

After the "politically motivated drama" of her resignation, which she had clearly done only to save face amid the farmer protests across Punjab, SAD President Sukhbir Badal was widely expected to pull his party out of the NDA, but that did not happen, Amarinder Singh said.

Lambasting the Akalis for actively supporting the Union government in what he dubbed as "selling off the farmers' rights to the monopolistic corporate houses" through the "unconstitutional and undemocratic" Farm Bills, the Chief Minister said that the SAD had completely lost all political credibility or standing after their ""antics on the new laws.

"The Badals will go down in Akali history as the leaders responsible for the party's destruction," he said.

From the farmers' resentment against them, to their fallout with the BJP, the Akalis seem to be heading towards elimination from Punjab's political arena, said Amarinder Singh, adding that the state's people, especially the farmers, would never forgive the Badals for their deception and dishonesty.

The Prime Minister, and his BJP, did not care for the Akalis as was evident from the former's criticism of their alliance partner, and also the promptness with which Harsimrat's resignation was accepted, said the Chief Minister.

It seemed that the BJP wanted to go it alone in the Punjab Assembly polls, he said, adding that the stage seemed set for the NDA to throw out the SAD if the latter did not quit the coalition ruling at the Centre on its own.
<! Governor Aminu Tambuwal: stampede over his cash led to tragedy >

By Abankula with Habibu Harisu

A stampede for the monetary gift doled out by Governor Aminu Tambuwal in Sokoto on Friday has led to tragedy after a policeman shot dead one person.

The policeman also injured three others.

The shooter, a police sergeant, identified as Bello Garba, was promptly arrested by the Sokoto Police Command.

His victims have also been identified.

Bello killed 25-year-old Aminu Abdulrahman and injured Junaidu Abba, Babangida Muhammad and Awaisu Alti, during the incident at Sultan Bello Jumuat mosque, in Sokoto..

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The Commands Public Relations Officer, ASP Muhammad Sadiq, said all the victims were evacuated to Specialist Hospital Sokoto.

The injured will be treated, while an autopsy will be carried out on the dead.

Sadiq said victims were said to be sharing money doled out by Gov. Aminu Tambuwal after the Jumaat prayers to mark Nigerias 60th Independence anniversary.

Sadiq said that the Sergeant, of Counter Terrorism Unit Base 18 Gusau, was attached to Government House Sokoto.

He said that the policeman unprofessionally fired without reasonable justification at that material time.

The Sokoto State Police Command condemns in its entirety the unwarranted, uncivil and unprofessional conduct of a Police Sergeant on special duty in the state.

Commissioner of Police. Mr Sani Kaoje had ordered the detention and trial of the erring officer and charged the state Criminal Investigation Department to speed up investigation and come up with objective findings, Sadiq said.

He added that the commissioner also charged all officers and men of the Command to deploy professional acumen, including psychological capacity to enhance the safety of the people, and not to resort to using arms against the populace.

The incident occurred at about 2:30pm, shortly after the special Jumaat prayers offered in commemoration of Nigerias forthcoming 60th independence anniversary at Sultan Bello Jumaat Mosque.

The Governor of Sokoto State, Aminu Tambuwal while magnanimously giving out gifts to the needy, a brief distribution which gave birth to an upsurge in would-be beneficiaries.

However, in an unconventional effort to control the crowd after the departure of the governor the policeman fired the shot, Sadiq added.

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Plane with fake plates, flight plan abandoned in Chetumal

Chetumal, Q.R.  A plane was left abandoned at the Chetumal Airport during an inspection of its paperwork with the pilot and copilot fleeing. The unusual incident happened Thursday after the pilot requested permission to land the Hawker 800 aircraft.

Chetumal International Airport authorities granted permission to the pilot who was arriving from the Toluca Airport.

According to their flight plan, the plane had left Toluca and made a stopover in Ciudad del Carmen, Campeche before landing in Chetumal. Once on the ground, both the pilot A.H.V. and copilot, A.M.R., both of Mexican nationality, got off the plane to eat at a restaurant while authorities reviewed their paperwork, however, neither men returned.

While officials found the aircraft empty, they did learn that both the license plate and the flight plan were altered and that the data was false. For the time being, the plane remains under the protection of the delegation of the Attorney Generals Office (FGR).

Earlier in the week, the same type of plane was found landed in Belize. Both the cargo, which were believed to be drugs, and pilots had vanished before authorities arrived.
Thiruvananthapuram, Sep 26 : The CPI-M state leadership on Saturday claimed that the Centre had violated basic guidelines while ordering a CBI probe a day earlier into Life Mission project, calling it a "political move".

"There is a way a CBI probe is announced -- either the state should ask for it, or the High Court. Moreover, the state should not have been kept in the dark," Communist Party of India-Marxist State Secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan told the media soon after chairing state committee meetings.

"What happened is that a Congress legislator wrote a letter and soon the CBI probe was announced. It is nothing but a political move, but we will not be cowed down by these BJP tactics." Balakrishnan claimed that a CBI probe sought by the state government in a case involving top Congress leaders had not been taken up by the Centre even after a year.

The Life Mission project includes a complex of flats and a hospital for the weaker sections of society at Wadakkancherry in Thrissur district. It ran into trouble after funds for this project came from a UAE-based charity organisation -- Red Crescent -- and was routed through the UAE Consulate here.

Congress legislator from Wadakkancherry, Anil Akkara, was the first to red-flag it as a project in violation of all rules and regulations .

It became a hot political issue after it was revealed that Kerala gold smuggling case prime accused Swapna Suresh was behind this project, who allegedly got commission in the allotment of construction to a company. Two state Minister and a media adviser of Vijayan claimed that the total commission given was Rs 4.50 crore.

Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan had maintained that his government had no role to play in the matter.

"The CPI-M is not a party that can be threatened by misusing the CBI. We will go to the people and explain what's happening here. Of late, the state is seeing numerous protests and this is a joint initiative of the Congress and the BJP, which are now hand in glove. All these protests are funded by the corporates, as the Left government is totally against them and not allowing them to spread their roots in our state. We will fight this attack with the people's help," said Balakrishnan.

As for his son Bineesh Kodiyeri who was questioned by the ED for 11 hours and on Saturday served with a notice to list his immovable assets, he said he had already made his position clear. "Let any probe take place. If any wrong is found on his part, let them take action also," he added.
The Morrison government and key Senate crossbencher Jacqui Lambie have been warned a bill to "ban" mobile phones in immigration detention will make it more difficult for refugees to pursue resettlement in Canada and other countries.

In a last-ditch appeal before the Senate votes next month, the Ads-Up Refugee Network wrote to ministers and Senator Lambie on Friday advising of the "significant, unidentified risk", arguing it could cost taxpayers millions in extra detention time.

Senator Jacqui Lambie will likely cast the deciding vote on the controversial phone ban bill. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

Canada has emerged as a potential destination for hundreds of asylum seekers who cannot settle here or in the United States. Ads-Up is currently assisting 28 people lodge applications in Canada and expects to lodge many more in coming months.

The group told the government the Canadian process requires "a significant amount of detailed paperwork and identification documents", for which mobile phones are vital.
Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-26 07:51:34|Editor: huaxia

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UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic on Friday told the ongoing general debate of the 75th session of the UN General Assembly that response to the COVID-19 pandemic must not result in increased mistrust and isolationism as overcoming the crisis requires close cooperation and pooling of resources.

"Response to this crisis should not lead to increased mistrust and isolationism in the international community. On the contrary, it should forge our readiness to work together, in true spirit of solidarity and mutual support," said the prime minister of Croatia, a country at the crossroads of Central and Southeast Europe.

"To win the battle against the pandemic requires responsible and inclusive governance, close cooperation and pooling of our resources in order to strengthen our stressed health systems, save lives, jobs and livelihoods," he said.

"Synergies at regional, international, and global levels are essential to cope with the medical and socio-economic effects of the crisis," Plenkovic said.

"This is an important lesson and we need to raise our awareness and preparedness in the coming months until a successful, effective vaccine is developed," he said.

Speaking about the much needed COVID-19 vaccine, Plenkovic said that it "must be available to as many as possible and we should spare no effort to make it so."

The prime minister voiced his country's support for UN General Assembly's resolution on a "comprehensive and coordinated response to the COVID-19 pandemic," adopted not long ago with an overwhelming support.

"This resolution clearly demonstrates the need for a global joint approach in addressing the impacts and consequences of the pandemic," he said. "Mobilizing the political will and financial resources is the most effective response against the pandemic."

"The European Union demonstrated this in the best way in July, through its European Council conclusions. Croatia recognizes the pivotal role of the World Health Organization," he added.

"We emphasize in particular the importance to elevate the vaccine against COVID-19 pandemic to the status of a global public good," Plenkovic said. Enditem
Technavio has been monitoring the single-use bioprocessing system market and it is poised to grow by USD 2.91 bn during 2020-2024, progressing at a CAGR of over 11% during the forecast period. The report offers an up-to-date analysis regarding the current market scenario, latest trends and drivers, and the overall market environment.

This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200925005303/en/

Technavio has announced its latest market research report titled Global Single-use Bioprocessing System Market 2020-2024 (Graphic: Business Wire)

Although the COVID-19 pandemic continues to transform the growth of various industries, the immediate impact of the outbreak is varied. While a few industries will register a drop in demand, numerous others will continue to remain unscathed and show promising growth opportunities. Technavio's in-depth research has all your needs covered as our research reports include all foreseeable market scenarios, including pre- post-COVID-19 analysis. Download a Free Sample Report on COVID-19 Impacts

Frequently Asked Questions:

What are the major trends in the market?

Substantial use of single-use technology to achieve lower costs and higher productivity is a major trend driving the growth of the market

Substantial use of single-use technology to achieve lower costs and higher productivity is a major trend driving the growth of the market At what rate is the market projected to grow?

The year-over-year growth for 2020 is estimated at 10.85% and the incremental growth of the market is anticipated to be 2.91 bn.

The year-over-year growth for 2020 is estimated at 10.85% and the incremental growth of the market is anticipated to be 2.91 bn. Who are the top players in the market?

C3M Co., Avantor Inc., Compagnie de Saint-Gobain SA, Danaher Corp., Eppendorf AG, General Electric Co., Merck KGaA, Sartorius AG, Solaris Biotechnology Srl., and Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc., are some of the major market participants.

C3M Co., Avantor Inc., Compagnie de Saint-Gobain SA, Danaher Corp., Eppendorf AG, General Electric Co., Merck KGaA, Sartorius AG, Solaris Biotechnology Srl., and Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc., are some of the major market participants. What is the key market driver?

The growing product advancements and automation is one of the major factors driving the market.

The growing product advancements and automation is one of the major factors driving the market. How big is the North America market?

The North America region will contribute 37% of the market share.

The market is fragmented, and the degree of fragmentation will accelerate during the forecast period. C3M Co., Avantor Inc., Compagnie de Saint-Gobain SA, Danaher Corp., Eppendorf AG, General Electric Co., Merck KGaA, Sartorius AG, Solaris Biotechnology Srl., and Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. are some of the major market participants. The growing product advancements and automation will offer immense growth opportunities. To make most of the opportunities, market vendors should focus more on the growth prospects in the fast-growing segments, while maintaining their positions in the slow-growing segments.

Buy 1 Technavio report and get the second for 50% off. Buy 2 Technavio reports and get the third for free.

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Technavio's custom research reports offer detailed insights on the impact of COVID-19 at an industry level, a regional level, and subsequent supply chain operations. This customized report will also help clients keep up with new product launches in direct indirect COVID-19 related markets, upcoming vaccines and pipeline analysis, and significant developments in vendor operations and government regulations.

Single-use Bioprocessing System Market 2020-2024: Segmentation

Single-use Bioprocessing System Market is segmented as below:

Product Bags And Mixers Bioreactors And Fermenters Filtration Devices And Sampling Systems Bioprocess Containers Other Products

Application MAb Production Vaccine Production Plant Cell Cultivation PSCTs Other Applications

End-user Pharmaceutical Companies CROs And CMOs Biotechnology Companies Academic And Research Institutions

Geographic Landscape Asia Europe North America ROW



To learn more about the global trends impacting the future of market research, download a free sample: https://www.technavio.com/talk-to-us?report=IRTNTR40062

Single-use Bioprocessing System Market 2020-2024: Scope

Technavio presents a detailed picture of the market by the way of study, synthesis, and summation of data from multiple sources. The single-use bioprocessing system market report covers the following areas:

Single-use Bioprocessing System Market Size

Single-use Bioprocessing System Market Trends

Single-use Bioprocessing System Market Industry Analysis

This study identifies the substantial use of single-use technology to achieve lower costs and higher productivity as one of the prime reasons driving the single-use bioprocessing system market growth during the next few years.

Technavio suggests three forecast scenarios (optimistic, probable, and pessimistic) considering the impact of COVID-19. Technavio's in-depth research has direct and indirect COVID-19 impacted market research reports.

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Single-use Bioprocessing System Market 2020-2024: Key Highlights

CAGR of the market during the forecast period 2020-2024

Detailed information on factors that will assist single-use bioprocessing system market growth during the next five years

Estimation of the single-use bioprocessing system market size and its contribution to the parent market

Predictions on upcoming trends and changes in consumer behavior

The growth of the single-use bioprocessing system market

Analysis of the market's competitive landscape and detailed information on vendors

Comprehensive details of factors that will challenge the growth of single-use bioprocessing system market vendors

Table of Contents:

PART 01: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

PART 02: SCOPE OF THE REPORT

Preface

Currency conversion rates for US$

PART 03: MARKET LANDSCAPE

Market ecosystem

Market characteristics

Market segmentation analysis

Value Chain Analysis

PART 04: MARKET SIZING

Market definition

Market sizing 2019

Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Market Outlook

PART 05: FIVE FORCES ANALYSIS

Bargaining power of buyers

Bargaining power of suppliers

Threat of new entrants

Threat of substitutes

Threat of rivalry

Market condition

PART 06: MARKET SEGMENTATION BY PRODUCT

Market segmentation by product

Comparison by product

Bags and mixers Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Bioreactors and fermenters Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Filtration devices and sampling systems Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Bioprocess containers Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Other products Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Market opportunity by product

PART 07: MARKET SEGMENTATION BY APPLICATION

Market segmentation by application

Comparison by application

mAb production Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Vaccine production Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Plant cell cultivation Market size and forecast 2019-2024

PSCTs Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Other applications Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Market opportunity by application

PART 08: CUSTOMER LANDSCAPE

PART 09: MARKET SEGMENTATION BY END-USER

Market segmentation by end-user

Comparison by end-user

Pharmaceutical companies Market size and forecast 2019-2024

CROs and CMOs Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Biotechnology companies Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Academic and research institutions Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Market opportunity by end-user

PART 10: GEOGRAPHIC LANDSCAPE

Geographic segmentation

Geographic comparison

North America Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Europe Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Asia Market size and forecast 2019-2024

ROW Market size and forecast 2019-2024

Key leading countries

Market opportunity

PART 11: DECISION FRAMEWORK

PART 12: DRIVERS AND CHALLENGES

Market drivers

Market challenges

PART 13: MARKET TRENDS

Rising focus of market vendors on strategic partnerships

Growing product advancements and automation

Increasing adoption of modular facilities among biomanufacturers

PART 14: VENDOR LANDSCAPE

Overview

Landscape disruption

Competitive scenario

PART 15: VENDOR ANALYSIS

Vendors covered

Vendor classification

Market positioning of vendors

3M Co.

Avantor Inc.

Compagnie de Saint-Gobain SA

Danaher Corp.

Eppendorf AG

General Electric Co.

Merck KGaA

Sartorius AG

Solaris Biotechnology Srl

Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc.

PART 16: APPENDIX

Research methodology

List of abbreviations

Definition of market positioning of vendors

PART 17: EXPLORE TECHNAVIO

About Us

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View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200925005303/en/

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Hong Kong, Sep 26 : Due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, house rents in Hong Kong, deemed the worlds most expensive location for expatriate accommodation, is expected to decline between 10 and 15 per cent this year, a media report said on Saturday.

According to commercial real estate service provider JLL, rents of luxury housing fell to 9.9 per cent in the first nine months of this year, compared to the same period in 2019, the South China Morning Post (SCMP) newspaper reported.

"Demand is weak, as expatriate arrivals have dropped significantly, and there have been high vacancy levels in the high-end segment," the newspaper quoted Nelson Wong, head of research at JLL, as saying.

Wong added that rents of high-end accommodation in the New Territories dropped most sharply, with declines of 4.6 per cent during the July to September quarter from the previous three months.

Rents declined 3.9 per cent in Kowloon and 3.3 per cent on Hong Kong Island.

For three years in a row, Hong Kong has topped the list as the world's costliest city for foreigners to live, according to a survey released in April by ECA International, which provides research on expat management.

It found that an unfurnished, mid-market, three-bedroom apartment in areas popular with international executives cost US$11,318 a month on an average.

ECA regional director Lee Quane told the SCMP it had predicted in April that rents would come down, given the declining number of overseas workers arriving in Hong Kong because of the pandemic.
California firefighters are getting ready for hot, dry, and windy weather in the state's northern and central areas this weekend that may fan the blazes of some major wildfires or ignite new ones.

Officials of the state's largest utility company are also preparing for the said weather conditions.

Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) is monitoring the weather to determine if it would be necessary to shut off power to areas where gusts could damage the firm's equipment or hurl debris into lines that can ignite flammable vegetation.

PG&E warned Friday that it might cut power from Sunday morning to Monday. The power shutoffs may affect 97,000 consumers in 16 counties.

Forecasters expect a ridge of high pressure will raise temperatures and generate gusts flowing from the interior to the coast on the weekend.

PG&E initially warned that approximately 21,000 customers in three counties would lose power starting Saturday evening. But the areas that may experience power shutoffs may still expand when the forecast changes, as per AJC.

PG&E cut power to about 167,000 businesses and homes in central and Northern California in a more targeted approach when heavy winds were predicted earlier this month.

Last year, the company was criticized for acting too broadly when it blacked out two million customers to prevent fires.

PG&E equipment has sparked massive wildfires in the past, including the fire that destroyed much of the Sierra foothills town of Paradise and killed 85 people in 2018.

On Friday, firefighters battling California's largest wildfire braced for the change in weather by building fuel breaks to keep flames from reaching the marijuana-growing enclave.

Authorities said many of the locals here have refused to evacuate and abandon their maturing crops.

According to the Los Angeles Times, the wildfire called the August Complex is getting closer to the small communities of Trinity Pines and Post Mountain.

Law enforcement officers conducted door-to-door to warn residents of the encroaching fire danger. However, they could not force the residents to leave the place.

"It's mainly growers. And a lot of them, they don't want to leave because that is their livelihood," said Nate Trujillo, Trinity County Sheriff's Department Deputy.

Almost 1,000 people remained in Trinity Pines and Post Mountain, based on residents and authorities' estimates on Thursday.

In recent years, several studies have linked widespread U.S wildfires to global warming from the burning of oil, coal, and gas, mainly because climate change has made California much drier. A drier state means there are more flammable plants.

The U.S. Forest Service's Pacific Southwest Region announced Friday that it is extending the closure of all nine national forests in California because of some concerns, including fire conditions and critical limitations on firefighting resources.

The threatened marijuana growing area is in the Emerald Triangle, a three-county corner of Northern California that by some estimate it to be the country's largest cannabis-producing region.

Those familiar with Trinity Pines said the community has almost 40 legal farms with more than 10 times that number in hidden, illegal growing areas.

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MKHONDVO  A man who innocently acquired a homestead at Mkhondvo in the Shiselweni Region has inherited an elderly woman who is at the centre of a land dispute.

The elderly woman is a mother to the previous owner of the homestead, Mphathi Mhlanga, who insists that he long surrendered the homestead, to the umphakatsi after he went through a gruelling divorce with his wife.

A divorce decree between Mhlanga and his former wife, Thabile Mkhaliphi, was issued by the Manzini Magistrates Court on June 20, 2011, while they were both staying in the now controversial Mkhondvo homestead which is on Swazi Nation Land (SNL). Before ending their marriage, they had two children aged between 29 and 30.

Mhlangas mother, Khumbuzile Zulu, who has now been rendered homeless, had also stayed at the homestead for a few years until she was taken away by her younger son, Inspector Musa Mango, who is a police officer based at the Hhohho Regional Headquarters in Mbabane. Mhlanga who shares the same mother but different fathers with Mango said, at the time, he was faced with a double dilemma. My wife and I were divorcing and my mother went to stay with my brother, which resulted in my home being deserted as I was also staying far from it to be closer to work. I started getting complaints that the homestead had turned into a den of thieves, something that did not sit well with the community, he said.

Mhlanga said the only option for him was to surrender the home back to the umphakatsi. It was a result of these developments that the home ended up in the ownership of Mhlanga, who came in through the normal kukhonta process. Kukhonta is a traditional process by which a person is given a piece of land on SNL after paying customary duties to the royal kraal.

Reasons

Things came to a head when Mhlangas half brother, Mango, decided to part ways with their mother for personal reasons. Given that their mother (Zulu) did not have a home of her own, the only plausible option was to take her to Mkhondvo at the disputed homestead.

It was on a Saturday afternoon, two weeks ago, when Inspector Mango arrived at the homestead in a bakkie in which there was his mother and her belongings. Tsela, the new owner, was away, but had left a relative who did not want his name mentioned, to look after the premises.

Mango immediately first checked all the other houses in the compound until he decided to keep the goods in a rondavel to the far eastern side of the compound. He then offloaded the household goods into the rondavel, said the man found at the compound. Mhlanga said Tsela had then reported the incident at the Kholwane Royal Kraal, which later summoned him (Tsela) to the umphakatsi.

He told Eswatini News that he was taken aback by his brothers actions because the homestead had long ceased to be his. He said prior to the incident, his mother had tried, with the help of his former wife, to reclaim the homestead from the new owner, even going as far as pleading with traditional structures. The first structure to adjudicate over the issue was the Kings Liaison Office, known as Ndabazabantu, of the Shiselweni Regional Administration.

Arguments

This structure heard arguments from all parties involved, including the two children of Mhlanga and Mkhaliphi, who said they wanted to return to their home at Mkhondvo.

We heard the argument of the children of Mphathi Mhlanga, who wanted to return to their home at Mkhondvo. Ndabazabantu committed itself to resolve the issue and in the process, found that Mphathi and Thabile Mkhaliphi had married through civil rights, then they divorced.

After some time, the children and their mother found that their father had sold the home to Tsela. Ndabazabantu said when Mhlanga was questioned about this allegation, he said the children had abandoned the home and they failed to listen to him when he ordered that one of the childrens dowry payment event should be held at the homestead. Instead, they held the event at the Malkerns farm, where his ex-wife and children now reside.

Mhlanga also told Ndabazabantu that when he applied for kukhonta in the area, he was still a bachelor and was not even accompanied by his mother, but by an emissary identified as Ngcamphalala and another man known as Khiza as well as his children.

Submissions

Ndabazabantu also listened to submissions made by one Robert Madvolo Mhlanga who said Mhlanga khontaed in the company of his mother. The Kings Liaison Office was also told that Mhlanga was in the company of his former wife when he acquired the piece of land.

However, the Kholwane Royal Kraal disputed all this and corroborated Mhlangas statement that he was neither with his mother nor wife when he khontaed. The royal kraal also said Mhlanga was a bachelor when he settled in the area.

Ndabazabantu ruled against the notion of taking the children out of their parental home. If the children still want their home back, they must go back to it.

Indlunkhulu must report to the chief of the area, Manana, that Tsela is supposed to vacate the homestead within three months, reads the judgment by Ndabazabantu.

Mhlanga filed an appeal with Ndabazabantu, pointing to many flaws in the judgment, and demonstrated how many salient points were disregarded in his argument. He said the issue was a family matter, which therefore meant his children brought it to Ndabazabantu prematurely. He said Ndabazabantu was wrong to hear the matter without referring it back to the family structures.He also said the judgment was overtaken by events because the homestead was no longer in his jurisdiction as he had long surrendered it back to the royal kraal.

I did this openly and according to the customs and traditions of the country. By so doing I have forfeited and denounced any right attached to and or accruing from that piece of land.

Letter

He also furnished a letter from the royal kraal which states that he no longer owned the land but had returned it to the royal kraal. He also alleged that his children had never stayed at Mkhondvo, but at his other home in Malkerns, so it was wrong for Ndabazabantu to say they must return to Mkhondvo.

When my mother left the homestead in 2015, no one stayed there. I could not move in with my second wife, hence I decided to return the land, including the homestead to the Kholwane Umphakatsi, he averred.

He also said Ndabazabantu was wrong to overrule the Kholwane Umphakatsi because it had a right to give land to whomsoever it pleased.

Mhlanga said the judgment of Ndabazabantu must be set aside and that the dispute must be referred back to family structures for adjudication.

Alternatively, if his children need another home apart from that in Malkerns, he said he must be given a chance to look for another piece of land on their behalf, even if its from the same area of Kholwane.
PASCAGOULA, Mississippi -- A Pascagoula man has been charged with capital murder in the death of a 29-year old Gautier man whose body was found floating in the Pascagoula River Tuesday.

Jackson County Sheriff Mike Ezell announced late Friday that 33-year-old Joseph Paul McLeod of Pascagoula had been arrested Thursday night on unrelated charges, but on Friday investigators charged McLeod with capital murder in the death of Dustin Lee Suttles.

Suttles' body was found Tuesday afternoon near the Roy Cumbest Bridge near Wade-Vancleave Road, according to Jackson County Sheriff Mike Ezell. The Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries & Parks recovered the body about 1 p.m.

The man had no identification on him, so investigators put out a photo of a distinctive tattoo on the mans arm in the hopes of determining his identity. By the next day, family members had seen the photo and notified the JCSO and identified Suttles as the victim.

At the time Suttles' body was recovered, an abandoned boat was also located about a quarter-mile from the body. The autopsy was performed Thursday.

McLeod is jailed in the Jackson County Adult Detention Center. As a capital murder suspect, he is not eligible for bond. Additionally, McLeod is a convicted felon who was still on probation at the time of his arrest.

In addition to the capital murder charge, McLeod is charged with probation violation, felony possession of marijuana, felony possession of methamphetamine, possession of a stolen firearm and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. He is expected to make his initial court appearance Monday.

McLeod is no stranger to jail cells, having previously been arrested on charges including possession of a controlled substance, disorderly conduct, malicious mischief, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon and providing false ID to law enforcement, among other charges.

Anyone with information relative to this case is asked to call the JCSO at 228-769-3063 or Mississippi Coast Crime Stoppers at 877-787-5898.
Costumes inspired by Netflix's Tiger King are okay. Sexy COVID? Not so much. Yandy

Controversial sexy costume maker Yandy is drawing the line at "sexy COVID," and will not be making a costume inspired by the virus.

"I don't think there's anything sexy about it," Pilar Quintana-Williams, Yandy's vice president of merchandising, told Business Insider.

Despite the pandemic, 85% of 18 to 24-year-olds plan to spend money shopping for costumes this year, according to the National Retail Federation.

Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

The coronavirus pandemic isn't dulling sexy costume maker Yandy's Halloween spirit.

But, even Yandy  which has sparked controversy in past years with racy costumes inspired by The Handmaid's Tale and Fake News  realizes some things are impossible to glamorize.

Pilar Quintana-Williams, Yandy's vice president of merchandising, told Business Insider that the company will not be selling "sexy COVID" costumes in 2020.

"I don't think there's anything sexy about it," Quintana-Williams said in a recent interview.

Still, Quintana-Williams said, Yandy would not be Yandy if it wasn't planning some topical costumes for 2020, emphasizing less depressing aspects of the news-cycle. The company has already debuted the sexy "Banned App" costume  a crop top that looks curiously like a TikTok logo  and racy costumes inspired by Netflix's Tiger King.

"I think that it has been a difficult year for everybody with quarantine, with all the changes," Quintana-Williams said. "So the stakes are high. But again, we want to bring humor and we want to bring light heartedness to the holiday."

Yandy says sales of sexy costumes have only grown in 2020

Yandy says the sexy Halloween costume is thriving in 2020. Yandy

Yandy's dedication to sexiness has not cooled during the pandemic. The company said its costume sales have only grown this year, despite the CDC advising against trick-or-treating and crowded Halloween parties. Yandy has launched more than 500 new costumes, as well as launching sexy men's costumes and masks for the first time.

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Only 22% of people said they planned to attend a Halloween party this year, down from 32% in 2019, according to a National Retail Federation survey of 7,644 people in early September. With Halloween on a Saturday, it would typically be a massive day for parties, especially for younger adults dressed in skimpy costumes.

Despite the pandemic, 85% of 18 to 24-year-olds plan to spend money shopping for costumes this year, according to Katherine Cullen, NRF's senior director of industry and consumer insights.

Yandy executives expect people to buy sexy costumes for virtual gatherings, smaller celebrations, and to show off on social media. The company started selling Halloween lounge rompers this year, for people aiming to combine comfort and sensuality. Bedroom costumes are also in high demand, with sales up 31% year over year, according to Yandy.

"We do have costumes that you can wear to parties, but we also have a very large collection of bedroom costumes, where you can kind of spice up your love life at night," Yandy co-CEO Aras Koktas told Business Insider.

"Even if they don't go out there during the day, I think they're going to buy some of those bedroom costumes and do a little bit of role role play in the bedroom at night," Koktas added.

Are you planning on buying a sexy Halloween costume this year? Email ktaylor@businessinsider.com to share your thoughts.

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This fall, there have been several internet memes claiming there have been much larger declines in the incidence of abortion during Democratic presidential administrations than during Republican presidential administrations. Their implied message is that pro-choice Democratic presidents have been far more effective at stopping abortion than pro-life Republican presidents. However, a close analysis of reliable abortion data shows that this claim does not withstand serious scrutiny.

The internet memes purportedly showing large abortion declines during Democratic presidencies are misleading for three reasons.

1. Nearly all of them neglect to mention that the U.S. abortion rate rose sharply during the presidential administration of Democrat Jimmy Carter.

2. Some of these memes use abortion data from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). The fact that California stopped reporting its abortion data to the CDC in 1997 explains why some memes report a very large decline in abortion numbers during the Clinton administration.

3. Some of the memes analyze total abortions instead of the abortion rate. This is misleading because during the 1980s, there was an increase in the population of women of childbearing age (15-44). As such, even though the abortion rate declined during the Reagan administration, the overall number of abortions increased.

An analysis of abortion rate data from the Guttmacher Institute tells a much different story. Unlike the CDC, the Guttmacher Institute consistently reports abortion rate data from all 50 states. Additionally, since Guttmacher conducts a survey of abortion facilities, their abortion data is considered more reliable than CDC data. As the table below indicates, Guttmacher Institute data demonstrates that there has been a durable, long-term decline in the U.S. abortion rate that has persisted through every presidential administration since 1980.

Abortion Rate Declines by Presidential Administration

Now it is true, there were larger abortion rate declines during the presidential administrations of Democrats Bill Clinton and Barack Obama than the administrations of Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and George W. Bush. However, these abortion rate declines had nothing to do with the actions of either President Clinton or President Obama.

Since the Supreme Courts 1992 Planned Parenthood v. Casey decision, states have played an increasingly larger role in abortion policy. During both the Clinton and Obama administrations, Republicans made large gains in many state legislatures. In fact, between 1992 and 2020, the number of states where Republicans controlled both chambers of the state legislature has increased from seven to 29. Furthermore, many states with Republican legislatures have been very active in passing a range of protective pro-life laws.

Furthermore, an analysis of the long-term decline in the U.S. abortion rate provides some very important context to this discussion. Since 1980, the U.S. abortion rate has dropped by more than 50 percent. While many are quick to credit contraception use, the unintended pregnancy rate has actually fluctuated since the early 1980s. A better explanation for the abortion rate decline is because a higher percentage of unintended pregnancies are being carried to term. Approximately 54 percent of unintended pregnancies were aborted in 1980. That number fell to 42 percent by 2011. This nicely shows that pro-life educational, service, and legislative efforts have all been effective. Furthermore, this data also shows that the long-term decline in the U.S. abortion rate has nothing to do with the election of Democratic presidents.

Overall, as the pro-life position has made gains in the court of public opinion, groups that support legal abortion are trying a new strategy. Instead of arguing that that pro-lifers are wrong, they try to argue that pro-lifers are ineffective. They are quick to circulate analyses which purportedly show that electing pro-life candidates or enacting pro-life laws are ineffective strategies for lowering abortion rates. Instead, they claim that increased spending on contraception, health care, and welfare is a better strategy for pro-lifers. However, there are no peer-reviewed studies which show that more funding for welfare, health care, or contraception programs will result in abortion rate reductions. Conversely, there is a significant body of academic research which shows that a range of pro-life laws reduce abortion rates.

In conclusion, pro-lifers should not be fooled by these internet memes. An important reason why the U.S. abortion rate has declined during both Republican and Democratic presidential administrations is because of the tireless work of pro-lifers. Our educational, service, and legislative efforts are paying dividends. A higher percentage of Americans identify as pro-life. According to Heartbeat International, the number of organizations devoted to assisting pregnant women has increased by 86 percent between 1988 and 2015. A significant body of research shows that the Hyde Amendment saves lives. My 2016 Lozier Institute study found that the Hyde Amendment saves over 60,000 lives every year. In addition, there has been a significant increase in the number of state level pro-life laws that have been enacted.

Pro-lifers would do well to stay the course.
Many South Africans may have an older TV set which still offers a great viewing experience but lacks smart integration.

Other might be stuck with a TV with an older smart operating system that has lost support for certain important applications.

One example of this was Samsung last year announcing that its smart TVs manufactured in 2010 and 2011 would lose access to Netflix.

Having to hook up a laptop or copy files to a USB to watch on your TV every time can be a tedious undertaking, but a smart TV box offers a hassle-free, plug-and-play solution to make a TV with an HDMI input smart.

These devices are effectively compact computers with an operating system (usually Googles Android TV) that allows for the playback of content via apps or through external media.

Features to consider

There is a wide range of options for cheap smart TV boxes with Android TV available in South Africa.

Aside from the required hardware for solid performance, there are several features to consider which could have a significant impact on your experience with a smart TV box or stick.

Firstly, Google-certified devices offer support for all official apps as well as official versions of the Android TV OS.

If a box is not Google-certified, then applications like DStv Now will not be available to download directly from the Google Play Store.

In certain instances, it may be possible to side-load the app, although this does not guarantee it will work as intended.

Another factor to weigh is what type of remote youll be getting with the device, as well as whether the box supports Bluetooth connectivity.

The addition of full-size keyboard may make it easier for you to search for and find your content, improving your overall experience.

Bluetooth support will also allow you to connect wireless peripherals like a mouse or keyboard to ease navigation and input.

Smart boxes under R1,000

Weve put together a list of 10 of the cheapest TV boxes and sticks available in South Africa for those looking to add smart features to their TV.

Most of these devices are not Google-certified, but still offer users access to a wide range of applications, including Netflix, YouTube, and Showmax.

Tech Geeks 4K Android TV Box  R675

Tech Geeks 4K Android TV Box Output [email protected] CPU Amlogic S905W GPU Mali 450 RAM 1GB Storage 8GB Operating System Android TV 7.1 Connectivity 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi, Ethernet Ports 2 x USB 2.0, 1 x HDMI, 1 x microSD Card reader, 1 x 3.5mm AV jack Google-certified No

MXQ Pro 4K Smart Box  R725

MXQ Pro 4K Smart Box Output [email protected] CPU Amlogic S905W GPU Mali 450 RAM 1GB Storage 8GB Operating System Android TV 7.1 Connectivity 4 x USB 2.0, 1 x HDMI 1.4b, 1 x SD card reader, 1 x SPDIF jack, 1 x 3.5mm AV jack Ports 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi, Ethernet Google-certified No X96 Mini Android TV Media Box  R797

X96 Mini Android TV Media Box Output [email protected], with HDR10 CPU Amlogic S905W GPU Mali 450 RAM 1GB Storage 16GB Operating System Android TV 7.1 Connectivity 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi, Ethernet Ports 2 x USB 2.0, 1 x HDMI 2.0, 1 x microSD card reader, 1 x 3.5mm AV jack, 1 x CVBS output Google-certified No

Blaupunkt Android Media Box  R699

Blaupunkt Android Media Box Output 1080p CPU Rockchip RK 3229 GPU Mali 400 RAM 2GB Storage 8GB Operating System Android TV 7.1 Connectivity 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0 Ports 4 x USB 2.0, 1 x HDMI 2.0, 1 x SD Card reader, 1 x SPDIF jack, 1 x 3.5mm AV jack Google-certified No

Ultra Link Android TV Box  R799

Ultra Link Android TV Box Output [email protected], with HDR CPU Amlogic GPU Mali 450 RAM 1GB Storage 8GB Operating System Android TV Connectivity 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi, Ethernet Ports 2 x USB 2.0, 1 x HDMI, 1 x microSD card reader Google-certified No

Xiaomi Mi TV Stick  R895

Output [email protected] CPU Quad-core Cortex A53 GPU Mali 450 RAM 2GB Storage 8GB Operating System Android TV 9.0 Connectivity 802.11ac Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.2 Ports 1 x HDMI 2.0 Google-certified Yes MyGica ATV495X  R892

Output [email protected] CPU Amlogic S905X GPU Mali 450 RAM 1GB Storage 8GB Operating System Android TV 6.0 Connectivity 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.1, Ethernet Ports 2 x USB 2.0, 1 x HDMI, 1 x CVBS, 1 microSD card reader Google-certified No MyGica ATV4595MAX  R889

MyGica ATV495MAX Output [email protected] CPU Amlogic S905X GPU Mali 450 RAM 2GB Storage 16GB Operating System Android TV 7.1 Connectivity 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.1, Ethernet Ports 2 x USB 2.0, 1 x HDMI 2.0, 1 x microSD card reader Google-certified Yes TX 6 Android TV Box  R898

TX 6 Android TV Box Output [email protected], [email protected] CPU AllWinner H6 GPU Mali T720 RAM 4GB Storage 32GB Operating System Android TV 9.0 Connectivity 802.11ac Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5.0, Ethernet Ports 1 x USB 3.0, 1 USB 2.0, 1 x HDMI 1.4, 1 x SPDIF Google-certified No

Sigmalink Amlogic  R909
New Delhi:

Trinamool Congress, which is angry over the arrest of its two MPs by CBI in connection with the chitfund scam, will not attend Parliament on February 1 when the Budget is presented, citing Saraswati Puja on that day as the reason.



Trinamool will also not attend the all-party meeting convened by Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan this evening ahead of the Budget session of Parliament beginning on Tuesday.



Trinamool will not attend Parliament on February 1 because of Saraswati Puja which is a big day in Bengal, party leader and MP Derek OBrien told PTI.



He said that on Saraswati Puja, day, there is a custom of keeping away from work and not even touching the tools.



Saraswati Puja is beyond a religious festival. It is a socio-cultural festival of Bengal, he added.







Budget will be presented by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Wednesday.



About not attending this eveningas all-party meeting, he said this was because Trinamool supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee RPT Banerjee had called a meeting of party MPs for today a10 days backa.



Asked whether the party was aboycottinga these proceedings or just skipping, he replied, aIt is open for your interpretationa.



Trinamool Congress has been angry over the arrest of its two MPs Sudip Bandyopadhyay and Tapas Pal by CBI in connection with the Rose Valley Group chit fund scam.

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